Election-Shelection

Now look at the results of the General election in India. None of the media pundits, psephologists (sound they are constipated) or hobnobbists (my term) managed to predict close to even a fraction of an inch of what the results are. i won't cite links here. Just google up and/or read BBC even.

Manmohan is the man. Advani has no advantage. Maya is dismayed. The Left is left huffing and puffing especially in Bengal. Darn! Who knew the UPA will have such a victory. Lanslide is an old word. It is Lord of the Rings all the way for Congress.

I'm blogging nothing practically because I'm traveling. Haven't written any poetry either. Have poetry news though and will post later.

What do the people of India say? Pretension is harmful to your stomach. Because those who suffered losses in these polls gotta stomach a lot.

Indian Love Story: Romance Under An Umbrella

I've never celebrated Valentine's Day, never really figured out what's there in succumbing to the commercial pressures of buying and receiving flowers, dinners, gifts... unless of course we want to stimulate the flagging economy in these trying times. I don't even have money for that, dang! But the month of February, for very special reasons that are personal, makes me think about love and romance. Also, I start sniffing Spring already! So here's one of the love poems I've been writing lately as part of a series. They are clubbed under the header INDIAN LOVE STORY (and don't ask me why it is the fourth one!):

INDIAN LOVE STORY
4. Romance Under An Umbrella

It’s the rain
And your face that streams
Like the pain of an inch-long separation
While we listen together

The road’s song churning under an umbrella
In full monsoon cadence

No, fingers don’t touch
And you take back the longing
Of our heavy-breathing nights
To the trill from a paan-shop radio

Reciting the very lines
I had memorized for you.



Photo from Internet: Raj Kapoor and Nargis in film "Shree 420"

My dad's latest blogpost: IN THE SHADOW OF FAMINE

It holds a special meaning for me to read my father's blogposts, however infrequent these may be. Not because he has been a column writer and commentator in local newspapers and other publications from a long time. Mainly because, for a person aged 70-odd, using the Internet happens to be a completely new and unrelatable skill for all his years of job, writing, activism and knowledge gathering. Now he uses the e-mail, speaks to us across seas using Skype and blogs now and then.


This account below is not just deeply touching but it also happens to be a slice of history. His repository of commentaries is an oral history that I have always found to be of utmost relevance -- something that should be recorded in some manner.


Go to his blog Old Man River or the specific link to read: http://pbdasmailing.blogspot.com/2008/12/in-shadow-of-famine.html

Pop Goes Delhi!

South Asia Curator of Cornell University, Bronwen Bledsoe, a very funky and friendly personality, is coming to town. That is Delhi. Where I am these days. She I came to know recently through Prof. Debra Castillo of Cornell in Ithaca. Debbie, the lovely angelic soul that she is, had very kindly suggested my name to Bronwen as one of the people to meet up, for planning a Bollywood series in collaboration with Cornell Cinema. Later about that.

Now Bronwen is touring South Asia and China regarding her own work and researching on Subcontinental pop culture (she is a historian, and in her words, everything is "pop to a medievalist" like her!!). I'm damn glad I have a chance to meet her again. Hopefully at least a couple of times we will have delightful discussions on Bollywood, food and neo-urban customs.

That brings me to think: what is pop culture in Delhi without a Big Fat Punjabi wedding anyway? Something in the style of "Monsoon Wedding"! In fact, I just came through one in the family, my sister-in-law's wedding, held pretty true to medium-budget (ha!) Bollywood flicks. Every ritual seemed important as well as mindless at times and yet we enjoyed so much! Now IF I can take Bronwen to a loud, pompous, alcohol-infused, raucous DJ-music-ridden, obscenely intricate crystal-and-gold lehenga-carpet-curtain-cover-draped farmhouse or clubhouse wedding, I'd say both of us will instantly know more about pop culture than any astute researcher poring over books or a computer screen.

Or, we can take it easy and just eat and drink and laze about in Dilli Haat or Crafts Bazaar in Pragati Maidan or scrounge around in Janpath. Also visit my alma mater JNU.

If my readers have any suggestions, kindly write in about what to do in the name of pop culture in Delhi.

Photo (from Internet): Diwali decorations on sale

Usha Akella's editorial in the forthcoming issue of Muse India

I shall be posting the 2009 January Muse India link when it goes live. In the meanwhile, here is an e-mail and a sneak peek of the editorial by this Diaspora issue's guest editor Usha Akella. I'm pretty excited that my poem appears with hers in the urban poetry anthology SHEHER (Frog Books). Parts of the editorial that I have vested interest in, have been boldfaced...

"Dear Friends:

While sharing with you, the contributors, the editorial to the January 2009 http://www.museindia.com/ that includes your work, I'd like to say a heartfelt thank you for submitting in time and being part of this exciting project. I am truly grateful for the opportunity to connect and savor your work. Please do not forget to check out the website in January.

The submission period and editing is closed as of today and henceforth direct any queries/needs/requirements you might have to GSP Surya Rao, the manager of museindia.com at gsprao2003@yahoo.co.in. My participation in the project ends today but I hope that this is the beginning of new friendships, projects and shared kinship between us. For me, poetry has always been about the connections and friends it brings.

I'd love your feedback to the editorial. I sincerely intended to pay tribute to all of you and to the poetry we write so I hope it does you justice.

Warmly,

Usha Akella"


Dense with words, a homecoming
Diaspora poets, USA
By Usha Akella

When G.S.P. Surya Rao invited me to edit this issue, I had an opportunity to connect with the unseen community I belong to- the US Diasporic poets. On reading the poems sent to me there was an instant familiarity- the gnawing, simultaneous claiming and disclaiming within our sensibilities, and the passionate ownership of words to heal/acknowledge/define/transcend that fluidity. I felt I had just entered the country I truly belonged to- a country with many post offices. To quote Rajarshi Singh, 'For it is not simply a tale of one promised land.'

I am hugely delighted to share with you the poems of Ravi Shankar, Reetika Vazirani, Ralph Nazareth, Pramila Venkateswaran, Soham Patel, Saleem Peeradina, Pireeni Sundaralingam, Meena Alexander, Goutam Datta, Kazim Ali, Ro Gunetilleke , Nabina Das and Rajarshi Singh. (For various reasons, I was unable to include the work of Vijay Seshadri, Prageeta Sharma, Sana Mulji Dutt, Amitava Kumar and Agha Shahid Ali which to me would have rendered this issue 'complete.')

I delivered an impromptu speech at the Calicut International Book Fair, Kerala, October 2007 somewhat bewildered by the decades old, and to me, passé debate if Indian poets writing in English are authentic enough:

I am glad for this opportunity to finally confront my own personal history. I write in English. I dream in English. I blunder in English. I know no other way. This was circumstantial, and we must not be guilty of our circumstances or our personal and national histories. I accessed my Indian culture in English as a child. And my culture accesses me via my English poetry today… When English is unceasingly and scathingly targeted as foreign, I wonder why do we not ask the same question of Urdu? After all this language too is the language that emerged as a result of invasion and occupation. We have allowed time for a process of assimilation for this language and accept it as intrinsic to the land. Where is the spirit of generosity, absorption and inclusiveness that to me is the quintessence of India. Do we ask the question, are Punjabis Indian? Are Tamils Indian? Are Muslims. Indian? Are Christians Indian? What is pure Indian? Is this an answerable question?

English is here to stay because English more than any other Indian language has evidenced the spirit of adaptability and absorption. How many kinds of English exist within India alone! Like a river taking on the characteristic of the land it flows through, English has the incredible flexibility to morph according to the mother language of the speaker. English is the only language that is able to access an Indian sensibility not just a regional sensibility- and thankfully! In some sense, this issue being debated in English is like a brain observing itself.

I now have a golden chance to tear down a few walls. Pireeni Sundaralingam enquired if she was eligible for the issue, given that she is not Indian. "I was born in Sri Lanka and lived in both Europe and the US but, sadly, not India." She was welcomed with Ro Gunetilleke, and on reading their work we will be glad of the hospitality extended. I'd like to think India softened its borders in this issue.

I am glad to honor the poetry of late Reetika Vazirani who seemed slated for a great poetic career Her exquisite poetry evokes jazz, chant, lamentation and celebration. I thought it appropriate to include two prose pieces in this issue- an interview with Ram Devineni, the founder of Rattapallax and a staunch promoter of poetry; and poet Goutam Datta's foreword to the anthology A mingling of waters. Goutam and Ram collaborate to bring American poets to Kolkata. (Check out Goutam's new online Literary journal, http://www.urhalpool.com/, a contemporary Bengali-English bilingual webzine. The next issue of Rattapallax is devoted to Bengali poetry)

I felt that this is an editorial that should be heard from the poet's mouth- what it is to be bracketed by twin realities. I asked the poets to provide an artist statement and the fascinating array evidenced an acute awareness of identity, poetics and displacement. Poets by definition are natural immigrants 'comfortable' in exile- both inner and outer.

Saleem Peeradina states this suspension with a lucid image in 'Song of the Makeover':

Where travelers reaching their destination
Discover they are lost. An error of navigation,

A trick of perception, crunches two realities
Into a single space

Ironically, the parenthesis itself becomes the figure for Diaspora - the release from India and an unceasing unfoldment from her. A poetry, this complex, can never be wholly contained by geographical extremities or even psychological ones, and is constantly re-imaging and imagining itself beyond its own scope.

Perhaps, in the land of language, India is Kazim Ali's vowel and America his consonant. Both are needed to speak, and to contain, to find the silence from which words must come.

Ralph Nazareth's poems froth in a furious awareness of fragmentation. 'Try to take India away from me, and I'm like my dog, fierce in defense of his bone.' This could be called a poetry from a borderland fully lucid of its sleep walking. Perhaps, there is no better way to portray it than Pramila Venkateswaran. She writes poems 'Early in the morning in the silent hour between sleep and waking.' In contrast, for Soham Patel, India is the noise and music, the magic that keeps her rhythm. Ravi Shankar poems whirl delighted in the substance of words, spiraling within the contours of language to find their center. Like Nabina Das, if only we could perceive our world as an amble in two gardens savoring two different bouquets. For Meena Alexander poetry is an expanse in which Meera meets Ginsberg. Poetry can ask for no more!

In conclusion, I say to Pireeni and the company I am in, let's "find each other in foreign lands."

