It is often said that Delhi is the Heart of the Nation. An essential body part. Frankly, I would also like to say here that the anal orifice is another essential body part too, but be that as it may, there is a lot of crap in and around Delhi too and truism is that the Nation which is India begins at its borders. And the borders are our land and sea borders, as well as our islands – on which an excellent book was written by Pradeep Damodaran, a review for which by me is provided here.
Every so often, the Borders of India are re-drawn, Delhi goes through a huge churn, and another influx of adventurers as well as refugees pour back into Delhi to fill in the void of repeated destruction. History is then re-written in Delhi by the newest winners, Mongol Mughals and Bust British are the present versions, but our Borders are where the Truths can be unearthed and understood. I have been lucky enough to be able to experience land, mountain and ocean borders as well as live in Delhi – where I keep returning to every now and then.
The disconnect between Delhi and the Borders of India, in my experience, is enormous and also something that seldom gets written about or discussed – and that is also because our elected and selected representatives, as well as our media and justice delivery system, all tend to be from the internal parts of India. Connecting borders of India to the hinterlands, by road, rail or air, was more about moving produce for import and export, whilst people living on our border areas were given short shrift in context with connectivity.
An example is our Delhi Centric Law Making and Justice Delivery System.
In my global travels, I have not seen this sort of a disdain and disregard for border connectivity to the heart or anus of a Nation elsewhere. Only recently has this trend been reversed in India with more broad gauge railway lines, better roads and airports to serve the border areas. Mountain, jungle, and coast.
One side effect of this is that anal trouble-makers, also known as Left-Lib un-de-colonised slaves, have started moving to the border areas. For one, Delhi, the air is terribly polluted. Which may have been OK if it was just the junkies moving, but they appear to be bringing their own pushers along too – in the search for clean air, the larger pollution this causes in the many pristine parts of where India begins is hugely visible.
Anecdotal – a few weeks ago, I happened to be present for an evening get-together at the pleasant home of friends who go back decades, but are decidedly feudal left liberals from the heartland. The location was a pleasant part of Coastal India, verdant, pastoral, low-cost, low-stress, laid back and with a seafaring origin society now globalised. The sort of part of India that finds it very impolite to discuss religion and/or politics after sunset.
The gathering was eclectic, our recently re-located feudal area friends were getting used to doing the dishes themselves as well as responding with shock and awe to the lip they were getting from their own teenage children who were now mixing with the almost classless contemporary lifestyle that going to good local school on bicycles brings.
Yes, some children have fancy geared bicycles costing more than cars, but very soon they learn that the local kids on gearless roadsters are going faster all over the lie of the land, putting their roadsters on top of buses or in the back of trucks to extend their range, and also having more fun. One big reason is because the simple gearless roadsters have mudguards, while the fancy geared bicycles don’t have mudguards. They were simply not meant for normal commuting. Or India.
So in the course of the evening, a fine middle-aged gent joined the festivities, and as is my wont, when we were introduced, I gave just my surname. Just something that goes back to when we were cadets under training. My new friend perked up and then lobbed a sort of melange’ of statement cum questions which I am kind of used to—
“I’m also from the same religion as you. My ancestors came from across the hills. Were you from Delhi? Are you new here and do you need any help? If you want any stuff, reach out, wink-wink.”
In one breathless introduction, our man also told me he had been a production assistant cum photo documentation person for a couple of random firang movie groups. (Which, for the uninitiated, true job-description is – “go get the dope, you dope.”)
Now I’ve been around too. So I responded with, hey wow, how did your ancestors come to India, over the passes on horses with swords to slash, traveling light carrying their one and only book? Then I threw in a few phrases in the language of his ancestors, of which he did not understand even a single word, his true origins being South Delhi baba-baby log patios, with random Waah-Waahs thrown in, simple polite greetings. By then I had also looked him up online, rapidly, and understood where he was coming from – so I said, yup, we are new here, and could really do with help.
(We have been “there” for over 40 years now.)
The man was a pusher, dealer and broker, all rolled into one, scouting for more customers in the gold-rush towards our borders.
Here is some simple truth about the junkie-pusher relationship – the pusher is the junkie’s best friend as long as the junkie has money, and keeps introducing new customers. Thus, the typical Liberandoo hep with-it party scene. The pusher’s role is to multiply the returns and be very aware of when the junkie runs out of money.
So then that brings me to the huge 3 tonnes of heroin seized at one of India’s borders, coastal in this case, the enormity of which does not appear to have sunk in with many of us as yet. From being a nett exporter of opiates for the past few centuries and more, the reality is that the borders of the country are now being subverted to convert us into nett importers, so that the already polluted heart is further strangulated and killed.
And that is what I see happening now on our borders, where India begins – the greed and consumption of narcotics in our hearts, the large cities, is reaching out to destroy our borders, where India begins. Land borders have a 50 kilometre buffer under the BSF, what do the sea and ocean borders have, in comparison?
Veeresh Malik was a seafarer. And a lot more besides. A decade in facial biometrics, which took him into the world of finance, gaming, preventive defence and money laundering before the subliminal mind management technology blew his brains out. His romance with the media endures since 1994, duly responded by Outlook, among others.
A survivor of two brain-strokes, triggered by a ship explosion in the 70s, Veeresh moved beyond fear decades ago.
