Mritkaal

(The Era of Pharmakon)

A Skit/Agitprop Dedicated to the DHFL Victims

Posted on 05/03/2023

Debaprasad Bandyopadhyay ⤡

Akhar Bandyopadhyay ⤡

Dramatis Personae

A Lady: a Muslim widow of an Indian army martyr and a victim of the DHFL scam

Chaddi: a member or karyakarta of the ruling Saffron Party/Hindutvavadin

The Man: a non-partisan political activist

[In the dark theatre hall, Modi’s voice is heard. He is talking about the “Amrit Kaal” of India. Some portions of the following video can be used:

the following song overlaps the speech.]

[CURTAINS RISE]

[A nearly Dark Room. Only a dim blue light is visible.

In the right corner of the stage (audience’s view), a Lady is crying while sitting on the floor. An outline of a door behind her is open.]

[Chaddi enters through that door.]

Chaddi: “Jai Shri Ram”! (notices lady) What’s wrong? Why are you crying? Modiji’s in power, come on! Sab Changa Si! Acche din has arrived at your doorstep!

Lady: (sobs) All my money’s gone. Your Modiji does not simply care.

Chaddi: What are you talking about? What money? Did Nehru swallow it?

Lady: Stop the stupid blame-game! It is the fault of your party. I lost my husband in the Pulwama incident. (whimpers) Where did all that RDX come from? Didn’t your Modiji know?

Chaddi: Oh, nonsense! Pulwama was an act of the Muslim infiltrators, the terrorists- our arch-enemies!

Lady: (exhales) Huh! All the money he had was invested in the form of FDs in the Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Limited. Now, due to your party’s insatiable greed, my husband’s money’s gone! We have been waiting for three years now.

Chaddi: The DHFL matter? Areh, Why did you put your money there?

Lady: Because it was an AAA rated company! The Air Force, UPPCL, and Ramakrishna Mission- all had invested their money in it! Shah Rukh Khan was their brand ambassador–I love to view his films. I followed their path. Where did the vigilant agencies go? Have they taken narcotics borrowed from Adani port?

Chaddi: So what? It is not our party’s fault. The owners of DHFL, those Wadhawan brothers, are the ones who are at fault because they had opened so many shell companies to launder money. Not only that you are deceived by a Muslim actor’s false canvassing. Instead of boycotting him, you had followed him. And don’t talk about Adani’s Mundra Port. Blame Shah Rukh’s son, Aryan Khan, who was caught red handed with narcotics.

Lady: What? Is it really the case? Aryan Khan is not a criminal. Don’t your party’s favourite Adani and Ambani open such similar fraudulent accounts and manipulate stock as well? I am talking about Hindenburg Report.

Chaddi: You Muslim twat! Listen to me right now— I want to f***k you and teach you the lesson of a lifetime! Take this as your gharwapsi, dirty woman!

[Chaddi hurriedly proceeds towards the lady, the lady tries to protect herself. The chaddi slaps her and pushes her to the ground. The lady shouts on the top of her voice. The lines “sama-drishthi ne trishnā tyāgī,
para-strī jene māta re” from the Bhajan Vaisnava Janato plays in the background.]

[Rapidly enters a man through the door and pushes away the chaddi from the lady.]

Man: Come to your senses, you jingoistic brat! You still follow your Veer’s dictum to impregnate Muslim women??? You sickheads are nothing but followers of the British Divide and Rule Policy! (Hesitatingly) Umm..are you alright, lady?

[The Man takes out a bottle of water from his sidebag and hands it over to the lady, the lady nods and gulps the water while shivering.]

Lady: (with spasmatic voice) I cannot forget the trauma of Godhra… it haunts me every night. I scream, but no one can hear me. I lost my niece in the Delhi pogrom…. does anyone remember??? (Settles Down)

Man: (grasping the chaddi by his collar) Hey you, at once apologize to her or get the hell out of here!

[Chaddi gets frightened and somehow releases himself from the stronghold of the man, falling on the floor as a result. The man then slowly walks away from him and gets closer to the lady.]

Chaddi: (mutters) A Brahmin sanskari can do no wrong!

Man: If you don’t mind, I actually overheard a part of your conversation. Would you mind if I intervene? Are you feeling a little better now?

Lady: Yes, Go ahead.

