My Little Magazine

Ruuhan

2012-02-10T16:11:00.000-08:00

By Ananya Mukherjee

Singapore

Kaaga sab tan khaiyo, mora chuun chuun khaiyo maans re,

Par do naina mat khaiyo, mohe piya milan ki aas re

My name is Ruuhan. Given that am not a human, it is an unusual name. The forest officer has a poetic streak about him and a special affection for my ma, and it is he who has christened me thus. Ma tells me, it means spiritual.

I don’t know if there was anything mystical or pious about my birth. Just like any other fawn, I was born amidst an immense and gory struggle of will and contentment in a little shaded corner surrounded by huge tropical trees in India’s Kanha National Park. But unlike many others in my tribe, my birth was registered; I was named and tagged. During the process, I remember overhearing something about being a handsome but rare and endangered species. I don’t know what it implied. However, right from the time that I’ve seen the light of the world I’ve known one truth. I am different, if not special.

And I have grown up with this conviction. Interestingly, this difference that I once so happily assumed, is also quite stark now. It stares me at my face when I stop by the sparkling waters of the stream for a drink. My reflection on the sweet water tells me I am beautiful, that there’s none like me, yet that is also the reason why I am usually alone. In my moments of quiet silence and respite, I have often wondered if it’s the onus of carrying a name with a meaning (something that is unheard of in my clan) or having being born with such a different psyche that I have always been a loner. Another bone of contention in my herd! A stag like me should be a leader heading a band of five hundred gazelles, not grazing around alone in the forest and wondering about the philosophical implications and divine influences of his name. But, you see I am Ruuhan, and I am different.

But there’s a story about me that I haven’t told anyone. I see strange dreams, like frames from an afterlife or one that I have been through and these dreams keep coming back to me like a deja vu. Often in my idle wakefulness, I see myself as a cosmic illusion, a golden deer with eyes like rounded gems, horns and hooves like silver, sprinting around in a forest clearing. And I know that I am here for a purpose. I am being used as a bait and there’s nothing that I can do about it. I am merely following orders with death as an inevitable reward. I vision myself as a small part of a greater plan, a bigger picture, a divine intervention in the imbalance in the law of nature. Then I see an arrow striking me, slicing into my body, and leaving me numb. Even in my hypnotic state of painlessness, I feel something piercing into a formless entity and hear someone call out a name in my mind. Mareech.

Oh, I just ramble on and I think too much like humans, my ma tells me. I am a creature of the forest. I should be led by instincts not logic, she warns me all the time. But I know I am here for a purpose like none other. I am yet to find out what that is, but I know there is a reason for my being for sure.

One of the possibilities could be finding love. I am still on the lookout for a mate. My handsome demeanor does attract a lot of kohl smudged doe eyes. I have seen many of them cross my path, huddle up and lure me but Ruuhan as I am called, my search is somewhat different. A bit spiritual if I may be allowed to add. For me, it’s not the bark of a deer; it ought to be a call from a soul mate. I wonder why something tells me that voice in my dream that calls out my name with a desperate pain is that of a female. Maybe she was my consort, my mate in a previous life and from the jungles of Chitrakoot to the plains of the Seoni Hills by the Wainganga, I’m carrying her safely within me like my prized kasturi.

It’s getting dark and times are not as good as they used to be. My life has greater threat from men than from predators. Ma tells me there are poachers hiding in the park and I should get back to a safer location deep in the forest after dusk. I must hurry back now and take refuge in the shelter of the thickets beyond this plain. Hush, a moment…I hear something like a rumbling of the earth and before I know it…I feel something rush towards me and pierce into my smooth skin….

My hind legs feel heavy, my breaths are running short…and I know my time is out. Between the two thick forests of bamboo, just when the glorious sun dips its head into a submission to the earth, I can feel a numbness enveloping my senses and life slipping out of me. Flashes from a previous birth come rushing back ...yes, it was a female’s voice and she was calling out my name…Mareech.

I make a last attempt to rise and say, yes, my love, I am here…I can hear you now…but in my last breath all I can manage is crying out a name….hers.

Ghazal. Someday, they will remember you and me for leaving our legacy behind.

PS: This writing was inspired by my own passion for music and poetry. Not too long ago, Ghulam Ali Sahab shared a story about the origin of ‘ghazal’. The Arabic word originated from gazelle, he said. Kahete hain, teer khaya hua hiran (gazelle)jab akhri saansein leta hai, uske halaq se dard ki, tarap ki, ek akhri awaz sunaayi deti hai...us awaz ko ghazal kahete hain. Kya aap isse waakif thhey?

Kolkata: Half Baked Dreams

2012-01-31T05:07:00.000-08:00

By Aritro Bhattacharya
Kolkata, India

Opposite Caffeine, Gol Park

It rained. Hard and blinding and brief. Unusual squall for a mid-May urban day. As the drops pelted down upon the rickety tin buses and the squabbling auto-rickshaws and the archaic cabs of the yore and the adolescent motorcycles, I patiently waited. As the hydrants spewed tarry sewage and the associated paraphernalia of glistening gutkha wrappers, stubs of unfiltered, carcinogenic, uncouth, cheap Charminars pulverized by the gurgling muck, a couple of earthen bhaands in aimless ying-yan swirl, and a lonely used condom sticking out like the spent phalanx of a phantasmal lovemaking, I waited. As truant love-birds, sidewalk bastards, academic discards mayhemmed, launched paper fleets, danced topless, intertwined furtive fingers which occasionally touched fiery, taboo flesh, I waited. As the feuding mini-buses, the marauding 407s, the medieval hand-pulled rickshaws writhed, squirmed and wriggled through the orgies of existence and the pot-holes and first rains and earth smells and death-raced each other to respective destinations, I waited. As Ayudh’s ashes still floated down the polluted Buriganga, cosying against drained bottles of hooch, broken kolkes, dog carcasses and the rotting tuberose wreaths of the dead, I waited. In his city which was once mine. For a girl who was once his.

I wouldn’t have recognized Saanjh if not for her characteristic Madhu Sapresque sashay which she picked up God-only-knows-how from the grainy, flickering fashion shows of 21” B-W Keltron which occupied about 1/7 of the 6 * 8 room in Chetla which she shared with her parents and a scoundrel brother. Saanjh Mitra was born out of a failed contraceptive measure, as she loved to say. She was a girl, which translated into ‘one more idle mouth to feed and get married off to someone not a pimp or a rapist’ in her environs. More so because her father, a Communist by ideal and an accountant at a local grocer’s by practice, swore upon Sukanta’s promise of making this world more habitable for the kids and decided to practice celibacy till that happened. It never happened, her wife bore his fruit twice, and he had to work his ass out to provide for them. He silently brooded over his twin failures of a broken promise and his withering utopia. He never complained though, and instead supplemented the lack of dietary proteins with mouthfuls of poetry- from Whitman to Jibanananada, his trips were eclectic. And so, born into a smoggy Kolkata twilight, into a prosaic locality of long queues at the communal tube-well, starving, littering dogs, and domestic violence and crackling radios and rowdy Kalipuja and Durgapuja and Vishwakarmapuja carousels, Saanjh was christened so by her father, who brushed aside the traditional Annapurna, Protima or Karabi.

And, as good genes and bad luck would have it, much to her mother’s consternations Saanjh loved mathematics, poetry and the colour Red. She gave two hoots to mastering the business of stitching together petticoats for a local hosiery brand that her mother dabbled in to add to her father’s infinitisemal salary, shunned the company of the soap-opera ogling girls of her colony who sighed over the chest hairs of Chiranjeet and Prasenjit and the nasal soprano of Kishor Kumar clones, never leafed through Prasad, Nabakallol or any damndest Bengali magazines if not for poetries, summarily ignored the cat-calls, whistles and sexual and romantic innuendos of drain-pipe-trousered, fish-net-vested, wiry-biceped, grease-slickened matinee Bhola, Pocha or the slightly chic Rocky of her paara.

Going much against the run of the domestic sewing-machines, she aced her class in the municipal high school where the teachers were more interested in bunking classes than the students, and gate crashed into the hallowed porticos of Presidency. On a full tuition waiver. To study Mathematics. Good she did. Where else would she have met Ayudh?

Campus folklore has it that Ayudh Sen Chowdhury, the bespectacled (the best pair of frames from G K Opticals, Ballygunge), fair-skinned, pink-lipped, guitar-strumming, Dylan-humming, Lake Place resident fell in love with Saanjh over her colourful orations in the Canteen where she borrowed liberally from her list of after-dusk expletives which would put any guy to shame, and also from nondescript little magazine ideas. However, going by his hyperactive hormones and her lithe dusk-skinned, pout-lipped, kohl-eyed, perfect-breasted figure, both of which have hordes of students vouching for, it was lust that rather paved the way for this alliance. Add to it Saanjh’s natural inclination towards numbers and Ayudh’s innate nonchalance towards anything distantly curricular, and no wonder Ayudh clung on so dearly to his lady love or lust, whatever you may term it.

“Kire Neel? Ki khobor? What’s cooking”? The reverie was broken. I could just make out a whiff of Chanel. Oh yes, Saanjh had come a long way. But more of that later.

People say grief can turn you into idiots. Standing in the rain I thought the theory was totally retro. Or perhaps it was not. We really were playing the parts of idiots. It was barely a couple of days since Ayudh had died. Yes he did. He was all of 26. More of that later.

And here was Saanjh, his muse and I, his accomplice in numerous escapades, walking in the rain towards the Caffeine nestled in between Grub Club and Amber take-away.

His favourite haunt. Across His zebra-crossings and His traffic lights. His paper-mâché coasters. His ceramic mugs. His framed Garfield strips. His Café Negro. His Cappuccino Grande. His greasy chicken nuggets. His loosely-strung guitar. His stunned hearts. His dried tears. His starched, Chanel-ed, vermillioned, impregnated ex-girlfriend. His irritated best mate. His breathing poetries. His Dylan Thomas. His Sreejato. His Saanjhbaati. His Akashneel. His broken links. He was this close to playing God. He so is not here.

“Saanjh, you should have made it to his house before they took him away. Kakima was asking for you”.

“Saanjh, you should meet at least meet with Kakima once, she needs that.”

“Saanjh, do you miss Che? Motorcycle Diaries? Boolean Algebra? Marijuana swigs? The day we decided to launch a radio station for the insomniac, suicidal and the prostitute?”

“Saanjh, will you name your unborn foetus Ayudh? Even if for a second? So that he is born into poetry?”

“Saanjh, Ayudh died. I am scared. This city is no longer mine. Shred it into pieces. Distribute the pieces among the leper, the love-child and the love-lorn.”

“Saanjh, shed a tear. For God’s sake. Ayudh is dead.”

No quivering lips. No trembling hands. No choked larynxes. No nauseating longings.

The unsaid words crawled all over the place. Traipsed over the acrid coffee smell. Into the manicured nails manoeuvring the mobile phone. Whirring it, buzzing it, typing texts. The syllables animated the weary fingers rubbing the bloodshot eyes and porcupine stubble and acetic eyelids. Two mannequins, layered in Levis, Fabindia, Ray Ban, dog-eared Nike, Dr Scholl’s’ pumps. Enacting the charade of familiarity. And grief and conversation in a faux-pas bistro in a faux-pas cosmopolis. Nothing is said. Nothing is asked. The blowing AC circulates no apparent torment. Perfect harmony.

The last sip trickles down the gullet. Tasted like gasoline. Pity Ayudh can’t taste this. Would have puked. Would have been fun. Madhu Sapre in Chanel next to me stirs. Swift flick of wrists. Pays check. Tips. Plumbs deep down into the Gucci bag. God, isn’t she RICH nowadays!!! Fishes out a papyrus from the forgotten times. When Ayudh was alive.

