भाग्य

अब तक कहता था,
"अपना भाग्य अपने हाथ,
जैसा चाहो बना लो,
सफलता देगी साथ,
अगर इरादा पक्का हो

मंज़िल कैसे ओझल हो जाएगी,
अगर निगाहें टिकी हों,
मेहनत रंग लायेगी,
अगर तमन्ना साँची हो

सपने सच हो जाएँगे,
अगर ख़ुद में भरोशा हो,
एकदिन  तारे भी तोड़ लेंगे,
अगर दिल में आशा हो"

पर अब कहता हूँ,
"नहीं चला भाग्य पर ज़ोर किसिका,
क्या ग़रीब क्या धनवान,
भाग्य के बिना, नहीं मिलता कुछ किसिको,
बहुत बेगस है इंशान,

मंज़िल दो क़दम दूर हो,
और सारे रास्ते मिट जाए,
आँखें मंज़िल पर हो भी ,
तो कैसे उसे पाय ।

सपनों का शीशमहल जब खड़ा हो,
और भाग्य के ओले पड़ने लगे,
तो कैसे मनुष्य आकाश छूने खड़ा हो,
किस छतरी से अपने महल को बचाय" ।

यह जीवन एक भाग्यचक्र,
कुछ नहीं अपने हाथ में,
हम सब रंग मंच के पुतले है,
जिनकी डोर भाग्ये के हाथ में ।





आसमान से गिरना, आग पर चलना,
पहाड़ से टकराना, काँटों पर सोना,
जाने कितने ठोकर क़िस्मत और लगाएगी,
पर हर ठोकर के बाद, मुझे और मज़बूत वो पाएगी ।

बेग़ाना

ज़िंदगी की राह पे,
मुश्किलों से लड़ के,
कहीं हार के, कही जीत के,
कभी हंस के, कभी रो के,
तनहा ही सही, बढा तो जा रहा था ,
फिर जानें कहाँ से,
मेरी तनहियों को मिटा कर,
हार को भी जीत बनाकर,
आंशुओं को मोती में ढालकर,
तुम साथ मेरे आ गए

तपती मरुस्थल भूमि पर,
तन अग़न को मन अग़न से बुझाकर,
कभी तूफ़ान में उड़कर,
कभी लहरों में बहकर,
थका ही  सही, रुका तो ना था मैं,
तभी मंद हवा सी,
मेरी हर थकान मिटाकर,
शूल को फूल बनाकर,
चाहत की बारिश कराकर,
तुम साँसों में समा गए

तुमसे रिश्ता जोड़कर,
आँखों में ख़्वाब के सजाकर,
सपनो के गगन में,
इस दिल की हार धड़कन में,
बस तो तुमको लिया था,
फिर जाने क्यों,
हाथ मेरा छोड़,
तन्हाई की घूँट मुझे पिला,
आँखों को रुला,
अपना होते हुए भी,
तुम बेग़ाना मुझे बना गए

Expectation

The greatest Expectation that one can have is to have no Expectation!!

Dreams

May your dream, take away your sleep!!

Running Away or Behind

When you are running behind something, know what you will run away from and when running away from something, know what will you run closer to.

Pain of a gem

In the far flung jungles of Jhakhanpur, a lump of coal underwent great pressure for long time and turned into a diamond named him Heera.

Heera kept waiting for ages for someone to discover him. His wait was over when a shepherd noticed its glitter. Heera felt very happy but being precious stone worth millions of rupees, he had no way to express his happiness. Shepherd kept fiddling with Heera for sometime and looked puzzled. After sometime he got a collar belt out of his sack and fixed Heera into one of its groove. He put the collar belt around the neck of the youngest lamb in his herd. Heera then realized that the shepherd didn't knew anything about diamond. Heera kept laughing while hanging around the neck of the lamb.

After a week, a farmer purchased the lamb from shepherd by paying 20Kgs of grains. For the collar belt and the shining stone he paid 2 kgs more. The shepherd felt very profitable. Heera laughed again, but had any human ever herd the laugh of a gem?

Farmer's wife noticed the glow of the precious stone and removed it from the collar belt. In the soft hands of the woman, Heera felt certain of now getting the treatment that he deserved. The woman put Heera into a transparent jar and started to use it like a lamp.

Definitely better than hanging around a sheep's neck but not what Heera had expected. He could do nothing but smiling at the situation.

Once the shopkeeper of the village saw the lamp that gave faint light without consuming any fuel and was impressed. He offered the farmer Rs 500 for the lamp. The farmer was able to negotiate it for Rs 1000. The farmer thought the deal as very profitable but like before Heera just laughed.

The shopkeeper kept Heera as a show piece in his shop where every customer could see its shine. Once a jeweller came to the shop. He immediately identified Heera to be real diamond worth millions. He asked the shopkeeper where did he got it from. On hearing the reply, jeweller immediately realized that the shopkeeper knows nothing about worth of the shining stone he has. The jeweller expressed his desire to purchase the stone at double the price the shopkeeper had purchased. Shopkeeper refused to sell it for anything less than Rs 3000. The jeweller negotiated a bit and got it for Rs 2500.

