Monday, November 19, 2012
The Courier
Thursday, October 11, 2012
'Celebrating' the girl child?
Today is October 11, 2012: The International Day of the Girl Child. A plea, rather than a celebration, against the backdrop of ever-increasing atrocities against women and the girl child. An expression of shame for being a society where sons are perceived as assets for being members of the physically stronger, financially and socially empowered sex and daughters as financial liabilities and a potential source of social embarrassment and shame for their parents.
For being a bestial society where women, being disadvantaged solely in terms of sheer brute force, are perceived as fair game for myriad forms of molestation, be it against their dignity in the form of catcalls and ‘eve-teasing’ as they walk down a street or in a marketplace; or against their bodies and souls in the form of physical/ sexual abuse, both marital and non-marital; or against their self-esteem in the form of mental and emotional violence: in homes, in educational institutions, in workplaces. For being a nation where the states with the highest levels of prosperity are also ones the most ludicrously skewed sex ratios. For being a country where the affluent practice sex selection in conception of babies and sex conversion of their girl children.
For being a people who worship the Mother Goddess and simultaneously murder their daughters before birth and brutalize, humiliate, degrade, subjugate or commoditize them if they manage to be born. For being a country of bigots and zealots who quote Manu and Tulsidas, shorn of their contexts, to form Khaps that bolster their fragile sense of superiority and give them a platform to validate and legitimize their power plays through abuse of women.
SCENARIO I: A highly educated professional from a 'good family' is physically abused by her 'better half' because she went for a cup of coffee with colleagues from office and his mom had to have her evening tea made by the domestic help.
SCENARIO II: A wealthy business tycoon's trophy wife is not 'allowed' the time or space to recover fully from a hysterectomy because he needs his picture perfect hostess within a week of her surgery (those designer labels and jewels are, after all, investment, and his business socializing cannot wait upon the vagaries of something as trivial as her health!).
SCENARIO III: A perfectly sane, healthy, capable and self-supporting woman lies about visiting her parents or personal friends to avoid irrational showdowns at 'home'.
SCENARIO IV: A highly qualified professional, who runs her home, works full-time at a high-profile job, and handles the wherewithal of raising her children single-handedly, is put down and constantly criticized by a spouse still steeped in the age-old myths about male superiority, whose fragile ago is bruised by her lack of dependence on him (which he would have resented, in any case).
SCENARIO V: A hitherto hardworking, responsible dhobi (washerman) takes to drink when his wife delivers their fourth girl child: the astrologer had assured him it would be a son, otherwise he would have had the damn thing aborted! The old ladies in the families he works for bless him as he helps them up from chairs or runs small errands for them: “May the next one be a son”.
SCENARIO VI: A group of girls coming home from the school bus stop are accosted by a stranger who ‘flashes’ at them and calls out obscenities. They dare not mention this to their parents out of consideration for their trauma and fear of paranoid parental supervision. They carry large safety pins and their grandmothers’ knitting needles to ‘dissuade’ anyone who gets ideas about coming closer. Then, one day, four out of the five happen to be absent from school and the one who was present falls prey to the flasher and his cronies, who perceive the fact of her walking alone on the street as an invitation.
SCENARIO VII: A middle class professional is at the end of his tether because he has two professionally qualifies, good-looking, well-earning daughters of ‘marriageable age’ and the ‘going rate’ for halfway ‘decent’ grooms in his community is way beyond his reach. He wishes his daughters had been more ‘proactive’ and found partners for themselves. Odium from the community would have died out in time, after all!
SCENARIO VIII: The middle class parents of a girl married into a middle class family have lost their sleep and appetite because they know their daughter is miserable. She is constantly subjugated, derided and physically abused by her marital family. However, they are not in a position to do anything. They are financially unable to feed the avarice of her in-laws to induce them to let up on her. They have another daughter to be married off, so, bringing the first one back home from that hell hole is out of the question as well. They simply can’t afford it. Besides, what respectable family will consent to accept the younger one if the elder sister leaves her marital home? Further, even after the younger one is married off, how can they bring their abused daughter home? Their sons would not be willing to have a married sister foisted on them for life! The abused daughter holds on to life till her younger sister is married off. Three months later she hangs herself to escape her miserable existence.
SCENARIO IX: Two daughters-in-law in an extremely wealthy family are mentally and emotionally abused on the occasion of every festival as the ‘gifts’ from their parents are held up to ridicule and scorn. The girls’ parents get regular anxiety attacks weeks before every festival and celebration, trying to live up to expectations from their daughters’ families, which, of course, can never be met. It is a game of one-upmanship, after all. It is their due for having birthed sons, and those who have been cursed with daughters (no doubt, as a result of sins committed in previous births) deserve to be put down and penalized!
SCENARIO X: Just a few days ago, a highly educated, professional young woman in my neighbourhood watches fondly as her nine year old brat vandalizes an elderly neighbour’s lovingly cultivated plants. As a friend and I request her to stop her son, she turns and rends us: “You won’t understand, because you don’t have a son. Daughters listen when you tell them something. Sons are different. You need to let them do exactly as they please. These are only plants, after all!”
It would seem that those who wish to avoid the ‘burden’ of the girl child have reason, after all! How many people would see a ravening beast heading their way and not try to side-step it? How many would actually choose to lock horns with it?
And violence against women and the aversion for the girl child it is not really about men as aggressors and women as victim at all. Members of a society behave in ways that society rewards them for. In that sense, it is more about unacceptable societal mindsets springing from patriarchal systems that defined such roles for women as to place them in a position of subjugation as the contexts changed.
Is this perhaps why women in our society suffer from low self-esteem and spend a large part of their lives apologizing for being women? But we need to realize that times have changed. The contexts of societal systems have changed. It is high time our mindsets too changed in tandem. Along with the need for men to be sensitized, there is also need for women to come to a realization of their own strength and potential; to empower themselves on the mental and emotional levels. Else, conformity to the anachronistic expectations of traditional patriarchal societal norms will, as always, set the tone for our daughters' conditioning and psychological patterns that would haunt them all the lives.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Who Burnt the Bride?
A letter from a Mr. Yadav from Rajasthan is all over Facebook, accompanied by a photograph of a girl in the midst of some wedding ceremonies who, he says, was his sister who was brutally murdered by her in-laws in Jaipur on 26th January because her parents could not meet their never-ending demands for cash and other things. He says that the authorities have turned a deaf ear to all complaints and the culprits are still at large.
The usual endless rhetoric and rant against dowry seekers and bride-killers has been the inevitable outcome. We are rightly shamed as a society for this commoditization of our marriageable members, where sons continue to be auctioned off to the highest bidder and daughters continue to be regarded as lifelong liabilities, spawning atrocities such as those wreaked on 2 year-old Baby Falak who is currently battling the effects of brutalization at AIIMS, not to mention astronomical rates of female foeticide, still prevalent female infanticide and the horrific sex change surgeries performed on female children in Indore (and in other places too, for all we know) which were brought to public notice by the media last June.
The facts and figures of dowry deaths in our country are horrific and shameful. Despite the Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961 and its subsequent amendments in 1984 and 1986, the official figure for dowry deaths in the country was 6,500 per year, as reported in 1995. Thereafter, even though domestic violence too has been rendered punishable by law, the incidence of dowry deaths in the country continues to spread like an epidemic, with approximately 25,000 women being murdered every year for dowry, according to unofficial estimates.
