Careers in Pakistan

In the middle of Pakistani Government's shameless efforts to protect it's terrorist citizens, I received this apt and rock-hard fact mail from a friend.

Careers in Pakistan:-

If we were in Pakistan , our options for professional courses after Std. XII would be as follows :

JEE - Jehadic Entrance Examination
IIT - Islamic Institute of Terrorism
IIM - Institute of Infiltration Management
CAT - Career in Al-Qaida & Taliban
IAS - Iraq after Saddam
M Tech - Masters in Terror Technology
GATE - General Aptitude in Terror and Extremism
TOEFL - Test of Extremist Foreign Languages
GRE - Graduate in Relocation Extremism
MBBS - Master of Bomb Blasting Strategies
MBA - Master of Bombing Administration

Kung Fu Panda !

I was not at all in mood of this movie. I have never seen an animated movie in a cinema hall. But as on the almost bugging demand of his kids, Rajeev bought tickets for all of us and directed me to reach theater at six on the last Sunday evening. Till the end I tried to convince him to leave the kids in cinema and all the adults to scroll some other place somewhere but failed.

Anyhow, all the children were very excited and unable to find any rescue, I planned to have a little nap after the movie starts. Mostly entire hall was empty, I think there were only 50 - 60 people for this show.

First four - five minutes were going simply the same way as I assumed, but.........BUT.........but when the story started rolling on, my drowsiness was vanished, my eyes were wide open, ears concentrating fully on each sound and my funny bone working at its full capacity.

Kung Fu Panda, as a story is not a new tale but surly told in a new and amazing way and presentation is definitely superb. Po played by Jack Black is lazy waiter at his father's (who is a goose - a very interesting combination to be a father of a panda) noodle restaurant in the Valley of Peace and a crazy fan of Kung Fu martial art. He always keep dreaming of Kung Fu and to be a greatest Kung Fu warrior but his unique, typical and giant panda shape won't let him climb the very basic step of this fascinating martial art. The Kung Fu school/ palace in the celestial hill top run by tortoise master Oogway and Shifu, the red panda, was about to select it's mighty dragon warrior to fight Tai Lung, an evil leopard and former brilliant student of Shifu who escaped from prison and is a great threat to palace and people of Valley of Peace. While everyone is expecting the selection of Dragon Warrior from the famous Furious Five ( a tigress, a monkey, a crane, a viper and a mantis) excellently skilled students of Shifu, dying hard to be in the premises of closed walled arena of Kung Fu school, Po, the Panda, miraculously is selected Great Dragon Warrior. Shocking everyone especially the Furious Five and master Shifu, Po is no match even for weakest fighter in the Valley and he was expected to defeat mighty Tai Lung. What happened next is a hilarious account of tale with naughty touches of emotional spices.

The humor is classic, natural and enough forceful to burst someone in laugh. Animation of the movie is so gorgeous and soothing. The imagination is so rich and beautiful that some scenes can leave permanent mark on one's mind, like I got one of the starry night sky while tortoise master leaving for his last journey. The rich colors of Kung Fu palace, or the fantastic landscapes or even the sparkle in the eye of disappointed Shifu are un-washable impressions. Finally the dubbing, voices to these amazing characters are given by stars like, Jackie Chan, Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Lucy Liu and Jack Black. Fighting scenes are great, funny and enjoying.

Not only children but everyone presented in the movie hall loved this movie, I can tell this for sure as I heard everyone laughing whole heartedly while watching this tale. Great work indeed.

My First Lady !

Rereading Irving Wallace’s “The Second Lady” after so many years, brought me a funny thought this time.

One of the best thrillers of Irving’s, The Second Lady is about a plot webbed by Russian spy agency KGB to replace a Russian theater artist Vera Vavilova with USA president Andrew Bradford’s smart and beautiful wife Billie Bradford. Vera being a look alike of Billie went under some surgical operations to match every mole and hair of American First Lady and very scrupulously practiced and adopted Billie’s habits, styles and manners. KGB dug very deep to get all the details of Bradford’s and took care of every aspect (which could arise in a reader’s brain) to make their ‘Second Lady’ successfully planted in White House and fetch first hand information directly from the president to win a crucial diplomatic summit connected with the holding of power and peace of this world.

