Mr Minister... Are we Indians cattles?

"Tell us Minister, next time you travel to Kerala, will it be cattle class?"

"absolutely, in cattle class out of solidarity with all our holy cows!"

Doesn't it sound like a conversation from the British Raj era?

Oh! How I prayed it would be. But no. It is from the present day. 11:27 AM Sep 14th, 2009 and 11:47 AM Sep 14th, 2009 , to be precise.

This is what happens when you reply within 20 mins (which can be compared to a split-second reply when we take into account the punctuality shown by most of the Indian Politicians). Mr. Shashi Tharoor let all his 53 years of conditioning and diplomacy go out of the window by this one crass statement.

And this is the exact reason why I don't tweet. Not that I will be asked such stupid questions but then why take a risk.

Sample these dangerous situations:

• Some cute, beautiful girl asks me, "@paritosh are you married?" and in the heat of the moment, I reply "@darling_mona No absolutely not. So, tonight my place or yours?". Duh! What a dreadful nightmare!!
• I tweet "Biwi not at home, mast daru party tonight. All my friend invited. Standard entry charges apply.". Biwi reads this and cancels her flight back home.
• Gabbar tweets, "Are o @kalia, Kitne aadmi the?". As I am following @gabbar, I get the message. Excited, as I know the next dialogue (as I have seen Sholey some 100 times), I prompt him "@gabbar, Suwar ke bacche". But then Gabbar takes offence and comes with his daku party at my home.

Can you imagine the implications of such mindless, fast tweeting?

I digress a lot. My bad. Coming back to the topic, the Indian media is crying hoarse about this slight misdemeanor from the Minister of State for External Affairs. They say it is a disrespect to all the Indians who fly Economy Class.

And most of the Indians do fly economy, in fact. Heck, even I do.

BTW, any guesses as to who started this fire? Kanchan Gupta, the associate director of The Pioneer. Now, this is what I call a classic case of hypocrisy. You entice someone to speak and then strip him bare in the public because he spoke your words.

I ask, why isn't the media asking questions to the honorable editor? Isn't it a "holier than thou" approach by the media? Why doesn't it ostracise him for using such degrading words in his questions in the first place?

I can totally understand Mr. Tharoor's jesting reply. In fact most of us educated Indians do. But beware Mr. Minister, after the stay-in-a-five-star-hotel fiasco, you are playing with naked fire.

Another Award

Anyways, while these two were tweeting their way into deep shit, I got another award. Oh! I love my life.

And, Surprise! Surprise! This came from another Shilpa.


Thanks a ton Shilpa! You made my day.

This time, the award comes with a baggage of rules:

1. Each Superior Scribbler must in turn pass The Award on to five most deserving blog friends.Check.
2. Each Superior Scribbler must link to the author and the name of the blog from whom he/she has received The Award. Check.
   
3. Each Superior Scribbler must display The Award on his/her blog and link to the original post at The Scholastic Scribe which explains The Award. Check.
4. Each blogger who wins The Superior Scribbler Award must visit the original post at The Scholastic Scribe and add his/her name to the Mr. Linky List. That way, we'll be able to keep up-to-date on everyone who wins This Prestigious Honor. Check.
5. Each Superior Scribbler must post these rules to his/her blog. Check.
   

I would like to give away the awards to:

• Shrinath Vashishtha : For his tireless blogging about the A&N Islands. His efforts has kept the little known culture and identity of the archipelago on the blog map of India.
• Mohammed Musthafa : A kid with the wisdom of a hundred year old. Sometimes I envy his writing and creative skills.
• Shilpa Sharma : For her latest post. For the first time in the history of (wo)mankind a girl has taken up the fight for the boys :D.... Seriously speaking, she has talent and needs to write more.
• Neeraj Shinde : For his passionate writing. He writes about a bouquet of topics and each of them is so masterly covered.

In the end, I would like to take a bow and thank you all for the love and support you have shown me.