However, I have a question here. Why is no one asking how far these women’s own parents and families are responsible for what happens to them? Of course, anyone who murders another person deserves the severest punishment possible, but while we rightly revile the perpetrators of such heinous crimes, why do we let off scott free those who stand by and watch their own daughters or sisters sinking into a morass which they can see is likely to end in murder, especially with all the instances around them?
If a parent throws his crippled child to a ravening wolf, or stands by and watches the wolf devouring his child, trying to placate it with offerings of food, but making no attempt to extract his child from the situation, isn't he, at some level, even more to blame than the wolf? The wolf, of course, needs to be shot. But should there not be some action taken against the parent too?
And that is exactly my question, for these women who get murdered for dowry are usually crippled with regard to empowerment and self-esteem. They are either pushed into these situations, or not rescued from them by their paternal families, or else, emotionally blackmailed into staying by the fear of social repercussions for their parental families.
And so, aren’t these women’s parental families party to these crimes as well? For raising their daughters with the conditioning that by the act of (compulsory) marriage, they relinquish all right to think, feel or fend for themselves—that is, if they had any, even while they were growing up? For feeding, as far as they are able, the fire of their in-laws’ greed, thus helping to propagate the evil that culminates in these women’s brutal murder? For placating the dowry monster with money and material offerings, and choosing to look the other way while their daughters drag out their miserable existence in such surroundings? For not lifting a finger to pull their daughters out of the clutches of such people, simply out of social cowardice, or maybe out of reluctance to disrupt their own lives?
The most ironical part is that even as bride burning statistics scale new heights, divorce rates in India have doubled over the past five years alone, with one marriage in every 1000 collapsing. The situation is symptomatic of the cultural duality typical of a society in a state of flux as it undergoes the transition from traditional values to mores dictated by the demands of contemporary lifestyles.
On one end of the spectrum are couples who seem disinclined t o invest adequate time or effort into their marriages. Statistics say these, for the most part, are ‘techie’ couples—highly qualified, double-income couples with little time or patience to spare from their jet-age lifestyles and a disconnect with traditional values—who seem to prefer to separate amicably rather than put emotional investment into their relationship. Since both partners are professionally, financially and materially self-sufficient and the pressure of traditions non-existent, divorce is virtually a snap decision.
On the other extreme are orthodox households steeped in age-old traditions, where divorce is still a social anathema, where the parents of a girl caught in an unhappy marriage are unwilling to support her even in the face of physical abuse and atrocities, preferring to placate her in-laws with material offerings rather than incur the social odium of their daughter ‘sitting at home’, and where it seems more expedient to the groom’s family to finish off an ‘unsatisfactory’ bride rather than resort to the socially unacceptable solution of a divorce.
While age-old attitudes and perceptions will essentially take time to change, one cannot help but feel that if only the women from such traditional families were brought up to be self-supporting, they might not be subjected to atrocities in the first place, largely because their in-laws would be deterred by the knowledge that if pushed too far, they had the wherewithal to opt out of the marriage without having to depend upon parental support. The parents too might be more supportive if they were unhampered by the fear that bailing their daughter out of an untenable marriage would land her, first on them and later on their sons, as a financial liability for the rest of her life.
In conclusion, I would like to entreat that in cases of bride burning, not only the in-laws of the victims, but also their parental families should come under investigation to determine the extent of their culpability, in feeding the fire of dowry demands on the one hand and coercing their daughters to continue in abusive marriages clearly heading towards catastrophe on the other.
Ultimately, let us not forget that there do exist in our society, numerous women from traditional backgrounds, who have managed to successfully walk away from abusive marriages and make a life for themselves (with or without children) despite parental exhortations to reunite with their abusive marital families, and they are living proof of the power of education and self-esteem.
The usual endless rhetoric and rant against dowry seekers and bride-killers has been the inevitable outcome. We are rightly shamed as a society for this commoditization of our marriageable members, where sons continue to be auctioned off to the highest bidder and daughters continue to be regarded as lifelong liabilities, spawning atrocities such as those wreaked on 2 year-old Baby Falak who is currently battling the effects of brutalization at AIIMS, not to mention astronomical rates of female foeticide, still prevalent female infanticide and the horrific sex change surgeries performed on female children in Indore (and in other places too, for all we know) which were brought to public notice by the media last June.
The facts and figures of dowry deaths in our country are horrific and shameful. Despite the Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961 and its subsequent amendments in 1984 and 1986, the official figure for dowry deaths in the country was 6,500 per year, as reported in 1995. Thereafter, even though domestic violence too has been rendered punishable by law, the incidence of dowry deaths in the country continues to spread like an epidemic, with approximately 25,000 women being murdered every year for dowry, according to unofficial estimates.
However, I have a question here. Why is no one asking how far these women’s own parents and families are responsible for what happens to them? Of course, anyone who murders another person deserves the severest punishment possible, but while we rightly revile the perpetrators of such heinous crimes, why do we let off scott free those who stand by and watch their own daughters or sisters sinking into a morass which they can see is likely to end in murder, especially with all the instances around them?
If a parent throws his crippled child to a ravening wolf, or stands by and watches the wolf devouring his child, trying to placate it with offerings of food, but making no attempt to extract his child from the situation, isn't he, at some level, even more to blame than the wolf? The wolf, of course, needs to be shot. But should there not be some action taken against the parent too?
And that is exactly my question, for these women who get murdered for dowry are usually crippled with regard to empowerment and self-esteem. They are either pushed into these situations, or not rescued from them by their paternal families, or else, emotionally blackmailed into staying by the fear of social repercussions for their parental families.
And so, aren’t these women’s parental families party to these crimes as well? For raising their daughters with the conditioning that by the act of (compulsory) marriage, they relinquish all right to think, feel or fend for themselves—that is, if they had any, even while they were growing up? For feeding, as far as they are able, the fire of their in-laws’ greed, thus helping to propagate the evil that culminates in these women’s brutal murder? For placating the dowry monster with money and material offerings, and choosing to look the other way while their daughters drag out their miserable existence in such surroundings? For not lifting a finger to pull their daughters out of the clutches of such people, simply out of social cowardice, or maybe out of reluctance to disrupt their own lives?
The most ironical part is that even as bride burning statistics scale new heights, divorce rates in India have doubled over the past five years alone, with one marriage in every 1000 collapsing. The situation is symptomatic of the cultural duality typical of a society in a state of flux as it undergoes the transition from traditional values to mores dictated by the demands of contemporary lifestyles.
On one end of the spectrum are couples who seem disinclined t o invest adequate time or effort into their marriages. Statistics say these, for the most part, are ‘techie’ couples—highly qualified, double-income couples with little time or patience to spare from their jet-age lifestyles and a disconnect with traditional values—who seem to prefer to separate amicably rather than put emotional investment into their relationship. Since both partners are professionally, financially and materially self-sufficient and the pressure of traditions non-existent, divorce is virtually a snap decision.
On the other extreme are orthodox households steeped in age-old traditions, where divorce is still a social anathema, where the parents of a girl caught in an unhappy marriage are unwilling to support her even in the face of physical abuse and atrocities, preferring to placate her in-laws with material offerings rather than incur the social odium of their daughter ‘sitting at home’, and where it seems more expedient to the groom’s family to finish off an ‘unsatisfactory’ bride rather than resort to the socially unacceptable solution of a divorce.
