The world needs us

"Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake."

-Rabindranath Tagore


The world of a writer is unbiased and translucent.

A few days ago,I had visited the 2nd Edition of the Kolkata Bloggers' Workshop held on the occasion of the Apeejay Kolkata Literary Festival;listening to prominent bloggers who had shaped their lives in the light of words was a refreshing experience.Every blogger comes from a different background,someone is an engineer,someone is a flight-attendant;someone is a homemaker,but writing had united all of us,that day and we had all pledged to change the world through our writings,inspire the people who fear to write to rise up and shine.

One of the topics that came up during the discussion was the unfortunate murders of the Bangladeshi bloggers, who had dared to go against the tide and express their views against the religious fundamentalism.The exiled author Taslima Nasreen has spent half of her lifetime outside her homeland in order to avoid the same fate as these bloggers.But is this the end to writing?

This century has observed the rise of atheists all over the world;every person who had once adhered to a set of beliefs,has refused to be blindfolded by the lies preached by orthodox priests and live a life on their own terms.

I believe that in order to write you need to be an atheist.

By atheist I do not mean the traditional atheist who doesn't believe in god,but who doesn't believe particularly in anything that people consider true,blindly-a writer needs to cross the boundaries of faith,one needs to sacrifice the burden of religion and god and find the truth,the eternal truth without any social inhibitions.

Writers don't seek the refuge of political parties to flourish,nor do they seek permission from a community to publish their views.There was once this novel called "The Satanic Verses" that was banned,it never got published but today's rebellious generation of non-believers has fought for freedom of expression and has been able to sell copies of the e-book on the internet.

There is a dialog from the movie "Nirbashito-a woman has no country",
"in between the sword and the pen,it is the sword that always wins".
We often speak about the strength of pen,how it is mightier than the sword,the pen inspires,encourages,frees the minds,but the sword takes lives.But writings transcend life;you can destroy a life,but the thoughts live on.Think about the Vedas;they were never written but they have been transferred through voice;how century-old knowledge has never died with the death of their authors is a wonder.


Life is nothing but a small part of the infinite timeline,but knowledge conquers the brevity of life;it only proliferates with time,no sword can destroy it.



 As I have mentioned before,the world needs us,it needs our voice to end the corruption around us,it needs us to behold the light in the times of darkness,every time the world takes a step back towards primitivism,we swear to restore normality by pouring words of wisdom,modernism and freedom.

To be a writer we need to be belligerent in our hearts,but tender in our language.

Someone once said,life is not counted by days but what we do with the time that is given to us.So,it's important to abandon the comfort of appeasements and write.

Stop hiding in the shadows and start writing.

Write my friend,write.

Farewell to Severus Snape

It's been such a heavy week,first David Bowie,now Alan Rickman.

I find it so strange to feel remorse for someone's death,a person whom I have never met,but who has established such an eternal connection with people who have viewed him.I am at a loss of words to write something extremely poignant,a verbose piece on how Alan Rickman forever curved a niche in our hearts as the much hated and later loved Professor Severus Snape.

Alan Rickman's journey as Severus has been so realistic,that I can picture him standing infront of me,louring at me with his piercing black eyes,as I read his lines.Professort Snape has died thrice till today,first in the book 9 years ago,then in the movie and now,he is gone forever.

Remember when Sirius died,and Harry wondered whether he would appear in that two sided mirror again.I just wish our world had been same as the magical world where there would be a resurrection stone to bring back the dead,a mirror to make us see the the deepest desires in our deluded hearts,and someone like Severus Snape who had actually loved someone deeply,desperately forever,even after death.

Alan Rickman made us loathe Snape for serving Voldemort with utter blindness in his initial years but later turning onto the brighter side after losing the one person who he had loved.The transformation,the gray shades in his black draped character were so prominent,the scene where he grabbed Lily close to his heart,as if to make her listen to his pounding heartbeats,was so hauntingly beautiful that it makes me cry every damn time I watch it.I wait with my eyes wide open to see him say "Always" and waive his wand into the silver doe patronus,I want to feel the regret of misunderstanding him,when he holds Harry for the last time and asks him to look into his eyes.Harry must have felt guilt and a sense of honor at the same time,when he became the last person who Snape saw before he breathed his last.

I often used to wonder that somewhere down the road,Alan Rickman and Severus Snape would actually become the same.And they definitely became the same.Alan had been suffering from Cancer for a long time,but the world never had a hint about it.He had been so much dedicated to his character that he had never allowed himself to be viewed as a fallen legend.He was immensely strong,on and off screen.He made me realize that not every person is not fortunate enough to embrace the light,but love is enough to stop us from losing to the dark.Snape gave me an assurance that there are guardian angels in our world who thrive in the shadows,but hold up the lamp to give us the light,he made me believe that even the ice can fall in love with the fire,that that braver souls do not make a noise,they wait for death with their arms spread.

Sir you will be missed more than you can even imagine,today,I can put you in the same pedestal as the late Heath Ledger,you immortalized Severus Snape,and you will be loved for being who you were,for believing in Severus just as Dumbledore did.