Usha Akella

Assam clashes: The communal angle came from the news media

My journalist-writer friend Subir Ghosh has taken out an exciting and deeply investigative study. Those of you who are political animals and in general are interested in the North East of India, do read the news release below. Clicking on the title of this post will take you to the detailed report, downloadable and free.

New Delhi, October 23: The ethnic clashes between indigenous Bodos and Bangladeshi migrants which broke out in Assam in the first week of October 2008 gave unnecessary importance and prominence to the “Muslim” aspect of the latter.

The finding is from a study by Newswatch, an independent online entity which monitors, collates and documents news and information pertaining to the news media and journalism. The Newswatch (http://www.newswatch.in/) probe was conducted over an eight-day period starting the day the clashes broke out (October 3). The study —Identities and descriptors: How the news media described the Assam clashes — was meant to be a qualitative analysis, and not a quantitative one. The idea was to look at the way the news media covered the issue, and not quantify the exact number of publications or news outlets that did a story, or did not. “Sectarian violence in Northeast does not always make it to the front page of newspapers. But this one did — coming as it was in the backdrop of the attacks on Christians by Hindu rightwing elements in Karnataka and Orissa, and a palpable sense of Islamophobia that seemed to be all-pervading in the aftermath of the serial blasts in Ahmedabad, Bangalore and New Delhi. The prime objective of this study was to look at how the media uses descriptors and modifiers in ethnic conflict situations,” explained Newswatch editor, Subir Ghosh.

Altogether, 597 stories published during the period were tracked down by the researchers. After leaving out duplicates (mainly because of news agency creeds), the number was brought down to 187. The next round of elimination was done to exclude non-English stories and ones that ran into 100 words or less. In the end, 138 stories were selected for the content analysis.Very few stories, it was found, desisted from naming the two communities involved in the clashes. It would be wrong to say very few “publications” did so, since different news items emanating from the same outlet used varied descriptors for the two groups of people. In other words, there seemed to be a dearth of policy when it came to naming communities or ethnic groups involved in clashes. The study found 26 sets of descriptors and modifiers which were used to describe the Bodo tribals which ranged from “local Hindus called Bodos” to “non-Muslims.” In case of Bangladeshi migrants, the number was 27, with the descriptors and modifiers varying from “Bangladeshi Muslim migrants” to “Muslim migrant settlers”. Many terms, both correctly and wrongly, were used as synonyms.

The study also looked at the use of the term “Muslim” both in the headlines as well as in the body of the copies. Seven news items (of six outlets) played up the Muslim card in the headlines. As many as 66 stories used “Muslim” to denote Bangladeshi migrants either in the first two paragraphs, or later in the copy (if this community was first introduced only in a latter part of the story concerned). Though the Bangladeshi migrants, by and large, are Muslims, the over-emphasis on the “Muslim” aspect of this particular community went a large way in adding a communal colour to a clash that was not essentially communal in nature. It was rather surprising that the coverage of a clash which left over 50 dead and rendered about 100,000 homeless, saw only 21 Bodos/Assamese/Bengalis and 8 Bangladeshi migrants being quoted in 138 stories. This filtering of voices becomes all the more lopsided given that most of the stories analysed directly or through insinuation projected Bangladeshi migrants (even mostly mentioned just as Muslims) as being the victims of orchestrated violence against them. The lopsidedness in the count of both sources and voices of the people may be gauged from the fact that almost half the stories (65) originated from Guwahati.

The report can be downloaded from here: http://www.newswatch.in/research/1754

Details of the report:

Pages: 10

Format: PDF

Colour: All-colour

Price: Free

Size: 640 KB

For more information contact: Subir Ghosh, Editor-Publisher, NewswatchTel: 0-9811316305Email: editor@newswatch.in Website: http://www.newswatch.in/

Fiction forthcoming in Mirage Books short story collection

This was a nice surprise:
My short story selected to appear in a collection by Mirage Books (http://www.miragebooks.com/), India. The story is "Tara Goes Home" that I originally wrote last year, as an entry for Orange Prize (ambitious, ambitious!), UK. It didn't make the cut there and I felt the story had too many loose ends and quite a bit of fluff. So I edited it over and over again. Finally, this year Mirage Books picked it up and I thought, OMG, they like this story? No way! I had contributed three stories (all within 1,500 words and only one to be selected), and my preference rested on either of those other two. Those were really nice tales! But this probably has more gravitas in the theme. Who knows?

Anecdote: When Nadine Gordimer wanted to stick to the title of her novel "A Sport of Nature", her publisher kept arguing against it citing some silly reason like this title might have the book mixed up with sports books! What I mean is, publishers and writers allegedly have totally different world views... (Now I'm not Nadine Gordimer, so let's move on...)

The selected story is about a young woman named Tara who lives in Delhi. She is chided and goaded by her family to bear a son while she keeps getting pregnant with girl babies (revealed by illegally done ultrasounds) that are aborted one after the other. So, finally one day, she steps out of her conservative home and gets on to a bus. The bus meets with an accident and Tara lands up in a hospital. There, half-conscious, she takes a strange decision about her life. This is all about Tara Goes Home.

Here's part of the e-mail that came this morning from Mirage Books editor:

"Hi Friends,
Announcing the winners of the contest -
[From the list below, you can check if your story has been selected, but do come back to read the following message.]
First of all, I'd like to thank all of you for participating in our contest. The response for it has been much better than what we had expected, initially. For us this has been quite an enriching experience and I hope you enjoyed participating as well.
These short-stories which we have selected will be published in our next book and each story will be followed by a short bio and a photograph of its author: That is the Prize.
The very reason why we announced this contest was to promote writers and story-writing. There are so many good writers who don't get the opportunity to get published: Well, today we feel that fifty talented writers will be added to the select group of – 'Published Authors'. Congratulations Winners!
For the ones whose stories don't feature in the list, I'd like to say: Most of the stories we received were good and it has been quite a tough task selecting the ones which we did.
Here is the list of the stories which have been selected:

SELECTED STORIES
01
Nandita Mundle
Ink And Lead
02
Anu Chopra
Arranged Marriage
03
Asma Siddiqui
Beyond Love
04
Ankita Aranke
Desert Faith
05
Ketan Joshi
Drilled
06
Padmaja Menon
From The Mouth Of Babes
07
Saurabh Turakhia
Call Of Nature
08
Vijaya Prakash
A Good Bargain
09
Susan Smith
Aware
10
Sunil Sharma
Butterflies Grandma And Me
11
Pooja Nair
Recipe For Disaster
12
Vandana Jena
Second Sight
13
Shantanu Dhankar
And I Burn
14
I D Atkinson
First Contact
15
Lilia Westmore
Escape To Hopeland
16
Gerardine Baugh
Father
17
M Annamalai
Million Steps
18
Anusarat Kothalanka
Nishgandha-A Dreamscape
19
Pratik Shah
Wavering Bounds
20
Rachana Shah
Gulabjamuns In Syrup
21
Cyril Sam
They Say I Am Crazy
22
B S Keshav
Fast Forward
23
Nathia
Mirage
24
Nabina Das
Tara Goes Home
25
Kenneth Cross
A Healthy Dose Of Insanity
26
Farahdeen Khan
Mona
27
Divya Mohan
The Silent Brook
28
Anita Baruwa
Just Rs 499
29
Sunil Tarini
Betrayal
30
Ribal Haj
Chased By The Wolves
31
Leo Mukherjee
The Fly Who Knew Too Much
32
Anubha Yadav
The Gift
33
Kamal Sharma
Ghost
34
Bharadwaj Vijaysarathy
Tom Dick And Harry
35
Chandru Bhojwani
The Love Letter
36
McKenzie Hightower
The Lost And The Forgotten
37
Sweta Vikram
Challenges Of Breaking Rules
38
Eva Bell
Perfect Execution
39
Kirin Gupta
Now
40
Ramprasad Adpaikar
The Baby
41
Sindhu Ramachandran
Happy Teacher's Day To Life
42
John Wolf
Earth Dogs
43
Vivek Shivram
A Conversation With The Damned
44
Salil Chaturvedi
Ta Rat Thing
45
Malavika Shridharan
The Shooting Star
46
G S Vasukumar
The Last Drop Of Tear
47
Joe Pfeffer
Supreme Reflections
48
Tia Rohit
Darkness Behind The Bush
49
Carmalin Sophia
Love Me Dear
50
Swapneel Khare
I Am Sorry

[This list is subject to the authors' furnishing the details and complying with the rules.]
The authors of these selected stories need to furnish some details, for which we will email them, individually, very shortly.

Warm Regards,
Huned Contractor
[Editor: Mirage Books]

Random thoughts... with Hillary out, will Palin iron shirts now?

Random thoughts are good. They don't stay long! On a propitious day such as Columbus Day (that plunderer...) I am thinking hmm, now that Sarah Palin is the Republican mascot, will anyone stand up in her meetings and holler: "Sarah iron my shirt"? How's that going to fare? As it is, some complaining noise was made about how either her opponents are harsh with her 'because she is a woman' (or a pit bull wearing lipstick) trying to compete with men or too soft on her because 'oh poor thing's woman' and should be back to womanly things only.

Somehow, opponents of Hillary have forgotten that there had been folks holding up signs or screaming "Hillary iron my shirt" (http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/01/07/hillary-hecklers-yell-iron-my-shirt-at-new-hampshire-campaign-stop/) at her campaign meetings. Now I'm randomly forced to think, will this happen in India when Mayawati or Sonia Gandhi or Renuka Chowdhury stand up speaking at their meetings. Will a Mulayam, Advani or any other supposed supporter of "male" privilege of being in politics do or say this sort of a thing, ever? NO.

Well, I don't mean to say anti-woman stances are not there among prevailing Indians, but not blatantly at least.

What is it that in a country like India, where gender biases run deep, where patriarchy can assume ugly forms, and where women are seen as means of reproduction, no one dare stoop so low regarding a woman in politics, government and policymaking. No sir, no one will say "Sonia make my rotis", "Maya clean my dishes" or "Renuka wash my undies"...! They might say, let's see, "Mayawati is a megalomaniac", "Sonia is manipulative" or "Renuka is unrealistic" -- things that politicians are supposed to say to each other.

So why, in America the land of freedom and other sundry stuff associated with that, will men stand up saying "Hillary iron my shirt"? Now don't try saying that to Palin, or you'll be branded a misogynist, for sure... Random thoughts.

BETRAYAL BEYOND BELIEF

This is taken from the SACW dispatch that I receive by e-mail:

-- by Badri Raina

Agreed you were Adi Indians,

Long before the Aryans came;

Agreed we made you Dalit

To set off the conqueror’s name.