While age-old attitudes and perceptions will essentially take time to change, one cannot help but feel that if only the women from such traditional families were brought up to be self-supporting, they might not be subjected to atrocities in the first place, largely because their in-laws would be deterred by the knowledge that if pushed too far, they had the wherewithal to opt out of the marriage without having to depend upon parental support. The parents too might be more supportive if they were unhampered by the fear that bailing their daughter out of an untenable marriage would land her, first on them and later on their sons, as a financial liability for the rest of her life.
In conclusion, I would like to entreat that in cases of bride burning, not only the in-laws of the victims, but also their parental families should come under investigation to determine the extent of their culpability, in feeding the fire of dowry demands on the one hand and coercing their daughters to continue in abusive marriages clearly heading towards catastrophe on the other.
Ultimately, let us not forget that there do exist in our society, numerous women from traditional backgrounds, who have managed to successfully walk away from abusive marriages and make a life for themselves (with or without children) despite parental exhortations to reunite with their abusive marital families, and they are living proof of the power of education and self-esteem.
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Hindi Poems for Kids
बागीचा
मेरे घर का है जो बागीचा,
थोड़ा ऊंचा थोड़ा नीचा.
हरी दूब का एक गलीचा,
बड़े जतन से जिसको सींचा.
एक आम का पेड़ खड़ा है,
जिसपर झूला बहुत बड़ा है.
जगह-जगह फूलों की क्यारी
मन को लगती बहुत ही प्यारी.
रंग-बिरंगे फूल महकते,
तितली उड़ती, पंछी चहकते.
खुश कर देता है सबका मन
यह मेरा सुन्दर सा उपवन.
स्कूल
रोज़ सुबह जब उठते हैं हम
सारे बच्चे नटखट;
नहा-धोकर, वर्दी पहनकर
स्कूल पहुँचते झटपट.
बहुत मज़ा आता है स्कूल में,
हो मित्रों से मेल;
थोड़ी-थोड़ी करें पढ़ाई,
थोड़ा-थोड़ा खेल.
क्लास में टीचर पढ़ा रही है,
पर हम करते दंगल;
गुस्सा होकर टीचर बोली,
"क्या समझा है जंगल?"
"जल्दी-जल्दी कर लो पढ़ाई,
वरना सज़ा मिलेगी;
सब कुछ देख रही हूँ,
कोई बदमाशी ने चलेगी."
पर टीचर की यह सख्ती भी
हमको लगती प्यारी;
यह फटकार ही हमें कराती
जीवन की तैयारी.
"स्कूल के दिन फिर न लौटेंगे",
सभी हमें समझाते;
मौज मना लो, और बिता लो
यह दिन हँसते-गाते!
मेरे घर का है जो बागीचा,
थोड़ा ऊंचा थोड़ा नीचा.
हरी दूब का एक गलीचा,
बड़े जतन से जिसको सींचा.
एक आम का पेड़ खड़ा है,
जिसपर झूला बहुत बड़ा है.
जगह-जगह फूलों की क्यारी
मन को लगती बहुत ही प्यारी.
रंग-बिरंगे फूल महकते,
तितली उड़ती, पंछी चहकते.
खुश कर देता है सबका मन
यह मेरा सुन्दर सा उपवन.
स्कूल
रोज़ सुबह जब उठते हैं हम
सारे बच्चे नटखट;
नहा-धोकर, वर्दी पहनकर
स्कूल पहुँचते झटपट.
बहुत मज़ा आता है स्कूल में,
हो मित्रों से मेल;
थोड़ी-थोड़ी करें पढ़ाई,
थोड़ा-थोड़ा खेल.
क्लास में टीचर पढ़ा रही है,
पर हम करते दंगल;
गुस्सा होकर टीचर बोली,
"क्या समझा है जंगल?"
"जल्दी-जल्दी कर लो पढ़ाई,
वरना सज़ा मिलेगी;
सब कुछ देख रही हूँ,
कोई बदमाशी ने चलेगी."
पर टीचर की यह सख्ती भी
हमको लगती प्यारी;
यह फटकार ही हमें कराती
जीवन की तैयारी.
"स्कूल के दिन फिर न लौटेंगे",
सभी हमें समझाते;
मौज मना लो, और बिता लो
यह दिन हँसते-गाते!
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Of ‘Personal’ and ‘Institutionalized’ Corruption
India is up in arms. The populace is out on the streets in large numbers to unite under a 74 year-old satyagrahi who wants a ‘Jan Lokpal’, or an Ombudsman with teeth, as against the government proposed milk and water one. Of the protesting crowds few really know anything about the ‘Lokpal’ or the ‘Jan Lokpal’, under which banner they gave been united. So, it is natural to ask whether all of this is one gigantic farce.
To any thinking person the validity, or indeed, the rationale of a fourth body of government, or a Lokpal (‘Jan’ or otherwise) who would necessarily come from our own corrupt society is a matter of the gravest doubt. And even if the ‘Jan Lokpal’ were to materialize, history stands witness to the corrupting proclivities of ‘power’, and it is not unrealistic to say that it would not be long before there is a demand for a fifth body of government!
However, that having been said, it cannot be denied that the angst and the frustration of the people out on the streets and those expressing their support to the movement in various ways, is very real. And if one cares to listen carefully, one realizes that only a select few are actually talking about the Lokpal. The populace of the country en masse is voicing their support ‘against corruption by politicians’.
Why only politicians?
A thinking person, at this juncture, is bound to ask, what about corruption at the grassroots? Why pitch on politicians alone? Why not clean your own fingers before pointing at others’ spots?
What about people pulling strings or paying money to avoid a traffic ticket; to square the police in a hit-and-run; to get their child admitted into schools, colleges and professional institutes; to avoid a municipality challan for littering or for mosquito-infested water around the house; to get a ration card, a PAN card, a passport or a driving licence? What about the tacit consent, and even encouragement to corruption implicit in the high level of matrimonial eligibility of those who have a good proportion of unaccounted income, be it a tax-evading entrepreneur or a bribe-taking government employee?
What about milkmen diluting milk; vegetable vendors tipping the scales or palming off bad produce; shopkeepers short-changing the public and maintaining false bills; government employees presenting false tickets and bills to claim LTC and other payments that are realizable on actuals, misappropriating perks like transportation and various cash allowances for personal use; media persons accepting ‘gifts’ from industrialists and other vested interests in lieu of favourable stories that gloss over unpleasant facts? Let he who has never sinned cast the first stone!
Corruption at the micro and macro levels
The answer is yes, there has always been corruption—in our very fibre. It is not right or justified by any means. As the older generation says, ‘It’s always been there like a pinch of salt in the dough ... a sort of leaven.’ And yes, we need to address it, primarily through self discipline, and a determination not to give in to convenience and take the easy way out by greasing the wheels of government machinery. The laws that can bring this about are in place, but it needs the will of the people to make sure that they are enforced. It can be done, and is, indeed, being done by determined individuals who make it their priority. However, the fact remains, that even though it is regrettable and needs to be redressed, it is, nevertheless, corruption at a ‘personal’ or ‘micro’ level, each instance of which affects a handful of people. Micro level corruption very much exists, and is not right, but it is limited in its scope.
For the past few decades, however, the citizens of the country have been facing a steadily increasing level of ‘institutionalized’ or ‘macro level’ corruption that originates in high places. And this form of corruption is anything but limited in its scope.
The kickbacks in national and international deals, the misappropriation of public funds for various schemes, the blatant disregard for the law of the land exhibited by those holding positions of public trust and their families— it all happens on a mammoth scale and diverts public money from public spending to the secret accounts of a select few: Money that should have been used for the welfare of the citizens. Money that should have boosted subsidies to regulate the astronomical rise of fuel and food prices in the wake of the global economic downturn. Money that might have regulated the out-of-control spiral of inflation that is sucking the common man in like a cyclone.
