It's nice to know Meena Kandasamy has found a rather interesting name for the anthology that's going to have my poem among several others. (http://meenu.wordpress.com/2008/07/26/i-finally-found-a-title/#comment-3013) The name is such a one that has been hanging right on the tip of our tongues, it's that simple. Yet, I like it for its beauty and resonance. Also, for a English language poetry collection, this Hindi/Urdu title is very meaningful, full of zing and all that romanticism one can attach with the notion of CITY.

Here you go:

"SHEHER

Urban Poetry by Indian Women"

The photograph here is the working cover. The final cover should be uploaded soon for all of us to see.

Blogging on Sulekha.com

I've been blogging on Sulekha.com for a while now. It's been okay, I'm probably not a prolific blogger, given I have other writings to do. And Sulekha is really huge and it's darn tough to find an author who can be a good read. Well, I don't mean, good writers are too few there, just that the overwhelming number of bloggers make it a huge task finding them. All of us love to think we write well, yes I do, but the truth is, not everybody can engage. Some day I will engage, a vast audience!

Also, it scares me to see the amount of rightwing blogging going on in Sulekha. Some are guarded and covert, but quite a few ones (some among them "longtime" and "prominent" bloggers) are rabid, odious and dangerous.

So did I not find any satisfaction while blogging on Sulekha? No, that's not why I'm writing this post. Quite a good number of people have befriended me on Sulekha, so I am convinced this is a pretty well-connected blogging community. Of all the 10 blogs I've written so far, a few that are worth any remote literary value have been liked by readers.

Three of my poems (actually five in all because one title contains three poems) have been read, commented upon, recommended. Even temporarily featured on the respective blog home pages. Not bad, huh? Although, this doesn't bring my work closer to publishing again. I need to wait, be patient, sharpen my skill and breathe deeply.

So, those Sulekha pages where my work is featured, are:

http://nabina.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/07/a-few-things-of-remembrance-a-poem-i-have-yet-to.htm

and

http://nabina.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/07/whispers-in-the-attic-a-memoir-poem.htm

and (the three-poem set)

http://nabina.sulekha.com/blog/post/2008/06/three-food-poems-a-taste-of-nations.htm

Now if you cannot see the pages, it's not my fault. Login to www.sulekha.com and you can probably see them.

Forthcoming: Urban Indian Women Poets' Anthology to Print my Poem in September

I am very happy to announce that my poem, CITYSCAPES, will be published by Frog Book publishers in September 2008 (hopefully without delays)in an anthology of urban Indian women poets. It's a great feeling to be in the company of names like Meena Alexander, Jane Bhandari, Imtiaz Dharker and Rukmini Bhaya Nair. Hey, Rukmini was my teacher at Jawaharlal Nehru University where I did my Masters in Linguistics. She taught us Morphology! And Kamala Das too?? The legendary Kamala Das?

Here's what guest-editor Meena Kandasamy wrote to me in an e-mail:

"Congratulations!
I loved your poem Cityscapes and it's been selected for our as yet-untitled anthology.
Could you send me a 100 word bio (ignore this if you have already sent it) and your postal address.
We'll mail you the anthology once its released in September.
Thanks for the submission once again, and the patient wait.
I am terribly sorry for getting back to you so late.
It's just that I was stumped with the submissions.
Do you have any title suggestions for this book?

Cheers,
Meena."

On her blog site (see link in my bloglist ), she posted the details as follows:
"Sixty and Done

July 11, 2008 by Meena Kandasamy (blog by a 24-year-old Tamil woman obsessed with dr.ambedkar’s dream of caste annihilation)

