Saturday, April 3, 2010
The Medium
THE MEDIUM
(Rathram)
'Rathram' means KNOWLEDGE. It is woven on a lucid concept that people born at midnight of Indian Independence have got supernatural powers. Everybody in this world has sixth sense. For most of us it is dormant, and may not be vivid. But to a few it fits in them as a boon or a weapon.
Rathram depicts a cross section of India’s pre-independence era and analyses the happenings of the day when India became free, and from there it develops gradually scaling 62 years of Free India, the reminiscence, being the offspring of Great Partition, which took thousands on its death toll. Call it as The Year of the Lion or call it as The Year of the Rat for the convenience of our prejudiced minds.
The political, cultural and sociometric entities of Indian Society are exposed through a girl named Adila (Justice) who is born at midnight of August 14, 1947, out of a very ‘down-caste’ Hindu-Muslim wedlock, in a Mumbai suburban slum. When the clock strikes 12, amidst the rampant violence, her poor and innocent parents are butchered by the vanishing government machinery, and she is ‘forced out of the dead mother’ at the very moment marking the cry of Free India. While the babe cries aloud into the ‘void’, struggling in the shivering outstretched hands that took her from ‘the dead but warm womb’ of her slain mother, Jawaharlal Nehru hoists the tri colour flag at Red Fort declaring India’s Independence.
Adila grows up in Mumbai under the care of ill nourished, submissive and needy slum dwellers consisting of scavengers, coolies and other underdogs. When she attains the age of 13 she gets “contaminated” and struggles with the advancement of a supernatural power and becomes a medium to bring forth the apparitions of the "dead". Late rulers, politicians, tyrants, social reformers, administrators, godling and godmen appear before her in their real forms to reveal the other side of their eventful life….
While the rituals and performance continue blending Arabic, pagan and indigenous forms the people get the best from her due to its positivity. However, in the innermost she has a feeling that these will not last and that the good shall perish soon. For even Gods had enemies and may still have.
Adila is renowned now and people assemble around her with esteem piety. To their astonishment she pronounces the spell, and ‘the actors’ of the 14th August drama appear before her as apparitions. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Gandhiji, Jawaharlal Nehru, Lord Mountbatten, and the wife are all crowding to make known ‘their other side’ to the mass. Questions bring answers. True. The living may tell lies, but the dead does not!
What the dead tells now creates panic among the people who spread the news all over. They become confused and factions originate. Some go against her, while others support. The call for Jihad takes to a violent turn. She cannot sit idle. The enemies are strong and outrageous.
Adila resists. She doesn't yield to their threats. The antagonists start their vile indulgences and twist the situations to their favour. Their attacks not only thwart the calm flow of her service but also inflict the existing social set up.
And with the help of Shiva- a superman of Indian black magic- the rivals start to make her surrender before them. In spite of a strong police protection, Shiva's telepathic impulses penetrate every resistance and become very intense and reach her. Unable to withstand the onslaught and fury, Adila succumbs and at a critical moment, when the omen turns wrong and negative, her whole physical form blazes off in the engulfing fire, and her soul gets liberated. Before leaving the mutilated burnt body behind and dissolving to oblivion, her soul takes a vow that it will come back one day to avenge them.
A total elimination of Adila is what Shiva wanted. But things do not turn up as he wished….! So, knowing she would return he waits for that doomsday.
Eventful 4 decades go by. Years of unrest and calamities march forward. New boundaries are set up. New political equations come into being. The international scenario changes for favor of Uncle Sam. New allies and work front thrive. Terrorism and religious anarchy form the flagship of social life. The intra-socio-economic balance shatters. The oppressed still stands oppressed.
The much debated 2k comes in. The country is in the grip of stale brokers, gamblers and bootleggers. Political black sheep whistle the tunes. The Indian society is metamorphosing.
And in a modern township away from the city, Natan, a 25 year old handsome youth is in fits. The mental aberration and nightmares take the brain out of him. He has visions. Adila, the dead comes in his dreams and induces telepathic marvels in him. As if a clairvoyant Natan interacts with the ghostly form. He becomes possessed. Gradually he gains a psychic power that is more than equivalent to Adila. He begins assuming himself to be reincarnation of Adila, though it is in his masculine form.
Natan becomes renowned due to his supernatural power. His name and words traverse across the oceans. Disciples throng to be blessed with his presence. Political leaders and business tycoons fall in line for his blessings. His words acquire the magnetic beam which is potent to change even the rulers of the country.
The apparitions he brings forward uncover their other sides and it quakes the nation. Idols and images collapse. Controversies follow. Violence erupts. The prevailing religious harmony is lost.
And Liza, a young journalist in twenties thinks Natan is a swindler. She wants to affirm this and tries to dig out the secrets behind his sixth sense. But while doing it, she understands that Natan is blessed with real supernatural power and becomes his follower. Meantime, some of his disciples who are strong under his shadow want to overpower him in order to amass wealth and fame.
