Ummaachu- The Saga of a Brave Woman

Ummaachu by Uroob

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Ummaachu (Beloved) is a novel written by famous Malayalam writer Uroob (P.C. Kuttikrishnan). Uroob (1915 – 1979) was considered as one of the most important among the progressive writers in Kerala, along with Vaikom Mohammed Basheer, Thakazhi Shivashankara Pillai, Karoor Neelakanta Pillai, S.K. Pottekkatt, and Keshava Dev. As most writers of the period, his writings portrayed the life of the people of Kerala during the time of Independent Struggle, including the social, political and cultural dimensions. We can see the Kerala during the early period of 1950s, especially in a novel like Ummaachu.
Ummaachu is predominently a love story, or stories covering generations. In the first generation, the protagonist Ummaachu is in love with Mayan, who has no social status, income, and he is an orphan. Due to family pressure, she is forced to marry Beeran, another childhood friend of Ummaachu. Beeran is the only son of a wealthy man, so Ummaachu’s family cannot think otherwise, except but to marry off her with the wealthy scion. However, her mind already accepted Beeran, but as she is a woman who has no voice in the family, she marries Beeran. Beeran leaves the village soon after the marriage and became a wealthy man in Wayanad, Malabar. He comes back after a few years and meets Ummaachu. He finds that he still has a place in her heart, which makes him in an ecstatic mindset, and as a result, he kills Beeran at night. Later, he gets married with Ummaachu, and accepts Abdu, son of Beeran in Ummaachu, as his own son. He with the help of his close associate Chaappunni Nair, manages to build a happy home there, and he has two boys in Ummaachu, Marakkar and Hydrose. In his later life, in old age, he feels guilty over the murder of Beeran and commits suicide.
Another love story that can be seen in the novel is between Abdu, elder son of Ummaachu and Chinnammu, daughter of Chaappunni Nair. This narration shows the bold stand of the author as having an affair between a Muslim man and a Hindu woman even in literature can create a hostile reaction from the readers in a sensitive place such as Kerala, where even now the issue of “love jihad” spurs controversy. However, as the predominant concern of the novelist is the importance of strong relationships among human beings irrespective of caste, creed and religion, this twist is unavoidable. This in a way shows the nationalist concerns of the author, that of an India where human relationship is built based on human feelings and concerns rather than religion. This idea is further developed as Abdu became an active participant of Congress party and in the assertion of Chinnammu that “we are not against people”.

The novel further explores the life of people in Kerala during the 1950s. The inequalities and superstitions in the life of both Hindus and Muslims are shown in the work. It is a Kerala where inequalities in the name of caste can be seen, where women were being out casted, where polygamy was prevalent.

Apart from the nationalist concerns of the author, powerful critique of social injustice, the novelist also narrated the intricate mental struggle each character has gone through. Ummaachu at first is forced to marry a man whom she doesn’t love, and later she gets married with the man who killed her husband. This situation puts her in a difficult situation as a struggle goes on between Abdu, her son in the first marriage and her husband, Mayan. She cannot leave Abdu or Mayan. The condition of Abdu is also filled with emotional turmoil. He has to live with the man who killed his father, a Hamlet like situation. The same ‘to be or not to be’ question can be seen here. Due to the emotional trauma, Mayan commits suicide. Again, Ummaachu has to see the ‘cold war’ between her sons, Abdu on the one hand and Marakkar and Abdu on the other.

The language used to narrate the novel is also of greater importance. Any writer who wants to narrate the story of Muslim community in Kerala will face this challenge, the challenge of selecting the language, as the dialect used by the Muslim community in Kerala is in contrast with other regions, or communities. I am of the opinion that the linguistic difference is based on the geographical difference rather than religious. Any native Hindu in the Malabar area can understand the language of Muslims. However, we cannot neglect the fact that a variant of Malayalam known as “Mappila Malayalam” was prevalent in Malabar. Vaikkom Muhammad Basheer was one of the rare creed of writers who got immortality by being able to record the features of this language variant. Though Uroob used this style in the novel, the determining style is that of Standard Malayalam.

Overall, we can say that Ummachu is a saga (a narrative telling the adventures of a hero or a family) of a woman who determined to change her destiny by questioning the dogmas of the society.