“Neel, Ayudh wanted you to have this. I’ve been carrying this albatross for many lives now, it seems.”

“What is this”? Even though I know it in my bones.

“No idea, a letter perhaps. He wanted me to give you this if he died before you. I don’t think he meant so soon. You know, how humongous an emotional bastard he was. And how he loved writing……”

“Yes, he wanted to get published”.

“You bet. And now he’s gone! I believe his ‘omnibus’ is still hidden somewhere. For posterity. But for whom?”

Sepulchral silence. The first quiver. The first sting. The first acid rain.

We step out.

A pair of leaden Kolkata skies implode into a zillion Ayudh droplets.

The Armour of Amrapali

2012-01-07T18:39:00.000-08:00

By Dr Bina Biswas
Secunderabad, India

A foundling at the foot of dawn -

Loveless animal couplings with

mere nightly gratification of the want of flesh

had borne this lovely fruit of

irresponsible lust.

The mother had abandoned her

with callous ease.

Swathing her in a spotless linen

and stowing her in a wicker basket

to be left to her own devices

under a mango tree -

She had fulfilled her motherly obligations

and got rid of her shame.

But a divine gift she was

for the guard on his homeward way

after a nightly vigil at the House of Elders.

With infinite tenderness he picked her up

and carried her home to his childless wife,

to be nurtured and cherished.

Found under a mango tree,

her foster-father lovingly named her

Amrapali.

The tale of Sunda-Upasunda,

warring over the peerless Tilottama

made the decision easier for the Elders.

They apprehended a blood-bath borne of lust

over the nubile beauty of Amrapali

and this they could ill afford in peaceable Vaishali.

They declared that when she came of age

she would be wedded to, not one,

but to all males of the Republic of Lichhabi,

whosoever fancied and could afford her.

They etched out a gory career of a courtesan for her.

She was to become a Janapadabadhu,

a Bride of the Republic.

A foundling could hardly expect more.

A minstrel sang in the court of Magadha.

He sang about the radiance of Amrapali,

her physical beauty, her sensuality,

her unfathomable depth of knowledge,

her bewitching music, her ethereal dancing grace,

and her prowess with the use of arms.

Bimbisara listened with rapt attention.

He was a real connoisure of beauty and art,

as he was prowling tiger in fields of battle.

A sense of want gripped his soul,

but at this moment Magadha and Lichhabi

had their horns locked.

The merchant was handsome

and his bag of gold heavy.

Amrapali's guardian was all smiles

to welcome him to the inner sanctum,

where Amrapali sat playing the veena.

As the tall shadow fell on her,

Amrapali's nimble fingers missed a stroke.

The veena, not used to such lapse,

rang discordant, as if in protest.

She looked up.

He stood there in silhouette, features darkened

from the light behind him.

His stature was tall, complexion, burnt copper,

bearing regal.

The broad chest, bare in the mild clime,

with only an Angabastra draped loosely over it,

looking so inviting to lay the troubled head on,

tapered down to a narrow waist-line,

like that of a lion.

The arms hung loose, rippling with

taut, battle-weary muscles.

This was no ordinary merchant

as the physique spoke of a Kshatriya.

Amrapali stood up, a bit dizzy in the head,

and moved to one side,

so that light fell on his face.

She saw a strong, firm jaw, sensuous lips,

and the eyes - oh! she almost swooned.

The eyes were dark, deep, soft and searching.

The lashes were long and graceful.

The brow resolute -

For the first time in her life,

Amrapali, the courtesan,

who had sung and danced for nobilities,

who had adorned the bed-spread of countless

virile, young men,

who had, with a dispassionate ease, borne out of

rigorous training,

been able to segregate her profession from life,

for the first time, the poor girl,

fell madly in love.

Bimbisara, for it was he,

gazed enthralled at the beauty before him.

The minstrel had done scant justice

to this nubile form.

Vaishali was no place for her.

She would have been at home

in the court of Indra, the king of gods.

Forgotten was his realm and the battle raging

a few yojanas out there.

He stepped forward to hold her hands.

When his lips met hers, it was as if

two souls met after a separation of aeons.

The single flame in the earthen lamp

wavered, spluttered and died.

In the blanket of darkness,

right there, amidst the veena and mridangams,

body met a thirsty body, as soul met soul.

Amrapali had seen lust,

Bimbisara had known love.

But nothing compared to the deluge

that swept over them now -

nothing existed, nothing could,

but a man and his woman,

and all world, a mockery.

Bimbisara had departed after a few days.

Amrapali could never again know happiness,

for he had gone.

But she was never happier, too, as he went,

for she had come to know who he really was.

Within a few days, her eyes brimmed over with

unshed tears,

as she heard that the Magadha forces

were retreating all along the border.

Bimbisara was true to his words,

true to his love.

She knew that she'll never see him again.

But now she felt that a little part of him

was growing within her.

Her child shall keep her love alive.

Goutam Buddha was coming to Vaishali.

The whole city throbbed with eager expectation.

Streets had been swept clean

and garlands adorned evey door of every dwelling

to welcome him.

Amrapali sent her son Bimala, now a fine, young man,

to invite him to take up abode in her place.

Amrapali looked at herself in the mirror of polished metal.

The years had been kind to her.

Her hair was still black, with not a silver strand.

Her eyes had lost none of their lustre.

Her smile was still something that

men could lay down their lives for.

Bimbisara's image had faded somewhat

from her memory.

Amrapali looked up after touching the Buddha's feet

For her nothing existed anymore,

But for those almond shaped dark brown eyes.

Looking at her with soft intensity of love

for his fellow beings,

So straight was his bearing,

With long hair tied up in a knot

on his head,

That Amrapali became breathless.

Since childhood she had worshipped Lord Shiva.

It seemed as if Shiva

Had come to her in answer to her prayers.

She wanted to be one with him

But could not utter a word.

Amrapali's yearning was apparent to him.

He placed his right hand on her head

In silent blessing.

III

Sleep eluded Amrapali that night

At the break of dawn she walked over

To where the Buddha sat in silent meditation.

The Buddha looked at her

She sat at his feet now and begged him

To let her join the Sangha.

Gautam Buddha shook his head

In wordless refusal.

The morning sun appeared to lose its glory

The birds stopped to twitter.

'But why my Lord?" She flared up.

The Buddha pondered throughout the day

And gave his consent

When the sun was dipping beyond

The western hills.

On foot they clambered over the hilly terrains,

All of them dressed in ochre garb

with shaven pates,

Carrying a satchel in one shoulder.

A begging bowl in the left hand

A long walking stick in the right.

The column wound up the hills,

with the Buddha at its head.

The figure at the end was that of woman,

She was Amrapali

Matching her steps with her monks.

A chant filled the morning air

"Buddhang Sharanam Gacchami

Dhammang Sharanam Gacchami

Shanghang Sharnam Gacchami."

(This poem was first published in the Kritya: Poetry in our time)

Quality Check: Do you know who you are hiring?

2012-01-07T04:19:00.000-08:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

You have the resources, the capital and the technical support to fill in a key staffing position in your organisation such as a director job, but how do you confirm that the potential or new hire is the ‘right’ talent? How do you ensure that the new employee holding a manager jobwill perform at a high level and deliver more of the business? How do you confirm that the hiring process is the best that you can have and what do you do to plug the gaps when you find them? The most pertinent question above all is: how do you measure the quality of hire and set new standards for new-hires performance?

Leaning on the adage, “what cannot be measured cannot be improved”, it is imperative for organisations and more importantly, HR to know that recruitmentas a process in your organisation is both measurable and therefore, subject to further improvisation and improvement.

Although in the past many employers simply relied on paper employment applications and excel spreadsheets to track their hiring process, the current labour market makes this task impossible to do effectively without using an automated, web-based ATS System, HR gurus observe. But which is the best way forward?

Technically speaking, it all depends on the systems, companies and implementations involved, say industry watchers. Whilst one organisation may use a tool that provides a 1-5 grading scale (to be used by hiring managers) to evaluate how a new hire performs after the first 90 days, others may use a system that includes an early 30-day check up with subsequent feedback at three, six and nine month intervals.

Needless to say ATS or Applicant Tracking Software isgaining popularity amongst employers, especially those that are hiring at an exponential rate across geographies today. The software allows organisations to maintain a database of applicants and job information. Rather than browsing through thousands of resumes, human resource managers and recruiters use this information to find matches between openings and applicants. The value of this information is enhanced since it can be stored and retrieved electronically. However, be warned, this is not a fool proof method of selection, since you run into the risk of automatically discarding potential talent whose resumes do not perfectly match with the predetermined profiles.

Furthermore, as part of the metrics initiative, you may gather data on performance, retention, hiring-manager surveys and productivity. In addition, psychometric testing also could help in accessing the potentials of a new hire. By pre-screening applicants on personality, experience, critical-thinking and problem-solving, some organisations claim to have cut turnover by almost 30%.

Some employers have already begun empowering HR and recruiters with on-screen, dashboard capabilities to view recruiter scorecards that evaluate how recruiters perform on a checklist of metrics. These include measurements linked with quality of hires.

Employers can then correlate high performers and their sources and determine where to find the best fit for the job position.

A bad hire is costly; not only in terms of the recruitment expenses, but also with regards to lost time, low quality and compromised productivity. Hence, getting it right at the very start is critically important to business. After all, only a right talent at the right place can change or improve business bottom- lines.

MEASURING THE PREDICTORS OF JOB SUCCESS
01/ Set Key Performance Indicators or KPIs to measure the quality of hire
02/ Set up a process and system to measure against these KPIs
03/ Analyse these numbers
04/ Measure the quality of hire and recalibrate periodically
05/ Measure the hiring manager surveys, time to productivity and retention

(The article was first published in the Headhunt magazine, Singapore)

Ritu's Home

2012-01-07T03:34:00.000-08:00

By Dhrijyoti Kalita
New Delhi, India

Year 1985. December.

“Ritu, come over here, she’s waiting for you. Why don’t you eat the cutlet? She’s waiting for you, baba. Come soon and eat it. Leave that, now. Come, complete it later.”

“Wait, Ma. I’m coming. This is just about to finish. Give me a minute, please.”

“Aahi, my little girl, you start with it. He’s not going to listen to anyone. He’ll only come when he finishes with his works.”

Ritu was trying to complete his tasks as soon as possible. He had to go to the field, because. His friends were awaiting him for some time now to play cricket. They had already started with the game. He was writing as well as squinting at the wall clock frequently. He was in a hurry. Once it was dark, all finished. He’d not be able to continue the game with them.

He was only about to finish his home tasks, when Aahi, the girl from his neighborhood arrived. He felt it difficult to react how in those circumstances. It should be understood that he was annoyed when she came. He was in haste and tried to avoid and restrain from any unwanted hindrances at that time. His mother lovingly allowed her in and asked if she had come to meet him. She smiled. A pretty little girl. She came and sat on one of the chairs of the dining room, near the kitchen, where from his mother threw a volley of questions upon her- on studies, school, exams, marks she got, et al. She was probably irritated and hesitatingly looked towards the adjacent room at times only to see when he’d come and sit beside her. And, inside the room, Ritu heaved a great melancholic sigh as if the gods had fallen upon him suddenly.

Inside the room, Ritu speaking to himself-

“Oh God…what shall I do now? Why should she come, now? Couldn’t she come some other time? Is this the only time to come? Now, what shall I do? I’m done with the game. How, how will I go to play, leaving this…now? And, if I go away, Ma will leave no stone unturned to butcher me when I return from the ground. Help me God, what shall I do?”