Agreed you are illiterate,

Agreed you have no say;

Agreed you are untouchable,

Agreed you are kept at bay.

Agreed that our development

Makes you resentful, red;

Agreed, in fact, we prosper

Upon your sweat and blood.

Agreed we rape your women,

Agreed we stray, at worst;

Agreed you may not use our wells

To quench your low-born thirst.

Agreed our Constitution

Is ours and ours alone;

Agreed our hallowed temples

Will not let you in.

Agreed your land, your forest

We grab, we chop, we burn;

Agreed our banks, our markets

Will never serve your turn.

Even so, your villainous move

To leave the Hindu fold –

How could we ever forgive you

Betrayal so beastly, bold?

Go tell these priests who dupe you

That all plants, animals, men

Were created Sanaatan Hindus

The minute the world began.

Do you then prefer Christian ease
To family atrocity?
How traitorous, how ungodly

Can this world of vermin be!

The sarcasm is clean and ringing! For Badri Raina's writings, go to Badri's ZSpace Page >> at zmag.org.

On this note, it is astounding that the Indian Cabinet is divided on the demand for ban on VHP-Bajrang Dal-Sangh. More evidence is needed, is the refrain. Aghast as I am, I hope more evidence piles up from the rightwing outfit's past exploits. What's been going on in Orissa in the past few weeks, is only a glimpse into the dark deeds of the Sangh Parivar practised and honed through years (Gujarat is the golden age... Nanavati may not agree). Combined with it is the issues confronting the Dalit community and other under-privileged citizens of India and also the "intervention" by Maoist groups in rural areas of Orissa and Karnataka. India has a huge challenge here, only a rising GDP and a booming stock market does not guarantee smooth business while other matters remain highly discordant.

A lot has already been written about it ... but the "encounters" in Jamia Nagar in Delhi (pic below) after the recent bomb blasts have naturally put another community more blatantly under the scanner than ever -- the Muslims of India. Two young men and a police officer had died in the shootouts. It is said the bullet that killed the officer is not being found. Why? How do we then know who killed him -- terrorists or his own men or a stray or a ricocheted bullet? Do we remember in broad daylight in Delhi some years ago, police had gunned down two men on the suspicion of being dangerous antisocials? The whole case has been turned over and the dead men found not guilty! Forget that the police actually had planted "evidence" that these men were real targets and ultimately they were punished by the court. And wasn't there a report about the police faking tomato ketchup as blood to 'create' encounter scenes and have medals awarded to themselves? What encounters are these anyway?

I'm not trying to blame the police. The sodden force must be under Himalayan pressure. I just wonder what 'intelligence' leads to such incidents.

And oh, the name "Indian Mujahideen" is really popular now. Apparently they masterminded these blasts. So now there's an identity tag to it -- Indian -- as opposed to let's say Afghan Mujahideen or Pakistani Mujahideen!! Nationalism in terrorism at last, may I say?!

Other India Stories: Death penalty for Dalit murders

A court in the western Indian state of Maharashtra has sentenced six people to death for killing four members of a lower-caste Dalit family in 2006. Read more here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7633128.stm in this edition of Other India Stories.

Other India Stories: Revolutionizing (almost ruining) a Rural Indian (Brahmin) Wedding

We often keep having animated discussions on this aspect of Indian society -- caste, gender, religious bigotry and related hierarchy. We meaning Mo, Shashi, Anu and me for most times. Anu runs this group blog "Time and Us" (http://castory.wordpress.com/) where she has several others comment and write, and she also cross-posts blogs and articles of relevance that debate the topic. I happen to be one of the registered "commentators" of that blog but I usually have very little to write. But when we meet face to face, a slew of anecdotes and observations flow spontaneously. This is not because I have zero stories about the Dalit experience (I am not one and can't speak on behalf of others). But caste and gender divides are all pervasive in the Indian society much as you may try to deny it. So, I do have my own share of stories that pinpoint the experience of being a "non-Brahmin", often an effective blanket term dumped on an individual in several parts of India when it comes to maintaining the power structure, exercising status quo, according social acceptance, the degree of acceptance and ritualistic adherence (if one is a practising Hindu).

This is a story I shared recently with my friends about attending a rural wedding in a Brahmin family of Uttar Pradesh, in a village called Jagdishpur. I'll call this series -- for I hope to have some more -- Other India Stories.

We were invited by our Delhi neighbor, of last name Pandey, to their oldest son's wedding. The fellow -- I'll call him UP here, how significant! -- was Mo's childhood friend and the family treated Mo like their own son, although they were Brahmins and Mo's family Khatris (I have no clue what that caste is, perhaps something to do with being a martial clan, so don't ask me to explain ... these labels come up only during socio-religious events like marriages, festivals and idle chatter by folks who have nothing better to do). Anyway, so in that respect I was considered their "bahu" or daughter-in-law.

The journey from Delhi via Lucknow to Jagdishpur itself can constitute an interesting tale. But I'll try not to digress. That we were traveling to a place totally back of beyond, was evident hour by hour. When we reached, Jagdishpur stood like a canvas of green farm fields flanked by lofty brick-and-mortar houses with erratic electricity lighting up the quaint rural scenes later at night. I was told, the farm laborers lived quite a distance away, not in the vicinity of the rich Brahmin landowner. So I didn't see any other villager there.

Soon on reaching, I became a cat among the pigeons. Without even suspecting what commotion my statements would generate, I asked to join the baraat (groom's party that goes to the bride's house to marry the boy) the next evening.

"But women never accompany men in the baraat. Never," was the terse comment that followed from the senior-most Pandey (he never appeared to talk directly, so this sort of wafted from his chamber where mostly men were assembled).

Oh, I should have realized. Women and men never ate together in these households, women never walked side by side with their men (they followed them mutely), women never sat down to tea with the men to discuss sorrow, happiness and life in general. So now that I said it, what'll happen? Precisely that's the question the Pandey women asked themselves, a little scandalized by my audacity but also hopeful that they can finally, in the 21st century, attend a wedding in the girl's house by joining the traditional baraat. One of them, UP's cousin's wife, told me privately how this was absolutely the need of the hour, breaking down this silly rule. You bet!

From indirect sources again, Mo was requested to pump some good sense into my impatient foolhardy head. But only 'requested'. He was like a son to them, he couldn't be ordered as they would have ordered a peasant. So he did not prevail over me.

I was further blacklisted, a woman who did not heed her 'lord's' words. I'm told the Pandey household, the menfolk actually, got huddled into a conference. The older women were sort of terrified, but they smiled at me, those aunts and grandmas, trying to look normal.

Meanwhile, eager to savor fresh country air, I even went to the "khet" (farmland) with UP, his brother, a young girl of seven (not yet in the 'woman' category) and Mo. Going to the khet has a terrible connotation in rural India. Later on that.

Finally the verdict came.

Yes!! We'll all go as baraatis to the bride's house. They could not turn down the request of a 'daughter-in-law'. Suddenly all the younger women in the house looked bright like sunflowers. They busied themselves in choosing the right saris, ornaments and the mehendi to be done in time. I guess I managed to break a huge taboo, but back then, I was only interested in enjoying things as one should.

Now the second part.

While the men baraatis went in a van -- smoking, a few drinking and waving to the crowd when they reached the bride's house, our van was a silent one, with very dark tainted windows all rolled up. We could see people (mostly the poor, forsaken, low-caste villagers) standing by the roadside and gesturing and blessing, but we were advised not to open the windows or respond in any manner. This was a 'law-and-order' requirement, we were told. So be it. But we were there.

I'm told the bride's family too was faced with a major quandary about how to welcome a van full of errant women (one of them a city woman, the word got around), how to sneak them inside the wedding venue without the lowly subjects spotting us, and in general how to deal with any social stigma if one might arise out of this.

I'm so glad I was blissfully unaware of all goings-on.

Only that cousin's wife whispered to me later (seeing me half-sleepy through the elaborate wedding ceremony): "You asked to come here and revolutionized the family wedding! No one can stop us after this. Don't sleep now for God's sake!"

I ... revolutionized ... a wedding? I thought I almost ruined their family event. Seeing her and others happy made me feel good. But does it take an 'outsider' always to break rigid norms? Why can't they themselves do it?

"We are daughters, daughter-in-laws and women in a high-caste household. Our society will never allow us to change things," one said.

The only man, other than Mo (UP and his father maintained a diplomatic profile) who quietly praised the adventure was UP's sister's husband, a soft-spoken man who conducted things slightly differently than his enlightened counterparts. The others, especially the senior-most Pandey of Jagdishpur, never spoke to me directly, even after the episode. When we were taking their leave, I thought of acting traditional and doing a pranam to him, to which he said rather nicely, "Daughters don't touch feet. Be happy."

I said goodbye in English then. From daughter-in-law to daughter, I did make some progress!

Will be back later with more Other India anecdotes!

The Trouble With Azaadi

I would like all visitors to take a look at this post I came across recently:
http://qalandari.blogspot.com/2008/09/trouble-with-azaadi.html

Qalandar makes a point that's usually not given much space for discussion in the subcontinental forums, especially when passions run really high and national movements are deigned to be the only path for subverting existing nation-state strangleholds.

I'll return with my observations later.

Vogue-India: Not à la Mode

When Queen Marie Antoinette supposedly had said, "if they don't have bread, let them eat cake," about the starving French commoners during that infamous and controversial monarchical reign, she had underestimated the power of people and also, did not think much if her 'creative' quip would backfire that horribly, costing her own life. Legend may have spun this tale into something we all want to believe.

Priya Tanna is no Marie Antoinette and although being in charge of 'creative' aspects of Vogue India is something she is serious about, she is not serious about India's poverty and the way the fashion industry shape the middle class psyche, not legend but reality. She won't be guillotined for sure, but a lot of folks would want that little head of hers to think a little more humanistically.

Fascinating really is while the Indian media, of course those channels and papers that pride themselves as "mainstream", is busy producing oodles of newsprint and tape about the Indo-US Nuclear deal deliberations in Vienna, a handful of journalists are talking about a recent photo series by the fashion magazine Vogue-India. There's even a Facebook protest group.

