I am not Anne Frank or Marcus Aurelius, and yet I will articulate on “My Meditations”

This (2009) year marks the tricentenary occasion of Ananda Ranga Pillai diary. Ananda Ranga Pillai is famous for writing his dairy, documenting the history of French Pondicherry, as a senior dubash to Duplex.He became more famous , more than the Governor himself . Such is the power of writing. Kindly remember what he wrote, remained in a dormant state for long and indeed he and the region are fortunate enough to see those writings get a favor and repute. Destiny has preserved them while in most cases, the personal writings of many have gone unnoticed and unremembered.

The diary of Anne Frank was very famous. While facing death, she joked in her diary and dreamt of life after war. Diary was her only companion, a best friend, to let her imagination run free. Even while facing all the absurdities and cruilieties of life she never lost the capacity to believe, to hope and dream.

Like many great souls, she died young and lived life to the fullest, without much grumbling. She eventually died in Hitler’s camp. Her classic statement, “I still believe
inspite of everything that people are truly good at heart.” must remind all of us that even in the face of all adversities and atrocities, we must not lose faith in the goodness of the universe. Talking personally,, in the last two and half months, I have been tossed by two officers in Pondicherry to forward just one letter to get my Provident Fund amount. The supreme power alone will know, when a minimum law and order will prevail in all Govermnet offices of India. Thank God, I only I only died in my daughter’s dream and I have not committed suicide unable and unwilling to tolerate the rape.

All through my life , if I had written all the events I had encountered, both academic and personal, it would have given more solace and comfort to me.

Many letters I wrote to my young and beautiful wife in the early years of my teaching life-the first ten years or fifteen years, during which I was continually separated either for her pregnancy or my studies. She preserved them for a long period until 1985. By cruel and wicked fate, somehow I lost that treasure, as they were destroyed by her because of my stupid statement that they are worth publishing under the title: “Letters from a husband, even while they were not responded.” Perhaps like Newton’s papers,they also received their dues this way. If only those letters are now alive they would reveal and remind the glorious past spent in innocence and laughter and more important, how much I loved her as I do now, seeing the eternal beauty of the ageing wife, unmindful of her frustrations and irritations with me which will not vanish into thin air.