For him, it was the most crucial and frustrating situation and his eyes were like those which saw a tiger in front all of a sudden on a clear street and could find no way to escape. He was totally restless and knew not how to leap into the next step and flee from the dungeon. To the ground, which was his heaven now. To play. With his friends.

Aahi who was also restless, for him, was playing around with her fork, piercing the cutlet and making noise by the saucer. She hadn’t yet started eating. She was waiting for him. Only when his mother came to put the glass of water, she gulped a tiny bit of the piece, much in reluctance and against her will. She was still with her hopes that he’d come and sit beside. Now and then, she tried to look and desired if her eyes could pierce through the curtains and look at what he was doing.

He came after some time, after much mind boggling and spirit consoling. But, left no way to wreck her spirit. She was astonished, shocked and received an uncalled shudder at such a wild, unhealthy and indifferent disposition; when he came and went again inside, now with his saucer of cutlet.

“Sit down, sit beside her and eat, Ritu. Why do you want to go back, inside? She has been eagerly waiting for you since so long, can’t you see? My child, she has not even touched that, you see. Why are you so rude? Come now, sit down here.”

“No, Ma. I’ve some works left and then I’d go to play. You promised me that you’d allow me to go and play, after I finish. Let me go now and complete it soon before it gets dark.”

Meanwhile his father arrived. And his mother-

“Look at him. A fool he is, a very rude fellow. The girl has been waiting for him since such a long time and this boy, look…he came and went back again, inside. The only thing he knows, is to play, play and play- cricket and nothing else in this world could bring him up. Very foolish, should he do that?”

“Aahi, my girl, don’t wait for him, you eat. He’s a fool. I’ll give him a thrashing today, if he goes to play. Exams are approaching and he needs only to play.”

“Aunty, can I go inside and look at his books?” Breaking a long silence, now Aahi uttered her mellifluous voice. It seemed as if her throat and her epiglottis were soaked in the juices of the sweetest rasgullahs. Without any extravagance, it can be claimed as the prettiest voice to be heard from a child of thirteen years.

Now, replied his father on behalf of her-

“Go, my child. Go and watch, what he’s studying. If he’s not studying anything or sitting idle over there daydreaming, you must come and tell me, ok. Go, go….go inside.”

She went inside through the adjacent room, turned left and stood at the threshold of the small study room of approximated size 10” * 11”. It was a very small room, allowing at best two persons barely to sit and talk. That was where Ritu studied and slept. She stood there and smiled at him. There was no reciprocation. She again smiled. As if he was a living carcass, trying very hard not to look at her and concentrating in disguise, in his books. The case window near him, through which noise of the game could be heard, distracted him wanton. He only wished that he could somehow reach his destination and start playing. How the noise of the sixes, fours and the falling of wickets followed by the howls of the players and the jobless spectators enticed him, could be understood only by him. Probably, he thought as such.

Aahi stood there. She was nowhere, totally embarrassed, trying hard to hide her nose. Although, the game was his primary thing, Ritu noticed critically what she had worn and how she looked. She had put on a frock of lesser sleeve that tried somehow to rest at her knees. The band she stacked with her hair was of higher breadth and allowed some fringes at her forehead, making her more than pretty. Ritu thought then, it was kind of a bad thought or a taboo perhaps, to love someone or exalt beauty, especially of a girl. He found it probably out of the world, immoral or despicable to fall in love with someone. No, he couldn’t think of that; not at all. So, he felt better to avoid such things to exhibit himself good, of proper etiquette and moral, as if, he thought, his hormones would never rise.

Within himself, he spent sometimes, at his leisure, to dream about her. But, he tried hard to compress and suppress those thoughts inside, he never desired outlet for that. He talked, as if to his thoughts, “Go, go, go inside, why do you come…and disturb me? Why do you make me so bad and immoral? Why are you here again? Go inside, please.” Like a person with diarrhea would ask his shit, when he’s attending a guest’s house and his shit fills up to the brim, about to touch his pants.

In a couple or two of minutes, he’s ready to set out for the field, when Aahi was already gone, bidding her most embarrassing bye to his parents. Ritu had a violent feeling running underground when he got himself readied to ask the permission, of his parents, now for the most desired. He asked himself before that-

“Did I do something wrong with the girl? I never meant to do anything deliberately, of course. She was here on her own, when I’m ready for the field, to play. So, how can I attend her, when I am engaged in something else? And, indeed I’ve completed my tasks, my homework, after all. So, Ma should let me go now…I must ask her, yes. Yes, I must. Come on, Ritu, you can do it, you can.”

When he appeared in front of his parents, Baba was sipping his last bit of tea and Ma was preparing some more cutlets to serve him for the afternoon snacks, in the kitchen, while as well, they discussed family matters that always go tangentially above Ritu’s head. Today, Baba arrived early from office. He usually arrived sometimes after the advent of darkness and sometimes even late. Now, Ritu didn’t even want to listen to, in fact hear those silly for him stuffs…someone died at the village, who’d wedded whom, groceries to be fetched from the market, et al. which however were not his concerns, even from the distant edge of the prism. And, not at least now, when…

A meek, docile child approached. Noticed their movements, gestures, the silly talks, their voice seemed even louder now. Where is he?

“What…? Have you eaten or not? How was the cutlet? Why didn’t you talk with the girl, at all? She came with her greatest expectations. You must not act as such…”

His father was not able to complete, when-

“Baba, I was studying then and I have to go to the field, see Ma promised, after I finish with my tasks. Now, I have completed everything. I must go now. May I go, please? (With enough persuasiveness and stress on the sentence) They’re waiting for me. I’m late, indeed today. See, they have been playing since so long and I’m not there with them. I’m here with my studies and now it’s done, all completed, everything’s done. I’ll come and directly sit down at my table to study. You said, you’d take my English test today. I’ll study and you take the test after that. I’ll be ready soon.”

“What do you say…Rani? Should you let him go? He says, he’s done with everything. His homework is all done. At night, he’s also giving me a test, of English today. Ha…what do you say?”

She was busy inside the kitchen with all assorted noise from outside the window-of cars, people talking aloud, laughing, young boys riding motor bikes yelling, howling, and ringing of the cycle bells that pass in each second’s interval outside, in the street and yes, of course, the sounds of oil ready to fry the raw ingredients in the bowl. She didn’t clearly come to what her husband asked.

“Ha…what do you say? Should he go, or what…?”

“Where does he want to go?” Ma asked, showing ignorance to his feelings, now. She acted, as if she knew but was reluctant or not wanted him to go.

Ritu was annoyed with this; it’s growing late anyway and now all sorts of fiddlesticks going around. What kind of a vicious circle is this, he thought to his mind.

“To the field, and where else should I want to go now?”

His mother was in a hem and haw; indeed she showed that she was trying hard to be decisive now upon his wish or it has become a fancy for him, as of now. And his father silent, indifferent. We couldn’t make out what he wished for him- to let or let not. After asking her mind for some time-

“Now, study some more…” The boy’s face cried in utter astonishment, confounded upon hearing an estranged thing as such, from his mother. He was not trying to listen further.

“Now study some more and we will be going to the market. I have some shopping to be done. (To his father) What do you say, are you ready to go today? I need the stuffs or else it’ll be too late. The jeweler’s shop will be open today, I think? It’s not closed on Saturdays, is it? They’re coming the day after; I’ve also finished with the baking powder. What do you say about a chocolate cake this time? Oho…I just forgot for one second, you’re diabetic.”

She laughs out at her own banter, as if she was not at all concerned with his feelings and whims. She goes inside the kitchen. Baba remains aloof, although he was not. And, Ritu felt as if Ma was very happy in forbidding him. He thought as if his mother was still laughing at her odd joke inside. At that moment, it was disgusting and he felt all alone in the world. He thought he should leave his home and settle somewhere else, even though it was a hostel, he’d prefer to this hell. The unaware- of- all- worldly matters mind of his, thought.

He went inside, sat at the table and kept pondering over his mother’s words. He mimicked those like obnoxious scansions of poetry and scorned. Now, his rage was such that it could tear asunder a Spanish bull. He was angry, angry over everything. His Ma was the worst in all world, he was sure now. That was a doubt, which began when he got a nice thrashing from her with the well-polished cane last time…

That was a ridiculous incident, he recalled at his table. He smiled and controlled his eager to laugh cheeks. He was a crazy person, he thought of himself. Why did he show his slippers at Kamala, their house maid that day and leaped like a frog several times, in front of her? She must be confirmed by that day, he thought, that he had some defects or loopholes in his brain. She was also somewhat mad, he thought. Why should she shout aloud like that, when his mother was present and alive there, in the next room? He was a little boy after all, he thought now. Why should she act as such with him, didn’t she understand anything, like what a little boy-do-did?

He was excited, yes and that was why he did that, showed his slippers to her like a mad one. And, she thought, yes that was right, what he thought now reflecting back, that she was insulted. He recalled and spontaneous words came out of his mouth-“Yes (which was uttered like the rectilinear motion of a slow flowing river in the absence of tide, like the start of a harangued hymn and the “s” came out much late when he said that “yes”)….gotcha! She has a son, yes, older than I, and a daughter, O God, who is married. She’s older than my mother, a respectable old lady. I mean whatever…but she’s an old lady after all. She must not be done like that. Shit, there’re all shits here, here everything’s shit. Why did I do that? It should not have been done. How can I repent now, no way? Nothing can be done now.” He had to remain complacent thinking no use crying over spilt milk. All’s irrevocable now.

But, the thrashing, how could he forget, started with the polished cane and ended up with the mosquito net stand.

“What a demoness? So wild, feels very happy after beating me up with her beastly hands. How can one be so cruel? Yes, I understand now, maybe I’m not their natural son, maybe adopted from somewhere.” He recalled of the silly flick he watched few days back, where the boy was told much later that, the parents he thought to be his was not actually his own, they’ve adopted him since years. He was awestruck, started thinking like in an odd reverie, strategies of leaving home. He thought, once he acquired a large heap of money, he’d return back everything that his so-called parents have invested upon him, until now. His face acted along with his thinking with exact curves and bents while his naive thinking continued, when all of a sudden, he was disturbed-

“Are you ready? What are you studying now? Are you studying or dreaming something else?”

Ma called upon from the other, without noticing what her son was doing, thinking.

“Leave that apart now. Get ready. We have to go. And remember. Don’t go on pestering for unnecessary things in the market. If you need something important, tell it to me in my ears or in your Baba’s, alright? Now, come on, stand up soon. Dress up.”

When his mother went away, he frowned and mimicked again ending in some rough signals, as if he’d like to teach his Ma a lesson, on his part. He scraped back his chair in deep anguish that created unwanted sounds of settling down to its place. That was his anger, he wanted to show. Listen to that everyone!

It was few years earlier to his Baba’s purchase of the Vespa scooter. They rode on rickshaws. Three of them. A man observing from distance would think, so harmonious nuclear family, a happy family indeed. But, how could he understand what sort of harmony was running inside his mind?

Tezpur was a clean city, a green city. Life was simple, tranquil and pleasant. It was some kind of a little developed countryside. It reminds us of pastoral assuaging of the human soul. There were no humdrums, as such and people there were satisfied, complacent with their livings and livelihood. To make a theme, it was a peaceful place to live in, people seemed happy always, leaving apart Ritu. He was addled, baffled, messed up with many things in his mind, which was acting with an adult’s shoulder now.

The place was good. No violence, which means negligible violence, existed. Social life always flourished there. The neighboring people enquired even when someone slightly coughs at the next house. There was such amicability, compatibility and co-operation amongst and amidst the denizens of Tezpur.

Only sometimes, but very less often do people come across unwanted and ugly news, which came like thunder, as they did not have the habit or the nature to get accommodated to those stuffs.

