Smokeless Diwali: Dr Harsh Vardhan, sound and fury

It's that time of the year when Indians light up their homes with diyas and set the streets alive with crackers. Aaah, the familiar pungent whiff of explosives wafting to our nostrils and eyes tearing with joy thanks to festive fumes. Yes, the same time when most people on your Twitter timeline crib about noise and air pollution before haggling at the fireworks stalls because the son refuses to buy anything but crackers that cost a bomb. With a Hindu-friendly government at the Centre, we expected that they will encourage Hindus to celebrate it with noisier patakas, but like it has been happening since May 16, the government has betrayed the trust of people. Union health minister Dr Harsh Vardhan has gone on record demanding a silent Diwali this year. Next year, he will want to silence noisy TV debates and by the time his term comes to an end, our voice.

His excuse is: "A Supreme Court order of July 2005 had banned the bursting of firecrackers in residential areas." Somebody please remind Dr Harsh Vardhan that dowry, bribery and solicitation are also banned.

But has that stopped Indians from celebrating our rich traditions and cultural heritage.

He asked the lieutenant-governor of Delhi to launch a pre-emptive campaign blitz so that people can be informed before they buy firecrackers this year. This is not only deceitful but is an assault on our rabid culture worse than the ladi-laid assault on our eardrums.  I am happy to report that Dr Harsh Vardhan's partymen rejected his childish idea by lighting up the mother of all ladis ever lit in Delhi the moment the Assembly election results were announced. The road in front of BJP's headquarters resembled a war-zone, in other words, India the morning after Diwali. Yet, political hypocrisy obligates Dr Harsh Vardhan to call for a smokeless Diwali, because these leaders have no understanding of Indian tradition, culture, history and geography. So for their benefit, I present the definitive primer on Diwali.

Diwali is celebrated to mark the day a victorious Lord Rama returned to Ayodhya. Having run out of almost all the money because of many nights of gambling (chausar, because they were worse at teen-patti), the people longed for their king. They were in the meanwhile ruled by the king's sandals made of sandalwood. The good people of Ayodhya lit up the entire town with diyas and decked it up with flowers. When they finally saw the raja returning, they burst into joy as the victorious army were bursting Cock-brand crackers that lit up the sky. After their initial bewilderment, they learnt that the army returning from Lanka rested a night at Sivakasi on the way. That's the origin of the relationship between firecrackers and Sivakasi. We till date do not know why they omit the "H" in both Shiva and Kashi. Legend has it that it disappeared after a firecracker-related incident.

In the light of these facts, let us demolish the position of detractors. If firecrackers have nothing to do with Diwali, why would Sivakasi fall straight in line of the journey between Lanka and Ayodhya?

This is not a GK question. GK is in Delhi. GK II is the sequel and like all sequels the worst in the series. So bad that we don't even know where GK III and GK IV are. This is not about GK. This is about history and geography. How was Lanka burnt to ashes? Any forensic expert investigating arson will tell you a lot of explosives were used. That makes it also about forensic science.

I know some bookish-knowledge kinds are already laughing at my facts and looking at mythological books. Some of them will claim the events I have retold above are not mentioned in those books and cannot be true. They should first refer to the dictionary and look up the word mythology. What is in the books isn't true either. At least not 100 per cent true. That’s why those books are stacked in the mythology section. The same can be said about what's not in the books. So have a glass of water.

They say a lot of people are killed and injured by firecrackers. Are we talking about festivals or statistics here? More people are killed by falling coconuts every year than in shark attacks. Should we declare coconuts more toothy and dangerous than sharks? What kind of a man gives this excuse of pollution? Do you think Ganga was polluted by firecrackers or Delhi's dirty streets are a doing of firecrackers?

Now let us talk about the customary but essential point raised by Hindu brethren: Why don’t these intellectuals call for a slaughterless Eid? What about the Muslims? Yes, what about them? Muslim youth do wheelies on 100-CC bikes on city roads all night long on Shab-e-Baraat, the Prophet's birthday. The streets of Mecca erupted in joy when Mohammed (PBUH) was born and they must have done their stuff on camels. How awkward will it be to see youth riding camels trying to do wheelies near India Gate? There's a technical glitch as well: Camels have hooves, making it difficult to attach wheels to them. By the way, Shab-e-Baraat is not the day the last Prophet was born but the night he ascended to heaven on a winged horse. But did you care about facts? Then why burst our bubble? We live in them. We don't live on this planet. We punctured a hole in the Ozone layer so that we can escape to heaven.

What about Christians? They have their mass on Christmas and we aid them in launching Cock-brand rockets on their New Year, which we have made our own. They have returned the favour by launching Cock-brand rockets on Diwali. This brings us to the moot point: Firecrackers and other excuses to make noise promotes communal harmony and unity. One person honks at the traffic light and everyone follows as if on cue. We don’t honk on the basis of religion. Noise makes what we are. We are 1.25 billion people. If we so much as breathe together, the universe will sigh.

If you have read till here, I would like you to thank you for not bursting into a firecracker. If you are one of those who insists on scaring the neighbourhood dog, light one up your behind and see the city from above. It looks pretty without the smoke and noise.