Arguing India: India Sans Rants, Stereotypes, Simplicities

My Martin Luther King moment

2009-06-17T15:49:00.005-04:00

Many journalists have had their Obama moments, sometime last year. I had mine a couple of months back when Mike Patel – a prominent Indian American hotelier from Atlanta - called to tell me that he had lined up an exciting interview for me – with Martin Luther King III, who was in Delhi. It was a Sunday morning and I was somewhat zoombiesque having worked till late the previous night. However, the fact that I was actually coming face to face with what for me is history, had me in quite a tizzy and I was off for the meeting – at a Delhi hotel – within less than 15 minutes.
The fact that I was to meet the son of Martin Luther King Jr – so soon after Barack Obama becoming the prez of US of A made the Sunday even more special. It was a good interaction and MLK III took time in responding to all my questions at length – in fact we spoke for almost 45 mins and discussed wide ranging issues such as the challenges before the new Prez, poverty in America, civil rights, racial discrimination and Mahatma Gandhi’s thoughts and ideas which had so much influenced MLK’s father.
I’ve met and interviewed key Indian-American members on the Obama team – Vivek Kundra & Aneesh Chopra, before of course their current assignments. I’ve even interviewed Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal on phone – but MLK III, believe me, was a very special interview. And that despite the fact, that it wasn’t exactly the kind of interview that would make it very big on our business newspaper.
My President Clinton moment was somewhat unusual too – when I shook hands with him at the Chatwal wedding in Delhi some years ago. In fact, I’ve met another POTUS – Jimmy Carter – who was in Delhi for a Coke foundation event – there too was an Indian America link - Dr Sue Sehgal, Founder & President, Jimmy & Rosalynn Carter Partnership Foundation. None of us had got anywhere near President Bush when he visited Delhi – I guess now I’ll have to keep trying to get the big one – an interview with BHO himself!!!!

To Didimum, with love

2008-08-04T07:37:00.004-04:00

My grandmother Joyasree Sen would have been 100 if she was with us today. But that was not to be. This is a tribute to her, from a collection of essays that family members have put together for her 100th birthday.

She was a daughter of the Bengal Renaissance – with many of her family members, including grand-uncle Rabindranath Tagore, as the stalwarts who provided the intellectual ammunition that helped in creating modern Bengal as we know it today. Joyasree Sen (nee Tagore) was born and grew up in an era when history was being carved out in many different ways and the young Joyasree was influenced, we have heard, by various social and political movements of her times. She was sensitive to Communist thought and, not surprisingly, Brahmo philosophy had a very early and deep impact on her. But the biggest revolution in her life was probably standing up against the wishes of her genteel and well-known family members and marrying Kuloprasad Sen after a two-year romance, when she was just 19 years old.
Girls from the Tagore family – during Joyasree’s youth - were pioneers in women's education and socially ahead of their times. But not many of them, perhaps, had the courage to fall in love with someone who was not socially or economically their equal and marry despite family pressure. Joyasree and Kuloprasad’s wedding was historic, with Rabindranath as the Acharya or the Brahmo officiating priest. Later, he also composed and dedicated a poem to the two of them as a gift for their wedding anniversary when he was visiting them in Meerut. Joyasree did not show off about such things. As author Chitra Deb was to say in her book, Thakur Barir Andarmahal: “Joyasree is reticent in talking about herself”.

Joyasree’s striking good looks were visible even when she was a child and later in her youth she came to be known as one of the most beautiful ‘Tagore girls’. But quite characteristically, vanity was never one of her vices. It was probably her graceful demeanour, flawless and fair skin, stately bearing and classically well-etched out face that attracted the attention of one of the best-known painters of her times – Nandalal Bose. Joyasree was to be the muse for one of his paintings, where he depicted her as Goddess Saraswati playing the Veena. She was at that time a shy, young girl in her 20s and had patiently posed with her musical instrument, while the already well-known painter created his masterpiece.

Joyasree and Kuloprasad’s romance and their marriage was a fairytale that all of us have heard so much about. She was Mrs K.P. Sen and the significant other in the relationship – but in many areas, including running her household and bringing up her children, she also held her own. She was the mother for all seasons. Mother of triplets and her two elder sons, grandmother and great-grandmother – Ma, Dondon, Didun, Didimum and Boro-Didun! She was often found ministering to the needs of her children and grandchildren who were ill.

And even though, the story of Kuloprasad (Motru) and Joya (Joyasree) together has been told and retold, she lived for more than 20 years without her husband after his death, independently and mostly happy with herself. Though she started off by choosing to live alone because she wanted to keep Shesher Kobita the way he would have wanted it to be kept, she then went on to carve out her own independent existence, which was what Shesher Kobita then came to represent for most of us.

It would have taken great courage for an aged lady, who had never been alone before, to pick up the pieces and to carry on, which she did with great fortitude. She was the new age granny, who knew her Swiss chocolates and played a game of Scrabble with her youngest grand-daughter to chillout. She took all the relationships that her children and grandchildren entered into in her stride and was always understanding and supportive. She even advised a granddaughter to remain single because she felt that was best for her. A voracious reader who enjoyed Sidney Sheldon as much as she enjoyed Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay, Joyasree also deeply appreciated music and turned to Tagore's songs for peace and solace. She even selected her favourite songs, which were to be sung at the 'sokh sabha' after her death!

It was Joya’s garden which bloomed for all those 20 years after Motru passed away; it was her friends of all ages and social groups who visited her and kept her company. And, of course, it was her close and extended family members for whom she was a focal point. On her 95th birthday, when Srila (her eldest and favourite grand-daughter) had organized a birthday party, all of us who had gathered in Shantiniketan had made a wish – that we come together with her again on her 100th. Sadly, that was not to be and Joyasree fell short of a grand century by just three years. But we are now bringing out this book together – and we hope that she lives on in this effort that we are making together as a family, to remember her and capture our memories in print.

Ishani Duttagupta
New Delhi, June 2008

Gangotri: The old order and the new and an ode to immortality

2008-07-16T15:21:00.002-04:00

Each journey, for me, has a meaning – besides the beginning and the end. Each journey is life-changing, I think, in some way or the other. And this one of course, was a bit more than just another journey – it had many more layers of meaning tucked away into it than many others. So to start with, it was an adventure trip that I had been planning with my nephew Rahul for a couple of years. It was his first trip to the Himalayan heights and not surprisingly, he spent a lot of time chalking out the details and putting together his gear in London - where he lives. Well, Himalayan high altitude may be new for him, but camping and meticulously planning out the details of our trek to Gaumukh (3900 metres) and hopefully beyond that to Tapovan (4450 m) was something that he did with a lot of enthusiasm and ardour. In fact, I found myself increasingly caught up in his youthful enthusiasm as the dates neared.
As for me, Gaumukh was the pilgrimage that I was hoping would perhaps provide some of the answers that I have been seeking for a couple of years now. It was for me another mile on the journey that has taken me to Haridwar, Rishikesh, Pushkar, Benares, Dakshineshwar and Amritsar. Now that we’re back, and as I take stock of whether I have my answers or not, I know that I have some - while others still linger on. As another trip to the Himalayas – which for me is my spiritual home – this was long awaited. The rugged and extreme Garhwal was a region that I had not really encountered before, except for a much less intensive trek to Har-ki-dun. That too was a journey with depth - with a childhood friend who has always been there for me. Back to this one - perhaps it’s fitting that the toughest Himalayan terrain was left for what could well be my last trip to the rugged heights. The experience – in terms of geography and pushing the physical envelope was everything it promised to be. From Gangotri to Bhojbasa and further on to Gaumukh, the glacial snout which is considered by us Hindus as the birthplace of our holiest of holy rivers – the Bhagirathi and the Ganga – provides the most complete range of features that one can hope for. From glacier walks to crossing mountain streams and walking on scree and terminal moraine and even dodging rock falls – the scenery does not disappoint even for a moment. Besides the thrills, the landscape is intensely beautiful too – as one walks along the river bank with the stately Shivling and Bhagirathi peaks for company. There are the chir pine forests of Chirbasa and the Bhuj trees along the way. One runs into company in the form of the mountain goats or the Ber, as they are locally called.
But for me, the trip has taken me beyond just the Himalayan grandeur that was the passion of my youth. Rahul – who the hill folk have decided to call my ‘bachcha’ - much to my delight, did come up trumps. And even though I’m exhausted and can’t even imagine making it to Tapovan – he does it with a fair degree of skill and competence, despite his status of a first-timer. He has braved the steep gradient, the height gain, the lack of oxygen and of any defined paths. And most important, he has enjoyed every bit of the adventure and will probably come back again for more. Besides, along the way to Gangotri & Gaumukh, Rahul also developed a taste for simple Indian food such as chapatis, the delicious pahari rajma and alu paranthas - which my dearest friend Alka, a skilled mountaineer, who's been on many tough expeditions, feels is the best cuisine to tackle Himalayan journeys. And my 'bachcha' has also passed the test of ferrying his own load during the trek, something that I've always failed to do.And while maintaining his composure under pretty extreme conditions, he was only ruffled a little bit when some ugly red scars mysteriously appeared on his forearm at Doon School - at my friend Purnima's home, after we got back to the plains. Probably ruptured blood vessels from a scratch he got from his rucksack or heat rashes. Anyways - nothing that the magic neosporine powder from the little white bottle with a blue cap couldn't take care of!
As for me, I was thinking of my father throughout the trip – in fact, it was a journey made for him in many ways. As I sat on the rocks near Gaumukh with my feet dipping in the freezing waters of the Bhagirathi, I knew that he was definitely there in my life, even though death had taken him away from us forever.
And as I helped my ‘bachcha’ pitch his Summit Series tent at Bhojbasa – battling as we did against the snow-storm, I knew that it didn’t really matter, if I could not ever make it to such heights again. There were the signs of immortality strewn all around me. And I just love to drink it in and absorb it. The Himalayas are eternal and so is life – that’s the biggest takeaway from this journey! And then it's not really a surprise or hardly a coincidence, when soon after our return to Delhi via Uttarkashi and Dehra Dun - my cousin Srila (my Bachcha's mother) sends me a photo of my parents which is one of the best recent ones that I've seen of my good-looking father. The photo must have been hidden away in her albums and she must have suddenly chanced upon it. For me, it certainly eases the degrees of separation and brings back my father much closer to me.

Dilip Gupta - my Madhumati connection!

2008-07-12T10:00:00.001-04:00

There are some people – who are no more – who one would have liked to have got to know better. In fact, there are times when looking back we regret many lost opportunities in interacting with them. For me, watching the movie Madhumati – by one of Bengal’s and India’s best known directors Bimal Roy – was such an occasion, which brought to mind an uncle, Dilip Gupta. He was the cinematographer for Madhumati and even won the Filmfare award for best cinematography in the year 1958 for it – incidentally the legendary Madhumati also turned 50 this year!
What I have gathered from trawling the Net – riding Google – is that Dilip Gupta or Jhunu Jethamoshai as I called him, was a cinematographer in Bollywood between the 1930s & 1960s and was director of photography for Prem Patra (1962), Jab Pyar Kisise Hota Hai (1961), Dil Deke Dekho (1959), Madhumati (1958), Yahudi (1958), Gotoma the Buddha (1956), Biraj Bahu (1954), Deedar (1951), Street Singer (1938/I)... aka Saathi, Street Singer (1938/II)... aka Saathi (India: Hindi title) and Devdas (1935).
Dilip Gupta was my father’s favourite cousin and my father, who was younger, drew a lot of inspiration from him. I remember a couple of family events, where Jhunu Jetha was present and Baba taking great pains to create an opportunity for my sister and me to chat with him. By then, he was aged and showed a great deal of affection for us – unfortunately for me, it just did not occur to me to sit and chat with him about the past and his exciting work as one of the early great cinematographers in Bollywood. Of course, I do remember my father and mother fondly remembering Mr Gupta and his wife and the happy times that all of them had spent together in Mumbai way back in the early 1960s. My father, who was a skilled and creative photographer – drew a lot of inspiration from his Jhunuda and it was Jhunuda who had introduced my parents to the famous Bimal Roy and his wife in Mumbai.
Mr Roy, of course, is among Bollywood’s great directors of all times and his extraordinary career as a director also coincided with a Golden Age for Bengali talent in Bollywood. P.C. Barua, K.L. Saigal, Salil Chowdhury, S.D. Burman and even Ritwik Ghatak have all worked with Bimal Roy on various projects. He started his career in Bengal with New Theatres but later migrated to Mumbai where he was to first work with Bombay Talkies and later to set up his own production company. Some of the most famous songs from Bollywood are from his films, such as Suhana Safar Aur Yeh Mausam Haseen from Madhumati (1958) and Mora Gora Ang Lai Le from Bandini. Music for these films was composed by the two legends from Bengal - Salil Chowdhury and Sachin Deb Burman.
Coming back to Dilip Gupta – I do remember an occasion when he had visited my grandparents’ home in Kolkata and had talked about a film that he was shooting on the life of Thakur Ramakrishna – the famous religious and spiritual leader of Bengal – whose teachings greatly inspired him. Since I was very young at that time, I didn’t have the slightest interest in asking him details about his work – again I look upon that as a huge lost opportunity. By then, he had retired from full-time work and was on a vacation in Kolkata from Mumbai. He along with his wife had spent quite a few hours with my grandparents on that occasion and it would have been the ideal time to talk to him about his work.
I also remember another occasion when I had met him – I don’t remember where this was – along with my father. The two of them had chatted about Jhunu-Jetha’s recent visit to LA, where he had spent a nostalgic vacation amidst memories of the time when he had gone there as a young student of the techniques of film-making. Again – had I listened their chat with a greater degree of attention, I’d probably have got a better understanding of the world of LA than I was to later get from my own visit to Universal Studios – excited at being at the Mecca of Hollywood, all by myself. In fact, my sister, with her artistic sensibilities has probably had far richer interaction with Jhunu-Jetha than me – she’s even visited him at his Mumbai home and had a glimpse of the Dark Lady – his Filmfare award for Madhumati!
I’ve heard from family members that one of Dilip Gupta’s daughters – my cousin – is now working at putting together a book on him with articles contributed by Hollywood greats such as Dilip Kumar and other material that she has with her on her father. I wish her all the best with this project and look forward to its completion.

Whole nine yards and beyond....!

2008-06-18T13:19:00.010-04:00

This a tale of a traditional Indian Sari. The garment, which belongs to my mother, is far more that just a personal clothing item. Its warp and weft weaves together historical value of great significance.
More than a 100 years old, this sari belonged to my mother’s great-grandmother Gyanadanandini Devi who was the wife of Satyendranath Tagore (1842-1923) - the paternal grandfather of my grandmother Jayashree Sen, and elder brother of Rabindranath Tagore.

He was the first Indian to join the Indian Civil Service. He was also an author, song composer, linguist and made significant contribution towards the emancipation of women in Indian society during the British Raj.
After Satyendra Nath Tagore returned to Kolkata from abroad he had to leave for Mumbai for his posting in the civil services. He wished to take his wife (my grandmother’s grandmother) Gyanadanandini Devi with him. But a serious problem cropped up as to the dress the lady would wear while stepping out of her inner quarters. The solution to this problem came from a French tailor. He prepared an oriental dress for the lady.
Later in Bombay, Gyanadanandini ransacked the market for a perfect dress that would be fashionable as well as fit to be worn in the society. She appreciated the style the Parsi women adapted while wearing the saree. She emulated them and also mastered the use of petticoat, the chemise and the blouse. Thus she became the founder of the contemporary Bengali fashion for ladies. This historic sari belonged to her and was a gift from her to my grandmother's mother Sanga Devi, who later gifted it to my grandmother. It was a present to my mother from her mother during her wedding in 1963. The sari is a traditional Bengal Baluchari sari, which depicts scenes from the contemporary political and social life in Bengal through its designs. Baluchari saris, which have been now revived as a traditional handicraft from Bengal, also sometimes depicted scenes from mythology and Hindu gods and goddesses.
When my grandmother Jayashri Sen (nee Tagore) gifted the sari to my mother, she had also shared with her anecdotes about Gyanadanandini and her huge collection of beautiful saris. My grandmother was a favourite grand-daughter and had spent a lot of time with her grandparents and was deeply attached to them before she married my grandfather - Mr Kulaprasad Sen, who was the Post-master General of Eastern India when he retired.
I’m sure there are many other women such as my mother across India, who possess such beautiful saris which have such wonderful bits of history attached to them.

Better to stay home!

2008-06-13T15:01:00.002-04:00

Many Americans decided to stay home during Memorial weekend and not go on their usual long-weekend trips. I was delighted to find a new word that they had coined – STAYCATION. And it’s not just staying at home during long weekends – wheel-happy folks in the US are buying less SUVs and even choosing to travel by train. Obviously, the zooming oil prices are having an impact on everybody’s lives.

What is interesting is that, recession and high oil prices are forcing people in America to turn to thrift. In India, we’d always been taught not to waste food. When we were young, crass consumerism was by and large frowned upon. It was things like “don’t waste food” or “you don’t need any more clothes” etc. My grandmother had painstakingly taught me frugal values – she told me to try and keep my needs at a minimalist level.
But, economic liberalization brought with it the concept of ‘consumer is king’. And thus, it became very un-hip to not buy lots of clothes, not turn into foodies and not take foreign vacations. So the middle class in India went in for the kill armed with plastic money and bank loans to buy big houses and bigger cars. People who still wanted to keep their consumption at a minimum level were either looked down upon as not fashionable Gandhians or even condemned as Communist conspirators.
Seems like now the wheel has come full circle – with America teaching us to take Staycations and buy smaller cars. Besides helping us to save money for ourselves and reduce the overall oil bill, Staycations will undoubtedly help save scare resources for our geNext as well. Really hope that the Delhi-ites - with their passion for bigger cars, better houses and larger plasma TVs - are listening.

Good news ! It's soon going to be too expensive for people to shoot people !

2008-06-06T13:50:00.011-04:00

Apparently the cost of bullets has risen to such a level that shooting is getting to be an expensive proposition, to the extent that Police Departments in the USA have cut back on target practice. I'm not joking !

The main contributory factors are the rising cost of copper and lead globally, fuelled by increased demand in countries such as India and China, and the enormous demand from the U.S. Army which has used 1.8 billion rounds of ammunition in Iraq, according to one report. Incidentally the same report goes on to say that “..About 75 percent of the ammo expended in Iraq (both sides) is supplied by China..” ! There's got to be another story there somewhere.

In the case of at least one police department in Ohio the cost of practice ammunition has risen from $128 to $211 per case, while a case of bullets for on-duty use has skyrocketed from $73 to $180. Hunters and other gun users are also complaining.

The situation has created enough impact in the USA to inspire the standup comic Chris Rock to create a routine in which he declaims

“I would blow your head off…if I could afford it. I’m gonna get me a second job, save up some money, and then you’re dead !”

Since rising costs are now a global phenomenon, we suppose this ammunition inflation must have reached India. Can we hope it will inhibit death by shooting in India , too ?

The Original Argumentative Indian and the Politics of Food

2008-05-30T00:58:00.006-04:00

Our blogsite pays homage to Amartya Sen and his concept of the Argumentative Indian. Dr. Sen himself has now stirred up a veritable storm of argument with an article in the New York Times on the looming food crisis. Within 24 hours the article generated so many responses that the New York Times had to declare that it could no longer entertain any more comments on the subject !

In the article, entitled The Rich Get Hungrier, Dr. Sen has chosen to place blame on misdirected Government policies such as alternative land use, growing purchasing power generating more demand than hitherto and imbalance in wealth distribution.

The comments from readers range from the downright dismissive, such as

“There is nothing new which Prof. Sen has brought out. The better thing would have been if Prof. Sen had come up with the solutions of the problem”

to more reasoned analyses and differences of opinion.

The fact that a voice as eminent as Dr. Sen's has now been added to the whole discussion of food will have the welcome result of focusing private and public attention more intently on the whole subject.

And not too soon either, considering that (according to a summary of studies conducted in the U.K.)

Over 9 million people die worldwide each year because of hunger and malnutrition. 5 million are children.
Approximately 1.2 billion people suffer from hunger (deficiency of calories and protein);
-Some 2 to 3.5 billion people have micronutrient deficiency (deficiency of vitamins and minerals);
Yet, some 1.2 billion suffer from obesity (excess of fats and salt, often accompanied by deficiency of vitamins and minerals);
Food wastage is also high:
In the United Kingdom, “a shocking 30-40% of all food is never eaten;”
In the last decade the amount of food British people threw into the bin went up by 15%;
Overall, £20 billion (approximately $38 billion US dollars) worth of food is thrown away, every year.
In the US 40-50% of all food ready for harvest never gets eaten;
The impacts of this waste is not just financial. Environmentally this leads to:
Wasteful use of chemicals such as fertilizers and pesticides;
More fuel used for transportation;
More rotting food, creating more methane — one of the most harmful greenhouse gases that contributes to climate change.
The direct medical cost of hunger and malnutrition is estimated at $30 billion each year.

In India, with its stark contrasts between lavish feasts and widespread starvation, the situation is made even more poignant by the fact that according to Government sources from the Ministry of Food Processing, the annual food wastage in the country due to inadequate storage and transport infrastructure is Rs. 58,000 crores annually (close to US$15 billion)

In order to forestall a shortage, the Government of India has now placed restrictions on the exports of rice from the country, provoking an outcry from traders bemoaning the loss of foreign exchange earnings in a rising market. It is worth remembering what Mahatma Gandhi said “There is enough in this world for man's need but not for man's greed” .

Recipes for the Melting Pot – further insights on immigration

2008-05-28T17:12:00.010-04:00

“Assimilation Factor” is the new mantra in the Great Immigration Debate that is now raging in the USA and Western Europe. The extent – or lack – of this “Assimilation Factor” is causing great apprehension among European traditionalists. In a 2007 article entitled “England is Vanishing” by Cal Thomas in the blogsite www.realclearpolitics.com this fear is expressed in the following words

“..a record influx of foreigners is threatening to erode the character of the land of William Shakespeare and overpowering monarchs, a land that served as the cradle for much of American thought, law and culture..”

In the article Thomas makes it clear that he is taking aim at legal immigration, i.e., a “record influx of foreigners” that has been sanctioned by the U.K. Government, presumably because it was deemed to be in the interest of Britain. He goes on to offer his own diagnosis of the situation

“..The difference between many of the current immigrants and those of the past is that the previous ones wanted to become fully American or fully British. The current ones, in too many cases, would destroy what makes our countries unique...”

Is this just Eurocentric xenophobia or is there a wider issue here ? After all, the force of home-grown immigrant terrorism has been felt in Britain when British-born Muslims from South Asia staged a deadly attack on the London Underground. And in Belgium, Malika el Aroud a woman of Moroccan origin who is now a Belgian citizen, is openly advocating Jihad and support for Al Qaeda on her website, according to a news item in the New York Times – while drawing the equivalent of US$ 1,100 per month in welfare benefits from the Belgian Government ! The Belgian courts have refused to convict her, accepting her defence that exercising her freedom of speech is by itself no crime. After all, Malika knows the rules. “I write in a legal way,” she said. “I know what I’m doing. I’m Belgian. I know the system.”

In the U.S.A., the Manhattan Institute of Policy Research has published a report dealing with the Assimilation Factor of immigrants. As may be expected from this prestigious institute, this is a serious attempt at an objective and scientific evaluation of the Assimilation Factor. The study deals, among other criteria, with cultural assimilation which it defines as

“... the extent to which immigrants, or groups of immigrants, adopt customs and practices indistinguishable in aggregate from those of the native-born. Factors considered in the measurement of cultural assimilation include intermarriage and the ability to speak English, which have been the focus of many previous efforts to track immigrant assimilation in the United States. Cultural assimilation also incorporates information on marital status and childbearing.”

An unexpected (to me) conclusion of the study was that Chinese and Indian immigrants are the least integrated culturally with the American populace at large ! Those interested in the methodology that gave rise to this conclusion can read the full article.

Far from being xenophobic, the Manhattan Institute is careful to point out that

“..It is important to note that cultural assimilation is not a measure of a group’s conformity with any preconceived ideal. Changes in the customs and practices of the native-born can promote cultural assimilation just as easily as changes among the foreign-born.”

Could it be that the ideal of a monotonously uniform cultural pattern is not the most desirable scenario ? New York's former mayor David Dinkins may have defined the correct objetive when he described his city as no longer being the “Melting Pot” but a “Glorious Mosaic”. The question is how to make the different elements of the mosaic blend into a harmonious pattern.

Bollywood in bed with Hollywood ?

2008-05-22T19:47:00.003-04:00

The party scene at this year's Cannes Film Festival is apparently buzzing with news that Indian interests, led by Reliance Big Entertainment (an affiIiate of Reliance Industries), are moving into the world of Hollywood film production. Reliance is reportedly providing substantial development financing to a number of Hollywood production entities, including the production vehicles of megastars such as Jim Carrey, George Clooney, Tom Hanks' Playtone Productions and Brad Pitt. After MGM and Paramount, will Anil Ambani be the next dominant force in La-La Land ?

The Indian foray into film production in the USA is not new of course. Ashok Amritraj, the brother of the tennis stars Vijay and Anand, has been active in this area for several years now, with at least a score or more of TV and big screen films to his credit. The appearance of a $100 billion conglomerate like Reliance has stirred the pot to the point that even the Wall Street Journal has sat up and taken note. With more and more funds coming on to the international investment scene from India, there have been other alliances reported as well, such as a pact between the Lionsgate organization of Hollywood and Kishore Lulla's Eros International Group, for reciprocal arrangements to release Lionsgate's English language productions in India and Eros's Bollywood films in the USA.

The Reliance investment package includes plans to spend $1 billion to produce over 60 feature films in nine languages over the next two years. As a result Reliance will gain Indian distribution rights for these films.

And it's not just the area of film production and distribution – Reliance, already India's largest operator of movie theaters, are also moving ahead with plans to open a chain of 250 cinemas across the United States, according to other Press reports. Will cinemas screening Indian films be as prolific in US neighborhoods as the burgeoning Indian restaurant scene ?

Triplets and more...

2008-05-21T21:32:00.002-04:00

We love it when people read our blog and send us their comments, reactions, responses, appreciation etc. My post on my mother and her triplet brother and sister got such a response when NDTV India - one of India's leading Hindi news channels -called me asking for contact details of the three of them for a programme that they were doing on twins & triplets. So now the triplets - who were famous within our family - will be seen on national TV! For those interested in watching this programme - Salam Zindagi on NDTV India - the details follow. Telecast timing: Friday May 23 at 8 p.m. IST and repeat telecast again on Saturday 2p.m

The link to NDTV India for those who can't tune in from overseas etc is http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/salaamzindagi/home.asp

No Darkies please, we're Indian !

2008-05-21T15:53:00.004-04:00

When it was announced that U.S. style cheerleaders were being imported to spur on the teams in the India Premier League, everyone agreed that this move would add colour to the traditionally sedate cricket scene. Here is the link to the story on Economic Times. Apparently, however, on one occasion this added more colour than the Desi audience could stomach. It has been widely reported in the Indian press that two cheerleaders, part of a group imported from London, were unacceptable to the organisers of a recent match at Mohali, and asked to leave the grounds. The two unfortunate young ladies reportedly exited in tears. Their shortcoming ? They were black !

The Indian yen for light complexions is not a secret, of course, especially to those who have perused the matrimonial ads. These are full of insertions that sheepishly admit to “wheatish” or proudly proclaim “fair” on behalf of their candidates. None claim to be glowingly dusky. Then of course there have been reports of monkey gestures directed towards black athletes of visiting teams. In Australia, Harbajan Singh barely got away from the charge of racism, he denied describing Symonds as a “monkey”, pleading that what he had actually said was “Teri Ma ki..” an expression at which I personally would have taken greater offence if directed at me !

In spite of all this, Indians are generally quiet about their colour complexes in public, and much given to vigorous protests when at the receiving end of racist slurs. The recent case of Shilpa Shetty comes to mind. The outrage her experience caused in England was shared around the world, and the sympathy factor propelled her to even higher levels of celebrity (much deserved – I think everyone will agree she is a delightful personality, who handled herself with great dignity during her ordeal)

Undoubtedly the case of the two unfortunate black cheerleaders will be widely reported in the English press, and the Indian reaction to this incident (official and unofficial) will be interesting to follow. And to think all this is going on while in the United States a black candidate is gathering massive support as a Presidential nominee !

Plus ça change....

2008-05-19T21:05:00.002-04:00

A look backwards took place in my mind on returning from a recent trip to India – a country undeniably on the edge of great things, with a prosperous new middle class (300 million + ?) fueling rapid urban development. Lurking among all the buoyant statistics though is another which says that 300 million people live below the official poverty line and another 300 million or so inhabit the shadowy world between the very poor and the middle class ranks. These 600 million are now faced with the phenomenon of rising food costs worldwide. A recent New York Times report stated that working class families in New Delhi were having to do without milk or meat in order to buy rice. One wonders what else they are forced to give up.

Trying to explain all this to myself took me back again to India – this time in memory, to a hot summer day in 1967, when four of us sat for hours in a suffocating, dark room - air conditioning and lights turned off by an angry mob of striking workers. We were in a factory, 40 miles from Calcutta in the town of Kalyani. As I sat there, sweating, there was ample time to think back on the events which had landed me in this situation.

At that time I was the head of Finance and Administration of a British engineering company.

Business organisations all over the post-war world were embracing new developments in automation, computerisation and modern management techniques to survive. Calcutta too and the rest of West Bengal, traditionally the center of India's engineering sector began to take steps in that direction. India's first school for graduate business studies had been established in Calcutta in 1961 with MIT collaboration, funding from the Ford Foundation and with a young eager faculty, some of whom were my friends. Companies such as IBM set up operations in Calcutta. Professionals like myself now had access to courses and seminars that put us in touch with the latest developments in management thinking and technology of the '60s. There had been very little fresh investment in India's manufacturing sector since World War II and we were all excited by the prospect of being able to participate in the transformation of West Bengal's Rust Belt into a modern industrial environment.

Unfortunately, the modernisation of businesses in the 1960's invariably involved downsizing through automation and outsourcing (not unlike developments today). And also not unlike today, it was a difficult social argument to promote a degree of immediate unemployment in return for future growth. It was an even more difficult argument in Calcutta and West Bengal generally, which in the '60s was the nerve center of the Communists and Leftist movements of India. In 1967 they had come to power in the State Government and were not about to acquiesce in the loss of jobs. Closures or downsizing provided an obvious target as another example of capitalist exploitation. In the case of a British-owned business, the imperialist bogey could also be trotted out for good measure.