Since the mainstream media is still dithering, let me cut to the backstory, a report in the New York Times:(http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/01/business/worldbusiness/01vogue.html)

According to Heather Timmons, the writer, for many in India there are reasons to feel squeamish about the photos as the editorial spread seemed “not just tacky but downright distasteful” according to Kanika Gahlaut, a columnist for the daily newspaper Mail Today. She denounced it as an “example of vulgarity.” There’s nothing “fun or funny” about putting a poor person in a mud hut in clothing designed by Alexander McQueen, according to Gahlaut who spoke in a telephone interview. “There are farmer suicides here, for God’s sake” she said, referring to thousands of Indian farmers who have killed themselves in the last decade because of debt."

Priya Tanna, the editor of the fashion magazine in question, tried dismissing the notes of disapproval. “You have to remember with fashion, you can’t take it that seriously,” Ms. Tanna said. “We weren’t trying to make a political statement or save the world.”

Precisely, that's the problem. Ms. Tanna ignored the fact that in a country like India, statements, reports, photos, features, songs -- everything has a political bearing. Every crumb of bread is politically earned by a huge majority. Every slice of cake produced (I presume Ms. Tanna likes her cake) by impoverished underpaid workers translates into social and political ballot. So, to depict a poor villager who perhaps earns less than $2 a day holding a Burberry umbrella or a toothless and clearly poverty-stricken old woman cuddle an infant wearing a designer French bib is nothing but political immaturity and an unpardonable frivolous act.

Do I then say that fashion cannot and shouldn't depict the poor and the underprivileged? Why not. I love fashion, I have my own version of it and I think the established fashion houses only need employ their resources a little better to "democratize" fashion in India.

Let's back up from the pseudo-arty pretension of Vogue/Ms. Tanna and see how else fashion events can make a difference. All of us here know about the UN's recent bid to promote awareness about sanitation and the NYC event where Indian sanitation workers (mostly Dalits) walked with top models (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7489296.stm). Naturally, the intention of that fashion event was to make the society open up its sluggish eyes (Cosmopolitan or Bloody Mary-induced) and look at folks who have barely earned any respect for a service they have been providing to a society divided so comfortably hierarchically...

Lip service? I'd rather have folks do that than turning away from realities as if they never existed. If Vogue had an iota of concern for the people they recruited (were they paid in French bibs and Burberry umbrellas?) -- perhaps a poor farmer like thousands we hear committing suicide, an old homeless woman, her ilk neglected and discarded, a baby representing millions that don't have basic care, a young girl who symbolizes gender imbalance and female foeticide -- I'd have probably looked at their campaign with sympathy in a country where it's cruel to call this photo series anything like 'art'.

Having said that, it's a pity that quite a few people still love a war, a drought, a hungry sad face... Be it fashion or news reportage or community outreach, so many book covers/magazine covers/annual reports (of NGOs too) etc. are full of sordid images meant to sell. If you ask me, one of my favorites is that famous photo of the Afghan girl (Sharbat Gula) looking with her stunned bewildered green eyes clicked by Steve McCurry. But then, here the photographer's mission statement was clear -- exposing the brutality and uselessness of war.

What is Vogue's mission in their caricature of a campaign? Just "lighten up" as Ms. Tanna said? She should probably suggest international Vogue editions to do high-fashion photo-shoots with East European war refugees, Katrina victims, rundown Chicago neighborhoods, jobless US auto workers etc., and see the reaction. Not only lighten up, she'll sober up too. If there has to be a fashion agenda making these folks the cynosure of all eyes, there better be a good reason beyond just selling magazines.

Why boycott Vogue India? They say the circulation figure is 50,000 although I doubt about the magazine's real following. Just march to Priya Tanna's office, bombard her with e-mails and phones, post blogs and messages, so she takes both fashion and poverty seriously hereafter. As a journalist I have seen worse, as an activist I don't want to see more.

My journalist friend Subir has blogged on this issue and as he mobilizes more opinions, I shall draft all that here.

POLITICS AND COMEDY -- three old articles retrieved

POLITICS
EKAL SCHOOLS: LESSONS WITH A SAFFRON HUE

NRI-funded schools imparting 'traditional value education' are sprouting up all
over tribal India

New Delhi, January 29, 2001

Ram mandir and Hindu Rashtra may be the immediate catchwords for the Sangh Parivar for the forthcoming Assembly elections, but this is not the lone agenda for which the saffron brigade seems to be working. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is not just wooing the mainstream, but is also making inroads into the tribal belts of India. The killing of missionary Graham Staines in Orissa in a most horrific manner as a statement of tribal resistance to western influence may have been a singular incident. The approach taken by the Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation of India (EVFI), an organisation with obvious Sangh sympathies, of changing the tribal
mindset is a more sustained process.

At a glance, some prominent trustees on the board of the EVFI are B K Modi, founder chairperson ModiCorp; Justice P N Bhagawat, former chief justice, Supreme Court; Dr L M Singhvi, MP and former ambassador to UK; Dr Abid Hussain, former ambassador to US and member of the Constitution Review Committee; Sadhvi Bhagwati, international director (youth education), Parmarth Niketan, Rishikesh; several NRIs, and a whole host of top brass of the ModiCorp and Modi Foundation.

The EVFI is supposedly a non-government, non-profit organization, and is registered as a trust. The main objective of the foundation is to help in the "overall development of remote tribal villages".

Interestingly, the EVFI also has a branch in the US. The Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation of USA, along with home-bred organisations, are committed to create a "people's movement involving thousands of selfless dedicated Indians, NRIs and other people of Indian origin, in order to wean children of remote tribal areas of India away from illiteracy, and consequently superstition, exploitation, ill-health, poverty and crime," said sources.

The EVFI offers five years of free schooling for children, especially in the tribal belts of India. A typical class has around 30-40 children in the age group of four-15 years, and is often conducted in rural environs. All study materials are provided free of cost.
Although the EVFI website has a large portrait of poet and writer Rabindranath Tagore, obviously referring to his "nature is our teacher" philosophy, there is not any pertinent information on the syllabus taught. The EVFI apparently imparts "basic
alphabetic and numeric knowledge, health and hygiene, character-building and moral
values" and "sanskaars", whatever that may mean.

As teachers, the EVFI appoints locally educated youths (generally those who have only studied till high school) who are "specially trained" to become key figures and catalysts of change and "character building" for the entire village or area. Besides, the schools are also supposed to conduct health camps, cleanliness drives and
environment awareness programmes among rural tribals.

Classes are more like informal teaching sessions comprising katha (story-telling sessions), natak (dramas), lok-geet (folk songs), and pravachan (religious discourses).

State-wise distribution of EVFI schools

State August 2001 March 2002 (Est) August 2002 (Est)
North East 660 690 960
West Bengal 325 325 540
Orissa 510 510 600
Bihar 270 450 450
Jharkhand 720 970 1060
Uttar Pradesh 420 715 1150
North Zone 120 450 600
Rajasthan 240 480 780
Gujarat 300 390 570
Maharashtra 450 630 930
Madhya Pradesh 1140 2370 2880
Chhatisgarh 660 1260 1530
Andhra Pradesh 540 1000 1080
Karnataka 60 240 360
Tamil Nadu 180 240 270
Kerala 90 180 240
Total 6685 11100 14000

The US wing of the group estimates that it only costs $365 to run an Ekal Vidyalaya for a whole year.

Non government organisations (NGO) that have been identified to help set up more EVFIs are the Birsa Seva Prakalpa in Bihar, Bharatiya Jan Seva Sansthan in Rajasthan and Swami Vivekananda Cultural Society in Tamil Nadu.

Some 3,000 schools are being run by NGOs like the Friends of Tribal Society, Bhartiya Kalyan Pratishthan, Bhartiya Lok Shiksha Parishad, Bhartiya Jan Sewa Sansthan and Janhitay in the states of Rajasthan, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Assam and West Bengal.

At present, the EVFI enjoys the status of a charitable trust. Donations to EVFI are 50 per cent tax exempt. It has even received Foreign Contributions (Regulation) Act (FCRA) permission to receive donations in foreign exchange on actual receipt basis.
Funds from the US are obviously a big asset for the group. In fact, the mission of
the ECFI and the Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation of USA is to set up 100,000 Ekal Vidya Mandirs in the remote tribal villages by the year 2010. Imparting sanskar and moral values should then be easier for the saffron brigade, once its movement gains ground.
http://india.indymedia.org/en/2002/02/656.shtml


COMEDY
MARRIAGES ARE MADE IN HEAVEN? (http://www.jaalmag.com/archives/01051999/slangmatch.htm)

Sumit thought an arranged marriage would buy him the heavens. Steaming cup of tea in the morning, hot chapatis off the tawa, hot meals in a lunchbox, clothes washed and laundered, house cleaned and … all that. Besides, of course, the proverbial amount of gold and cash that an arranged marriage is supposed to supply to a man's coffers. But lo and behold, what he got could described by some as a rough deal in the hands of- no, not nature or God - but his wifey dear.
Barring tea and an occasional toast thrown alongside the cup containing an insipid brown beverage, Manisha had no skill or patience for any culinary capers. She declared within a first few days of their familiarisation programme that she would rather spend her time eating out, watching TV, wear expensive clothes and shop in abundance. Housework is to be done only those who are "backward-minded", "unsmart" or "uneducated". After all, Sumit had settled for a convent-educated wife who spoke English and wore Western clothes, had he not? She had also brought in enough cash and kind to keep the family financially solvent for several years to come. For Sumit, arranged marriage had been robbed of all its relevance. Grapes that had gone sour.


