What the stars foretell, believe it or not

I recently suggested to a friend who freelances to write about the fortunetellers in Beijing. But she said that it is not a science, and she should not be propagating such falsehoods. That's true, but maybe I didn't communicate properly what I meant, which was to expose the field for what it is. The writer Manto, who is symbolic of the undivided India of our dreams, once said: "If you find my stories dirty, the society you are living in is dirty".

Maybe there are greater ills in society, though, than someone minting money by "predicting "what lies ahead of you in your career or love life. Unless one takes fortunetellers too seriously, they can actually be quite entertaining. Well, I should know, because I come from a country where many of us check our horoscope more than the weather forecast before stepping out. If it warns of a possible accident that day, we still venture out, but are extra careful. It's always good to be forewarned, isn't it? They don't offer astrology as a course in some Indian universities for nothing.

When I was a senior in primary school, one of my classmates checked my palm and told me I'd die in an air crash. I cried for a whole day, and my parents had a tough time convincing me that palm-reading is not a science I should believe in. And yet, when I once showed my dad how my horoscope predicted I would meet with an accident that day, he was worried every time I stepped outside.