While all this was taking place our company had drawn up plans for modernization that would involve closing some processes. Approximately 75 of a total force of 500 would be made redundant through a Voluntary Retirement Scheme.

With the intention of finalizing these plans, a meeting was arranged with workers' representatives in the factory. The company was represented by our British Managing Director, myself, the Works Manager and a personnel executive. We soon found out that there was no negotiating intended on the other side. The Trade Union officials were under political instructions. We were summarily asked to withdraw all proposals for staff reduction. When we refused, we were advised that we would not be permitted to leave. The doors were locked, the power turned off, the phones disconnected and we realised that we were now being "Gheraoed" – i.e., subjected to a compulsory sit-in. We sat listening to the workers chanting slogans - inspiring ones at first such as "Long live the Revolution" - but as time wore on, more personal and offensive sentiments began to be expressed. I envied our British Managing Director, who couldn't understand a word of what was being shouted.

There had been instances of Gheraos continuing for 12 hours or more, until exhaustion or threats had forced the employers' representatives to capitulate or be carried out in ill health. We wondered how long our ordeal would last. Initially we did not really feel physically threatened. As the hours wore on though we all remembered with discomfort the infamous Jessop Steel Plant incident in 1949, two years after Independence, when a labor dispute turned murderous and a British engineer and his Indian colleague were pushed into a blast furnace. We had no blast furnaces in our factory, but there was no shortage of iron rods in an engineering establishment. We loosened our shirts in the heat and reconciled ourselves to waiting things out, since we did not really have a choice. There was an air of unreality about the whole proceedings.

Looking back on events, it seems incredible to me now that we sat through eight hours of this noisy confinement without food, water or access to bathrooms (Don't ask !). Suddenly the noise subsided, the door opened and we were advised we could go home. The union gave us notice that the workers were now officially on strike, and the management would have no access to the factory until the Company agreed to abandon any thought of labour reduction. We learned later that our workers had refused to be more harsh with us and insisted that we be released without further physical abuse.

We were eventually able to resolve the issue through measures which included protracted negotiation, some legal action and token improvements on our initial offer. The process took several weeks, during which time the striking workers received no wages.

Some time after these events, during one of my factory visits, I was talking to one of the workers and asked him how he had fared through those weeks. He told me that the strike had erupted during a period when he had fallen into debt because of the serious illness of his 2-year old child, who had then died as he could not feed his family and continue all the treatments at the same time. There was no animosity in his attitude - just an air of quiet resignation that I found more wrenching than any demonstration of rage or grief.

Management school theories seemed far away. I felt I was back in the Industrial Revolution, when conditions had prompted Thomas Hood in 1843 to write the lines

“Oh ! God ! that bread should be so dear,
And flesh and blood so cheap !”

As the French say “.. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.” ( “The more it changes, the more it's the same thing” )

It Is Within Walking Distance

2008-03-16T01:36:00.009-04:00

Way back in 1976, my parents along with our good friend Debashis Sengupta, went on a hike from West Bengal's industrial town Durgapur to Tagore's educational hub Santiniketan. Here's an account that my father wrote about the trip in AVB News - the journal for employees of the company where he worked. As I typed this out, time and space were totally muddled in my mind, and I was completely transported back to my childhood long, long ago...
BY R.K. Datta Gupta
From time to time man gets restless to refresh himself in a big way from the monotonous routine of just living, and feel youthful again, never mind the age. With such an urge, when someone suggested one evening at our Club a long walk in the countryside, the idea immediately registered with three of us in a very objective manner.
Although walking is generally associated with the constitution of the stout or the aged, a leisurely trip to the nearest bazaar or the only means of locomotion for the have nots of mechanical transport we decided to give it a try as a source of refreshment. Come winter and we hatched our plan. Be it noted that this season is the finest for long walks in this country, especially in the plains. The air is cleaner, the temperature more bracing and appetites more whetted. We agreed that the walk should not be restricted to the countryside but stretched to cross country. Inhibiting thoughts such as getting waylaid and injured in lonely country or facing hostile villagers were conveniently brushed aside with the motto “No risk, no walk.” A conditioning walk took us sixteen kilometers around Durgapur one night through such ways and byeways which at other times would give one the creep on account of association with danger.

Knapsacks and rucksacks were taken down from storage, dusted and repaired, lists were drawn for minimum personal requirements of food, clothing, blankets, shoes and medicine were procured. Maps were obtained from the Town Planners and others, to collect maximum information of the proposed route. It may seem pretentious, but a two-day walk took about a fortnight’s planning and preparations.
Santiniketan on the opening day of the annual Paus Mela was unanimously selected as the destination which meant a two-day walk with a night’s rest. Starting at 6:30 a.m. on 21st December, Debashis, my wife and I walked into the orange hued sunrise along an unfinished road behind the FCI Colony due east, till we came to Arra village. Here we swung NNE and kept moving at a jolly pace of 5.6 kph. The surface was hard earth and was comfortable for our feet. The way weaved through the villages of Rupganj and Kuldiha, around ponds and harvested paddy fields. Each of these villages boasted of a primary school. Beyond Kuldiha we struck across paddy fields but found it rough going through the stubs. We passed a colonnade of stately palms on the left, across the river Kunur with its sluggish green water to the mouza of Malandighi. Sri Sarkar a veterinary, who runs a dispensary for sick animals, got off his bicycle to walk with us for about a mile, taking a healthy interest in our mode of travel and commenting when one of us said that he must be taking us for mad to go walking like this, that, what was not madness anyway! Some people were mad about eating, others for drinking, some for reading and many for talking, so what was wrong with our walking! We took leave of this friendly soul just outside Malandighi and made for an Acacia and Sal grove for a breakfast stop. It was 9:10 a.m. and we had walked about 11.3 kms. Breakfast was a picnic of bread, butter, eggs and cheese. Through Malandighi haat we plodded, making a five minute stop to find out the best route Ilambazar. A young resident of the village who is a trainee with AVB exclaimed to his friend, an employee of a neighbouring organization, when he saw a female among us, “see, see could your chaps do such a bold thing? You are always bragging of your organization outdoing ours, you bighead!” This spontaneous outburst gave us a cheer and a hearty laugh and many of the villagers joined us.
Taking the route to SHibpur we entered a forest and walked for an hour and a quarter, finding the going very drab and monotonous. The road was a surface of churned dust and even the Sal trees on either side wore a browned off look under the midday sun. Our feet were pinching as blisters were in the making. We rested somewhere between Jamban and Jatgaria villages (on the left beyond the thick screen of Sal). On the right we had left behind Saraswatiganja and entered the large mauza of Bistupur. It is a great pity we could not go through these villages and meet some more people in their habitat. A man in his village feels like a knight in his castle or a lord in his manor. He is not subdued by affected inhibitions, but feels free to talk with confidence, and it is an exhilarating experience to meet him there.
Just after midday, we walked out of the forest and arrived at Sibpur medical centre. A long and cool drink from the local well refreshed us, and we plodded on through Sibpur village(the bus terminus on the south bank of Ajay) past three waiting buses with their conductors gaping at us in anticipation. Arriving at the sand bank of the river, we met an old woman who had just crossed it. My wife struck a dialogue with granny and I invited the two to pose for a photograph. Our blistered feet were amply soothed, wading through knee-deep water of the Ajay. Clambering up the north bank of the river we stepped on Joydeb Kenduli at a distance of about 21 km from Durgapur at about 1:30 p.m. Loads were unhitched at a tea stall by the terracotta temple, and we stretched our legs to rest and consume tea by the litre. There was some excitement about the forthcoming Baul mela, an annual event during Paus Sankranti. AT 2:50 p.m. we set out again by the shorter route to Ilambazar, through the villages of Janubazar, Sugor, Nohona to the right, Kanur to the left, Bharatpur and Gangapur. The road lay due east parallel to the river bank and was more of a bullock cart track; we frequently got into a rut in the true sense of the word to the utter distress of our feet. Munching chocolate bars as we walked did for lunch.
Whenever we asked anyone, if we were on the right track, back came the tirade of cross questions, “where are you coming from, where are you going, why did you not take the bus from such and such a place?” We answered back in crisp but polite comments, sometimes spinning a yarn and sometimes telling the truth. About a mile away from Dumrud village an inspector of police, driving along on his Enfield ‘Bullet’, stopped to advise us that his odometer showed 10 kms from Ilambazar. This came as a slap on our weary spirits, as we had obviously covered only 6.4 kms from Joydeb, and still had a long way to go. We called a halt in a mango grove by a sparkling pond, to collect our wits together and muster confidence anew. The time was past 4 p.m. and we started having misgivings of reaching Ilambazar before dark. A rustic passer-by advised that we should cover the distance between Dumrud and Paer villages as it was not safe otherwise, while another one rubbed it in that it would get dark long before we reached our destination. By 4:30 p.m. with our shadows now stretching ahead to infinity, we continued our perambulation, but fortunately under the guidance of a helpful kisan, who recommended a more direct route by-passing Dumrud and Paer. After a mile, he left us, and we came to a roofless school building right plump at a cross road. Some villagers from adjoining Nohona came out to have a look at the strangers and one named Chand was good enough to put us on the right track. Another one cordially invited us to take shelter in the school house for the night, offering to take good care of us till the morning. The offer was no doubt tempting as the sun had just set.
We walked along past Kanur and approached Bharatpur. Hunger pangs were now telling, and the chill of the winter dusk was biting; so we sat down by a paddy field and ate cold meat parathas which tasted delicious. One Sri Bagdi tarried to have a chat with us and though hungry, shared our parathas only after ascertaining that we were of a caste acceptable to him! He pleased my wife by stating that the parathas were tasty, and offered to accompany us to the next village, Gangapur. Pulling on extra pullovers, we now picked our way in the dark with the help of a flashlight. We parted from Bagdi in Gangapur and walked half a mile to a cross road, where we got confused in the dark and lost our way. Seeing a light in the near distance we made for it and came to a cluster of huts where we asked for direction. In the lantern light our packs and my wife’s staff must have looked forbidding, and the worthy sons of the soil, mistaking us for Martians, were reluctant to leave their thresholds; the irony of it was that we should have been the frightened ones! After much cajoling a couple of fellows followed us at a safe distance to put us on our track again. And at last, we arrived at the outskirts of Ilambazar at 6:45 p.m. having lumbered in the dark for over an hour. We made for the post office where the post master, a kindly person, received us cordially at 7 p.m. and handed over our reservation slips for the inspection bungalow. Soaking our aching feet in scalding hot salt water, we ate more parathas for dinner and chatted over the highlights of the long days’ tramp late into the night till sweet slumber took over.
The second day’s journey started at about 10:15 a.m. after a heavy breakfast. We followed the motor road from Ilambazar to Santiniketan via Surul and Sreeniketan, a distance just over 19.3 kms. Though footsore, the going was at a steady pace and we covered the 5.6 kms. Stretch through Sal forest beyond Ilambazar in about 2 hours with a half hour’s rest. The loads on our backs had been reduced by taking out the blankets and wrapping these around abdomens or shoulders to cushion the strain of the rucksack straps, a brainwave of Debashis, the youngest in our group, but the one most concerned about the general welfare of all. Outside the forest at Ramnagar, during a 40 minute tea halt, we had a friendly argument with a couple of cowherds, who insisted they could walk 72.4 kms in a day, herding cattle too. About 4 kms out of Sreeniketan we dumped our sacks on an empty bullock cart to refrain from the temptation of dumping ourselves instead. We arrived at Surul at 2:45 p.m. and were overtaken on the way by friends driving up from Calcutta, who waved but glanced back in amazement, as they sped away. Our arrival at Surul was marred by a little accident; an urban youth rode his bicycle at speed into our group as we were lifting our sacks back from the cart, hurting my wife in her shin. After rendering first aid to her and another tea break we left for the last lap of the hike, and at 3:47 p.m. plodded past the last milestone arriving at our destination at about 4:30 p.m. An elderly gentleman, out for his constitutional stroll, walked a while with us enquiring about our purpose, and wished he was younger.

Three is not a crowd

2008-02-13T13:44:00.007-05:00

Farah Khan has had triplets. My mother wants to get in touch with her to congratulate her on her babies. And that's not really because she's a fan of Bollywood style dancing or because she turned all nostalgic with OSO. The reason is because mom is one of triplets - and coincidentally my grandmom's combo - two girls and a boy - more than six decades ago, was the same as Farah's. When I told my mother - the big news of the day last week - that Ms Khan had triplets, she immediately wanted her email address or some contact detail to send best wishes.
And was Farah shocked or just surprised, my mother then wanted to know. Nothing of that sort, I said, because she already knew that she was expecting triplets...just a bit disappointed since she had hoped for two boys and a girl. That put mom in a very reflective mood. "When my mother delivered us, there was no way to find out that there were triplets on the way. In fact, when her two doctors, a well-known gynaecologist couple in Kolkata in those days - realised that there was more than one baby on the way - they joked among themselves and said the more the merrier," said mom. Of course, we'd heard that one before - it was part of the family-lore surrounding the triplets - my mom, mashimoni and choto mama.
In fact, there are many more anecdotes surrounding the birth of triplets in the family. My grandmother - didimum - apparently almost passed out when she realised that she had given birth to three babies instead of one - she already had two sons before that - mejo mama & boro mama. In those days, children were born at home and didimum's delivery was at her parents house in Kolkata's Palm Place. Just across the road was the residence of her sister who was married into the Chattopadhyay family. My mejo mama - a five year old at that time - was given the task of running across from his grandparents' house to his aunt's to let her know that his new brother or sister had arrived. So the first time he went and said, "I have a sister, but another one is on the way." But next time when the doctors told him to run across with the news that he'd had another sister but yet another was on the way, he refused to budge. "I'll wait till they all arrive," he said!
Then there was the problem of telling one baby girl from another since they looked like peas in a pod. The doctors wanted to tie a thread round my mother's wrist when they realised that she had a birthmark right there that would help in identification. Of course, my mother and mashi resemble each other so much that even today, people tend to mistake them for each other. Often mom meets people in a bus or at the market, who start talking to her like they've known her for a long time. And when they realise that she can't figure out who they are, they're almost dumbfounded. On such occasions, she comes back home and calls up my mashi to tell her "you've lost a good friend, who'll never talk to you again". Likewise, mashi too, has similar experiences, with mom's friends.
Sometimes I've wondered whether having a twin or triplets causes any loss of identity or not. But when I think of the kind of support that Ma's triplets have given her and continue to give her, the feeling is always of three being better than one. The three of them try to spend their birthday together whenever possible. And sometimes just the three of them have done something together on that special day. After my grandparents had gotten over their initial shock of having been blessed with triplets, they had made the most of bringing up the three together in the best possible way. The bonus was having two elder siblings - that made their childhood even more fun. My mother and hers sister participated in all the rough and tough activities that are usually associated with young boys. Their brothers ensured that they didn't ever turn sissy. From climbing trees to flying kites and even making their own fire-crackers to burst at Diwali - the triplets did it all. And obviously, they were all in it together. Of course, choto mama refused to wear a shirt with flowers printed on it that matched the dresses that his sisters wore. But they usually had common friends - many of whom are in touch even today. Talking about friends, my friends from school days - Rinku, Tinku and Minku - are triplets too. They're all girls but Rinku is very different from the others. So while, Tinku and Minku look alike - like mom & mashi - Rinku looks completely different. And often I've heard my mom praising their mom for her courage and patience!

Try Hyderabad, when it gets too cold in Delhi

2008-02-09T13:02:00.000-05:00

It's pretty cold across India and that seems to be one of the main topics of conversation when talking to friends and relatives in various cities across the country. And Delhi is rather cold too with wind-chill, low temperatures, fog and rain. So a trip last weekend to Hyderabad turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Not only was it not cold - it wasn't uncomfortably warm either. In fact, there was a pleasant breeze all-day on the first day and the second day was cloudy bright. Evenings were a bit chilly - but very comfortable by Delhi standards.
But besides the weather, the trip had other highlights too. I was at Indian School of Business (ISB) - which has recently become India's first B-school which has got a global ranking. The Financial Times ranked ISB at 20th on a global scale. The seminar was on Asian business families and had very high profile speakers. From members of top Indian business families, to Kellogg professor John Ward, the seminar was very high on top content. The ISB campus is as good as many of the top B-school campus around the world.
Hyderabad had earned the title of Cyberabad under the former chief minister Chadrababu Naidu. It has, in fact, given competition to India's Silicon Valley - Bangalore in many ways. Hyderabad is also an educational hub and provides skilled human resources for the IT and IT-enabled services industry. With a large number of its residents going overseas, Hyderabad attracts a large part of the foreign remittances from NRIs and it is one of the Indian cities with high spending power among its consumers. A reason perhaps for the growing number of malls around town.
But there for no time to go mall hopping for me. However, I did go to Golconda Fort in the evening for a SOund & Light show. WIth Amitabh Bachchan as the 'voice', the show turned out to be awesome. The history of Golconda has tragic undertones and the sprawling fort is largely in ruins today. But the sound and light show amidst the darkness all around, brings it alive to the audience. And then there's the enjoyble experience of shopping for pearls. The beautiful strings of pearls - in colours ranging from grey to purple, pink and of course pearly white - are available in shops around the Charminar or at the more upmarket Punjagutta Road. There are big names such as Mangatrai Jewellers and Mamanram Srikishan. Besides pearsl, coral jewellery too is a specialty of Hyderabad. And finally, what's Hyderabad without its Biryani or the paans?

India's big woman investor? Or just big hype!

2008-01-18T06:15:00.000-05:00

If there's anything that's bigger in India than the cricket Twenty-Twenty win or SRK starrer Chak De! it's probably the Reliance Power initial public offering that closes today. As I write this, the issue is around 50 times oversubscribed and the feeling that one gets is that riding the sensex boom every single Indian has become a savvy investor on the stockmarket. However, this belief for me now seems to be a hype, after the harassment that my mother suffered in trying to apply for a very few shares in this GREAT Reliance IPO. She's a retired school teacher who lives alone in Kolkata - the first hassle for her was trying to open a demat account. Apparently the Reliance IPO has caused a huge demand for opening the demat accounts and banks are working overtime to meet the rush.
In my mother's case, an agent from a prominent private bank who she had contacted came to her home and made her fill up the requisite form. Only when my mom went to the stockbroker's office to submit the application for the issue, she discovered he had opened a savings bank account for her and given her its number! Needless to say that she had no need for a svaings account.
Meanwhile, it was too late to apply for the IPO of the decade - no guarantee that she would have been allotted any shares even if her application went through. Further, mom who could have become a first time investor on the stockmarket failed to get the services of any stockbroker at her home. Surely, such services are available for people who are 65 and above. Well as far as India's great stockmarket boom is concerned - I think it's only for the net savvy, young people who open a demat account and start trading online. As for senior citizens, even if they are well educated and not computer illiterate, they remain at the mercy of idiots and unscrupulous agents. My mother has reiterated her faith in small postal savings - she walks down to the post office every month and chats up other retirees who are waiting in the queue. Even if the wait is long, no one's taking her for a ride after all.

Here to Eternity

2008-01-14T03:05:00.000-05:00

Here's an article that I wrote in The Economic Times on Sunday

In a fitting tribute to Hillary, Sherpas are praying for his reincarnation. Along with Norgay, he will probably live on forever to inspire the spirit of adventure

THE SUMMER of 1987. For me, it was the most extreme training that I have ever taken in my life, at Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling. Looking back there are intense images of trekking up to Tiger Hill with a fully loaded rucksack - starting at midnight and getting there in time for the sunrise, only to be greeted by a thick blanket of clouds and a drizzle. And there were the PT sessions even before the crack of dawn and the jog down to the Mall from Jawahar Parbat where HMI is perched. A week on, we trekked up through lush green valleys and rhododendron forests to the glacier - Rathong - surrounded by 6500 m + peaks of Frey’s, Kabru Dome, Sinolchu and many others. High altitude acclimatisation, training on snow and ice, trekking with snowboots and crampons and above all coping with the subzero temperatures - those were a couple of weeks that I will never forget.

It was also just an year after the legendary Tenzing Norgay had passed away - but his inspiration and spirit lived on at HMI. Norgay was the first director of field training when HMI was set up in 1954 and had been associated with the institute all his life. Many of our trainers were sherpas who knew him very well and had been mentored by him. So when we climbed down to the institute after training sessions, past Norgay’s home in the late afternoons - many of us trainees stopped for a while and looked up at the prayer flags fluttering in the lawns with awe and respect. It was just an year since he had passed away and almost everyone remembered him and spoke about his achievements. We were told how every year he graced the graduation ceremony as chief guest - and our graduation from HMI was a very low key affair as a mark of respect for the man who had conquered the world’s tallest peak with Edmund Hillary in 1953. So when I read that the Sherpas in Nepal and Darjeeling had prayed for the reincarnation of Hillary, who died on Thursday at 88, it seemed to me a very fitting tribute.
Sir Hillary - after all - was not just a skilled mountaineer who pushed the envelop of physical and mental endurance to climb Mt Everest. He has climbed ten more tough peaks in the Himalayas between 1956 and 1965. He has also gone to the South Pole with a Trans-Antarctic Expedition and led a jetboat expedition - Ocean to Sky - from the mouth of the Ganges River to its source. In 1985, he accompanied Neil Armstrong in a small twin-engined ski plane over the Arctic Ocean and landed at the North Pole. It was not just his intense spirit of adventure - the New Zealander has left his footprint in Nepal through his philanthropic activities. He founded the Himalayan trust through which schools and hospitals have been built in remote villages in the mountains.
Mt Everest to most skilled mountaineers today is not really the most difficult climb and the alpine style expedition in 1953 - through the South Col - was not the toughest route either. However, there’s no way that anyone can play down the sheer achievement of the two men who were the first ever to set foot on the summit of Everest at 8848 metres. They had forged a route through the treacherous Khumbu Icefall. The last bit of that historic expedition was the ascent of a 40-feet sheer rock face which Hillary found a way up through a crack in the face, between the rock wall and ice. This has since been called the “Hillary Step”. Obviously their pioneering spirit will live on and continue to inspire mountaineers and sportspeople down the ages. As it did their sons, Peter Hillary and Jamling Tenzing Norgay, who are both well-known mountaineers and together climbed Everest in 2003 as part of the 50th anniversary celebrations of the first conquest by their fathers.

Hazy Shades of Winter

2007-12-15T14:37:00.000-05:00

It’s winter again in Delhi. Time for gajjar halwa, peanuts and chikkis. Lots of Dilliwallahs just love winter – probably because they have some cause celebre, such as weddings and season-end parties. People also love to bring out their winter clothes from mothballs and flaunt them. It’s time for the silks, black suits, thermals and lehngas, shawls, mufflers and even overcoats.
There’s something very ceremonious about the season. People have to pull out their winter clothes, get the blankets back from the dry cleaners and silks and woollens out of the mothballs. It’s time for the morning fogs that disrupts flights and trains and chilly winds in the evening. But also time for weddings, parties and concerts. There are outdoor parties too where people huddle near charcoal stoves that are provided. Fresh colourful veggy salads, and kebabs are the favourite snacks that are circulated at the parties. It’s time for the hot chicken soup too and basking out in the golden afternoon sun. All of Delhi’s parks and even little islands of greenery have people sitting out, taking breaks from office or homes to just sit out in the sun and perhaps peel and eat oranges. For kids there are the picnics at Delhi’s sprawling gardens. At home, its time to roll-out the carpets and turn on the heaters.
I find that every year for the last three years, winter has brought a death – of a near and dear one. Many years ago, back in college, reading the Romantic poets had been about the symbolism of seasons where winter was symbolic of death and destruction. But when one has to grapple with reality, dealing with death is far more painful than accepting the change of seasons where winter will be followed by spring – the season for regeneration and rebirth. Again in Delhi, winter is also a time to plan trips to the monuments that surround us – Red Fort, Qutub Minar, Purana Qila and Humayun’s Tomb. It’s the season when the ruins almost come alive in the background of the mellow sun and chilly mornings. TV, meanwhile, has visuals of Srinagar and Manali where snowfall is attracting hordes of holidaymakers from Delhi. There’s big time Christmas shopping too for cakes, candy and decorations – Khan Market is crowded with expats, well-heeled Delhiites, diplomats and even young college students – everyone’s looking for cakes, fruits, exotic veggies and fruits and even smart clothes – the new Autumn-Winter selections! The Kebab corners, not surprisingly, are drawing the largest crowds. Everyone’s packing their shopping bags with dry fruits too – Delhiites cant imagine their winter evenings without the kajus, kishmish, almonds, pistachios and walnuts conveniently served in tiny bowls probably with the sundowners. There are the very delicious and exotic chilgoza or pine-nuts too. And then there are the foggy mornings which are braved by walkers encompassed by their shawls and overcoats – wearing caps, socks and even gloves. This season there was the Italian Opera in the backdrop of the awesome Purana Qila – an awesome performance! Vacation time for kids is also time for parents to plan vacations – overall winter in Delhi is a season that’s a feast for the senses.

Taslima Nasreen - OMG

2007-11-24T08:00:00.000-05:00

Like most modern platforms - the blog too is unsafe and insecure. This is what I just discovered after inadvertently leaving a comment on another blog - greatbong. The main comment was appreciating a post on the situation in West Bengal - a small after thought was about Taslima Nasreen's presense in Kolkata. So right now even as the hounds are baying for my blood - I shall make an attempt to state my views on Taslima from an immigration point of view - since I write on immigration matters and have some understanding about it. Firstly, the majority of Taslima's supporters - at least on greatbong's blog - are not liberal Leftists but rather the Hindutva brigade. What I gather is that the latter is a very aggressive group who given a chance would bulldoze anyone that comes in their way and reduce them to pulp. Their political opinion has no place for tolerance.
Moving on to Taslima, she enjoys UN refugee status and hence a country like India is in no position to force her to leave. But given the various law and order issues that West Bengal and other states have, I feel a person like her who is a self proclaimed humanist and human rights activist should leave for another country in the West which is better equipped to give her the high level security that she obviously needs. I don't think the government of West Bengal can afford to notch up a huge bill in providing her security and dealing with riots that may occur because of her presence in Kolkata. I'm sure in certain European countries, there is no likelihood of riots because of Taslima but in India it is very likely. Obviously rioting cannot be condoned and should be dealt with aheavy hand. But as experience has shown us, it is always better to avoid riots than deal with them when they happen. The huge loss of lives and suffering that accompanies rioting is absolutely avoidable at all costs, even if it means politely asking Taslima to leave. Also if there's money to spare - instead of using it for Taslima's security - why not use it for the uplift of the girl child in India's villages? Or even for relief to women who are victims of the cyclone in Bangladesh. My very personal opinion is that Taslima is a publicity hungry intellectual - who is putting her own safety at stake by remaining in India. If she moved to say Norway for instance, she would be safer but obviously less visible. That seems to be her main problem. When we come to the issue of granting permanent resident status to her, like all other countries India has the liberty to choose its immigrants. The US even cancelled the short-term visit visa of Narendra Modi because they perceived him to be a threat to peace - so why cant India ask Taslima to leave because she's a threat to peace?
Finally, I cant bring myself to equate Taslima with Salman Rushdie on the grounds that Rushdie is great writer while Nasreen is at best mediocre. Rushdie is a Booker winner and the creator of a new genre in English literature. Surely we cant put him and Nasreen on the same platform. And in any case, India is not offering permanent residence to Rushdie - so why Taslima? If we were to take on the responsibility of granting political amnesty to everyone who's prosecuted by Muslim fundamentalists, we would increase our population by many millions. Do we really have the resources to do that?

An island of contrasts and tranquility

2007-11-17T04:30:00.000-05:00

I'm just back from Singapore - I like it there because it's such a relaxed city, country & island. The shopping is good, the food and drinks are great, the work was good, networking was not stressful and sightseeing very enjoyble. Despite being a financial hub and tourist hub - one of the biggest in SE Asia, life seems to move along at an easy pace. For one thing whether you are a tourist, a business traveller, a single woman - or whatever - you wont get stressed on any issue other than the non-availability of taxis during rush hour.
Of course, besides taxis, there's Singapore's hi-tech MRT system, which easily puts London Underground to shame. Overall, the public transport system is well-oiled and does not take tourists and foreigners for a ride. Security issues for women in Singapore are almost non-existent and the average person on the street is polite, helpful, non-aggressive and service-oriented. For someone who lives in Delhi - that believe me is a very big change. Again the sheer variety that one finds in the island-nation from beaches, to Buddhist temples, awesome dim-sum cuisine and spectacular Hindu temples, tree lined avenues, fascinating highrises, museums, art galleries and sprawling malls - the place has just everything and that too within an average of 15 minutes cab distance of each other. Singapore's China Town is the usual buzzy district with fascinating shopping options and great dim sum cuisine. A special mention could definitely be made of the local Tiger beer.
Mustafa shopping centre which forms the hub of the Indian district, is also very vibrant and good for quick fix and fast track shopping solutions. The upmarket VivoCity Mall, near Sentosa Island, on the other hand is a place to go hunting for designer and luxury brands - or just hang out and soak in the ambience.
Hotel Pan-Pacific where I had put up had a great gym and a swimming pool surrounded by dizzying skyscrapers. The weather too was not a complete wash-out and it rained a bit and was sunny for a bit.
A walk along the Singapore riverfront with a friend and lunch at one of the riverside thai restaurants was a treat - as was dinner with my cute nephews Ghotu & Kabir! Shopping at the malls was pretty good too and I picked up my long-time object of desire - an iPod Nano - from the well-known IT mall Funan. Also took a look at the current blockbuster the iPhone and the sexy PlayStation 3. From Australians to Indians, everyone wants an iPhone, it seems.
And now the Singapore government is looking for Indian immigrants in a big way for skilled jobs. Work permits are processed on the fast track and are not subject to any number quotas. The authorities are also wooing Indian students to some of the top engineering and management institutions. Hope, Indian IT professionals are listening - it's time to look East perhaps and leave behind the H1B worries folks.

Let's face facts!