Atheist groups proclaim Natan to be a fraud. They set fierce propaganda against him and he is caught in its whirlwind. The disappearance of certain disciples put havoc in his life.
Police is after him, and the frequent raids put him in doldrums. There are attempts to kill him. Liza saves him. She develops a soft corner towards him and tells of her love. But Natan cannot accept it for he is not meant for worldly life, he says. To her bewilderment he declares, “I am not a man at all….!”
The secret thus revealed, Shiva, the super man of black magic, revives his memories. Though he is aged, the vengeance in him is still not settled. He rekindles it, joins his allies and plots against Natan.
Liza is now his staunch follower and right hand. The frequent nearness to her causes physical and mental changes in him. To his bewilderment when the first menstrual vibrations hit ‘him’, ‘he’ collapses under its weight. The very moment ‘his’ supernatural power fails ‘him’. And ‘he’ is lost…!
Turbulent days follow. Underworld dons and political mafia do not rest. They revamp their strategies one by one. Natan is cornered and is defamed. Shiva attacks ‘him’. ‘He’ escapes the attempt with the help of Liza. Police chases ‘him’ to satisfy the ulterior moves of political manipulators. ‘He’ has got nowhere to go. The people hitherto worshipped ‘him’ disown him now. ‘He’ is totally exhausted.
But ‘he’ is not frail, and Liza inspires ‘him’ to recapture the power lost. Practicing Egyptian black magic or Atharva is the only solution to the problems, she says. So, in the silence of the night, Natan, along with Liza and a few disciples, disappears into the dark, unnoticed.
They reach a remote and dense forest. The forest people provide shelter to them. With their patronage Natan and Liza start practicing severe occults. After a great ordeal they acquire the supernatural power they craved for. But this time the power they attained is something negative. Nevertheless, they with the prowess and fury of Mahakaali and Rudra, wait for the right moment to unleash their revenge….
The cycle is set to motion once again… The socio centric scenes shift. Apparitions still come; now willfully…. The oppressed shall not remain oppressed. The ‘fusion of woman and man in one’ becomes the fire to win… And to win means destroy…For, destruction is the only truth in Nature...! Destroying to create…...
*** **** ****
© Punalur Chandrasekharan
TC 10/33, Ambady, Killiyar Lane, Pipinmoodu, Sasthamangalam P.O., Trivandrum-695010, India
Email: punalurchandrasekharan@gmail.com Mobile: +91-9605690154
(Rathram)
'Rathram' means KNOWLEDGE. It is woven on a lucid concept that people born at midnight of Indian Independence have got supernatural powers. Everybody in this world has sixth sense. For most of us it is dormant, and may not be vivid. But to a few it fits in them as a boon or a weapon.
Rathram depicts a cross section of India’s pre-independence era and analyses the happenings of the day when India became free, and from there it develops gradually scaling 62 years of Free India, the reminiscence, being the offspring of Great Partition, which took thousands on its death toll. Call it as The Year of the Lion or call it as The Year of the Rat for the convenience of our prejudiced minds.
The political, cultural and sociometric entities of Indian Society are exposed through a girl named Adila (Justice) who is born at midnight of August 14, 1947, out of a very ‘down-caste’ Hindu-Muslim wedlock, in a Mumbai suburban slum. When the clock strikes 12, amidst the rampant violence, her poor and innocent parents are butchered by the vanishing government machinery, and she is ‘forced out of the dead mother’ at the very moment marking the cry of Free India. While the babe cries aloud into the ‘void’, struggling in the shivering outstretched hands that took her from ‘the dead but warm womb’ of her slain mother, Jawaharlal Nehru hoists the tri colour flag at Red Fort declaring India’s Independence.
Adila grows up in Mumbai under the care of ill nourished, submissive and needy slum dwellers consisting of scavengers, coolies and other underdogs. When she attains the age of 13 she gets “contaminated” and struggles with the advancement of a supernatural power and becomes a medium to bring forth the apparitions of the "dead". Late rulers, politicians, tyrants, social reformers, administrators, godling and godmen appear before her in their real forms to reveal the other side of their eventful life….
While the rituals and performance continue blending Arabic, pagan and indigenous forms the people get the best from her due to its positivity. However, in the innermost she has a feeling that these will not last and that the good shall perish soon. For even Gods had enemies and may still have.
Adila is renowned now and people assemble around her with esteem piety. To their astonishment she pronounces the spell, and ‘the actors’ of the 14th August drama appear before her as apparitions. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Gandhiji, Jawaharlal Nehru, Lord Mountbatten, and the wife are all crowding to make known ‘their other side’ to the mass. Questions bring answers. True. The living may tell lies, but the dead does not!
What the dead tells now creates panic among the people who spread the news all over. They become confused and factions originate. Some go against her, while others support. The call for Jihad takes to a violent turn. She cannot sit idle. The enemies are strong and outrageous.