The whiplash of inflation
With the misappropriation of money meant for public spending, the government is forced to resort to highly inflationary neo-liberal economic policies, which render the day-to-day lives of the populace hideous. The ‘people’s representatives’, with their cars running on fuel funded by the government (read taxpayers’ money), their canteens scandalously subsidized and their every wish for luxuries fulfilled by lobbying sycophants, remain insulated from the lash of inflation. Plus, of course, they have their loot in their secret foreign accounts to fall back upon: money that, as recent events have shown us, no one can make them disgorge, even if they are prosecuted and have to spend some time in discomfort. The ‘representatives of the people’ avail regular foreign junkets while the common man, intimidated by the expense, cuts down on the quantity of vegetables and fruits his family consumes and even the middle class debates how to avoid attending a dear cousin’s wedding.
With the common man writhing under the whiplash of inflation, which is, to a large extent, a direct outcome of this increasing ‘macro-level corruption’, the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ has been widening rapidly. The crime rate has burgeoned as frustration, born out of highly divergent standards of living, brings out the worst in those existing on the fringes of society. And the people of India, so far acquiescent, have been forced against the ropes, as they feel totally stripped by their ‘elected representatives’ of all financial, physical and moral security.
And so, when an Anna Hazare, with his track record of successful social activism (water harvesting and anti-liquor drive in his own village, RTI activism at the national level, etc.) comes along and suggests a ‘Jan Lokpal’ as a panacea for corruption in high places, the people are bound to follow—not for the Lokpal, but against ‘macro-level’ corruption, because they have reached a pitch where they have very little to lose. His agitation has the right mix of populism, media savvy and a Gandhian reference to find a connect with the people.
One needs to read one’s history and remember that Queen Marie Antionette’s reported remark ‘let them eat cakes if they have no bread’ was the igniting spark for the French Revolution!
Thursday, August 18, 2011
A Nation on the Warpath
The entirely unprecedented and unexpected countrywide uprising of the populace in protest against Anna Hazare’s arrest has been a resounding slap on the government’s face, indeed. And although Anna’s manifesto explicitly states that they are not opposing any particular political party, but corruption in the country as a whole, the fact remains, that the central government, by virtue of being the entity in power, has ended up with egg on its face!
Having got away with their heavy-handed tactics with the Saffron Baba a couple of months ago, (as well as with an unending list of scams) they seem to have expected to literally ‘get away with murder’ in perpetuity. And so, the turning of the worm, that is the long-suffering, so-far-acquiescent Indian public, was the last thing they anticipated, or indeed, were prepared for!
The drama continues on multiple levels: the various factions of the opposition have been rendered temporary bedfellows, as the saying is, for the purpose of reviling the government; the Baba has not been slow to rush in to grab a piece of the limelight. And in perhaps one of the most farcical twists in the entire imbroglio, the populace, having offered arrests en masse and bundled into Chhatrasal Stadium, has been reportedly demanding that the overflow be accommodated in Nehru Stadium ‘to get some value out of the public’s money squandered in the name of the Commonwealth Games’!
Now, pacifists and ivory tower intellectuals have been heard to condemn fasts-unto-death as blackmail and thus, undemocratic—no less a personage than Dr. Ambedkar being quoted ad nauseam to this effect over the past months. However, the point that has been missed here is that desperate situations call for desperate measures. And for the common man, writhing under the twin whiplashes of corruption and inflation, the situation is desperate indeed!
As scams upon scams surface with increasing frequency, and as no facet of public life is left untarnished by corruption and graft, the common man has, for the past decades, stood by helplessly, watching the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ getting wider and wider, bearing mute witness to ‘his elected representatives’ stripping the country of its dignity, the public of its hard-earned money and the citizens of security at all levels, be it physical, financial, emotional or moral!
The way politicians deal ‘democratically’ with swindlers and with rampant and unabashed corruption in public life is no secret. Given such blatant failure of the democratic machinery to effect checks, and the consequently worsening plight of the citizens of the country, if it takes a ‘fast-unto-death’ by a 74 year-old idealist to spur the youth of the nation into a definitive stance against injustice, so be it!
‘Anarchy!’ scream the pacifists. Really? And what would they call the prevailing state of lawlessness, complete lack of accountability by the people’s representatives and the comprehensive denuding of the citizens’ security? Why is it anarchy only when the people raise their voice, and not when the establishment fails them on all fronts?
And this is no tirade against the ruling party—as the Anna says, almost everyone in the political arena is equally culpable! ‘Why doesn’t Anna contest the elections?’ is hardly a valid argument. Those who did contest the election and were voted to power chose to do so themselves, and if they have abused the people’s trust and the responsibility reposed in them, the civil society has the right to call them to book. If they feel it is unfair, it would, perhaps, be better for them to step down from the public arena.
Having got away with their heavy-handed tactics with the Saffron Baba a couple of months ago, (as well as with an unending list of scams) they seem to have expected to literally ‘get away with murder’ in perpetuity. And so, the turning of the worm, that is the long-suffering, so-far-acquiescent Indian public, was the last thing they anticipated, or indeed, were prepared for!
The drama continues on multiple levels: the various factions of the opposition have been rendered temporary bedfellows, as the saying is, for the purpose of reviling the government; the Baba has not been slow to rush in to grab a piece of the limelight. And in perhaps one of the most farcical twists in the entire imbroglio, the populace, having offered arrests en masse and bundled into Chhatrasal Stadium, has been reportedly demanding that the overflow be accommodated in Nehru Stadium ‘to get some value out of the public’s money squandered in the name of the Commonwealth Games’!
Now, pacifists and ivory tower intellectuals have been heard to condemn fasts-unto-death as blackmail and thus, undemocratic—no less a personage than Dr. Ambedkar being quoted ad nauseam to this effect over the past months. However, the point that has been missed here is that desperate situations call for desperate measures. And for the common man, writhing under the twin whiplashes of corruption and inflation, the situation is desperate indeed!
As scams upon scams surface with increasing frequency, and as no facet of public life is left untarnished by corruption and graft, the common man has, for the past decades, stood by helplessly, watching the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ getting wider and wider, bearing mute witness to ‘his elected representatives’ stripping the country of its dignity, the public of its hard-earned money and the citizens of security at all levels, be it physical, financial, emotional or moral!
The way politicians deal ‘democratically’ with swindlers and with rampant and unabashed corruption in public life is no secret. Given such blatant failure of the democratic machinery to effect checks, and the consequently worsening plight of the citizens of the country, if it takes a ‘fast-unto-death’ by a 74 year-old idealist to spur the youth of the nation into a definitive stance against injustice, so be it!
‘Anarchy!’ scream the pacifists. Really? And what would they call the prevailing state of lawlessness, complete lack of accountability by the people’s representatives and the comprehensive denuding of the citizens’ security? Why is it anarchy only when the people raise their voice, and not when the establishment fails them on all fronts?
And this is no tirade against the ruling party—as the Anna says, almost everyone in the political arena is equally culpable! ‘Why doesn’t Anna contest the elections?’ is hardly a valid argument. Those who did contest the election and were voted to power chose to do so themselves, and if they have abused the people’s trust and the responsibility reposed in them, the civil society has the right to call them to book. If they feel it is unfair, it would, perhaps, be better for them to step down from the public arena.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Me First!
