Baba and his 'Bhookha' designs

It was therefore Baba ‘s pleasure and intention , that he should starve . Not that the desire to starve had suddenly descended upon him , or that he felt he would leave the granaries any bit fuller or wholesome , with a fraction more of food per million inhabitants . The compelling motive for his sudden upsurge of desire to follow in the steps of the fifty million more’ bhookha nanga people ‘ and starve his own mortal self to death , was fuelled by one Mr Anna , a south Indian professional ‘starver’ , who had given up his right to idly , had gone without it for a week , and had talked of nothing else for three more . What irked him even more was the media , who had been eloquently effervescent , and maybe, a bit too willing ,in awarding him the title of Modern Gandhi , which was rather ironical , for it was a long line of Gandhis that he was fighting against , but then again , that could be attributed to the Gandhis suffering from multiple personality disorders . Off – course , he had not met a single person in his long life , who complained of having ever suffered from a syndrome that bore even an iota of similarity to multiple personality disorder , but what with the Hindu Gods effortlessly metamorphosing into Robin blue avatars , the syndrome seemed more real than possible . But that was the least of his problems. Gandhi fighting Gandhi , he could accept , what his mind could not possibly make peace with was his rightful crown , now sitting pretty on somebody else’s head .

There was no doubting the legitimacy and irrefutability of Baba’s claim to the title of Modern Gandhi. The man’s CV was nothing short of staggering . He could perform stunts that no mortal had possibly ever dreamt of . For one , he could perform the exotic moves of Arabian Belly dance , all the while , pinned to his Asana , but that was just the tip of the iceberg . There was the entire body of freezing cold ice-berg that bore testimony of his talents (how so , I have no idea ). Some even say , that the icebergs were not really a metaphor for his talent , it was rather the sea that the ice-bergs were found floating in . He could inhale through his highly developed nostrils , and then , quite effortlessly , change into an avatar whose only solicitation in life seemed to lay in exhaling out all he had inhaled , probably to maintain natural balance , and then , of course, he could breathe in through one nose and breathe out , quite as easily through the other , and then , to top it all , he could breathe out through both noses , all at the same time . But all of those talents had come to naught, all his endeavors , his years of effort now counted for a big zero , because of some Sambhar addict , who had given up his right to sambhar and dosa, and had pledged not to touch either , until the government agreed to bring back to the India, some thousand million Black Money stashed away in safety vaults of foreign banks . If thousand million ‘Bhookha Nanga ‘ Indians , starving ever since their mother had lapsed into the foolish mistake of giving them birth , could not convince them too bring all that ‘dirty Nigger money ‘ back, there’s little chance that adding one more to the queue will change the governments mind . But then , what’s reason in the face of such buccaneering racism .

So Baba resolved that only a personally performed stunt of ‘Bhookh hartal’ , in a show of extreme austerity , along with a heavy harvest of press- photographs , could possibly reinstate him as a contender to the title of Modern Gandhi . And armed with this resolution , and some thousand supporters , who were probably supposed to prevent him from giving in to his carnal desires, in those moments of weakness that every mortal so often experiences , he marched into Delhi . However , it is for a reason that India is one of the fastest developing countries in the world ,and Ramdev much to his despair and despondency ,was to find that out .The government of India had gone so far towards the establishment of a welfare state that one could not possibly starve himself to death , unless they had the state’s permission . Certainly , the people of India , staunch spiritualists that they all are , often felt within themselves , an upsurge of such noble desires , and promptly got their intentions ratified by the Government , so that they could peacefully starve to death . Baba , not having obtained official permission , was decreed by the government as having broken the natural order of things , and was forthright labelled as a threat to the nation . However , Baba did escape the police crackdown that ensued , dressed in a salwar , but could not escape Darwins famous , ‘A mans hunger is rarely bound in poverty or want , and hardly ever shackled by abstinence , unless one develops a mind for being unhappy . Infact , as times demand , and as Darwin would vouch , a man’s hunger , might in times of need , come to define him . The more a person learns to live of the starvation of others , the more fit for existence he is .’ Also , if a tortoise participates in a competition , irrespective of who else is participating, the tortoise always wins (though , how this is relevant to the story, I fail to see )

He did later perform a toned down version of the previously planned hunger strike , ‘skipping meals to stay healthy ‘….but that’s another story.