Adila resists. She doesn't yield to their threats. The antagonists start their vile indulgences and twist the situations to their favour. Their attacks not only thwart the calm flow of her service but also inflict the existing social set up.
And with the help of Shiva- a superman of Indian black magic- the rivals start to make her surrender before them. In spite of a strong police protection, Shiva's telepathic impulses penetrate every resistance and become very intense and reach her. Unable to withstand the onslaught and fury, Adila succumbs and at a critical moment, when the omen turns wrong and negative, her whole physical form blazes off in the engulfing fire, and her soul gets liberated. Before leaving the mutilated burnt body behind and dissolving to oblivion, her soul takes a vow that it will come back one day to avenge them.
A total elimination of Adila is what Shiva wanted. But things do not turn up as he wished….! So, knowing she would return he waits for that doomsday.
Eventful 4 decades go by. Years of unrest and calamities march forward. New boundaries are set up. New political equations come into being. The international scenario changes for favor of Uncle Sam. New allies and work front thrive. Terrorism and religious anarchy form the flagship of social life. The intra-socio-economic balance shatters. The oppressed still stands oppressed.
The much debated 2k comes in. The country is in the grip of stale brokers, gamblers and bootleggers. Political black sheep whistle the tunes. The Indian society is metamorphosing.
And in a modern township away from the city, Natan, a 25 year old handsome youth is in fits. The mental aberration and nightmares take the brain out of him. He has visions. Adila, the dead comes in his dreams and induces telepathic marvels in him. As if a clairvoyant Natan interacts with the ghostly form. He becomes possessed. Gradually he gains a psychic power that is more than equivalent to Adila. He begins assuming himself to be reincarnation of Adila, though it is in his masculine form.
Natan becomes renowned due to his supernatural power. His name and words traverse across the oceans. Disciples throng to be blessed with his presence. Political leaders and business tycoons fall in line for his blessings. His words acquire the magnetic beam which is potent to change even the rulers of the country.
The apparitions he brings forward uncover their other sides and it quakes the nation. Idols and images collapse. Controversies follow. Violence erupts. The prevailing religious harmony is lost.
And Liza, a young journalist in twenties thinks Natan is a swindler. She wants to affirm this and tries to dig out the secrets behind his sixth sense. But while doing it, she understands that Natan is blessed with real supernatural power and becomes his follower. Meantime, some of his disciples who are strong under his shadow want to overpower him in order to amass wealth and fame.
Atheist groups proclaim Natan to be a fraud. They set fierce propaganda against him and he is caught in its whirlwind. The disappearance of certain disciples put havoc in his life.
Police is after him, and the frequent raids put him in doldrums. There are attempts to kill him. Liza saves him. She develops a soft corner towards him and tells of her love. But Natan cannot accept it for he is not meant for worldly life, he says. To her bewilderment he declares, “I am not a man at all….!”
The secret thus revealed, Shiva, the super man of black magic, revives his memories. Though he is aged, the vengeance in him is still not settled. He rekindles it, joins his allies and plots against Natan.
Liza is now his staunch follower and right hand. The frequent nearness to her causes physical and mental changes in him. To his bewilderment when the first menstrual vibrations hit ‘him’, ‘he’ collapses under its weight. The very moment ‘his’ supernatural power fails ‘him’. And ‘he’ is lost…!
Turbulent days follow. Underworld dons and political mafia do not rest. They revamp their strategies one by one. Natan is cornered and is defamed. Shiva attacks ‘him’. ‘He’ escapes the attempt with the help of Liza. Police chases ‘him’ to satisfy the ulterior moves of political manipulators. ‘He’ has got nowhere to go. The people hitherto worshipped ‘him’ disown him now. ‘He’ is totally exhausted.
But ‘he’ is not frail, and Liza inspires ‘him’ to recapture the power lost. Practicing Egyptian black magic or Atharva is the only solution to the problems, she says. So, in the silence of the night, Natan, along with Liza and a few disciples, disappears into the dark, unnoticed.
They reach a remote and dense forest. The forest people provide shelter to them. With their patronage Natan and Liza start practicing severe occults. After a great ordeal they acquire the supernatural power they craved for. But this time the power they attained is something negative. Nevertheless, they with the prowess and fury of Mahakaali and Rudra, wait for the right moment to unleash their revenge….
The cycle is set to motion once again… The socio centric scenes shift. Apparitions still come; now willfully…. The oppressed shall not remain oppressed. The ‘fusion of woman and man in one’ becomes the fire to win… And to win means destroy…For, destruction is the only truth in Nature...! Destroying to create…...
*** **** ****
© Punalur Chandrasekharan
TC 10/33, Ambady, Killiyar Lane, Pipinmoodu, Sasthamangalam P.O., Trivandrum-695010, India
Email: punalurchandrasekharan@gmail.com Mobile: +91-9605690154
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