Well, all stories are not told in the same manner. Pranjal and Sweta had a love marriage, but Sweta ends up doing all household chores simply because, they stay with Pranjal's parents. "I really don't think there is any difference I have made to my life by opting for a marriage of my choice," she said with bitterness, "I am cooking, washing, cleaning even if I have to put in as much energy and time at my workplace. How am I leading a different life anyway?" Pranjal seems to be caught between the Devil and the deep sea, wishing to mitigate his wife's sorrows and at the same time, not eager to leave his parents' house.
Daily chores apart, does this notion of arranged and love marriage make any difference to the quality of relationship shared by the husband and the wife? A good number of traditionally married couples stress that nothing is amiss in the relationship. They court each other after marriage, in fact without any fear of shame or embarrassment, which is very often looming large on courting couples before their marriage. The newly married pair is often sent off by the family for a royal honeymoon. They don't get caught sneaking inside a park or don't have to walk the roads in search of a place to sit and utter sweet nothings.
Sangeeta and Ashim were packed off by Sangeeta's parents to (hold your breath) Mauritius where they wear they had a swell time. A tension-free co-existence where no one's even heard of being chased by the local policewallah from park to park, being glared at by one's neighbour in the cinema hall for having held hands, or even those pangs of break ups that are constant miseries of couples supposedly in love. "We wrote each other real passionate love letters, bummed around like teenagers, holidayed like never before and did all kind of things for which I had no time. And my wife and I are happy that my family is around with us to look after our needs when we need help. It could have been bad otherwise," proclaimed Shishir, a busy Infotech executive.
Reena, married after two years of courtship, feels that somehow the fun and naughty element of the relationship has subsided. They do not go out as often, rarely eat out, sleep off as soon as they hit the bed, even do not have time to chat much after an arduous day at work. "May be in an arranged marriage I would have had the chance to explore the conjugal relationship and make it livelier than it is now," she rues.
"Arranged marriage vs love marriage is no longer the issue," said a couple. It is lifestyle and the way you choose to lead it, that matters, they maintain. It is like choosing a package, a gift you give yourself. "One either chooses the glitter or the drudgery, and consciously, for there is always the option of rejecting a structure given the fact that both men and women today are aware of their demands," philosophises Andy. Well, he is a bachelor who at the moment is courting nature with his camera. We shall soon see.


POLITICS
Talks useless until Indian troops are withdrawn: Lashkar mentor

On the eve of the forthcoming Indo-Pakistan summit in Agra, Lashkar-e-Toiba big daddy Prof Hafiz Muhammad Saeed has, in a scathing albeit sarcasm-laden editorial in the outfit's Website, criticised the Indian leadership and exhorted the Pakistani President to represent Muslims of the subcontinent, says Nabina Das (www.tehelka.com, July 11, 2001)
On the eve of Agra Summit between India and Pakistan, the Lashkar-e Toiba ('literally the Army of the Pure), one of the dreaded separatist outfits involved in jehad (freedom struggle) for an independent Kashmir, has exhorted Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf to look at the reality of Kashmir and the struggle of the Kashmiris for the past 12 years. The group has also lashed out at India for not attempting to withdraw its troops from Kashmir which it says would mar the atmosphere of the talks. The Lashkar big daddy Prof Hafiz Muhammad Saeed has in fact, come out with a scathing albeit sarcasm-laden editorial in the outfit's Website Markaz Ad Da'wah Wal Irshad (www.markazdawa.org) criticising and advising the forthcoming Indo-Pakistan summit.
The Lashkar-e-Toiba believes that jehad is the be-all and end-all of a true Muslim's life and quotes a Hadith in Sahih Muslim, where Prophet Mohammad, while illustrating the attribute of true believers, said, "This religion will outlive forever and for the sake of it, a class out of Muslims will continue Jihad until the dawn of the Doomsday." This, in a nutshell, is the philosophy of this dreaded separatist group which is well known for their fidayeen (suicide) missions against the Indian state in Kashmir.
The group, in it website, clearly spelling out its strategy and denouncing the Indian state in the strongest of terms, vows that the Lashkar Mujahideen (freedom fighters) will do everything to fail the activities of the Indian army on the eve of the forthcoming talks between Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf.
In the Editorial titled "The Trap of US-sponsored talks has once again been set to cover up atrocities of Indian army in Kashmir", Prof Saeed, mentor of the extremist group that mostly draws its cadre from non-Kashmiris - Afghans, Pakhtoons and Central Asians - says, "We want General Pervez Musharraf to realise that the country is today at a very crucial juncture. One of the ways leads to freedom, not only of Kashmir but also of the entire Pakistan. If he understands the anatomy of Kashmir Jihad then he must also be aware of the fact that this is the only highway leading to freedom. Jihad will liberate us from all fetters of slavery. At the moment Pakistan is not a free country. There is so much pressure on it from all sides."
Under the section Voice of Islam, the smooth-talking Prof Saeed spins a tale of Kashmiri suffering vis-à-vis Indian oppression with an aim to strike at the jehadi mentality. He tells a story about parents and relatives, including a large number of women, of martyred jehadis who had recently gathered in Lahore. All of them were all concerned over the recent developments with respect to Kashmir problem and were keen to know the outcome of the upcoming talks. Several wondered whether they should write to President Musharraf to inform him of their feelings and misgivings, writes Prof Saeed.
Very dramatically, Prof Hafiz Saeed writes, "The young men (jehadis) have gone to Kashmir after hearing the tales of Indian atrocities. They heard that Muslim sisters are being dishonoured. And they sacrificed their lives to live up to their relationship with their sisters and brothers in Islam. And even their bodies did not return to Pakistan, their mothers could not get their last glimpse. They just got the news of their martyrdom and said 'alhamdulillah' and shed no tears. I have seen the mothers of martyrs bear their sons' martyrdom with fortitude. The number of martyrs both in Pakistan and Kashmir is in thousands. They are all tied together in the bond of Islam." (Talks useless until Indian troops are withdrawn: Lashkar mentor www.tehelka.com, July 11, 2001)

Food, Health, Climate: Can We Set Our Karma Right?

Last year, when India stood tall in the global hall of fame for R K Pachauri being named a co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize along with former US Vice President Al Gore, speaking to news agencies on the eve of receiving this prestigious award, Pachauri emphasized that reliance on technology alone wasn’t sufficient to keep the world cleaner. He was, of course, referring to the ways countries could cut CO2 emissions, following the example set by Norway. Simply put, industrial technology will have to yield more space to a sustainable approach that would propel real development for countries. Pachauri must have used the word ‘alone’ knowing very well for India, a country that looks at technology as a quick-fix solution to almost every ailment, a broader and more balanced strategy needs to be adopted. In the spirit of his mission he said, “We all have to adjust our way of life to minimise the looming threat.” Translates as, we need to re-evaluate methods and arrest the silent turmoil that is ongoing regarding our environment, health and lifestyle.
But think of it, does it need a Pachauri to tell us things are a bit off-track? The US doesn’t need a Gore to tell them what’s been going on with their environment, their food, and consequently, their health (Code red on that last one – obesity is the new enemy)? Or maybe it does. While unluckily for me, six year’s of stay in the United States has been fraught with the constant struggle to avoid cheap, abundant and bad food, industrially mass produced, luckily, 2006-07 has been a transition to local and organic food, to understanding my role in contributing to a cleaner environment, basically to understanding how the ‘karmic’ cycle of bad environment, bad eating and bad health works.
Let me backtrack to illustrate the last point.

Fat chance for health!
Within a week of the Pachauri-Gore sound bytes still dominating our media, I spotted a BBC story about dead fish surfacing in the river Brahmaputra in Guwahati, the capital of Assam, apparently because over-zealous fishermen had been using pesticides in the water to kill more fish for larger profit. Thousands of dead fish reportedly had been washed ashore. The number of sick fish matched those killed. There’s an alleged controversy that perhaps the fishermen really did not kill the fish, but that the fish died owing to the rise of pollution level in the river. The Guwahati refinery, as everyone who has lived in Guwahati (as has this writer) or follows health and environment news knows, has been a defaulting polluter according to Assam Pollution Control Board (APCB) officials. But whether the refinery is the culprit or it’s the greedy fishermen, the bottom line is, there was a serious breach.
Fish happens to get contaminated very easily and once eaten, passes the contamination to our body. There is a global debate raging about PCB and mercury levels in the fish we eat. For those who do not eat fish, things are not rosy either. Pollution levels in rivers and seas only pollute further our environment, even so seriously, affecting vegetables and crops. In fact, the worsening climate change owing to pollution – industrial and otherwise – have been linked to obesity and other more serious diseases (as if obesity isn’t enough disease causing and organ destabilising). With climate change, diseases of weird nomenclature have been popping up now and then in India and abroad. Remember the recent occurrence of chikungunya in Italy, a disease supposedly of warmer tropical climates? Apparently immigrants didn’t bring it!
So, did I say obesity was somewhere linked to all this? Quite likely.
I’m reminded of a time when as a nonprofit group’s media officer I was on a field tour to Hyderabad promoting grassroots journalism in the mainstream media. A prominent newspaper editor told us a story about his visit to China. He, also a prominent Left supporter, said that all around him in Beijing and other big cities, he noticed that half the number of children seemed not just fat or plump, but patently obese. He also noticed the Chinese kids ate fast food and their parents took them to shopping malls. This was eight or more years ago. I don’t believe things have changed much the other way round.
Fast-forwarding from China to the India of today, it seems things are surely caught in a vicious cycle between a polluted environment, bad food and obesity. Visiting Kolkata in 2006, I was amazed to see how not fat, but obese kids and teenagers dotted the malls, Big Bazaars and other shopping center landscapes. This was India’s middle class – the news spenders who are also new vigorous polluters. A vendor roasting corns on charcoal outside my apartment complex bitterly complained: “The babus now order pizzas … and of course their favourite restaurant is Mekdoonal (McDonalds)!”
Traditional Indian food – the gourmet variety – has always been high in calories, but there is still the option to eat healthy. Typically, now most urban middle class Indians are consuming foods like French fries, soft drinks, cookies, burgers, deep-fried meats and other highly processed fatty, sugary and salty items.
Fat chance for health then!

A turbulent Rubicon
It may seem gibberish to say that global temperature is expected to increase by 5 degree Celsius in the 21st century (according to The Human Development Report 2007-08) thereby endangering all life. Still wish Union Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss took a cue from the HDR while planning to launch a pilot project for ‘Prevention and Control of Cardiovascular diseases, Diabetes and Stroke', reportedly budgeted at Rs. 5 crore for a year (The Hindustan Times, Jan. 3) in six districts, before it is extended to the whole nation. The six districts are Kamrup in Assam, Jalandhar in Punjab, Bhilwara in Rajasthan, Shimoga in Karnataka, Kanchipuram in Tamil Nadu and Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. While Ramadoss’ vision that these districts will offer a national footprint maybe correct, such a project must factor into it the overall environmental pollution, the food chain, popular lifestyle, sustainable and eco-friendly farming and trading practices, etc. Only then can the national footprint be deemed holistic. Although seemingly a drop in the ocean, these types of efforts would no doubt contribute to improving the lot of the worst sufferers, about 40 per cent of the world’s poor people, which is 2.6 billion. Go ahead and calculate the number of India’s poor.
As for the moneyed Indian middle class with their increasing girth (I read somewhere that 55 percent of Delhi women are overweight and 76 percent have abdominal obesity), alarm bells are already ringing. This sordid statistics brought to my notice a recent effort launched on a war footing by the British government (BBC, Jan. 23) – a £372 million strategy aimed at cutting levels of obesity in England. Reportedly, several "healthy towns" would be created at a cost of £30 million with comprehensive cycle routes and pedestrian areas. The thrust of the effort is mainly on children with obesity. So, everywhere it seems, there’s now a growing concern for healthy living. Has to go hand in hand with promoting a clean environment.
On this cue, because I live in North America, I had to dig out the fact that ‘the average American meal travels 1,500 miles from field to fork, consuming untold gallons of chemical fertilizer, pesticides and fossil fuels along the way (New York Times, Dec. 14, 2007)’. Now do we see the connection between healthy living and eating and a clean and sustainable environment?
The Pachauri-Gore tips probably only point to the tip of a dangerous iceberg that’s melting fast. There are hundreds of activists and scientists working in various areas of the composite environment-health-food/lifestyle problem. Maybe our ministers and policymakers would like to know a few of the strategies they suggest in order to cross the turbulent Rubicon.

