Dheeraj Kalgutkar

India’s highest court has ruled out that firecrackers be banned in Delhi NCR. And not very surprisingly it has ruffled the feathers of the old Hindutva crown. Some have welcomed it, as always and some have not, again, as always. But twitter has turned into the new battleground. Battles are no more fought in Kurukshetra or Kargil, new age warriors no more wield swords and battle hammers, they use their clickety-clickety keyboards now. But there is one thing that everyone seems to miss in all this hullabaloo. Ramayana. Yes, the old Hindu mythological text that tells the story of Ram, his wife Sita, his brothers, monkey-god Hanuman and other ensembles of the cast. If you are familiar with Indian Twitter scene, you must already be aware of certain patterns. Like for example, the Hindu right wing, especially certain hardliners, always take back their argument to ancient texts. They talk about how wonderful, scenic and peaceful life was in age-old times. But this time, they are caught...

“Internet to me is all about Cats and Porn.” — Anonymous World Wide Web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee took to Reddit recently for an Ask Me Anything (AMA) to celebrate a quarter century of the world wide web (www). In responding to the question, “What was one of the things you never thought the internet would be used for, but has actually become one of the main reasons people use the internet?” he replied, “Kittens”. So there it goes. You believe it or not. Cats are everywhere. There also is an island in Japan popularly called ‘cat island’ where cat population is huge compared to their human counterparts. Cats outnumber humans six to one on the island. There was one little kitten at my home too. But no more. The other day I saw her at late night folding herself beside a Deepavali Diya (oil lamps lit during the festival of Diwali/Deepavali) in a typical cat fashion. Here’s what happened. I tell you this story for I hold a guilt somewhere in a corner of my hear...