Man: (addressing the Chaddi) You were accusing the Wadhawans. Do you not know that your party aligned with two international terrorists, Dawood Ibrahim and Iqbal Mirchi, in order to increase their assets? No wonder that your party’s assets have increased astronomically over the past few years!

Chaddi: (angrily) Shut your mouth, anti-national! We can never touch the filthy money of the Muslims! The donors donate to our party out of their love towards us and our Hindutva agenda.

Man: (laughs) So, why are you keeping it all a secret? No RTI can be filed to know the source of your assets. The Electoral Bonds are transparently opaque. The PM CARES fund is also a non-governmental agency using the symbol of Ashok Stambha. Is it not a great hypocrisy on the part of your party? Above that, if you do not accept so-called Islamic Money, why did you donate 200 crores to the Talibans? (blows raspberries) What a joke!

Lady: (to the man) Can you please tell me how and when will I get back my savings? During the pandemic, me and my daughter starved for so many days. We had to borrow money from our neighbours. At this era of hyper-inflation, how are we supposed to sustain ourselves? Is this the treatment we receive in return to my husband’s relentless service and sacrifice for the nation? Besides that, the “One Rank One Pension” has not been applied yet. So, what would be the future of my daughter?

Chaddi: You keep nagging, don’t you? Listen, for your daughter, our Modiji has come up with the brilliant “Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao” scheme. No need to worry by hearing the false propaganda of the tukde tukde gang.

Lady: (crying) yes! Bilkis Bano, Asifa, the Hathras victim and countless unknown others have all been molested or killed by your men! Don’t you dare talk about the security of women! I do not believe in the mere lip-service of the biggest liar of the world!

Man: (soliloquy) Well, there is one to one correspondence between the astronomically rising assets of the ruling party and the abrupt bankruptcies that the country has witnessed. Many PSBs have been destroyed to soothe the nerves of crony and monopoly capitalism. Even in the name of “write off”, lakh-crores worth of public money taken by wilful defaulters have been waived off by the RBI. Oh, what an instance of Orwellian doublespeak! All this for what? For Adani and Ambani and their family members? (turns back) Lady, I am sure you know that Piramal, the one who occupied DHFL by unfair means, is a secondary kin of Ambani?

Lady: I know that quite well. I saw the broadcast of their shameless expensive wedding.

Man: Yes. You know, even though Piramal claims to be the owner of the DHFL across the social and print media, yet both the NCLT first order and the NCLAT second order put a giant question mark beside the very legality of the ownership issue of DHFL. The resolution process under the pretty problematic IBC has been found full of irregularities. Piramal and his obedient CoC clearly disobeyed NCLT’s initial order and did not even bother to answer the NCLAT’s pertinent critique. On both the occasions, it’s a case of contempt of court. Could Piramal and the CoC have done all this without receiving the ruling party’s blessings?

Chaddi: (enraged) You Urban Naxals are spreading lies after lies!

Man: (laughs) We cannot reach the level of the King Liar though! The business-persons in India, like the Wadhawans, are bound to donate to the ruling party via gangsters (pauses for a second)… and to compensate for making that donation, they have to open the shell companies by taking recourse to the unfair means. The ruling party, on the other hand, pools in this donated money to win in elections and trade horses in the legislature. How can they afford to spend so much money to buy MLAs and MPs? By the by, how much GST should one pay for horse-trading?

Lady: Despite NCLAT’s findings, the ruler, the king does not pay back our life-savings at an ongoing, profitable concern. They deliberately handed it over to Piramal as part of their crony agenda and sent us to the door of death. The funded Godi Media is paying no heed to our crisis. In this catastrophic scenario, I have no other option but to commit suicide. I am appealing for legalizing active Euthanasia in our country. I beg for a death with dignity!

Man: (consoles the lady) You must remember, death is not the answer of tyranny. You have to take a different path. But yes, you are right though. Legally, your money is safe. But, it all depends on the political will now.

Chaddi: Bakwas! Our economy is growing rapidly. The fall of the rupee means that the dollar is strengthening. India will soon reach the five-trillion dollar economy under Modiji’s able leadership. We are within the amrit-kaal!

Lady: Your amritkaal is mritkaal for the thousands of ill senior citizens, physically challenged people and widows like us! Let me tell you the popular Aesop’s story:

[The dim blue light fades and the left corner of the stage lights up with a yellow light. The following story is enacted in pantomime].