The final line-up
Usha Akella, Meena Alexander, Anoopa Anand, Jane Bhandari, Rukmini Bhaya Nair, Sujata Bhatt, Sampurna Chatterjee, Rimi Chatterjee, Pervin Chhapkhanawala, Roselyn D’Mello, Mamang Dai, Kamala Das, Nabina Das, Atreyee Day, Eunice De Souza, Mira Desai, Nandini Dhar, Imitiaz Dharker, Tishani Doshi, Reshma Ghosh, Uddipana Goswami, Anjum Hasan, Abha Iyengar, Mamta Kalia, Meena Kandasamy, Lajwanti Khemlani, Preethi Krishnan, Chicu Lokgariwar, Gayatri Majumdar, Sharanya Manivannan, Meena Menon, Monica Mody, Monidipa Mondal, Anita Nair, Sandhya Nambiar, Suniti Namjoshi, Gopika Nath, Marilyn Noronha, Sukrita Paul Kumar, Meher Pestonji, Joan Pinto, Anuradha Pujar, Ratna Rajaiah, Lekshmy Rajeev, Anupama Raju, Mani Rao, Mukta Sambrani, Bina Sarkar Ellias, Priya Sarukkai Chabria, Anindita Sengupta, Shefali Shah Choksi, Yogita Sharma, Menka Shivdasani, Sushmita Srivastava, Arundhati Subramaniam, Pooja Susan Thomas, Sridala Swami, Payal Talreja, Pali Tripathi, Ruth Vanita, Annie Zaidi

I have included the names of the poets from whom I solicited submissions, and the names of the poets who probably decided to give this a try. I think this is just the collection that I have always wanted to read, and that I never imagined I would ever put together. There are a lot of new, new names and I am happy I did that. Someone decided to give me a chance because they liked my way with words and that’s why I am where I am today. So, I haven’t been swung around by established names alone. I loved doing the selections and I love the ones I have handpicked. I did love a few other poets (I mean, their poems), but sometimes the theme didn’t match. And to those who can’t see their names here, I am not sending any rejection mails. If it isn’t here, it isn’t in the book. That’s all. Besides, Sunil Poolani might be using a few great poems that didn’t go into this book for Urban Voice (with the poet’s permission of course). So, it is not a complete rejection, really. Thank you dears for making this so wonderful.

The pre-press will swallow the rest of July and some part of August. The book will be out in early September 2008."

My book pitch a winner at the 2008 Kala Ghoda Literary Festival, Mumbai, India

My book pitch entry became a winner at the 2008 Kala Ghoda Literary Festival, Mumbai, India, early this year. HarperCollins India and Palador publishing houses have expressed their interest in this novel. I have just finished up -- PHEW!! -- revising the 200+ page-long manuscript and have carted it off to HarperCollins India. Hopefully they'll see the sparks of genius in my work. In fact, the preliminary chapters of the novel have won a 2007 Joan Jakobson Scholarship for Fiction from Wesleyan University (where I workshopped it with the writer Josip Novakovich) and a 2007 Julio Lobo Scholarship for Fiction from Lesley College, Cambridge, Mass.
Details below:

Title: FOOTPRINTS IN THE BAJRA
Genre(s): Literary Fiction

Blurb:
Violence. Revolutionary passion. Change. FOOTPRINTS IN THE BAJRA is about a young Maoist recruit, Muskaan from Bihar who meets Nora, a student-activist. Muskaan’s transition in belief, aided by Nora, through a series of staggering bloodletting and self-reflection takes her to America, reshaping her radical zeal through her newfound love.

Synopsis:
FOOTPRINTS IN THE BAJRA is a novel about Muskaan, a teenaged girl recruited by Maoists in a remote north Bihar village. Muskaan fiercely clings on to her ideology of change until she comes across Nora, a student-cum-theater activist from Delhi, who has her eyes set on studies and career in the US.

FOOTPRINTS charts the moment of transition – in belief and identity – in the life of Muskaan. It begins with how the young rebel and her comrades, while capitalizing on the presence of Nora and her theater troupe members in Durjanpur, carry out a bloody kidnapping and killing in the outskirts of the village. During this incident, Nora accidentally finds out Muskaan’s radical role – carefully concealed so far. The event pits them together in a new relationship where Muskaan turns into an adversary because of Nora’s exclusive knowledge about their rebel outfit.

Even as Maoists threaten her with death, Nora quietly convinces Muskaan of the possibility of a different world before she is released owing to political pressures from Delhi. Muskaan discovers that her reverence for her foster uncle and mentor Suryakant Sahay and her senior comrade Avadhut fail to pass muster when it comes to representing the real aspirations of the people around her. Her nascent passion for Palash, a comrade-in-arms, also suffers a breach as she finds him to be far situated from the idealistic plane she imagined. Confused yet adamant, she reaches out to Nora who is in New York by this time, studying and working.

