Disclaimer: The title is nothing more than an obscure pun on Ramar Sethu. It does not intend to express any opinion on the origins of the legendary god king who dumped his wife in the forest. It also does not express any political opinion on the construction company that built Adam’s Bridge.
So some shifting sand shoals in between the Palk Strait and the Gulf of Mannar have paid heavy bribes to the Saffron brigade to whip up irrational fervour in their favour. Oh wait! That does not make sense.
So some issue has finally united the pro-Hindi BJP/VHP/North and the South by actually getting the northies to use a Tamil word other than “Idli”, “Dosa” or “Samburr”, namely Ramar and not Rama. Oh wait! That’s irrelevant.
The ASI is a rabid organization whose only aim is to destroy ancient religious monuments and hurt people’s sentiments. No wait. That does not make sense too. Because it also seems to describe the BJP and VHP circa 1992.
So let’s first state the bleeding obvious in terms of opposing viewpoints and get that out of the way.
#1 The Ramayana is a glorious and wonderful myth that has inspired billons, but must not get in the way of industrial progress by irrationally insisting that ships must waste fuel going all the way around Lanka. A 650 km reduction in a large ship’s travel distance is absolutely worth hurting 800 million people’s sentiments for.
#2 The Ramayana is, Inshallah, Gospel truth and it makes us Sikh to think that Baha’i destroying Adam’s bridge, we will, in Jew time, all reach Naraka/hell. Let us Buddha matter to rest by leaving it alone, shall we?
#3 Amidst all this din, the real social and environmental concerns about the Sethusamudram project are lost. Since any and all forms of industrialization are attempts to destroy the fisherman’s way of life, we must not ignore this.
But since all the above 3 viewpoints are at the vertices of a really large equilateral triangle of uncompromising dogma, let us simply ditch them altogether and come up with something new. Too many people are talking too much sense, which explains why nobody is listening. But what if we synthesized a new form of fuzzy gilma logic from this morass?
I say, let’s simply admit that the bridge was built by an army of muscular simians a few thousand years ago. But because of the uneven nature of the construction materials (what with squirrels offering to bring miniscule pieces etc), the Ramar Sethu is today nothing more than shifting sand shoals. But today’s Ravana is the ten-headed monster of oil-dependence who is holding the Sita of our foreign currency reserves hostage. So metaphorically, the Ram of today must build a water bridge over the shoals of sand and neutralize Ravana by reducing ship fuel consumption. And to completely kill Ravana, we must start to use non-hydrocarbon powered sailing boats and this way, even the environmentalists are kept happy.
No wait. Lets take this to this logical conclusion. This is also the same bridge that Adam crossed with stolen apple in hand (which explains its alternative name). Sita then happened to pluck this very apple from its hiding place and munch while contemplating about her hubby beloved. And this explains why Rama put her through the Agni test. It was, afterall, the fruit of temptation.
So there. When all of you are done shouting at each other about this issue, ponder a little bit about my recommendation. It does not make any sense, and therefore it should be perfectly palatable to all parties involved.
Cross-posted from Mutiny.in
Doing Jalsa & Showing Jilpa 
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