Ritu remembered the only incident that had occurred since he was born. The shooting on the Kalia Bhomora Bridge. That was lethal. He remembered his Baba talking and the town’s people as well about the brutal killing of the surrendered extremist upon the bridge. That was clandestine as people said, on the part of the police to kill the man. He had grown quite irritating and deadly for the people and the police. So, the police high command secretly allowed killing him, registering it like usual, “encounter”. But, it was only an open secret. Who didn’t know about this? Even the disturbed soul, Ritu knew about it. Who remained not to know? Everyone knew about the Liberation Front militants, their liberating motives at the inception and forgetting about that gradually. They wanted to make the state, a country? Did they know the glossary of the word “country”? Their own sons were studying abroad and they insist people in the state not to send their sons, daughters and kin to some other places, outside the state or country, to study. They had a very clear agenda, but violent and misled. Their propaganda was led astray, was void, was worth despise, hatred and of innumerable spits. With such large ideals and patriotic objectives, they can surely commit heinous murders, plan assassinations, no matter who died, innocent and the vile. Their objective had reached the notch Lucifer had, what Hitler had, eliminating all good and prevailing evil, eliminating all Jews and prevailing German rule, respectively.

When this was narrated, Ritu remembered, he just drew it in his mind; he saw the images, saw it moving in front of his eyes, like a movie. He gazed…remained gazing for some time, he remembered. The person killed was clear in his eyes. He thought, what did the person do? How did he kill? And also people said that, he surrendered from the killing business earlier. Then how was he deadly again? He surrendered to the police, right? Again when he remembered, he got entangled in the cobweb.

He was looking at the movie banners now tacked at those walls when the rickshaw neared market. That was a definite place for sticking the banners and movie pamphlet stuffs and Ritu always waited eagerly to see those pictures there; when he knew that they were going somewhere, either to the market or to some guest’s place through that street. It was a small town and one generally had to pass through that place while going.

He soon forgot what caused him swimming in troubling waters. He forgot all that happened to him at home, Ma’s no-permission, Baba’s indifference, everything. Now, all landed. He was soon to be found engaged in getting mesmerized by cricket playing kits, chocolates and what not displayed hither and thither in the shops. Now, he thought of somehow managing to get one new bat for him and a cricket leather ball, which had been his fascination for long.

He maneuvered it, his bat; it was labeled “VAS”. Some local name, probably, children’s playing cricket bats…but Ritu was much taken by that bat.

“Baba, this…”

“Huh…this is not for sale, ask the shopkeeper. (Now, asking the shopkeeper to convince Ritu) Hello, this is not for sale, right? This is just for display, you’ve kept here, and you don’t mean to sell it, right?”

The shopkeeper just gave a coarse smile, didn’t reply anything in prompt. Because he also wanted to sell his commodities, whatever it was, of the customer, didn’t matter and why should it? He laughed like huh, huh, huh….that showed he managed either ways: to comply with Baba as well as to forward his stuff for sale.

“Sir, why don’t you give the bat to the child? Look at his face, he wants it so much. This is a good one and would last. You see here, this has a good hit and strikes well, even with leather balls, look here, Sir, please.”

The shopkeeper tried his best hand in convincing his customer. Baba asked-

“So, how much do you ask for this?”

“It is for Rs. 250, Sir.”

“What price are you giving it, tell me that?”

“Sir, what do you say, we have very little margins of profit in these commodities, believe me. Ok, for you and the child, I’ll just take Rs. 230. Fine, deal is done.”

Baba asked Ritu now…

“Can you promise me of getting the first position in the class this time? If I give you the bat, you’ll go around playing, you won’t study anymore…so?”

“No, Baba, I’m second for just a single mark last time. I promise to come first this time. You give me the bat and I will study well. I will go home and sit down to study. I’ll think of nothing else. Please just give me the bat. I promise, I promise…”

Looking at the shopkeeper-

“So, what rate do you fix for the bat now? Tell me something reasonable, don’t just ask for anything. The last time too, I’ve taken a bat from here. (Although it was the first time, they’ve entered the shop, last time they’ve bought the bat from the next street, the Ex-Police Street, Ritu remembered). That didn’t last long. It is now in a worn out state. The grip came out of the body and striking a hard ball has become difficult.”

Those were oral versions of Ritu, whereas Baba had never seen in what condition his bat lied. Those were what Ritu said once complaining about his bat to Baba. And, Baba just smiled and ignored. Even if he didn’t ignore, he simply forgot; it was however trivial for him when he was thinking about his office, managing the household, trying to buy a new plot of land and all.

But, he remembered all now. He was trying to make the shopkeeper believe that he was an old customer of his and he deserved a rebate; of consumer satisfaction he wanted to establish in front of him.

“I’ll give you Rs. 200. If it’s ok with you, you can pack, or else…we have to leave.”

“Ok, Sir, Rs. 210. Final, final, it’s done. In the middle, I have fixed it. The bargain is yours as well as mine, ok?”

The bat was bought. Ritu was the happiest one…

Now, Aahi returned home. She was very embarrassed; hatred was streaming all over her. She saw red, felt as if would kill; destroy everything that hinders her way. Reaching home, she headed towards her bed and sat down taking the pillow over her lap; cheeks swollen and looked fluffy. Her mother, Mrs. Dasgupta was engaged somewhere, probably in the kitchen.

“What happen to you, why do you sit as such, are you angry with someone? Did someone tell you something? What happened at Ritu’s house, you went there, right? You came so early, why, what happen? Now, tell me, Mumu (her pet name that was) why are you angry? Did you fight with Ritu?”

“Ma, you know, that boy’s such a stupid, he’s a rascal, he’s a demon, he’s a miser, he’s a loser, and he’s a….uh!”

“Yes, but what happened, tell me now?”

“Nothing. I was sitting over there, waiting for him and he showed as if he was busy doing some very important work inside his room. He didn’t turn up for even once. Yes, at last he came and took off his plate and went inside again. Such a…I have never seen such a bad boy in my life. (Meanwhile, her mother watches her smiling like giggling) And, when I stood in front of his room and smiled at him, Ma, you know, he just ignored me, just ignored. That’s why I returned soon. I will never go to their home again, never. Such an odd boy…I hate him, Ma, I hate him. I’ll never…”

“Ok…you hate him so much, I see now. Then why were you shouting since yesterday that you’d go to Ritu’s home? You won’t go to their home again, would you? I see something…” (She smiles again)

“Ma, why do you smile? I’m very angry today. Please don’t keep smiling. I hate him very much…”

Her mother knew that Aahi had a strong interest to play with Ritu and be with him. She told-

“I see, we have to arrange your marriage. That’s how, only we can bury the hatchet. Ha ha…”

The Bengal Renaissance

2011-12-09T18:56:00.000-08:00

By Bina Biswas
Secunderabad, India

The Battle of Plessey fought in 1757 was of extraordinary importance not only to the East India Company but it demonstrated the utterly corrupt political life in Bengal. It also showed that the Hindus were absolutely dissatisfied with the Muslim rule in the province. But still it cannot be maintained that the battle of Plessey firmly established the British rule in India or in Bengal. The British had still to fight for another fifty years or more to secure that position.

Mir Jafar remained the Nawab of Bengal after Siraj-ud-Daula and when the latter died in 1765, the Calcutta Council put his son named Najam-ud-Daulah on the throne of Bengal. However, all the powers passed into the hands of the English Company.

At this time, the condition of Bengal was chaotic. There was anarchy, confusion, bribery, corruption and extortion everywhere. Such was the state of affairs when Clive came to India in 1765 as the Governor of Bengal for the second time. Clive was sent second time specifically to reform the entire government of the company. Lord Clive was the founder of the British Empire in India, was also the architect of the ruin of the people of Bengal. Warren Hastings was appointed as the Governor of Bengal in 1772. He was succeeded by Lord Cornwallis and he remained the Governor General for seven years. The Permanent Settlement of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa was one of the achievements of Cornwallis. This settlement created a limited proprietary right of the Zamindars. Magisterial powers were taken away from Zamindars. Pathuriaghat Tagores were also affected by this settlement. Here, it will be interesting to note an excerpt from Tagore’s essay The Religion of Man:

"I was born in what was once the Metropolis of British India. My ancestors came floating to Calcutta upon the earliest tide of the fluctuating fortune of the East India Company. The unconventional code of life for our family has been a confluence of three cultures, Hindu, Mohammedan and British. My grandfather belonged to that period when amplitude of dress and courtesy and generous leisure were gradually being clipped and curtailed into Victorian manners…I came to a world in which the modern city-bred spirit of progress had just triumphed over the lush green life of our ancient village community. Though the trampling process was almost complete… something of the past lingered over the wreckage."

Lord Wellesley was appointed as the Governor-General of Bengal. Lord Hastings succeeded him and completed his work. Lord Amherst took over from Lord Hastings. The most important events of the reign of Lord Amherst were the First Burmese War and the capture of Bharatpur. The arrival of Lord William Bentinck marked the beginning of a new era in many ways. Bentinck’s social reforms were remarkable. He was responsible for the abolition of Sati and Thugee. Both these customs involved death. The death in the case of Sati took place voluntarily whereas in the latter the death occurred for ransom. Nobody knows the origin of the custom of Sati. Although the practice was absolutely voluntary, one finds a mention of this custom in the Mahabaratha too where Madri had become Sati with Pandu.

Undoubtedly, it was an old custom which prevailed among the higher castes. It was considered to be a privilege and honour and that is why it was accompanied by the recitation of sacred hymns. The widowed woman burnt herself along with her husband. She was made to put on all her expensive clothes and ornaments and after the act of burning was over the Brahmins were able to put all the gold into their pockets. This created vested interests and hence the custom continued in spite of protests from time to time. It is interesting to note that, “Even Mughal Emperor Akbar tried to suppress the custom of Sati. William Bentinck made Sati a penal offence. He was helped in the task by Raja Rammohun Roy. By a regulation in 1829, Bentinck declared the practice of Sati as illegal and punishable as culpable homicide.”

No discussion on the Bengal Renaissance is ever complete without the mention of Henry Louis Derozio, and his students of Hindu College with whom he helped start Young Bengal in early 19th century. He was one of the pioneer teachers who brought about emancipation of thought in his students. The proponents of the Young Bengal movement had a deep impact on the society at large. Another name worth mentioning was Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar, the great educationist and a social reformer who was primarily responsible for Widow Remarriage. Vidyasagar was a philosopher, academic, educator, writer, translator, printer, publisher, entrepreneur, reformer, and philanthropist. His efforts to simplify and modernize Bangla prose were significant. He also rationalized and simplified the Bengali alphabet and type, which had remained unchanged since Charles Wilkins and Panchanan Karmakar had cut the first wooden Bangla type fonts in 1780.

The renaissance in modern Indian literature, in culture and spiritual awakening began with Raja Rammohun Roy. He was the first of the Indian masters of English prose, but he was so great in so many other fields that he belongs to Indian history more than to Indo-Anglian literary history.

The Brahmo Samaj was founded in 1828 by Raja Rammohun Roy. He aspired to establish a strict monolatrous worship of the Supreme Being and the Brahmo Samaj advocated the worship of One God and the brotherhood of man. After the premature death of Raja Rammohun Roy the Brahmo Samaj was left without organization, constitution, membership, covenant or pledge. It was revived byMaharshi Debendranath, father of Rabindranath Tagore, and he put a new life into the organization and introduced a regular form of church service, including thanksgiving, praise and prayer. Debendranath did not formally become a Brahmo until 21 Dec 1843. There was a profound influence of Raja Rammohun Roy on him, who was, according to Tagore, “the best friend of my grandfather.” Roy was a phenomenal linguist who drew upon sources written in Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Hebrew, Greek, English, French and Bengali. He was also the greatest Indian Intellectual of the nineteenth century.

