HAPPY HALLOWEEN.....

A holiday celebrated on Oct 31st , on the eve of "All saints day" (previously know as "All Hallows day") , which is celebrated on Nov 1st .The origination is linked to remnant and extension of a pagan festival "Samhain" , celebrated in Ireland which latter got introduced to the rest of the parts of America and Europe.

It is assumed that on this day , spirits try to get in touch with the material world , hence to ward off , impersonate and pacify the phantoms of the parallel world, people conceal themselves within layers of costume and masks.It is a celebration of many traditional merriment activities like costume parties , trick-or -treating , playing special halloween games and visiting haunted houses.

One of the event that fascinates and excites everyone , are the Costume Parties , which strikes the atmosphere with vivid energy and exuberance.

The best part about custome parties is that , it gives everyone the opportunity to:
*Be freaky.
*Unleash your wicked side.
*Break the monotony of life and be incognito for a day.
*Impersonate our fascinations ,aspirations and adorations.
*Discover a different facet of your and comrade's existence.
*Stimulate Fun and Frolic with friends
*Jump with joy
*Get surprised and excited
*P articipate in the nation wide Fancy dress competition.
*Display your assets.
*Finally , to maintain the sanctity of this tradition , in few cases , Ward off SPIRITS!!..

Kudos to such traditions!!

An Evening with Kiran Bedi

Some people have a power to make a difference and she definitely is one of them.

I had heard about her in media and from people but meeting her in person, made me more certain , that she is an amazing personality with a positive aura and immense capacity to inspire people. It was a Sunday , on 3rd Oct 2004 , at Wilde Auditorium in Hartford-Connecticut , where kiran bedi was welcomed on behalf of a women’s group SNEHA, to make a difference in people’s life. I went with an excitement of meeting and knowing her more. Many people gathered outside the auditorium to meet her.She entered the room with grace and a beautiful smile, wearing a black full sleeve shirt and a grey half sleeve coat over it, with grey pants and black shoes. She is ready all the time, be her career or such occasions.Everyone around, got a chance, to interact and click pictures with her.I did the same ,purchased a book authored by her “I DARE” and requested her to sign it up for me.She was available to everyone with a welcoming smile and warmth.
She received many compliments from guests gathered in the conference. One of the guest ,an American delegate , inquired the meaning of the word "KIRAN" , Kiran replied "SUN SHINE ", she noted it down and then latter commented in her welcoming speech for Kiran , that she knows why it is shinning today because "KIRAN" is here. Indeed ,some people have the capability of turning around the environment and atmosphere into warmth and compassion.

The Guest speakers spoke about kiran’s achievements and accolades. Every speech made me more impatient to listen to her speech. She was welcomed by Dr.Vohra,a reputed person in the field of POLITICAL SCIENCE , subject mastered by Kiran Bedi and an appropriate person to welcome her.She walked on the podium with vigour, took the mike and moved away from the dias. She wanted to be completely transparent and started the speech by thanking people who invited her for this occasion. She spoke about her family, birth, sisters, schooling, subjects, career and challenges she faced in her life.
She ventured into a male dominated profession , without doubting her conviction and brought changes in the society and police department . She changed the entire picture of policing by culturing and training people under her. The sales liquor went down under her supervision , and the scene of TIHAR JAIL changed completely. She spoke about her life , without pride, but more of modesty and humility and fire of striking the unjust. She faced a lot of challenges and politicians made several attempts to transfer her but nothing could deter her conviction , their efforts were futile. Every sentence delivered by her , represented a clear picture of her high standards in morals, education, conviction and conscience. Her speech had depth, gravity and attraction.

She presented a succinct and poignant documentary , out of one of her many social programs ,in TIHAR JAIL . Women prisoners ,while serving their sentence in tihar jail , could legitimately,take the custody of the child, resulting in the child being a captive with his mother .She considered this situation as a primal case , and benevolently started a program to provide the children with proper food, education, clothes, sanitation and counselling. The children are admitted , later on, to the mainstream schools, where they are provided with good facilities like an appropriate hostel for accomodation and good education. They are given counselling, encouraging them to become a productive citizen of the society.This disclosed the subtle side of Kiran bedi, a thoughtful , benign and a role model for the society.

After her speech , there was a Question and Answer round. Everyone got a chance to ask her questions and thus learn from her. The round was fabulous and she had answers for all. She was questioned about politics, terrisom, education, society and physcology and she answered all of it so well. Her knowledge and vocabulary is profound and diversified and her answers were terse and to the point. She gave many good suggestions and right on the spot.