2007-10-28T00:34:00.001-04:00

I’m now on Facebook! Well if you ask me what I’m doing on a virtual forum that’s largely the domain of 20 somethings, I don’t really have a quick enough answer. For one thing the technology fascinates me. There are all kinds of applications that allow you to do all kinds of interesting stuff related to music, travel, books, entertainment, food, games and tons more. When I need ‘timepass’ stuff, Facebook is turning into my most favourite haunt. Then again there’s a lot that can be done with photographs, which is great too. But it’s not just the technological wonder that has drawn me to Facebook – there’s the social networking thing too.

I had heard a very senior official in the global marketing team of one of the cola majors say in an interview that she along with all her team-mates hung out on areas like Facebook & Orkut to track the trends among the youth globally. Thus, more than social networking, it has turned into a professional necessity too. In a way, for me too there’s a professional compulsion – increasingly, I feel that many organizations in India are turning pro-young in a very active way. And often that leads to isolation of and even discrimination against older people in the organization. And in staying in touch with younger folks – what could be a better place than Facebook?
Of course, the same logic was thrown to me by my friend – the father of a teenager – that he was trying to persuade his daughter not to waste time on things like Facebook and instead spend more time with her studies - so how could he be seen there – sorry he was refusing my invite to join up. Again some friends who are academics don’t exactly want to be seen hanging out on Facebook with their students, that could lead to professional issues. And some others – who work for global listed companies – couldn’t get on Facebook because their employers may object. A few others felt that social networking online has a very serious fallout on their privacy and sometimes security. I can understand that all these issues are serious enough and often I wonder what I’m doing here myself. But then when I look at the diverse group of friends I have on Facebook, I don’t really regret getting on to this platform. From my colleagues – an obvious group – I’m now connected to a friend who’s a top fitness trainer and another one whose Salsa dance video is a big hit in the US. There is a restaurateur in NYC and a top VC in Silicon Valley, and many others from different places and diverse walks of life. There are former colleagues who I haven't met in many years and even friends from school who I thought I'd never meet again. And of course – the most inspiring group – my nephews and nieces – who keep me up-to-date about what’s hip and happening around the world today. So even as I poke people or send them a tequila – I don’t think it’s really a total waste of time! And for Keshu, Megha, Ashwin, Rahul, Iraj, Anand, Arvind, Schaunga & Ishani (Dasgupta) - thanks for hanging out with me. When I meet you on Facebook, I feel young and rejuvenated.

A Candle for Heena

2007-10-27T13:31:00.000-04:00

I’ve been following the twists and turns of the Rizwanur Rehman & Priyanka Todi case in Kolkata on other people’s blogs. Some of the comments have really set me thinking about the rise of fundamentalist thoughts among the youth today, even in a state like West Bengal where we liked to believe that the religious divide was not so sharp and people were by and large more tolerant.
And even as I follow this case, which has today become very high-profile, I can’t help but think of Heena, an young Muslim girl who was a domestic worker in the apartment block where I live. She's dead and she too died like Rizwanur because she had dared to enter into an inter-communal marriage. The only difference was that there was no-one to fight for justice for her and I don't think anyone even remembers her today after a couple of years.

She worked at my house too and every morning greeted me with the energy and high spirits that only a young girl of that age can have – she was in her late teens, at the most. Heena came from a impoverished family where her father was ill and unable to work. Her step mother and she along with her sisters worked at domestic jobs to earn the living for the family. She had a couple of brothers too, who didn’t seem to have any great jobs. Heena, like many others who worked at people’s homes, often pilfered money from my purse – that was almost an open secret and I had told her off often. However, she didn’t grumble about any extra chores that I asked her to do occasionally and was always in good spirits. During Id she even brought across delicacies that had been cooked at her home for me. And then one morning she didn’t turn up anymore. A few days later her mother came and picked up the work at my place, telling me that Heena had been sent to her grandmother’s place and was to be married soon to a boy that the family had selected for her. A few months elapsed with almost no news of her. Finally, one day she returned looking frail and worn out and very unhappy. She told me that she had rebelled against her family and married a Hindu boy. She was now living with him and his mother at a colony nearby. She needed to have her job back since it was very important for her to earn a living to add to the meager income that her husband earned by doing odd jobs. She told me that her family was very unhappy over her marriage and had cut her off completely. Her father and brothers refused to even meet her, while her step-mother still spoke to her sometimes. She was not allowed back into her home. She had been meeting the Hindu boy before and both of them were keen on marrying each other – but what forced them to go against her family and marry in a hurry was the fact her family was forcing her to marry her first cousin who was many years younger than her. So for a few months she worked again with me though she had lost her verve and her youthful vigour. Money seemed to be a problem and she was taking on many jobs – she had lost a lot of weight and looked stressed most of the times.
And then again she stopped coming – after a few weeks her mother rang the bell and when I opened the door she burst into loud tears and told me that Heena was dead – set on fire by her mother-in-law and husband in their house and the door bolted behind her. She was hospitalized with severe burns and when her parents and brothers called in the police she made a statement on her deathbed saying that she had tried to kill herself and no one was to blame. After her death there was little her parents could do beyond burying her. Apparently there had been a reconciliation between her and her family and she had spent her last evening with them before she returned to her husband’s house and terrible end. What added to the tragedy was the fact that she was pregnant too.
When I got to know of this, more than two weeks had passed by since her death. When I talked to some of my neighbours and friends about it – wondering what we could do to seek redressal – most felt that there was nothing that we could really do. A Muslim friend of mine – who is herself married to a Hindu – told me that this was the price that the poor girl had paid for transgressing. She felt that her own family too would probably have felt a certain degree of relief at her death even though they were perhaps unhappy at her loss. For a girl who was weak economically and uneducated – marrying a Hindu boy was an act that she had to pay for with her life. And there was no justice afterwards. She passed into oblivion along with her unborn child - without anyone raising any voice for her. And today she’s largely forgotten, perhaps by her own family too. Even I wouldn’t really have thought about her had it not been for Rizwanur Rehman’s death. So I think I’ll light a candle for Heena even as I remember her lively laughter that helped me into wakefulness every morning for many months…I hope she has found her peace and justice somewhere beyond.

What’s in your collection?

2007-09-29T17:46:00.000-04:00

Are you a collector? I don’t really mean the uber rich, connoisseur kind of collectors who accumulate vintage wines or cut glass or diamonds etc. What I mean is simple things – that people collect either when they travel themselves or their friends get for them as gifts. From tiny miniature cars – which were called dinky toys when we were kids – to little plastic animals that came inside toothpaste boxes, which we referred to as Binaca toys – we were collectors even as kids. Many of my friends complain that their kids – despite belonging to the hi-tech, computer savvy generation – drag them to McDonald’s for Happy Meals just to collect the toys which come with them.

There's something very personal and warm about collecting little things which I dont think is matched by collections of Mercs or jets. As a girl, I collected postal stamps – as did many of my friends. But then those were the days when we wrote letters to friends and relatives, sometimes across thousands of miles. And when the envelopes or aerogrammes arrived from uncles and aunts or pen-friends living overseas – carefully detaching the beautiful multi-coloured stamps and putting them up in albums was something that many of us enjoyed doing. My grandfather – a very creative person – collected feathers that birds had shed and then made beautiful cards for us with them. In a similar manner, my aunt collects leaves and flowers and preserves them between pages of notebooks to make cards for her friends and family members.
My sister is a big collector of headgear – caps and hats – from all over the world. I remember my first trip overseas to Phuket when she had specially asked me to get a straw hat for her. I had risked the x-ray machine and other hazards of international travel to bring back the biggest one I could find for her. She has herself added many chic felt hats to her collection when she traveled to Tibet during an arduous pilgrimage to Mansarovar Lake and Mt Kailash. Her friends have got her berets from France and baseball caps from the US. My uncle Subir Sen, too, had a big collection of traditional Indian caps from various Himalayan states such as Himachal, Nepal, Uttarakhand etc. And he loved sporting them in Kolkata, thus creating an unique style of his own.
Maitreyee Chatterjee – an activist for women’s rights in Kolkata – collects statues of owls and like her I know someone who collects frog statues. My mother, Haimanty, has a collection of miniature animals in metal, stone and terracotta as well as a lovely collection of small bells. My friend Nilanjan in America tells me that he is collecting Minolta cameras from yester-years. Don’t ask me why I do it, he had said. Perhaps, because they’re a throwback to our past when photography was all manual and involved positives and negatives and elaborate printing processes. Maybe collecting things that bring back the past is about nostalgia.
My father Rabindra – who for me symbolized simple living and high thinking – didn’t throw anything away unless it was absolutely of no use. In fact, he believed in recycling stuff all his life – even before it became fashionable to do so. From hairclips to old pens and glass bottles, my father put small things – which we would have thrown into the garbage can – to some use in household repairs or in his unique creations. I remember collecting wine glasses from all the wineries that we visited during a trip to Napa & Sonoma two years ago. But that's a touristy thing to do and a part of the wine-tasting ritual. Squirreling is perhaps an inherent quality in many of us – and that’s probably why we keep adding to the collection!

CHAK DE INDIA!!!

2007-09-24T13:09:00.000-04:00

It's Diwali come early in Delhi - in Kolkata despite three days of heavy rains and water logged streets people are out with victory processions on the streets late at night! Sachin Tendulkar is at home with friends opening bottles of champagne. Shah Rukh Khan who watched the match in Johannesburg - is celebrating with the heros themselves!! Tell us how you are celebrating the BIG 20/20 Indian Cricket win!!!!

The Last Lear: Some thoughts

2007-09-15T13:41:00.000-04:00

It was a rather intriguing experience I must say ... watching Kolkata and what I had always known to be a very typical representation of quality Bangla theatre at its peak - at the Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto. Rituparno Ghosh's Last Lear, inspired by Utpal Datta's Ajker Shahjahan had its world premier at the Toronto International Flim Fest last week. Naturally, the media has already discussed this ad nauseum, focusing on the "red carpet history", the presence of the crew, including Ghosh and Bachchan, but surprisingly little about the substance. About the latter, two things struck me in particular. For one, Ghosh provides an excellent critique of contemporary cinema and film-making and how it does not hesitate to demean other art forms as it considers necessary for asserting its own superiority. In the film, this ruthless self-referential, smug and insensitive character of contemporary 'young' cinema is represented through the director Siddharth (Arjun Rampal). But Siddharth does not only represent this ethos of contemporary cinema, but also, in my opinion, a certain faction of youth who possess the very same qualities.

I do not with to generalize, but the reckless, patronizing self-assuredness with which some of our younger generation treat the older generation (such as us) is something that may well resonate with many of us. Sometimes I envy them for their confidence. But more often, I am angered by their lack of interest in the past. The young, debonair, confident and yet somewhere violently confused director Siddharth wishes to use a veteran stage actor to essay his script; and yet has little patience, knowledge or sensitivity about the art form in which the actor excelled, much less about Shakespeare who the actor is obsessed with. This relationship between the young director and the veteran actor (Rampal and Bachchan) conveyed to me simultaneously the nature of the generational conflicts we see today as well as the superiority with which one artistic community views another.

The second feat that Ghosh has achieved is in presenting Kolkata - with all its specificities that one would not know if one has not lived there - in a truly global sense. How did he achieve that? As a hopelessly nostalgic Bengali, I think he focused on the attributes that manifests Kolkata's truly universal and cosmopolitan character: its love for the arts, for good theatre, off-beat relationships, conversations, the disconnect with materiality, the effortless evolution of friendships.. Perhaps we can now abandon the need to exoticize ourselves and celebrate the specificity of Kolkata, Bengal, or whoever, whatever we are without being ghettoized, or being limited to just that.

Finally, it brought back, inevitably perhaps, the memories of watching the great maestros such as Shombhu Mitra and Utpal Datta on stage.

Of Mothers and Daughters: Debjani Banerjee

2007-09-14T08:34:00.000-04:00

It was one of the rare sunny afternoons in August and we were celebrating my niece’s tenth birthday with a barbeque party. Watching her play around with her friends I was reminded of the day she was born. When the telephone call had come on a Saturday evening, I rushed over to my parent’s house to celebrate. My mother organized a puja to thank the Lord in her way and invited everybody over. We still had not stopped smiling when a well meaning neighbour came over to commiserate with my mother. ‘Don’t worry, may be next time.’ A neighbour who had just had a grandson echoed the same sentiments. I tried to picture my sister’s face and imagined people pitying her for delivering a beautiful, healthy baby girl. I was livid but my mother, having borne 3 daughters and 0 sons, was used to this sympathy and took it in her stride, just as she had remained calm for so many years in the face of much whispered rantings of ‘Who is going to look after them? They have only daughters.’ She had remained calm and confident as we had gone through our lives studying to be professionals (like other male children) getting jobs (like other male children) taking responsibility for our households (unlike other male children) and parents (like some male children). She remains equally calm now when the same commentators enviously say, (looking at us I hope) ‘It’s easier to bring up girls rather than boys.’ All’s well that ends well.

I was prodded out of my almost pleasant reverie by a news item on NDTV, ‘Bombay High Court upholds sex test ban.’ The petition was filed by a couple, Vijay and Kirti Sharma, residents of Lokhandwala complex in Andheri; they wanted to use sex determination to have a male child as they already have two daughters.

In their petition they said that in a ''less advanced society'' like India where a ''patriarchal mindset exists'' and where a ''girl child is not socially accepted,'' it is better that such children are not born. It was followed by a short and quick interview with Kirti Sharma, who said that, the ban on sex determination tests does not take into account the trauma a mother goes through when she finds out that the second child is of the same gender as the first!!
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Others milling around the television found the incident funny. Someone suggested, ‘If I send my two hyper active two year old to them for a day, they’ll change their minds about wanting a son.’ But I could not join in their light hearted banter. It’s not an unknown fact that in many, perhaps the majority of the Indian households, the male child is looked upon as the ultimate blessing. The Sharmas perhaps even deserve a pat on their backs for trying to legalize something others are doing anyway. It is no secret that ever since prenatal sex determination tests have been banned in India people have explored many loopholes. For the right fee, doctors find ways around the law by revealing gender through gestures and codes. Advertisements saying, ‘Pay 500 now to avoid paying 5 lakhs later,’ are clear evidence of the existence of such practices.

But the issue that kept troubling me is that the Sharmas had two daughters and wanted a male heir; not only that they wished that the girl children were not even born? What message was Kirti Sharma sending to her daughters? That they were second best? That they were associated with stigma? Ten years down the line I could see the Sharmas struggling to put together a huge dowry to buy a son in law instead of turning right around and teaching their daughters to believe in themselves and be independent in social and economic terms. I cannot accept that my ten year old niece and five year old daughter, who are beautiful, intelligent, loving children, could be so easily dismissed as second-best. In fact, as a parent, is it not my responsibility to fight discrimination in any form? I thanked my parents for allowing us to live and blossom in an environment in the 70s and 80s where such inequalities were far away fictions. Looking around me now, I realize that it must have been a hard task and I congratulate them for that.

It is ten long years since my mother was consoled for having a granddaughter after three daughters. So much seems to have changed and yet so little! While women, in urban India at least, have made huge progress in every field imaginable, the Sharmas and perhaps many others seem to think that the girl child is not accepted in India. The Sharmas who live in an upmarket area in Bombay have argued that affluent couples who have the financial and social means should be allowed to choose the sex of the child as opposed to couples who use such tests to have only male children.
But isn’t that convoluted logic? Is it not one and the same thing? Is it not even more problematic to have daughters and sons and treat them as unequal?

There are two relevant issues to ponder upon and they may be linked. Firstly, there does not seem to be a way for the woman’s movement or individual women achievers to get through to this particular section of women – the affluent, upper middle class (if you like gradations) woman for whom modern India seems to have afforded a life of convenience and even moderate luxury. Women like Mrs Sharma are not able to identify with the fruits of the women’s movement, they have never had the conviction that women can be empowered in society or at least till they are, they can struggle for it.

Secondly, it seems to me that the Sharmas seem to be locked in the wrong battle. They are clearly vocal people who can speak up for their rights but perhaps their cause is a little misplaced? Why not use the same resources to challenge the “patriarchal mindset” that according to them, does not socially accept the girl child? Now, that could be a battle worth pursuing and it would make their daughters’ life easier. Why not fight dowry and other injustices that may contribute to the girl child being discriminated against? Wouldn’t that be a more concrete battle, improving the lives of their daughters instead of trying to add numbers to a population that is bursting at the seams?

The one silver lining in the whole issue is perhaps the stance of Justice Ranjana Desai who is among the few women judges in the Bombay High court. She has written that ''Sex selection is not only against the spirit of the Indian Constitution, it also insults and humiliates womanhood. It violates a woman's right to life.” It is not always easy to be so vocal about women’s rights even when and perhaps specially when one is in a position to do so. But she has come out and condemned the Sharmas’ arguments as shocking and upheld the ban in no uncertain terms.

So three cheers to her and to the spirit of our legal system!

Tagoreana: Sublimity encased in simplicity

2007-09-12T15:06:00.000-04:00

As a Bengali who grew up in Bengal, Tagore’s songs or Rabindra Sangeet is something that I consider an intrinsic part of my life. Of course I know friends who probably outgrew Tagore’s songs or others who can’t relate to what they consider Tagorean upper class sensibilities. My sister too finds Tagore’s music somewhat contextually confined and has developed more cosmopolitan taste in music (except some renditions by Late Kanika Bandopadhyay the unparalleled exponent of Tagore songs). For me, however, it’s the sheer simplicity of Tagore that I can always relate to. I find most of Tagore’s songs a package of sublime thoughts wrapped in melodious tunes. They have almost all been touched with the magic wand of Tagore’s master craftsmanship when it comes to the poetry and for the musical scores he dips into traditions as diverse as Scottish highland songs to Indian classical and Bengal folk.
My grandmother, who was a grand-niece of Rabindranath had often related to us stories of how he would compose songs within a few minutes – sometimes as gifts for his loved ones on their special days. He had, in fact, written a humourous poem on one of my grandparents’ wedding anniversaries that he had spent with them. Tagore had composed various dance-dramas too – for performances by students of Vishwa Bharati University. He himself supervised these shows which were vibrant musical festivals in Santiniketan with Rabindranath himself as the focal point. But even though Tagore wrote some of his music and his poetry to commemorate day to day events, it’s the universal spirit in his work that has made it immortal. The simplicity of his sublime thoughts often bring solace to those who understand Bengali, even when they are far away from home or suffering from unhappiness and pain.

To end I’ll try a very rough translation of one of my favourite Tagore’s songs:

Diye genu basantero ei gaan khani…

I’m leaving behind this gift of a song of spring for you…
When the year ends, I know you will forget….
…But when another season comes and your eyes moisten over the nostalgia of this song, I consider that reason enough to compose it…
….And then Spring will come again and bring new people into your life and new melodies of life…
Probably when Tagore was talking about new melodies of a new spring, he was crystalball gazing into the present time when the copyrights on his songs have expired and people are free to do what they like with them – creative or otherwise. Who knows, it could be Rabindrik Rock perhaps!

The 'Come September' feelin'

2007-08-31T03:26:00.000-04:00

It's that time of the year again - the only time when I feel the potency of the season in my veins. I can't really explain why this happens. But even as August turns to September, I start dreaming of blue skies with billowy white clouds. And no, I'm not in Kolkata or its neighbourhood - but I still feel the ambience of "Durga pujas" all around me. I'm sure I can't explain this feeling to anyone but other Bengalis, who've lived in Bengal and felt the monsoonal season slowly change to a mellow autumn. "Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;...that's Keats' Autumn - and mine too in many ways.
I remember lazy September afternoons on campus at Jadavpur University which slowly turned into light, hazy (Kolkata isn't misty, it's smoggy instead) evenings. It was puja vacations and most of my friends at the JU women's hostel had gone home - I would too in a few days. My father and mother - who were in Durgapur - had sent me a generous allowance to buy myself new clothes for the pujas. And I had treated myself to a shopping spree at Dakshinapan - Kolkata's only 'shopping mall' in those days. Actually it is a shopping complex with various government emporia under one roof - but for us in those days, it was the ultimate retail experience. And Dakshinapan has an outlet of the Gujarat emporium - Gurjari - which provided us with all our needs of ethnic chic apparel. I had just bought my new festival clothes but couldn't wait till the Pujas to start preening in them. I still remember my long red kurta - with elaborate embroidery and mirror work that I was wearing as I strolled around the huge JU lawns and the football field, waiting for at least one of my friends who lived nearby to turn up. Our on-campus 'subaltern' cafes, which were actually dingy tea-stalls were all shut for the vacations. There was a sense of desolation all around which perhaps was symbolic of the end of our heady campus life in a few months from then.

Going back to Durga Puja - it's that time of the year when the farmlands outside Bengal's city limits are overflowing with the yearly rice crop - ready for harvesting. So when you take a train ride from say Kolkata to Rabindranath Tagore's Santiniketan - your eyes can feast on the green fields and the blue skies, truly an artist's palatte. At many places the landscape is carpeted with the almost symbolic 'Kash Phul' - silky white blossoms on tall green stems growing amidst the grass which have been immmortalized by Satyajit Ray visually in his Panther Panchali, the first of the Apu Trilogy. Besides Tagore's own poetry that captures the beauty of the season, a novel called Nilkantha Pakhir Khonje in Bengali- set in Bangladesh before the partition of India also epitomises for me the understated and nostalgic beauty of Autumn in Bengal.
This is a season that doesn't have the exuberance of spring and the underlying tone is one of sadness and the onset of winter. Most Bengalis are part of revelries for the week-long Durga Puja celebrations - but Goddess Durga whose advent we are celebrating will soon be going back to the home of her husband leaving her parents behind in tears - that's the significance that the Pujas have mythologically. The season captures that feeling of loss and also brings with it a coolness all around with occasional light winds and showers - one can sense that winter is on the way, just waiting around the few coming weeks. But where I am now in Delhi, there's no such cooling down, it's still very warm, muggy and uncomfortable. But yet my senses tell me that things are about to change soon.
My birthday is usually close to the celebrations for Goddess Durga and my aunt, parents and grand-parents named me after her - so perhaps it's a kind of bond that I have with the Mother Goddess. My father, too, was born in September and so this year, the intensity of my memories is almost all engulfing. I have always felt that I looked like my dad and did quite a lot of things like him because we shared the month of our birth. Now I feel the pain of separation and a bond with him that runs far deeper than my life and his death...

Independence = Freedom & Happiness.Enjoy!

2007-08-16T14:10:00.000-04:00

I spent Independence Day with my cousins, uncle, aunts, nephews and neices at a beach resort near Mahaballipuram.It was a great break which I spent soaking in the sun and sand, swimming in the pool, tucking into Sri Lankan cuisine, negotiating the waves, getting myself a tan and most importantly enjoying the company of family.

The reason for writing this however, is to describe a tricolour ceremony at the Ideal Resort which was graced by Indians, Global Indians and non-Indians. The theme was of India changing and finding the true meaning of freedom. There were no arguments - though many felt that the last 20 years were far more meaningful chapters for Independent India than ever before.

We had senior citizens in our midst who were born before 1947 and a Britisher whose speech on the occasion was interrupted by a falling coconut "upstaged by a coconut" he observed with typical British dry humour and then carried on with what India and our I-Day meant to him.

The flag was hoisted by a lady from Chennai who's married to an African-American in Washington DC after which we the Indians and Global Indians in the group sang Jana Gana Mana... The couple with their two cute kids come back to Chennai to enjoy a seaside vacation every year. My brother-in-law, an IT professional in London - spoke about the economic resurgence in India while a retired school teacher said that for her freedom had meant grooming her young students to face life.

Later we enjoyed a cake with tricolour icing and listened to popular south Indian patriotic songs before everyone went back to the serious vacation buisness of relaxing on the beach. Of course, later in the afternoon, my nephew rigged up the kite he had specially stitched for the occasion and flew it on the beach taking advantage of the windy day, as the rest of us took lessons from him.

Beyond argument: Nearly eighty percent of Indians live on half a dollar a day

2007-08-12T10:54:00.000-04:00

From the Times of India

" NEW DELHI: The number of people below the poverty line may have come down, but 79% of unorganised workers, 88% of SC/STs, 80% of the OBC population and 84% of Muslims belong to the "poor and vulnerable group"... "That includes 6.4% who live on less than Rs 9 per day or three-fourths the poverty line level, another 15.4% who are between this layer and the poverty line, 19% who earn at best 1.25 times the poverty line and 36% who earn between 1.25 and two times the official cut-off for poverty. It, therefore, cautions that while large numbers may have technically ceased to be included in the official poor, they remain vulnerable"

This according to a report by the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganized Sector (NCEUS). The report (says Reuters) shows that about 836 million people - 77 percent of Indians live on below 20 rupees (50 U.S. cents) per day.

As expected, there is lament all around as to how growth has not benefited most Indians. A real surprise, isn't it? Was it supposed be another way? A few days ago we had a post from RV Bhawani regarding the agrarian crisis. Reporting on the same issue P. Sainath has now won the 2007 Ramon Magsaysay award. Then there was the issue about malnutirition amongst India's children. Much ink was spilt by great economists such as Surjit Bhalla to suggest that poverty did not exist anymore in India. Then there was the debate about exactly how much poverty had fallen by. All along, we have had (fairly predictable) evidence as to what was happening to most of India.

Of course, fiscal redistribution is an immediate need, although its limits are well-known. I think there is little evidence in history which suggests that a nation can keep growing at 8,9,10 per cent with 77 percent of its populace in such condition. And, ironically, there is much evidence that redistributive growth has multiplier effects. But beyond that, there is the need to go beyond the game of fiscal redistribution; band-aids only go thus far and no further. Living off the crumbs of the back-office of the world cannot be a permanent solution for the 77 percent; in fact it is not even clear that it can serve too long as a solution for the 5-10-15% who are now gaining from it.

Reducing India

2007-08-10T17:35:00.000-04:00

"Twenty years ago the rest of the world saw India as a pauper. Now it is just as famous for its software engineers, Bollywood movie stars, literary giants and steel magnates."
Time Magazine

Pauper, really? and in my opinion, none of these four categories of people represent the people of India. Its amazing how the media is so apt at reducing India to one, two, three or four things ... or just one city (B'lore) or just one issue (foeticide) and so on...

India@60: Sixty arguments at Arguing India

2007-08-08T21:36:00.000-04:00

Let us start with a few.... please add, comment, argue as you wish..

1. India is taking over the world

2. Indian democracy is reaching new levels of maturity

3. Inequality is increasing

4. The situation of India's women reflect deep and irresoluble contradictions

5. Life in India for Indians is much better than life abroad...

6. Indians are religious but India is secular (what is secularism is itself a matter of great debate everywhere and certainly in India. One meaning that I find useful is the one in India's constitution: freedom to practice any religion of one's choice; non-discrimination on the basis of religion, ethnicity, caste, creed etc.; and separation of state and religion).

Double standards on racial issues

2007-07-31T12:12:00.000-04:00

They're both young Indians and they both were brave enough to look beyond the borders of India for a job. But that's where the similarities end. Dr Mohammed Haneef is back in India. As he himself has said at the press conference that his lawyer Peter Russo, his family members and he addressed in Bangalore - he's been a victim of terror investigations. While that may be a very politically and legally correct way of describing his trauma in Australia over the last month, the government in that country has categorically said that his work visa will not be reinstated and there will be no apology issued to him.
That brings me back to the topic of my previous post - glamorous Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty was a victim too! And the UK government went all out to make amends to her - The Queen, then UK PM Tony Blair, UK media, the people of UK, human rights oprganisations and the organisations working on racial relations - everyone was rushing to Shilpa's side to offer her a shoulder to weep on after the Big Brother fiasco.
But no such sympathy wave for Dr Haneef - even though the Australian government has released him without any charges whatsoever. His only strength probably comes from his excellent legal team led by Peter Russo who seems to have pulled him out of his predicament in Australia. Of course, there was support from the India government too. So what would Dr Haneef need to do to turn the tide of sympathy in his favour among the public in Australia and perhaps even in UK - where the media was pretty unfriendly towards him initially. Perhaps hire Shilpa Shetty's PR firm! Shilpa Shetty is a Bollywood actress who has probably entertained Indians around the world with her performances - besides she's glamorous, beautiful etc! But Doctor Haneef too has served his patients at the Gold Coast hospital and played a socially relevant role in Australia. We're all aware about the skills shortages that many western nations face and the need for skilled professionals such as doctors, nurses and IT professionals from India to fill such gaps. Dr Haneef was brave enough to leave the comfort of his hometown in India and go first to UK for training and then to Australia to work. His situation was a real immigrant's story of struggle and not a reality show. Of course, both Dr Haneef and Shilpa were looking beyond Indian borders to make a living and faced racial discrimination in that search. So why is the British government and more importantly the Australian government not rushing to Dr Haneef's support?

Are the Brits losing it over Shilpa?

2007-07-18T08:29:00.000-04:00

Read this really weird news in Times of India
A leading UK University will confer an honorary doctorate on Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty on Wednesday for her outstanding contribution to cultural diversity.

The Leeds Metropolitan University has, in the past, honoured prominent Indian personalities who contributed to India's emergence as a fast developing cinema-proud nation during its 60th year of freedom struggle, a spokeswoman of the University said.

Mangalore-born Shilpa Shetty is the youngest actor from the Indian film fraternity to join ranks of Amitabh Bachchan, Shabana Azmi and Yash Chopra who have been earlier chosen for the honour.
Isn't this Shilpa Shetty thing being carried too far. After all, when she joined the Big Brother show, Shilpa knew it was not going to be a bed of roses. She probably joined partly because she needed a boost to her flagging acting career and partly for money - both of which she got, and much more besides.
As for racism - obviously it cannot be supported. But then there are hundreds of Indians and people from other races too, including children, who are dealing with racism at school, on jobs and socially, in different parts of the world everyday. Isn't it time people started doing something for them too rather than go on and on with Shilpa?
As for a honorary doctorate, I think it's really unfair to dole out doctorates to people who have done nothing to earn it even as many students are struggling with backlogs to get their PhDs, even after they have worked very hard. In India, for instance, administrative delays have ruined the careers of many serious researchers, whose doctorates take up to even a decade in coming through. Many of these reasearchers have done pathbreaking work in their line of studies. Should the Leeds Metropolitan University then make such a mockery out of a PhD degree?
Finally, despite all the hungama around the Big Brother show and the Richard Gere kiss, I don't think Shilpa's career in Bollywood is going anywhere. Doesn't that come as a big professional failure for a person whose core claim to fame is being a Bollywood actor? Besides, how exactly has Shilpa contributed to cultural diversity - whatever that means? In fact, in giving her the doctorate and other such honours isn't the mainstream British society sweeping far more important racist issues under the carpet. It's almost like trying to put up a big show by heaping goodies on Shilpa and hiding their poor racist record. Shilpa may be a victim of racism, but it's not the worst form of racism that she has faced. There are much more terrible hate crimes based on racist tendencies that all of the Western society has to seriously face. And it's not even restricted to Western society - many countries around the world, including India, have to deal with racist issues! Shah Rukh Khan's wax model at Madame Tussad's makes sense because he's definitely the most bankable Bollywood star, as does a doctorate for Amitabh Bachchan, who has spent his whole life in producing a huge body of unparalleled work for the Hindi film industry! But Dr Shilpa Shetty - just doesn't make sense.