Tagore placed Raja Rammohun Roy amongst the greatest Indians. Today Roy is known mainly for his stand against Sati and widow remarriage. Roy aimed to rid the contemporary Hinduism of inauthentic traditions. After years of debate with Christian missionaries, Roy founded the Brahma Sabha, around 1830, a monotheistic Hindu society which opposed idolatry, rituals, Sati and casteism. For the Brahma Sabha, idols, rituals and caste were blasphemy. It developed on Roy’s interpretation of the Vedas. After the death of Raja Rammohun Roy- this Society became a movement, the Brahmo Samaj became the post influential movement of religious and social reforms in the nineteenth century India. One of its pillars was Prince Dwarkanath’s son Debendranath Tagore.

(Renaissance in Bengal had started long before Tagore's advent on the literary scene.)

I acknowledge:

Rabindranath Tagore : Religion of Man: A Poet’s School, Towards Universal Man,(New Delhi, Rupa & Co., 2005)

V.D.Mahajan: India Since 1526 (New Delhi, S.Chand & Co., 2001)

Visva- Bharati Quarterly: Ideals of Education (Shantiniketan, Visva-Bharati, April-July 1917)Krishna Dutta & Andrew Robinson: Rabindranath Tagore : The Myriad Minded Man, (New Delhi, Rupa & Co.,2003)

Tintin

2011-11-26T04:11:00.000-08:00

By Sampoorna Mukherjee
Singapore

The movie ‘Tintin and the secret of the unicorn’ is about a young reporter named Tintin, who buys an antique model of a ship named the ‘Unicorn’ from the streets of London. Little does he know that the model ship holds a secret beyond one’s wildest dreams. The ‘Unicorn’, a sixteenth- century three masted galleon had gone down with a belly full of booty which was scattered among the wreckage of the ship and could never be recovered. Tintin soon finds out about the secret of the scroll hidden in the model ship’s mast and becomes determined to find Captain Haddock; the last descendant of the owner of the ship, Sir Francis Haddock. However, Tintin and Captain Haddock are not the only ones looking for the treasure. Ivanovich Sakharine, the descendant of the pirate Red Rackham, who was Sir Francis Haddock’s worst enemy, is also interested in getting his hands on the treasure. The hunt for this treasure will sent Tintin, his faithful dog Snowy and Captain Haddock on a dangerous voyage across oceans and deserts by plane, ship, jeep, motorbike and perhaps most memorably; a haulage crane. Besides being a Steven Spielberg production, ‘Tintin and the secret of the Unicorn’ also has outstanding animation and special effects. And that's because of its brilliant new technique of filming- motion capture animation- that literally brings the characters to life.

(This is a child's account of Tintin)

Puja Ispesal

2011-11-25T00:43:00.000-08:00

By Saron Datta & Prodipto Roy

Kolkata, India

(This graphic novel, in its original life size form, was created as a Puja Pandal at Kashba Rathtala, Kolkata during Durgapuja 2011.)

That Poem Called Life

2011-11-12T17:06:00.000-08:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

Poetry is about finding life in the silence of sleepy summer afternoons in Delhi of the past, in murky flashes of lights in dingy pubs reeking of garlic, spices and tobacco, in the simple weaving of a humble weaver, in the gurgles of the bi-cycle tyres as they meander their ways through flooded Mumbai by-lanes....and if it is Gulzar, chances are you will find life in the imagery and visualise yourself as the protagonist sharing a parallel existence, living each moment of the metaphorical literary utopia while his deep throated voice resonates in your ears!

Rich in literary speech yet simplistic to the point of innocence, Gulzar’s musings are a treat to those craving for an intellectual stimulation as well as the ordinary man who yearns to express himself and capture the memories of human realisations in phrases and couplets.

In a 90-minutes poetry session at Singapore’s esteemed Esplanade Concert Hall, the poet and lyricist teams up with Pavan Varma, another literary genius and the Indian Ambassador to Bhutan, and encapsulates the essence of romance...towards life. “Shayeri is about life,” the poet begins his session with the magical statement.

Needless to rationalise, his inspiration from the simple everyday business of life is well reflected in his writings. His metaphors leave the audience enthralled. From that night in the mountains where two waterfalls converse like two long lost rustic friends having suddenly met to finding the elixir of life in the birth of his grandchild, to the thoughts that burnt and continued to live amidst the ashes, his literary acumen emotes perfectly in harmony with the sensitive articulation of a poet, a lover, a father and a friend.

Pavan Varma does a fair job in translating some of Gulzar’s works in English for a wider audience, yet, somewhere between the lines, the beauty of the language is lost. His own sonnets from a collection called Yudhishthir and Draupadi are, however par excellence and take his insightful interpretation of an episode in Mahabharata to a new level. Gulzar’s transliteration of the collection recreates the charm in a new flavour retaining the essence of the original yet adding a personal tint to the analysis.

At the end of the evening, as I have traversed miles in a parallel space with the duo, exploring various facets of human nature, relationships, articulating the innate unsaid feelings, contemporary and in reflection, am left with a mixed sense of contentment and a craving for more....and yes, his last poem “Meghna” does leave me with very moist eyes.

Conversations

2011-11-12T16:15:00.000-08:00

By Prodipto Roy
Kolkata, India

Soliloquy

Tea-a-tete

The Eternal Bride

2011-11-06T19:54:00.000-08:00

By Mithu Chakraborty
Singapore

The Waiting Room

2011-11-04T20:27:00.000-07:00

By Amitava Nag
Kolkata, India

The Waiting Room - 1
---------------------

They come alone
Red
Green
Blue
Walk with you
Talk till your words
Dry up -
Then they leave
Alone.

You get up,
Bathe,
Fill up and greet
Another
Transit passenger.

The Waiting room - 2
---------------------

They change trains,
I whisper in the ears
Tales - as they wait,

They wait, to leave me.

In silent dusk
I wander
with pregnant hope,

I wait, to be emptied yet again.

Then It Is Life

2011-11-03T06:28:00.000-07:00

By Dr Bina Biswas

Hyderabad, India

Have y' ever stood on a lonely hilltop,

At the stroke of dawn?

Have y' ever seen the golden orb

Lighting up the morn?

As you welcome another day,

Does it come to mind?

That every dawn is a morn newborn,

As the old one's left behind.

Have y'ever seen an hour-glass,

With sand all slipping away?

That is time and that is life,

Both here, but not to stay.

Have you ever seen one flounder

In a quicksand known as life?

Imagine one going under

Untold agony and strife.

Have you ever seen a fellow being

Suffering silent pain?

Have you ever thought of getting a chance

Of living once again?

Don't be pensive, don't you doubt,

And you don't ever be sad.

For though the days are fading out,

Life is not that bad.

When you feel life is a cave,

Closing in on you,

Just look here, and look there,

For a sec or two.

For it's no cave, nor cavern,

Never has it been.

It's a tunnel, at the end of which

A faint light can be seen.

A glimmer, no doubt, it's all about

Hope and mindless love.

Love sustains where hope's on wane,

As sure as sky above.

The Light

2011-10-25T17:39:00.000-07:00

By Sudeshna Dasgupta
Singapore

Business Talk: Which Way Ahead??

2011-10-22T20:45:00.000-07:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

HR pundits have identified the gaps in the existing HR strategies that when effectively addressed can translate into higher productivity and better bottom-line results.

Basic Instinct: Being Fundamentally Right

Naturally, as the market rebounds, employers will be looking at using this upswing to their advantage. Growth is clearly on everybody’s agenda, but what is the best way forward?

“In times of crisis we have traditionally responded by being conservative and hedging our bets, but with recent events we are realising that the situation is quite volatile and unpredictable. We have to have the combination of being quick to spot opportunities and act on them and being prudent in other places where maybe opportunities are not so intense. Market-specific adaptation is needed,” Milagros C Perez, vice president for Global HR areas, Philips, says.

Learning points

Therefore, keeping the voice of the markets within hearing distance is key, she adds. HR needs to truly understand not just what the markets are saying but also ensure that these are accurately translated into its plans concurrently. “In HR, we are starting to do this through a disciplined approach to workforce planning, working hand-in-hand with the business in concretising the implications of our business plans and projections into structure, headcounts, capabilities and sourcing. In addition, we intend to review our existing HR practices to see where it makes sense to have market-driven policies instead of global ones,” she underlines.

Star Wars: Talent Attraction & Management

Having said that, no matter how foolproof the infrastructure is, businesses cannot run successfully without managing the talent optimally. No strategy or execution can be achieved without the right people in the right places and HR needs to be relevant in achieving this for the organisation.

Moreover, as Singapore transforms itself into a global hub for technical and managerial expertise, global talent will become increasingly central to its competitiveness, HR leaders point out. The challenge, however, is not restricted to attracting global talent only, but also to find innovative ways to prepare local talent for global roles. Developing a new generation of leaders and accelerating their development is seen as one of the fundamental challenges in the year to come. “Singapore, like Japan and China, has a rapidly ageing executive pool. The next generation of executives is ambitious and keen to join the executive ranks at a much younger age than their predecessors. The challenge is to accelerate their development and build a ready pool of next-executives who can move into leadership positions sooner,” notes Indranil Roy, managing director, Asia Pacific for Korn Ferry International’s Leadership and Talent Consulting Business.

Besides, the workforce today is a combination of different ethnic and cultural groups, with different expectations and as the job market slowly improves, better work opportunities will surface. Employees may be tempted to leave if they feel that their employers are not giving them enough in terms of stability, growth and developmental opportunities, or they do not feel connected with their organisations, Sureish Nathan, vice president, Asia Pacific, Center for Creative Leadership, observes. “Perks like compensation and career development opportunities play a big part in retaining talents, but ultimately, the most compelling reason for employees to stay is the relationship they have with their immediate managers,” he says.

Long-term solution

As a starting point, fair pay and attractive benefits will have to be in place to reward the employees who have weathered the downturn together with the organisation. Also, it is high time to start coaching your employees and giving them a chance to continue learning. A company is likely to lose its key employees if it does not provide enough opportunities for their development, learning and advancement, HR practitioners share.

As mentioned before, engaging and retaining talents is about how good leaders are. A CCL study on employee engagement conducted in partnership with Booz Allen Hamilton found that among those who strongly agreed that they worked for a manager that cared about their well-being, 94% said they intended to stay with their current employer. “The most effective way to engage and retain employees is to improve the quality of managers at every level in the organisation. Companies need to focus on helping managers learn how to be a good coach, give effective feedback and provide direction to facilitate the learning and growth of their people,” Nathan suggests.

Never say Goodbye: Talent Retention

Attrition is an issue that remains a major concern for HR whether the market is buoyant or recovering, and so it will remain a dominating factor in HR management in 2011. Human resource gurus agree that retention is linked to engagement and this is strongly correlated with how an individual feels his managers and the organisation are interested in his individual and career development. So why is developing talent a challenge? Andrew Bryant, director, Self Leadership International remarks: “Because it requires an integrated and cultural approach and many organisations are too focused on execution with the minimum cost. In addition, there has been a strong Asian mindset of following establishing procedures rather than finding creative ways to lead and solve problems.”

Follow the leaders

However, not all organisations fall into that category. Employers have formulated all kinds of innovative designs such as workplace fl exibility, work-life harmony initiatives, rewards and recognition policies, healthcare benefits amongst others to top up the already existing tools like pay for performance, higher bonuses, career management, training and development opportunities that help retain talent. For instance, NatSteel has found a unique tool to motivate its workforce which has an average age of 42. Protecting the health of its people is key to sustaining productivity and managing medical costs, says Frankie Yung, vice president, human resources, NatSteel. The organisation has done well in this regard, having achieved the Platinum standard for the Singapore HEALTH Award.

