A few days ago, newspapers greeted us with full page ads all trying to outdo each other in wishing the PM on his birthday. We also watched lavish celebrations and wondered whether we were still a democracy—or whether we had quietly slipped into some ancient monarchy. Streets decorated, speeches thundered,…
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.
No One to Talk To..!
Many years ago, my secretary, who used to travel by the good old suburban trains of Mumbai, told me stories of the strange therapy sessions that happened on the rails. Total strangers, wedged together on a wooden bench, would whisper their deepest troubles. She once confessed to me that she…
Crossover Doctors..!
Let’s start with an imaginary neighbour of mine. One week she was treating patients with tiny sugar globules wrapped in tissue paper, the next she was prescribing antibiotics strong enough to bring down an elephant. “Dual practice,” she told me with a proud smile, “I’m both a homeopath and an…
We Didn’t Shake Hands, Ma..!
There was turmoil in the Mohan household the other evening. The kind that usually follows when cricket is discussed. Not because the TV set broke down during the Indo-Pak match, but because the Mohan parents discovered their two sons had just returned from playing cricket with the neighborhood bullies. “Playing…
The Lost Art of Small Talk..!
“Lovely weather we’re having, isn’t it?” There you go — I’ve just started a conversation that would have gone down well two decades ago. Today, if you try that line, the fellow beside you will either whip out his phone, pretend he’s late for a Zoom call, or worse, check…
A Reason for the Traffic Jam..!
It was just a month ago, I stood at the memorial of the Twin Towers in New York. People streamed in quietly, many carrying flowers, placing them tenderly over the engraved names of loved ones who had perished in that terrible massacre. Some knelt, some wept, some whispered prayers. And…
Don’t Associate With Them..!
A few years ago, I attended a function. The choir sang like angels, and the crowd applauded like fans at a cricket match. But suddenly I was shocked, because there, on stage, smiling like a movie star at a premiere, sat a bishop who had been removed from the church….
Wanted – A Statesman..!
Our political leaders in the ruling party are getting old, and soon we will need younger, dynamic ones to lead our country. But as I watch our netas thump their chests and roar into microphones, I feel like putting out an advertisement in the classifieds: “Wanted – A Statesman. Age…
Being Human yet Invisible…!
I opened the paper this morning and there it was—big, bold headlines telling me that Salman Khan had stretched his muscular arms all the way to Punjab. Not to beat up another villain, but to rescue flood victims. The details were all there like a movie poster: 25 boats dispatched,…
Being Your Own Doctor..!
Today’s headline in page fourteen of the Times of India screamed, ‘Many Indians are treating AI as a doctor. And turning critically ill’. I chuckled—and decided to bring three people out of my imagination, one, my neighbor Ramesh who actually announced his own funeral date! Let me explain. Ramesh had…
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.