image courtesy A t the outset, let me confess that I am a strong votary of the theory espoused by Charles Darwin, Evolution. And I think that everyone who has read and taken to heart that theory should also pursue the observations of the human socio-biologist, as he is called, Desmond Morris. In particular, I would recommend the reading of his two titles – Naked Ape and Intimate Behaviour. And for those who do not, this would be just a fantastic flight of imagination. Having defined the setting of my thoughts, I can now dwell on the burden of my song. Patriotism, to put it in the zoological sense, is simply the territorial instinct of the animal. This instinct is more pronounced in the case of mammals. The longer gestation and weaning period, that is the hall mark of the species, must have been the reason why this species turned out to be passionately protective of its native environs. A concern for safe rearing maybe one of its underlying reasons.  This behavior is a ...

pic courtesy When I go to sleep at night, it is with the firm belief that I would wake up the next day, with everything inside and outside as it had been before. And in the morning, when I go to attend to my daily chores, I go with the conviction that I would find the house and all things inside in the same way as I left it. This, in essence, is what we understand by civilized living.  The belief that you can go along with your life undisturbed, living it the way you want it to be lived, without any one else intruding into your sphere of living.     An idyllic and very tame life, no doubt. But that is how the majority of what we call the common people would like to live their lives. I well remember the choral rants from T S Eliot’s play, Murder in the Cathedral. The Chorus in the play represents the Common Person, who is sure that the return of the Bishop, Thomas Beckett, would surely invite murder and subsequent anarchy. They do not want that to happen. They had been ...