The organisation has a comprehensive health programme, Yung informs. It conducts annual health screenings for all staff aged 40 and above, and biannual health screening for other staff. “This enables us to arrest any health issue at its early stage. Any employee discovered to have chronic illnesses are managed by our Occupational Health Unit on an ongoing basis. Through this effort, we are able to reap the benefits of having less downtime, while ensuring that staff productivity is not compromised.”

In short, foster a work environment in which employees feel appreciated for their past conducts, see that their present is taken care of and perceive a definite growth for themselves in the future.

Measure the Intangible: HR Productivity

Having said that, it is also time for HR to look into its own mirror image and gauge its functional success. Traditionally, HR professionals talk generally and conceptually about employee morale, turnover, and employee commitment as outcomes of HR efforts.

But the HR function can no longer be an expense generator and administrative function and not a value-added partner. As HR expert Dave Ulrich was once quoted as saying, to fulfill the business partnership role of HR, concepts need to be replaced with evidence, ideas with results, and perceptions with assessments.

ROI-the ultimate checklist

Naturally, the need for measurement becomes vital. HR gurus recommend that as managers, you need to focus more on the money spent on people costs for ROI in terms of dollar and compare the improvement with the previous year. Beyond that, begin putting each of your job functions under the microscope. For example, start with checking the quality of your recruitment skills. Are you hiring the right talent for the right job? Check the performance appraisals of new employees and you’ll know if you are doing it right.

Determine the difference between the talent who take jobs offered due to development opportunities and the employees who leave the company because of a lack of a good career path, and you will have clues to many unanswered questions.

The Road to Success

With the emergence of significant regional powerhouses like India,China and Korea,Singaporeis no longer an attractive destination for low cost activities. Even for higher-end skills like R&D and technical expertise, China andIndia are proving to be increasingly attractive destinations. Singapore, therefore, has to constantly set the bar higher for its own workforce to remain competitive. The emphasis has to be on innovation, creativity and higher-end technical skills and governance skills.

Most importantly, markets and economies are changing fast. Most of HR insights are from hindsight and no one can confidently predict what is going to happen. So organisations make choices based on how it views the world and where it fits in it. Whilst as HR, you can plan for those choices you must also know that at any time you may have to change the course because the landscape will change yet again. However, by mapping out some of the anticipated challenges, HR managers may be able to plan their strategies more effectively.

(The article was first published in The HeadHunt newspaper)

Aleph: Where Time & Space Converge

2011-10-22T20:20:00.000-07:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

If Aleph is indeed the autobiographical account of Coelho's journey of personal discovery, The Zahir is perhaps a reflection of his inner search, only narrated more beautifully. Aleph, in all fairness is probably Paulo Coelho's most personal account ever to be printed in black and white, yet, if you have read The Alchemist or The Zahir before, you may find traces of a deja-vu in Aleph.

The novel starts with Coelho's revelation apropos the stagnation of his spiritual growth. He embarks on a journey that starts from Africa and then to Europe and Asia via the Trans-Siberian railway. Most of the book describes the author's experiences during the journey with his publisher and Hilal, a girl whom he meets in the travel. Coelho soon finds out that she's the one whom he had loved five hundred years ago in a different incarnation. What follows next is a very intimate account of the relationship in their past lives.

Here the novel takes a Bollywood slant and for those with a more realistic eye, the timelessness of Hilal's presence in Coelho's life is somewhat unconvincing. If reincarnation and related stories are not particularly your choice, I would suggest you skip this novel.

To me, reading Coelho is a trial of self discovery more than the relevance of its contents in terms of realism. The beauty of the sentences leave an indelible mark on me, the magic of his words and thoughts often overwhelming and provoking the mind to see beyond what the eyes can behold.

And who knows such an Aleph may just exist somewhere for you too....waiting only to be discovered!

Fourth Estate Under Threat!

2011-10-22T19:52:00.000-07:00

By Deepak Adhikari

Kathmandu, Nepal

In the dead of the night on June 5, Khilanath Dhakal, a reporter with the Nagarik daily newspaper, was brutally attacked.

He was in Biratnagar, a once thriving industrial town in Nepal's southern plains. Members of the Youth Association Nepal, a wing of the Unified Marxist Leninist (UML), a party that until June 30 ruled the country, targetted him.

They were angry with his report on June 2 which exposed their attack on a rival gang while inside a local court.

Dhakal, 23, had moved to the border town a year ago. He was invited to an intersection with the pretext of a meeting and then forced to pillion ride a bike. The assailants, armed with bamboo sticks, drove to a secluded place and assaulted him. He sustained serious head injuries. Luckily, not long after his attack, a policeman spotted him running for his life.

A man of slender build, Dhakal is now back to work after undergoing 18 days of treatment in the local hospital’s neurology unit.

“The attack was the worst incident of my life. But on a positive side, it triggered a massive, countrywide campaign and my case became a symbol for a battle for the free press,” Dhakal told the Doha Centre for Media Freedom. “My pictures and the accompanying news was covered by all the media and it felt good to be a part of the campaign.”

Undeterred by the assault, he started to file stories for his daily column, often highlighting the wrongdoings of Parshuram Basnet, a local UML activist, who, says Dhakal, ordered the attack.

"Parshuram Basnet became indispensable to certain leaders in UML precisely because he has been able to acquire overwhelming dominance over rivals in the environs in and around Biratnagar,” wrote columnist Aditya Adhikari for The Kathmandu Post in June.

This phenomenon, when the state allows the prime suspect loose, in disregard for the rule of law, has cast a dark shadow over Nepal's fragile and troubled transition to democracy.

Private media flourished after the restoration of democracy in 1990 and is credited with creating awareness about the fledgling set-up.

It also helped the 2006 pro-democracy movement that forced King Gyanendra to step down and paved the way for an end to the decade long Maoist insurgency. But since then, the media has found itself in a murky environment.

Several armed groups, all jockeying for power, launched after the Maoist insurgency ended. They often threaten journalists, prompting them to self-censor.

Culture of impunity

Journalists like Dhakal, working in a hostile environment outside the capital Kathmandu, no longer feel safe.

There is a culture of impunity that encourages and protects armed groups, which rely on violence and even resort to murder in some cases.

These groups could either be purely criminal or gangs masquerading as political outfits. Often nurtured and used by political parties, the government rarely punishes them.

This protection, Dhakal said, is at the heart of the crisis.

"This also shows how weak the state has become,” he said. “If the officials arrest these people, then there is pressure from the politicians. Fearing for their jobs, the officials bow to the highhandedness from the politicos."

These days, Dhakal, who has recently reported on an illegal arms deal involving Basnet, treads cautiously, informing the local police about his whereabouts.

But, he adds, he still “can't think of any other (better) profession except journalism."

The Committee to Protect Journalists’ impunity index, released in June, ranked Nepal as the seventh most dangerous country out of 13 from 2001 and 2010.

“Political parties have, in competition with each other for power and resources, built vertical networks that extend from Kathmandu to the districts ... and operate in a grey zone between legality and illegality,” wrote Adhikari.

A series of attacks

It has been a long time since journalists in Nepal have been able to report freely.

Several recent examples demonstrate the kind of threats reporters encounter.

The assassination in February 2010 of Jamim Shah, a media entrepreneur was covered internationally. After providing detailed coverage of the circumstances leading to Shah's murder in the Kantipur, the country's influential daily, its editor and publisher also received threatening phone calls.

In January 2009, Uma Singh, a radio reporter in her mid-20s based in the restive southern plains of the country, had written articles critical of the local administration. A group of armed men hacked her to death.

In December 2009, Tika Bista, a 22-year-old journalist with the national Nepali-language newspaper the Rajdhani Daily was working in the remote western hills of Nepal. Members of the Maoist party attacked her until she was unconscious, leaving her 20 metres under a cliff, with severe head injuries and lacerations. Forced to flee, she now works from the Kathmandu office.

Maoists and the monarch

The darkest day in recent history for Nepal's media was on February 1, 2005. Gun-toting army soldiers raided newsrooms across Kathmandu and major cities, following King Gyanendra’s orders. All communication systems, including the internet, were shut down. The country's half-dozen TV channels and radio stations were banned from broadcasting anything except the royal proclamation.

During the King's autocratic rule, from February 2005 to April 2006, there was a severe media clampdown and heavy censorship. After the restoration of the parliament in 2006, however, the interim constitution guaranteed freedom of press.
Before that period, the biggest threat to the safety and independence of Nepal's journalists came from the Maoist insurgency.

Journalists, especially those critical of the leftist rebels, were threatened, kidnapped and murdered.

Shailendra Kharel, a freelance photojournalist who worked in the conflict-hit midwestern region for theKantipur daily, said journalists were often caught in the middle.

"If we covered Maoists, the army would suspect us for collaborating with the rebels. On the other hand, the Maoists would call us spies if we met security personnel,” he said.

More than 14 journalists were killed during the insurgency, a majority of them at the hands of state security forces.

It was after that period that criminal gangs entered the fray. Threatening journalists, such as the young Dhakal, they punish those who even think of writing anything critical of their behaviour.

"Things like these tend be a natural byproduct of the transitional phase that we're in," said Dharma Adhikari, the general secretary for the Media Foundation, a Kathmandu-based research group.

In recent years, the threats from non-state actors have far outweighed the ones from the state, but the Nepalese media is ‘revolutionary,’ he argued.

"The media has been one of the most vocal institutions in the transformation taking place in Nepal,” he concluded, echoing the sentiments of many who continue to endure pressure in their fight for press freedom.

Deepak Adhikari is a Kathmandu-based journalist whose work has been published in his native Nepal and internationally, including TIME magazine.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being....Jobsless

2011-10-10T06:56:00.000-07:00

By Aritro Bhattacharya
Kolkata, India

This Bijoya Dashami, as Maa Durga of our ancestral Puja was about to hit the waters of Ganga, I slipped in some fervent prayers. There were the usual greedy supplications to take care of me, my parents, my girlfriend, my one-car-one-home-one-pug-two-kids utopia, my depravities, my aspirations, my fears, my nightmares. It was all about the I. The prayer, inexplicably, however, ended with "Maa, take care of Steve Jobs". But then, not so inexplicable I guess. It ended indeed with an 'i'.

Before the 8th of January, 2007, Steven Paul Jobs was as alien to me as Justin Bieber is to me now. Prior to that fateful smoggy Bhubaneswar morning, I was another cog in the all-encompassing wheel of Infosys. I was 24, I was still trying to get a hold of software programming, boozed and/or doped most nights, and had already attempted once to take my life. I was trying to be in terms with a bad heartbreak, and to top it all, my ex-flame was in the same town, allegedly with another guy. Rudyard Kipling, I believe, once famously said that all of us want to run away from something- if not from a troubled home or childhood, at least from an unpleasant school. At that point of time, I really wanted to run away. From life it seemed.

But then, I digress. On that fateful morning, in between learning to be efficient with spreadsheets, I clicked open a mail from a friend of mine. It was a fairly long note, and the subject was suffixed by the dreaded "Fw:". I was about to use my newly-found alacrity of pressing Shift-Del, but then suddenly, the penultimate sentence of the mail caught my eyes. Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish, it said. And I decided to not go back to my mundane A6-B5 filling up of cells. And am thankful I did.