My favourite folk tale from Haryana …
‘Hmmm… something smells good!’
Chaudhary Maan Singh sniffed appreciatively as he entered the house, returning from his early morning chores on the farm. Having left at dawn with a thick leftover parantha and a glass of frothing milk, he was ravenous, and judging by the smell, Kalawati was frying some of her mouth-watering goodies! Ah!
He really was lucky, thought Maan as he washed his hands and feet at the pump in the courtyard. The Almighty certainly knew what he was doing when he matched a foodie like him with a fabulous cook like Kalawati. His parents too had left for the customary pilgrimage to Hardwar after his marriage, secure in the assurance that their daughter-in-law would take good care of their only son. And as for him, he just couldn’t get enough of her cooking, and had been systematically overeating ever since they got married, two months ago. Thanks heavens for farm work, or he’d have had trouble entering the house through the door!
In the kitchen Kalawati was frying gulgule and fuming: ‘Here he comes! I love cooking for him and like the fact that he loves my cooking; but he really is the limit—as long as there is anything special left, he just won’t stop stuffing himself! I cook in such enormous quantities, but not one bite do I get! I wish my duty as a wife did not forbid me to taste these gulgule before my husband, or I’d have sneaked a few before ever he set foot inside the house’.
‘GULGULE!’ exclaimed Maan as he entered the kitchen. He gazed adoringly, first at the mound of golden-brown balls of goodness piling up in the basket beside the stove, and then at his wife working her magic on the mundane flour and sugar. As he reached out for a couple, the unprecedented happened:
‘Don’t touch them!’ shrieked Kalawati.
‘Why?’ he was shocked. ‘I’ve washed my hands and feet!’
‘It’s not that …’, she hunted in her mind for a plausible reason … ‘They … they have to be taken to the temple for puja (ritual prayer) first,’ she blurted out.
‘What kind of puja?’ he asked, drawing back, disappointed.
‘Yesterday the panditji (priest) at the temple told me today is Ludhkan Chauth (ludhkan: to tumble; chauth: fourth day of the lunar month),’ she babbled, improvising wildly. ‘We fry gulgule and offer them up in prayers first. Then we bring them home and place them on the chhappar (the canopy that runs round the house). The ones that tumble down are to be eaten by the women and the ones that stay up are given to the men.’
She put out the stove and went to get ready for the temple, leaving Maan in a thoughtful mood.
‘Hmmm … that sounds peculiar! The chhappar slopes downwards, so obviously all the gulgule are going to tumble down … and she gets to eat the whole lot!!! And I’ll probably have to eat the khichdi (rice and lentil stew) or leftover paranthas she would have eaten after I was through with the gulgule … What nonsense!’
Rendered resourceful by the exigencies of his taste buds, he tied some bamboo poles all round the lower edge of the canopy. ‘There! Now let’s see how many gulgule are able to escape!’
Kalawati, meanwhile, went to the temple with the basket of gulgule and rendered prayers and apologies for her perfidy. ‘But I just can’t take it any more dear God,’ she pleaded. ‘I too have the right to eat good things for a change—something apart from the leftover paranthas that usually fall to my lot when my insensate lump of a husband is through guzzling on the goodies I make for him—I do think I have the right to at least a bite or two!’
Wending homewards, and feeling thoroughly guilty by now, she thought, ‘I can’t possibly eat all these. I’ll keep a few for myself and make up some kind of a tale and give him all the rest,’ when she saw from a distance, her Lord and Master, atop the roof with bamboo poles and ropes.
‘Oho! So it’s like that, is it?’ she thought, with the light of battle in her eye, taking in the situation at a glance. ‘Well, we shall see who wins: brain or brawn!’ By the time she reached home, Maan was back down, looking quite innocent and the bamboo poles were out of sight from the ground.
‘Hey! Good news for you,’ she chirped with a smile on her face. ‘Panditji says he’d mistaken the lunar date. Today is actually Reh Reh Paanche (reh: remain behind; paanche: fifth day of the lunar month). So, that means, that the gulgule that remain on the canopy are eaten by the women, and the ones that tumble down go to the men…’
And she sailed away in triumph, to scatter the gulgule on the canopy …
How to make Gulgule
Ingredients: (8 to 10 pieces)
1 cup wholewheat flour (atta)
½ cup sugar
1 tsp powdered fennel (saunf)
A pinch of baking soda
Oil for frying
Procedure:
Mix the flour, sugar, powdered fennel and baking soda together. Dissolve in just enough water to get dropping consistency. Cover and keep for 5 minutes.
Heat the oil in the kadahi or deep pan. When it starts smoking, drop in tablespoonfuls of the batter and fry to a light golden.
Drain and remove from the oil on a newspaper or sheet of blotting paper to soak the excess oil.
Can serve either as finger snacks or in combination with kheer (see recipe in 'Sweet Nostalgia').
Gulgule and kheer as a combination is a traditional monsoon snack in many parts of North India.
Additional tips:
Can use crushed gur (jaggery) instead of sugar to make it more nutritious.
Can mash a small overripe banana into the mixture to increase fiber and mineral content.
Can add powdered almonds into the batter to make the gulgule crisper.
‘Hmmm… something smells good!’
Chaudhary Maan Singh sniffed appreciatively as he entered the house, returning from his early morning chores on the farm. Having left at dawn with a thick leftover parantha and a glass of frothing milk, he was ravenous, and judging by the smell, Kalawati was frying some of her mouth-watering goodies! Ah!
He really was lucky, thought Maan as he washed his hands and feet at the pump in the courtyard. The Almighty certainly knew what he was doing when he matched a foodie like him with a fabulous cook like Kalawati. His parents too had left for the customary pilgrimage to Hardwar after his marriage, secure in the assurance that their daughter-in-law would take good care of their only son. And as for him, he just couldn’t get enough of her cooking, and had been systematically overeating ever since they got married, two months ago. Thanks heavens for farm work, or he’d have had trouble entering the house through the door!
In the kitchen Kalawati was frying gulgule and fuming: ‘Here he comes! I love cooking for him and like the fact that he loves my cooking; but he really is the limit—as long as there is anything special left, he just won’t stop stuffing himself! I cook in such enormous quantities, but not one bite do I get! I wish my duty as a wife did not forbid me to taste these gulgule before my husband, or I’d have sneaked a few before ever he set foot inside the house’.
‘GULGULE!’ exclaimed Maan as he entered the kitchen. He gazed adoringly, first at the mound of golden-brown balls of goodness piling up in the basket beside the stove, and then at his wife working her magic on the mundane flour and sugar. As he reached out for a couple, the unprecedented happened:
‘Don’t touch them!’ shrieked Kalawati.
‘Why?’ he was shocked. ‘I’ve washed my hands and feet!’
‘It’s not that …’, she hunted in her mind for a plausible reason … ‘They … they have to be taken to the temple for puja (ritual prayer) first,’ she blurted out.
‘What kind of puja?’ he asked, drawing back, disappointed.
‘Yesterday the panditji (priest) at the temple told me today is Ludhkan Chauth (ludhkan: to tumble; chauth: fourth day of the lunar month),’ she babbled, improvising wildly. ‘We fry gulgule and offer them up in prayers first. Then we bring them home and place them on the chhappar (the canopy that runs round the house). The ones that tumble down are to be eaten by the women and the ones that stay up are given to the men.’
She put out the stove and went to get ready for the temple, leaving Maan in a thoughtful mood.
