Life-lessons from the insect world

Spring arrived in the northern hemisphere some days ago and in India, it already feels like summer. With summer, come insect and reptilian house-guests who are rarely welcome. 

If you know me, you know that I am afraid of and repulsed by almost all members of the animal kingdom, large and tiny. The tiniest challenge my wish to be a non-violent being and yes, I am ashamed of this so I pray for them to be liberated or born into a happier existence next time. None of this stops me from reflecting on the many things there are to learn from the world of insects. Here are some life-lessons insects teach me, that I have learned imperfectly. 

(And for my mistakes and anything that gives offence, I apologise in advance to anyone who feels hurt.)

Illinois, where I studied, is home to Caterpillar, which like BHEL in India, makes 'earthmoving' machinery. The insect, caterpillar, while regarded an agricultural pest, also fertilises the soil with its droppings. The lesson is: do your part, whatever it ends up being. Your contribution will surprise you! 

The grossest form of insect life that intersects with our days are arguably lice. Schoolchildren and their parents are intimate with the menace of lice infestations. I have heard that there is even a saying that lice climb seven beds, meaning they will infest seven people before they are done. In other words, 'climb every mountain' or leave no stone unturned. Do everything you can to achieve your purpose. 

Ants work very hard and they seem to work non-stop. They also work together with other ants. My instinct is to do things by myself and I am impatient with others but ants underscore an important truth--working together, steadily and in a disciplined way, we achieve more than we can alone. Teamwork is a good thing! 

"We will destroy this wall!" No one ever read a termite declaration to this effect but over a period of time, they eat into the core of the most solid structures. For all of us interested in social change, they should be an inspiration. Day by day, without measuring and obsessing over results, they smash structures and barricades decisively. 

Patience is what spiders are famous for, as the nursery rhyme hero, Insy-Winsy reminds us. Everytime its web is washed away by rain, it starts over. The spider weaves. It rains. It weaves to build again. It does not matter if what you build is washed away; it matters that you patiently pick yourself up and start over. 

Much reviled, cockroaches exemplify resilience. As a child I heard that cockroaches lived very long and were the only creatures that could survive an atomic bomb attack. I don't know if that is true but it is an impressive introduction! Life is going to throw multiple challenges at us. How do we get past each one and keep going? That is what living is about. 

We first learn the word ‘metamorphosis’ when we learn about the life-cycle of the caterpillar and the butterfly. The butterfly reminds us that metamorphosis is the journey--for us and for the world around us. Everything changes. Everything must change. Everything will change. And it will be the change towards which we work. 

Very simply, insects teach us that the scale of our effort is immaterial because everything counts if we persist together everyday, purposefully, meticulously, patiently, resiliently, untiringly and together.

What would Gandhi do?

 Vijayadashami and Gandhi Jayanti falling on the same date must have some cosmic significance, especially for those of us who would like to be useful in the world!

Coincidentally, I finished reading Krishna Kumar's wonderful novel, "Thank you, Gandhi" yesterday. As a person who aspires to be a peace educator, Professor Krishna Kumar is an educationist whose writing and views I have long sought out. This book is a departure from what I have read of his work and it was a wonderful surprise.

Assailed with all the disappointments and anxieties engendered by the world we now live in, he does not rant. Artfully, he uses fiction to say the things many of us would like to say. The device he uses is so simple that reviewers have assumes he is writing about himself and his friend--and perhaps this is the case--but that is arguably just their assumption. 

The protagonist is left a series of files written by his childhood friend who has died, asking that he complete this book project. The notes themselves are reflections on a changing India written by a bureaucrat who has served over decades of rapid change. This friend sees the change, as many of us do, as being a deterioration in values and political culture, barely mitigated by an even-handed improvement in quality of life. He reads about Gandhi and he reads Gandhi and he converses with Gandhi to try and make sense of this world. 

The Union Carbide factory leak looms large because the friend was an MP IAS officer and served in Bhopal in the relief work at the time. But his notes also mention the epidemics of caste-based killings, gang-rapes and lynchings that go unheeded. 