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Fight Superstition

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The Kaleidoscopic Vision in Black Hawk Down

Reviewing movies is something which I never attempted before; it is not that they are not worth talking about, but there are only few movies which will compel you to talk out something. Black Hawk Down (2011) is a movie like that, especially in the contemporary scenario, where the world police, the USA is trying for a war against Syria. In other words, it’s the time I saw the movie that compelled me to write this, rather than the movie itself. Whenever any conflicts happen in the other nations, the US Govt takes it granted that it is their duty to intervene in the issue, often with the justifications such as to ‘save democracy, war on terror’ and so on. Though we can find a ‘colonialist ideology’ in the approaches of the ‘self-declared savior of the world’, it has been criticized often that the US Govt has some special interests such as oil, arms trade, etc in the move. During the time of Iraq war, the armed forces reiterated the claim that Saddam Hussain had had ‘weapons of mass destruction’. In the same way, in order to interfere in the Syrian Civil War, they are alleging that the Syrian forces have used ‘chemical weapons’ in the war. In fact, the US often makes these kinds of allegations without much scrutiny. American films also cater to these ideas of the US Govt, for which the best example is the movie, Black Hawk Down.

The movie was based on an actual event happened during the Somalian Civil War in which the US forces tried to capture the Somali warlord Mohammad Farrah Aidid. The movie celebrates American heroism even at the time of great difficulties. One dialogue in the movie shows the ideal of the common American soldier:
Hoot: When I go home people'll ask me, "Hey Hoot, why do you do it man? What, you some kinda war junkie?" You know what I'll say? I won't say a goddamn word. Why? They won't understand. They won't understand why we do it. They won't understand that it's about the men next to you, and that's it. That's all it is.”

When the American soldiers are portrayed as the symbols of courage, brotherhood, and men of great ideals, their opponents are the epitome of cruelty, brutality, savagery and even their women take weapons to kill the angels in the world, the American soldier.
At one instance, the Somali leader, Atto says to the general “You shouldn't have come here. This is a civil war. This is our war, not yours.” Then, the general, General Garrison replies, “300,000 dead and counting. That's not a war Mr. Atto. That's genocide.” If we applies the same logic on what the Americans did in the Iraq or Afghan war, we can see the same ideology working.

The narration is one-sided; we can easily see the construction of the ‘other’ and the ‘self’ in the movie. When each soldier getting killed by the Somali is shown with great sentiment and extreme feelings, the Americans killing the Somalis were being justified, since they are eliminating the ‘evil’. When the American soldier is portrayed as a gentleman in his captivity, the opposing war leader is shown as arrogant and brute. See his conversation,
Abdullah 'Firimbi' Hassan: You Americans don't smoke anymore. You live long, dull and uninteresting lives.

[Durant is being interrogated]
Durant: My government will never negotiate for me.
Abdullah 'Firimbi' Hassan: Then perhaps you and I can negotiate, huh? Soldier to Soldier.
Durant: I am not in charge
Abdullah 'Firimbi' Hassan: Course not, you have the power to kill, but not negotiate. In Somalia, Killing is Negotiation.

Abdullah 'Firimbi' Hassan: Do you think if you get General Aidid, we will simply put down our weapons and adopt American democracy? That the killing will stop? We know this. Without victory, there will be no peace. There will always be killing, see? This is how things are in our world.

The American soldiers are still possessing what we call the ‘white-man’s burden’, thinking that it is their duty to civilize the exotic, Asian-African tribes. The character Eversmann at one point declares, “Look, these people, they have no jobs, no food, no education, no future. I just figure that we have two things we can do. Help, or we can sit back and watch a country destroy itself on CNN. Right?” This is the justification, I believe, each American man has to defend the US intervention in the affairs of other nations, right?

Colossus by Kakkanadan- A novel which is still significant

Colossus by Kakkanadan

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Colossus is a Malayalam novel written by the modernist writer George Varghese Kakkanadan.

"Known for ushering in a whiff of modernism in Malayalam novels in the 1960s, novelist George Varghese Kakkanadan .... was a great storyteller who charmed readers through challenging Malayalam writing styles of the time.

It all began 50 years ago in New Delhi where he was having a cushy job in Railways. But he saw his stint with Railways a part of the journey to his cherished destination: a novelist. And when he felt that he reached the destination after a 10-year journey, he disembarked from Railways.