‘Hmmm … that sounds peculiar! The chhappar slopes downwards, so obviously all the gulgule are going to tumble down … and she gets to eat the whole lot!!! And I’ll probably have to eat the khichdi (rice and lentil stew) or leftover paranthas she would have eaten after I was through with the gulgule … What nonsense!’
Rendered resourceful by the exigencies of his taste buds, he tied some bamboo poles all round the lower edge of the canopy. ‘There! Now let’s see how many gulgule are able to escape!’
Kalawati, meanwhile, went to the temple with the basket of gulgule and rendered prayers and apologies for her perfidy. ‘But I just can’t take it any more dear God,’ she pleaded. ‘I too have the right to eat good things for a change—something apart from the leftover paranthas that usually fall to my lot when my insensate lump of a husband is through guzzling on the goodies I make for him—I do think I have the right to at least a bite or two!’
Wending homewards, and feeling thoroughly guilty by now, she thought, ‘I can’t possibly eat all these. I’ll keep a few for myself and make up some kind of a tale and give him all the rest,’ when she saw from a distance, her Lord and Master, atop the roof with bamboo poles and ropes.
‘Oho! So it’s like that, is it?’ she thought, with the light of battle in her eye, taking in the situation at a glance. ‘Well, we shall see who wins: brain or brawn!’ By the time she reached home, Maan was back down, looking quite innocent and the bamboo poles were out of sight from the ground.
‘Hey! Good news for you,’ she chirped with a smile on her face. ‘Panditji says he’d mistaken the lunar date. Today is actually Reh Reh Paanche (reh: remain behind; paanche: fifth day of the lunar month). So, that means, that the gulgule that remain on the canopy are eaten by the women, and the ones that tumble down go to the men…’
And she sailed away in triumph, to scatter the gulgule on the canopy …
How to make Gulgule
Ingredients: (8 to 10 pieces)
1 cup wholewheat flour (atta)
½ cup sugar
1 tsp powdered fennel (saunf)
A pinch of baking soda
Oil for frying
Procedure:
Mix the flour, sugar, powdered fennel and baking soda together. Dissolve in just enough water to get dropping consistency. Cover and keep for 5 minutes.
Heat the oil in the kadahi or deep pan. When it starts smoking, drop in tablespoonfuls of the batter and fry to a light golden.
Drain and remove from the oil on a newspaper or sheet of blotting paper to soak the excess oil.
Can serve either as finger snacks or in combination with kheer (see recipe in 'Sweet Nostalgia').
Gulgule and kheer as a combination is a traditional monsoon snack in many parts of North India.
Additional tips:
Can use crushed gur (jaggery) instead of sugar to make it more nutritious.
Can mash a small overripe banana into the mixture to increase fiber and mineral content.
Can add powdered almonds into the batter to make the gulgule crisper.
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Madness at Midnight!
I wake up sweating and swatting (mosquitoes) in the middle of the night. Hubby is swearing under his breath, mindful of the 11 year-old making irritated noises from her bed at the other end of the room.
A power cut on a sweltering July night. I’d been sleeping like the dead after an especially exhausting day, but to judge by the vibes of irritation eddying about in the pitch dark, and from my own drenched and mosquito-bitten condition, the power must have been out for some time.
“About one hour,” growls hubby.
“What do they say at NDPL?”
“No idea ... haven’t called!”
“Why not?” I’m indignant. “Am I the only one who can call up and lodge a power cut complaint in this house?”
“Yes, because the number is saved in your phone and I didn’t fancy groping all over the house in the dark for it,” he says unanswerably.
“And whatever happened to the inverter?” I shrill. “At least the fans and light bulbs should be working!’
“The batteries dried up, remember? And you were out every day this week, so there was no one to get them serviced,” he reminds me.
Oh! So now it’s my fault! Typical!
“My night’s rest is ruined!” wails kiddo. “How will I ever wake up in time for school tomorrow?”
“Don’t even start!” I snub her. “You cannot stay home from school tomorrow.”
“Oh, but ...”
“No buts ... you are old enough to be able to do with a little less sleep for one day.”
As she subsides, muttering, I grumpily retrieve my phone from its nightly resting place under my pillow (for the morning alarm, as hubby should very well have known) and ring up NDPL.
“Good-Evening- NDPL- ‘XYZ’-here-How-may-I-help-you?” rattles off the voice at the other end, without break and without expression.
“I need to lodge a power cut complaint for ABC Colony, PQR Zone, New Delhi, India.” The process is outsourced now, so the call center guy needs to know the precise geographical location. And although I was told that the call center is at the other end of the city, it is better to play safe and provide complete information.
“Which part of ABC Colony are you calling from?”
Suppressing the urge to say, “the part between its ears”, I hold on to my patience and reply, “I’m calling from house no. 123, the residence of Mr. Goyal.”
“What is your exact location?” comes the next question and patience flies out of the window.
“Talk sense!” I snap. “I’ve told you the number of the house, the name of its owner, the colony, zone, city and country. What more do you want to know—the location of the room I’m calling from?”
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Ma’am,” the BPO operator reverts to the standard fallback.
“May I know your K number?” comes the next query.
“My WHAT?”
“K number—the 10 digit number on the top left corner of your electricity bill ...”
“Why in heaven’s name do you need the K number?” I ask, amazed.
“Our system can track you and lodge your complaint only by your K number,” comes the deadpan reply.
I’m speechless.
"Then why were you badgering me about the minutae of my location?"
“What’s the problem?” asks hubby.
“They want our K number to lodge our complaint!”
Hubby takes the phone from my hand and says with awful patience: “Listen mister, it’s past midnight and pitch dark. The 10 digit K number is not something you remember off-hand. You have our name, address and phone number. Surely your system can register our complaint on the basis of these details?”
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Sir,” parrots the operator. “Your complaint cannot be lodged without your K number.”
Hubby disconnects the phone in dudgeon, muttering, “Go to hell!”
Half an hour elapses. The heat, humidity and mosquitos are getting more and more unbearable by the minute. I get up, cursing, switch on the flashlight in the phone, stumble over to the chest of drawers and scrabble around for an electricity bill. Call up NDPL again.
“Good-Evening- NDPL- ‘XYZ’-here- How-may-I-help-you?”
“I’m calling from house no. 123, Mr. Goyal’s residence in ABC Colony, PQR Zone, New Delhi, India. I need to lodge a power cut complaint and our K number is ----------,” I say triumphantly.
“How long has the power been out at your place?”
“More than an hour and a half!”
But if I thought I had cracked the NDPL complaint system, I had another think coming.
“Is it just your place, or the whole colony?”
“Now, how the hell am I supposed to know that in the middle of the night?” I ask in exasperation. “Conduct a door-to-door survey?”
“NOW what do they want to know?” asks hubby resignedly.
“Whether the power is out at just our place or in the whole colony!”
Hubby takes over the phone.
“Mister, you have been provided all the details you need to lodge a power cut complaint, including the K number. Now please register our complaint and let us know the complaint serial number,” he instructs in his Senior MNC Manager voice. It apparently cuts no ice with the programmed automaton on the other end of the line.
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Sir, but ...”
“DON’T KEEP APOLOGIZING,” bellows hubby, past patience now. “JUST REGISTER THE COMPLAINT SO THAT SOMEONE CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!”
The instruction to ‘DO SOMEHTING’ is clearly not part of the automaton’s programming. It gets confused and promptly disconnects the line! We try again ... and again ... but the receiver is off the hook!
