nature – AbhiKNotes – The blog of Abhishek Karadkar

Hazards of Dry grass burning

I often visit the local hills in Pune, which are known as Vetal hill, or Tekdi. They are the most visited by nature enthusiasts, joggers, trekkers, and those who like to spend some time breathing fresh air for few hours, which is so rare in the city nowadays.

But I was shocked today to see that the dry grass has been allowed to burn inside the reserved forest or green spaces. Usually, in India, the farmers, have a practice to burn the stubble to reduce time to replace the land with a new crop. And that creates air pollution and smog in the capital of India, for which it has been notoriously infamous.

But burning the dry grass in the grassland or forest is something very dangerous for the ecology as well for the air quality of the city. Many times dry grass catch fire due to summer heat, or even due to mistaken use of cigarettes by un-responsible people. But the forest authorities have also turned a blind eye towards this, and have let the fire burn the grass to such an extent that the entire grassland is burnt as seen today in the below pics.

Due to the grass being burnt, the surrounding trees are also affected, even to the extent of being burnt completely. I saw a volunteer trying hard to stop the inside of the trunk of a neem tree from catching fire. As the hill does not have water sources, I immediately gave my water bottle to atleast wet the trunk to stop the fire. But the water was less, and hence, we had to use dry sand/mud to extinguish the fire.

Not long before, the grassland used to look green or even dry, but beautiful. It hosts many birds nests, insects, squirrels and rabbits. But now, after burning the grass, they have deprived them of their homes.

Below are the pics showing the beautiful grass before.

Hence, its high time that we should take care of nature, and not let them burn like this. Forest fires are a matter of concern not only for the environment, but also for our well being. We have to be cautious for not using cigarette or any thing that can catch fire. Also, laws should be made to avoid purposefully burning of the dry grass, whether in the fields or grassland.

The law of karma..

The word, ‘Karma’ means a person’s actions in this life, and even in the previous life. I am not quite a believer of the existence of the impact of previous life, even though there is a lot of literature which tries to explain it. But I being a pragmatist and realist, often limit myself to this life itself when it comes to karma. Actually, even though this word is used quite a lot in Hinduism and Buddhism, but recently it has been wide spread in the western countries as well. Many people from corporate world, media & music industry, writers try to use this word, and explain their point of view.

This law of karma is actually the equivalent to the English idiom ‘As you sow, so you reap’. And we all have read this in school. It even relates to the golden rule, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” In plain English, you should treat others the same way as you would like others to treat you. Simple, isnt it? But the question is do we really follow this?

The law of karma is very much universal. I mean no one can simply escape it. Because the evidence backing it is enormous. We all must have experienced this law even in small things, like when we hurt someone, we don’t realize it at that time. But we grasp it immediately when someone else hurts us in the same way. If we cheat in exams, we get caught and suffer the consequence. If we eat wrong food, we fall sick. If we spend too much money in shopping, or even bad vices like drinking, we soon run out of our savings. This law is very much practical.

Even if someone tries to run away from the effects of that karma, they simply cannot. We can see many famous examples in history, and day to day life as well. Some of the Nazis who had committed horrendous atrocities on innocent jews tried to run away from getting jailed or hanged to South America, but years later, many of them like Adolf Eichmann did get caught and were later hanged. Many serial killers, terrorists, rapists who commit horrible acts end up being killed or caught someday or the later. Osama Bin Laden, Pablo Escobar, Ted Bundy all got caught & killed. Even those who committed frauds like Jordan Belfort, Bernie Madoff, Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, Ketan Parekh, Harshad Mehta all got either caught or exposed sooner or later. Karma circles and hits back!

But then I wonder why people still forget this, and act as if they will never get punished for their actions. This is something of a moral question, for which there is no easy answer. But I do think there are two reasons for this. Well, first is the uncertain time delay between action and result. Just like a mango tree does not give mangoes immediately after the sapling is planted, similarly it takes time for the action to fructify. It could be years, or even decades. Meanwhile, the person who committed those acts mistakenly gets convinced that his/her actions won’t hit back, or as if they are immune to it. This usually happens when power corrupts. Somehow, those people who are extremely rich, famous and powerful, start believing that they are above the law.

