Some nights ago I received a call from an old childhood friend of mine. “How’s your family?” I asked him after some time. “They’re fine Bob,” he said, “My wife still teaches and my two sons are working!” “And your dad and mom?” There was silence and I repeated the…
Robert Clements is a journalist and newspaper columnist. With an estimated 6 million readership, his column, Bob’s Banter is published in over 30 newspapers and magazines in nearly every state in India, as well as in the top newspapers of Bangladesh, London and Dubai and is also translated into Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu.
Who’s Afraid of Afghanistan..!
“Come on China, come on Pakistan, we’re going to discuss Afghanistan!” “Why should we come?” snigger the two countries as they slither away from the National Security Advisor’s meet. The others comprising India, Russia and Russia’s little breakaway states went ahead and had their meet, finally telling the Afghani’s in…
Bottled Love..!
Cheap bottle, filled with cheap liquor, sat on a table in a cheap looking bar, looking craftily at a bedraggled man hunched in front. “Cheers!” said the cheap bottle of yellow fire. “Hic,” said the man. “Burp, hic, burp, slurp!” “Enjoying me huh?” asked the bottle sensuously. “You swine!” said…
His Four Wives..!
Was walking yesterday with a friend who had just undergone a bypass; he looked a little despondent. “When I was in the hospital Bob,” he said turning ashen, “I suddenly realized that all that I had worked for and striven to get I would not be able to take with…
Keep The Fizz Going..!
Many authors have a brilliant idea, start a book and soon stop writing as the initial enthusiasm fades! Or someone elected a leader starts work with passion and then boredom or the lack of motivation sets in. Even we, often we are very excited when given a new task, a…
The Teakwood Box..!
“Dad?” asked my elder one, “what’s happened to the friend you used to be quite fond of, the one who was like a brother to you?” “We’ve fallen apart!” I said gruffly. “And you never tried to repair the relationship?” she asked. “I did,” I said, “but I don’t think…
Using the Whip..!
“Look at your church!” non-Christian friends cry out, “Is there anything inside different from what is happening outside? Your priests grab land, grab women, grab power, and you try to tell us you have something better than we have?” I look at the newspaper they hold out to me, “Bishop…
Stop this Civil War..!
Without a war cry or formal declaration, a new civil war rages, and if not arrested immediately will have disastrous consequences and nearly did in the confrontation between Assam and it’s neighboring state of Mizoram, where civilians were not the only casualty, but policemen killed by policemen! Unheard off, right?…
Hugging Our Fear..!
No, no! I’m not talking of the political hugs being given worldwide, even to the Pope by a political leader! But years ago I spent some of my evenings with a friend who had a kidney problem. He had just got out of dialysis with a new donated kidney which…
A Statue Bigger than Liberty..!
There was a tapping on my window. It was midnight, and cold in the New York apartment where I was living. “Who’s that?” I asked petrified. You don’t get a tapping when you are so many floors up. I gently pushed the glass pane up, and saw a huge hand,…
Robert Clements is a newspaper columnist and writes a daily column, which has graced the pages of over 60 newspapers and magazines, from a daily column in the Khaleej Times, Dubai, the Morning Star, London, and in nearly every state in India, from The Statesman in Kolkata, to the Kashmir Times in Kashmir to the Trinity Mirror in Chennai.