The food karma
Some advocates of healthy eating, a clean environment and fair trade practices propose the “100-mile diet” plan. This of course won’t ensure 100 per cent overnight improvement in our lifestyle, but will certainly instill a sense in us that we have more control over what we feed our body. For example, whenever I buy from my local farmers market, I ask about their farming methods, if they use pesticides, if the poultry is free-range, etc. I’m not fanatic about staying cocooned within the 100 miles. So coffee, tea, wine, rice, wheat, spices and a few others are definitely ‘outsourced’. But it feels good to eat local, organic and seasonal vegetables and fruits, as also locally raised free-range poultry or meat. Because even organic carrots shipped from California would mean a huge amount of fuel being burned, I’d soon shift to locally grown organic beets.
Certainly, it’s tough being a ‘locavore’, like learning to swim or drive as an adult! But it’s worth it. The other benefit is that you get to know more local people when you buy and eat local. Fosters good camaraderie. Something my aged parents still hold precious without knowing the jargon around it. When Jeevan the local grocer gets them items produced locally, Suleiman the local fisherman sells them fresh fish brought from his village, Bimala the local vendor lady gets them seasonal fruits, vegetables or herbs from her kitchen garden, they rely on each other economically and form a humanistic web. This is notwithstanding the proliferation of supermarkets and malls in the city that are systematically taking away jobs from small farmers and local growers and compromising with our overall health.
So high time we earned a bit of good karma! Buy local, buy seasonal, and buy organic at least for the famed “dirty dozens” – apples, cherries, grapes, nectarines, peaches, pears, raspberries, strawberries, bell peppers (Shimla mirch), celery, potatoes and spinach. Milk, red meat and poultry are the other preferred organic buys.
Often however, the complaint is, although locally grown produces are not usually expensive, certified organic fruits and vegetables sometimes cost fifty percent more than their regular counterparts. So does it mean by becoming willing to contribute to a green environment, we turn into paupers? Not really. Eating local and seasonal can be a great way avoiding paying too much. Exotic or non-seasonal produces can cost us a packet, as these would invariably travel long miles before reaching us. Going to a mandi or a weekly haat can open up the doors to fresh, local and sometimes organically grown food. Paradoxically, while trying to save up money by not buying organic, a large number of population in the US or the UK have recently been incurring high medical costs on account of obesity and other ailments.
One might ask, where’s the organic certification in India? That’s something advocates are working on. For thousands of organic farmers in India and elsewhere, organic certification currently is a political hot potato, hopefully to be resolved soon. So far, most certification guidelines have been coming from the affluent West, and what wonder! It is American and European companies that have jumped into the fray smelling good money in the organics business. The latter insist that farmers everywhere follow a prescribed database of seeds and buy only from them, which is being opposed by farmers of the global South.
We have good news. In India, various state governments now have incentives for farmers to go organic. At the ‘India Organic 2007’, a trade fair and seminar, there were business enquiries worth Rs. 150 crore, “a growth of 80 per cent over 2006”, according to Manoj K. Menon, executive director, International Competence Centre for Organic Agriculture (ICCOA). This, after reports that most of India's farms – 65 percent of the country's cropped area – are "organic by default”, according to a study by Rabo India, a subsidiary of Rabobank International. This means that small farmers, located mostly in the eastern and northeastern India, have no choice except to farm without chemical fertilizers or pesticides. On the other hand, it is also true that many of them choose to farm organically, as has been the tradition for thousands of years.
To go back to Pachauri’s warning about heavy reliance on industrial technology, several of our farmers have seen firsthand the effects of chemical farming – erosion of soil and soil nutrients, low-nutrition food, and human diseases resulting from chemical seepage in the water table as well as from emissions in the air. We as consumers can alone help prevent this. So the food-health-climate karma watch is ticking away, right as we read this. The best reason for investing in it will be a healthy planet, awarded to us in this life itself.

Walk like a Mexican!

So there was I, flying to the West Coast last year, my first visit that side of this vast landmass we call America. ‘We’ meaning, Americans who travel very little, and the likes of me, not-American, living in the US for some time. A six-year long East Coaster, I was aware of the difference in the weather, culture and sundry other things made accessible knowledge by news, the Internet and the like. I was headed to San Jose to visit my sister-in-law. Mo and I were in the three-seater row with a middle-aged lady by the window side. Now middle age is a tricky word in the American context. She was easily in her fifties but she may not have liked me calling her middle aged if such issues were raised.

It was I think a five-hour long flight with a connection to catch at Minneapolis, Minnesota. I settled down in my seat, the middle seat, feeling good about my California vacation.

The lady on my left smiled. Amiable. She muttered a little when the aircraft took off. Perhaps she was nervous. Then she said to me: “Always this part is the hardest.”
“Yeah.” I nodded.
“How else would I travel back home? It’s too far to drive from North Carolina.”

Yes it is a long drive. In a car-loving, long-driving country, NC to MO would be too much indeed. Although people do things like that. A friend of ours recently had driven from New Mexico to Illinois. Take that!

“I was at my daughter’s,” my co-passenger said.
“Must have been nice.” Polite conversation should never be avoided.
“Yes, so different from Minneapolis. Warm, green!”
“Is it not so in Minneapolis right now?”
“Um, it’s a bit soggy, you know,” she said uncertainly. “So where are you going?”
“San Jose,” I said brightly. “My first West Coast visit.”
“Must be tough to stay away,” she said, a little ambiguous. “From New York City?”
“No, no. We are from Ithaca, not too far from New York actually.”
She nodded although it didn’t appear that she knew about Ithaca.
“Working or studying?”
“Both. We live in the Cornell University campus.” I went on to explain about our Ivy League shelter without lacing my talk with any arrogance.
“That’s a good college, I’ve heard about it.”
Who hasn’t?
“Your English is very good.”
I knew it wasn’t bad. But to be reminded was nice. Thank you.
“Do you feel at home?” It was so kind of her to ask that.
“We try to be cheerful. You know, miss the food at times, or festivals.”
“But to go back to Mexico must be exciting! Maybe I should take a trip there.”

No, what? She said Mexico. I heard her right. She thought I was Mexican.

“Er, I’m going to San Jose. That’s California.”
She shook her head. Gave a benevolent smile. I doubt if she realized I was trying to correct her.
“You must visit Minneapolis some day.” The plane was landing and she pointed out the sprawling flat city skewing on the horizon. “It has a twin city. And there are nice spots to vacation close to these cities. Lakes, camping grounds.”
I certainly will note that down. I love lakes although I haven’t camped much.

We ran along the terminal. She said her sister would be there to pick her up. My connecting flight to San Jose was waiting to leave soon.

“Bye then, enjoy your stay in Mexico!”
“Thank you. Bye! Enjoy back in Minneapolis. By the way – ” I wanted to tell her again I was headed to California and that I was Indian. Oh well.

