Monday farce: Left is right

An electric shock at the bath is not the best way to begin a Monday, but that's precisely what I had to endure as I stretched my right hand to the tap this morning. A few seconds later I stood, dripping on the bedroom floor with the dual knowledge that I'd received a nasty shock and screamed - not a term you would associate with a man.

Indignation at the way our rented house is wired aside, there was some irony as well. It was as if the gods were punishing my right hand, on World Left-Handers Day. Had I not committed various blasphemies for a left-hander in recent years? From deigning to shake hands with my right (as the world at large does), to eating with my right in temples where using your left is frowned upon. Indeed it occurs to me, you would have been 'punished' too if you're a lefty, for accepting to live in a right-handed world. Aren't shirt buttons, jeans zips, car doors, scissors - even guitars designed to the convenience of our heavily populated evil cousins?

When I become a dictator I shall abolish all right-handedness and even change our lexicon while I'm at it. In Hindi, the left hand is also known as Ulti haath, which translated means 'upside down'. In Kannada, the right hand is called Balagai, which literally means 'hand of strength'. My Ministry for Good Behaviour and Speech will have one John McEnroe as Chief Minister. The head of my Anti-Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances Bureau will be Jimi Hendrix. And I shall coerce Sourav Ganguly to be Minister for Diplomacy and Foreign Relations. You get the picture right? And finally, anyone who hasn't read Ursula K Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness will be punished!