Married with Billie for eight years, Andrew Bradford the president of USA amazingly could not find out through out the novel that his wife was replaced with a Russian spy and not only behaved very normally with her but also revealed the vital information which she was looking for.

Leaving that novel story here, I was wondering whether it is possible for a husband (married for eight years) to not to recognize his wife if she is replaced by her look alike? I think even if one may practice like anything to adopt someone’s styles still cannot copy every this and that of a person. Everybody has a typical way of behaving which cannot be copied by even best actors of this planet.

The funny thought? I was thinking what if this happens with me, (though I am not that lucky L ) I think I will realize in max 24 hours about her.

Eight years! How much a person can know about his wife in eight years? My emphasizes on eight years cause we two are in eighth year now and I am sure I have minimum hundred solid ways to know about her switching with someone else. Here is the checklist of some ways if ever God be kind on me to switch her with someone else. :P Yummy idea !

• Only she could sleep soundly even with books, pen/pencils, combs, her mobile or even knife under her at the bed without even realizing them. If she is making up her bed it means she is a Russian spy.


• The very first thing she would definitely do after sitting in car is to switch over to FM if CD is playing and to switch over to CD if FM is already tuned.


• That only real Vande would let any object (it could be her own photograph) lay on the floor of her bedroom for months (if stupid maid does not show her intelligence to pick it) and if she herself picks it up and place on an appropriate place, she is defiantly her look alike.


• Only Vande can sleep wearing her most favorite and most expensive dress on, her look alike would never do that and will get caught. Ha ha ha !


• She would genuinely start mumbling a song and more genuinely would never complete even a single line with correct wordings. A tough task for KGB agent.


• That only she would run the water tap at maximum speed even if she requires a tiny drop of water.


• If ever I find her expensive golden Titan (her first gift from me) safely kept in her cupboard and not in the shoe rack or any place like that, I know she is switched by some foreign spy.


• If the bedroom wardrobe is neatly maintained and is not occupied with toys, books, spoon, water bottle etc (or anything beyond imagination to be there) I have strong reason to suspect her reality.


• The original Vande would keep fumbling with electronic gadgets including power window switches of car or my ipod. Her only favorite electronic item is TV remote (precisely channel 3 button, star plus for saas bahu).


• The right hand of actual Vande would automatically scratch her left arm whenever she would laugh out loudly. Did you know that Vera Vavilova?


• Even our neighbors can hear her speaking within the house and I wonder even if her mother could hear her on the other side whenever she chats with her over telephone, she speaks so lowly. A cool trap for any spy.


• Vande always forgets the names of companies I deals with, obviously it won’t be easy for her look alike to pretend.


• She would reveal the suspense on a movie promptly if she has seen it already and you have not seen. On the other side would keep grilling you for revealing the suspense if she has not seen it before but unluckily you have seen that movie. A blowout situation for her replaced clone.


• And finally the Russian spy would have to meditate for years to achieve Vande’s cool. She would never loose her temper even being married to such an irritating and always complaining person like me.


• Only the real Vande would keep praying for our bondage to be for seven lives and like this is not sufficient she wants this one to be the first life among seven. Of course no spy on earth can spend a single day pretending to be wife with a hubby like me who can write all this. :)

There are a lot more points I can verify about her but I don't wanna reveal all and put here on record that one day KGB chief General Ivan Petrov may discover them and start thinking of some new misadventure. :)

No More Karuna

Received a mail this morning from a friend:

DOG OF ALL THINGS

Murali A Raghavan

When my friend Ranjit wanted to strengthen the security at his Lokhandwala residence, the choice before him was to either install a Zicom security system or get a dog. Ranjit pitched his bets on the latter because a dog not only raised alarm but also mounted an attack on the aggressor and woke up the entire neighborhood and got them involved in your problem.