Through a series of self-reflection and her lonely struggle to break out of her familiar web of violence and retaliation, Muskaan manages to arrive in the US as a student. All along, Nora’s friendship and support act as her mainstay. Their blooming friendship – even when they are miles apart – reveals to the young rebel a far more radical possibility for changing life, not only for her, but also for her community and society where century-old causes have always generated equally archaic and unsettling effects. Finally, when in love, and in a decisive stage of her life and friendship, Muskaan sees the path to change clearly in front of her. She returns home to follow the path, however forked it is.

This is the story of Muskaan’s bewilderment and untutored enlightenment, about the effects of globalization and its new economic mores spanning from the badlands of Bihar to Delhi’s elite environment and American ivory towers of intellectualism.

Through her new love and tough choices it offers, she sets out to stamp new footprints, this time not steeped in blood, but in intense hope and no less elemental desires to see life-changing dreams come true.

My Red Hot Taiwanese Dinner

NOTE: don't bother to read this if you are a die-hard vegetarian or even an omnivore who's not experimental at all...

“I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.” -- Winston Churchill
“Pigs are not that dirty. And they're smart, strange little creatures. They just need love.” -- Shelley Duvall
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/pigs.html))

My morning starts with a glass of orange juice. Usually I have a breakfast of a small bowl of cereals or a toast with cheese spread. Occasionally, on weekends, I may opt for an English breakfast of bacon and eggs and coffee or go for croissants.
On weekdays, later in the day, I usually drink two cups of tea with milk or coffee with creamer.

It’s surprising to most people that I tend not to eat a quick lunch, like others who eat fast food or just one sandwich or survive eating a salad. My lunch is normally a near-full meal, whether I am at work or in the university. Usually I carry lunch from home and avoid eating out. I eat breads or pita rolls or rice, vegetables or lentils or beans, chicken or fish or tofu and a seasonal fruit. There may be some salad included too in my meal. If I have to use up leftovers, I make a pita pocket to eat it.

With the midday meal, I normally drink only water. At times, I take a fruit juice or eat unsweetened yogurt.

I make it a point to drink a cup of tea or coffee in the evening, sometimes with scones or light snacks, what the French would call a goûter.

My dinner is usually light – a soup, breads or noodles and maybe some vegetables. For soup, I prefer having cream of broccoli, French onion, cream of mushroom or spinach soup. Again I only drink water with my meal. At times of course I break the monotony drinking Perrier or on rare occasions, some red wine.

I almost never eat dessert unless it's a special occasion. Like an anniversary or a birthday. Then, I have cheesecake or rice pudding.

My weekend meals are little more elaborate. Lunch has at least an additional course, as has dinner. Often I like to eat out on weekends. My favorites are Thai, Chinese and Middle Eastern cuisines. I adore Pad Thai, dumplings and couscous.

Well, having listed all of the above, I one day ventured to eat and drink something that I have never tried before and I believe not many people who appreciate diverse cuisine, would even have ever eaten it.

Invited to a dinner by my Taiwanese friends at their home some time ago, I had this once-in-a-lifetime experience. Knowing the Taiwanese have a very diverse cuisine, I had agreed to eat a surprise ingredient the Taiwanese commonly use in their “hotpot”. Well, it has a specific name for them that I do not clearly recall. I think it is “Zhu Xie Gao” but don’t recall for sure as my Taiwanese friends are not around now to tell me. Also, before eating it, I had no idea what it would look like or taste like. Our friends asserted it was arguably one of the best items one could sample in Chinese or Taiwanese cuisine.

On the day of our dinner, we gathered round a table on which sat a small stove burner. A large pot warmed on it, three-fourths filled with water. Kevin and Elisa, our friends, neatly placed around all food items that were to be offered in the hotpot once the water started to boil.