A power cut on a sweltering July night. I’d been sleeping like the dead after an especially exhausting day, but to judge by the vibes of irritation eddying about in the pitch dark, and from my own drenched and mosquito-bitten condition, the power must have been out for some time.
“About one hour,” growls hubby.
“What do they say at NDPL?”
“No idea ... haven’t called!”
“Why not?” I’m indignant. “Am I the only one who can call up and lodge a power cut complaint in this house?”
“Yes, because the number is saved in your phone and I didn’t fancy groping all over the house in the dark for it,” he says unanswerably.
“And whatever happened to the inverter?” I shrill. “At least the fans and light bulbs should be working!’
“The batteries dried up, remember? And you were out every day this week, so there was no one to get them serviced,” he reminds me.
Oh! So now it’s my fault! Typical!
“My night’s rest is ruined!” wails kiddo. “How will I ever wake up in time for school tomorrow?”
“Don’t even start!” I snub her. “You cannot stay home from school tomorrow.”
“Oh, but ...”
“No buts ... you are old enough to be able to do with a little less sleep for one day.”
As she subsides, muttering, I grumpily retrieve my phone from its nightly resting place under my pillow (for the morning alarm, as hubby should very well have known) and ring up NDPL.
“Good-Evening- NDPL- ‘XYZ’-here-How-may-I-help-you?” rattles off the voice at the other end, without break and without expression.
“I need to lodge a power cut complaint for ABC Colony, PQR Zone, New Delhi, India.” The process is outsourced now, so the call center guy needs to know the precise geographical location. And although I was told that the call center is at the other end of the city, it is better to play safe and provide complete information.
“Which part of ABC Colony are you calling from?”
Suppressing the urge to say, “the part between its ears”, I hold on to my patience and reply, “I’m calling from house no. 123, the residence of Mr. Goyal.”
“What is your exact location?” comes the next question and patience flies out of the window.
“Talk sense!” I snap. “I’ve told you the number of the house, the name of its owner, the colony, zone, city and country. What more do you want to know—the location of the room I’m calling from?”
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Ma’am,” the BPO operator reverts to the standard fallback.
“May I know your K number?” comes the next query.
“My WHAT?”
“K number—the 10 digit number on the top left corner of your electricity bill ...”
“Why in heaven’s name do you need the K number?” I ask, amazed.
“Our system can track you and lodge your complaint only by your K number,” comes the deadpan reply.
I’m speechless.
"Then why were you badgering me about the minutae of my location?"
“What’s the problem?” asks hubby.
“They want our K number to lodge our complaint!”
Hubby takes the phone from my hand and says with awful patience: “Listen mister, it’s past midnight and pitch dark. The 10 digit K number is not something you remember off-hand. You have our name, address and phone number. Surely your system can register our complaint on the basis of these details?”
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Sir,” parrots the operator. “Your complaint cannot be lodged without your K number.”
Hubby disconnects the phone in dudgeon, muttering, “Go to hell!”
Half an hour elapses. The heat, humidity and mosquitos are getting more and more unbearable by the minute. I get up, cursing, switch on the flashlight in the phone, stumble over to the chest of drawers and scrabble around for an electricity bill. Call up NDPL again.
“Good-Evening- NDPL- ‘XYZ’-here- How-may-I-help-you?”
“I’m calling from house no. 123, Mr. Goyal’s residence in ABC Colony, PQR Zone, New Delhi, India. I need to lodge a power cut complaint and our K number is ----------,” I say triumphantly.
“How long has the power been out at your place?”
“More than an hour and a half!”
But if I thought I had cracked the NDPL complaint system, I had another think coming.
“Is it just your place, or the whole colony?”
“Now, how the hell am I supposed to know that in the middle of the night?” I ask in exasperation. “Conduct a door-to-door survey?”
“NOW what do they want to know?” asks hubby resignedly.
“Whether the power is out at just our place or in the whole colony!”
Hubby takes over the phone.
“Mister, you have been provided all the details you need to lodge a power cut complaint, including the K number. Now please register our complaint and let us know the complaint serial number,” he instructs in his Senior MNC Manager voice. It apparently cuts no ice with the programmed automaton on the other end of the line.
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Sir, but ...”
“DON’T KEEP APOLOGIZING,” bellows hubby, past patience now. “JUST REGISTER THE COMPLAINT SO THAT SOMEONE CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!”
The instruction to ‘DO SOMEHTING’ is clearly not part of the automaton’s programming. It gets confused and promptly disconnects the line! We try again ... and again ... but the receiver is off the hook!
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Paradise on the Pavement
Kitaab Bazaar or the Patri (pavement) Book Market in Darya Ganj, in the walled city of Old Delhi, is an institution in its own right. The pavements of this oldest commercial hub of the Capital, which bustles with activity from Monday to Saturday, continue to be the venue of one of the largest known markets for used books every Sunday for the past 50 years and more. The market stretches along the pavements of the spine of Darya Ganj, Netaji Subhash Marg, for more than a kilometer, from Delhi Gate to the Iron Bridge. It houses more than 200 bookstalls every Sunday and attracts about 25,000 devotees on a normal business day, and is as much a part of the city’s identity as Paranthe Wali Gali, Kinari Bazaar, or indeed, India Gate, Red Fort, Parliament House or the Rashtrapati Bhawan.
For the Capital’s bibliophiles—indeed, bibliomaniacs—who haunt the hallowed pavements of Darya Ganj compulsively every week, missing their ‘Sunday’ is a major catastrophe, and there abound tales of domestic strife and family feuds that have arisen around their obduracy over it. The tales seem exaggerated, as they did to me before I became a part of it, but what happened on that first Sunday beguiled me into the cult of the Kitaab Bazaar fanatics, which I remain to this day.
My first impression of Kitaab Bazaar was that of an infinite ocean of books as far as the eye could see. I was first lured there at the age of 19 by the prospect of being able to indulge in my passion for buying books at prices that would not strain my college allowance. Regulars to the bazaar proudly declare that one may find any book in the English or Hindi language that has ever been published in any part of the world. And indeed, the place seemed like heaven to me on that first Sunday when I was initiated into the fellowship of Delhi’s book lovers.
Having been told that, (a) the place was the Mecca of book lovers, and (b) that it was advisable to reach there in the early hours before the hordes rushed in, one winter Sunday in my 20th year found me confronting the vacant pavements of Netaji Subhash Marg at 8.15 in the morning, waiting for the appearance of a bazaar that officially opens at 9 am and goes on till 9 pm.
I had not long to wait, for by 8.30 am, the bookseller with their stacks and stacks of books started arriving and unpacking their wares, and proceeded before my fascinated eyes, to transform that bare stretch of pavement into my notion of paradise!
Finding myself almost the only customer at that hour, I prepared to browse to my heart’s content, and soon realized that the claim of being able to find there any book in English or Hindi that has been published anywhere in the world was no idle boast! The sheer number and volumes of books of every shape, colour, size and subject was overwhelming, to say the least.
Forgotten friends would turn up in different clothes (covers), and just as I would reach out for them delightedly, some tantalizing newcomer would beckon invitingly. And very soon I was in the grip of a bibliomanic frenzy—much like an alcoholic running amok in a well-stocked cellar!
Grabbing greedily at Agatha Christie whodunits; browsing reverentially through Tolstoy’s unabridged War and Peace (and then, looking incredulously at the unbelievable price, hastily buying and stowing away the hefty volume in a polybag); augmenting Dad’s collection of Wodehouse humour back home with four well-chosen gems; even finding some items that had been missing from my childhood collection of Enid Blyton series—I was soon staggering around, weighed down by the unbelievable finds at unbelievable prices.