He himself had once said that he found Railways uncertain and so sought a way out to take him to the tracks of writing. Though he had started writing much before the railway stint and even wrote the novel Vasoori, it was his second novel Sakshi that brought him laurels.

The book had a great impact on the younger generation of Malayalam readers and was credited with breaking new grounds in Malayalam literature. Though labelled by his readers as a ‘formidable ultramodern Malayalam writer,' Kakkanadan himself was of the view that modernism in literature has no convincing rationale.

Style of writing

During an interview with The Hindu several years ago, he said 'the writings of Shakespeare, Tolstoy, and even Kalidasan had all the ingredients which work to make a literary creation modern. It is just my style of writing which was interpreted by readers as modern.'

There were times when he completed a novel within two months. The first two were followed by Ushnamekhala, Ajnathayude Thazhvara, Parankimala, Ezham Mudra, Edavapathi, Barsaathi, Ee Naikaluday Lokam, and Orodha, which won him the 1984 Kerala Sahithya Akademi award. Then came Mazha Nizhal Pradesham, Colossus, and other short-story collections.

The compulsive writer began to experience ‘inertia' with the publication of Colossus. A cataract operation in 1998 and diabetes led to the disinclination though there was no dearth of ideas. During the interview, he said his magnum opus was yet to come and that he was working on two novels.

One of them he named as Kshatriyan, which he said would be his own story and his swan song. 'Its publication will take time since I do not want to compromise on quality'. But fate had it that Kakkanadan had to finish his journey without completing it.

Though he had the opportunity to closely know veteran Communist leaders and his house was a hideout for leaders such as M.N. Govindan Nair and T.V. Thomas during the days when communists were hounded, Kakkanadan had said that he was never impressed by Communism and that he never had any political leanings.

'I believe in God, but it confuses me when someone asks me to indentify the God I believe.' In his words, the members of all religions are fundamentalists, but it is when these fundamentalists get converted into fanatics that they thirst for each others blood.

Kakkanadan had admitted with pride that the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky had a tremendous influence on him and his works. But his source of inspiration was life itself. He was of the opinion that young Malayalam writers are writings and Malayalam literature as such would grow richer through them." (The Hindu, October 19, 2011
Updated: October 19, 2011 18:20 IST)

The noun 'Colossus' means "someone or something that is extremely big or extremely important"; it must be originated from the great statue 'Colossus of Rhodes' which was built in one of the Greek villages Greece in the past.

The name has this significance in the novel, though I have a confusion which character in the novel is 'Colossus'. Undoubtedly, the hero in the novel is Rudrabhairavan, the son of a notorious sorcerer Rudranandan. The title Colossus more accurately denotes the father rather than the son in my opinion. Though the character Rudranandan is negative, I don't think the Greek god Helios is negative, of course pagan for the Christians.

The story is that Rudrabhairavan was born as the son of Rudranandan and his mother was a 'devadasi'. During his birth time itself there were bad omen as in the time of Duryodhana's birth. The sorcerer predicted that the son will bring him fortune and trained the child all the ideas to acquire power. And at last, the son became the prime minister of India by practising what his father professed. However, during the journey, he understood the meaninglessness of the whole venture and tried to deviate from the path. At last, both the father and the son died during a blast which happened in the Ashram of his father, maybe as predicted by his father.

The novel is significant in the sense that it shows the decay of the political system of India. The historic time period of the novel is from the Gandhian struggle to Nehru's rule. Indirectly, the novelist mentions the struggle by Gandhi, his assassination, Netaji's case, Nehru's rule and his deviation from his professed path, and the unending struggle for power in which leaders started having illicit relations with concubines and anti-national powers.

Though the theme and the way he narrates the events are of greater importance, the criticism he made is not that much sharp as that of O.V. Vijayan as he did in his Dharmapuranam, or so I felt. Even then, the novelist was successful in capturing the decay in the system.



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A Short- Visit to Kushal Nagar, Karnataka

Last Sunday, along with my friends Geo, Dills and Jinju, I made a journey to the Tibetan settlement in Kushal Nagar, Karnataka. Someone said, “Focus on the journey, not the destination.” In our trip, it does not mean the place which we visited is a bad one; instead it is an important place because of the cultural and political significance of the area. However, as we did not plan the trip, we could not spend much time, barely half an hour in the destination.