“Lets go” Ranjit said and we were off to a dealer to have a look in at the available stuff.

Mehta welcomed us and asked us to take seat. Ranjit began “Mehta, frankly speaking, I am buying a dog for the first time. I’d therefore like to see a few varieties before I could decide.”

“Sure” said Mehta and thrust an album on our hands and started explaining. “This brown one which is sturdy, long and well built with black splashed around the nose area is Alsatian. It is a great fighter and can scare anyone from a distance. If you have taken loan from Citibank and are unable to repay it, Alsatian is must in your portfolio. I have two of it with excellent pedigree. One of its ancestors held a top position with CBI. It is expensive but a great one-time investment. It is better to have one Alsatian than two sons who may send you to old-age home in your twilight years.”

“Can you show us something less expensive?”

Mehta turned the leaf and showed us another and said “This one is a black spaniel. If you have a temperamental wife who keeps throwing things around in a fit of anger, it is an ideal companion for you. A great reliever that it is, it will chase and bring back whatever that is flung. It has never dropped a catch unlike our slip fielders. His forefathers hail from the same place as Jonty Rhodes which gives it an edge in the fielding department.”

“Okay Mehta, what else you have on the block?”

Mehta turned another leaf and continued “Look at this one. It is such a fine baby with curly white hairs. It is called miniature poodle. You can call it by variety of fond names like Pinky, Dolly, Rosie, Darling and Deepu and have the same satisfaction of bringing up a daughter. It likes to go for a long ride in the evening and take bath twice a day with Aloe Vera and used to a luxurious life. So, unless you own a Ferrari and can afford two bottles of shampoo every month, you should think twice before laying hands on this.”

Ranjit flipped through the album and finally showed the snap on the last page and said “What is this? This black one with ugly look wearing dark glasses resembles some one from Tamil Nadu.”

“Yes. This is the latest to join the ranks of the dogs. Normally the dogs bark only at human beings but this one barks at Gods. Also, the dogs are generally faithful but this one is not. So you can say it is a black sheep among dogs. I don’t recommend it to anyone.”

“I don’t understand one thing. If you are not selling it why have you kept it on display?”

Mehta smiled “You see when people come to this page they feel any dog is better than this and buy one. It helps us sell other breeds easily.”

Honda's New 3W

I found this new model of three wheeler from Honda on the road today pressed in 'civic' duties :)

Let's Play !

Almost daily work out in early morning is my routine since my childhood. This workout includes jogging, sprint, yog and of course my favourite one, playing the games. My day won't sound a day if I am not drenched in my sweat any morning. I remember in my school days when we used to play like maniacs in the summer evenings and when we sat after the game for a breath, we actually could see the white smoke of vaporizing sweat from our hot burning backs.

I still have the memories just like yesterday, when in the rain we used to play the worst game of struggle in the muddy grounds. It was really fun. Never in the life my mom ever scolded me for a torn t-shirt filled with mud or my elbows or knees to be sanded off to the white layer of fresh skin with sparkles of very slowly growing tiny red dots of blood.

It was real fun. I would say without any doubt that I am a lucky guy to still have the almost same fun even now. (Though now days some friend hesitate to bother wives for their dirty clothes or not having that much of enthusiasm as I used to see among my team mates in those good old days) I still have the fun of working out and playing games with my fullest strength. By the grace of god, I have been able to maintain the my image of any match winner. One thing I wanna clear here is that I am not talking about the game of Cricket where two or three persons are active and rest are chewing nails in wait for their turns to move their muscles. We mostly play desi Indian games.

Having a stretched muscle, bad sprain, muscle or nerve strain, twisted ankle, jammed neck, pain of punches on the back or biceps or thighs are very common and friendly problems to me. And these oh-ah-ouch's never could stop me to be at the ground again the very next day. I feel pretty lucky to never have any broken bone till date even with my wild playing. I never had any fracture, touch wood. Though three of my friends had ligament fracture in this May withing a span of only 20 days.