I found it very difficult to read at a stretch the first 40-50 pages, which are the protagonist's contextual account. We might say the prose is triggering; more precisely, it was actually both gut-wrenching and a relief to find that someone had written down words that we now find ever-harder to utter. We are surrounded by sycophantic commentary, self-congratulatory self-promotion and lies. No one seems to remember history. Hardly anyone is able to ask questions. Some who do are punished for it. Others are barely heard. It was so hard to see all the things that I feel written down and printed. Even as I read, I felt fear for the author. 

But the use of fiction blunts the sharp edge just enough as the book oscillates gently between reminiscence, relatively distant history (which actually is not that remote, given the public health impact of the Bhopal gas leak lingers) and biting comment on our times. 

The discussion of Gandhi's ideas, Gandhi's relevance and the conversations with Gandhi take forward in some ways what my cousin Niranjan Ramakrishnan wrote about in his book, "Reading Gandhi in the 21st Century" and what Rajmohan Gandhi writes about, especially in "Why Gandhi Matters." For most of us who grew up during or in the shadow of the Gandhi-Nehru era, this moment is especially baffling and it is challenging to find ways to be and act that feel true. This part of the book spoke to me less than the rest and I think it is because there were so many parallel conversations underway in my head. Perhaps I will come back to this at another time. 

Page 37

The book works the way I have always imagined that many of Professor Krishna Kumar's classes do--starting with the idea of the journey he wants to facilitate, raising questions, reflecting honestly, enabling a variety of perspectives to be explored and articulated and not necessarily with a pat conclusion. Learning is a journey. Political action is a journey. And both can be done creatively. I will just close by saying, "Thank you for writing this book!" 

Dialogue is an all-weather bridge

I am mirroring here a post that has been brewing since May 20205 and that I just posted on another blog.

***

Impossible divide, imperative dialogue

This piece originated in online conversations with friends on both sides of the India-Pakistan border in May 2025. It took me months to write it—because it was personal, because it was challenging, because of the demands of everyday life. It is still not everything I would want it to be. Embracing its imperfections, I am posting it today as a reflection and a prayer for peace on International Day of Peace.

***

Months after hostilities were paused/ ceased, India and Pakistan remain tiptoed on a cliff’s edge. There is no peace.

There is no peace despite decades of official and non-official, public and back-channel, attempts to talk. Every single time we have got the most well-meaning Indians and Pakistanis into a room, over a few days of discussion, familiar lines appear between us. For Pakistanis, this line reads “Kashmir” and for Indians, it reads “terrorism.”

The Kashmir line

Pakistan’s initial national imagining was based on a vision that included Kashmir and the ideology behind this was the “Two Nation Theory”—an understanding of social relations in the region that saw Hindus and Muslims as two nations rather than religious communities. As each nation seeks statehood so that their peoples might be sovereign and self-governing, so must Hindus and Muslims. The Indian freedom movement—dominated by (upper class, upper caste) Hindus—was seen as essentially seeking a Hindu state, and the corollary was that Muslims—that is, Muslim-majority regions—must have their own. (This was a view shared by the Dravidian movement, incidentally, which has since found a way to live with and within the Indian state.)

For Indians, Muslim-majority Kashmir was made out to exemplify the refutation of the “Two Nation Theory.” If the Muslims of Kashmir were voting regularly and settling in other parts of India, they were said to be voting with their feet to be a part of the secular Indian state—meeting plebiscitary conditions. The flaw with this logic was of course, that successive elections in Kashmir were allegedly rigged and elected governments were overthrown by the central government through constitutional interventions. This is often listed as the cause for the insurgent movements in Kashmir since 1989. Furthermore, the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019 removed any semblance of regional autonomy, forcing the integration of a special status accession into the Indian/Hindu mainstream. 

Many now recognise that there are three points of view that should be represented at any Kashmiri peace table—Indian, Pakistani and most essentially, Kashmiri— but this is still far from a mainstream position. In Pakistan, the assumption is that the Pakistani and Kashmiri positions are the same, and in India, it is that the Kashmiri position must be subsumed within an Indian one. For Pakistan, there is only one negotiation on Kashmir, and that is a bilateral, inter-state negotiation. For India, there is only one negotiation and that is an internal negotiation which, depending on your politics, is either a multi-stakeholder dialogue or an internal security problem. What Kashmiris think is rarely considered, and if it is brought up, the question becomes: who will legitimately speak for (which) Kashmiris.

