Remembering Rohith Vemula

"The value of a man was reduced to his immediate identity and nearest possibility. To a vote. To a number. To a thing. Never was a man treated as a mind. As a glorious thing made up of star dust." - Rohith Vemula

 Truer words have never been said.

 Dear Rohith Vemula,

   You would've turned 27 today. It's saddening that a bright mind like you has left us to due to a cruel system that only thinks of identity, votes and numbers.

   You have woken a lot of us up to realizing that some harsh realities exist, and it's us and only us who need to wake up a dormant system, to bring a much needed change for a better society, where people are, as you have said, treated as a mind, as glorious things made of stardust. We will fight, struggle, get beaten, but will bring about the change.

  You are in a far far far better world, wherever you are right now.

Somewhere in Edinburgh.

   When I visited Edinburgh with my sister on September 2015, we had gone on one of the free walking tours of the place. We walked through one attractive downhill street with pretty buildings around it, Victoria street. It's said that the Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter is based on this particular street. I had clicked it then, and recently made a pencil sketch of it. Here's the sketch.

Some street-side in Madras.

A new pencil sketch of a cycle parked against a bunch of  standing logs at the side of some street in Chennai. Had taken a picture of this long back and then decided to make a sketch of it. Here it is.

A street scene.