The last muscle strain I had was just around the last week of April. And it was pretty bad. Surprisingly it stayed very long, I could not run at all for almost all the May. I got frustrated as I was not able to have the usual fun I am habitual of and physiologically I felt I was gaining weight cause of not having exercises.

This Sunday morning, I decided to kick off that strain and found myself standing in the court of Kabbadi match refusing to be a referee as per schedule. My friends were happy to see me standing next to them and the friends in the other team were little anxious. The game started well off. Though I was not feeling 100% fit, we managed to gain the lead of 18 to 6 in the first half.

Though many friends sitting outside were feeling it was an unequal match, an experienced and strong player was added in the opponent team to balance the match. As I started the raid in the second half, my strain decided to kick me off. The moment I tried to touch the same player with me left leg, my right one refused to follow with the same pace. A cool wave of pain started from my left groin and knocked the door of my brains while changing expressions on my face. I could not realise when my leg was blocked and held and pulled by the opponent. And I had to fall and I did and I did it very beautifully. Just like as they write, 'he fell like a tree'. In attempt to save myself I tried to support my right hand at the ground but angle went wrong. I landed on my elbow pinning my right chest. Ah! What a fun it was. It felt like some one nailed my elbow in my ribs. As I was just enjoying the pain, five of the other mates jumped on me in fear of I might try to touch the center line. Damn it was good.

I was out and as my team did not want to leave me sitting alone outside the court holding my shoulder, they followed too one by one. A friend who was not playing and was the main person to shout about the unequal match ran to me and spoke while bursting in laugh, " Arre, aaj to untth ko kutte ne kaat liya'. I laughed aloud too but the pain forced me to halt immediately. No need to mention, we lost this friendly match by 26 to 27.

But the pain could not stop me to play a small football match with local kids in the ground for another 15 minutes after we conclude the meet. Do I need to mention, we lost that friendly match too, by 0 to 2 :)

Later at home as the body was cooling down, I started realising the real flavour of these burns & bruises. I was just unable to move with a month old muscle strain in left thigh, a nailed down right rib, strongly twisted right shoulder, jammed neck and puffed right index finger. (what happened to finger? I can't remember). As I was harmless and arms less enemy at the battle field, Vande did not leave any chance to tease me all the day long, making fun of my oh-ah-ouch's.

But as I said before, these injuries cannot dampen my spirits to be at the grounds very next morning (at least I try) shouting to my friends, "Hey, Let's Play".

.

My Wish List ! # 1

In the light of:

“The only way to rid the country of corruption is to hang a few of you from the lamppost” said two judges bench of Supreme Court of India while hearing fodder scam on 6th March.

It is indeed a ventilation of anguish and frustration by the honorable justices and also reflects the state of mind of 'Aam Adami' of India in their ink.

I always feel uncomfortable with such incidents and tries to find out some 'Ram Baan' remedy for such cancer like troubles. Many thoughts keep floating my mind now and then, consciously or unconsciously. Sometimes I day dream of heading this country and taking extreme steps to change the face of our India. Sometimes I wish for some supernatural powers to eliminate evil elements of this country or sometimes I want to look out for a time machine and travel back in history to undo & edit wrong decisions of our rulers and politicians. I have countless wishes for betterment of my country, society, culture, religion and myself. Here is one........

Politics:

I want to have a chance to head a government department. I know asking for Prime Ministership is too bad idea. I wonder how people could write those essays of "If I was the Prime Minister", and if they really meant those words. The task of PM is most difficult and thankless. So I would like to start from a small department or ministry. I have many ideas for the development of various areas and I think they would be damn effective.