In Memoriam

2007-07-16T06:50:00.000-04:00

Got some photos of Ranjabati Sircar from the albums of a close friend of hers. While these would go well with my earlier post on her - I thought it better to post them separately, considering that her friend sent them to me after painstakingly searching them out and scanning them for our blog

New continents & people

2007-07-15T14:20:00.000-04:00

Fellow blogger Roma has been busy travelling around the world working on a project - here are some excerpts from her travelogue!

...After a harrowing day pursuing tickets to different destinations and nightmarish logistics, I just sat down in silence...and my Quaker journey starting in Oxford floated past me...I am sharing with all you pilgrims...all of you who have upheld me...

Spirit-led…
Broken, wounded, larcerated I arrived at Oxford on a supposed academic
journey I had no idea of the Spirit-led journey that I would be taken on
I was unevolved, uninitiated in the ways of the spirit
Moving to Canterbury Road was truly pivotal
There was a certain Presence there
And a sense of Being
But I only had glimmerings of this world
At moments in the Silent House in Taize
When silence released me from preparing a face to meet the faces that one
meets I was released into the peace of being and inner sanctum
But these were transient moments
I was too preoccupied trying to survive with a mindnumbing baggage of the
wounded past Pulling me down at every step
And then came the Quaker garden
That was the beginning of liberation
The true inner journey began to be revealed to me later mainly through
Sylvia Button and her mentor Constance Peters
Sylvia presented me with a book called Strenuous Liberty
In those twilight years in St Theosevia’s I scarcely understood what it
meant
That people choose bondage with ease rather than strenuous liberty…
Years later when scarcely a day goes by without my thinking of Sylvia or
feeling her intense spiritual presence in my daily life when I often
experience her interceding on my behalf
I now understand what it was all about
Now that the garden is within me
I now understand that the contemplative life is about joy and abundance and
being thrice as alive as a normal human being

It has been wonderful these past two years of being without work
Without any constraints
When I could have more inner time
And feel that glow within in harmony with a cosmos aglow with Presence

With my new assignment once more has come the tumult of the outside world
The cacophony of untuned voices, the world of barter and exchange
After a long time I find my inner space being invaded by martians

It may be that I am being taken to a higher level of challenge where I have
to retain the inner garden within the busy-ness, cacophony and tumult
Or be led to rejecting busy-ness altogether and moving on to another way of
life

I am wordless with gratitude for this magnificent journey that has been
given to me

I pray that I am upheld and I can keep the Peace…
******************************************************

Some of you know that I lost my father rather suddenly in Nov 05 and since
then have been in India in Kolkata/Calcutta taking care of my mother who was
clinically depressed...fortunately she's much better now...and my father who
was a very pure soul...somehow his passing away...released me to more being
time...

Recently I was head-hunted and have
been hired to do a global project and some sample countries
from the perspective of its commitment to gender equality...at one level I
am excited to do this Consultancy as it's years since I have had a global
conversation, but I am very wary of the political minefield of such
spaces...
I am also being asked to travel rapidly through places where I have very
cherished friends-but it's an express train of meetings through places-New
York from 20th-28th-and a meeting in Hove (UK) from 5th-8th and then to
Amman, Jordan...

...anyway I
would love to stop at 43 for a bit- a core place in my being...

I normally stay with John Linton in a guest room at Oxford at Plantation
Road-as he had kind of become my godfather-but I fear he may be having eye
surgery in hospital and he can't hear so I can't phone him. I will write to
Wolfson to book me a guest room.

When I think Oxford, I think mainly of you all and feel humble at all the
love I have received

************

Greetings from Amman-here on a 2 week visit to collect analysis

Arrived safely from Kolkata/Calcutta-memorable flight over blue green
Arabian sea-I flew to Bahrain-looked like a beuatiful sea resort from the
air and then over Lawrence of Arabia land=over the Arabian peninsual which
was surreal
I remember flying over the magnificence of the Sahara -45 mins of an awe
inspiring vastness
Arabian plateau not that kind of experience
but closer tto Amman the sand dunes waved patterns and then the wind had
made lace patterns on the deseert
rtaher like nerve patterns-very intricate
Amman is full of bright light
beaytiful sandstone houses with lots of date palms
I am enjoying the warmth of my Jordanian colleagues
people are so courteous here

we have hectic meetings all day but I love working dor gender and social
development issues
so it's very rewarding and I feel very blessed to use my education for those
who are excluded by society
I am going for the weekend to see a project in Aqaba a sea side resort
and very close to me is the Jordan river where Christ was baptised
and the whole area is so historic
Petra where I have no time to go
goes back before 8000 BC!!
Thinking of each and every one of you with love

***************

Flew from Kolkata to Bahrain via Muscat- After flying over the
blue Arabian sea with emerald green glints on the water, Bahrain looked like
a beautiful seaside resort with picture perfect turquoise blue sea and sandy
beach-the people were fashionably dressed in latest European fashions and
designer labels (the elite women all seem to be blonde and look like
European/Italian film stars) –just managed to board my plane to Amman-the
Gulf air flight from Bahrain to Amman had wonderful music channels-I
especially enjoyed contemporary Arabic music using pop and rock rhythms and
suddenly found myself flying over the Arabian Peninsula-while I have flown
over the Sahara – and marvelled at its vast awe-inspiring presence-almost 25
mins on an international flight-the Sahara is magnificent and has huge
presence-by contrast the Arabian Peninsula is vast but appears as rather
uninspiring stretches of sand-however, just 20 mins prior to landing in
Amman, the desert suddenly appeared interspersed with dark blotches (which I
later understood were occasional farms) and then the desert became a million
little sandy hills forming a pattern brownness which gave way to desertscape
that looked like a laced pattern rather like T.S. Eliot’s poem where he sees
a nerve-like pattern-the desert appeared like a surreal brown dreamscape
like a lace of nerves, in reality, all it was, was intricate wind erosion

In Amman, in our hotel, I rebelled against eating spaghetti bolognaise and
lasagne that is cooked for foreign visitors, luckily my Canadian colleague
is as adventurous as me so at the first opportunity we joined some local
friends and went to taste typical Arabic food in a more vibrant bazaar area
and ate Mansaf (which is cottonwool soft lamb cooked in a yellow pilau like
rice rather similar to my mother’s Yakni pullao and a desert that tasted
like a pancake made of fried cream rather like the Indian shahi tukra, but
completely different from the latter)-I am constantly discovering Indian
indebtedness to the Arab world in language `duniya’, `vasta’ and `mulkin’ to
name some-in handicrafts-a lot of the brass engraving very similar to
Moradabadi work (but who got it from whom?) and of course the fabulous
mosaics, artisanal motifs-Indian cultural heritage owes much to the Arab
world…

June 28th-We flew south to Aqaba- a fashionable seaside resort that people
in Jordan go to as a weekend getaway-after the desertscape just before
landing we saw the azure blue gulf of Aqaba against a series of endless
brown sandy ridges and date palms silhouetted against the coast-we stayed
for one magnificent night in a seaside resort that combined Swiss design and
hospitality with Arabic physical luxury and owing to a misunderstanding I
got upgraded to a VIP suite! I have never lived in such luxury-it was
aesthetically very Scandinavian in its elegant minimalism in design and
emphasis on wood and sandstone and muted colours where elegance is pure,
marked by restraint, as opposed to South Asian or Middle eastern exuberance
in design - every painting was chosen with taste and added to this we got
Jordanian human warmth in hospitality-the Jordanians are very pleasant
people and the ambience in Jordan is of a people who have found a way of
life that might be slower but they are happy and relaxed and that seeps into
any visitor
We had a private beach with a picture postcard view of the gulf rising in
different tones of blue and motor boats raced and yachts bobbed around and
there was a lot of happy Arabic families with lots of children swimming in a
glassy blue calm sea…a huge contrast to the turbulent and rough Bay of
Bengal…
In the evening one of my Jordanian colleagues’ brother who lived in Aqaba
invited us to a lovely restaurant called Ali Baba and I did feel like a five
year old Bengali girl in wonderland as he ordered so many delicacies for
us-the warmth, generosity and hospitality of this part of the world is
something!!

We ate delicacies from different salads, baba ganoush, olives, fried
calamari, falafel, meat chops, and then our main course was seafood (prawns,
crabs and cuttlefish) with rice (I of course ordered the rice!!)

In contrast to all this, the whole day we had spent with meetings with a
very fragile Palestinian refugee group –girls, boys, men and women who had
grown enormously in terms of a better understanding of their social
attitudes and leadership thanks to some innovative development programmes
that we are assessing-it was unbelievable to see the energy, vibrance and
creative ideas of adolescent girls and boys and to sit with a bunch of young
teenage leaders (every expressive face I have taken away with me) created in
a most confining of life spaces thanks to some innovative socialization
programmes –I was speechless with admiration-knowing that just over the
border young girls and boys were living in a scenario of armed conflict-I
couldn’t help thinking what if they had had the benefits of these programmes
and learned alternative ways of living eschewing violence…

What a difference progressive socialization makes-to have not just education
but to be trained in critical thinking –that’s what young people need the
world over
It was equally amazing to see middle aged and elder gentlemen from the
refugee camps speaking so reflectively about new attitudes to women, their
wives, sons and daughters after the workshops…it was a very moving
experience…social attitudinal change is never easy to facilitate and when
one witnesses it through the courage and determination of men and women who
are battling with serious life challenges, observing such a process is an
education in itself…the glaring inequality of their lives and the lives of
wealthy holiday makers in Aqaba was very disturbing for all of us…not
dissimilar to the inequalities we see in countries of South Asia-when
inequality is just taken for granted…
The night flight back the next day from Aqaba to Amman with a full desert
moon wraithe-like gliding over a blue black desert sky and miles and miles
of brown, lifeless ridges will be difficult to forget…
Today my first day off work in weeks I visited Bethany, the site by the
river Jordan where Christ was baptised and then to other amazing historic
sites (Petra which is the remains of a whole civilisation from 8000B.C. was
not possible to visit as temperatures here are searing! And the hot desert
winds are …!! )
I was equally moved by the simple waters of Jordan and the wild shrubs and
trees where John the Baptist had escaped to, from the persecution of the
Roman empire living as a hermit eating locusts and honey and where the boy
Christ was baptised-the physical simplicity of the place was very moving-and
more so as it was sandwiched between two militarised zones of Israel and
Jordan on either side of the river
My Jordanian driver, who knew hardly any English, even less about
Christianity or even Christ seemed to me a most Christ like character in his
simple human gestures-he took care of me like a mother hen and in his broken
English and my almost non existent Arabic I tried to make him stop to buy a
quick lunch and juice for both of us on en route-we did stop and eat but he
insisted on paying!!!…I really felt he was the saint in the story, a taxi
driver from Amman who had a value system that others take a lifetime to
acquire!

This whole experience is one of contrasts-on the way back from Aqaba when I
told a colleagues’ daughter that I was worried about my family and friends
in India as there were floods, she replied: “Isn’t it strange that your
country has so much water and we people pray just for a drop…”

Of women born and unborn

2007-07-13T11:01:00.000-04:00

Two stories caught my eye as I read the BBC with my morning coffee. In Bangladesh, classmates of 13 year old Habiba Sultana was able to save her from a forced child marriage. Habiba comes from a poverty-stricken family and her father had decided to marry her off to her 23 year old neighbour. A not-so-unfamiliar story of the gender dimensions of poverty.

In India, the government has proposed that all pregnant women register with the government so that it can regulate abortions. This is, on the face of it, a ridiculous proposition both in terms of the norms it embodies and the institutional impossibility it entails. What we will effectively have is a black economy which will make back-alley abortions even more rampant and all sorts of new and creative arrangements for the harassment of women will become institutionalized. I am not sure if this proposal is any better than the cradle scheme or the 'palna' project. "Under the scheme, baby girls can be dropped off at government cradle centres - akin to orphanages - that would be set up in each district in the next couple of months. Cradles will be placed at various government agencies including primary healthcare centres, hospitals, nursing homes and short-stay homes. Later, these babies would be transferred to specialised adoption agencies for rehabilitation.." (link)

Of course, I do not wish to suggest that the alternative is just to allow the continuation of foeticide. But I do wish to suggest that this is not a problem where governmental efficiency can be put on display as a solution. The problem in India has many dimensions which cuts across social class and education female infanticide is not limited to "the poor' - in fact the "new" Indian middle travels to the US to take advantage of the Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis technique). One of the reasons often cited for this "cross-class" gender bias are institutions such as dowry - and hence the efftors to link the question of foeticide to the economic value of women.

This value analysis of human beings, is in my opinion, ethically and politically unacceptable - and as long as we make economics the main argument against killing foetuses we will get nowehere. Neither will we get anywhere by taking away women's freedom of choice and her basic reproductive rights. The solution lies in two things: the strict implementation of the laws preventing sex selection, and political, legal and institutional support to (men and) women who try and resist this terrible practice. Just as Nisha Sharma made news by resisting dowry, there must be women in India who are refusing to kill their unborn daughters. We must find them and bring their stories into the realm of public knowledge.

A Bong connection & beyond

2007-07-11T12:16:00.000-04:00

Last weekend found me going out and doing something politically correct - watching Anjan Dutta's latest movie - The Bong Connection. The backdrop of this was that I spent the earlier part of the evening with a friend and a group of Delhi 'Bongs' who have connected through Orkut and had got together for a book reading session in Bengali. Well how did I feel at the end of the evening?
To begin with, the movie was very average. The new genre of movies on cross-border Indian families and individuals has caught up with Bengalis too. But then the phoney accents of the central characters didn't leave much of an impression as didn't the laboured parallel drawn with Satyajit Ray's Apu. Also there seemed to be an element of wardrobe dysfunction with one of the central characters lounging around in what appeared to be a cross between an overcoat and a raincoat in Texas! The guy is a Bengali IT whiz working in an Indian start-up - surely he didn't have to overdo this peculiar dressing style when everyone else was suave and well turned out!
In any case, I object to the concept of "Bong" - which was even stretched to encompass a Bangladeshi cab-driver in a Crash-esque immigrant sub-plot. Bengali is a language and a culture. Bengal is my home which is full of idioms that are very close to my heart as an immigrant Bengali - but what is Bong? I frankly don't understand. It may be a hip and happening concept - but I can't quite relate to it. This is despite wanting to call this blog - BLONG - since so far all us participants are Bengali Bloggers! OK, so Bong may be just another smart word!
To digress a little beyond the movie, cutting all the literature and poetry out of the immigrant experience - as a day to day story, it seems to have changed many of our families into dispersed entities. My mother and sister, for instance, are in Silicon Valley and I'm in Delhi - and I'm not even beginning to calculate those miles between. Our home in Santiniketan, meanwhile, is desolate and I don't even want to go there alone. Often, it's a logistical nightmare organising a visit by aged parents to Europe or America as the case may be - not to forget the visa hassles. So here's where I'd say cheers to the many new flights between India and US and Europe that are scheduled to be launched in the coming months - Continental, Air-India, Jet Airways and Delta. I think actual air connections are far more comforting than far-fetched Bong connections.
As for the Bengali poetry & prose reading session - I'm not sure that one can really share such personal experiences with a group of folks that one connected with on Orkut?

Tilda & My Mother's Signature Biryani

2007-06-28T14:42:00.000-04:00

Recently I did an article on Tilda Rice with my colleague Sudeshna Sen who's based in London. Tilda - which is one of the best known Basmati brands in Europe & US - is an example of a global brand created and promoted by a global Indian family. The London-based Thakrars, who set up Tilda in the 1970s, are a Gujarati family who lived in Uganda before 1972 and moved to UK during the Idi Amin dictatorship. The company is now a big exporter of basmati rice from India to major markets in North America, Europe, Middle East and Africa. The Thakrars are even known as the rice kings in UK.
Tilda basmati is a well known brand among South Asians in UK, US and Europe and the company now plans to launch many of its products in India too riding the retail boom. An interesting promotional activity undertaken by Tilda in UK is sponsoring events with the Craft Guild of Chefs and the company has even published a recipe book with signature biryanis by UK's famous chefs.

And now the company plans events with top chefs in India too and is planning to bring Cyrus Todiwala, MBE and founder & executive chef of London’s famous restaurant chain Cafe Spice Namaste to India.

Tilda sees South Asians all over the world as its brand ambassadors.The company sponsors the TUCO University Chef of the year competition in UK every year. And talking about signature biryanis I would like to share with our readers my Mother's Signature Biryani. This is possibly the most simple and yet most delicious biryani in the world. A lot of my busy friends and family have told us that this is the ideal recipe for entertaining people during the weekend and provides a quick and tasty option. Another good thing about this recipe is that it's not too high calorie either.

So here's My Mom's Biryani - something that I've grown up with and will always love.
Ingredients
1.Mutton 1kg.
2.Yogurt (dahi) 800gms
3.Basmati Rice 4 cups/you could use Tilda! ( 1kg apprx)
4.Onions 2 large or 3 small
5.Oil for frying
6. Jeera(cummin seeds), Methi (fenugreek), Mouri (aniseed/saunf), Sukno lanka dry (2-4 dried red chillies) fried and powered
(1 teaspoon of all the spices and half teaspoon of fenugreek)
7. 6 cups of water
8. Turmeric powder
9. Salt to taste
Method
1. Marinade the meat in yogurt and the spices and
turmeric powder for 2 hours.
2. Put in a pressure cooker
and add 1 cup water. Cook till meat is soft (about 15
20 mins, according to the quality of the meat.

3. Meanwhile cut onions into thin slices and fry in about 2 or 3
tablespoon of oil till golden brown.

4. Wash rice and drain
5. When u can open pressure cooker, put the fried onions
with oil and put in the rice.Add rest of water
6. Close cooker again and put on fire, wait till the pressure builds. Now lower the heat and
keep for only 5 mins not more (this is important.)
7. Open pressure cooker when u can.
8. Don't try release pressure by lifting the wieght with a spoon

Marching with BRIC

2007-06-24T12:42:00.000-04:00

The BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China) are about to crash into the G-6 list, displacing France, U.K., Germany and Italy. According to a Goldman Sachs report prepared in 2003, called "Dreaming with BRIC's - the path to 2050", only Japan and the USA will remain in the top six economic powers by 2050. The ranking at that point, according to the report, will be

1. China
2. USA
3. India
4. Japan
5. Brazil
6. Russia

India is forecast to maintain the steadiest growth rate throughout this period. If the predictions are correct, India's GDP should outstrip that of Japan by around 2030. In the words of a recent article in "Accountancy" magazine, the journal of The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales "..India's the one to watch !"

Many aspects of the report have raised eyebrows. One is the prediction that Brazil will outrank Russia. Another is a forecast that the currencies of the BRIC countries will appreciate by 300% against the US Dollar by 2050 !

The currency outlook is one which requires careful scrutiny and is likely to be the main indicator that matters are progressing according to the Goldman Sachs projections. The Indian currency steadily declined against the dollar after Independence. Some of us remember that in the 1950s the Rupee was 7 to the dollar ! However, that trend may well have been reversed. In 2005 the Rupee declined to 49 to the dollar. Today it is around 40, an appreciation of 18% over two years. While the prediction of a 300% increase may sound unrealistic, it is worth recalling the history of another currency - the Japanese Yen. In the mid-1970s the Yen was app. 300 to the US Dollar. Today it stands at 120. So the analysts of Goldman Sachs may yet be proved correct.

Danger signals abound, though. The growing (and highly visible) disparity between the upwardly mobile urban middle class and the teeming masses mired in poverty, requires the most urgent attention on the part of India's social engineers. Even the Goldman Sachs report points to the risk that political and social instability could derail the Indian Express.

It's worth repeating the words of the late Archbishop Romero of El Salvador " What good are beautiful highways and airports, all these beautiful skyscrapers, if they are fashioned out of the clotted blood of the poor who will never enjoy them ? "

Farmers' widows & children in Wardha: RV Bhavani

2007-06-23T06:44:00.000-04:00

R V Bhavani, Director, B V Rao Centre for Sustainable Food Security, M S Swaminathan Research Foundation has sent us the following article

Linisha and Bharti Bhatero outside their ramshackle hut in Wadgaon village, Seloo block, Wardha

Over 60 percent of India's population is rural and dependent on agriculture and allied activities for their livelihood. The landholding situation is highly skewed with the majority being small and marginal farmers with landholdings of 2 hectare and less. The share of agriculture in the Gross Domestic Product has however been falling over the years. So has investment in agriculture per se as well as investment on agriculture research and in rural infrastructure - a phenomenon that has characterised the neo-liberal reform period beginning in the nineties. Insurance for crop failure is virtually non-existent. The agriculture extension system has failed. The farmer is largely left to take a beating on the Input (Credit, Technology, Inputs) and Price and Market fronts. Increasing number of suicides by farmers in rainfed farming areas (mainly the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Vidarbha region of Maharashtra) since the late nineties is a manifestation of a serious malaise afflicting the Indian economy today. In fact, these are danger signals for the policy makers to sit up and take note but that sadly is not happening.

Their husbands/fathers have taken their lives, leaving behind the mothers and children to cope with the harsh realities of everyday existence. The situation is bleak; what do they have to look forward to, is the question that keeps coming to mind when one meets and speaks with them. It is a question of surviving from day to day. Most of the widows now work as farm labour and the children also go to work during weekends and holidays. While the women/girls get Rs.25/- to Rs.30/-, for five hours of work, the boys get about Rs.50 (in both cases, less than a dollar). In some families, atleast one son has dropped out of school to help their mother with farm work. In some families, the older son had been in a crucial year at school when the father committed suicide and that put an abrupt end to studies. The land in most cases is joint property or in the in-laws’ name. One could feel the anger in 17 year old Linisha’s voice, from Wadgaon village in Wardha district, when she said that her uncle now cultivates the land they had and her mother goes out to work as farm labour. Linisha has given her class X exams and would like to study further. Her sister Bharti, 13 has gone to class VIII. Their home is a ramshackle hut with asbestos roofing and mud flooring in the front room.

The insensitivity with which the agrarian distress relief packages are being implemented and the general apathy especially at the lower levels of administration also comes to light. Usha Dhale of Rohankheda village shelled out Rs.4000/- for a cow under the relief package. The cow is not yielding any milk and is an additional liability. Her father has taken it to his village so that it is not a burden on her. Asha Kurwade from Khambit village in Ashti block with one acre of land and no well was thrust with an engine for which she had to shell out Rs.5000/-. She has since borrowed from a moneylender at a rate of 5% per month to meet expenses when her children fell ill.
Asha Kurwade with her children, Khambit village, Ashti block, Wardha - what does the future hold for them?

The license for the fair price shop that Sushila’s husband Prakash Taksande used to run in Kharda village of Deoli block in Wardha district was withdrawn when he committed suicide. His wife, young Sushila who, hats off to her resilience, manages to have a smiling face all the time, was not considered for running the same, inspite of being class IX pass. She has not got any suicide relief either. The household of mother and two sons aged 12 and 7, runs on the rupees ten thousand she gets annually by leasing her four acre plot of land. In one village, the post office cuts Rs.20/- per child from the instalment deposited in the post office savings account as monetary support for education by a NGO.

Most families still have the debt outstanding, to the pressure of which their husbands succumbed, hanging over their heads. Some suffer from health problems, following the trauma of the husband’s death. What is however heartening in the scenario of gloom, are the aspirations of some of the children to study and the endeavor of the mothers to stand by them and strive to ensure that their desires are fulfilled. Nineteen year old Amol from Ashti village whose mother works as a helper at the anganwadi centre in the village will be completing an ITI course in wire work this year and hopes to take admission in class XI. Some of the families have children who are going to take their first steps in schooling and go to the balwadi or class I, and have a long way ahead.

The least the larger community could do is to ensure that these children do see some hope at the end of the tunnel and their aspirations are not thwarted even before they have taken shape. While it is a fact that by and large the scenario is not going to improve unless the ground realities of the agriculture that they do changes and necessary infrastructure and support services are in place, immediate support to the widows and their children is imperative. A small pilot initiative steered by the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation, a non-profit trust, is on in Wardha district of Vidarbha, where children of school going age from farmer suicide families are getting monetary support to ensure that they continue their education. 77 children from 37 families spread across the eight blocks of the district are covered at present. Children completing class X and XII now need help and counseling by way of courses they could join that would also give them some income earning skills instead of just leading to a run of the mill degree with no assurance of a job at the end of the day. The Rural College at Pipri, Wardha for instance offers a two-year diploma course in agriculture. Students undergoing the programme can if they wish to study further apply for admission to any degree programme other than engineering and medicine. Alternately, the diploma is also considered as valid qualification for certain jobs in the district administration. Children who had to drop out due to the sudden tragedy can also benefit by acquiring some vocational training skills that will help them to earn some additional income besides working just as farm labour. For instance, Nilesh, 19 of Paloti village is class X fail; so are brothers Narayan, 23 and Nitin, 22 of Sawli Wagh village. The Community Polytechnic at Pipri, Wardha offers six-month certificate courses in computer hardware repair, TV repair, two-wheeler repair, welding, electrical work etc. Undergoing such training can help them have an additional income earning skill in hand.

Ranjana with sons Abhishek (Class I) and Suraj (Class VI), Chincholi village, Karanjha block, Wardha: A long way to go...

Livelihood rehabilitation for the widows is also a matter of concern. Many have qualification ranging from class VIII pass to Class XII pass. Many are quite young too, in their early twenties to mid thirties. Most as mentioned earlier now work as farm labour. Life has virtually stopped midway on the tracks for them. Training in some skill that they can put to use while in their respective villages and make some money can help them get confidence, but it is also a challenge. A village may have only one such affected woman. The villages are spread out across the district, some being a hundred kilometers from the district headquarter, making a plan to bring them together for long periods of training difficult. Some of the women are members of self help groups. But only in one case we heard of a Self Help Group (SHG) having started a goatery enterprise with bank loan. Moving from just saving and lending to enterprise development and management is crucial if the quality of life is to improve. Uppermost on the minds of the mothers however, is the worry on what the future holds for their children, on what will happen after they have completed schooling so that they get a better deal in life.

Wardha abounds in educational institutions some with international renown; there are also many research institutes in the vicinity like the Central Institute of Cotton Research and National Bureau of Soil Science and Landuse Planning at Nagpur, just 70 kilometres away; The College of Agriculture in Nagpur is a century old. There is no dearth of intellectual capital either. The banks in the district led by Bank of India and State Bank of India, have undertaken a financial inclusion initiative. Historically, Wardha happens to be the base from where Gandhiji steered India’s freedom struggle and had all the potential for developing as a ‘Gandhi Zilla’ where everyone has a means of secure livelihood and can lead a life of dignity. Sixty years on however, the challenge is to stave the ignominy of being labeled a farmers’ suicide district.

Of Women and Presidents: Debjani Banerjee

2007-06-19T11:30:00.000-04:00

It has been a heady week in Indian politics and the Presidential nomination is still up in the air. But I thought I would post this anyway so we can mull over matters while the politicians play their cards.

I was excited when I heard that India was going to have its first woman president. Even if the role of the Indian president is largely symbolic and not quite equivalent to that of the French or American president (if the U.S. swears in a woman this November, I promise I will have no rants), it is path breaking. A woman even as the ceremonial head of India seemed like a harbinger of things to come.

But as I pondered over the matter I wondered if Pratibha Patil-Sekhawat’s nomination was clinching a deal for the women of India. I think people who are working at the heart of gender politics would not agree so readily.
The problem is not that she is low profile or that she has not done enough work in the area of gender development. The problem is that she is being chosen for her name rather than her work. Her hyphenated name at once appeases the vociferous Sekhawat community and complicates the candidature of the Vice President, Bhairon Singh Shekhawat who has jumped into the fray. As a son (sorry, daughter) of the soil, her nomination would please the Maharashtrians, (The NCP of Maharashtra, under Sharad Pawar, has been threatening to break away over several issues and they need to be mollified.) Suggesting the name of Pratibha Patil, currently the governor of Rajasthan, was a brilliant masterstroke by the Congress (who along with their allies are in political power at the moment) after their candidate, Shivraj Patil, the ex speaker of the Lok Sabha was turned down by the Left. The Left and the allies had also rejected the names of Sushil Kumar Shinde who represented Maharashtrian Dalits (we have already had a Dalit President in K.R. Narayanan so there is no urgency to appease them again right away?) and Karan Singh. (Dr.Karan Singh who hails from the royal family of Kashmir and studied at Doon School is obviously too esoteric a choice?) In contrast, Pratibha Patil, who belongs to a comfortable middle class and has a good education and a distinguished, if not spectacular career, seems like a safer choice. Her nomination has been lapped up by the allies of the Congress. But the Opposition parties have other ideas.

In the most recent development, the Vice President (who is being supported by the Opposition party) has said that he would withdraw his candidature if Dr.Abdul Kalam, the present incumbent, agrees to a second term; supported by heavyweights like Jayalalitha from the south, the President has maintained that he will return to Rashtrapati Bhawan only if he is the consensus candidate. In this complex game of identity politics and electoral ratios, Pratibha Patil, is being positioned as a woman candidate who, by virtue of her gender, represents all the women of India. My concern here, is not that she would have to be called the rather inelegant, Rashtrapatni, but that too; are we going to rename the post and the place of Residence? And even if we do that, can this lady stand outside of petty political strife to even try and make a difference? India is no stranger to women in politics. We have had a woman Prime Minister who has “ruled” India for fifteen years; the current de facto power in Indian politics, it is whispered, is a lady. And yet the position of women in non urban India has not improved in leaps and bounds.