In almost eight decades, we have not built a road between these perspectives on “Kashmir.”

The terrorism line

For Indians, Kashmir is not the main issue between India and Pakistan. The main issue is “cross-border terrorism.” In the Home Ministry’s annual report to Parliament, four types of internal security threats are described, each as confined to one geographic region. One of these is “cross-border terrorism in Kashmir.”

For decades, the government of India has squarely accused the Pakistani government, specifically the Army and intelligence services, of fuelling, funding, training and supporting logistically, militant operations in Kashmir. In a political culture where foreign policy is securitised, information is relatively scarce and any discussions are opaque. Furthermore, the public is inclined to believe the government. After the 2008 Mumbai attack which played out live on television screens, this inclination has taken further root. The government of that time chose the diplomatic route, presenting dossiers of evidence to the Pakistani side. In multiple attacks since then, it has become easier for the Indian public to believe in the Pakistani ‘hand.’ In April-May 2025, it was not just hawkish politicians who were speaking about Pakistani support for cross-border infiltration and violent activity by militants, it was also those otherwise critical of Indian government policy and actions.

Like their Indian counterparts, Pakistani leaders make belligerent statements from time to time, primarily intended for a domestic audience, and these statements reinforce the Indian public’s faith in Indian government statements. The Indian government contends that as long as Pakistan supports cross-border terror, it is not possible to hold any talks. (In any case, in the Indian view, Pakistan has no locus standi on the question of Kashmir which it insists is an internal problem.)

Pakistanis point out, rightly, that they have also been victims of terrorist attacks, asking, “How can you accuse us of supporting terrorists when they are also attacking us?” This is correct. It is true that since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, Pakistanis have experienced countless small and large attacks by armed groups. Pakistan has also lost its leaders to violence by militant groups. In addition, people in their border areas have been caught in the cross-fire of others’ wars with drone attacks in civilian areas. It is true that the Pakistani public has been a victim, as much as the Indian public has.

However, the Indian accusation pertains not to the people of Pakistan but to the Pakistani military. Even if the civilian rulers of Pakistan are unaware and unable to stop them, this accusation makes them complicit. Given that neither ordinary Pakistanis nor ordinary Indians are privy to “proof” and we both live in a time of obfuscation and disinformation, we are left to choose, purely emotionally, what we want to believe. Or, at best, with several questions and no hope of finding definitive answers.

I struggle with this question of terrorism for many reasons. Even a lifetime of scepticism about government claims leaves me wondering about these accusations. Can there be smoke without fire, one wonders? The accusations of interference through support for insurgents are made on both sides—Pakistanis supporting Kashmiri groups (or now, supporting groups that are affiliated to transnational networks but operating in Kashmir and elsewhere in India) and Indians supporting Baloch groups.

All states survive through the use not just of force within and without, but a host of covert activities—espionage, surveillance, political interference—that each considers its legitimate right to security. Transparency is inimical to the success of these activities so we know but we never have proof. Those who challenge the idea that such activities are essential are dismissed as naïve and those who demand accountability for them are branded treacherous. Citizens learn to survive through silence and therefore, tacit consent for such undertakings. Thickening smoke and smouldering fire obscure thinking.

Can we cross these lines to sit and talk?

For peace activists, this is a very challenging situation.

Talking—via official and unofficial talks, through confidence-building dialogue—is an expression of faith. You cannot speak with someone you demonise (and until you speak with them, you will demonise them!). Statements by Pakistani civilian and military leaders (such as this one and this one) that anticipate and affirm a long-term “enmity” with India reinforce Indian accusations. But the rhetoric of Indian leaders too, is now intemperate—sometimes in the tone of streetside gang war–and my friends on the other side of the border must have exactly the same questions.

Every time the two governments descend into the cesspit of mutual vilification, it is harder for ordinary people to make the simple point that they would like to hear the other side’s story. In informal gatherings—such as university campuses outside the region or third-party convenings on other matters—Indians and Pakistanis may bond over a host of questions and they may even have one-on-one conversations that cross these lines. However, the official vilification works as a taboo, imposing a cost on those who will publicly push it aside and ask for talks. For most, the prospect of being accused of betraying our countries simply by asking questions or seeking to learn is an impossible cost to bear.