Bajji Tales

Just mention the word bajji to me or ask me to eat it, an army of thoughts marches over my mind. Not because these fried and stuffed Anaheim peppers are not meant for the weak-stomached. The name, just the name rakes up disturbing scenes. From that ensuing commotion, two faces appear before me – one a dark round one, slightly bearded and grave; the other with a pair of eyes trying to peer down your heart and with the expression of an actor or a clown, twisted with laughter or disdain. Punnam and Anji Babu. Two very different but scintillating individuals I made acquaintance of once upon a time in a city called Hyderabad. In a southern state of India. As the train pulled in to the station Hyderabad rose in front of me like a stark stony plateau. And so did Punnam. Actually what I thought to be the city was probably a fort in the distance or a temple. To me all that never seemed clear enough. Forts, temples, Osmania University, Birla Mandir. Something was always visible above the city on the canopy of the sky apart from the regular sun, clouds of dust or shrill birds with no names. At first glance, Punnam seemed to stand out among all this. Tall, burly, rather stony faced in the beginning, and imposing like a deep dark cloud cover.
Punnam I did not know at all earlier but was given his reference by an acquaintance from my university.
“Hyderabad is better than Delhi but they might think you are a northerner.”
“I can explain … ”
“No, no, my cousin will be there to help. Don’t hesitate.”
Being a northerner would create small problems. Small but irritating ones. I understood that. I wasn’t a northerner or a north Indian. And I was aware of the currents of the all-consuming southern political movement in 20th century India. But it never occurred to me to be careful on that account. Obviously after I encountered Punnam – meaning full moon – I was assured I wouldn’t have to worry at all. An engineer by education and thirty, he was looking for a job recently and didn’t mind helping a student from Delhi to find her footing in Hyderabad for two weeks.
“Did you have dinner on the train? We could get some dosas,” was his first full sentence after mute greetings as I descended on the platform and smiled at him, he looking at me with a stony demeanor. He held a biggish placard with my name in capital letters.
“Dosas would be great,” I said, eager to show I was not a northerner, then pointed to the placard: “I can see you got that!”
“Didn’t need it. You look like what my cousin described.” I dared not ask what his cousin might have pictured me for him. “Besides, most people in this train are local folks – you can easily tell,” his round dark face lightened up in a smile at last. I smiled again too.
Traveling light is useful I found out, especially when I had to ride on the back of Punnam’s motorbike and we decided to eat before Punnam took me to my destination.
Most restaurants were closed naturally at past nine then, so we made a stop at a curbside stall in a well-lighted place near the railway station. The vendor had two hot tawas going as he stirred the dosa mix and sprinkled drops of water on the iron implements, wiping his sweaty forehead with a cotton towel tucked under his hips. He spoke in Telegu, which evidently I did not understand and respond to. Punnam realized his role and quickly rattled off, perhaps without giving away that I was from the north (although not a northerner). The dosas were the best ones I have had in my entire life. This entire life anyway consisted of no sojourn into the southern parts of India.
“Osmania University? What’s the address?” Punnam munched his food. Like me probably he had nothing for dinner till that late hour.
“The university guest house. Here.”
He nodded, I know. He knew. A life long Hyderabadi. No wonder his cousin chose him to familiarize me to this place. I decided to thank my university friend soon for his benevolent gesture.
The guesthouse was dead like a tombstone. The lobby was well lighted, not visible from the main road, but there was no one at the reception desk. Punnam coughed loudly a couple of times in order to attract attention of anyone who might be there, then said a loud, “Hello!”
A man emerged from around the corridor, stepping sleepily, with bloodshot eyes. He mumbled at Punnam who became even more stony-faced and asked him a few questions in turn.
“He says the caretaker left a note saying someone from Delhi was expected.” He was the night shift guard here. There is a room ready he can open it up immediately.
“Oh good,” I said.
“No, that is not good,” Punnam’s English was a bit like talking to a thinking mirror – it said mostly the same words I uttered, with just a few added words more.
Punnam assessed the guard to be drunk. Besides, the guesthouse was in a secluded part of the university – the entire university anyway seemed to be on a secluded hilltop dotted with great stones and impenetrable shrubs. There seemed to be no other soul living inside that building. Hence, not good.
“Come let’s go home,” he summarized quickly.
**
I didn’t care to know or ask the route that we took, the neighborhoods that we passed by or the house that we entered, so tired and sleepy I was. Completely having surrendered to Punnam’s instructions, I remember waking up in a large sunny room with two kids by my side on a wide plush bed. Still sleepy, I watched Punnam tug at the little boys’ wrists, coaxing them to be up for school.
An hour later, I found the attached bathroom and came out freshened to find Punnam determinedly scooping out fluffy white orbs from a steaming plate. An old woman worked at the pots and pans at the kitchen sink and said something very urgently to him.
“Idlis for breakfast!” he announced looking up at me. “Our work-auntie is reminding me about the rice-and-lentil powder that must be eaten with it.”
I thought I was lucky to have all that. And ‘work-auntie’ touched me. Nice guy, this Punnam. Abundant daylight through the windows around the living room showed his burliness to be more of a hulkiness, his teeth sparkling white like water bubbles, his short wavy hair like a tight cap around his head and his earth-brown complexion blending with the must-be-eaten powder he served on my plate alongside the steaming rice cakes.
“Homemade podi.”
The two boys were already off to school, dressed, fed and dropped by their uncle Punnam. The parents, Punnam’s brother and sister-in-law, were away in the village to attend to some important family matters. Therefore, Punnam was not only the guide and protector of the woman from Delhi, but also of his little nephews.
I called up to thank my Delhi benefactor.
“Punnam is a gem,” his cousin my friend gushed. “After his girlfriend deserted him and married someone else last year he had become so wound up. I thought being around you might lighten him a bit, you know, in a friendly way.”
**
Instead of Osmania University guesthouse I shifted to another smaller one – meant for Hindi language students of Telugu University – quite near the Osmania campus where my conference was scheduled. And happily discovered there were six more participants in the same conference from different parts of the country. Madhavi from Chennai became my roommate. She told me of her impending marriage, showed me family photographs and laughed seeing me wearing only either black or white petticoats under my exquisite hand woven saris specially brought for the conference. In fact, most women participants noticed that aberration and when we all gathered during the tea break, peering at the scorching February sun outside – Hyderabad is notoriously hot right then through June – they giggled and confirmed that I wore black underneath red, green, magenta saris and white underneath cream, blue, lilac saris. Funny.
“Get yourself matching petticoats,” one advised gently. “You look so good in saris. Don’t let bad style spoil it.”
It was tough convincing them I will, I who mostly dressed in jeans.
**
Punnam came around now and then although I had reclaimed independence in mobility and association. He was indeed a nice fellow and an ice cream one evening or a little trip to the old city on his faithful motorbike did not hurt. Increasingly he looked less stony-faced and more animated. However, he regarded my guesthouse mates with aloof scrutiny. Madhavi he did not so much care (along with other female residents) to observe as he did Adnan – a forty something lecturer from Baroda in western India, Anji Babu – a thirty-year-old PhD candidate from Thiruchirapalli and Pramit Pandey, a masters student like me from Agra in northern India. Adnan was an avuncular figure, patient and comforting to everyone. Back from the conference every evening, he showered and relaxed on the verandah in spotless white kurta-pajamas reading the stale morning newspaper. Pramit would be off exploring the city most evenings. He had friends in this part and never got back before midnight, initially making the gateman grumble that it was a violation of the guesthouse rules to be out so long. Later he opened the gates without a fuss for I believe, he was handsomely tipped by the suave, smart Pramit. Anji Babu was probably the most interesting of the three men. Or I think that’s what Punnam made him out to be. For his medium height and moderate built – nothing special to say if you saw him up close – his face was unusually expressive. Two eyes shone like charcoal with icing on them. His smile was perhaps the most arresting of all features. He sang, playacted, mimicked and joked. He was the star in the group. Also, he drank. A lot. And threw tantrums.
The first time he did that, Punnam had come to drop me at the guesthouse. I had been gone to meet his brother and sister-in-law who were back from the village. They loved to hear that I liked Hyderabad and that I already learned to say “pappu” for daal in Telugu and phrases like “randi randi kuchandi --- please come and sit down”.
“Pappu is a male name in the north,” I said gingerly.
“Yeah, they’d keep any name like that!”
My “Please come in, sit down” also generated much banter and merriment when transliterated into Hindi. They insisted I could come and stay with them. I told them how thankful I was for being allowed a night of rest while they were away, courtesy the thoughtful and kind Punnam. I dined with them, delicious things I didn’t have a name for, except obviously the pappu.
Après dinner, the gentlemanly Punnam dropped me at the guesthouse gate and heard a commotion inside. Anji Babu, drunk and boisterous, was addressing the gateman, just arrived for his nightly duties. Anji flaunted his well-built arms being shirtless in the warm February night. His conversation – Telugu or Tamil I could not tell – seemed to grow louder and rougher.
“Does he sound like trouble?” I asked Punnam.
“Like trouble,” the thinking mirror repeated, “You can’t be here.”
“I don’t mind staying here.”
He grimaced. “Don’t mind staying here?” and added, “ I don’t understand.”
I appreciated the mirror’s concern. And was amused by his mirror responses. But I convinced him no trouble would befall me from Anji. Until later.
I will digress here to speak about a few more ‘mirror responses’.
In different scenarios, such responses were prolific.
Scenario one: A trip to the mythical Yadagirigutta temple with Punnam.
A teenaged boy was selling flower garlands at the bottom of the hillock standing on a scenic road that connected Hyderabad with its twin city Secunderabad. He rattled off an instruction translated by Punnam thus: worshipping in this hilltop temple for forty continuous days would relieve anyone of very tough diseases.
“What tough diseases? Does he mean cancer, AIDS, Alzheimer’s?”
“Cancer, AIDS, Alzheimer’s,” Punnam repeated.
Although we were conversing in English, the boy understood the diseases mentioned and stuck out his tongue and caught his ears with both hands in an apologetic gesture.
“He is appalled. The very mention of cancer and AIDS makes these people cringe.”
Oh, glad to know that, I thought. What about the garland business then? How many can he convince just like that?
“How many can he convince like that? As many that come here.”
“Punnam I’m not convinced. I came here only because of touristy interest.”
“I’m not convinced,” he repeated after me. “I came here because of you.”
What did he mean? Lord knows. He rose like a mini hillock in front of me with that, as he strode up the hill to where Yadagirigutta smiled down on us in mid-morning sunshine.
Scenario two:
I had been told three things I must try before leaving Hyderabad: Bajji, sojji and buttermilk. The first item was a fritter made from Anaheim peppers, the second was sweet semolina pudding oozing with clarified butter. Buttermilk was a hot favorite to maintain cool heads with the temperature rising outdoors. My loyal guide Punnam – who seemed out of the sorrow inflicted on him by his ex-girlfriend – took me on a culinary trip.
Seeing me ask for a fork and knife for the bajji his face flopped.
“You just bite into them.”
“Need to make sure the peppers don’t have seeds inside.”
“The peppers don’t have seeds inside,” the mirror mouthed.
“I don’t trust peppers Punnam.” I was a little harassed with the chaperoning.
“Just have sojji afterwards na…” he trailed off.
Of course, the sojji, a sweet dish, had the potential of rescuing people from bajji’s volcanic taste. But did I need to be told everything?
“Don’t trust peppers!’ He would still repeat after me, but with a kindness in his eyes. After all, I was not a Hyderabadi.