There were fresh shrimps, shiitake mushrooms, chopped sausages, tofu cubes, broccoli florets, shredded chicken and beef, baby carrots and corns, fish balls and the special item I was going to sample that evening. Soy sauce and vinegar were to be added at one’s discretion. One normally stirred the broth from time to time to check if the food in there was done and used a ladle to serve. One ate from dainty Chinese soup bowls (or probably they were rice bowls), added steaming jasmine rice to the broth and used a pair of chopsticks. I am bad at using chopsticks, so spoon and fork were just fine for me!

As various items were tossed in to the hotpot and we eagerly waited for the broth to be ready, I knew it was my big day to eat the “unknown” item. Kevin joked that it required thorough cooking and so waiting would be fine.

And then I was served the most delicious hotpot broth I have ever tasted in my entire life. I searched in my bowl amid shrimps and mushrooms and baby corns, and picked up 'the' piece – a dark red cube, like a red tofu. There it was, the much-awaited and curiosity-arousing item. Congealed pig blood. Cut neatly in cubes, a delicacy for several communities in the world. I put it in my mouth, in awe and trepidation.

I must make clear that before my hosts suggested I eat this surprise ingredient, they knew I was not only an omnivore, but also not squeamish about eating beef, pork, lamb etc., and pretty experimental about my diet. I wasn't cheated or anything.

So, I ate congealed pig’s blood, considered a delicacy in China, Taiwan, the Philippines and a few other East Asian countries. It is not a usual item that a non-East Asian would hope to eat, however avid an admirer of such cuisine he or she may be or however diverse meat eating experience one may have.

The reason I voluntarily tasted it was because I wanted to be familiar with the culture that my Taiwanese friends represented. Another flimsy reason was to break out of the mundane shrimp-and-tofu routine that most eaters of Chinese/Taiwanese food are used to. (Umm, I've decided to stick to that routine though!) Although pig or pork was a sort of taboo to my family, it wasn’t a taboo for me. So, I went ahead.

Most people I spoke to about my experience with eating congealed pig blood, reacted with astonishment and to some extent, utter abhorrence. Some asked me if culturally (and religiously) it was okay for me to eat pig’s blood. To that I said, for me any cultural experience was just fine, as long as it did not cause food poisoning etc.

Most Indians (my country of birth) reacted with visible shock and disgust. Most Americans reacted with disbelief (and some shock). Most East Asians took the news calmly.

Although I sound okay with that experience, for me challenges were many in the beginning. Overcoming unfamiliarity was a big one.

Also, it was difficult coming to terms with eating something I was never familiar with. So when Kevin explained what the secret item was, I had to steel myself.

Culturally, although eating pork is not encouraged in Indian society, I've been eating sausages and salamis right from my childhood. But pig blood? Huh, that was a different ballgame all together.

Let me confess, I WAS worried about the hygiene aspect of this item to begin with. Eating blood? Gracious!

The image of blood in my mind also did not make me particularly enthusiastic when I actually got down to eating it.

On the flip side, the fact that I did not actually see any blood in the hotpot kept my nerves calm. At my friends’ recommendation when I picked up the congealed blood cube, it looked quite innocuous, like a dark red tofu cube. It tasted salty, but it did not have any additional flavor which might be good idea to make it easily palatable to those that have never tasted it. So next time I eat it, I'd take the help of chili sauce or garlic to better the taste. Only if I eat it.

Having eaten congealed pig’s blood, it acted as a window to other East Asian cultures. “Pork blood jellos” or “chocolate pork” (as Filipinos call them) is a ‘normal’ food item in these cultures. For them, eating congealed pig’s blood (duck’s blood for those who do not approve of pig), was just like eating blood sausage or similar food eaten in Europe (hey, yes, Europeans have their own).

The one assumption that I begun with, when I brought the spoon to my mouth as Kevin and Elisa ran their commentary describing the red cube, was that pork blood cubes would taste simply horrible and spoil the taste of other items cooked along with it.

On the contrary, I found out that the blood cubes were not of any heightened flavor. They were certainly not worse than smelly bean curds or salty anchovies. They were in fact very much like salted tofu, a little harder in texture may be, but not unsavory. Cooked in that Taiwanese hotpot, they did not at all affect or alter the taste of the broth. I think though a little spice might do it some good.