One of the student, congratulated and requested her to give advice to the present youth.Kiran replied spontaneously, " MAKE YOUR CAREER A CAUSE". This line is concise but complete and self explanatory.

I admire and revere her fearless resolute and a complete belief in herself . She loves challenges and her fearless attitude , got her acknowledged , as the recipient of the MAGASAYSAY award and ambassador of UN.She is currently deployed in a project at Haiti where she is providing solutions in the policing department for the UN.

We all should be a learner in life and learn from people like KIRAN BEDI that life is way beyond family,career,money and self. It is more of giving than taking. If we educate our children from their formative years ,that giving is everything , then we can develop into a compassionate society.Current generation , has role models as public entertainers and their negligence in morality , is a great loss of principles. The essence of life is forgotten when we choose them as our inspiration. We drift away from the right track, if we don’t have an ideal role model, a person who inspires us to do a lot for others.

Lets us learn and be of service to people around us and people in distress.
Let us Dare like KIRAN BEDI to pass hurdles of life and emerge as a winner.

----Reply from Kiran Bedi:
On Thu, 14 Oct 2004 Kiran Bedi wrote :
thanku Bhumika....i have really liked the article...and am grateful to you for thinking this way....i am honoured..... who have you written this for?....and tell me more about u...are u a regular writer...?..with love kiran .

UnderEstimated Love !

A plain tete-a- tete with a collegue at work developed into an argy bargy on a cliche motif -Politics at work.

The discussion was on two managers at work fighting with each other for a single post,consequently maligning each other's reputation among all the levels of ramification -seniors , co-workers and subordinates.

My collegue adamantly pressed the point that Human Nature tends to stub one's reputation to reach higher levels of hierarchy which is inevitable and largely visualized in organizations everywhere .I contradicted that such nature may bring some accolade and promotion to person in charge but will sure detriment his reputation and more importantly that the essence of human Nature does not comprise of hatred.


After the discussion in draw , I drifted for a while within myself and few questions kept reverberating in my consciousness. Does human Nature tend to get derogatory in such a trivial competition ? Aren't we suppose to be higher forms than all the creatures on this planet? If hatred is a part of our human nature then why does unconditional love exist when people FALL in LOVE? Why is there a undeniable presence of unconditional love between child and a mother or father?

It may survive in few moments but it does exists.So why do we not feel the same about all people around us? What is lacking ?

I tried to seek answers within myself and credited it to lack of belongingness in us .We all live in complete ignorance and tend to underestimate our essence , existence comprising of pure love. We extend and offer ourselves completely to people we feel live in our territory of meaningful co existence and remaining set of people exits outside the circle, in zone of negligence.

In other words we under estimate and limit the amount of unconditional love that exist within us.

A brief personal anecdote to highlight this point -- I had joined a beautiful ART OF LIVING course named "DSN -Divya Samaj Ka Nirman " last year which made me realise that we indeed constitute love .All the entrants had to engage in a drill , which entailed walking to each and every participant posing hands in Namaskar and looking into the eyes and conveying gratitude , it had to be done without speaking and through actions .Initially I smirked on this exercise and took it with less intensity but as I got involved , it cracked open a ravine of emotions in my heart.

A mystical music in the background encompassed the space within the room with
light sprightliness and as participants encountered each other, looked into each others eyes with affection and implying the presence of godliness in all of us , thanking each other for everything with namaskar and bowing down to each others soul and higher form of conciousness .It felt not like an interaction at physical level , it was soul bowing down to the other soul in recognition of existence of our form as an energy.The ambience metamorphised completely, there was melting of ego , ignorance, robust attitude and immergence of love. Every single person felt the wave of belongingness in the room and was overflowing with emotions and everyone cried.In a moment the atmosphere changed and we all realised the amount of love and gratitude that exists wiithin us which was so underestimated , our territory of belongingness had proliferated widely.

I had to run out of the room as I could not hold myself with this newly discovered reality and wept buckets .I remember that I forgot myself for a second and let the tears drain relentlessly. Everyone felt the wave of love ,belongingness and everyone cried and like me and mused about this alteration in emotions and ambience.

The whole point to bring this issue was that we are basically comprised of love and belongingness only we need to realise it. We need to meet every one with reverence and seek godliness in everyone around us . This may seem impractical and we may divert many times to ignorance but if we have a knowledge and realisation of it then we may drift back on the right track.

So even if you are competing with someone for the same post , do it with same reverence , belongingness and love. Let the person best entittled for the post win.Do your best , keep a healthy competition and you will see yourself exceeding beyond your limitation and emerging as a new discovery to your ownself.