For an example, No one wanna take a glance on government run schools, they are in worst conditions. The buildings or infrastructure are in bad shape. The status and level of education is very low. No chance of sports or other activities is there. Even drinking water is not safe in those premises. A family with capacity would never admit their kids in those schools but only poor and helpless parents. So what is the solution?

Now if I had to head Education department and I had to uplift all the government schools in competition to so called prestigious public and convent schools, I would simply present a bill, forcing a mandatory law for all the government employees including a peon to IAS officer or MLA's or MP's to educate their kids only in government schools. In no case, education from other than 'sarkari' schools will be allowed. Dramatically, this bill will not enforce the law with immediate effect but will give at least a years time to come into existence. I am sure the faces of schools will be magically change in such period. All the persons attached to these schools will knew that their kids are gonna get education there so would deliver their best.

I am damn confident that in a record time all the sarkari schools would take numero uno position and sifarishs will change desks for these schools. Getting admission in these schools would be considered as a status symbol and long queues will be formed outside these institutions for admissions, in addition, principles and teachers would be given their due respect. Apart from performance, equality will be maintained and the turning of education into business by private players would be leashed. Sounds so simple, no? This formula can be applied in any department.

But the fact is that these 'Afsars' will get me out of my seat before that law comes in force.

to be continue.................

Joke of the week

This week's (sick) Joke :

After the murder of MP Sunil Mahto, Indian government has decided to tackle Naxalites 'More Strongly'.

Wow! I am so impressed..................................... Praney Yawns.

Weird Dreams

As Sudipta tagged Alka for the weird dreams and she tagged Manish, who on his turn tagged me, so here I am to perform my part of duty.

Though I don’t see much of dreams and if I do, I mostly can’t keep them saved in my memory even for the same day. So after reading Manish’s weird dreams I was wondering what to write. I tried to track past some of the dreams of mine but could not find much of them worth mentioning here. (As some of them are too weird to narrate here and are part of my private embarrassment).

But luckily today early morning I saw a strange dream which gave me word to publish this post.

1> Scene one: I got a call from one of the big bosses (He hardly calls me usually) of the company I deal in (I am into business of lighting products and not connected with media or journalism at all), asking me to get interviews of some giant Indian business tycoons. I also saw a faded face of Rattan Tata.
Scene two: I was playing some games with friends in the ground when the boss came to me in a white Maruti 800 (he would never step in any car less than Honda Civic in reality) with a Microphone and a box related to recording system for these interviews. (He only believes in taking and never in giving)
Scene three: I came out bathing from a place where so many other people were also taking shower and realize that I have lost that recording system and was worried how to get interview recorded. Then the other part of my brain suggested that I can use my I pod or should buy a new mobile which could record the long conversation. Before I could fetch my I pod or get any interview, the alarm rang to wake me for my daily workout.

2> This one I saw years back (96) and don’t know how I kept it remember so long. This one is not a very dramatic or very long dream but I still can feel the scare and thumping of my heartbeat in that dream. Years long relationship was forced to shatter and I was in the state of shock when I saw that dream (may be that’s why I saw that dream). I can’t call the dream weird but it was scary very scary.

Dream went like this, Me and she was traveling in a bus in very jovial mood. Bus was fully packed and all the passengers were talking so loudly. She too had to shout in my ear because of the talking noises of passengers and engine of the bus. I was smiling at her extreme effort to convey her words. And suddenly entire people including her vanished in the air like magic. I stood shocked in the bus all alone. Not a single person was visible and bus was running itself without any driver. I felt bloodless and frightened to death that where she has gone leaving me alone. My heart was bouncing so loud and fast and I was thinking of my remaining life in the same state forever. I woke up with shaken soul but was not lucky like other people who saw their dear ones in danger in dreams and on waking up feel relieved watching them sleeping safely next to them. I knew she had gone forever in reality also. I drank some water and went to sleep again with heavy heart only to see the same dream all over again, now in a train. Whew!

I don’t remember any other dream and would apologies to Sudipta for breaking his chain as I don’t have another five names to further tag on.