Later, while reading on the subject, I found out blood may be a taboo item in many societies and faiths, especially in the West, but blood is perfectly accepted as food in parts of Asia or Africa. I must say, eating congealed pig’s blood and the ensuing entry to the uncharted culinary world of East Asian countries led me to research further on the subject of “unusual” food. To my pleasant surprise, I found out that not only blood, but also several other very unusual food are eaten in Europe and America. One can check them at:
http://www.weird-food.com/weird-food-mammal.html

Often we are too quick to criticize the food habit of the “others”. But think “squirrel brain” in American Deep South or “Calf’s brain” in France or blood sausages of Germany and blood pudding of UK. How do these things get acceptance? Conclusion: Culture must be seen in perspective and sensitivity can only grow out of familiarity and acceptance, at least tolerance. But let me end by saying I'm not recommending eating blood cubes here. It was my experiment, it remains so.

Obama Nation-India's Lesson

Now that the appointment of a Black President is becoming an imminent reality for the United States of America, I'm really excited. Initially, to be very honest, my money lay with Hillary Clinton. Not just because she was a woman, but also because she, to use her opponents' words, bore the burden of experience, experience nonetheless. But gradually, I warmed up to Barack Obama, or lovingly as I call him Yo-Mama, who swayed all the votes. I don't think Obama will cause a miracle to happen. Or that race relations in the US will straighten out overnight and henceforth black and white Americans will dance and sing hand in hand. I don't think he has a unique foreign policy to implement; he has already pledged to stand beside Israel in all of the latter's projects (some of which could be, in my opinion, pretty damaging not only to the political settings in the Middle East but also to the rest of the clueless world). But on the sunnier side, Obama can begin a chain of thinking -- that all Americans can be presidents, commanders-in-chiefs, top bosses and practically anyone and everyone that seems to generate shock and awe in their minds.

So if it's gonna be an Obama nation, so be it.

This brings me to an interesting fact that somehow, the notion of a Black President has never been alien to Hollywood, so what if the 'people' were not ready for one. CNN reports (http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/TV/06/05/black.presidents/index.html) that on television and in film, black actors as acclaimed as James Earl Jones and as obscure as Tommy Lister have played commanders-in-chief. Apparently, if you fast forward a few decades, "the notion of a black man in the Oval Office provides ample joke fodder for comics such as Richard Pryor and Chris Rock." I don;t know all that. I never have been an avid cable-watcher. But I kind of like this silly joke: On one episode of "The Richard Pryor Show," the comedian's short-lived '70s variety hour, he played a president hosting a press conference. During the sketch, he tells a corps of reporters that he'd seriously consider Black Panther Huey Newton for the job of FBI director -- and nearly decks one journalist who inadvertently insults his momma. And when he's asked about his fetish for white women, he jokes, "They don't call it the White House for nothing."

Some of it continued in this way being a total caricature. I haven't watched the 2003 film "Head of State," where Chris Rock's president, Mays Gilliam, is said to blabber a populist lingo "glazed with hip-hop slang." Gilliam's running mate, played by Bernie Mac (hey, I know him although I'm cable-free), thinks NATO is a person and not an acronym.

Let me share a secret. I've watched on DVD, the hit series "24". That's where a black president is palpably respectable. Dennis Haysbert's David Palmer is as 'normal' as any white dude. No one reminds him of his race, nor does he evoke it because there are apparently greater issues like terrorism and bomb scares staring him in the face. CNN asks: "Will these depictions make any difference to Barack Obama's candidacy? Who knows? But what was once the stuff of joke and fantasy could be months away from being the real thing."

I'm sure the real thing will be a good thing.

All this musing brings me to another aspect regarding India. This is because like the US, India is a pluralistic, multicultural society. We have caste relations, maybe a more stinging problem that dogs our lives in India even in the 21st century. A journalist in India has raised the question: Who will be our Obama? He slams Dalit and non mainstream politicians for not being able to achieve much. Quite rightly.

Here's what I think: We had an Obama long back. Long long back in fact. We don't see this person anymore in that generous light any more. Perhaps we do. Some of us. This was Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar, the architect of India's Constitution. To my mind, given that period of time when India was a new-born nation, Ambedkar's contribution is above par. Maybe it is even not wise to compare him to Obama.