So, if Pratibha Patil is chosen as the President when the politicians have exhausted all their moves, will it mean something for the women of India? Does it mean that women can have more legislation in their favour? Can it even signify that women’s achievements are substantial enough for them to be considered as the head of state, even in a titular position? Or is it just a token gesture that will not serve any real purpose? Tokenism worries me because for those of us who take gender politics seriously, it is a reminder that those in power can just use gender politics to their advantage; because “they” do not want to commit themselves to women’s empowerment in any serious way, they nominate a woman president! It sounds like circular logic but it is unfortunately how tokenism works. And tokenism implies condescension. Well sorry, we cannot pass the bill that ensures that women should have 33% seats reserved in the Lok Sabha, (and this is the place where Bills are debated so it is important to be there) but instead, we can have someone who looks like you as the President! It is like being handed a bar of chocolate when one needed serious attention in order to deal with female foeticide, anti dowry legislation, better education for women and the skewed gender ratio. Tall orders, any of these, but this is what India needs if ever we want development for all our citizens and globalization at a less-than-surface level.

It is being claimed that Pratibha Patil’s biggest advantage is that she has the right name, she is close to the Gandhi family and that she is non-threatening. This last bothers me more than the first two. Previous presidents have been chosen for their names and yet Abdul Kalam, Zakir Hussain and Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed have left individual imprints as good speakers, who with their knowledge and intellect can make appropriate legal interventions. Kalam certainly has been hailed as a popular President and as such, Patil has large shoes that she has to fill. Can she find non threatening ways to commit to progressive and secular values for the women of India? Or will she be just another name on Wikipaedia? Going for her is that she is a lawyer, an efficient administrator and an experienced politician who has held ministry portfolios of housing, health and education. And my personal favourite – she was the table tennis champion in her college!

Coming to terms with Father's Day

2007-06-18T15:53:00.000-04:00

Usually I don't feel too inspired by marketing driven events such as Valentine's Day, Mother's Day and Father's Day etc. Every year there's a kind of circus around Valentine's Day when certain fundamentalist political elements resort to vandalism on the streets in some Indian cities while at other cities and metros various companies and restaurants etc manage to make a packet around lovey-dovey marketing buzz. In fact, even very public celebration of birthdays sometimes don't fit in with Indian social realities and often when one goes to wish a colleague whose Birthday is announced on the official website one is greeted with blank looks. That's probably because the colleague in question has a different date of birth for the records than his/her actual birth date. One then gets the feeling that exporting US HR practices directly into Indian companies are sometimes examples of cultural insensitivity and lack of understanding of social realities.

In any case, this year Father's Day (which was yesterday) left me feeling different because I was missing my father a great deal. Every little advertisement on TV and even the promotional flyer that a local hospital had inserted into my Sunday newspaper brought him back to me as did all the little things around my house like the light bulb that he changed during his last visit and the chair that he had painstakingly painted.
After a great deal of soul-searching I zeroed in on the following poem as the best way to remember my dad on Father's Day. Sailing had been one of his favourite leisure activities and he loved adventure. The poem is Classic T.S. Eliot, so enjoy. And Happy Father's Day (somewhat belated) to all you fathers out there.

What seas what shores what grey rocks and what islands
What water lapping the bow
And scent of pine and the woodthrush singing through the fog
What images return
O my daughter.
Those who sharpen the tooth of the dog, meaning
Death
Those who glitter with the glory of the hummingbird.
meaning
Death
Those who sit in the sty of contentment, meaning
Death
Those who suffer the ecstasy of the animals, meaning
Death
Are become unsubstantial, reduced by a wind,
A breath of pine, and the woodsong fog
By this grace dissolved in place
What is this face, less clear and clearer
The pulse in the arm, less strong and stronger -
Given or lent? more distant than stars and nearer than
the eye

Whispers and small laughter between leaves and
hurrying feet
Under sleep, where all the waters meet.

Bowsprit cracked with ice and paint cracked with heat.
I made this, I have forgotten
And remember.
The rigging weak and the canvas rotten
Between one June and another September.
Made this unknowing, half conscious, unknown, my own
The garboard strake leaks, the seams need caulking.
This form, this face, this life
Living to live in a world of time beyond me; let me
Resign my life for this life; my speech for that unspoken,
The unawakened, lips parted, the hope, the new ships.
What seas what shores what granite islands towards
my timbers
And the woodthrush calling through the fog
My daughter.
Marina
(Quis hic locus, Quae
regio,quae mundi plaga?)

Durgapur & the Age of Innocence

2007-06-16T00:17:00.001-04:00

I grew up in a small town called Durgapur - around 150 km away from Kolkata. in those days we didn't really know about classifications of cities such as SEC A, B etc, so I'm not very sure about Durgapur's (or DGP) socio-economic category in those days. Instead, it was categorised as an industrial town and even sometimes (a bit exaggeratedly) called the Ruhr of India. Some of my father's colleagues who had visited Germany even imagined that the lights of Durgapur Steel Plant which glimmered like fairy lights when the train approached DGP from Kolkata reminded them of the Ruhr Valley in Germany with its heavy concentration of steel plants. Whether that was really the case or not - the lights definitely rang an alarm bell for us passengers in the train because we had to be ready to move to the door all set to alight. After all DGP was a tiny railway station where most trains stopped only for 2 minutes!

But the steel plant is not DGP's only industry - there's Phillips Carbon Black (of the Goenka group), Damodar Valley Corporation the power generating PSU, Fertiliser Corporation of India, Mining & ALlied Machinery Corporation - a PSU where various experts from the erstwhile Soviet countries often came to work. In fact my close friend in school Joanna Hornik was Polish and lived in MAMC. Her father was a mining expert from Poland while her mother was German. The list of industries in Durgapur could go on and on - but ACC Babcock Limited where my father worked was a company that manufactured industrial boilers and pressure vessels. We lived in small townships attached to the industries and probably ingested a lot of industrial pollution through the water we drank and air we breathed. Our childhood however was simple and unstressed. In fact, our smart cousins who grew up in the metros of Kolkata and Chennai often teased us about our naivete. But life in DGP was simple and without the upheavals of metro life. We went to school in a bus provided by my father's company and timed ourselves by the morning news on the local radio station. Evenings were a time for outdoor activities from paying catch n' catch to badminton, cycling and later swimming. By sundown all the kids were home and had to get down to serious studies and we had early dinners are were sent of to bed early. Our parents too followed a similar lifestyle - only sometimes they went for a late movie or a few drinks at the local club, leaving us behind with the domestic helpers. Drinks were probably restricted to the men folk while women chatted over colas. Those were pre-TV and pre-computer days and hence we lived with and for our books, our friends, our games and our lives at school.

Recently when Anup Singh (Munna) - who lived at the Steel township and mentored younger boys and girls to take up sports activities - called to invite me to a meeting of DORA (Durgapur Old Residents Association) in Delhi, I went on a pleasant trip down memory lane. Anup had actually mentored a girl called Anupama to take on my sister Deborani in the Durgapur Club annual swimming championship. My sister, of course, was a champ in her own rights and was a winner of swimmimng competitions at the state and district levels. And she had a strategy of her own to take on Anup's protege. The race was a marathon of a considerable number of laps. My sister allowed Anupama to take an early lead and in the very last lap overtook her to win the gold medal in a nail-biting finish. Of course, she was later reprimanded by our swimming coach from the MAMC Swimming Club - Kanti Dutta - who was also a national diving champion, for taking such a big risk with her competition. While my mother was a teacher for more than two decades at St Xavier's School, the boys' school in Durgapur, my sister and me went to Carmel Convent - which was the best known girls school. My mother walked across to her school through a copse of deciduous sal trees even as the bell rang announcing the start of classes. My father was the last to leave home for office. I suddenly chanced upon a website of St Xaviers Durgapur created by a group of ex-students. Photographs of the huge grounds, the auditorium and the buildings brought back memories of times when I went with my mother to fill in a leave vacancy at St Xaviers during college vacations.

The ABL township where we lived all our childhood years had large British style bunglows and was surrounded by deciduous woods. Among the local places of interest was the Bhabani Pathak's Tila or mound. It was a tiny hillock on top of which was a broken down stone wall like structure. DGP-lore had it that this was the headquarters of a gang of Robin Hood style dacoits of yore and the mound was connected to the Damodar river nearby through an underground tunnel. Needless to say that none of us had ever encountered any tunnel. However, we had pleasant outings to the hillock including a nocturnal moonlit picnic when we had trekked there with a group of friends from ABL - which was about 8 km away. My parents were always very adventurous and had once trekked to Santiniketan which was about 50 km away with their friend Debashish Sengupta. That was the mid-1970s probably and the trio had followed a rural route along the Ajay river. They had spent one night at a forest bunglow enroute and reached Santiniketan the next evening - proving to everyone that Snatiniketan, which was also my grandparents' home - was actually walking distance from DGP. Later, Baba and Ma with Debashish and his wife Sumita Sengupta and two other friends Jawahar Pillay and R.Kumar had gone on an arduous, off-season trek to the hill shrine of Amarnath in the Kashmir Valley. So while life was simple and uneventful - it had its share of adventure too.

We had our unconventional birthday parties - meticulously planned out by Baba. The memorable ones are one when Baba drove us with a bunch of friends to the breath-taking rose garden around his office in the evening and the second when he and Ma organised a bonfire and bar-b-que for our friends on a November evening. We had collected autumnal leaves for weeks before that to stoke our bonfire and the party was a roaring success. We had annual picnics, festival dinners, badminton and cricket tournaments and Holi revelries. Most of these events are well documented through photographs taken by my father. In fact, those sepia toned memories are about all that remains of life in DGP - as my childhood friend Nilanjan, who's now a very successful professional in America, says: "Durgapur is indeed a time capsule more than a physical location - a grimy, boring metaphor for our lost youth." He hasn't been back since 1983. And I probably went to DGP for the last time even before 1983. I don't have much clarity on what plans the West Bengal government has for Durgapur - if any. All I know is that most of us who spent our childhood in that city still think of our lives there and have many pleasant memories. I've been part of a school alumni meet at Silicon Valley - when my classmate Kalapi - a computer scientist at Intel - rallied all our other batchmates from Carmel Convent Class of 1981 together for a lunch about six years ago. We spent the whole afternoon at her house in Cupertino, talking about little apart from our school days and life in DGP. Then there's Neema Kudva, a professor of city planning at Cornell, whose garden and house in DGP were happy hunting grounds for many of us on summer evenings. We climbed trees, plucked fruits, played hide & seek or just sat around and talked books.In fact, if Durgapur was about the outdoor experience - it was also about reading lots of books and creative writing and literary discussions.

Two of my friends with who I shared my love for reading and writing were, of course, Neema and Nilanjan. A memorable experience was a play directed by Nilanjan's mother Mrs Sarbani Sen - a very talented individual - who had got together a motley crowd of school kids like us and some of my father's enterprising colleagues to put up Agatha Christie's A Murder is Announced. The challenges for her ranged from dealing with strange regional accents and ensuring that people had learnt their lines before they came for rehearsals to finding an empty bunglow for the rehearsals and chastising the boys in the cast - who often disappeared for a game of cricket instead of practising - and then finding the right costume for Mrs Marple. Needless to say that the production set in a small village in England created quite a stir in our own provincial small town lives in DGP. It was undoubtedly the highlight of that season! There were the muscial programmes too of song and dance that had a great deal of involvement of both my sister and mother. Rehearsals for those went on for weeks and even months and the final evening was always of very high quality performances. The rigourous rehearsals brought out the best of talent and team work in various people including homemakers who usually maintained a low profile at other times. Those were occasions that we looked forward to and which helped us to communicate with others around us and do creative things together.

I'm not quite sure if such a lifestyle exists now, even in DGP. Besides, I'm not even sure if there were not issues that needed to be addressed way back in our childhood such as more global exposure etc. In fact, life in a small town setting where everyone worked at the same office or went to the same schools had its flipside too. For lots of people, malicious gossiping sessions provided the only leisure activity and many of them were trapped in the little comforts that came with the small town lifestyle. Perhaps a lot of talent went undiscovered and many people found their spirit of adventure harnessed by the ordinary routine existence. However, my own world that was essentially created by my parents and my sister was totally nurturing and DGP gave me all the values that have been with me after I left it behind. The two and a half hour journey from Durgapur to Kolkata by Bidhan Express that I always longed to make was more than a grimy train ride. It will always remain for me a metaphor of growing up and transcending the limits of a small town existence. It was a journey that had to be made, even though what one was leaving behind was precious - the age of innocence.

The Cost of Multiracial Love

2007-06-15T22:09:00.000-04:00

The Best Things In Life Are Free, goes the conventional wisdom. That should include Love, surely one of the best things in life.

Not so apparently in the USA, in the case of men wishing for success with women of a different ethnicity.

A joint MIT and University of Chicago study (What makes you click - Mate Preferences and Matching Outcomes in Online Dating by Gunter Hitsch and Ali Hortacsu) has actually spent a lot of academic time on researching the amount of additional income a man needs to date a woman of a different ethnic background in America.
Anyway, the findings are that (taking an income of $ 62,500 per annum as the base), significant increments are needed for trans ethnic dating in many instances.

For example, the study says, for equal success with White Women, a White Man needs 0 incremental factor over $62,500. However, an additional $154,000 is needed by a Black Man to date a white woman, i.e., an income p.a. of $62,500 + $154,000 = $ 216,500.

A Hispanic man, on the other hand, needs only $ 77,000 more than $62,500 to achieve success with a White Woman.

Now comes the bad news. Asian men apparently need a whopping $247,000 more than the base of $62,500 to win a White woman !

Further bad news for Asians. According to the study, Asian women will accept a discount of - $24,000 if wooed by White men, so they are apparently easy preys to White men earning only $ 38,500 per annum ! On the other hand, they require - according to the study - an incremental $ 30,000 from Hispanic men.

I am not sure how the field work was conducted between MIT and the University of Chicago. Hopefully it was a lot of fun for the research team, but presumably expensive if the wrong ethnic combination was involved. Perhaps the academics on our blogsite can enlighten.

Long live Academic Research !

CONTINUING DELAYS ON THE MAGIC CARPET

2007-06-13T15:54:00.000-04:00

In an earlier blog I had written about the over subscription of H-1B visa applications for 2008, the present quota being 65,000 from all countries. Since historically Indians account for more than 50% of H1-B entrants to the USA, this was clearly bad news for Indian technicians and other qualified personnel hoping to gain employment in the USA. In spite of the lobbying from employers to raise the quota, I had reluctantly concluded that ".. However, the reality is that these limits will probably not be increased any time soon, while the Great Immigration Debate rages on through the United States as part of the 2008 election campaigns.."

For a while it seemed that my prediction was too pessimistic, since the recent Immigration Reform Bill contained a provision to raise the quota to 115,000. Alas, this bill has been defeated in the Senate, mainly because of opposition to other clauses, but of course the net result is that the H1-B visa position remains closed for 2008.

While the heated discussion in the USA on this subject has focused almost entirely on Mexican migrants, the implications for immigrants from other countries have largely been ignored. In particular, the significance of Indian immigration is largely lost on the US public. It is a little known fact here that India accounts for the second largest number of immigrants to the USA, after Mexico. Even more significant, in terms of legal immigration, Indians rank far higher than Mexicans, who are only sixth on the scale of legal immigrants.

The contradictions and inequities in the Immigration Reform Bill which caused it to be denied passage will mean that the flow of Indian qualified personnel to the USA will probably continue to remain in check, at least through 2008 and perhaps beyond that date.
One favorable exception though is in the category of Nursing. Because of the severe shortage of nurses in the USA, a special category of Green Card (Schedule A) has been created for qualified nursing practitioners, and Indian nurses have been taking advantage of this category. As a result, they now constitute the second largest number of foreign nurses in the USA (after those from the Philippines)

Myths and Memories: Benares May 2007

2007-05-31T23:33:00.000-04:00

From ever since I can remember, I wanted to visit Benares. But now that I've been there and done that, it's a bit tough to write about. That's mainly because so much has been said and done on the city that I'm groping for some new idioms and symbols to make my own inner peace with this ancient and holy pilgrimage.A good start here was watching Satyajit Ray's Joy Baba Fhelunath & Aparajito all over again. Both the movies use Benares as a very strong symbol and the magic of Ray's camera captures the fascination of the ghats, the river Ganga and the lanes and bylanes of the city even better in some ways than one's own imagination.

The flight of doves that Ray has used in both the films was, however, missing from the ghats of Benares and I wonder whether the birds find the environment less hospitable now. A paddling of ducks out on a stroll by the river, of course, made my day when I visited the Ramnangar Palace. The building is a formidable fortess from where steps lead right down into the waters. The descendants of the former ruler of Benares still live in the palace - in what appears to be a kind of splendid isolation. This family, it seems, has not gone in for converting their palace into a heritage hotel as some of those in Rajasthan have done.
Of course, Benares is now covered by a security blanket and the narrow lanes adjoining the city's most powerful symbol - the Kashi Vishwanath Mandir - almost feel like an airport check-in. My hotel by the Assi Ghat provided a deckside view of the ephemeral Ganga and took me back all the way back to memories of a relative's house at Baranagar near Kolkata by the Hoogly. Living in a house which gives you a view of the river from almost every window and listening to gentle waters lapping around at night probably has a calming effect on everyone - but for my sister and me as children, the majestic view of the Dakhineshwar temple on the other shore was even more fascinating. And the ulitimate treat was when my father rowed us in a country boat to the opposite side even as the boatman himself stretched out and relaxed. My father had been a skilled oarsman in his salad days and had won rowing competitions in Kolkata. He often told us about the famous Head of Thames boat race in England where he had participated. Since my trip to Benares was in many ways inspired by him, the river flowed through my consciousness with its flood of memories of Baba and of happy childhood years. As I went on boat rides on the river and even took the proverbial holy dip to cleanse myself of my sins, I didn't feel any sense of filth or dirt that travellers to Benares often come back with. I would like to hope that this has something to do with the government's efforts in cleaning the river, the ghats and the city. And no, there were definitely no dead bodies floating by though the boatmen like to point out the Manikaran ghat to visitors as a place "where dead bodies are burnt round the clock". An interesting aspect of life by the river is that it has an early start. Even before day break, the river and its ghats are bustling with activity. If you're not performing the pujas yourself, just watching some of the ceremonies being conducted by others is interesting and non-intrusive. I found a couple of foreign tourists watching the sunrise sitting atop the rampart of the fort at Chet Singh ghat. The heat (abover 40 degree C) at this time of the year, doesn't seem to bother the American and Europeans, who form a large part of visitors to Benares.
My sister had given me the tough job of finding a Benarasi silk sari for her which matched one that came to my mother with her wedding trousseau decades ago. Armed only with my impressions about the sari's colour, weave and design, I undertook a journey into the other side of Benares - narrow gallis where Muslim weavers lived and created the fascinating saris on their looms. It takes them about 10 days to weave one sari, one of them told me. I didn't exactly find the twin of my mother's sari - though I did bring one back which is close enough! Benares has a very large community of Bengali immigrants from areas such as Malda and Murshidabad. A couple of Bengali rickshaw drivers took charge of my sight-seeing around Benares, when they found that I too spoke their language. In fact, after I had convinced then that I wasn't a foreigner, they shared with me the stories about how their parents had moved to Benares years ago in search of a livelihood. And on a rickshaw tour around the city, I discovered Banaras Art Culture, an art gallery housed in a 275 year old building. The owners, Shree Gopla Ji Goel & Shyam Das Agrawal are running a project to revive folk art and crafts in and around Benares. The large number of foreign visitors to the city probably provide a customer base for local artists.>

Tiger Tales and More: Debjani Banerjee

2007-05-28T18:40:00.000-04:00

THE Ranthambore National Park is perhaps the best place in the world to see tigers in the wild. I knew that the tigers we see on National Geographic and Discovery Channels are almost all natives of Ranthambore. I had heard enough stories of Genghis, the beloved tiger, who was famed for hunting down his prey into the waters of the lake. But what I found out was that there is much more to Ranthmabore than tiger trails. I will always remember it as a comprehensive jungle experience that leaves one thirsty for more.

Set amidst undulating topography with a rich diversity of flora and fauna, the open habitat of the park makes for spectacular views. The arduous hilly terrain which varies from flat topped mountains of the Vindhyas to the conical and comparatively steep ranges of the Aravalli, is interspersed with jungle streams. For the initiated, the area boasts of over 300 species of trees and 272 species of birds! The park gets its name from Ranthambore fort, the remains of which can be found on top of a hill overlooking the park.

Old fortifications that dot the forest claim a splendid architectural past for the area. The juxtaposition of the fort and the jungle is a constant reminder of the grandeur of the past nurturing majestic presence.

Once the place was chosen, I began working on the details and the creature comforts. Planning the journey was not without its usual quota of excitement! As soon as our travel and hotel reservations were confirmed, the park closed suddenly due to some legal issues. My aunt had organized a field trip with her students from National University of Singapore but they were not allowed into the precincts of the park. As we dully toyed with alternate destinations – Sariska, Kanha, the park re-opened again, just as abruptly. If my scepticism regarding travel and tourism in India had raised its ugly head with the government’s quirky actions, it was proved wrong as soon as I stepped on to Sawai Madhopur station. The station was comfortable and well organized and I had to give the thumbs up for Rajasthan tourism for everything I saw and experienced between my two stops at the station.

The hotel itself was a haven. We were a motley crew and the hotel had enough facilities to make everyone happy. If I was content to admire the purple haze of the imposing Aravalli right behind our cottages, the more energetic members of the group could toss a ball in the green lawn; the children were delighted with camel rides that made off into the wilderness; for the not so brave there were hammocks and sand pits. The more inquisitive amongst us marvelled at the thriving rose bushes and all of us appreciated the prompt service that provided good food and beverages all through the day just as they had promised on the website. All in all, they pampered us to the extent that if they had relegated us from a covered jeep to an open canter for the forest safari (to upgrade more privileged guests?) we chose not to be too offended.But it is the forest that held me in its thrall. I have prided myself on being rather a veteran of forest tourism in India-- Periyar, Bandipur, Mudumalai, Nagerhole, Sundarbans, Jaldapara, Bandhavgarh – each forest unique and spectacular in its own right. I was prepared for scattered clumps of trees or an extended copse may be. After all, Ranthambore borders the arid Thar desert, how could one have expected more?

I was proved pleasantly wrong. Not quite the “woods are lovely, dark and deep,” Ranthambore forest had a lovely golden-brown hue quite unlike the lush tropical forestation I had mostly seen and enjoyed in southern, eastern and central India. The vegetation is varied and forms an interesting combination of dry deciduous trees, tropical moist vegetation and shrubs and climbers that can survive in drier climates. The deciduous patches interrupted by evergreen glades make for some spectacular scenery. The main tree cover comprises of the dhok or flame of the forest (the tongue twister version of it is anogeossis pendula) as it is a hardy tree that can withstand spells of drought. Other than the ubiquitous banyan, I could also spot jamun, berry, teak, tamarind, kadam, babul, neem, mahua, khajur apart from plenty of bamboo. In fact, our local guide mentioned that the banyan tree at the gates of the fort was the second largest banyan tree in India, the largest being in Calcutta Botanical gardens. Later, I checked that this is most likely true. Local guides have never ceased to amaze me with their wealth of knowledge. We see so much of this ‘be proud of your heritage’ drive here in local counties and I think the wonderful local guides would be an excellent example of people who have being doing that for ages.

Ranthambore fort, situated at the meeting of the Aravalli and the Vindhya mountains, was our first destination. The ornate and intricate carvings have helped historians to conjecture that it was probably built in the tenth century A.D. by a member of the Chauhan dynasty. Because of its location it was one of the more invincible forts, it was also the point of control for central India. Amongst the ruins (the fort was clearly ravaged by many wars) the Badal Mahal and Hamir’s court are redolent of past grandeur. I was fascinated by the colourful stories regarding Alaudin Khiljee’s unsuccessful attempt at conquering the fort but it is Rana Hamir (circa 11 A.D.) who holds a special place in the hearts of the locals as the legendary hero who fought the superpowers to save the fort. The Mughals were finally able to acquire the fort in late 16th century; from them it passed as a gift to the royal family of Jaipur and was used as their hunting grounds. In the 19th century the fort was supposed to have become a prison.

While I was engrossed in the tales of the past, the others were busy spotting crocodiles in the aquamarine waters of the lake right below the fort. It is in the jaws of a couple of such crocodiles that the local star Genghis had met his end. There are plenty of lakes within the forest that serve as watering holes for the animals; Padam Talao, inside the perimeter of the fort, provides a kaleidoscope of animals as they come to quench their thirst. It is also an excellent place for sighting birds – we saw gulls, terns and storks.

Our onward journey into the forest had us quivering with excitement. Craning to catch a glimpse of the majestic predator, we encountered the lovely cheetal deer and a lonesome black buck. The chirpy langurs dramatic as ever, snatched, quarrelled and jumped swiftly from one branch to another. Nilgais, in large groups, moved across our path. Most animals in Ranthambore forest seem not to be too perturbed with human intervention. Herds of sambar settled comfortably on their own land and did not as much as glance at us as we drove past. The rufoustailed hare and the palm squirrels scampered across looking very busy. A jackal slinked across. The children were intrigued with their first glimpse of bats hanging from trees– being used to the more glamorous batman stories on celluloid. The rich birdlife was evident in the number and variety we saw; peacocks walked around leisurely. One of them even deigned to show off their glorious feathers. We saw parakeets, a beautiful golden oriole, kingfishers, wagtails, the Paradise flycatcher, Partridge, red spur fowl, and the odd camouflaged owl, the last being a unique sight, the memory of which never fails to amaze me. By 5.30 in the evening we had to leave the park; the rules here seemed to be more rigid than most Project Tiger reserves.

The next morning we were in the forest right after sunrise. It was our last opportunity and by then we were quite desperate for a private audience with the lord of the jungle. We mistook every shape and outline to be that of a tiger. If the bamboo trees swayed, so did our expectations, only to be dashed at the next turn. My son is convinced that he saw the disappearing beast on a mountain slope. Our hopes truly skyrocketed when we saw fresh pug marks en route. But alas, we did not get a glimpse of the elusive predator nor its sleek cousin, the leopard. The other jeeps/canters that went out that morning had all been rewarded but we returned empty handed…or have we? Even as I close my eyes now I can see that gorgeous kingfisher amidst a splash of blue or that deer, trying to reach the overhanging branches of the tree, wanting to sample new delights. As for the tiger tale, this is only the beginning…

Greetings from Ganga

2007-05-23T10:25:00.000-04:00

I'm just back from my first trip to Kashi (Benares or Varanasi to many). It's been an overwhelming experience for me and I'll have to wait a bit for my thoughts to settle down before I can write a post. Till then here are some photos (on the right). Enjoy!

The Empire Strikes back - in High Spirits

2007-05-19T18:34:00.000-04:00

It was recently announced (including by the Financial Times on May 17, 2007) that United Breweries (UB), the alcoholic drinks comglomerate controlled by Vijay Mallya had acquired the Scotch Whisky manufacturer White & Mackay for $1 billion. This now gives the Mallya organisation access to a production capacity of 40 million litres of Scotch Whisky, catapulting UB to the position of the third largest manufacturer of spirits in the world (after Diageo and Pernod Ricard).

This follows a series of investment deals from India concluded in 2006, when for the first time, India's outbound investments exceeded inbound foreign investments in value.

2007 promises to maintain that trend. According to the Financial Times report, the first four months of 2007 has seen 73 successful takeovers of foreign companies by Indian companies in deals totaling $24.4 billion, as compared to 38 foreign deals for Indian companies in the same period worth $17 billion. Tata Steel's $13 billion acquisition of Corus Steel led the way.

Vijay Mallya's declared objectives for the W&M acquisition was as much to help expand his Indian business as it was for foreign market penetration. In keeping with the rising sophistication of the Indian consumer market, the consumption of Scotch in India has been growing at 25% a year. Other premium alcoholic drinks are likely to increase in demand too, which has also prompted UB to earlier acquire the sparkling wine manufacturer Bouvet-Ladubay. This presumably ensures that when champagne corks pop in the UB boardroom from now on, they will only need to open bottles of their own manufacture.

Petition from Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak on Baroda

2007-05-16T11:55:00.000-04:00

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak sends you the enclosed
page from PetitionOnline.com:

http://www.PetitionOnline.com/ms150507/petition.html

Ranja Sircar: Creativity unlimited

2007-05-14T15:31:00.000-04:00

Sometime back The Telegraph in Kolkata had an article on college and university campuses and some of the places and people who had almost become part of the folklore for the generations of students who have studied there. The article had stirred up quite a movement on the blog world with lots of people going on nostalgic trips about their own student days in Kolkata and elsewhere. While the article was mostly about the canteens and the 'addas', there's a person I can think of who's almost like a part of the legends of my years at Jadavpur University. Ranjabati Sircar will probably be remembered as an extremely talented dancer and choreographer, but at JU in the mid 1980s, Ranja was a symbol of beauty, talent and brains. She was the kind of girl on campus who drew the largest amount of male attention and again it she who topped the BA & MA exams at our English department and was awarded the UGC scholarship. In fact, the story goes that when Ranja was sent by senior professors of the English department to teach a class of engineering students an optional English paper, the entire faculty turned up and even ex-students wanted to join the class. The university authorities had to move the class - which had very poor attendance in the past - to a gallery, which had the maximum seating capacity.

While Ranja was undoubtedly one of the most beautiful girls on campus for many years, she was also cerebral, liberal, articulate and intelligent. Dancing was probably the passion of her life, but she was also a participant at debates, an active member of the super-intellectual film club and always among the main organisers of literary seminars and workshops. I remember a seminar on the poetry of TS Eliot where my classmates and me had heard Ranja making strong and relevant points after an overseas speaker had finished reading his paper. I don't really recall the details of the topic, but Ranja in an orange and green sari, with the trademark long bindi on the wide forehead had mesmerised all of us with her intellect and her grace. In fact, her fan following was both among girls and boys in college.