Working on peace means you cannot work on partial truths. Even if Pakistani agencies are supporting violent activities across the border in India, that is one part of the truth. There is also the Indian state’s culpability in creating conditions that facilitate such activity, most notably through rigged elections and interference in the functioning of governments. Making Kashmir a symbol of something in the idea of India has made Kashmiris mere instruments of geopolitics. Dialogue depends on listening to and acknowledging all these truths which must coexist in our heads and collective conscience, even as they coexist in reality.

But the absence of transparency in the security sector means that on both sides, we are dependent on a state that says “Trust us” but we really can’t. Whose information will we then trust? Who is telling us the truth? What is truth and what is the truth in this situation and what is each person’s truth? Whose truth matters more? Dialogue for peace involves finding a way through all this, but that is easier said than done.

The murky adage, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” lends to violence a romantic and hopeful glow it does not deserve. When Indians raise the question of cross-border terrorism, the answer cannot be, “But they are fighting for freedom, do you not see that?” It has to be, “This method is wrong and whoever is endorsing and supporting it, is wrong too.” Yes, a non-violent fight against a militarised state seems hopeless, but attacks like Pahalgam (and the Indian Parliament attack in 2001, Sarojini Nagar bombing in 2005 and the 26/11 Mumbai attack, to list a few) just diminish the legitimacy of whatever cause is being espoused. The suspicion that they are being backed by a state makes the cause too seem spurious. I would even say it obfuscates the original cause almost entirely.

When I raise the issue of arbitrary violence, regardless of the perpetrator, such violence is wrong. It cannot be perceived as correct in one circumstance and as wrong in another. When the Indian state absolves the lynching of minority citizens by ignoring it and focusing attention on irrelevant detail (“were they really eating beef?” or “what is the real meaning of this social media post?”), it is also wrong. When the state enables violence against the citizens of another country, it is wrong. The wrongness of violence is the one thing that is crystal clear and unchanging.

Dialogue despite the dividing lines

To reach this clarity, it is important that we are able to sit and listen fully and openly to each other’s accusations. We need to be able to sit and listen to each other without flinching and jumping up defensively. It is not necessary to counter each statement with contestation (“you are wrong”) or contingency (“but…”). Just as we place our weapons outside the door of the negotiating room, we must place all our issues—offensive, bleeding, spurious, inflammatory, as they may seem to us—on the table. That airing is a prerequisite for peace.

This is why dialogue, at multiple levels, is important. We cannot stop talking, no matter what. And if symbolically, official dialogue stops, it is imperative that other tracks continue to communicate. The maintenance of bridges becomes even more critical in bad weather.

Two kinds of behaviour further challenge the process of dialogue. The first is the pressure to perform. There are invisible models of how to be—what a true peace-lover would say, or the correct line for a “progressive,” or expressions of genuine patriotism—that lurk within and without us, making it hard for us to open our hearts and minds to learn and reflect and grow. Conformity and performance are easy and we make it hard for each other to remain true to the messiness of inner transformation which is the hallmark of peace-making. The work of peace is the work of inner transformation leading to outer change. It is the work of the satyagrahi—a person whose integrity and values are strong, who is not easily swayed by emotion or passion and who has the discipline to do what is right.

The second is the insistence on perfect consonance. When the expectation in a room is that everyone will agree to exactly the same things, dialogue is doomed. It used to be the habit that when one bought or stitched clothes for a growing child, one added room for alterations that would accommodate their growth. Similarly, peace processes, both official and non-official, must build in rooms for disagreement and dissent so that one departure, one edit suggestion or one question cannot derail the broader work. Language matters but semantics must not sideline what we need to say to each other. We must embrace the idea that talking peace takes time and this is because we need to be willing to pause, listen, reflect and either shift our “text” or find a space for the difference of opinion without stopping the process altogether. We are building peace, not a house of cards.