Like all the times, once again Heera was sold for a price that was not even a fraction of his real worth. But this time Heera cried as if his heart was torn into millions part. All this time the purchaser knew nothing about his real worth. He couldn't bear the pain that people who knew his worth too will under-value him.

Epilogue:
In this story Heera is symbolic to anything that is valuable, living or non-living. It can be a precious metal or a key team member in a team or a valuable friend.

The pain that Heera endures is the feeling that only living things, specifically humans, experience when they are not valued as per their worth.

In the business of life we often try to gain by paying less. And this story inspires us, to pay the right price of valuables. It applies equally to relations, employments, business and many other areas.

Irrespective of who you are and how many roles you play, take time to know your gems before they experience the same pain that Heera did.

This is an adaptation of a folk tale.
Image taken from http://www.a1-diamond.com/images/diamond.jpg

Helpful teacher

Srikant Das joined the school Sarasvati Vidya Mandir 6 months ago as senior teacher in hindi literature. He taught the textbook well but his emphasis was more on example based teaching. For most of the textbook topics he would narrate additional short stories. Whenever he got a chance would ball and bat an over with whichever class was playing cricket on the grounds. Very soon students started to trust him as a friendly, helpful and intersting teacher.

In the month of March, came the exams time. Srikant was appointed as invigilator to the class 11th for physics paper. It was his first appointment in the school as invigilator. The students of this class were notorious for the cheat sheets. It was almost impossible for anyone to catch all cheaters and their cheatsheets.

Just 5 minutes after the start of exam, Srikant could see the activities of stundents from corner of his eyes. For sometime he pretended as if he had seen nothing. Later on he looked at one of the student and caught him in action. But unlike other teachers who would have shouted and rebuked the boy, Srikant smiled with a wink that everyone in the class noticed.
Now students got little bolder and didn't tried to hide their cheat sheets as much. With increased activity and boldness of the class, Srikant got concerned. He looked little worried now. He went near the class door, peeped out and closed the door. In a suppressed voice he said to whole class.

"देखो बच्चों, मुझे कोई आप्पति नहीं यदि तुम लोग नक़ल करो, नक़ल के लिए भी अक्ल चाहिए. और फिर हम भी कभी student थे. लेकिन समस्या उस समय उत्तप्पन हो सकती ही जब कोई दूसरा invigilator इधर से गुजरते वक़्त तुम्हे नक़ल करते देख ले. उस स्थिति में तुम्हारा और मेरा, दोनों का कल्याण हो जायेग. इसलिए तुम सब अपने पर्चे मुझे दे दो.. तुम्हे किसी प्रशन का उत्तर चाहीये तो मैं तुम्हे कुंजी देख कर खुद बता दूंगा. इस तरह तुम भी पास हो जाओगे और मेरा भी physics में ज्ञान बढ़ जायेगा."

Students couldn't belive what they just herd. They looked amazed and surprised at the same time. One student, probably most tensed one, asked, "सर, question नंबर 5 का क्या answer है?". Srikant got the reference book to that boy and with his help located the answer. All this happened in the starting 20 mins of the exam. It was eutopia for the students.

Srikant said,"मैं उम्मीद करता हूँ की तुम में से कोई भी इस बात का जिक्र किसी से नहीं करेगा.. क्योंकि बात निकलेगी तो दूर तक जायेगी.. और मेरी नौकरी टोकरी में जा सकती है. अब जल्दी से अपने अपने पर्चे मुझे दे दो."
Whole class never cooperated anyone before, as much they cooperated Srikant in giving out all their cheat sheet. In less than 5 mins, Srikant visited each student, got their sheets and thanked them looking eye to eye. In a class of 30 students only 4 of them didn't had any cheat sheets. While all the faces were shining, anger and dissatisfaction could be easily seen on the faces of these 4 students.

Now Srikant stood taking support of the central table and scratching his head with left hand hand holding the reference book in his right. He had started answering question number 3, when the peon entered the room with fresh answersheets. Srikant asked the peon to distribute it to each one except the 4 students. Whole class was confused as what is happening.

Srikant said,"प्यारे बच्चों, शिकारी अक्सर शिकार को फंसाने के लिए चारा डालते है. तुम्हारे साथ भी यही हुआ. बिना गरज की मदद अक्सर किसी किसम का चारा होती है. फिलहाल तो इस चारे में तुम सब फँस गए हो. अभी से तुम नयी answersheet का इस्तेमाल करो, और अपनी पुराणी answersheet peon को दे दो. तुम्हारे समय में से लगभग ३० मिनट ख़तम हो गए है और बाकि बचा समय नक़ल के बजाय अक्ल का इस्तेमाल करो. मैं उम्मीद करता हूँ की तुम में से कोई भी इस बात का जिक्र किसी से नहीं करेगा.. क्योंकि बात निकलेगी तो दूर तक जायेगी.."