After her tragic death some years ago, I had written a tribute to her for the weekend section of The Economic Times in Kolkata (with my former colleague Madhumita Mookherjee). Unfortunately, I seem not to have kept a cutting of that article, which one of my colleagues had headlined very aptly: Amazing Grace. But the people who I had spoken to while doing that article had all provided rare glimpses into her truly amazing life. While Ranja and her mother Manjushri Chaki Sircar will definitely be remembered as the founders of Dancers' Guild and pioneers of a new movement in modern Indian dance - Ranja also belongs to the JU folklore and there have been very few like her who have made such a deep impact on fellow students.

Ranja topped in class and was a thinking and socially conscious being. She was also deeply artistic and creative. While on one hand she was travelling overseas for dance performances very often, she also joined the student protest movements which were very much a part of our campus life and again she was always there to donate blood at voluntary camps. And the adda sessions at the famous JU 'lobby' were never quite complete without her. So when her classmate and film-maker Mainak Biswas (now a faculty member of JU's school of film studies) made a short film called Grafitti shot on the campus, it was no surprise that Ranja was one of the protagonists. A shot from the film which had Ranja walking down the little bridge that separated the engineering and arts faculties of our university - had a poster with Pablo Neruda's poetry as the backdrop. The lines of the poem are etched in my mind forever - I want to do with you, what spring does to the cherry trees. She was a role model for many of us, her juniors and everything she did was different and unique. Ranja dressed differently and always managed to look stunning - "daring but not decollete" as her friend and film-maker Mandira Mitra had described to me after her death. I always felt that Ranja had the beauty and grace to make it big in films or modelling if she had wished to.

But that was not Ranja - she was a dancer, a literary person and even a college professor for some years. Dr Jasodhara Bagchi, our professor at JU, had shared with me her last meeting with Ranja in London, when they had watched Shekhar Kapur's Elizabeth together. "We discussed the dance genre of that age afterwards, it was a very lively discussion and I had no premonition that I would never see her again," Dr Bagchi had remembered. Needless to say that Ranja was among her most favourite students in university. A lot has been written about Ranja's dance and choreographic career - but for me she was much more than just a famous dancer. Ranja was the symbol of a modern woman who lived life and perhaps even ended it on her own terms. She was beautiful and intelligent. She was literary and very well read. An old dog-eared and pretty tattered copy of the bold American novel: The Women's Room, that had been passed on to me by a friend's sister and which I had never got around to returning, is still a part of my collection of books. It belonged to Ranja and has her name written in bold letters on the flyleaf. Honestly, I don't regret not returning it - in fact it's symbolic that a book on the early days of feminism, that belonged to Ranja should end up with me, since I've always considered myself a fan of hers.

When I had written the article as a tribute to her after her death in 1999, I had started with a quote from W.B. Yeats. Mainak Biswas, I remember had appreciated the poem as the most apt portion of my article. I hope I've been able to zero in on the same verse again this time:
The body is not bruised to pleasure soul,
Nor beauty born out of its own despair,...
O body swayed to music, O brigthening glance,
How can we know the dancer from the dance?
Besides, Yeats, it will also be very apt to quote from Cassandra, which also is the name of a choreographic creation by Ranjabati. While it marked the zenith of her artistic abilities, a close friend of hers had told me that in a way it was a reflection of an artist's ultimate struggle against waning creativity, mortality, death, decay and destruction. He felt that through Cassandra, Ranja's creative soul was struggling with the onslaught of psychological despair
"Alas for human destiny! Man's happiest hours
Are pictures drawn in shadow. Then ill fortune comes,
And with two strokes the wet sponge wipes the drawing out.
And grief itself's hardly more pitiable than joy." (Cassandra in Aeschylus' Agamemnon)
So when an editor in Delhi (also an ex-student of JU) had told me that my article on Ranja was not really suitable for the Delhi newspaper but should only be published in Kolkata, I was disappointed. After all Ranja was a dancer who had made an international impact and our paper did cover cultural issues during the weekend. But today I feel that the true spirit of Ranja is something to be shared only with those who lived and studied on JU campus in those heady years of the mid-1980s. She was a person who inspired those who lived those campus dreams and ideologies to the fullest. Ranja was no ordinary being and she inspired many of us to aspire and do better. And I like to think that we were a generation that didn't need to go to the malls to find inspiration. We lived and feasted on ideas that were generated on our intellectual campus.

No more seats on the magic carpet

2007-05-10T16:00:00.000-04:00

The Magic Carpet that flies most of the skilled professionals from India (and other countries) to the USA is the H-1B visa. This visa category, however, is subject to an annual limit (65,000 at present). In respect of 2008, the limit for 2008 H-1B visa petitions was exceeded in a single day - in fact 150,000 applications had been received by mid-afternoon of the first day on which applications were processed !

Applications for H-1B visas are filed by the prospective employer, not the individual. The situation underscores the fact that U.S. demand for foreign scientists, engineers, computer programmers and other technicians continues to grow rapidly. For example, fully a third of Microsoft's U.S. based employees are foreign citizens. A spokesperson for Microsoft has gone on record as stating that .."We are trying to work with Congress to get the cap increased . Our real preference here is that there not be a cap at all."

Intel, Oracle and other corporations have also voiced their opposition to the visa limits. Robert Hoffman, an Oracle vice president, says .."..Our broken visa policies for highly educated foreign professionals are not only counterproductive, they are anticompetitive and detrimental to America's long-term economic competitiveness."

However, the reality is that these limits will probably not be increased any time soon, while the Great Immigration Debate rages on through the United States as part of the 2008 election campaigns. Lobbying groups for the protection of domestic personnel are vociferously promoting the case that increasing the visa limit will bring down wages in the technical sector and discourage American youngsters from pursuing technical careers.

Since the needs of Microsoft, Oracle and Intel and other companies (not just in the US but in the developed economies of Europe) will presumably have to be met, the portent for the future will surely be an outsourcing bonanza. If the bodies can't be imported, the functions will need to be exported.

The benefits will go beyond India, where there are signs that the supply of technical skills is already beginning to fall short of demand. A technical outsourcing boom is quietly taking place in Bangladesh, for example. The Danish Government, among others, has been investing substantial amounts of financial aid to develop the technical education facilities in Bangladesh, hoping no doubt to corner a significant percentage of that country's skills for Danish companies.
It appears the Magic Carpet will be flying Round Trips soon, not just one way.

Will India open the door as globalized moral standards knock ?

2007-05-10T14:47:00.001-04:00

The Telegraph of Calcutta, in its issue of May 7, reports

"..A 145-year-old law that bans sex “against the order of nature” has landed the foreign ministry in a quandary. The Canadian high commission has requested Delhi to clear diplomatic spouse privileges for two officials, a man and a woman, each married to a partner of the same sex. Gay marriages, allowed in Canada, are not legally valid in India............Foreign ministry sources said that as Indian law does not recognise same-sex marriages, the Canadian requests cannot be granted.."

It is interesting that Canada should have made this request of India - one must assume that the Canadian authorities would have been aware of the Indian legal position on this issue. The story seems to have been ignored by the Canadian media.

The full report can be read here

The issue goes beyond the posting of the diplomats concerned of course. It is fair to point out that same-sex unions have only been legalised in a handful of countries, and is far from the norm even in Canada's neighbour the United States. The two Canadian officials would probably find it difficult to receive full diplomatic accreditation in many countries.

The broader question is how India's tolerance of public behaviour will keep pace with global norms. Realisation is dawning that globalisation is not just about economic parity but an acceptable common code of behaviour that will straddle a wide range of cultures, morals and religious taboos across both the developed and developing regions.

Just a few days ago, there was the cause celebre of the Richard Gere- Shilpa Shetty kiss, as extensively reported by the world's media, including CNN

The Gere-Shetty Kiss story is far from over. The Jaipur Court's warrant against the offending couple is still in force, and a hearing has been set for May 26. Potentially the couple could be imprisoned under section 294 of the Indian Penal Code.

At least India apparently got through St. Valentine's Day 2007 without the sort of major trouble - destruction of McDonald's oulets, etc. - that reportedly took place in February 2006 !

Santiniketan on Tagore's Birthday

2007-05-08T16:04:00.000-04:00

Santiniketan on Tagore's birthday, May 9, 2007. Photo by Sivaditya Sen (click on the photo to view an enlarged version)

Santiniketan, West Bengal is where Tagore founded his university, Vishwa Bharati (the microcosm of the world). Tagore's notion of the university was deeply spiritual - one one hand it was to be the meeting place of all cultures, east and west, and on the other it was supposed to connect education to nature and to its social context. Art and creative expression was central to his pedagogy, as was the sense of community.

Like every Tagore-obsessed Bengali, there are many things for which I repeatedly go back to his philosophy. But if there is one thing for which he is my unequivocal reference point it is his belief in the fundamental equality of all human beings, irrespective of caste, class, gender, religion or ethnicity. During the recent debates on equality and access in India, I have been reminded constantly of Tagore's famous poem (he mor durbhaga desh - Oh my unfortunate land) in which he speaks of the tragedy of the innumerable social divisions which make up Indian society. Tagore undying hope was of India's transcendence into a society where such schisms did not exist.

South Asia and the girl child: where fiction meets reality

2007-05-07T10:09:00.000-04:00

In Kolkata in spite of the squelching oppressive heat and the duststorms that don't happen, one still celebrates…currently we are celebrating the birth anniversary of two great imaginative minds - Rabindranath Tagore and Satyajit Ray. When the lens of the camera, the moving magic of cinema, defies the material and captures consciousness on screen, consciousness made visible through a writer's great art-there we have a real meeting of genius, a blurring of boundaries between fiction and reality.

Two images remain fixated in my mind of two young girls Ratan and Mrinmoyee – Ratan is the protagonist of Tagore's classic short story `Postmaster' and Mrinmoyee of `Samapti'. Both are child-women, with huge expressive kohl darkened eyes, destitute, abandoned by society living in the rural poverty of Bengal. Ratan has no parents, no sense of self and has been abandoned to the elements to survive. She wears a dirty saree not only out of poverty but she has no relational world, no one to live for or change her saree for. Mrinmoyee comes from an internally displaced background. All that I have read about in theory of the multi-dimensionality of poverty comes alive in these two films. Poverty not just as income-poverty but the many-sided vulnerability and powerlessness of being poor, abandoned by society, a girl and a child.

Yet with the combined genius of Tagore and Ray both the `Postmaster' and `Samapti' celebrate the agency, intelligence, creativity and sensibility of these two girls. Abandoned by society, within the world of the creative imagination, Ratan and Mrinmoyee wield extraordinary power over their lives. Ratan a waif, a child woman whips into action when the hero, the postmaster, highly educated from Kolkata, falls ill. She gets a doctor, takes care of him when he is ill and even protects him from a huge onslaught of the elements, a massive storm. Illiterate and ignorant when they meet she learns to read and write from him at a remarkable speed and most powerfully experiences an inner self-awakening intellectually, sexually and emotionally. It is through the consciousness of poverty-stricken Ratan that we experience a self-awakening in the short story/film and we watch the transformation of her understanding of her world. In contrast the Kolkata educated urban adult male leaves the village with a static consciousness, unable to adjust to village life, unable to embrace life and most importantly unawakened.

Tagore's trenching irony is supreme when the hero tries to appease Ratna's grief and tears with money, as he leaves the village.

In `Samapti', Mrinmoyee too is a symbol of freedom and autonomy of being, in spite of being a prisoner of poverty, displacement and gender inequality. A poor, rural girl, she too contests the thinking and choices of the hero a Kolkata educated, urban male. The film's unforgettable image of Mrinmoyee on a swing – celebrating her freedom, dynamic, lofty in space and buoyant – is mersmerising. She challenges society that marriage to an eligible bachelor is automatically to be regarded as empowering. The film powerfully grieves her loss of freedom, her attachment to wide open spaces in nature and her squirrel, her unbounded spirit and portrays by contrast the imprisonment of marriage and conformity.

Mrinmoyee's running away on her wedding night and sleeping outdoors, alone and free challenges powerfully even today…

Adventures with my father

2007-05-04T14:40:00.000-04:00

The sheer adventure and thrill of travelling in India has always been a fascinating aspect of my life and the person who I can thank most for it is my father - Rabindra K Dattagupta. He had an intrinsic love for speed and adventure which rubbed off in varying degrees on my mother, sister and me. We lost him a couple of months back and this is the first tribute that I'm dedicating to him. One of my earliest memories is that of trip from Baroda in Gujarat to Durgapur in West Bengal across more than a 1000 miles with Baba (my father) behind the wheel of his Rover car (don't really remember the model of the car but I do remember addressing the vehicle as Didi or elder sister). My father loved his car intensely and was as attached to it as a member of his family. My father, in fact, loved vehicles from as far back as he could remember. As an young boy he had sold a gold coin that had been gifted to him to buy a pair of roller skates. From his first bicycle to his motor bike that he rode during his years in UK, he was never without wheels. About cars, bikes, planes and engines, Baba's knowledge was almost encyclopediac, even though there was no Internet in those days for him to refer to!

My sister and me were about 4 and 5 years old and the year was probably 1969. Baba was all set to join a new job at Durgapur and after winding up from Baroda where we had lived for a year - he decided to drive down to Kolkata and then Durgapur - a steel industry hub where we then spent a good part of our childhood. Our first stop was on the Gujarat-Rajasthan border at the Temple town of Natgauda. The temple of Srinath Ji is now famous because of devotees as famous as the Ambani brothers and their mother Kokila ben. My memories of the temple and the darshan there is not very distinct, but I do remember a huge crowd of devotees surging forward and me perched on my father's shoulders and looking over the heads of others for a clear view of the temple's deity. My mother tells me that she had to cling on to my sister who was a tiny tot and was getting suffocated amidst the huge crowd. This, of course, is the typical scene at many of India's temples where devotees throng the sanctum sanctorum for a Darshan when the doors of the temple are opened by the priests daily. While memories of the temple town of Natgauda are very faint, my father always kept a photograph from the temple in our home as a mascot that would bring us luck.
While the darshan of Srinath ji was just the beginning of our long journey across India, the next stop was Jaipur where we spent some hours with relatives who lived there. My mother, I recall, had bought dozens of traditional Gujarati, hand woven saris as gifts for all the friends and relatives who we were to meet on the way. From Jaipur we drove to Agra, where my aunt (my father's sister) Indira lived. She was a professor of English at a college in Dayalbagh in Agra. The college provided bunglows for staff members on campus. I remember my aunt's house in Agra which was an old stone and brick building with a patch of garden in front. The campus was set amidst tree-lined avenues and my aunt's English department, where she took us all along, had a lovely green lawn in front. I also have indistinct memories of my aunt rehearsing a play with her students and colleagues - later I had heard from her that it was a Shakespeare production that they had been putting up. Dayalbagh is a small locality which is set away from the main town of Agra and is very quiet and peaceful. The evenings were peaceful and the nights very dark and quiet. In fact, I remember that my sister and me were scared of the darkness and remained close to the elders after sundown. Agra was the longest stop on our journey and we spent a couple of days as a happy family there. My parents and aunt probably visited monuments such as Taj Mahal and Agra Fort, but I have no memories of them from that trip at all. Taj Mahal - which I later visited with my mother and sister when I was about 10, had a very strong impact on me.

We usually started early in the morning and Baba drove through the day with brief stops for lunch and tea. But he never drove after sundown and we usually stopped either at guest houses on the way or with friends or relatives in towns where they lived. Accompanying us on the journey was Nemai, an auto mechanic from Kolkata, who sometimes drove when Baba felt tired or drowsy. He had accompanied Baba on many long drives and had often helped repair the Rover. However, when we got to Kanpur, he had some differences of opinion with Baba and decided to continue on his journey to Kolkata by train alone. For me, the most distinct memory from the Baroda-Kolkata drive remains the ravines of Chambal. My sister and me had never seen anything so spectacular before that. Baba & Ma's stories about the dacoits who lived in Chambal and looted visitors, heightened the excitement for us. I clearly remember Baba asking us to recite our nursery rhymes loudly so that he didn't doze off while driving along the rugged and winding road through the ravines of Chambal. Ma poured out hot water from a flask to make coffee for Baba when he felt too fatigued. We spent about 10 days on the road - but for my sister and me, it was like a lifetime with new horizons opening out in front of us everyday.

The holy city of Benares was another stopover before we reached Kolkata where my grandparents lived. It's a city that I've never visited after that, though my father had told me a lot about his own visits there, to offer prayers for his forefathers. It's also a city that Satyajit Ray has given a magical touch to through his lens and creative imagination. It's a city I dream of visiting sometime to pay respects to Ray, to the holy Ganga River and now to Baba too.

Why China will stay the world leader (and not India)

2007-04-28T11:27:00.000-04:00

The news is real - from none less than Reuters - but my title is tongue-in-cheek (so do not send me rants on my inability to see through 'deep underlying issues')

BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese tourism authorities are seeking investment to build a novel concept attraction -- the world's first "women's town", where men get punished for disobedience, an official said on Thursday. The 2.3-square-km Longshuihu village in the Shuangqiao district of Chongqing municipality, also known as "women's town", was based on the local traditional concept of "women rule and men obey", a tourism official told Reuters.

An interesting perspective on the tradition/modernity debate. Here is the full story

Desperation in Delhi

2007-04-28T07:38:00.000-04:00

Saw a film today, which is part of the EU film festival in Delhi that's currently on. Details of the film are below.

Name of Film : ‘Honey and Wine’
Year – 2006
Duration – 76 minutes
Director – Marinos Kartikkis
Synopsis
Eleni lives alone, haunted by memories of the past. Her life is a routine until she witnesses a quarrel between a young couple in the house across the street. One afternoon, Eleni receives an unexpected visit from Rhea, the young woman from the house across the street. She has locked herself out and needs to use Eleni’s phone in order to call a locksmith. And so begins a relationship between the two women with unforeseen consequences for them both.

Moving on from reel life to real life on a hot & torrid Saturday afternoon in Delhi proved a tough task for me. What struck me first as I hit the road outside British Council (where the film was screened) was not just the 40 degree celcius temparature. The film deals with a relationship - between two women who are neighbours. The striking feature for me in the film was the use of silence and silent spaces to convey a lot. Delhi, in contrast, is all about noise. People are aggressive, intrusive, loud and crass. A relationship between two women who help each other without intruding into each others private spaces is absolutely unimaginable. The Indian script is being played out globally in terms of gross domestic product, economic superpower and so much more. We have built huge malls which are supposedly as good as those in Dubai and Singapore - but in terms of evolving sociologically, we've still got a long way to go, at least in North India. All that I could think of as I watched the film was that this is so European and so alien here in Delhi. A story of two single women, both going through a painful phase in their life, far apart in age and yet helping each other out of a crisis. It's not like they're good friends or talk a great deal. In fact, at the outset, they're strangers. But as the plot moves on they come to mean a great deal for each other without intruding into each other's space. In Delhi, very often, the housing society where I live turns into a circus because someone has a wedding. What that means is that all the neighbours, are subjected to loud music and noise late into the nights and have to shift their cars from the usual parking slots. Even the electricity lines are sometimes tampered with and neighbouring buildings have to suffer long power cuts. People are not supposed to have any space to themselves and loud intrusions have to be dealt with without complaining. A wedding in the society is a cause celebre and obviously one doesn't complain to the police about rowdy behaviour. Even if you do, it's almost certain that no action is going to be taken. Even if some neighbours are helpful, they're also nosey and interfering. As for single women - they're just victims of circumstances - their singlehood!

Top news from India: April 2007

2007-04-27T14:26:00.000-04:00

Searching for a namesake?

2007-04-27T10:32:00.001-04:00

The Telegraph, Calcutta, (April 15, 2007) recently published an interview with well known novelist, critic and poet David Dabydeen while he was visiting India. He has stated thet he wanted to name his son Ganesh in a Hindu ceremony; last year, he had been named Ganpati at a temple in Tirumala. It was intriguing to me that Dabydeen who teaches at the University of Warwick and directs their Caribbean Studies Centre and who has gone on record saying that he is comfortable with the concept of England as home would want such a rite of passage for his son. David Dabydeen was born in British Guyana and travelled to England when he was 13 where he has lived ever since. If on the face of it, his connections to India had seemed tenuous, his given name for his son and the choice of naming ceremonies made me think again. It highlighted all those questions about identity in another context. What does it mean for David Dabydeen to be Guyanese and British and how is his Indian heritage connected to all of these plural identities? If identity is a name given to the process of positioning ourselves in the narratives of the past, then Dabydeen’s quest for identity seems to be linked not only with the name of his grandfather, but almost in a reverse move, with the name and naming of his son. He has, in order to excavate a history for himself, associated his past with his future.

>Dabydeen’s actual search for his ancestral name has drawn a blank. What he has discovered is that his grandfather sailed from Calcutta as indentured labourer on the ship SS Appollinaire (ironic connotations of reaching for the moon?). He tried to google his grandfather’s caste but to no avail. Dabydeen has to be satisfied with conjectures that his name is probably an oral distortion and cannot be traced now. So here he is, with an Indian heritage that cannot even be substantiated beyond a point. Gogol in Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake felt burdened by the name of a literary genius. Dabydeen, with more literary credits to his name -- he is the only West Indian other than Sir V.S. Naipaul to be awarded the title of Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature -- can merely talk about an empty space that he has inherited. Gogol could come back to Calcutta and re-connect with a history and a language that was still accessible to him. But Dabydeen admits to feeling discomfort in India where he does not understand the language; in Guyana he feels like an expatriate who lives in a hotel. So, in this history, twice removed, how do David Dabydeen and other Caribbeans of Indian descent insert themselves? It is not a history that can assert itself through daily rituals or through language or even daily customs. How does one connect to a history that is taking place elsewhere and can only be made accessible to you through memories – other people’s memories?

In literary terms, Dabydeen has tried giving a voice to the silence and the silencing of his ancestors. In The Counting House, the young couple Rohini and Vidia, troubled by caste prejudices in rural India, are easily tempted and misled by the recruiter’s promises of plenty. The reality in British Guiana is a stark contrast where the local population is hostile and life as a coolie is hard. The promised El Dorado is conflicted territory barely emerging from practices of slavery. Even more poignant is his epic poem, Turner based on the acclaimed painting of J.M.W Turner – “Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead & Dying.” Reading it while negotiating my life as a student in the U.S., I had found it extraordinarily powerful. In this moving poem, Dabydeen, re-writes a history for the drowning slave, articulating his covert desires; his peculiar amnesia does not however, allow him to create an idyllic past for himself as he can still recognize himself as “a nigger.” The dual themes of alienation and the inescapable burden of history run through Dabydeen’s works.

Growing up in British Guiana, the only English speaking place in South America, was an alienating experience. They were separated from the other Caribbean countries, if not by language, certainly by the rainforest topography. He remembers celebrating Diwali and being members of the Anglican Church. But identity is never a source of comfort – he was ashamed of his Hindu name and of women wearing saris and speaking in Urdu. Cultural identities are continuously re-made and never essentialist and David Dabydeen’s journeys vindicate that. He has obviously travelled a long way from that shame. His ancestors’ homeland has conferred upon him the Hind Rattan Award and he was invited to Delhi to receive it. He, in turn, has not taken any easy short cuts. I mean, he could have named his son Peter or Martin and be done with it. It would be easier certainly because everyone around us seems to be saying that national identity is passé in the age of globalization. It is one thing to impart history to a literary creation and another thing to try and reclaim a past for your child who can turn around and question your motives. Courageously, Dabydeen forges a link to his past that connects the personal, political and the representational.

Tongues on Fire

2007-04-24T11:40:00.000-04:00

Tongues on Fire, an Asian film festival that showcases women as directors and/or protagonists, celebrated its 9th anniversary in London in March this year. It was an exciting array of films, documentaries, short film competitions as well as panel discussions that included Q & A sessions. The show ended with a special tribute to the Bollywood legend Helen. (In the past years the festival has paid special tribute to Shabana Azmi and Aparna Sen.)

In naming the festival, Chowdhry and Nath have chosen an interesting if neutral name for their cultural production. They felt that some people would not even pick up the brochure if they named it as specifically female and Asian. Like the hosts of Voices of Bengal (an exhibition of Bengali culture and heritage hosted by British Museum in 2006), they wanted to woo the mainstream audience. Asian women were there at all the venues but all such exhibitions eventually need to co-opt the dominant culture. Speaking from the margins is fine, but the margins need to converge on to the main text and the main text needs to be revised and moderated by the nuances of the marginalia. Only then can new and dynamic dialogues be set up and we can even begin to speak of a genuine move towards globalization. Chowdhry and Nath, intend not only to resist the stereotype of their gender and race as down-trodden, subservient and devoid of personality but also to offer an alternative perspective.

If the festival directors Pushpinder Chowdhry and Harvinder Nath were aiming at bringing together an eclectic body of work, they certainly succeeded. The month long season opened with screening of The Namesake directed by Mira Nair; the festival also marked the premiere of Oscar nominated Water directed by Deepa Mehta. The Namesake drew fairly large audiences particularly young, discerning British Asians who I hope, could identify more with Gogol in The Namesake rather than Jas in Namastey London (a typical Bollywood masala film also running in theatres at the same time). Jhumpa Lahiri’s story, sensitively re-told by Nair, touched a chord in the older group of immigrants who left their homeland in the sixties and seventies and had to re-make themselves in strange lands.

There were previews of Provoked, directed by Jag Mundhra, starring Aishwarya Rai (oops Bachchan), Naveen Andrews, Miranda Richardson, and of another film with the intriguing tag line, ‘Everyone has something to hide.’ Hiding Divya is a powerful film about three generations of women, mother, daughter and granddaughter woven together by love, rebellion, mistrust and mental illness. Another film to watch out for is Pratibha Parmar’s Nina’s Heavenly Delights. A delightful comedy about a mixed race marriage and a lesbian relationship, this film is shot in U.K. Using elements from her own life, Parmar delves into issues of sexuality, friendship, food and tops it up with a rich sprinkling of Scottish humour.

No More Tears Sister & Of Such Times (The Modern Indian Woman) were also screened at the festival. The former is a must-see, set in Sri Lanka and based on the life of well known human rights activist, Dr. Rajani Thiranagama. Dor, directed by Nagesh Kukunoor was a pleasant surprise. The star cast of Gul Panang and Ayesha Takia seemed to indicate Bollywood flavoured pubescent love stories. But the ties of friendship between two women that develops at a critical juncture in their lives and across class lines signals exciting possibilities in women’s cinema coming out of India. Technical aspects of the film including photograph were brilliant.

Tongues on Fire, offers an opportunity, not only to watch the poignant films of today but also to meet the stars. For upcoming students of cinema, it offers a platform to demonstrate their potential. Together the screenings and the events convey a sense of creativity, intellectual depths, technical maturity and production finesse. Overall the festival exudes vibrance and a taste of things to come – we are here, Tongues on Fire seems to say, we the Asians and British-Asians and most importantly, we the women who have things to say and know how to say them.

Mistresses of spices rock the Big Apple

2007-04-23T13:34:00.000-04:00

It's good to see Bengali girls running great businesses in NYC. And this is not just an expression of parochial pride but also puts paid to the theory that the Bengalis usually lack the entrepreneurial gene. There's Kolkatan Payal Saha (right) who has taken the famous kati roll from Kolkata streets to Manhattan in 2000. Her Kati Roll Company outlets at NYC's Greenwich Village and Times Square are popular not just with South Asians but also Manhattan's maintream foodies! Then there's Nandini Mukherjee (left), an architect, who runs Indian Bread Company – a very successful restaurant in Manhattan.

Saha herself feels that the ubiquitous Kati Roll works for many different segments. "We see a lot of traffic during lunch and dinner and there's a steady flow all day of people looking to snack. And then there's the crowd looking for their after-drink munchies," she says.

Saha wanted to take Kolkata cuisine to Manhattan where she felt that mainly North Indian cuisine had come to be identified with India. "The idea of kati rolls was simple and quick and the idea was to cash in on the fast pace of Manhattan," she says. Kati Roll Company's menu has paneer and aloo rolls as the vegetarian options and chicken and beef as non-vegetarian. There's also a separate egg roll and egg as an add-on with chicken, beef and aloo while one of the outlets has Shammi kebab rolls.

Then there's Nandini Mukherjee, an architect who's originally from Jamshedpur, who runs Indian Bread Company – a very successful restaurant in Manhattan. She went to NYC for a masters degree in architecture and took on the challenge of creating her own business from scratch – a 9-5 job in an architectural firm was not for her! As a student she found the Indian food that Manhattan had to offer to be either very disappointing of too expensive. "I realised that there was a market gap for fresh and take away Indian food at a reasonable price. That's how the idea took shape and Indian Bread Co opened its doors in November 2003," she says. Indian Bread Company which is located on Bleecker Street near New York University serves an innovative menu comprising four different types of sandwiches - stuffed parathas, kathi rolls, Naanwiches (Naan pocket sandwich) & Naaninis (Naan grilled sandwich). U sing Indian breads filled with popular Indian fillings to form a 'curry-on-thego' sandwich meal – as Mukherjee herself likes to put it.

One of Indian Bread Co's biggest successes was being selected to cater for the 2004 RNC Media Welcome reception thrown by Mayor Bloomberg, Governor Pataki and Former Mayor Giuliani. "The event planner said that she was attracted by our novel concept and delicious food. The event celebrated the best of New York in food and cuisine. Not only were we the only South Asian restaurant, we were among the 20 places chosen to showcase New York as the culinary capital of the world. It was an honor and I was overjoyed by the overwhelming positive response. There were literally 3 floors of food and 2000 attendees; with each restaurant having a couple of tables to showcase their items. We served mini naaninis & kathi roll bites. As soon as people would taste the food, they'd immediately call their friends on their cell-phones to come over to our tables from wherever they were located at the venue. Unsurprisingly, we were the first to run out of food, in spite of stocking more than double the planned quantity. Planning and managing this event helped me gain more confidence in my managing and leadership abilities," says Mukherjee.

Being an Indian immigrant has rarely deterred Mukherjee who feels it often gives her company certain advantages. "It gave our company a minority owned & women owned business status, which made us entitled to certain privileges. Many corporations have 'supplier diversity programs' and set aside millions of dollars in vendor and procurement contracts to small businesses that have been certified as minority- or woman-owned," says Mukherjee who has recently won the prestigious Make Mine a $Million business programme which awards a combination of money, mentoring, marketing and technology tools that women entrepreneurs need to help grow their businesses from micro to $millions. Every year they have women entrepreneurs from all over the USA apply, out of which they choose 20 finalists. The 20 finalists then pitch their business live in front of a panel of judges and an audience, who then cast their votes to select 8 winners.

