Games people play

Title: PolyTicks, DeMockrazy & Mumbo Jumbo: Babus, Mantris & Netas (Un)making Our Nation

Author: Avay Shukla

Publisher: AuthorsUpFront/ Paranjoy Guha Thakurta

Year of republication: 2026

This book of mine, containing political satire lampooning our social peccadilloes and pretences, was first published by Pippa Ran Books and Media in 2020. It has now been republished by Author’s Upfront/ Paranjoy Thakurta this year.

I am reposting this brief introduction for the benefit (or mortification, as the case may be!) of those readers who have discovered me after 2020. Six years is almost a generational span in today’s fast-paced world, where one must register one’s presence on social media every day lest one be consigned to internet oblivion.

The sixty-odd pieces in this book cover subjects as varied as high society dinners, judicial oddities, the arcane mumbo jumbo of economics, politicians and their misdeeds, social peccadilloes, the absurdities of governmental policies, the inanities of our media and television channels, and much more. Rarely, however, is there a frontal assault: the battle is waged with humour, irony and satire; the intent is both to inform and amuse.

The book has a superb preface by the evergreen Shashi Tharoor, and I cannot blow my own trumpet better than by quoting from it:

'Avay Shukla is no ordinary blogger. He is a former senior bureaucrat… now retired but armed with nearly four decades of experience administering the complexities of Indian governance. He was clearly no ordinary bureaucrat either, for he wields an incisive pen, a highly effective vocabulary, and a style so original, so witty and often so devastating that his file notations must have been classics in their own right.

'Every subject is tackled with a command of both subject and language that makes his conclusions impossible to resist… Some of his writing is satirical, but much of it is infused with a burning passion for issues that matter in India, tinged perhaps with the disillusionment of one who has seen it all and found it wanting.

'The talent for brevity makes him the ideal blogger — somebody who has something to say, and does so readably and pithily… I hope Avay Shukla’s work finds the wide and discerning readership it deserves, well beyond the transience of its original medium in cyberspace.'

The book has merited a number of reviews, and I am happy to share one of them, by Jawhar Sircar, IAS (retd) and former MP of the Trinamool Congress. Jawhar is a batchmate and, even otherwise, a kindred soul. Here are excerpts from the review, published in the Statesman Literary Review:

'Few bureaucrats are endowed with a great sense of humour, or else they would not be bureaucrats in the first place. A profession that claims to be the world’s second oldest surely lacks the excitement of the first. There are, however, certain similarities, and Avay Shukla’s PolyTicks, DeMockrazy & Mumbo Jumbo lifts the hemline to reveal saucy bits, but leaves it to the reader to fantasise.

'We benefit from his insider’s ringside views about "babus, mantris and netas (un)making our nation". His wit has surely not deserted him even after cohabiting for thirty-five long years with dull, dusty and musty files. Behind his satire and flippant delivery, however, he displays utter seriousness with facts and figures, as is expected from a senior administrator.

'Shukla’s blog, View From (Greater) Kailash, is immensely popular among his former colleagues and a large band of other readers. They enjoy his flippantly serious dissection of earth-shaking problems and eagerly await their weekly fix. One is reminded of R.K. Laxman’s apparently innocent yet sarcasm-laden gaze as he spoke for the common man, whose one-liners were more devastating than gnashing one’s teeth or tearing precious hair. Most of his 58 articles tackle one problem at a time, and he keeps smiling even as he rips through its abdomen for the world to see.

'Let us sample his fare. Discussing the growing trust deficit, his opening comments are: "Many decades ago, when I was growing up in a simpler era, crooked people were called cheats, not 'ethically challenged'; when a 'face lift' was generally given to a building, not to a visage ravaged by time; when 'silicone valley' was understood to refer to Pamela Anderson’s cleavage, not to a tech wonderland, it was easy to have trust in people or things. The only objects that were universally not trusted were politicians, bureaucrats and shopkeepers — something, by the way, which holds good today".

'He then plunges into the serious business of analysing professions to show how "the trust factor gets more invidious" with time. "Beauty," he sighs, "does not lie in the eye of the beholder, it lies in the scalpel of the plastic surgeon".

'Delhi’s forever upwardly mobile society and its inescapable humbug are obvious targets of his acid tongue. He tries to figure out why nobody but a nobody ever arrives on time. "To do so ensures you will not be invited again (because) such aberrant behaviour reveals… that you are unemployed or (God forbid) retired, that you have no other place to visit that evening, that you are trying to save on your AC charges at home, that you are unimportant flotsam".

'After listing the mandatory fake behaviour one must endure while grinning throughout, Shukla explains that "exiting a South Delhi dinner is also an art which needs practice and panache". He suggests a good exit line: "Sorry, I must rush — Mr L.K. Advani is waiting for me." He has no qualms about this fast one, as "the poor guy has been waiting for years now for anyone to call on him".

'His remarkable wit notwithstanding, Shukla is deadly serious when examining issues ranging from police excesses and bureaucratic idiosyncrasies to citizenship disasters, smartphones, smart cities, and India’s rapidly plunging GDP and international ratings. He lays bare hard, internationally acknowledged data for readers to mull over, such as "1% of Indians own 55% of its wealth" or how "10% have collared 74%" of the country’s resources. Even these figures now require updating, as inequalities have worsened in just a few years.

'Berating regime-encouraged or caste-inspired agitations against certain films, often led by uninformed mobs, he laments that "all film production will cease". He rues: "Sunny Leone will regrettably go back to Canada, Amitabh Bachchan will become Baba Ramdev’s brand ambassador and Salman Khan will resume shooting blackbucks and chinkaras — which is a far safer occupation in India than shooting films".

'Lampooning Rahul Gandhi’s sudden hugging of the Prime Minister, Shukla comments: "I don’t think he was expecting any reciprocal cleaving to the bosom by the PM. It is well known that Mr Modi never, but never, hugs an Indian: his expansive embraces are reserved for foreign dignitaries, preferably on foreign soil".

'Shukla’s take on the IAS is equally merciless, comparing service years to Russian dogs who are "well fed but not allowed to bark". "When the muzzle comes off after 35 years," he notes, "they tend to be a rather chatty lot".

'In this apparently flippant vein, he tosses various personalities, social ailments and governmental goof-ups into the air. To Avay Shukla, there are no holy cows that cannot be tickled, despite the unpleasant consequences that have befallen outspoken critics who have gone too far. He is even-handed with all political parties and, if readers are curious how bureaucrats put up with the largely obnoxious political class, the answer is that they ‘faked it’ most of the time.

'Mercifully, Shukla does not pontificate or compare his bravado with the antics of the "lowly specimens" who populate the service after he left it. He laughs at himself all the time and that, by itself, proves that he has achieved something very difficult for most of his colleagues: to remain plainly human and simply normal.'

The paperback version of the book is available on Amazon

Views are personal. More of the writer's works can be read here

Avay Shukla is a retired IAS officer and author of Holy Cows and Loose Cannons — the Duffer Zone Chronicles and other works. He blogs at avayshukla.blogspot.com