Some Boys were playing one day at the edge of a pond in which lived a family of Frogs. The Boys amused themselves by throwing stones into the pond so as to make them skip on top of the water.

The stones were flying thick and fast and the Boys were enjoying themselves very much; but the poor Frogs in the pond were trembling with fear.

At last one of the Frogs, the oldest and bravest, put his head out of the water, and said, “Oh, please, dear children, stop your cruel play! Though it may be fun for you, it means death to us!”

[The yellow light fades. The right corner again lights up.]

Lady: (exclaims) Yes!Though it may be fun for you, it means death to us!

Man: Very True. The only path to get out of this mritkaal is to educate, agitate and organize. That can also be done in non-physical ways in a post-pandemic, web-based world. We need to learn from the examples of Occupy Wall Street, Moneyless Society in the US as well as from Egypt and Arab Spring. All these instances show how illegitimate authority can be tumbled down by the might of the people organized.

Lady: The problem is that, the FD and NCD Holders of DHFL are senior citizens, thus they are not tech-savvy.  They are not in one place like the farmers in India—it is essentially a diasporic population. We can follow the Stop Adani movement in Australia and in Birbhum, West Begal– both are simultaneously participating in the “No to Fossil Fuel movement”. As you rightly said, physical distance is no more a hindrance for starting a movement at this point. We have all the social media platforms to ease our tasks.

Man: Indeed. The majority of the FD and NCD Holders of DHFL are not tech-savvy. Above that, some of them are not courageous enough to point out, as for example, the Dawood-Mirchi connection in this scam to the face of the self-proclaimed Hindu rulers.

Lady: I am remembering Mother Courage and Her Children – Bertolt Brecht’s play, to bring down this autocratic regime. I have an appeal to all of you (addressing the audience): be courageous to participate in the web-based, non-violent civil disobedience movement. Do not let the paid BJP IT Cell instill fear in your hearts!

[The following music plays in the background…]

Chaddi: (shouts) Hey Bajrang, send these two termites to the detention camp, or we can just legally annihilate them! Heil Modiji! Heil Godse! Jai Shri Ram! (runs off the stage)

Man: No! Never! We will surely strike against your governmentality! We will dethrone you while the iron is still hot!

A group of Bauddha sramanas slowly walk across the posterior stage (left to right). Their shadows are only visible to the audience. Then, they physically appear on the front stage while maintaining the queue. They start chanting the 22 vows of Navayana Buddhism, the utterances being followed by the audience, the man and the lady:

I shall have no faith in Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwara, nor shall I worship them.

I shall have no faith in Rama and Krishna, who are believed to be incarnation of God, nor shall I worship them.

I shall have no faith in Gauri, Ganapati and other gods and goddesses of Hindus, nor shall I worship them.

I do not believe in the incarnation of God.

I do not and shall not believe that Lord Buddha was the incarnation of Vishnu. I believe this to be sheer madness and false propaganda.

I shall not perform Shraddha nor shall I give pind.

I shall not act in a manner violating the principles and teachings of the Buddha.

I shall not allow any ceremonies to be performed by Brahmins.

I shall believe in the equality of man.

I shall endeavour to establish equality.

I shall follow the Noble Eightfold Path of the Buddha.

I shall follow the ten paramitas prescribed by the Buddha.

I shall have compassion and loving-kindness for all living beings and protect them.

I shall not steal.

I shall not tell lies.

I shall not commit carnal sins.

I shall not take intoxicants like liquor, drugs, etc.

(The previous five proscriptive vows [#13–17] are from the Five Precepts.)

I shall endeavour to follow the Noble Eightfold Path and practice compassion and loving-kindness in everyday life.

I renounce Hinduism, which disfavors humanity and impedes the advancement and development of humanity because it is based on inequality, and adopt Buddhism as my religion.

I firmly believe the Dhamma of the Buddha is the only true religion.

I consider that I have taken a new birth. (Alternately, “I believe that by adopting Buddhism I am having a re-birth.”)

I solemnly declare and affirm that I shall hereafter lead my life according to the teachings of Buddha’s Dhamma.

After the vows end, the sramanas along with the man and the lady come off the stage and join their hands with the audience, forming a human chain. The distance between the audience and the actors is blurred.]

THE CURTAIN DROPS…