There is somewhat 100 kilometers from Iritty to Kushal Nagar; even though we did not have any idea about the distance or the condition of the roads, we started the journey in motor bicycles from the presumption that we can reach there within two hours. Chilling rain, poor roads turned the drive a miserable one.

We started at 11.30 and reached there at 4 pm. On the way, as the condition of roads was really bad in some places, we fell from the bike and had to buy a new pair of jeans for my friend. Once we reached Kushal Nagar, we went to a hotel to have food (had Chicken Biriyani in fact!). As the rain became stronger and we need to get back to our homes as soon as possible (Geo had to reach Kottiyoor), we returned from the Golden Temple after spending barely half an hour.

We took some photos, of course, and could see some nice girls (one of the objective of the game), it was not that much satisfactory. The return trip was awful. It was raining! Though the rain stopped pouring after sometime, light mist started clouding the road through the forest. However, we slowly came down through the cloudy forest. Once we reached the Karnataka check post, it was around 7.45. The policemen in the check post demanded the documents such as driving license, which unfortunately only one of us had at the time. The officer then said, he won’t let us pass the road without the document. He asked us to pay INR 1000 as compensation, but after some ‘bargaining’ we paid INR 200 and left. We reached Iritty somewhat at 8.30. There weren’t any buses at that time to Peravoor-Kottiyoor route, so our friends, Dills and Jinju took us to Peravoor; from there Geo went to his home and me in my home.

Aathmakadhaykku Oramugham- Lalithambika Antharjanam

aathmakadhaykku oraamugham by Lalithambika Antharjanam

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Lalithambika Antharjanam’s “Aathma kadhaykku Oramugham” is a literary autobiography ( autobiographies or memoirs by literary figures). Lalithambika Antharjanam(1909-1987) was a notable author in Malayalam with so many credentials; one of the foremost feminist writer, nationalist, social reformer, and so on.

Lalithambika Antharjanam was a feminist writer. She was born in a Brahmin family at a time the community was from top to the bottom, patriarchal. Women were not allowed to go out from their homes, not been able to meet their own father and brother once they grew up. They had to spend the entire life time in the shadow of “Marakkuda (an umbrella made with the leafs of some tree).” They were often married to very old members in the community, maybe because of poverty in the family, or due to some pressure from the socially powerful groups. Once their husband dies (which often happens since they are marrying very old guys, but they themselves will be only ten or fifteen years old), they need to remain as widows the entire lifetime, without being able to participate in any social activities. If anyone of the female members were alleged to have any illegitimate relation with anyone, the community would conduct “smarthavichaarm” and disown the woman. It was the right of the lower caste men to take possession of these kinds of women and were entitled to do anything to them, even prostitution. The “smarthavichaaram” was conducted by the elite members of the community, and the arguments of the defendants were often or always neglected. The rules of the community were based on Bhargava Smriti and Sankara Smriti, which were crueler than Manu Smriti in its pro-patriarchal stand. Lalithambika Antharjanam was born in the community at a time where there was a great unrest against these inequalities. V.T. Bhattathirippat, MRB, and others started reacting against these inequalities openly through activities and through the publication of the play, “Adukkalayil Ninnum Arangathekku” and “Marakkudakkullile Mahanarakam” respectively. They conducted widow remarriage and other programs. The period was also witnessed Mahatma Gandhi’s intervention and this fuelled the situation. Lalithambika Antharjanam took courage from these and participated in the social reformation through activities and writing. Her fiction “Agnisaakshi” is a work in which the protagonist is a woman from the Brahmin community. This work is an open criticism against all the ideas propagated by the community. In her autobiography also, Lalithambika question the stand of the society which discriminates women.