But even though they might tweak the social laws, but they cannot change the effect of nature’s law of karma. And this is best seen in the recent example of Donald Trump, who had vehemently denied the existence of coronavirus, and profusely refused to wear or endorse wearing masks in public places. But then after few months, he got the virus, and the faith in this law of karma or cosmic justice being done was revitalized. Even his defeat in 2020 election is a proof of his actions for years, for which he had assumed that he would never get suffered. But as we know, even he could not escape the law of karma.

But the second reason I wonder is the bizare uncertainity in nature’s justice. We often see good people getting suffered for no mistakes of their own, and bad people getting away from their outcomes. As mentioned before, the bad people do get suffered, someday or the other, and that cannot be denied. Just, that it takes a lot of time, sometimes. But I have no answer or even any reason for why good and innocent people get suffered. We see innocent girls and women getting raped, people suffering from racism or caste discrimination, Jews had to suffer from anti-semitism and in concentration camps, India and many countries had to suffer from British and other European brutal coloniazation, innocent people dying in civil wars in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, people getting repressed in dictatorial regimes like N.Korea, people dying from earthquakes, tsunami, forest fires, riots, floods, draughts, famines, and even innocent people dying due to cancer, and now, covid-19! I wonder what was the fault of these people?

Religious preachers point to their karma in previous life. But for a practical mind, it does not convince. After all, who has really seen if we really had a previous life? Were we humans or some other animal creature? And why would it take so much time, almost a new birth, just to suffer the consequences of previous life’s mistakes? Why not just make it suffer in that life itself? Why to drag it till next life? I mean these are weird questions, which might not have any relevant answers. Those who have, might not convince us. This is the similar to the classic clash between free-will vs deterministic life! Sometimes, I relate this to astrology, or numerology, which fraudulently claims about people’s future or even a particular number as a good sign! For those fake and corrupt astrologers, I wonder if they themselves know what their future is going to be? I am pretty sure, most of them would not have a damn idea!

I think the quest for answers for the above questions will remain for quite sometime. But the good thing is we humans have come a long way in understanding this world, and nature as well. Not long before, we were trepidated by events like tsunami, cyclones and earthquakes. Our ancestors blamed it on other humans for doing immoral acts and because of which nature had taught us a lesson. Even a pious man like Gandhi, had blamed the Bihar earthquake in 1934 as a ‘divine chastisement for the great sin’ people there had committed against the untouchables. Seeing this absurd belief in superstition, the Nobel Laureate in Literature, Ravindranath Tagore, could not resist himself in responding to Gandhi with a letter of reprimand against this absurd belief.

So, today, atleast we have come a long way with all the modern technology and advancement in sciences. We atleast do not blame floods or forest fires for the sins committed by few men and women. I wish sciences get advanced even further to throw some light on this karmic aspect of life, which involves questions asked before. Maybe, a better understanding of life, will enable us to get the wisdom to know why some people suffer more than others? Is it their karma, or fate, or something beyond our present human cognizance.

© Abhishek Karadkar and abhiknotes.com, 2021. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Abhishek Karadkar and abhiknotes.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

The hills of Pune!

I recently moved back to Pune, India. And I have been visiting some of the hills which surround the city. Pune is blessed with many hills or in local language, they are called ‘Tekdi’. Some of the famous ones include ‘Vetal’ hill, ‘Parvati’ hill, Hanuman hill etc. Fitness enthusiasts often visit these hills for running, jogging, walking etc. Due to Covid-19, and the declining number of parks and jogging tracks in the city, these hills stand as one of the last remaining option to exercise besides the gym. They also remain a well known tourist destination for city dwellers to have a quick visit away from the crowded buzz in the city.

I have captured some of the pics which shows the beauty surrounding the city.

This picture is captured with the view of MIT Pune ( which is my bachelor’s college). The college is located on the right which has a dome at the top. The mesmerizing clouds adds beauty to the view.