"Make Mine A Million in itself is a huge network of women entrepreneurs, and it's growing everyday. Besides, having varied interests, I meet many people from different fields whom I interact and network with. As such, I haven't joined any Indian American entrepreneurial networks, though I've attended various seminars held by Indian American entrepreneurial groups," says Mukherjee.

The curious habits of man

2007-04-18T23:44:00.002-04:00

Ezra Pound wrote:

.. When I carefully consider the curious habits of dogs
I am compelled to conclude
That man is the superior animal.

When I consider the curious habits of man
I confess, my friend, I am puzzled...

The last few days, we have had ample opportunity to study the "curious habits of man" in the USA.As if we did not have enough to discuss in terms of unprecedented Afro-American and women Presidential candidates, disastrous wars, international isolationalism, corrupt World Bank presidents and collapsing real estate prices !

All these topics were wiped out by a roughneck radio talk host called Don Imus and his description of young, female, black athletes as "nappy-headed ho's". For those of us who had no idea what that expression meant, we were subjected to an analysis ad infinitum of every nuance of those words. Apparently it was a disparagement of black women, a phrase coined by African Americans themselves as part of hip-hop culture. As the whole world knows by now, Don Imus has been fired by his media employers CBS and CNBC. The firing has drawn battle lines between two groups - the defenders of free speech on the one hand, and the advocates of Political Correctness on the other. They both miss the point, which is that Don Imus was paid to be outrageous, because that's what we, the People wanted. And we, the People wanted it so badly that corporate America, represented by the likes of American Express, Procter & Gamble and Coca-Cola paid CBS megabucks in the way of sponsorship, reveling in the publicity that he earned from a long litany of outrageous ethnic and tasteless slurs. Yes, he was paid to say these things as long as the ratings came in - and paid not just in hundreds of thousands, but.... (wait for it)..... 10 MILLION DOLLARS A YEAR ! And he was ultimately fired by the networks, many days after his remarks, only because the sponsors pulled their money. It wasn't good taste that ultimately won, it was just market forces. Don Imus was no longer good for detergent sales.

We thought the Don Imus story would never end, but of course it did run out of steam. However, no sooner had the networks stopped coverage on that burning issue, the Virginia Tech shooting hit the news waves. And, somewhat predictably, amongst the outpouring of grief for the loss of life, the hoary issue of Gun Control came to the forefront again. Oh yes, we were told once again .." It's not guns which kill people, it's people who kill people.." Surely that's true as far as it goes, ignoring the obvious fact that without guns people would find it just that little bit more difficult to kill. It takes more effort to bludgeon someone to death than just pull a trigger, but hen we run into the objection that the U.S. Constitution is supposed to guarantee the "..right to bear arms.." But does it ? The Second Amendment to the Constitution reads "..A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed..."

Anybody with a credit card being able to buy lethal weapons couldn't be further from the concept of a "..well regulated militia.."

Surely the Constitution needs updating, after all there have been twenty-seven amendments to that august document, including the abolition of slavery. But no, we will continue to prove that Ezra Pound was right to be puzzled.

Leading social change in contemporary India

2007-04-16T08:40:00.000-04:00

Outloook India has just published a list of the 25 people in contemporary India who are contributing to social change and critique. I have no quibbles with those who are on it, but a little (no, very, surprised) that .. well, you find out. Below are some Indians on our list.

Aruna Roy, The Right to Information Campaign,
(Photo courtesy, SAWNET)

Ela Bhatt, Self-Employed Women's Association
(Photo courtesy: Centre for Science and Environment, Delhi)

Girija Devi, a Dalit woman from Bihar who spear-headed the anti-liquor movement and addressed an UN convention in 2006.

Krishna Mohanty of Baji Rout Chhatrabas, Angul, Orissa

Mahashweta Devi, noted writer and activist
Photo Courtesy: SAWNET

Rashida Bee and Shukla Bee, Justice for Bhopal
(Photo courtesy: The Goldman Environmental Prize

RV Bhavani, director , BV Rao Centre for Sustainable Food Security at the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation

Shaoli Mitra, Noted actor and stage personality, best known perhaps for her feminist interpretation of the Mahabharata

Surendra & Sanghamitra Gadekar, Anti-nuclear activists from Gujarat

Sumita Ghose, well-known social worker who has worked at the grassroots level in Rajasthan, Assam and Delhi for the past two decades. She is the central moving force behind Ranga Sutra - which she defines as a family of grassroots organizations coming together to find a space in the market today.

Teejan Bai, folk perfomer par excellence
Photo courtesy: Durg District website

Lure of the foreign degree: there is need for caution, says China

2007-04-11T18:32:00.000-04:00

The Times of India reports on the plight on Indian students who travelled to British Columbia, Canada to study at Lansbridge University. Lansbridge, a private university, will close on May 1, and the Province will assist students by appointing a liaison to help them transfer to other schools to complete their education. According to the TOI story, the cost of an MBA is 10-15,000 Canadian dollars at Lansbridge. From the British Columbia Faculty Association website I learnt that Lansbridge University, Kingston College and other educational businesses are owned by Michael Lo and his wife Queenie Tin through the Kingston Education Group and a web of interlocking companies. One of the more bizarre revelations in the inspector's report was that student transcripts were printed on the back of previously used paper. Apparently, one transcript was printed "on the back of a copy of an e-mail message regarding the extension of the Lo's Visa credit limit"!

Lo was on BC premier Gordon Campbell's Chinese Advisory Committee but stepped down when the investigations began. In his response to the Ministry of Education's directive, CEO and President of Lansbridge argues that the closure would undermine the history that was made at Lansbridge as the first Canadian university to be owned by the Chinese-Canadian community. McLeans reports that Lo’s group also operates Lansbridge University in Fredericton, Kingston College in Toronto, Kingston High School in Vancouver, and two B.C.-certified high schools in China.

Very understandably, the Chinese government has issued a directive advising students not to apply to private Canadian universities "blindly". As a professor in Canada's third largest public university , I routinely get questions about these new private universities where Indian students seek admission. More often than not, family savings are at stake. Caution must indeed be exercised. Private universities are a relatively new emergence in Canada, and not viewed highly favourably by the academic community. You can see why. Canada has a very healthy and respectable tradition of public universities, which are fully government regulated (such as York, the university where I teach). Private universities in Canada are not going to be at par with public universities for a while, in my opinion.

Pushkar & Ajmer: A double pilgrimage & the elements

2007-04-10T14:21:00.000-04:00

For the Hindus, the holy triumvirate of gods are Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwar (Shiva) - the creator, preserver and destroyer of the world. The only temple dedicated to Brahma is at Pushkar in Rajasthan. And having recently realised that this temple of Brahma is so rare, I decided to make a trip to Pushkar last weekend (for photos, click on the slideshow to the right).

As an young girl I remember asking my grandmother why Lord Brahma was depicted as an aged saint with his eyes always shut. My grandmother's explanation was that after creating the world, the creator immersed himself in deep meditation, leaving it to others to preserve the world and even destroy and recreate it when evil became the dominant force. While a lot of mythological tales abound around the conflict between Shiva and Brahma, the dominant mythological description of Lord Brahma is one of an ancient saint in deep meditation below the deep ocean. There's a lotus stalk - which represents the beginning of life - that rises from his navel and blooms above the surface of the sea. Again, the original life is said to rise out of water rather than land.
Back to my journey - an interesting coincidence is that the railhead for Pushkar - which is situated around a lake amidst the desert of Rajsathan and is bordered by the Aravalli hills - is Ajmer, the city famous for the Dargah Shariff of Hazrat Khwaja Muinuddin Chishti. Khwaja Shahib, a Sufi saint is not only worshipped by the Muslims in India but is the epitome of peace, harmony and enjoys universal respect from people of all religions in India. Women and people from all religious faith are allowed entry into the mausoleum of the saint - which is not very common for Muslim places of worship. Ajmer & Pushkar, twin towns with religious symbolism, are both situated around lakes, akin to two oases in midst of the Rajasthan desert sands and fringed by the rugged Aravalli ranges. They are separated by a 15 km drive through hilly landscape.

Getting to Pushkar from Delhi is a pleasant six-hour experience on board a Satabdi train to Ajmer. The Satabdis are India's premium trains where passengers are pampered through the journey. The catering services include tea, snacks, colas, juices and breakfast and even dinner during the return journey, all of which come free included in the ticket. The heritage hotel where I had booked a room - Jagat Palace - had a large number of European tourists who seemed unperturbed by the desert heat even during the day. Many of my fellow guests spent the hot afternoon by the poolside reading and chatting while some were adventurous enough to go on a camel safari. Evening however brought respite in the form of a thunder squall, gusty winds and rains - which was a very pleasant surprise. The Pushkar lake is considered very holy by the Hindus and taking a dip in it is believed to wash away one's sins. There are many Ghats beside the lake where pilgrims can take a dip. One needs to watch out for priests who will descend on you and ask for cash offerings to perform prayers.
The Brahma temple is situated beside the lake and is about a kilometers walk from Jagat Palace. Pushkar is a laid back pilgrimage when compared to the hustle and bustle of places such as Haridwar and Rishikesh. And it's a big relief to visit the temple where there are no army of priests and volunteers descending on you like they do at some of the other pilgrimages in India. The extreme heat coupled with the rugged rocky and arid landscape somehow evokes a feeling of an elemental space where the world may actually have been created by Lord Brahma. It brought to mind the landscape of the Grand Canyon for me - where a formation is fittingly named after God Brahma - believed to be the creator of the world. My father, when he visited the Grand Canyon had written a letter to me from there pointing out the names of the ancient rock formations named after mythological Gods from different cultures - a fact that I remembered when I visited the Grand Canyon myself.
While Lord Brahma's temple is easily accessible and within walking distance from any of the hotels nearby - his wife Goddess Savitri is said to reside in a temple which is high above perched on a hilltop. A trek up can be quite an effort specially for those who are not physically very fit. However, once up there, even for non-believers, the view of the city of Pushkar and its lake is quite awesome. Wouldn't have missed out on that even to avoid the aches and pains that I have brought back with me!!!!
On a completely different and materialistic plane - Pushkar is a good place to pick up street fashion items. Like the rest of Rajasthan, cotton apparel is cheap and available in abundance at the stalls of Pushkar. Colourful cotton pants, shirts, tops, shirts and the chic kurtis are a big hit with the foreign and hip Indian tourists too. Besides chunky silver jewellery and semi-precious stones too are cool bargains. Foreigners, of course, love the bindis, bangles and mehendi. If you use ayurvedic medicine - Baidyanath, which is a well-known brand - has a large outlet at Pushkar. And don't miss the malpuas soaked in syrup either - which are the region's special dessert!

Tagore in Praha

2007-04-05T15:56:00.000-04:00

Professor Nigel Hughes, Dept. of Earth Sciences, University of California, Riverside sent us these photographs of the statue of Tagore in Praha and the street named after him. He writes:

On the bus, when I caught a glimpse of the statue, my first thought was that it might be Marx not Tagore, but that seemed most unlikely..I was visiting Praha to work in the National Museum on their magnificent fossil collections, having worked there for a month or so some 12 years ago. People are extraordinarily kind there - my friends there even arranged a private astronomic viewing at the Praha Observatory! They really love natural history.

Nigel was a student in Santiniketan in 1985-86, an experience from which he hopes "he will never recover". His research concerns fossil trilobites, which he collects from the Himalayas, among other places, hence continues to visit Bengal...

When I travelled in Hungary I went to visit the famous Tagore Promenade at the Balatonfured.

Reality TV for recruiting Indian students: 5 UK universities believe it will work!

2007-04-05T09:17:00.000-04:00

A new reality TV show called Airtel Scholar Hunt is going to award Indian students entrance scholarships to several UK universities - worth up to £ 8,000. Five full scholarships are being offered by Leeds, Sheffield, Warwick, Cardiff or Middlesex.

According to the CEO of the company running the show, this is a novel way to marry scholarship and the "competitive spirit", which "taps into the growing aspiration of many Indians" to study abroad.The British universities (such as Leeds) claim that this will help "raise their profile" (aka highly cost-effective advertising) amongst the potential pool of talent in India. Interestingly, everyone involved is very concerned to clarify that academic standards are not going to be compromised, although the BBC story does not quite make clear how.

This has two obvious implications: first, how much more widespread the ambition to study abroad is for young Indians, and second, how much in demand students from India (and China) are globally. The first problem is to determine if this is a demand for talent or adeamnd for revenue? Apparently, "175,000 overseas students pay around £1bn in fees and contribute some £8bn to the British economy, according to the British Council" (BBC news). One does have to wonder if spent in their home countries, how this might have addressed the deep crisis of universities in the Global South. Report after report produced in the South speak to this crisis and almost every donor has been funding "capacity building" (which I think is a problematic notion and objective and is increasingly challenged by Southern scholars).

The continuation of the crisis of education (and in some cases its aggravation) is what pushes students abroad, along with two associated factors. First, the entry to foreign universities is often the stepping stone to immigration; and second, a foreign degree is considered to be of more value. So if one has (any, some) talent, and the means, going abroad to study is the best option. The real challenge for countries like India, in this context, is to identify the means to nurture, retain and bring this trained talent 'back home'. Perhaps even more critical is to ensure that quality education becomes increasingly more accessible across social schisms, an issue to the Knowledge Commission Report speaks.

For recruiting countries, the questions are more complex. The critical issue concerns what happens to the talent pool when it enters the labour market. As we wrote in an earlier post, while Western nations face skill gaps that Indian recruits can fill, the job market still does not treat them at par.
[tv]

Our environment-friendly home (inspired by Laurie Baker)

2007-04-03T01:22:00.000-04:00

Read a tribute to Laurie Baker the guru of low cost and environment friendly housing in India in The Times of India this morning. He died at 90 in Kerala this weekend. Baker, a Britisher had made India his home for many years and even taken up Indian citizenship. Houses designed by him and made according to his architectural style were the hallmark of a typically Indian style borrowing heavily from the local architectural traditions and the local idiom and using material that was easily available and cheap. Our own house in Santiniketan - is in many ways inspired by Laurie Baker's techniques and his philosophy. My father had read up extensively on various indigenous architectural styles and had worked along with a local builder Udayan Sarkar in Santiniketan who in those days (early 1990s) was working with local building materials, styles and techniques in West Bengal.

The result was our home in Santiniketan which was very unique in those days and saved material and costs. Santiniketan which has grown around Rabindra Nath Tagore's vision of a global, educational hub, attracts a large number of Bengali intellectuals who have over the years built their homes in this heartland of rural Bengal. My mother's connection with Santiniketan was from her parents who had a beautiful family home there for many years. My grandmother was the grand niece of Tagore and my mother and her siblings had received their education at the Vishwa Bharati University. Coming back to our own home - my father took it up as his mission and it became an intellectual, aesthetic and physical exercise for him soon after he retired from his job. Among some of the environment friendly techniques that were used in our house was minimum use of concrete and rat-trap bonding - a technique that cut down on the number of bricks. The dome had a keystone to hold it and the house didn't use central pillars. Besides, local ceramic tiles were used instead of any fancy materials.

My father, who had just retired from his job, took up the mission of building the house as a intellectual and physical exercise and was involved with almost the laying of every brick. The group of masons and builders - who were specially trained in brick-laying - came from Murshidabad, a district in North Bengal and lived on our premises for several months while the house was built.

Today when discussions on environment friendly housing are very relevant, Laurie Baker and his work and life needs to be remembered and people around India need to draw inspiration from such localised techniques. My father - as always - was way ahead of his times. We had considered finding a name for our dream home in Santhali - the language spoken by the Santhals who are the ethnic group forming the oldest residents of the Birbhum district where Santiniketan is located as well as a large part of the Chhota Nagpur plateau in India. While we had toyed with Ausan - which means abode and some other Santhali words, my father, mother, sister and me never really reached a common word that we all liked. Today I can only think of my home in Santiniketan as a sacred space created by my father.

Blood and Wine - both flow freely near Bijapur

2007-04-02T19:29:00.000-04:00

The ancient city of Bijapur is the home of the Gol Gumbaz, the second largest dome in the world unsupported by pillars, after St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. (Photo by Dilip Nerlikar). A seat of power in South India since the 10th century, the monarchs of the Chalukyan Dynasty gave it the name of "Vijayapura" or the "City of Victory". Later the Adi Shahi Nawabs of the 14th Century constructed the dome and many other exquisite monuments in the Indo-Saracenic style. During my visit in 1997, I found it to be a charming spot, sleeping quietly in the lap of time. Lately, though, Bijapur has been attracting attention of a more contemporary sort.

On March 24, the Deccan Herald carried a report of the 110-acre Maya vineyard on the outskirts of Bijapur. Under the supervision of an English vintner who has worked for Moet et Chandon in Champagne and prestigious Chateau estates in Bordeaux, the Maya estate is turning out world-class Sauvignon Blanc, Shiraz and Cabernet varietals. "Crafted with French expertise", and aided by the vine-friendly climate of the Krishna Valley with its long sunny days and cool nights, the wines show "superb tannin development and excellent aroma and color" and the vintages are expected to get better year by year, per the Deccan Herald.

A week earlier, the Deccan Herald and other newspapers (including the New York Times)reported that 65 km. from Bijapur across the border in Chattisgarh, in the village of Ronibodilli, 54 policemen and auxiliary police officers were murdered after a long gunfight during a night attack by Maoist Naxalites. The whole area has been seething for years as Moriyas and other Adivasis continue to fight a losing battle for habitat against the official land acquisition of their ancestral fields and forests for logging, mineral and industrial development and other manifestations of the march of progress. Violence against the Adivasis by landowners, police and other agencies has given rise to an active Maoist movement that has retaliated in kind. The Government's answer has been to form auxiliary armed police forces, a sort of official vigilante group, to counter Maoist action. The latest attack in Ronibodilli was the Maoist answer to the formation of the auxiliaries.

The incident had eerie echoes of events further North, in Jharkand, Singur and Nandigram in West Bengal and as far afield as Nepal. Will these events creep across Bijapur to the Maya vineyards ? Or will blood and wine continue to flow side by side, in the contradictory mosaic that is the face of development in India ?

"The" scam of the century?

2007-03-31T12:56:00.000-04:00

Subroto Roy in the The Statesman claims that a huge scam is in the making:

The scheme involves private companies “borrowing” India’s foreign exchange reserves from the RBI, allegedly for the purpose of “infrastructure” creation ~ in collaboration with the American bank Citigroup, the American financial business, Blackstone Group, and possibly the American corporate giant, GE Capital too. Chidambaram took the unprecedented step of naming Parekh as well as Citigroup and Blackstone in the text of his Budget speech.

He then goes on to show how a similar Wall Street scam has defrauded the Central Banks of Poland, Malaysia, Portugal and Yugoslavia, and this is what is coming to India. Roy also tells us that he worked for a Wall Street firm founded by the same people who orchestrated this act, and he resigned when he was asked to develop contacts in India.

War against Malaria: GM as Ammo?

2007-03-28T05:04:00.000-04:00

In the war between man and mosquito, malaria claims 2.7 million lives every year. In the scenario where anti malaria drugs become resistant (read outwitted) with unfailing regularity, two different groups of scientists, one working at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore and the other at Imperial College, London, seem to have transformed the rules of the fight between us and them. They claim that malaria can be fought by releasing into the environment genetically modified mosquitoes that are resistant to the malaria infection. In time, they would wipe out the malaria causing mosquitoes. (Using mosquitoes, to defeat mosquitoes –that had to come from the human brain, didn’t it?) To me, this discovery seems exciting as it seemed to take us out of the vicious cycle of using a drug to treat a disease and then have it become ineffective over a period of time precisely because it is being used. Also, the implication that we could stop using the chemical sprays and the innocuous looking mosquito repellents is worth some optimism. More importantly, once the environment is safer, we do not have to worry about issues like whether a particular drug reaches the underprivileged groups or not. There is also a modicum of thrill — did the researchers ever see that horror flick, Mimic and wonder? But this one is not just silver screen matter but serious science-speak.

Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the work of the research team at Johns Hopkins vindicates the concept that engineering mosquitoes with cheap lab techniques can help control the killer disease. The idea is that genetically modified mosquitoes can survive in the wild and ultimately completely replace the anopheles mosquito that carries the infection. These enhanced mosquitoes release a protein called SM1 which blocks the malaria parasite from reaching the salivary glands of the mosquitoes which is how the disease is spread in the first place. When the wild and lab designed mosquitoes were fed on Plasmodium infected blood, they showed higher rate of survival.

The actual release of the mosquito into the environment is at least a few years away. Even then, there are some doubts as the experiments have been conducted on mice and with the anopheles stephensi, and not anopheles gambaei which is the main killer in Africa. But my main concern is what environmentalist groups will have to say about replacing a “natural” strain of mosquitoes with a genetically engineered species with red eyes or red testicles. There are serious ecological issues in wiping out traditional mosquitoes that cannot be glossed over. As Jonathan Matthews, editor of GMwatch e-magazine has said, ‘Whatever the initial advantages of GM mosquitoes, their evolutionary sustainability in the longer term is simply an unknown, and this could have a devastating effect on the food chain’ … ‘such a major human intervention could have worryingly unpredictable consequences.’ Conceptually, the unpredictability can be dealt with but strategically, the process itself will be ridden with problems since it involves the release of hundreds and thousands of genetically manufactured mosquitoes into the environment.

Within these polemics and as the GM mosquito is being readied for the wild, localized research continues with great gusto. Undoubtedly dogged by more funding problems than a Johns Hopkins or Imperial College, a group of scientists in India based in IISC, Bangalore, have demonstrated that ‘curcumin’, a component derived from turmeric, in combination with other substances could be developed into a inexpensive, low-toxicity malaria drug. Another group of scientists in Madagascar have isolated a novel compound, tazopsine, from Strychnopsis thouarsii, a plant species found in Madagascar. The characteristics of this compound makes it less likely to become drug resistant.

So war it is – the artillery has been brought out to annihilate the mosquitoes. This lab generated mosquitoes, with their red and green eyes certainly sound like space aliens and stuff of horror films, but I am all for them, if they can garner human victory in the war with the anopheles. I will sleep peacefully sans the hum of the mosquito, sans the toxic fumes of mosquito repellants and gratified to know that the Calcutta chromosome is truly only the stuff of fiction. But most importantly, I will stand by most things that can actually stem the killing of a child every 30 seconds in sub Saharan Africa even if it means denying the ancestors of the ubiquitous mosquito their rightful place under the sun.

Crony Capitalism in India? Take II

2007-03-27T18:01:00.000-04:00

During his keynote address at the Steel Summit 2007 organised by the Ministry of Steel and the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), our Prime Minister made some interesting observations:

A comment has been made recently that most of our business leaders who have become billionaires seem to be operating in either relatively protected business environments, in oligopolistic or monopolistic markets or are dealing in scarce resources. If this observation is true then someone could say that we are promoting crony capitalism. That certainly should not be the case. (full speech available at pib.nic.in)

Now, what exactly is crony capitalism? It is somewhat more complex than corruption, although that distinction is often not made. Let us start with none less than Gary Becker and Richard Posner:

Crony capitalism is a system where companies with close connections to the government gain economic power not by competing better, but by using the government to get favored and protected positions. These favors include monopolies over telecommunications, exclusive licenses to import different goods, and other sizeable economic advantages. Some cronyism is found in all countries, but Mexico and other Latin countries have often taken the influence of political connections to extremes.

Of course, much of the discourse on crony capitalism is associated with Asia (in particular in the wake of the Asian crisis) and Latin America. Paul Krugman has been one of the few US economists to talk about cronyism in the US. In 2003 he wrote in an NYT column entitled Who's Sordid Now?

Cronyism is an important factor in our Iraqi debacle. It's not just that reconstruction is much more expensive than it should be. The really important thing is that cronyism is warping policy: by treating contracts as prizes to be handed to their friends, administration officials are delaying Iraq's recovery, with potentially catastrophic consequences. ... It's rarely mentioned nowadays, but at the time of the Marshall Plan, Americans were very concerned about profiteering in the name of patriotism.. Iraq's reconstruction, by contrast, remains firmly under White House control. And this is an administration of, by and for crony capitalists.

While at the wake of the Asian crisis everyone was keen to show how the Korean miracle was really no miracle at all and the crisis was really an effect of the cronyism that went unnoticed until then, one critical question about the so-called "cronyism" went unanswered. It was raised by Alice Amsden in her pioneering work: why is that in South Korea, an extremely tight nexus between the state and business could bring about such tremendous increase in growth rates whereas everywhere else it has only resulted in the enrichment of a few at the cost of national development? Authors have offered many different answers. Amsden's own answer was that the South Korean state was able to get businesses to contribute to national development in exchange for the favours it granted them. Nothing as given for "free". I have argued in my book, Indian capitalism worked quite differently from Japanese of South Korean or Taiwanes capitalism. In these miracle economies, the focus of the state was on macro-economic growth and businesses were forces to operate in sectors, and with prices and costs where macro-economic growth would be maximized. The emphasis was not on corporate profits, but on maximizing revenue and productivity and capacity utilization. This focus away from profits and on growth was the most important thing the state could extract from business in exchange of all the resources it supplied. In India, and in most parts of the world, the state simply supplied subdized resources to its corporations and the corporations did what was in their interest: increase profits by whatever means possible, in most cases through practices through cartels, creating barriers to new competition and price manipulation. In East Asia, innovation and maximization of productivity were the only means to corporate growth (the data comparing profits in India and East Asia are quite illuminating, the methodological problems of comparing profitability not withstanding). Of course, the brunt of this was born by East Asian workers, who gain much by way of income, but lost a lot by way of rights and political freedoms.

In India, the state focused on creating many procedural and bureaucratic controls on business, which could all be bypassed if you were large enough a player but became insurmountable barriers for the small entrepreneur. This did little to create a synergy between corporate growth and profitability, macro-economic growth, productivity and innovation.

Globalization was supposed to cure these ills, by having the state withdraw from its regulatory role. Really, did it? Well, if Manmohan Singh is asking that question, then surely I cannot be blamed for being skeptical.

Immigrant experience on celluloid: The Namesake

2007-03-25T15:50:00.000-04:00

Mira Nair is an all time favourite film director of mine - but Namesake, which I just watched, turned out to be more than just another good film. I found many layers of meaning in the film which for me went well beyond only the immigrant story of a journey, loss, identity etc. What was special for me was the artistic use of Bengali language, script, idioms, Kolkata, music, ethos and culture. I found echos of Ritwik Ghatak's cinema that Mira Nair has herself acknowledged. The music was not Rabindra Sangeet - which I feel would be very easy to fall back on but would not have an universal appeal beyond Bengalis - but bhatiali, baul gaan, modern Bengali songs and Hindustani Classical. The two deaths in the film - the scene where Gogol shaves off his hair in America after his father's death and then when along with his mother and sister performs the last rites at the banks of River Ganga in Kolkata at Babughat - are experiences that many of us have been faced with. Again the recurring image of the idol of Goddess Saraswati being immersed in the river is symbolic and has shades of Ghatak. All in all the film is well made, poignant and will reach out to all immigrant individuals and communities and all Bengalis in a very special way. And of course, not to forget the reference to Fulton fish market - which I'm sure will strike a chord with Bongs around the world.

It's a coincidence perhaps that earlier last week I was at a seminar organised by the British High Commsion at Chandigarh on illegal migration to UK from Punjab and the need to curb this trend and saw another film on the topic of immigration - another side of it. Delhi based film director and producer Savyasaachi Jain's documentary Shores Far Away was one of the highlights of the seminar. This film also deals with immigration - the dark and ugly side of it. The director talks about the thousands of Indians who are smuggled across Indian borders to Europe every year. He goes into the heartland of Punjab - villages near Jallandhar - from where most of the illegal immigrants hail. The route is fraught with danger, they face hardships on the way and are often duped by unsrupulous agents - and yet they keep going in search of what they feel is a better life. The directors speaks to many of these illegal immigrants in Hamburg, Vienna, London, Birmingham and other places. He interviews families in villages of Punjab who are waiting for many years hoping their loved ones will come back, but have no information about their whereabouts. On the way to Europe many of immigrants freeze to death, get killed or face imprisonment. Some of those interviewed actually speak on camera about their hardships and try to send a message back home to young people not to follow in their footsteps. This film is very intense too and all the more disturbing because it's all true. In many villages of Punjab, immigrating - even illegally without papers - is very much a way of life. Some months ago, Naseeruddin Shah's directorial debut film Yun hota to kya hota too had dealt with the humane aspects of immigration. That was yet another sensitive potrayal of the subject!!!

Shashi Tharoor on the "Cricket Problem"

2007-03-24T17:38:00.000-04:00

Tharoor in today's New York Times:

Ever since the development of baseball, the ubiquitous and simplified version of the sport, Americans have been lost to the more demanding challenges — and pleasures — of cricket. Because baseball is to cricket as simple addition is to calculus — the basic moves may be similar, but the former is easier, quicker, more straightforward than the latter, and requires a much shorter attention span. And so baseball has captured the American imagination in a way that leaves no room for its adult cousin.

Tharoor ends the piece in utter condemnation of the American disinterest in cricket, a condemnation with which I can easily sympathize.

In the last twelve years that I have lived in North America, I have routinely failed to convince North Americans as how baseball is very similar to, but less than, cricket. Perhaps because I was doing what Tharoor does here too: express utter impatience and disenchantment with their fascination for what appears to me to be a rather monotonous and simple sport when a much more exciting alternative was available. In fact, I could not even convince anyone that there are similarities between the two. Then finally I decided to try something with my 6 year old when I went to watch him play baseball one day. He had hit what his coach called "an amazing hit" - and I told him if he were playing cricket, that would be six runs all at once.. and he immediately said he wanted me to take him to India to play cricket so he could hit a six. And we had an exciting conversation (my only exciting conversation about cricket in North America) about how one could hit six sixes in a row and people who did that set world records. Although we have not taken him to India to learn cricket, a curiosity remains alive in his mind to this day. In the odd occassion that I go to watch him play, he would often ask what his hits would score if he were playing cricket. Perhaps we should write off the adults and start with the little ones?