I want to talk peace. All summer, I struggled with this practical, political question–how can we bring Kashmir and cross-border terrorism into one dialogue, where raising one question is not to deny the validity of the other concern. I want a cessation of the violence that only hurts the innocent. I dream of a time when militarised borders will not divide peoples who share so much. I wonder what it means to celebrate our nation-state collectives, if we are not free from this legacy of carefully nurtured mutual enmity, so that we can actually nurture our own talents and enjoy the rewards of our daily labour, without fear or want. To be free, truly free, we must open our hearts and minds and speak freely with each other. We must be at peace.

Finding Words for Peace in a Season of War

 And so it has happened.

***

The terrorist attack targeting tourists in Pahalgam lifted the curtain on an eager chorus ready with war cries. Night after night in television studios and on location, they told us about the perfidy of the other side and whipped themselves into a vengeful frenzy, hoping that we would join them. They shouted so every household in the nation could hear them.

Beyond them, an enigmatic government escalated diplomatic measures, such as suspending the Indus Waters Treaty and cancelling visas, and spoke about giving the armed forces operational freedom.

***

Those of us that have spent our lives talking about peace and working towards it, one small task at a time, have watched in horror. We have preached to the choir of our friends and associates—because that is the extent of our reach. We have sat with our words because we have nowhere to put them. Our voices reach no one. We have reflected on how much agency and voice we have lost in the last decade or so. The sense of futility has equalled the horror felt as war-mongering voices have become louder.

***

On April 30, 2025, I wrote on Facebook:

Terror, or indeed any violence, by any actor, state or non-state, is wrong and its consequences are always tragic. The tragedy begins with its immediate victims, lingers in the vengeful anger we feed as we perform outrage and finally, decimates our own humanity--our ability to feel for others and our ability to think.

We can close the door on this by pausing. Feel deeply, but do not equate grief and solidarity with vengeance. Perform grief with care--for those directly hurt, for those indirectly affected. Perform care with thoughtfulness--that considers consequences, that considers who will pay the cost of what you demand, that considers the means more important than the ends.

Responding to violence with violence is always wrong. It always feels like it's now too late for pause, for patience or for dialogue, but it never is. When the chorus mounts, peace seems to be the talk of the weak and witless. But it is when the crisis is most acute that it is time to breathe. It is time to maintain balance. Rising vengefulness is a sign that one is becoming the other, or more truthfully, a sign that one IS the other.

At a time when I feel less confident in my agency as a citizen, I am writing this because my silence would be my failure.

It is Akshaya Tritiyai and I wish you peace. May peace abound--in our thoughts, in our lives and in the world!

***

Today, Indian cities will carry out civil defence drills with air raid sirens and sheltering. For people my age and older, this is reminiscent immediately of 1971.

We shifted school buildings, had two drills a day, ducked under tables, had blackout paper on our windows.

One evening, my father stepped out just before the air raid signal went out. He was on the road when there was a fly-by of Pakistani aircraft. We ran from our flat to our neighbours’ flat to shelter together with them—my great-grandmother, my cousin, my mother, my 1-year-old sister and I. My paternal grandmother came to stay in the middle of the fortnight long war and told us stories to keep us occupied during the blackout.

But nothing ever removed for me the memory of loss. I went to a school where students and teachers alike came from military households. Twice or thrice a day, we would hear announcements about fathers and husbands who had fallen. Those moments of silence remain with me today. They keep me here, writing, so there is no silence about war.

***

These disjointed pieces of writing are what I can manage today, like stuffing paper into the cracks in a crumbling wall, hoping to keep the wind and water out. Not doing even this is worse than its pointlessness.

***

When civilians glorify the military and the sacrifices of those who serve, they also do them a disservice. There is always glory in doing what you have assumed as your duty and there is satisfaction in doing what you think is right. However, when those of us who do not serve, stop at vacuous praise and romanticising militarism, we also abdicate our duty as the people they defend. It is their job to defend and protect. It is our job to protect them by practising restraint, by resisting the temptation to join a vengeful chorus, by holding our leaders accountable for trying every measure and by making sure, their blood is not shed in order to satisfy our egos. The military’s job is to protect us and it is our job to protect them from our own vengeful bloodlust or our leaders’ egotistical vision. Military options should be the last option. The very last option.