**
I was in the guesthouse for more than a week now. Anji had been up to his things every now and then but not so much in the open. One night, after amusing us by caricaturing south Indian film stars, the plump mustachioed lot, he begged us to stay up with him. It was late for both Madhavi and me.
“Okay, let Madhavi go. She is anyway getting married soon. But you stay.”
His logic wasn’t clear of course, as to why I should stay – just because I wasn’t looking to be married – while Adnan and Pramit were already headed towards their rooms.
“Let her alone.” Madhavi mildly reprimanded him.
That night Anji turned sentimental. It’s his own love story he wanted to tell us, he said. He needed an audience. He showed us a letter from his wife, the words “Anji” and “love” written all over the one-page missive. We were sorry it was getting late and we couldn’t stay.
Another night he started on the same vein. Drunk of course. How much he drank I had no idea. It seemed every evening on return from the conference he went straightaway to buy liquor first. He drank all through the evening, sometimes showed up at the guesthouse dinner, sometimes not. That night he was incoherent. We were chatting sitting in Adnan’s room. The man from Baroda spoke little, just smiled from time to time. All throughout Anji’s demonstration, he kept looking at him keenly. Later, pointing at the table clock he said, “Have to call in now.” Then looking at Anji he said cryptically, “In a week’s time, we’d all be gone. But you don’t go home alone Anji.” With that, he turned to me and threw a mischievous smile.
“What do you mean Adnan?” If there was some meaning there, I didn’t care for it. I got up to go.
Anji followed me till my room and when I pleaded with him to go back and not wake up Madhavi who was in early with a headache, he laid a finger on the hollow of my neck.
“Shush… It’s so soft.”
“Anji go to your room. I don’t want a scene.” I was afraid he’d try something else too. He didn’t.
“You’ve no idea,” that’s all he said and went back to his room. I kept this incident from the others.
At the conference next morning, he looked fresh and composed. He still continued to drink in the evenings but did not again accost me. Instead, he rattled some people on an outing. He wasn’t drunk then.
**
I made several friends and Hyderabad was gradually opening up to me with its tongue-tingling spices, balmy markets, strapping dark men with chiseled faces, well endowed women with fresh jasmine garlands in their hair, dusty streets and main thoroughfares with their fierce traffic, and centuries of history gently blowing in the incense-smelling breeze. Punnam appeared now and then. Although he refrained from intervening on seeing Anji drunk and quarreling with the gateman the other night, he made it quite clear that the guesthouse was no longer a nice place for me to stay. I didn’t tell him about Anji’s latest scrap with Sunil and his professor.
The latter were from a university in the state of Kerala. A group of us were out one evening visiting the historic Golconda Fort, colorful bangle markets in the old city, sampling the famous biriyani and mango lassi, and walking around a bright shopping area. I usually never dressed in a sari outside the conference. But Madhavi had requested me to wear one that evening. Both of us wore blue. She in powder blue, I in indigo. The Kerala professor was a friendly talkative man and he praised his student Sunil, his protégé, quite a lot.
“I not only have to get him a PhD, but also get him a bride,” Prof. Balaravi said, gently twirling his partly grayed moustache and patting his jet-black beard.
Past sixty at least, he resembled one of those ancient Indian sages depicted in calendars or roadside poster catering to the religious.
“Too bad no one is available,” Pramit quipped. “Besides, professor, you’d prefer a Kerala woman, right?”
Balaravi sighed dramatically, looked around at the milling shoppers eating, laughing. Then grabbing the ice cream cone from the six-feet tall but demure Sunil’s hands and giving it a determined lick he looked at me. Then pointed.
“Doesn’t have to be a Kerala girl. This sumathi here looks like one. Neelambari!”
His epithets embarrassed me. I understood them – a woman of good bearing and the lady in blue – all words from Sanskrit roots. Madhavi patted my shoulders. Everybody liked the joke at my expense. Well, I wasn’t angry or anything. Just taken aback.
“What? Did you say she is available?” This was Anji. He had been quiet all evening.
“My Sunil is a good man. Certainly a lady with good characteristics as this can make his life a heaven –”
Balaravi’s high-flowing address would have continued but for the fact that Anji leaped in front of him, nearly screaming, “Hey watch out”, and pulling himself up menacingly to the tall professor.
Madhavi quickly put a protective arm around me and in seconds Pramit, Adnan and other men in the group tried separating Anji from Balaravi. Sunil stood like a wet sheep not knowing what might be required of him. We came back to the guesthouse tired and bitter. Anji, not a drop of alcohol in his stomach that night, did not speak a word, instead went straight to his room. He presented a rather interesting paper the next day: Tamil Cilappatikaram: a comparison to Odyssey and Iliad of the West. Focused, enthused and thoroughly academically responsive he was.
**
Towards the end of our stay in Hyderabad, Madhavi and I began bonding well. I accompanied her on evening shopping sprees meant for her marriage. She bought saris, Hyderabadi lacquer bangles, Bidri vases and tableware as gifts for the family back home. Invited me to Chennai where the marriage was to take place four months later. A couple of times Punnam came looking for me and went back. I was out. During this time Punnam had completely discarded his stony face and appeared rather jubilant, at least the time I met him. He also became a little talkative – no longer just a mirror – and displayed flashes of volatility. Most of that last trait was directed at Anji Babu who he did not know well but already disliked.
“He drinks so much.”
Drinking wasn’t a virtue according to him, drinking in the manner of Anji.
“He was abusing the gateman the other night.” Apparently in choicest vulgarisms.
“Anji speaks Tamil … how do you understand what he said?”
“I had Tamil friends in the engineering college. Know them all,” he summed up with such hostile definitiveness (and no mirror responses) that I let the topic rest there.
**
On our last night at the guesthouse – most of us were to depart the next afternoon following the wrap-up session – we threw ourselves a little party. A few outsiders, like Punnam, were invited. Professor Balaravi and his protégé Sunil, who lived at the Osmania guesthouse, also joined us. Balaravi and Anji drank together like long-lost friends, pouring each other drinks. As usual the alcohol was procured clandestinely – it wasn’t allowed in the guesthouse – by our prolific colleague Anji Babu. He was drinking after a gap of days. He seemed relaxed. Sidelining all chatter about the conference to be over the next day, he was regaling Balaravi and Adnan about his love story. How he ran away with his beloved to make her his wife. Very Bollywood. Very bold. I think I even heard him mention riding a horse carriage. Amid rain and thunder. Her name was Amba. Anji and Amba were longtime lovers. Of different backgrounds – probably different castes, that factor which supposedly deeply permeates the Tamil society. He laughed, happy. Narrating his love story obviously was a curative effort.
Punnam had again withdrawn into his shell, speaking little, not drinking even a drop. Solemnly, he informed me he’d be at the railway station the next afternoon to see me off to Delhi.
“No Punnam, really don’t. I’m not alone. It’s fine.” I tried convincing him that his guardianship was formally over.
Anji heard that. He presumably was on a break from his storytelling. Refilling his scotch and ambling around.
“Don’t bother, I’m going to the station. Madhavi’s going too.” He spoke to Punnam.
“Madhavi’s going too?” Punnam the responding mirror had returned.
“Don’t you get it? I’m sending my wife a letter through Madhavi’s hands. I can see off both Madhavi and this friend of ours.”
“This friend of ours?” Interrogative mirror.
“Are you an idiot or what?”
“You are in idiot.” Assertive.
Anji made a gesture of helplessness. Surprisingly acting sober. Punnam, lucid enough sans much alcohol, glared at him. Adnan sensed things were about to turn awry and intercepted the not so illuminating conversation.
“Hey, both of you rest. I’ll go. Got to send a telegram to Baroda. Letting my folks know I’m planning to visit Bangalore, you know.”
“Bangalore,” Anji and Punnam said in unison – the ‘bang’ part of the word booming out.
The next day Madhavi and I boarded the same train because she was headed to a relative’s in Indore before returning to Chennai, her hometown. I would of course travel all the way up north, straight to Delhi, a longer but scenic train journey. The station, like all Indian stations was milling with people, talking, laughing, saying goodbye, crying, picking pockets, men brushing unknown rushing or waiting women on their butts or breasts, kids yelling and scampering, and beggars begging aggressively. Although northbound, trains to or from the south were usually clean, organized, and on time. Their bathrooms had the fittings intact, there was running water and no one peed on the floors. As a result these trains smelled quite okay too – of cleaning liquids and sanitary purifiers. Madhavi and I sat face to face, our small suitcases up on the luggage loft. We looked out of the window facing the station taking in the last whiff of Hyderabad. We had a sort of quick lunch at the wrap-up session, but it was past two-thirty and in our excitement we felt hungry. She was eyeing a stall selling soft drinks and potato chips. I was eyeing a boy vendor with fresh pepper bajjis on his makeshift wooden tray, carefully piled up on a sheet of aluminum foil, tucked on the sides by paper tissues to soak up the gut-clogging oil in which they were fried. I had been informed that these vendors usually have a set-up quite next to the stations where one person cleans and fries the Anaheim peppers and the other carries the freshly fried ones to the platform. Quite predictably, the bajjis are gone in minutes. The vendor then runs for the next batch and is back in no time spreading the crackly aroma in the normally stale station air.
“You want the bajjis?” Madhavi knew my new obsession.
“Well, I can … “
“No, I too will have some. Instead of chips. And how about some hot tea that woman is selling in earthen mugs?”
“They call them kullar in Delhi! Chai, ey chai!” I proceeded to call the woman.
“Bajjiwala, here! Pack us a dozen.” Madhavi waved through the window.
The bajji boy turned his head towards us, it seemed in slow motion, as if with three heads. No, it was two other heads that turned simultaneously at us with the vendor. Before even the vendor put his hands on his crispy fare, the other two heads, much taller than the boy, grew hands and reached out for the bajjis at the same time.
“Oh my god!” Madhavi said.
Anji and Punnam. They were at the station.
Their four hands grabbed the tails of fried peppers with a rapidity that confounded the vendor boy. One of the hands tossed a ten-buck note on the pile of peppers. The other quickly shoved the peppers in a paper bag.
“I paid first, hey boy take it,” one roared. I don’t know who it was.
“To hell with your money, I’ll get the girls my bajjis first,” the other swore.
At this point the little vendor started screaming, in anger or in fright. Naturally, he had no clue what was going on. Neither did we, although both Madhavi and I had guessed it all. The train gave a tug by then. The vendor was trying to prevent his livelihood from being sabotaged, while the station crowd suddenly saw the goings on.
“You wouldn’t give up? You … “
“And you wouldn’t, huh?”
The dialogues were more or less identical, tough to say who was saying what. Tamil or Telugu, I do not know till this day.
Horrified, we saw two hands reach out and smack each other. And then, one of them squashed a bajji in his hand and slapped it over the other’s eyes, seeds and all. I still couldn’t tell who did that to whom because the crowd now formed a ring around them, partly endorsing the quarrel, partly asking them to stop but not actively stopping the circus. Anji or Punnam, whoever got the pepper in his eyes, was howling like a half-slaughtered buffalo. The tea-woman had meanwhile forgotten to give us tea. The train was moving. Somebody blew a whistle, probably the railway police, if they did arrive so promptly against the usual slovenly speed of purpose any Indian security agency have.
“Oh my god,” Madhavi said again and gaped.
I wanted to laugh, really loudly. But I tried to respect her feeling. She saw my face was distorted with something hidden and started laughing herself. We rolled around as the train sped up.
“Let’s go get something to eat from the pantry.” I got up finally.
“No bajjis, please!” She still held her tummy.
**
I heard later that Punnam visited Delhi during the summer of my graduation. I did promise him an evening of ice cream while in Delhi but that did not materialize. He did not inquire after me. As for Anji, I never heard from him. I guess he and wife Amba lived happily ever after. Madhavi wrote me letters for months before she got absorbed into her married life. Adnan kept in touch for a while, never mentioning either Anji or Punnam. I never enjoyed bajjis again.
(2007-- Some names and portions of this account are fictional while some are real.)