The Mango Man of India !

Lately, the word mango has become the most used reference for a common man in India. The Government of India brands a common man as a “Aam Admi” in official national popular Hindi language. The media has translated “Aam Admi” as a mango man. Mango is called “Aam” in Hindi. I am still not sure whether the media has tried to upgrade the status of a common man or it is just a satirical synonym. However, the surface area of the  graph of this 21^st century mango man optimizes for the middle-middle class Indians as this category is the primary reason for the prosperity of media by raising its target rating points (TRP). The graph tapers down on the negative side where the poorest of the poor lurk like jungle grass and radiates at the grass root on the other side captured by  the upper middle class category who are going berserk to get themselves identified among the rich and the affluent.

Now-a-days, If one compares the Indian politicians with a street dogs , many people put strong objections to it . They rightly feel that this is an insult to street dogs.

I have also strong objections for calling a common man to be a mango man. I treat this to be a great insult ; not to a common man but to a mango tree. Only Indian “Mahatma” or the world class saints could reach to some of the qualities, virtues and wisdom of a mango tree.

A mango tree ( Mangifera indica) has a life up to 300 years. Though some dwarf varieties are also being grown, a fully grown mango tree could be 100⁺ feet tall with a crown radius of 30⁺ feet. Its leaves are evergreen. The Indians use its leaves and wooden branches for religious rituals. Its fruit called mango is a stony flesh. It is eaten while unripe and are pickled to various tastes. Its ripe fruit has a wide range of sweetness from slightly sour to deeply sweet and come in multitude of flavours, sizes and shapes . On an average, a mango tree gives around 200-1000 fruits during onset of the rainy season weighing 1-10 quintals.

The Hindu dominated India shows a ripe mango held by Lord Ganesh, the symbol of attainment. Mango blossoms are used for worshipping the goddess Sarasvati, the symbol of knowledge. The goddess Ambika of the Jain is traditionally represented as sitting under a mango tree. In several places in the world its fruit and leaves are used as floral decorations at auspicious ceremonies.

Having written all this, try to visualize such a tree standing majestically for centuries, giving shelters to birds, shades to  tired, fragrance to passers by, delivering delicious fruits in quintals without making any distinction among poor of the poorest and rich of the richest. If you happen to look through a speeding train window, these mango trees look like in meditation but with a difference. The Saints and the yogis do also sit on meditation but for a while. The mango tree stands rooted for centuries never going a-begging from one door to the another with a bowl but is fully satisfied with what its root , leaves and barks can adsorb and absorb. It never preaches but fans out fragrant breeze to freshen the air and the environment. 

A common man anywhere around the world has the same credentials. It has as many vices but a few virtues. Right from when he takes birth, he takes more than what he gives. He consumes more than what he could easily give. He never loves to stand as one family bound to each other with love and respect. He does not understand the power of honesty, sacrifice and service. He fights among each other rather than becoming a courageous and disciplined army. He never believes that the service to the nation is the service of the Lord of the Lords nor that the devotion to the people is the devotion to the supreme self. He loves only himself.

This universe and the Earth has born from imperfection. The dirt and debris collected by a black hole get unified and goes on to become a red star, a dwarf star and to further annihilation. On Earth, the nature has over a long period of time, slowly and steadily made flora and fauna to come closer to perfection. Only this common man is promoting those forces and people who are polluting the environment and trying to undo what the nature is ever trying to attain.

This common man has to choose whether he shall side with the perfecting forces or the annihilating forces. Both the measures have the same Greek tragedy. A perfect state ceases to react and becomes passive. The synonym of passiveness is death. A state full of anarchy also culminates to chain reaction leading finally to dirt and debris. But “Nirvana” or “Moksha” is certainly more beautiful than an explosion with implosion integrated.

While “Nirvana” is what a mango tree attains, the opposite is true for a common man.

However, the nature creates anything with a perfect objective in its mind. A measured amount of dirt is necessary to sustain a friendly atmosphere so is the grass which is not created for trampling but to make thge walk pleasurable and healthy; but to make the Earth green and devoid of desert. These dirt particles and sand goes on to make concrete and bricks that has created the modern world. Where there is grass, there is no desert.

A common man alone is like a dirt particle in a glass of drinking water. But when he conglomerate and corporates it becomes a brick and then a wall and then a building and then a city and then a metro. When the common man unites he makes a square either Red or Tehrir.

This common man is the reason behind a nation going democratic or autocratic, socialist or capitalist. He selects Lincoln and Nehru, he develops Napoleon or Hitler. He catalyzes a single party rule. He builds capitalist countries like America. He is the reason for a country favoring terrorists. He makes a nation a failed state. He catapults Gandhi to the peaks of a "Mahatma" and he pushes Gaddafi to the gutter.