Some instances from the autobiography- The author talks about many women members who suffered during that period. She mentions “Kuriyedathu Thathri” and also her own family members. One of the women members of her family helped her family to overcome the difficulties when some of the elder members died unexpectedly. She looked after her little brothers and got back the lost prestige of the family. When the brothers grew up and got married, there began unrest. Their wives complained about the elder sister to their husbands due to jealousy. Then the brothers questioned the elder sister and openly told that since she is a woman, she has no right in the property. Out of anger she replied that then she will leave the home, but contrary to her expectation, her brothers asked her to go. She went out of the home hoping that they will call back, but they didn’t. Once she crossed the gate, they closed it. At night, as she could not go anywhere, she returned and called them. The servant in the family replied that since she left the home without accompanying any maid, she would be an outcaste and so they would not take her back. She knocked every side of the house crying, “Parameshwara, Narayanaaa”, but nobody responded. At last, the “antharjanam” (the common name of all elder female members of Brahmin community) left the place. Nobody knew how she died and where.
Another instance she narrates is that of a young girl who married to an old man. As per Brahmin rules at that time, the married woman can enter her husband’s room only on the fourth day of the marriage. On the third day, this girl’s husband died. She was forced to have the fourth day night’s ceremony with the husband with an image of him made in grass. The rest of her life, she had to remain as a widow.

Lalithambika Antharjanam is undoubtedly a nationalist, a nationalist in action and in writing. Her autobiography is filled with awe and admiration towards Gandhi. She writes how Gandhian values influence her life and what was the price she paid. The orthodox community could not digest Gandhi’s teaching and they compared him with Kali, the total destroyer, whereas his followers replied this argument by writing “Gandhyashtakam”.

Through her autobiography, we can understand the social, religious, literary ideas of her lifetime.




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Forever Odd- Dean Koontz

Forever Odd by Dean Koontz

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Dean Koontz, the master narrator comes up with his mysterious fiction, "Forever Odd", in which the central character has a rare gift, he can see dead people. He has a psychic magnetism through which he can locate ghosts and even people. The story deals with the encounter he has to face with because of this rare gift.

Crime thrillers and mysteries often do not come under the analysis of literary critics as they think that these are inferior, or maybe they don't have the aesthetic taste to enjoy them. However, as these mysteries do appeal to thousands of people, and deals with the life of the people, its crime and decay, we need to consider the genre seriously.

The antagonist in the novel is the owner of a porn site who makes money by exploiting the sexual demeanor of the people. She, Datura her name, then ventures to exploit the other interest of the people, that of the unending desire for the supernatural. She wants to see the dead, and meets many black magicians to get what she wanted. Then, she heard about Odd Thomas who has the skill to see dead people. For making him summon ghosts for her, she kidnaps Thomas' friend. As in any thrillers, at last Thomas comes victorious.

Apart from this short story with its twists and turns, what the novel presents us? I agree that it came just as a representation of our long held battle between good and evil. But why the evil always is woman and not man. It is easy to identify women with evil, from the time immemorial, women has a liking for evil. It is Eve who ate the forbidden fruit.. It is women who were brutally murdered in the name of witch hunt. To add the spice, the author has a fine description of the Hindu woman-goddess Kali, who in her appearance shows everything grotesque. So it is easy for the author to compare Kali with the antagonists, but in the hurry forgets, maybe knowingly, that Goddess Kali stand for good as per old tradition, who never rests in her fight against the evil. Here, the author achieves by combining the women image of evil with the exotic oriental dark bloodthirsty goddess a special mood to the story which will satisfy any ordinary reader who gets mystified by these images.

However, here the antagonist seems so weak, without much to do in the encounter. The end is predictable, like in every crime thriller that is the victory of good over evil. Even then, I felt that the opponent is so weak, failing to arouse any horror.




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Raghuram Rajan- A Ray of Hope

Reserve Bank of India has now a new head to lead the country during one of its most difficult days; Raghuram Rajan is appointed as the new governor of RBI, congratulations! The young (comparatively) man has lots of achievements as his credentials: Chief Economic Advisor of the Govt of India, former IMF economist, visiting professor to the World Bank and US Federal Reserve Board and an author of many books. His books include, Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists, Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy.

Apart from this, the appointment of Rakhuram Rajan has some more implications, according to experts. His appointment is at a time when Indian Rupee is in its historic downfall and one of his first priorities would be to manage the situation. However, his stand on the issue is that decline of the value of rupee is not a big matter as India is open to market economy. Both Raghuram and the present Prime Minister of India, Dr. Manmohan Singh have the same backgrounds, that of IMF and Reserve Bank. In other words, his appointment would strengthen capitalist policies of the govt.