'Rag Basant'

Damn I am loosing my nerves.

In the rare and real celebration of Basant, Shubha Mudgal was to perform in the town on the invitation of Chandigarh Sangeet Natak Academy on the eve of Basant Panchmi. The news sparked me up like always and I decided to be there at any cost.

I always take such decisions whenever I came to know about such events. As Chandigarh is getting one of the most happening places both ways. Artists I adore are performing here now and then. But unfortunately most of the time I miss them this or that way. To be a part of mad crowd in free entry is not my piece of cake. Passes are only for VIP’s and they too are making money outta this these days (As happened in Mohali test matches last year) and tickets for the artists I adore are always too expensive. (Is this cause I like rare performers?) So I was telling, like always I made my mind to be there for Shubha Mudgal. But obviously entry was with invitation only and as I was not VIP and had to manage a pass (not two, cause she never likes such classical).

I know how many calls I made for a pass in my circle. Some of my business parties were in advertising field and a wishful thinking was hovering over me that at least one of them would get a pass for me from any sponsor. But ha, no one was sponsoring that event or at least we had no idea. Two days were gone and by the day of concert all the hopes were vanished. As I was trying to make myself understand for the lose, a call in the noon from a friend Naveen helped me to grab a reason and told me to be home early as he would visit with his wife to see Raavi. Fine, now I had a reason to tell why I could not watch Shubha performing.

But that was not my day. And to make my remaining day more spicy, destiny urged Naveen to call again only to inform that he had to visit somewhere else and could not visit me. Fine enough, I paid a visit to another friend Ameesh who was slightly injured in a minor bike accident.

Some how the day was gone. Today morning as usual I went for my routine work out. And on the way back I stopped at another friend’s house for tea and I picked up the paper just to make my heart bounce to my mouth. A fabulous picture of Shubha performing at stage was there on the front page. The picture greeted me a ‘very good morning’ and I was again carrying a long face. The friend saw my expression and asked the reason. When I told him the tragedy I faced earlier day he jerked his head like I was a stupid and said ‘You crazy? Don’t you know ‘he’ had plenty of passes lying with him?” ‘Who he?’ I jumped off the sofa and shouted. “Naveen, who else’ he replied carelessly biting a pinni and sipping tea, ‘being office bearer of Sanskar Bharti he always get passes of such events.”

Damn you! What was I supposed to say? Immediately I called up Naveen and asked if this was true. “What do you think why I cancelled the visit to your place? It got off my mind while making program to your home and when I recalled I called you up for cancellation. So you mean you were interested? In fact I had duty to perform there and I was just at the gate to attend some people in theater when I called you.” He was more excited than me.

I was not in position to narrate him how I felt and I am not in position to write here either. But as Naveen told me and what paper wrote, it was really a captivating performance. Shubha presented compositions based on Rag Basant and Rag Bahar Bageshwari and appeared to be at her best. The concert was well attended by people who managed to add yellow in their dressings to celebrate the euphoric Basant and dedication to Ma Saraswati. ‘Indeed this was an unforgettable evening for me’ he said.

Never mind Naveen, this was indeed an ‘unforgettable day’ for me too. But the good part is that Naveen promised me to send every pass he would receive for such spirited occasion in future. May be that is going to get real spirit of Basant for me.

Damn I am loosing my nerves again. Just can’t wait for another such evening to be a part of.

Challenge for Viewers !

Sidhu looked dynamic when he joined politics years back and I was amused to see him speak fluent hip hop Hindi jeweled with fancy proverbs. Since then he keep stepping on the stairs of fame. And then The great Indian laughter challenge.

Past some time laughter is really a challenge in this show. Sidhu's burst of laugh at super third class stinking jokes makes him nothing else than a clown. As if this was not enough the 'Tardka' double mean punches gives real cheapy impression.

The compulsory comments on the host Parizad by so called judges and all the participants and her proud smile( I don't know how professional smile that is) surprise a lot. Ladies please help me here understanding if such comments could be taken as a compliment by them.