As for Indian leaders today from SP, BSP and other political parties, no one has that stature. And it seems we are still in a caricature mode. Lalu Yadav evokes laughter far and wide with his ultra-folksy-ness while Mayawati evokes banter and 'women' jokes. The south Indian leaders are too remote for the so-called 'national' media but even they dwell in the realms of the absurd.

So what has India got? So far a lesson, at least, to learn from the US primaries.

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.

French should consider an eclectic model

Nabina Das
(November 11, 2005, The Ithaca Journal, finally I found this article!!)
It is rather naive to think or propound that in today’s world, a society can remain monolithic – in religion, color, language and culture. The country that just a few months ago, smirked at the debacle caused in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in the United States, has now its own underbelly exposed. The knives of discord would surely cause serious scars on it, if not tear the social fabric apart with the crisis is allowed to continue.
As France arrives at its ‘moment of truth’ the question is how the crisis originated. Was it an invasion by alien cultures overnight that ripped French suburbs for days now and rendered the Republic frustrated? Some deep reflection already hints it is a result of grave inequality practiced for decades, masked under the notion of “secularism” and “social integration”.
It seems, increasingly however, this form of Western secularism is running into problems in addressing emerging religions and communities whose followers become a critical mass in society. The stubbornness with which France responded to the recent hijab (headscarf for Muslim women) issue is a case in point.The option might seem to lie between choosing either a stricter (read dogmatic) treatment of ‘troublemakers’ or, devising short-term populist measures. But there are other long-term options available to us.
I genuinely think, France, at this critical juncture of a defining historical moment, must look either to the west or to the east and make an eclectic choice.In the west, the United States with Affirmative action as its cornerstone could serve as a proactive model for resolving the present crisis. Unless the cruel history of slavery in America was acknowledged, understood, written and read about and condemned, America would not be what it is today. Given that race relations are still stressed, to justify democracy above all other things, Affirmative Action acts as a beacon of light.
Looking to the east might present France with a rather novel framework, or help others that live in constant fear that their elite white Christian societies are about to be run down by blacks, browns, Muslims, Africans, Arabs, Asians, Polish plumbers, Turkish nurses et al – the list of so-called aliens can be endless.In the east, I am talking about India – the largest democracy in the world and one of the most complex societies of our times. The Indian constitution, adopted in 1950, had the foresight to create a public space for most minorities, religions, ethnicities, tribes, languages and even castes.
It is true violent religious conflicts, language and caste riots have plagued India time and again, as has decades of terrorism. But in the larger scheme of things, it is a country that has successfully prevented balkanization of its territory, maintained a strong national identity and has fiercely remained a secular democracy since its inception.For a billion-strong country with about 300 spoken languages, eight or nine major religions (not counting the several animistic faiths), numerous caste-based economic structures, and people of all color and looks, this secular post-colonial nation has done rather well for its 50-odd years, considering how several post-colonial countries still flounder or depend on larger powers.
Most of the Indian civil society certainly understands and accepts differences. It does not balk at people displaying Muslim headscarves, Sikh turbans, Hindu tilaks, Jewish yarmulkes or Christian crucifix signs; or at a Muslim president, a Sikh prime minister, an Italian-born (woman) Christian ruling party leader, and at prudent policies that help so-called “low-caste” leaders to challenge the hegemony of the upper classes.
Most of our French friends however, shudder at the thought of ‘quotas’ or ‘reservation’ for the underprivileged, which they think is an anathema to French socialist ideas. But acceptance alone can produce multiculturalism or diversity. India, historically a giant diversity workshop, can be a model of peaceful coexistence within the boundaries of a nation state.Why bother about such a model? Because, it successfully blends all values; two, inevitable worldwide migration of human beings cannot be stopped by exclusionist policies. As the West once sought out new lands to further its nascent capitalist interests, it now needs to accept the tide in its own direction. That is why, French-born Algerians, Moroccans, Egyptians, Tunisians, Mauritanians etc., will always be French. They can eat their Camembert cheese or drink Beaujolais as well as everyone else in France. The name or the color of skin will not sour that cheese or curdle that vin rouge.