His appointment has brought much hope in the economy, though some critics don’t see it. Since he is an idealist and often questioned the bad effects of capitalism, most people see a ray of hope. Whereas critics noted that he had been the Chief Economic Advisor of the govt when the country’s economy had witnessed much trouble, but he couldn’t do much to change the scenario, then how he can contribute anything as the RBI governor which is nothing but a bureaucratic position (of course, he argues for a limited role of RBI in economic matters). Let us hope for the best!

In between, I think BJP can also be happy in the appointment as at least one “Raghuram” is going to lead RBI, though it is not Lord Ram.

India- The Queen of Arabian Ocean and of Asia

It is time to congratulate our own defense experts and scientists who worked behind the launching of INS Vikrant.

Once again India stood with great pride among the world by launching its first indigenous aircraft carrier as only very few nations presently have been able to launch this sort of an aircraft such as the USA, the UK, Russia and France. Experts in foreign policy look with great interest this recent development in the sub-continent as the neighboring countries like China and Pakistan. It will make Pakistan in comparatively weak position, as already in the naval field India stand with confidence. However, the event has more meaning when we assess the other side, which is China’s stand in the development. China, it is said that, already seems to be worried about it. In many respects, China has an advantage over India, often playing the BIG BROTHER by crossing the border in the Indian side.
The upper hand India got in this will disturb many. Already, it has been assumed that the USA is trying to build a power bloc including Japan, Australia, and India along with. However, India would not be able to engage with the US as it will create another power bloc in the region, i.e., China and Pakistan. In other words, we are going to see much competition in the arms sector.

Watch the video here.

It is heard that Defense Minister A.K. Antony’s wife launched the aircraft carrier as the custom demands women to launch the aircraft carriers, which it is believed would bring good results. There will definitely be Ganapati Puja and other similar things before the launch. This is what we call Secularism.

Poverty Is a State of Mind- Rahul Gandhi

Previously, I have written a column on ‘using figures of speech in public speeches’, in which I noted that politicians are often targeted by the media simply because the latter do not understand, or do not want to understand the real motif behind some statements. What they do is simply taking some words used by the leaders in isolation and criticise it. Two recent examples are one made by Modi on Gujarat riot using the analogy of pets getting killed in the accident and the other one is Rahul’s infamous quote on poverty. I felt the media rushed hastily to make the statement controversial. See the captions of most newspapers, “Rahul Gandhi Mocks the Poor, says poverty is just a state of mind”. It has to be noted that media had not been invited to the event by Dalit Resource Centre (DRC) at the Gobind Ballabh Pant Social Science Institute (GBPSSI). Unfortunately, the complete statement made by Mr. Rahul is not given in any of the news media, even then Times of India seems to have given a comparatively fair record of it.

'Against the backdrop of a countrywide debate on poverty, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi said that "poverty comprises two elements - poverty of thought and poverty in material conditions. While there is a need to overcome poverty of thought to attain self-confidence, it's the latter which manifests in terms of food, money, education and so on," he added. "Poverty of thought has to be overcome so as to lend self-confidence to voice, leading to politics of one's own and a share in democracy and its institutions". "I understand the internal weaknesses of our prevalent system. I will try my level best to help the people, but unless and until the voice of the marginalized comes out from within, nothing can be done. People and the system will always discourage you that you cannot stand on your own feet and this in my opinion is the biggest lie," said the Congress leader. He further said, "We have to chalk out a strategy together as I do not want to develop a one-day relationship with the grassroots people...but a long-term relationship. I want to develop a relationship that is deep from within, which provides space to people to share their good and bad points. In India, the voice of the poor people is heard less and my one and only political aim is to tune my ears to the voice of the poor and the marginalized." Times of India, Aug 6, 2013, 10.51 PM IST


Simply focusing on parts of the statement, media went on criticizing Mr. Rahul. If we analyse the statement in a closer look, what he meant makes sense. He not only talked about two kinds of poverty, but also showed the understanding that “People and the system will always discourage you that you cannot stand on your own feet and this in my opinion is the biggest lie.”
What I felt is Rahul does need a good media team even if not to challenge Modi, at least not to get misunderstood by the media.