I owe you all!

I owe the blood to my father
‘Cause I have to pass it on the bloodline to the eternity.

I owe to my mother as well for the milk
She has fed me with all through these years.

I owe these all to my motherland for all I received so far
To make worth of life I am here in this world.

It’s more so for I have two mothers
If realized to care -
The one who gave me birth (Sikkim) and
The other who rears me up till this day (India)!

To repay my society whatever received all these years
I am so in hurry before it is too late and waiting till the end.

God’s providence is my inheritance and
His grace is forever
For everything is eternal in the nature
As the majestic and divine Kanchenjungha
Protecting and standing behind
to fear and care.

To the eternity
I owe you all!

R. S. Shresta
September 20, 2005
Gangtok Sikkim

Dedicated to Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam in Sikkim -
Submitted to him during his visit to Sikkim Legislative Assembly on 22 September 2005

 
The best thing possible and to happen during our sojourn in the United States was the launch on August 21 last year of this ambitious website www.karunaguthi.com - the best possible way to reach out to our friends and relatives worldwide. We are grateful to all who made it possible.

It was, however, not possible for us to keep our viewers updated regularly as expected. How right was Kamal P Malla with his remarks -  "It is easy these days to launch one, but hard to sustain it with meaningful matter and substance of interest to visitors."  We do not know how far we have been able to present ourselves with something interesting to offer all these days. There was, however, a long gap on our part and almost half the year gone whiled away in between.

Golden Jubilee and Patriotism
In Sikkim we have been celebrating the Independence Day even before joining the Indian mainstream. I remember my early days in late 1950s when we would be taken from our school, Tashi Namgyal Academy to the Residency (Bara Kothi that was what the present Raj Bhavan used to be known as) and sing the National Anthem with the unfurling of the tricolour by the Political Officer on Independence Days. We were thereafter treated with a packet each of singara (samosa, bundiya and bhujuri) to celebrate the occasion! Our friends studying outside must have been more lucky that way and fortunate enough to enjoy the day more and in better ways in understanding and celebrating the Day. Even Kalimpong used to celebrate it in the Mela Ground in a grand way perhaps the best in the Darjeeling Hills those days, where our Kumar Sportings Club used to be a regular participant in the Independence Day Football Tournament and winner too bringing home the Shield quite often.

We used to celebrate Gandhi Jayanti and perhaps the Republic Day too and the holidays for Dashain, Tihar, Lossong and Maghe Sankranti were of longer duration and occasions comparatively less. Of late, we have many more occasions to rejoice and so have more holidays too. Here we remember and pay homage to the national leaders like Mahatma Gandhi (at the Park with his bust on Mahatma Gandhi Marg), Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru (at the Park with his bust near the White Memorial Hall), Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan (on Teachers’ Day), Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (at Sikkim Legislative Assembly premises where his life-size statue is located)and Nobel Laureate Dr. C. V. Raman (on National Science Day).

When I was looking for a Sikkim Flag for designing the cover of this book, all my efforts almost went in vain and proved to be futile until I remembered of the one I had with my parents back home at Rhenock. My mother could dig it out and send it to my son while I was away in the press in Varanasi planning the cover design. I could get by e-mail the visual image of what was left of it.

Coming back to Gangtok when I mentioned of my difficulty in getting a Sikkim Flag, the Hon’ble Speaker mentioned that this could be due to a sort of ban imposed in possessing one during the transit period of the change over process during 1974-75. May be due to this reason I too had sent then this flag in safe custody.

Much water has flown down the Teesta and for the most of the present post-merger generation this flag may not be of much meaning. For them the National Flag means the tricolour and so does the patriotism mean to them what we too now understand and appreciate acknowledging it too in the present day context.

Happy Gunhi Punhi !

Jwajalappa!!

Gunhi Punhi is once again here to make us realize that we the Newa: have in our culture this solemn festival which give us the message of togetherness within ourselves. Kwati makes a delicious and nourishing soup deriving the best out of the nine different ingredients which belong to the same group of pulses topped with that extra zing of nutritious juwano (thymol) and energizing ghew/ghee. Pulses could be within ourselves, i.e., we the Newa: or the whole human race, if we are allowed to go in for bigger sense of better mutual understanding and for greater cause of universal brotherhood.

We do not have to prove our rich Newa: culture, literature, history and heritage at least whatever is the extent of the chauvinism. It has been ages and it is evident everywhere in the valley and beyond – its deep ramification in the modern society irrespective of communal divide. If they want to prove the history wrong then they are wrongheaded and in the wrong foot. They should hold now and step back and also better check their knowledge bank to find out how low is their credibility on this account!

We the Newa: have big heart but this does not mean that we should go on accommodating every action to jeopardize our own identity and risk being over-flooded that too in our own mainland – Nepal Mandala! It is we the Newa: who have shown the world what we are and what we have to get its own identity in and for the Himalayan kingdom and beyond.