By now am sure you have assumed, and correctly so that the mail contained a copy of Steve Jobs's famous speech at the Stanford commencement, that for the last few days have been translated and transliterated into every conceivable language by every conceivable newspaper. In 2007, however, it felt orgasmic. It felt like a million suns had exploded in my brain. It resonated as the best poetry I had ever read. The three stories literally had me hooked on. If the first salvo was about connecting the dots, the last straw invariably was about stoking the hunger and stupidity within oneself. It wasn't about reading a billionaire technocrat (honestly, I didn't know it then) ranting about his life. It wasn't about the drivel of a been-there-done-that honcho. Certainly not the pedagogy of a CEO to future business leaders. Rather, it was Bob Dylan. And the Buddhha. Or Vivekananda. And Rajesh 'Anand' Khanna. Or Sharukh 'Kal Ho Naa Ho' Khan. It was Lucky Ali. Or Kurt Cobain. And Allen Ginsberg. And Mohammad Ali. And Che Guevara. And the innate Bohemian we all secretly cherish. And it was all I needed. To come back to life. And solving its eternal puzzle of connecting the dots and expecting that a Mac Air takes shape. Even after churning out a thousand useless prototypes.

Today, when the world mourns the death of a genius. A visionary. An employer. A friend. A husband. A colleague. A classmate. A partner. A father, I feel lost. Because I was not an employee, or son, or fanboy, or colleague, or partner, or techno-blogger, or biographer, or columnist. I was just a believer who Steve Jobs healed. And inspired. And retaught dreaming. And hoping. And had been doing so for the last several months. Every single day.

Bijoya Dashami and Dussehra coincides every year. This year was no exception. As the Hindu diaspora revelled in the defeat of bad by good, I stole in a sly smile. Steve Jobs defeated cancer, didn't he?? After all, he is on the same side as God!!!

Thank you, Steve. Stay hungry stay foolish iWill.

Exactly how Untraditional?

2011-09-25T04:38:00.000-07:00

In a one-to-one exclusive with novelist Sweta Srivastava Vikram, My Little Magazine takes a peek into the untraditional life of an Indian woman and discovers the intricacies of human relationships

MLM: How did Perfectly Untraditional happen?

“Perfectly Untraditional,” true to it name, happened in a rather unconventional way. I had this story inside of me—gnawing—waiting to get unleashed—touch ink and morph into words. Not the detailed book that you see today. But I had the seed for a story. I knew I wanted it to be different—about common people—all of us. But nothing stereotypical or mundane A narrative about relationships, identity, immigration, and modern Indian families with subtle suggestions on how we could make our society a better place.

When I started working on “Perfectly Untraditional,” by the way it was called something else then, I basically wrote a 40-page novella. My agent came across the novella and asked if I had ever thought of writing a full-length novel—she had liked the story and my writing style. I was ecstatic and nervous. I am a poet before a prose writer. I knew it was a humongous undertaking, but I was determined to take up the challenge. The way I saw it, I had nothing to lose.

I have had so many friends and family members support me through my madness. Be it helping me with research to putting up with my crazy hours to tolerating my artistic moments to evaluating the title of the book to just being there as sounding boards.

MLM: At any point do you identify with the protagonist Shaili?

Before I answer that question, I would like to clarify that “Perfectly Untraditional” isn’t my autobiography. You wouldn’t believe the number of people who have asked me that question even though my husband was standing right next to me.

Yes, I do identify with the female protagonist, Shaili Kapoor—but only in a symbolic way. Like Shaili, who realizes the truth about herself after moving to New York from India, I too found myself, in a *symbolically* similar situation, when I moved to NYC from Mumbai.

I had always wanted to be a writer. But due to personal reasons, I couldn’t follow my dream when I was in India. While I thought I had made my peace with the decision to study sciences and turn away from creative writing and journalism, I was terribly wrong. Living in New York, I couldn’t fool myself any longer. I conceded that I am and will be nothing without words. And much as I respected all other professions, I didn’t see myself spending eternity studying or practicing sciences. Even if I tried…I couldn’t.

Both in Shaili’s and my case, distance offered a perspective on “The real us.” It gave us opportunities to blossom and carve out our individual identities. When we are inside the system of societal expectations, it’s difficult to think differently—even if your inner voice begs you. There is no room for it, actually.

As desis we are trained to appease and not consider our happiness. But once we move away, many of us start to evaluate terms like sacrifices, happiness, and fulfillment. Arisitotle said, “Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.” Can we impart happiness if we are unhappy from within? Can we pretend to be someone we aren’t? And is it really worth it?

MLM What's the best thing you have heard about the book so far?

Readers have been generous with their response so far. People have discussed it with me or reached out and said that they found at least a few things in the novel that resonated with them. For a writer, that too a debut novelist, knowing that your “untraditional” book was received well by both men and women across different age groups and ethnicities, has been extremely humbling and encouraging.

As writers, we pour our heart, blood, sweat, and soul into our books. And when readers recognize the efforts, interpret your book, and discuss it at length, it gives a warm, fuzzy feeling—that of fulfillment. I was pleasantly surprised at how involved people got with the characters. They had their favorites and not-so-favorite ones picked out.·A ninety-six-year-old-American man, who fought in both World War I and II, said to me, “Your book touched me in a way nothing else has. Never stop writing.” A psychotherapist, also a reader of my novel, commented that I understood human complexities and the different layers of human emotions. Her lesbian friend complimented the authenticity of emotions in the novel. An aunt-in-law in Minneapolis said, “I always wondered about the lives of writers and actors. It was such a distant world. Beta you have shown us that world. And I am so proud of you. any people have said that they couldn’t believe this was my first book. Numerous women have requested me to write a sequel…because they want to find out what happens to the young, male protagonist: Sadhil Sethi. He turned out to be a favorite with the ladies.

MLM: Any anecdote related to the conceptualisation of Perfectly Untraditional that you may wish to share?

I have shared this anecdote at probably all my readings, but it still cracks me up. When I wrote about Sadhil Sethi, in the first draft, I exaggerated his goodness—to the extent I put most Yash Chopra heroes to shame.:-) Sadhil was unreal, by human standards, in terms of his looks, heart, benevolence, attitude, manners, and personality. Or at least that’s what I was told. Sure enough, after having worked on Sadhil Sethi for as long as I did, I lived inside an unreal bubble of expectations. One evening when my husband returned home from work, we debated about some trite issue. I was upset and retaliated with, “Sadhil Sethi would have never done this.” Poor guy didn’t know how to respond. His competition was a fictitious character created by his author wife.

MLM: What's next?

I am working on several projects simultaneously including my second novel. But in the near future, I have a chapbook of poetry, titled Beyond The Scent of Sorrow, scheduled for October 13, 2011 release in Brooklyn, New York. And I am working on a nonfiction collection of prose and poetry, Mouth full, which will be released in London in early 2012.

I and the wind of the city

2011-09-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

By Ansuman Dey
Kolkata, India

I and the wind of the city -1

This day, no one's playing dreams.
this day, torn papers and old leafs
are flying in the air like me; very afflicted!
Such hollow mentality of the city wind
has left no philosophy on the streets.
The streets go down and down and lost
whichever way, without the history.
Like smoke, the wishes coming out
of the melting windows to breathe,
to smell the most latent aroma,
to perceive the waves of death.
This day is reverberantly excruciating.
This day, frogs and I are mute and busy
digging the soft mud ; very shattered!

I and the wind of the city -2

Neon sparks
and
I become
the mirror of the city.
Sleepy bricks crawl
into the Gothic darkness;
a very dilated and secret exodus.
A photograph excavates my soul and disappears.
Chronic noises hang
like the ear-worm blues from the futile erections.
I snuff out the neon to become
mirror to the city.

Sir

2011-09-04T03:29:00.000-07:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

It is impossible that you could miss him in a crowd. And had Shokhanaath Sikdar ever shared a first-class compartment on a long-distance Kolkata-bound train of the Indian Railways with Ray’s Lal Mohan Ganguly, I am convinced the latter would have definitely wanted to “cultivate” Mr Sikdar. Though almost separated-at-birth-twins with Mr Ganguly, the resemblance further accentuated by accessories such as a brown monkey-cap and a red and blue checked muffler, Mr Sikdar had a distinguished and unique style of his own.

His day started early fighting with the neighbourhood paperboy, he called Khoka. Each daybreak, Khoka would toss the popular morning daily, neatly tied in a roll, and throw it across Mr Sikdar’s coveted south-facing 7x 3 ft verandah adorned with money plants, a potted tulsi and some kamini flowers. To an onlooker, the blue-walled balcony adjoining the cramped living room was nothing beyond a slice of additional space generously used as a clothesline. Between Mrs Sikdar’s printed cotton nighties and petticoats, there was just enough room for an old cane chair and two low choir stools. In all, the weaving had fallen loose, but it did not bother Mr Sikdar, nor kept him away from his private haven, and he fought to conserve its authenticity as the truly intellectual corner in his middle class suburban home. Khoka and his Olympic style paper tossing was a constant threat to that preservation. Mr Sikdar had repeatedly warned Khoka that it in the past, his rough and uncouth attacks had hurt the kamini buds and snapped a portion of the money plants, both signs that were considered inappropriate, but the boy had paid no heed.

After calling out names, each morning Mr Sikdar would sit down in this blue space, reading the morning newspaper from the first word on the front page, browsing through headline news to classified pages including quack aphrodisiacs and gauging the impacts of planetary movements and their predictions on his less celestial life. Once he had Rahu and Ketu’s orbits sorted, dipping thin-arrowroot biscuits in his tea, he would always attend to the matrimonial, obituaries and all the other components that spiced up an ordinary man’s life in an otherwise monotonous setting.

After retirement from his job as the mathematics teacher of a government higher secondary school, Mr Sikdar’s world had become confined to the blue walls of his modest one-bedroom flat. Mrs Sikdar, childless and ageing had begun to complain of gout, since she stepped into her 50s, and now her days were all spent in cooking a simple meal for the two, a few religious rituals and watching melodramatic soap operas on Bangla television.

From his cane chair on the verandah, Mr Sikdar would watch her getting engrossed in the high-pitched family dramas on the idiot box, often so much that she would emote with the characters on screen. At times, he had even caught her crying with the innocent and cursing the wicked and scheming faces on television. Mr Sikdar, who grew up in an age when television was a rarity and being a couch potato was sinful would wonder how a 50-year-old woman could get so carried away by something so unreal and distant.

Apart from the TV, the blue-walled modest living room had a sofa cum bed. This was meant to be the most decorative and most expensive of furniture the Sikdars had ever bought. It was the pride of the living room. A student’s mother, out of sheer respect for Mr Sikdar’s Mathemagical brilliance had gifted a self-created set of appliqué cushion covers for the sofa cum bed. On occasions when there were guests in the house, and it happened rarely though, this was used as the extra bedding for the special visitor.

But of course, there was a brilliant laminated family photograph of three generations, proudly displayed on the TV top that you couldn’t miss. On a rare moment, when all the three generations of Sikdars had taken a Kundu Special tour to Darjeeling and the entire family of primary school teachers, bank managers and government servicemen had pooled in all the LTC they got, booked company holiday homes and managed to spend a week basking in their own glory in the Himalayan town. The photograph was a memoir of that rare moment one morning, when all the Sikdars, including the young ones Dollar and Sonnet (Mr Sikdar’s youngest brother was a bank manager. His convent educated wife had a fetish for English names and after the twin boys were born, she used her obsession with an overpowering vengeance thereby dismissing all alternate suggestions made by other family members) had arranged themselves proudly in three rows. The men in bright mufflers and hand woven pullovers at the back, the women in wet flowing tresses over cardigans and sarees were seated in between, and the children in road picked Bhutia jackets were kneeling down at the front. The group was facing the sparkling white mountain range with the holiday home as backdrop. Though proud to be framed in a perfect Suraj Barjatiya style family frame, none of them noticed or remarked upon the fact that there would be proof of the mighty Kanchenjunga in the photograph.