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.)

Lost writings

I realize some of my published writings -- reports, commentaries, articles -- are no longer on the web. Some of those pages don't show anymore. So, I've tried plugging on this site some of those I could lay my hands upon. Most of those articles from my days at Tehelka. But several are missing. I am looking for the hard copies, they must be tucked away some place. Too carefully I guess, so I can't find them now! Anyway, this blogsite is also like a place to tuck away stuff, hopefully to remain visible.

Kutchch Diary: Rapar, where desert meets the sky

Nabina Das

Rapar taluka (Gujarat), June 19 (2002)

Morning 8.30 in Bhuj (read "Bhuj: sun, sand and more sun" I'm searching for this story of mine) is a quiet time and just about warm as I set out to Rapar taluka with Mahesh driving me down. It is a two and a half-hour drive to Rapar, one of the worst affected talukas in Gujarat in the earthquake of 2001. Bhuj taluka too suffered lots of damages but comparatively, the Bhuj people have leapt back to normal life. Rapar still continues to be one of the backward areas of Gujarat, struggling even to meet day-to-day needs.

My journey begins along a road, well-metalled as most other roads in this place are, and prolong through acres and acres of dry barren land dotted with keekar, bawar and other desert vegetation.

Mahesh tells me that 60 per cent of the population of Bhuj work outside Gujarat, mostly in big cities like Ahmedabad, Surat or Mumbai or even abroad. “My father’s two elder brothers are in London engaged in travel business and one of my cousins is in Nairobi. People here have enough money. Our house got damaged in the earthquake but we managed to repair and rebuild parts of it. Even my father was abroad…, he came back 20 years ago.” He proudly tells me bank balances of Bhuj families would put to shame even those belonging to posh areas of Delhi or Mumbai.

He points out spots on the road that had developed cracks due to the quake. There are bridges on the way, which too are being rebuilt. The highway to Bhachau, Rapar and Anjar from Bhuj were all clogged last year as hoards of people, terrified after the quake’s impact, left home and hearth and shifted. Mostly they work in shops or do petty business in cities, having given up whatever little agriculture that they practised.

So what do they eat and how do they survive? Well, most of the times, vegetables, rice and wheat come from towns. Brahmins, known as maharaj, and Patels are vegetarian. Only darbars or Rajputs eat some poultry. Even dalits do not. Muslims of course eat non-vegetarian food, depending on its supply. “Is there any tension between Hindus and Muslims?” I ask, immediately realising the cliché I am always caught into. Mahesh, a Patel, smiles, “No, not in this taluka, or even in Rapar… Once in 15 years may be, chhota mota jhagda (small fights), not what you see elsewhere, not in Kutchch.’

It is quite amazing to see this vast expanse of land, a desert of shrubs and brown rocks, sometimes undulating and even hilly in feature, that stretch beyond one’s vision like a great brown sea to the horizon. Rapar is closer to the Little Rann of Kutchch and hence, is drier and hotter.

The road leads us into Bhachau, another taluka that registered massive onslaught of the earthquake. Bhachau still has heaps of rubble and debris and rows of broken houses that have still not been cleared. I look at the Bhachau village. The people have evacuated on to a different site close by, some have gone away to Surat or Ahmedabad to work, sending their families off to Bhuj. Half of Bhachau still stands as a ghost town.

Villagers in Radhanpura, Khirai and Chitrod villages have similar tales to tell. It is not that rehabilitation has not been carried out. There are colonies of houses of all designs and shapes built by agencies of all possible shades- the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party government, the Ramakrishna Mission, Larsen and Toubro, the Rajasthan government (this was recently inaugurated by Congress president Sonia Gandhi), NGO-industry collaborations and what have you. The villagers, especially those that are really poor, have indeed been benefited. They had never dreamt of making such pakka houses ever in their lives. It is the middle income segment in Bhuj or the well to do in Ahmedabad that have incurred losses running into lakhs and crores as their concrete houses tumbled.

