WET WISDOM

Now is the time for all advanced souls to say a prayer for Telangana. A shocking piece of news from Hyderabad informs us that the Government of Andhra has frustrated the efforts of their Excise Minister to elevate Telangana to a high moral plane. In his Bharatiya zeal, the Excise Minister recently ordered that five national days in the year should be observed as ‘dry’ days in the wet districts of Telangana. The Andhra Cabinet, on the plea that this was a unilateral decision by the Excise Minister, has now ordered a lifting of this rule and Telangana shall have not even five dry days in the whole wet year. Does this mean that a patriot cannot unilaterally work for the improvement of the country? Our nationalism flourishes on dryness and the Excise Minister was only being ultra-nationalistic in ordering a dry observance of such days as the day on which Gandhiji’s ashes were immersed. This dry patriotism has been countered by a very wet wisdom on the part of the rest of the Cabinet. The way the Government has refused to put up with even five parching days in the year makes our Bombay mouths water. But there is consolation in the thought that Telangana can never aspire to the supreme moral stature we in Bombay enjoy in invigorating dryness — despite the humidity.