The spirit of fatwas past

“Bad verses The readers’ curses, Aphorisms The soul’s prisms…” From Curry Boli by Bachchoo O tempora, O mores! All I ever got from defending Salman Rushdie’s right to write was a few seconds’ eternal notoriety on something called e-bay — or is it U-tube or Facelift — believe me I am bewildered when my children tell me that I am somewhere there.

High tea with Guv

I’m writing this the morning after the night before India’s 63rd Republic Day went off without an “incident”, and we should be so relieved. Imagine! It has come to that. For nearly a fortnight before January 26, there is an extra high alert all over the country, which means it is not the best time to be travelling, especially if Delhi is your destination. First, you deal with the notorious fog (surely, there’s a foreign hand somewhere?) that delays flights for hours on end. Then there’s the deadly red alert, which means further delays and mysterious procedures.