In security decision-making, there is little transparency and therefore, there is no accountability. Are we sure that every other option has been exercised?

Most important, have we insisted that every other option has been tried?

***

The problem with terrorism is that it tempts you to insist that only a violent response will satisfy. The truth is we have no patience for the alternative—which short-term may be to press on diplomatically and long-term to understand the appeal it holds. We are also defenceless against those who will goad us into demanding violent reprisal. That chorus is so loud that it sounds like a universal demand. For governments, a violent response is an easy simulation of action—someone else carries it out and pays and you get to say you did this. But nothing really changes.

The fog of war distorts our knowledge about what is going on. Who struck whom? Did they actually hit their targets? Did they hit something else? Were they felled or did they make it back? Very quickly we do not know. And we do not ask because asking is not allowed in times of war (and let’s face it, now also in times of no-war).

The fog of war also obfuscates our real reasons and agendas. Everywhere.

The real impact of this surreal time is on people. Soldiers who die. Families on the border. Families of soldiers. What looks glorious and glamorous at a safe distance is actually a lifetime of grief (mixed with pride for military families), displacement, disruption, disability and a struggle for those at the epicentre.

I am not belittling this sacrifice. I am questioning why we let it happen if there is even a chance it could be avoided.

***

Even when there is no war, life in the border areas is war-like. Over the years, we have seen and read countless reports of schoolchildren playing cricket and landing on mines. We have heard about the military presence in small towns, taking over schools or subjecting people to searches. And yes, there is always a justification for all this.

But really, honestly, truly, is there?

***

I live two lives that are apparently incompatible.

I am a peacenik, peace activist (whatever activist means), pacifist, peace educator—one of those people—you pick your word. In a small measure, this is because even in everyday life, I hate shouting and confrontation. Everyone should just get along and leave me alone. In a large measure, this is because I cannot separate violence and conflict and war from their dehumanising and cruel consequences. This is what is foremost in my eyes. This is who I have always been.

I am also a security studies scholar. This means my professional credibility depends on being and sounding like a peer group of (mostly) men--some of them my friends--who sit in suits, know everything (and everyone) and having spoken of all they know, are convinced of the rationale for war. Decisive action, forceful responses, cool reasoning, realist thinking—all of which add up to understanding and justifying the exercise of coercive power. It takes a generous and confident display of testosterone-driven aggression. 

I came to this field because I wanted to be a more effective advocate for peace. I respect my colleagues for how much they know and for their integrity in speaking their minds. But their conclusions have never become my truth.

***

There is a gender dimension to war. It should be obvious but I will state the obvious here.

Those who were shot in Pahalgam were men. Those who shot them were men. Those who shouted in the TV studios were mostly men. Those who sat in those televised but secret official meetings were mostly men. Those whose op-eds got media space were mostly men spelling out the arguments for a ‘forceful response’ and the very few voices I read calling for restraint were mostly those of women. Those who led the diplomatic effort and pronounced it successful (but still not successful enough to prevent war) were mostly men. Those soldiers who will die in the fighting between the two countries will mostly be men.

Those who were bereaved in Pahalgam were women. Those who are displaced or left behind by war are mostly women and children. Those who are rarely seen as experts or asked about what they think are these women who must live and rebuild their lives after men have decided.

Those who are invisible in all of this are sexual minorities and non-binary persons. They don’t even exist and therefore, need neither consideration nor voice nor protection.

***

On another note, in every ‘ordinary person’ interview on TV, that person has asked for peace and normalcy. Returning to the studio, this has strangely transformed into a rationale for calling for war. Anchors have pranced about exultantly and triumphantly telling us about how we have diminished our neighbour and frightened them and created anxiety.

***

It is in times of crisis that one must stop and breathe and wait. This is the advice one gets for one’s personal life. Don’t make big decisions in times of trauma. This should apply even more to nation-states because the stakes are so much higher. But it does not.

***

Air strikes have already happened and spin has already obfuscated fact. This writing is too little, too late and I know that hardly anyone will read it. But write, I must. When we are all dust and ashes, and perhaps, atomic waste, somewhere in the universe, someone will know—she did what she knew.