Mainstream WeeklyPART II (Part I appeared as Why the RSS-BJP Juggernaut Needs a Political Seawall in the Dec 6, 2025 issue of Mainstream)
Hans ran and ran, past the fields of tulips and past the windmills. His small wooden shoes clicked and clacked against the brick road and kept his feet warm and dry from the sloshy mud and puddles. Hans was still running when he passed one of the many dykes. Something did not look right. Hans crept closer to the dyke to see. There, in the middle of the high stone wall, in a crack between the stone blocks, was a small hole. From the hole seeped a small trickle of water.
Hans knew that the water building up behind the great wall would push at the tiny hole until it became bigger and bigger. Soon it would let the sea come rushing through, washing away the town. Hans knew he had to do something. Thinking quickly, he stuck his fist into the hole, plugging it up.
While Hans stood at the leaking dyke with his fist stuck in the hole, his mother waited and worried. She did not know the trouble that her son had discovered. She did not know that he was stuck in the middle of a raging storm, soaked to the bone from the rain, and chilled through his wet clothes by the wild, whipping wind.