This lush green landscape is known as ‘panchvati’ area in pune. This forest abodes quite a few peacocks, and its beautiful to listen their song.

This picture is captured at the top of ‘Vetal’ hill, just after the sunset.

*This park has a beautiful pond, where we can find many fish, tortoise and frogs.* The northern part of city can be seen behind the pond.

This picture is taken from the south, which shows the ‘Sinhagad’ fort faraway. This is a famous spot for joggers and morning walkers.

Picture of sunset on the top of hill. The grassland is a wealth of exotic flowers and plants.

Finally, this snapshot captured before the sunset shows the urban jungle of Pune.

I plan to do some more photography of the city and its beautiful surroundings. I hope this natural beauty is preserved as they are the lungs of the city.

Stay tuned to my blog for future travel updates and nature photography.

#Pune #NaturePhotography #SunsetPhotography

© Abhishek Karadkar and abhiknotes.com, 2020. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Abhishek Karadkar and abhiknotes.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Small things add up…

Nowadays, when we are staying or working from home, and this being considered the new normal, it is natural to remember the old days ( not very old, but just few months or years back), and it seems that things have come up a a long way. Today, when we find ourselves stuck up in the virtual world of social media, Netflix and work from home, but we forget there used to be those days when we cherished the small walks in garden or in nature, drinking the hot chai during the rains, going for trek in nearby mountains or hills ( my hometown is blessed with many surrounding hills, and I have very fond memories of it), meeting friends in the evening and talking about out of the box topics, or even roaming around the city by car or bike, just for the sake of passing the time.

When these things were easily done by everyone, everyday ( without even being aware of it), we somehow did not value them. But even those small things add up. We often know and understand more by discussing with friends, rather than internet or books. We make good friends in real life by actual meeting, sharing, with all those fun and random gossip, and not over social media, or accepting follow up request. There was a time when people did not need daily motivation quotes or inspirational videos to stay motivated, but just looking at the real life problems and striving hard to solve them, kept them inspired. There was a time when people did not join weight reducing program to stay fit, but just doing the daily work, traveling by bus, walking, cycling, climbing the stairs, doing housework kept them fit. Gone are the days when every kid had to suffer the punishment at the hands of their parents and teachers, and that punishment somehow got engraved in their memory, which reminded them of not committing that mistake again. But today, on the contrary, we hear that the parents and teachers are punished if they do the same. But even those small things added up in life. We discarded them on the grounds of modernity, freedom and independence, but somehow, we see the need of those things.

After all, we are not meant to be confined to a virtual life or digital image on some online website. We are not meant to be just working to survive the competition or to stay ahead in the success race with family members or friends. As J K Rowling famously said that many people confuse between life and qualifications. We see that in old days, the reasons of stress were poverty or famine or floods or any natural disaster which would destroy the crops or house. But today,we are much much ahead of them, and still our generation has more stress then ever in human history, for what? To beat the competition, to keep social status, to maintain the relationships?? We are stressed out in our work not to make life better or find solutions ( there are exceptions like Elon Musk though), but just with the fear of public opinion, or to avoid breakup in marriage or relationship etc. Today, the equations of life are altered to such an extent where the good old ways of living is simply out of fashion. In this quest to carve out our digital identity in a virtual, encrypted world, we no longer find time for simple, random acts, or loving nature, or even just finding time to be with ourselves.

For the Indian audience who grew up watching the movies during 70’s and 80’s, there were some unique set of movies which glorified simplicity, honesty and innocence. They used to be called parallel cinema. After hearing the sad demise of Basu Chatterjee, many of us were reminded of that era. Particularly were Choti si Baat, or Rajnigandha, or Baton Baton Mein. Today, do we find the satisfied life, or happiness in simple things as depicted in those movies? Even though they were movies, but still those characters and the story touch common man’s life even today. Why? Because they showed reality, they showed the day to day life problems, and also showed the way to live happily amidst all those problems. That tolerance level, capacity to accept the hardships in life, patience to wait and let evolve the beauty of relationships is what we miss today. In many ways, that life was much much akin to nature.

More to write on the beauty of parallel cinema..