Kallola

Deccan Herald, Sunday Herald. Cover story. Oct 16, 2011. http://www.deccanherald.com/content/198143/sense-sensibility.html The foundation of a ‘Welfare State’ has been most magnificently illustrated in Amish’s epic debut novel, The Immortals of Meluha . Its governance rests on the instruction of ‘give and give’, where each citizen is, by law, duty-bound to always do for the other. With everything taken care of for your self by the next person, no one is left wanting. Each citizen partakes, automatically, of a generous society that cares equally for its upkeep as it does for the sentiments of each other. Equal opportunity and abundance of resources and goodwill are a natural consequence and the state prospers under a moral framework poised on ethics and righteousness. By law. An ideal citizenry, in and of an ideal society. The Indian sentiment reveres it as Ram Rajya – the quintessence of ‘truth, tranquillity and peace’. Agencies of administration call it ‘Ideal State’ – a seemingl...