My saner self told me that it was sheer idiocy to go further down the market carrying a donkey-load of books, when I could very well do this another Sunday—actually, every Sunday, if I so desired (and I have been doing it most Sundays that I can manage). Common sense told me that I was already chin deep in trouble, as I now had the task of getting this load of more than 20 books back home, which was a round 20 kilometers away, and that too by DTC bus—the alternative was to blow up on the fare of an auto rickshaw all that I had saved on the books!
However, insanity, my guiding light for the day, egged me on to a final bookstall, and there the miracle happened! Browsing as usual, I suddenly saw a very familiar and popular book on childcare, the sight of which made my heart skip a beat. This was a used copy of an out-of-print book that had been my mother’s parenting bible.
I had lent the book two years ago to a friend whose sister had been expecting her first baby and was desperate for ‘some good literature’ on the subject. The friend had left Delhi with her family about six months after the incident, without bothering to return the book, and I had been dreading the day when Mom would inevitably miss the book amidst the hundreds of books in the bookshelves at home.
Now was my chance to replace the book without her noticing … after all, she was hardly ever likely to want to open it again, since all three of us were grown up. I rested the bulging bags of my purchases on the ground and reached out for the book. It felt absurdly familiar in my hands. And opening it at the cover page I found Mom’s name scrawled across the top in her own handwriting! Madam’s family had obviously ‘disposed of’ unwanted items before moving and Mom’s book had found its way back home via the Kitaab Bazaar.
So, now I am a firm adherent of the bazaar, and never again will I doubt that one can, indeed find here ANY book in English or Hindi published anywhere in the world!
Love in the Indian Joint Family
Everybody loves a love story, especially a real life one. But, while stories of people who had the courage to break the bounds of convention hold universal appeal, there also exist real life stories of deep and abiding love between people who live out their lives within the shackles of convention, in soul-destroying conditions, and yet, find the strength, through their love, to create a special world of their own that nothing can impinge upon. And here the allusion is not to poverty or material hardships (that’s a separate story for another occasion), but to unnecessary, created ones, stemming from insecurities that engender intolerance, jealousy, envy and set in motion chains of sordid, unsavoury events that are carefully kept within wraps to safeguard the family’s ‘honour’ in public.
Indian society has always prided itself upon its system of family support. However, this support often comes at the almost prohibitive price of avid interference, intrusion and imposition, not to mention the never-ending power games. While cases of exemplary support from in-laws do exist (albeit rarely), and those of exploitation of elders by the younger generations are publicized far and wide, the travails of young couples locked in the stranglehold of family pressures, guilt trips and unreasonable expectations often go unsung. Almost the only place these are aired is on family soap operas on the idiot box, to be treated with disdain by ‘sensible people’. So, it is quite on the cards that a number of readers might find the incidents discussed here either improbable, or even exasperating, just like people’s reactions to the movie ‘Patiala House’—while most positive, go-ahead people panned the movie in unequivocal terms, the story of the depressive, defeated, dutiful son struck a chord with a number of people who are themselves unable to break free of similar situations due to a (maybe misplaced) sense of filial duty.
The anecdotes referred to here are real life stories. However, the names have been changed, as have some minor details, since the protagonists have put their duty towards their family foremost all their lives and have agreed to let this story see the light of day only under condition of anonymity. And while the cases mentioned here have successfully navigated the shoals of family pressures and expectations, there are many, many others who have been forced apart … either into the divorce courts, or into legal separations, and sometimes, even to suicide.
Sadhana from an affluent Delhi-based business family relates how she and her husband were startled by an urgent banging on their door, minutes after they had entered their room on their wedding night. It was her husband’s sister, furious with her brother for wanting to spend time with his bride, and with the ‘usurper’ Sadhana for suddenly becoming so important in his life. The lady and her mother continue to do their utmost to wreak havoc in the couple’s married life, even after almost 15 years of marriage!
Incredible as it might sound to a rational mind, there are innumerable such cases that no one talks about—in metropolitan cities, no less. Bela from Mumbai shares how her extremely orthodox and ritual-loving mother-in-law brought her into the house after marriage without performing any of the traditional threshold rites. Thereafter she stood guard over her for about 12 hours, refusing to let her son be alone with his bride, till she was forcibly evicted (laughingly) by some helpful relatives. And in this 12-hour period of vigil she even managed to plonk herself in the middle of their marriage bed and take a two-hour nap, while the newly-weds and all the relatives stared at each other in shock!
Rama, the daughter of an affluent Delhi businessman married her college sweetheart after seven years of waiting for him to become ‘self-supporting’ and started her married life in a two-bedroom government quarter in South Delhi—the bride of the second of her parents-in-laws’ three sons. In spite of the fact that the sons were all earning well and could very well afford larger living space, the in-laws were adamant about ‘living together’. Rama and her husband were assigned a ‘bedroom’ made of plywood boards in a corner of the lobby, with a queen-sized bed and a rickety wardrobe. And to add to it, they were not allowed to shut the door—if they did, the in-laws would start hammering at it hysterically!
Aruna was married into a ‘traditional north-Indian joint family’—in Detroit, USA, of all places—in the late 1990s. She was expected to cover her head in the presence of elders, not speak to her husband in public (much less, touch him), and to take over the entire running of the household (albeit without any authority or decision-making power) from the day she got married. To top it all, her father-in-law, a cancer patient for the past seven years—a fact that Aruna’s parents had been unaware of—succumbed to his illness within a year of her marriage, earning for her the stigma of ‘manhoos’ (inauspicious), and causing untold misery in her married life.
The couples in these cases—and innumerable others like them—have managed to find their equilibrium after the inevitable misunderstandings, heart-burnings and tumultuous times, sometimes lasting as long as 10 years. Some have found their answers in spirituality, others in a blind adherence to astrology and the occult sciences, and yet others in mastering the art of ignoring irrelevances. Life goes on, and people learn to work their way around the most difficult situations. However, an interesting observation in most such cases is that the elders are usually people who migrated to metros from small towns or to Western countries from India. While never having lived in joint families for any length of time themselves, they are, nevertheless, determined to cling, limpet-like, to the lives of the younger couples.
Says noted Delhi-based psychiatrist Dr Kamal Kumar, “It is usually their fear of finding themselves ousted from their sons’ lives, the way their own parents were ousted from theirs, that makes them try to maintain a stranglehold on the young couples from the day they get married.”
“Another factor that comes into play,” he adds, “is the fact that the parents have always lived by their own rules and upon their own terms, and are thus, unable to tolerate any signs of individualism in the younger couples. They want to rule the roast as always and deny their children even basic acceptance as a couple”.
However, economic factors too are often seen to play a role in such situations. Dr Kamal Kumar agrees: “In quite a few families, mothers and sisters are actuated into their destructive behaviour, not only by possessiveness towards the son/brother and intolerance for the ‘outsider’, but also by a determination to retain control over the next ‘earning member’, as the son is perceived in traditional societies.” As an Economist friend remarks: “You can call it ‘primitive capital accumulation’ in its most elementary form: absolute control over the means of production, both monetary and human.”
But despite the exponentially rising rates of divorce and legal separations, it is to the immense credit of these innumerable couples that they, even today, in these ‘changed times’, cling to their commitment to each other in the midst of such conditions … for them their love is, indeed, forever.
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