Rise and awake – you mango man. Become aware of your latent power and become a “Hanuman” . Every common man alias mango man has an important role to play in building a paradise on the Earth.

As the Crow Flies !

A lot of people have this ego need that makes them want to believe that Earth is the center of the universe and humans are the most important species, the supreme expression of creation. 

Ann Druyan 

Summary
We have full confidence that we are the best creation of nature on the Earth. Sometimes, we also think we are next to God. We have a mind vibrating with intelligence. We do feel that we are the hands of God, and the Later gets His work done through us. We also proudly feel that all other existence on this Earth is bestowed upon to be either act as servitude or for our consumption. We forget that God cannot be partial. He must have a reason to create such a wide spectrum of flora and fauna. For one thing, He has created a paradise on Earth. We are turning this paradise into a hell, but others have a paradise of their own, unblemished and unpolluted. In fact, we are the eternal borrowers. Ask any one of other species to exchange its life with yours!You shall be shocked.

Life for Exchange: The One Eye Stance of a Crow
One day, I saw a pair of crows making a nest on the top of the mango tree in my courtyard. They were very excited. They were collecting 8-10 inch long twigs and assembling them to make their nest. I had kept an earthen pot full with clean and cold water for birds wishing to quench their thirst in the hot summer. These crows were making stopover to take one or two sips of water on their way to the nest under construction.
Crows make the worst nests among the birds. They do not know what size of twigs should be chosen and go for the largest and heavier twigs that they can carry to the place of abode. Like other birds, they do not mix other finer and softer material such as feathers, cotton wool or dry leaves to make their nest cozy and comfortable. I thought that if they had a pair of hands matching to their physical getup then thing would have been easier for them. I was also thinking that if they had homes like us then it would have been a paradise for them.
I was sitting on a chair about 5 meters distant from the earthen pot. One of the crows came down and had a sip. It stared towards me. These crows do not stare directly with both eyes, but obliquely with any one eye. He stared inquiringly as to what was in the mind of this creature that was me.
At that point of time, I was thinking that God has deprived these birds of hands. This is a heavy punishment. It looked like injustice of partisan. The thought also floated in my mind that these crows must be jealous of us and must be praying to God to make them human kind in their next birth. The crow again gave a passing look to me as if it wanted to talk. I decided to give it a chance.
The conversation began, one to one, mind to mind. I asked him whether he would like to change his life with me. The scorn in his eyes told everything in one fleeting moment.
How dare you think of such a proposition? The crow’s ultrasound was reaching my mind. We are the black beauties of the world. Even blackest of the black of your kind is nowhere near to our colour. And you! You creatures are without a distinctive colour. You yourself call yourselves wheatish face, whitish face, pale face, yellow face, the ebonite’s and many more. See your body. It is a shame compared to our sleek and perfectly carved structure. That is why you hide your body with whimsical covering and your women wear metal artifacts and use paste and perfumes to keep themselves bemused with false beauty. God has made our body and state of mind symbiotic to the nature. We, in reality, live in the paradise made by Him. You, Homo Erectus, are very delicate and live an unnatural life hiding beneath a shelter made by you, the perishing kind. Ah! You do not even share the fruits bestowed upon you by the nature and hence the God.
The crow had an ace of the spades in its mind. He further quipped. You have divided yourself in several ways. I understand partitioning the world into continents, countries, states , cities and villages. These might have taken place due to communication and conveyance gap. The most astonishing division is of have and have not’s. You have classes such as affluent, rich, upper middle, middle, lower middle, poor, very poor and the poorest of the poor. You have infinite number of religions, cults, languages. You have not left any mean that could divide you. You always try to find reasons to fight among yourselves.
Look upon us. We live together on the branches of trees irrespective of kind and creed. Yes, God has not given us the hands but the wings. We fly to the skies and roam straight ward to locations where we know the food we like is available in abundance. Here again we have infinite choices. To name a few, the eats that you waste and throw away is our fondest intake. If you have a pair of good eyes and you move around then you must be aware that we have no reservation about food.
And last thing. You mankind start worrying about your death right from the day, when you have some knowledge of the world and in the course contract illness and disease. Your death is also painful. You mankind elevate and prolong your pain and agony by surrendering yourself to medical exercises. We, on the other hand, know not what death is. We keep on doing our daily chores, and at the end we certainly do feel tiredness and laziness. But that is that. We fall down one day while flying, or while drooping on our favorite branch or eaten away by aliens in one short spell.
Sky is our limit; boundless by territories and religion. I would like to be a crow once again. The reason is quite obvious. The distance between truths is the shortest and at best could be described by " as the crow flies".