The International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal

2007-03-24T10:22:00.001-04:00

In Bhopal, the campaign for justice for the victims of the gas tragedy is celebrating a victory. After 15 days of hunger strike and active campaigning, the Government of Madhya Pradesh has agreed "to implement key demands to improve life for the survivors of the Union Carbide gas leak and ongoing water poisoning". Two of the leading figures in this campaign are Goldman Environmental Prize winners Rashida Bee and Champa Devi ( in the photo above, immediately after the government's announcement). Of course the campaign goes on, for as it stands now, compensation received by the survivors averages 6.2¢ per day. Read here what that compensation is worth. A potent driving force behind this movement are the Students for Bhopal who have mobilized strong local and international support for the campaign.

Getting to the root of the retention problem in IT

2007-03-21T16:20:00.000-04:00

Why is retention such a problem in IT? Those of us who just watch it from outside trying to make sense of the glitter and the gold would really like to know. As a CIO, admittedly plagued by the phenomenon of retention, writes anonymously in a post today:

I am responsible for IT operations in the "happening region" of Asia which has shown exponential growth rate in the last few years....As someone with IT technical background, I have to admit that we often see things either as one or zero, black or white. But I have realized one important component of IT which is "heartware" or people, in addition to hardware and software.

He mentions the five criteria for retention identified by Development Dimensions International (DDI): leadership, meaningful work, organization, people and development. He then goes on to assess himself "humbly" along these criteria, but does offer any more meaningful insights as to the retention problem.

My own hunch is that the main culprit is the second one in the list above, namely, the lack of meaningful work. I would even venture to say that, barring the obsession in the eighties about Japanese productivity, our corporate gurus have paid inadequate attention to the link between retention, productivity and meaning of work. The current obsession lies with cost-cutting and deal-making, (oh and I forgot - carving a socially conscious image) as opposed to innovation at the shop floor. This is a peculiar contradiction that charactizes the IT sector. On the one hand, the industry is driven by innovation; on the other, the profit strategies of large IT corporations remain tied to the under-utilization of a large pool of skilled labour force who must perform routine tasks that is hardly meaningful to them.

Of course, these are simply my observations from the outside. I would love to hear from you..

BTW, our CIO ends in a rather philosphical tone

: Whatever meaning people find in their relationships, work, in their own unique experience of living -- that is real. Everything else is an illusion.

World Cup Cricket 2007: Where is the excitement?

2007-03-21T09:48:00.000-04:00

Watching World Cup Cricket in England is a sober experience – a stark contrast to watching World Cup football. Just six months ago, there was so much verve and enthusiasm in the air -- England flags everywhere, pubs revamping themselves for the big event, cheerleading songs being composed and all kinds of football memorabilia flooding the malls. The English football fans, known for their mercurial temperament, if not thronging Germany, were shouting themselves hoarse at home. So even though England’s victory in World Cup football is almost a sepia moment now, English fans made their presence felt everywhere; Wayne Rooney’s health update was on every television channel. The television commentary, self referential to the point of being jingoistic, almost had you believe that England was poised to win the championship.
The same excitement and energy is missing now and the silence is almost deafening.

That is a pity since, World Cup Cricket, 2007, thus far has all the ingredients of a thriller – set in beautiful sea side locations it has already seen death, maritime adventures and the dethroning of the giants by the greenhorns. Inside the playing arena, the outcomes are undecided, with only New Zealand, Australia and West Indies making it into the Super eights as yet. Records have been broken and re-made including the highest score ever made by a batting side in a World Cup match and brilliant catches have been held. All this in a week which the pundits had predicted was going to be rather dull. In fact, there were nasty whispers that the ICC had unnecessarily prolonged the World Cup to fill their coffers. But the exit of big teams has certainly vindicated the much maligned cricket administrators.

I would like to think that the ripple effect began with Herschelle Gibbs; after practically ‘dropping’ the World Cup in 1999 he did a Gary Sobers by hitting six 6s in an over. India’s loss to Bangladesh created quite a stir, and then the zealous fans went on rampage in Dhoni’s house. Bangladesh and Ireland outmaneuvered India and Pakistan respectively. Perhaps the most tragic and chilling incident is Bob Woolmer’s death which the Jamaican police are now treating as ‘suspicious.’ Following Pakistan’s ouster from the World Cup, the coach was found unconscious in his hotel room. Andrew Flintoff’s drunken revelry has earned him a match expulsion and a few headlines. Luckily for England, they got past Canada, without Flintoff, recording their first win in two games. India has recorded the highest score ever in a World Cup match with 413 runs. We hope that this feather in their caps comes not in vain for the boys in blue.

Things may accelerate if England go through to the Super Eights. At this moment, however,any involvement in the game is simply not visible, neither in shopping arcades nor in sports pubs. Cricket news has to share the spotlight with F.A. cup. Television channels are doing their bit, telecasting all matches; the panel of commentators with the exception of erstwhile golden boy, David Gower and Bob Willis, (whom you will not recognize as the maverick fast bowler who had the Indian openers quaking) lacks star element. But it is the lack of participation of the vox populi that surprises and disappoints. Ironic, since England it was who carried the game everywhere and re-wrote national boundaries and pastimes. In the subcontinent, for example, cricket is the stuff of popular imagination and mass hysteria. So, while effigies of unsuccessful players and captains are being burnt and whole nations are on emotional overdrive, English cricket fans seem to have buried themselves. As I drive past Reading County Cricket club, I hope that they are sitting in the recesses of the lounge somewhere, watching their team play, ready to accept defeat or victory with a stiff upper lip. It is an English saying, isn’t it, may the best man win! So for World Cup 2007, may the best team win.

Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Indo-American factor

2007-03-19T09:00:00.000-04:00

Note: A different version of this story first appeared in The Economic Times and is also posted on Clinton's campaign blog

Senator Hillary Clinton's Presidential campaign received a shot in the arm this weekend with a dinner hosted by her husband President Bill Clinton where about a million dollars were raked in. The dinner at a Manhattan hotel had 1000 of New York state's rich and famous people and the biggest names in politics as well attending. While the event was the first joint campaign appearance of both the Clintons in the New York area since Hillary Clinton announced her presidential campaign in January, it also highlights the significant Indian-American factor in her Presidential bid.

From Indian Americans entrepreneurs to Bollywood stars - everyone is ready to pitch in for Hillary Clinton. She has already roped in New York-based hotelier Sant Chatwal as co-chair of her recently formed presidential exploratory committee to run for the 2008 White House race. Mr Chatwal was among the organisers of the Manhattan fund-raiser.

Some of the other well-known supporters of the Clintons include Atlanta based Hotelier and banker Mike Patel and Vin Gupta, the founder and CEO of Omaha based InfoUSA – both of whom are likely to become big fund raisers for Senator Clinton's campaign. Besides, the Indian diamond merchants in Manhattan are also known to be largely Democratic Party supporters and are likely to support Hillary. President Bill Clinton also has on his own team former aides from his White House days such as Satish Narayanan – who works for the Clinton Foundation now.

Mr Chatwal is creating an organisation called Indian Americans for Hillary 2008. "We are working on two milestone events this year for fund raising which will be attended by Senator Clinton. In June-July 2007, we plan a high end private Indian American event which will have Democratic supporters from across America attending it. While this is definitely a first for an US Presidential campaign, we also plan a Bollywood gala with top stars from Mumbai in August 2007 to raise funds for the campaign," he said. And with a view to add muscle to the campaign, he will also be deploying his newly acquired Falcon private jet for Senator Clinton's use. "Senator Clinton is the only candidate to have continuously contributed to upholding the improvement of US-India relations and championing for the Indian-American community within the US," he feels. So the 2008 US Presidential race looks all set to have a more prominent role for Indians in the US.

West Bengal: The X-ternal Factor

2007-03-17T09:18:00.000-04:00

What is happening in Bengal today is a matter of grave concern. But without going into whether it is bad politics or bad economics or historical baggage – just yet, I want to highlight the Prabasi or non-resident Bengali angle. Read an article which had reactions from many Bengalis in North America who expressed shock at the events in Nandigram and the human rights violations and police atrocities. What was interesting was that the reactions came in mostly from academicians and professors and a few doctors. I did not yet see any reaction from the Silicon Valley entrepreneurs – some of whom have invested in Bengal lately and become stakeholders in the state. Also have not so far seen anything from some of the best known Bengalis overseas – Rajat Gupta & Purnendu Chatterjee – who are among modern Bengal’s best known brand ambassadors. The decision of the West Bengal government to put on hold all Special Economic Zones (SEZ) will also, in fact, affect the Salim group which has a partnership with a prominent non-resident Bengali. Waiting to hear from the Prabashis about what they feel about SEZs vs human rights… has anyone seen anything from Amartya Sen on this issue yet?

Arresting Prospects: South Asians in NYPD

2007-03-15T20:44:00.000-04:00

Doctors, academicians, business professionals, perhaps even astronauts. These are the images which are generally conjured up when Indian-Americans are discussed. Sometimes, when traveling across New York for example, we are also made aware of South Asian taxi drivers. But Desi police officers ? Yes, there are reportedly more than 1,100 persons of South Asian origin serving on the New York Police Department, including at least five women.

Many of these Desi police officers were born in America and perhaps grew up watching TV police programs which attracted them to law enforcement as a career. Less typically, there is Officer Paramjit Kaur Gakhal, 38 and a mother of two, who came to America from Punjab with her husband at the age of 21. She had worked as a bank teller, nursing aide and sales representative before joining the NYPD. There is even a married couple, Sgt. Karena Patel and Sgt. Surinda Patel. It was Karena who first became a police officer, to be followed a year later by Surinda, who gave up a six-figure position in the apparel industry to join his wife in the NYPD.

An aggressive recruitment drive by the NYPD, one of the nation's most ethnically diverse police forces, has resulted in increasing numbers of South Asians joining the force. In addition to the prospects of adventure and the glamor of the uniform, the salaries, perks and retirement benefits are actually quite competitive with other careers and serve to counter the dangers of patrolling the streets of New York. Recruits are on full pay from the first day of training, and after five years are entitled to a base salary of $60,000 p.a. plus overtime, night pay, generous vacation allowances and other benefits. With promotion and length of service, total earnings can climb well into six figures. A retirement option is available at half pay after 20 years of service. The overall financial package is certainly a viable option as compared to the median annual household income of $61,322 enjoyed by Indian Americans (national US average $42,000 p.a.)

The highest ranking Desi on the New York police force is Captain Jagdeshwar Jaskaran. During his 14 years of service, Capt. Jaskaran has gathered over 35 medals and citations. He plays down the dangers of the job and is quoted as saying "..90 to 95 percent of police officers go through their entire careers not using a gun.." In spite of the Captain's nonchalance, some might say those are fairly dangerous odds, considering that an accountant (for example) would expect to go through 100% of his career without resorting to firearms !

The South Asians of the New York police have now formed the NYPD Desi Society as a platform for their points of view and expect to exert increasing influence for their group, working hard to disprove the Gilbert & Sullivan dictum that "..a policeman's lot is NOT a happy one ..."

E Pluribus Unum

2007-03-14T00:53:00.000-04:00

Where in the world can one see a commercial establishment proclaiming : "Yes ! We speak Spanish, Hindi, Farsi, Greek, Hungarian, Tagalog, Mandarin, Cantonese and Vietnamese " ? In an advertisement for a Toyota dealership in Sunnyvale, California - that's where.

The claim speaks volumes for the diversity which is now sweeping across North America. That employees of a business here should represent polyglot ethnic groups is not by itself an unusual phenomenon, but the fact that their linguistic ability should be used as a unique selling point is an indication of the buying power now represented by these various groups. Located in the heart of Silicon Valley, the small town of Sunnyvale is an indicator for the rest of the United States, where the Anglo-Saxon presence is forecast to become a minority within one generation.

The Founding Fathers of the United States did indeed acknowledge diversity when they composed the national motto which (translated from the Latin) means "Out of many - one". But their limited notion of diversity was represented on the original design of the Great Seal of the Nation by six symbols - the rose (England), thistle (Scotland), harp (Ireland), fleur-de-lis (France), lion (Holland), and an imperial two-headed eagle (Germany), representing - in their words - "...the Countries from which these States have been peopled..."

They might not be surprised today to see Spanish-speaking people as a significant presence, or even Greeks or Hungarians, but one wonders what their reaction would be to Hindi, Farsi, Tagalog, Mandarin, Cantonese and Vietnamese vying for equal billing ?

Indian BPOs being "bullied": A surprise?

2007-03-12T19:26:00.000-04:00

From today's Economic Times

CALL it the return of imperialism or new colonialism. Indian BPOs are being arm-twisted by their foreign clients into signing irrationally harsh contracts which have zero termination notice periods or notice periods as short as 30 days. Modus operandi: if you won’t accept your rival will.

Should we be surprised? This has indeed been the modus operandi for a long time, and indeed the main driving force behind the 'new' industrial strategies premised on the progressive dismantling of regulation. Initially this affected workers in sectors such as textiles, and slowly has spread and continues to spread to other industries. Interestingly, the various objections to such dismantling had been voiced by many social actors in the Global South, but were summarily dismissed by both their own governments and international institutions. Competitive deregulation was then the panacea for all developmental ills, and threat was exactly the one mentioned above: if you cannot provide the deregulated structure we seek, your rival will. However, when the 'race' got to the point where those deregulated structures began to attract jobs which once belonged to the middle classes in the West, "race to the bottom' emerged as an important part of the global discourse. The tide then turned quite dramatically: with a rising demand that labour and environmental standards must be reimposed on Southern countries, else we (the West or the North) must refuse to do business with them.

The truth is that both the North and South are harmed by the dismantling of regulation if it are not carefully planned. While the dismantling of some regulation is beneficial, some forms of regulation may indeed be necessary to guarantee certain social and economic rights. Neither are the "North" and "South" monoliths, their interests are neither completely compatible, nor thorouhgly irreconcilable. Finally, the choice between "development" and "deregulation" is indeed a false one.

Mira Dattagupta : An Amazing Life

2007-03-11T10:27:00.000-04:00

I had the good fortune to know Mira Dattagupta as a very close family member. She was a rationalist, a brilliant mathematician, a dedicated social worker, a feminist, a humanist and so much more. She had served as a Lecturer of Mathematics and principal of the women's section of Surendra Nath College, Calcutta. I believe that she is among the first role models that women in independent India had. This is an article I wrote for a collection of essays, memoirs and articles that was published as a book last year on the occasion of her 100th birthday by my father Mira Dattagupta: Ekti Jibon,( (Mira Dattagupta: A life), Publisher & Editor: Rabindra Dattagupta, Kolkata, September 2006.

Can you imagine a world without computers, internet, TV and cell phones? I actually can. It was the world of my grandparents home at 434, Jodhpur Park - where I spent many happy months with amma & dadu my grandparents, and bhaloamma, my grandaunt. There were no computers and no virtual world in those days. And Bhaloamma was not even Dadu's real sister, but his cousin. But they were all real people and everything that I got from them - the whole gamut of knowledge, love, affection, memories, stories and wonderful times together - will sustain me through my life. Even though this is really an essay about Bhaloamma, I cant help thinking about all three of them together with each of them standing tall as the three pillars of our very own world at Jodhpur Park. Moving on to Bhaloamma - she was a powerhouse despite her deceptive slight frame. In fact, she was plagued by various physical maladies too, but her indomitable spirit carried her through all kinds of difficulties.

I do remember for instance, an occasion when she had accompanied me to an eye specialist for a check-up. WHile we were waiting for my turn, she had an attack of palpitations. Bhaloamma was unfazed, she clutched at a vein in her throat - a treatment which a doctor friend had shown her many years ago - till her heartbeats returned to normal. When I went in for my check up, she was very much with me. Bhaloamma knew everything, from the best places to buy clothes, fish or a special sandesh to the difficult bus routes, the good schools and colleges, politics, history, current affairs, names of obscure relatives and of course, mathematics. When she returned from a trip to Germany for a conference during the International Women's Year, Bhaloamma got my sister Deborani and me our very first box of foreign chocolates. I still remember how we treasured it and every night took our pick from the delicious assortment. We had all heard the family folklore about Bhaloamma and how she had secured 2nd position and silver medal for her graduation at the Calcutta University in maths despite not sitting for one full paper. And I didn't even need to see her silver medal to be convinced about her mathemetical knowledge. When she had coached me in maths for a few weeks her sharp and clear headed lessons had helped me score 100% - the only time ever in my life. While for me, it was like achieving an impossible target, for her it was a challenge to teach me maths after my poor marks in an exam caused a lot of anxiety both for me and my parents. I've had other maths tutors too, but none as competent or as compassionate and sensitive as her.

But it was not just maths, history too was Bhaloamma's forte. India's Independence was for her a very personal chapter as an young woman who had become deeply involved in the freedom struggle. We've got insights into that part of our history both generally contemporary and her impressions of various political leaders, many of whom she knew personally to events which changed the course of the nation's tryst with destiny to intensely personal where she had to prove her commitment to her political organsation by spending a night in the same room with a male colleague. Besides maths and history the other subject that I associate with Bhaloamma is of course education.
She had long been the principal of the women's section of Surendra Nath College and a teacher there. There were a large number of her former students who kept coming over to our house to meet her, chat, discuss their career plans, problems at work or just pay their respects and say thank you.

Yes, that was Bhaloamma, when she was around the house was always a hub of visitors and friends..Dadu and amma had their visitors too - but it was through Bhaloamma that we met the most interesting people from different walks of life. From two young girls who had grown up in an orphanage that was founded by her to senior political leaders, intellectuals, college professors - there was always a stream of visitors at Jodhpur Park. Our lives were filled with human warmth and lots of real people. In fact, some of Bhaloamma's friends were very close to us and became close family. Dhiren dadu was not just her very close friend, but a member of our family too. A Bolshevik supporter, he was the first truly left intellectual that I have met. He gave me my first Kafka - AMerica - a book I've always treasured and which opened up a brave new world for me. I recently gave it to my sister Deborani - not just as a memento from Dhiren Dadu - but also because I felt it would in many ways echo her own expereinces and adventures in that country.Dhiren Dadu had travelled widely across Europe and he was fluent in both English and French. ANd what was most remarkable was his relationship with Bhaloamma. We've heard from Amma that in their youth, family opposition and the fact that Bhaloamma was dusky which made her an unsuitable bride had come in the way of their marriage. However, I've not come across a more mature and sensitive friendship between two individuals since I saw them together. Their frienship brought both our families together and helped us forge deep and lifelong bonds.In fact, whether it was friendship or all her other involements - bhaloamma was comletely selfless. She always put everyone else before herself. From constant attention to any one who was ill to helping with college admissions, Bhaloamma was always by your side. SHe was a rationalist, a brilliant academician, a dedicated social worker, a feminist, a humanist and so much more. But all this didn't take away from her being a deeply religious person too, and that's the common ground between her and my amma. In fact, sometimes, I felt that Bhaloamma's deep involvement with everything that formed part of her some started with an from an intrinsic involvement with people. SHe cared for people and that's how she made a big difference in the many lives that she touched and very often improved. She was always reaching out to people.In our own cloistered, small world's today when privacy is the mantra - I feel there are many lessons to learn from someone like her who was such a modern being and yet so much dedicated to the service of people all around her. That world didn't stop with immediate family or friends and I remember her telling me about how an young woman who had landed up at a police station in Kolkata after running loco from home had actually asked to see Bhaloamma - a local MLA in those days. That was many years ago, in the 1950s perhaps. It was late at night, but Bhaloamma went to the local police station and convinnced the young lady to go back home and talk things over with her parents. A lesson for so many of living in our clositered selfish, busy and private worlds.

And it was very apt that when I was filling my form for my higher secondary exams, Bhaloamma blessed me and also asked me to convey her blessings to my friends Simonti, Ananya and Bhavani for our exams. "I know that you'll all come out with flying colours she had said." That was one of the last things she told me. She became seriously unwell and passed away soon after. Incidentally, all my three friends have done very well in academics and are on the quest for knowledge in their own different ways. As for me, I consider myself blessed having known her and spent so much of time with her.

One of India's most prominent women jurists

2007-03-10T06:24:00.000-05:00

FOR one of India's most prominent women jurists, life has been more about living out her destiny than cracking glass ceilings . Retired Supreme Court judge Justice Ruma Pal - who as a young girl enjoyed solving crosswords - found herself enrolling for the law course at the Nagpur University College of Law quite by accident, during a vacation with her brother after graduating from Santiniketan's Vishwa Bharati University with a major in philosophy. Later, it was her dream of travelling and working her way around Europe that took her to Vienna. In fact, she was hitch hiking around the Continent when news of being accepted for admission at Oxford University's prestigious Bachelor of Civil Law reached her through an Indian diplomatic mission.

After debating on the relevance of Women's Day, I'm doing a reverse swing. ET had a special edition on March 8 which had three guest editors - HSBC India CEO Naina Lal Kidwai, Biocon CMD Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw and Britannia CEO Vinita Bali. Here's the link to an article I did that day.

Ethiopia "doing better" than Asia?

2007-03-09T10:08:00.001-05:00

Here you have India growing almost 10%, supposedly gaining on China and providing one of history’s greatest investment stories. And yet, Indians figured even worse in the (UNICEF) report than Ethiopia and on a par with Eritrea and Burkina Faso in the area of malnutrition. "Where even Ethiopia is doing better than Asia", the Economic Times, March 3, 2007

When I stumbled on to this headline in the Economic Times, I decided to dig out some more data from the UNICEF database comparing India, China, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Burkina Faso. While I am somewhat uncomfortable in using countries as "benchmarks" of disaster (and Africa seems to be a frequent victim of this act), it seems quite worthwile to examine how India looks in terms of the comparisons mentioned in the article. Take a look: it is every bit as bad as the article suggests, and even worse. In addition, levels of inequality are the highest in China, but quite comparable in India and Ethiopia. India has the highest percentage of its under-five suffering from severe-to-moderate malnutrition (about 47 percent), the highest percentage suffering from severe malnutrition, and so on.

And there is no redress in sight. In today's Hindu, Jean Dreze tells us that the budget allocation for the Integrated Child development scheme (ICDS) in 2007-08 has not increased at all: it remains the same as a proportion of GDP. Accordingly, the Government of India will be spending less than Rs.5,000 crore for its 160 million children under six. By contrast it will spend Rs.96,000 crore on defence. see Empty Stomachs and the Union Budget

Yes, increased allocations would certainly help. But what is at stake here is not simply a matter of fiscal allocations. At stake here is the overall vision of development itself. Very popular now are the ideas of "inclusive growth", "the bottom of the pyramind", "the triple bottom line" and their likes. Inclusive growth is of course a simple empty uttering of a master politician. The others are motivated by the belief that the the vast numbers of the poor must be protrayed as an economic opportunity. In fact, I see all around this infectious new economism" everything must be protrayed as profitable. (Most blatant is perhaps the discussion around female foeticide. As part of its Women's day collection, the Times of India suggests that the girl child must be made an economically attractive option if foeticide was to stop).

Paintings victims of injustice as a market or an asset? Children suffering from malnutrition as potential consumers of packaged babyfood? Perhaps baby food manufacturers can lobby Chidambaram for an increased allocation towards child health to be spent on babyfood? That would be "inclusive growth" in the best possible way: the growth of these children would include the growth of babyfood manufacturers, global and Indians. The government will finance a food distribution scheme for the "severely malnourished", by taking away from another public service. In the mean time, either nothing will change for the parents of the "moderately malnourished", or they will slip into the severe category. (Recall that 46 percent - i.e. almost half of under-fives suffer from moderate to severe malnutrition, according to the latest National Family Health Survey (NFHS-III of the Government of India).

Women's Day

2007-03-08T13:44:00.000-05:00

Why do women still need a day? Perhaps just like Valentine's day...it's just an occasion for branding & marketing. On my way back from Kolkata to Delhi a no-frills airlines wished me Happy Women's Day on the baggage tag. Of course, the airports were full of aggressive Indians of the male species, who jostled and pushed me and other women around and jumped the queues everytime. In fact, each day, in India, should be declared a politeness day.

Redefining "Brahmin" in the USA

2007-03-05T17:57:00.000-05:00

Ever since Oliver Wendell Holmes published his article "The Brahmin Caste of New England" in 1860, the term "Brahmin" in the United States has usually been understood to mean the Boston Brahmins. This elite group claimed descent from the families constituting the Masachusetts establishment who originally settled New England, and are described in a poem of the period

So this is good old Boston,
The home of the bean and the cod,
Where the Lowells talk only to the Cabots,
And the Cabots talk only to God

(Boston Toast by John Collins Bossidy)

Now, nearly 150 years after Oliver Wendell Holmes thus christened the elite of New England, Asian Indians are staking their own claim to perpetuating an elite hereditary class in a country that otherwise aspires to classlessness and intergenerational mobility.

This comes at a time when the mantra of equality of opportunity is wearing thin in the United States. The composition of the meritocracy of the 21st Century, to be determined by access to higher education, is increasingly consolidating within its existing ranks as the cost of that education continues to escalate. It is no coincidence that 90% of the students in the elite American Universities come from the top 50% of the income spectrum.

In this process, Asian Indians in America now occupy pole position in the race to establish a new power group. With annual household incomes higher than the white majority and spending more on their children's education than the national median, they already count 60% of their number as graduates (another statistic well above the average for other ethnic groups). They are set on a course to consolidate their privileges still further as their children, after graduation, usually follow the more lucrative and socially prized professions.Their numbers will be strengthened by new students from India, most of whom have historically remained behind after graduating. There were 70,000+ of students from India enrolled in American universities at last count, and their numbers are forecast to grow by 20% over the next five years.

We are surely witnessing the emergence of a new upper caste in America, grouped by ethnicity in a way not seen since the 19th Century. Unlike the 19th Century Boston Brahmins though, the flourishing Indian elite class will not be localised like the Boston Brahmins, but spread out throughout the entire country. Business, Law, Medicine, Engineering and Financial Services will be the areas of activity in which they will excel, giving them a prominent voice in their local communities.

Asian Indians have already made sure that when the word "Indian" is spoken in America, everybody understands that these are not the same people that Columbus named when he set eyes on the inhabitants of the new land. The question remains whether they will also exercise their growing wealth and position to exercise a positive influence the society around them. Their 19th Century New England predecessors did so to great effect by creating academic institutions like the Ivy League universities, and the ideologies of the Boston Brahmins continue to be associated with the most progressive policies. If the new Indian "Brahmins" achieve anything resembling the same effect wherever they are concentrated around America, it may soon be accepted that not all the Brahmins in America are the ones that Holmes observed in Boston. The Indian Americans of the 21st Century may well justify Holmes's own words "...now and then a seedling apple, or a seedling pear, springs from a nameless ancestry and grows to be the pride of all the gardens in the land."

"The technical gadget that Americans are most in need of"

2007-03-03T19:21:00.000-05:00

"THE TECHNICAL gadget that Americans are most in need of, it's been said, is a hearing aid. Too many of them are prone to lecture, hector, and otherwise pressure much of the rest of the world, in the far from touching belief that the American way is the only way" writes Professor Ramesh Thakur in today's Hindu. Professor Thakur, as many of you may know, is the Vice-Rector of the United Nations University (UNU) in Japan. The article reflects on the lack of interest of mainstream US media to give space to opinion from other parts of the world. He proposes a very interesting idea that might be able to address this problem:

why do the major newspapers (of India or the South) not organise a reciprocal exchange of columns — we will publish as many of your articles per month as you take of ours? Or do we share the westerners' implicit belief that what they have to say on any and every topic is important for the whole world to know; but what we have to say about our own affairs may perhaps be worth considering, but otherwise we should know our place and stay there?

I hope some editors take this up! However, there is an even deeper problem with respect to the mainstream media outlets in the West, especially Canada and North America. These societies have large disaporic populations, especially first generation immigrants who maintain strong linkages with their countries of origin. How many of these members of Canadian and American societies are visible in the media? With their own voices and perspectives? Their inclusion occurs along two trajectories. Either they are there simply as exihibits of diversity and multiculturalism. Or, their presence is in particular "enclaves" as in BBC's Asian Network or the various "ethnic" channels on television. Sure, they fulfil a need for those communities and provide a great (and ever explanding) market. But this is not a substitute for a fully inclusive and representative media in highly diverse and cosmopolitan societies. I wonder how we could solve this one..

Water and the Indian woman

2007-03-01T19:59:00.000-05:00

Initially when Water was released, I was inundated with all sorts of questions about whether it represents Indian reality. Then when it did not the Oscars the other night, I got another set of queries and opinions. Then finally, last night when I was interviewed for a television show on the theme of Indian women, I appear to have made surprised some people by not talking about Water. I, for one, was happy that the host did not raise it, as were some others who watched. While in my opinion Water is in fact a rather poor representation of the Indian reality, it is not fully clear to me what its appeal is to the global public. There is of course some appeal in watching cinematized tales of victims of "tradition" or other structures of oppression (such as "Born into Brothels", although this was considerably less cinematized than Water). But I suspect that for the majority, it is simply a matter of discovery. "I had no idea" is a common refrain I have heard.

The phenomenon is not as well known as the issue of dowry deaths, bride burning or foeticide. I think this is what has attracted most attention, and this is where I think the film is rather problematic in its depiction of reality. It appears to be frozen in time; its static quality leaves viewers with the sense that this reality has not changed between the time at which the film is set and contemporary India. What is worse, the film never mentions that this practice is prevalent only amongst Hindus, and not amongst all Indians, and not even amongst all Hindus. If the purpose is to create awareness about the plight of India's Hindu widows, a much more complex tale needs to be told. My intention is not to minimize the significance of the suffering in question, but to ask for a less passive and static portrayal of Indian women, not only in films but all media coverage.

Interestingly, the media continues to focus either on Bollywood, or political elites (such as Indira Gandhi) or at the other extreme on the hapless women who are being burnt and ill-treated. No wonder it appears as an impossible contradiction.

Interestingly, the media continues to focus either on Bollywood, or on elites or at the other extreme on the hapless women who are being burnt and ill-treated. No wonder it appears as an impossible contradiction to the global public.

Instead, how about we turn our gaze to a large number of South Asian women who are active agents of political change? Why are their stories not told? Some of my heroines are: Rashida Bee, Teejan bai, Kamla, Aruna Roy, Girija Devi, SEWA, Muktaran Mai (Pakistan), and Jahanara Begum (Bangladesh), Mahashweta Devi, and many many others.

Who are yours?