“The earthquake did not leave a pattern in attacking the buildings,” said Nirali Mehta, a resident of Bhuj and my guide in Rapar. “While very tall water tanks and some high rise structures in Bhuj did not fall or even show cracks, small single storied buildings were flattened. Village people were all the more benefited because they got new hospitals and schools.”

Most villages around Rapar had houses built of massive stones. Stones for the poor of Rapar are the easily available materials for building houses, as rocky structures abound in the hilly slopes around Rapar. Little did they know that the killer quake would strike with such intensity, bringing down their homes.

Somewhere in the middle of everything there are striking patches of greenery. Some look like lush crops, others sway by the roadside, painting the picture of an oasis before my tired eyes. “The crop looking things are fodder for cattle, ” says Mahesh, adding, “the greens flanking the road is bawar, a plant that grows anywhere and very fast. The seeds of bawar were strewn from helicopter during Indira Gandhi’s time because they thought this is good for social forestry. Once the bawar grows it looks lush green. But we know it is very bad for the soil, it makes the soil even drier and its roots do not come off easily. Now they are trying to slash and burn it all down, in an attempt to clear it completely. ”

I am stunned by the semi desert landscape and before I recover totally, I am led into a dusty lane housing the Save the Children (SC) office of Rapar. In this taluka the SC is building a number of integrated child care development service centres (ICDS) or anganwadi as these are locally known as, balwadis, primary health centres, and health service centres. It is a huge project and in most cases, the land has been donated by villagers themselves.

Although Rapar is comparatively backward than Bhuj, in the town there are a good number of people obtain income mainly from members working in big cities or in foreign lands. It is not unusual for a Rapar town resident to own 5-6 well turned out concrete buildings, rent them out or lend out stuff in credit for as much as Rs 3-4 lakh.

But Fatehgadh, the largest village in Rapar which has a population of about 8-10 thousand, have living conditions that may be called squalid. The people here are mostly dependent on subsistence agriculture that takes place one time in a year as rainfall is scant and on cattle rearing. “They mostly grow some wheat or jowar or bajra, if rains are satisfactory,” says Rajib Satapathi of SC Rapar office, “They even grow jeera (cumin seeds), as cash crop, to earn more money. Or else they sell milk.”

Vegetables come from Rapar main market or Bhuj and they are painfully limited in variety. About 50 per cent cattle had perished in droughts and the subsequent quake, hence cattle rearing has also become tough for villagers. It is regular to have drinking water delivered by tankers. “Often if we have got a tanker for our construction purpose, it is taken away by villagers. What can you say in matters of water scarcity!” Rajib says.

While NRI money seems to be controlling the fate of Bhuj in Kutchch, Rapar and Anjar talukas particularly do not seem to be offering any quality life for its people. It is only natural that education and health care among the people is also abysmally low. In fact, the PHC that SC is building in Fatehgadh village, would be the first of its kind in this area. The plan has been developed in consultation with the community. Villagers would have 24 hours access to doctors, medicines, complete with male and female wards.

The anganwadi in Fatehgadh too looks impressive. The most significant aspect of it is that the structure has been developed after exclusively consulting the children of the village. Anganwadis are traditional children’s schools and training centres which also provide them pre-school teaching and provide nutrition. Gujarat has an impressive anganwadi movement. Taking off from there, SC planned its intervention after the earthquake devastated several of such anganwadi buildings, health centres etc and devised a child-centric programme.

From the terrace of the near completed PHC I am shown the dusty roads leading to Devisar village. The residents settled there after the 1971 war. The approach to the village is not good, there is no electricity in Devisar, but almost 60 per cent households have telephones, thanks again to NRI connections. After Fatehgadh, there are mines where Devisar residents work. White soil is excavated for making porcelain which is mainly exported. There is some coal mining too, I am told.

On the way back again Rapar landscape numbs my mind. I see a couple of cowherds assembling fodder for their livestock, cross busy Bhachau shops in tin shades (now that they are scared to build stone structures), look at that vast expanse of coarse brown land clinically halved by the metalled road – a land that is without a single drop of water below or any speck of shadow of a rain cloud above. Despite such tough terrain, repeated droughts and the quake’s ravages, life goes on here, still.