The concept of 'Bar Bala' by Naveen was funny & fine for a while. But thanks to him for juicing out the laughter of it by repeating again and again. All the participants tries to butter Sidhu and Shekhar to a shameful height.

Partap Fauzdar is a funny performer but he too has started flowing with the current. One day at Aastha channel I saw him on the stage with some prominent Hindi Haasya Kavi(s) at a sammelan. Before starting his poems Fauzdar beg for the pardon for his useless jokes at The great Indian laughter challenge show. And at that stage he showed real Haasya poet in him.

The only other genuine hilarious performer is Raju Shrivastva. His laughter accounts are funny, aptly and full of life. In fact he deserved that crown of champion and keys of Chevy Aveo car.

But don't worry folks, its not over yet. Now you will have to bear two clowns with water in their mouth for Parizad and black spots on their white shirts. (Sidhu for unintentional murder and Shakti for sting operation).

Sorry guys I cant bear you any more. I would prefer the 9 pm movie at HBO or Star or Zee Studio. To my view, The comedy show Ha Ha Ha, Sara Bhai Vs Sara bhai are still fine. Office Office was great but it's enough now, they should start for a new idea. I don't know who paid to produce Johnny Aala Re which strategically erased Johnny Lever's name from the Indian comedian list.

The best was Wah Wah at Sab Tv but lost most of the shine when Ashok Chakradhar left the show. I would wait for such shows to be aired on the idiot box again.

Son In Law !

Obviously, after completing Sava Maheena Raavi got to got visitors as well as gifts and shaguns from all over. And of course his Nana - Nani were not exceptions. In fact both of them were eagerly waiting for the first Lohri of their younger grandson to perform their part of duties.

I don't know why this great poem of 'Kaka' came to my mind and I laughed.

जम और जमाई

बड़ा भयंकर जीव है , इस जग में दामाद
सास - ससुर को चूस कर, कर देता बरबाद
कर देता बरबाद , आप कुछ पियो न खाओ
मेहनत करो , कमाओ , इसको देते जाओ
कहॅं ‘ काका ' कविराय , सासरे पहुँची लाली
भेजो प्रति त्यौहार , मिठाई भर- भर थाली

लल्ला हो इनके यहाँ , देना पड़े दहेज
लल्ली हो अपने यहाँ , तब भी कुछ तो भेज
तब भी कुछ तो भेज , हमारे चाचा मरते
रोने की एक्टिंग दिखा , कुछ लेकर टरते
‘ काका ' स्वर्ग प्रयाण करे , बिटिया की सासू
चलो दक्षिणा देउ और टपकाओ आँसू

जीवन भर देते रहो , भरे न इनका पेट
जब मिल जायें कुँवर जी , तभी करो कुछ भेंट
तभी करो कुछ भेंट , जँवाई घर हो शादी
भेजो लड्डू , कपड़े, बर्तन, सोना - चाँदी
कहॅं ‘ काका ', हो अपने यहाँ विवाह किसी का
तब भी इनको देउ , करो मस्तक पर टीका

कितना भी दे दीजिये , तृप्त न हो यह शख़्श
तो फिर यह दामाद है अथवा लैटर बक्स ?
अथवा लैटर बक्स , मुसीबत गले लगा ली
नित्य डालते रहो , किंतु ख़ाली का ख़ाली
कहँ ‘ काका ' कवि , ससुर नर्क में सीधा जाता
मृत्यु - समय यदि दर्शन दे जाये जमाता

और अंत में तथ्य यह कैसे जायें भूल
आया हिंदू कोड बिल , इनको ही अनुकूल
इनको ही अनुकूल , मार कानूनी घिस्सा
छीन पिता की संपत्ति से , पुत्री का हिस्सा
‘ काका ' एक समान लगें , जम और जमाई
फिर भी इनसे बचने की कुछ युक्ति न पाई

काका हाथरसी