Till date, the pride associated with this photograph knew no limits and though neighbours and friends tried to often contest the value of this priceless piece of Sikdars, none were successful so far.Once, Mr Sikdar’s next door neighbour Shambunath Pal, tried to flaunt a photograph that showed his grandson standing below the Eiffel Tower. Now Mr Pal, unlike Mr Sikdar was not a man with many degrees (“uneducated businessman” in Mr Sikdar’s words). He ran a saree shop in one of the bustling districts of the city and had amassed a lot of wealth. A considerable portion of that wealth had gone into sending his only son Babushona to a private engineering college in Bangalore. Babushona, once his engineering degree was earned managed to do an MBA and find a job in a company that was doing a project with a French multinational. Needless to say, Mr Pal, much to the resentment of Mr Sikdar, was extremely proud of the fact that in a family where matriculation was considered sacred, Babushona had added so much glory so as to live in “bilet” or foreign shores out of his own academic steam.

So one day when Mr Pal brought out the picture of the Eiffel Tower and challenged Mr Sikdar on the pricelessness of photographs, Mr Sikdar looked unshaken. Studying the picture with the spectacles right at the tip of his sharp nose, he raised an eyebrow and said, “Hmmm....mane thik e ache, tobe oi amader Howrah Bridge taye beshi loha bodhoi,” (seems ok, but methinks our Howrah Bridge has more iron in it).

It only happened by a sheer conspiracy of fate that I landed up at Mr Sikdar’s door one hot and sultry summer afternoon. Let me explain. Mr Sikdar’s ‘almost umbilical’ ties with a government boys school was destined to weave into my life as soon as I met and fell in love with the brightest and best student the school had ever trained. My fiancé, Sid (Shiddharto to his teachers and all the other trails of his past life) was Mr Sikdar’s favourite student in his entire teaching career. The boy, the first in his school to crack the indomitable IIT entrance exam, as he recalls and narrates to all he knows was the “Braaitest” student he taught.

All that was more than a decade back! And Sid’s life, interim had undergone several changes. From the IIT Campus in Kanpur, he had moved to Rutgers for a Masters and ever since the lure of the greenback and the thrill of international recognition had kept him committed to sharing his bright intellect with the US of A. But he hadn’t forgotten his teacher. “I owe it to him in a way,” he would say.

Since I was travelling to India, Sid insisted I dropped by Mr Sikdar’s residence and paid him a visit. He even bought a shiny Kenneth Cole watch for his teacher and jokingly called it a “delayed but branded gurudakshina”. I knew the significance of this teacher in shaping the man I adored, so I agreed without further debate.

So on a hot uneventful summer afternoon, I cajoled myself and took a drive down the by-lanes of suburban Kolkata and landed up straight in the blue walled living room of the Sikdar’s.

“Are you also an engineer like him?” Mr Sikdar asked me as he gestured for me to sit on the prized sofa cum bed. He had not even offered me a glass of water as yet! Fearing that my IQ level was at stake and I might be subject to solving brain racking Calculus before my eligibility to sit on the sofa were decided, I sat down quickly and replied “No No, am into literature” then added stupidly enough, “My Math sucks!”

“What?”

“Er, I mean, I am scared of Math.”

“What are you saying? How can you be scared of Math? What is there to be scared? Only the dumb, dull and lazy are scared of Math,” Mr Sikdar almost roared in front of me.

“Aha...why are you scolding her? She is not your student,” Mrs Sikdar came to my rescue with a glass of red liquid.

I folded my hands in greetings and took the glass from her.

“Rooh Afza...I got it from Moni’s dokaan just yesterday. Dekho to kheye kemon? (See how it tastes!)”.

I smiled gratefully at her and sipped into the over sweetened artificial flavoured drink. But on a hot afternoon, it did not taste as bad as I had feared.

Mr Sikdar seemed put off by my presence. He sat on a stool, a little away measuring me up inch by inch. Perhaps even contemplating how his brightest student could even consider a life with a woman who did not enjoy calculus or trigonometry. I realised I had goofed up by touching the most sensitive passions of his life...mathematics! Not really thrilled about being classified in a category of “dumb, dull and lazy” I dug into my purse and took out the gift that Sid had sent to appease Mr Sikdar.

“What is this?” He still seemed unsure if I could be trusted.

“It’s a small gift Sid has sent you.”

“Sid? Who is that? Oh, Shiddhartho!” he said while opening the wrapper and seemed utterly delighted as he saw the gift. “Baah...please say my thanks to him,” he stood up as he spoke clearly indicating that our conversation ended here.
Sensing that I had little reason to linger on, I got up to leave, when Mrs Sikdar stopped me.

“Oki? Where are you going? Ei bhor dupure na kheye chole jabe naki? Ami bhaat boshiye diyechi. Kheye jeo. (how can you leave in this hot afternoon without having lunch? I have started cooking rice for you. You must eat with us).

I thanked her for her hospitality and looked nervously at Mr Sikdar. She perhaps sensed my discomfort and said, “He’s like that. Doesn’t speak much with anyone. Plus, today, they have the Higher Secondary result coming out. He’s tensed.”

“Oh,” I said and smiled with relief. It wasn’t me. The old teacher was anxious because of the board examination results.

She asked me to call her “mashima” and invited me to her little kitchen. I drew a small pidi (a raised wooden platform) and sat watching her chop potatoes and onions on a traditional bothi and marvelled at the finesse of that art. She asked me what I did in America, if I cooked at home, if posto was available in Houston and yes, if I could watch Bangla serials on television. There was something so sweetly simple about this middle-aged lady that I fell at ease immediately and even the ordinary meal of daal-bhaat and alu posto in a shabby oil stained kitchen tasted utterly divine.

Just as I was about to wash my hands after the meal, I heard a loud commotion outside the house. In few minutes, I saw a swarm of young boys rushing into the room, all talking at once and falling at Mr Sikdar’s feet while he shouted excitedly, “Ki holo? Kemon holo?” (What is it? How is it?).

One of the boys, a shy dark lean one in very simple ordinary clothes came forward from the group and touched his feet. “Sir, I got a rank. Not sure if first or second as of now, but I scored the highest in the district.”

Mr Sikdar hugged him to his bosom and said only one word, “Baah...!”

And I could see all the pride, the affection, the support and the intensity of appreciation encapsulated in that little word.

Then, he picked up the watch Sid had so fondly bought for him and asked the boy to stretch his hands.

On his bare wrist, he clipped the watch and said...”This is your prize.”

As I stood at the kitchen door with Mashima, witnessing the simple selfless act of an old teacher, whose only dedication in life was to shape the lives of others, whilst he continued his own modest living, I realised why Sid had such high regards for his man who never claimed his portion of the victory but nobly passed the baton of glory and success from one hand to another through generations.

The Black Bud

2011-08-21T07:25:00.000-07:00

A translation from Tagore's Krishnokoli

By Bina Biswas

Hyderabad, India

The black bud, I call her, though

In the village, the folks call her dark.

On a cloud laden day, I saw her in the fields

The dark girl with her dark gazelle-eyes

The head was bare and her loosened

tresses fell over her back.

Dark? However dark she be,

Her dark gazelle- eyes I have seen

Seeing darkling cloud- laden sky,

Two dusky cows lowed,

The dark girl dashed out in a rush

hearing them, out of her hut.

To the sky she lifted her eyebrows

Heard the growl of the clouds…

Dark? However dark she be,

Her dark gazelle- eyes I have seen

The eastern wind raged on a sudden

In the paddy field it rippled a squall

Standing by the ridge, I, was alone

Whether she turned her eyes or not, on me

Only she knows and I

Dark? However dark she be,

Her dark gazelle- eyes I have seen

This is how the darkening clouds build up

In the summer months in the north-east

This way the dark supple shadow drops

On the thicket in the rainy months

This way in the nights of August

Sudden mirth surfaces in the heart.

Dark? However dark she be,

Her dark gazelle- eyes I have seen

I call her the black bud, though

in the village, the folks call her dark.

There in the Mayanapara fields I saw

The dark girl’s dark gazelle-eyes.

The head was bare and her

loosened tresses fell over her back

she had no time to feel bashful

Dark? However dark she be,

Her dark gazelle- eyes I have seen

Bringing up Dad...

2011-08-11T17:48:00.000-07:00

By Anindita Baidya
Anand, Gujarat, India

Yes, I had a tough time bringing him up and he has still not grown.

He thinks otherwise. He feels, I have not grown yet and addresses me as he used to, when I was a skinny, worm-infested, thin-armed 8 year old boy.

‘Chhilkaa...!’(Hindi: छिलका), that’s how he addresses me even now. In presence of my wife, my children and my in-laws, he addresses me as ‘Chhilka’. He meant that I was not skinny, but was a skin...! Does he still think the same about his 74 kilos, 43 years small little boy? We need to ask him.

We need to ask him many things. One day I will, surely and tell him how tough it was to bring him up.

When I was a child, Babu (as I address my father) embarrassed me when he arrived at the Parents’-Teachers’ meeting in his blue factory worker suit, straight from his factory, riding his heavy Hercules bi-cycle, which had a black hard seat with no cover. And in the campus of the posh Saint Thomas High School, Babu became very prominent among the cars and two-wheeler owners. I often would refuse to accompany him around the school but then he would pull me by my ears and insist that I take him to the teachers. He never grew up!

Sometimes he visited my friends’ house along with me. I was embarrassed when he would sip the tea out of the saucer with a blissful ‘Sllllrupppp’ sound! So embarrassed I would be that I would pretend to be making that awful sound, just to make my friends and their families believe that I was the one who was ‘unpolished’ between the two.

Babu is an efficient and a very careful buyer. No, actually, I think he is obsessed with reading whatever is printed on the packing material. He would go through the MRP, date of Manufacture, Weight etc of a product t start with, next he would read the composition carefully and then the manufacturers. And he mastered the art. So much so that if you offered to try a new detergent, he would as well say that the new product also contains the same amount of Sodium tri polyphosphate but is costlier by Rs 16 and weighs actually 25 gm less! That was his accuracy. But that sometimes irritated me. When I would be down with fever, he would often prescribe the medicines by the Chemical Composition and I would fumble at the rack, looking for the right medicine bottle. He would also pick up un-read packets straight from the kitchen dustbin and dispose them only after he had memorised whatever was printed on those. No packing material could escape the scanning by Babu. He has not grown up from that too.

During the winters, he would often wear a simple shawl while chatting with the neighbours. At some point of time, in between, his eyes would fall on the antique Celsius thermometer hung above the equally antique television. Babu would look at the temperature and start feeling the chill; and then he would cover himself up with pull-over, socks, gloves and a grey monkey cap.

He did not have mercy on me when he met my Tamil girl friend. “Oh you are a Dravidian...” my wise Babu nodded. And then to my utter disgust, he continued, “So you worship Ravan and curse Ram?” Now, where from he had gathered the idea, I had no knowledge but surprisingly my girl friend and Babu struck instant rapport so much that anyone would doubt that Babu was the Ravan and this Dravidian worshipped him! He said yes to the matrimony and I got married to my Tamil girl friend. My Babu informed the relatives, “My daughter-in-law is from Tamil Nadu, which is a place in Madras.”

He continued to embarrass me by emerging out of the bathroom in his small towel, even in presence of my newly-wed bride! He managed to cook the most inedible stuff and praise his own skills. He even narrated to my wife, how he had caught me kissing the neighbourhood curly haired girl, when I was just 7.

“Did you HAVE to tell her that?” I confronted. To that the proud, broad-chested Babu answered, “So what! I have narrated this to your in-laws also!”

Surprisingly my wife and Babu have been the best of pals. To me he is still the merciless Babu who, according to me, left no stone un-turned to mortify me!

But then, I understand certain things now. I understand that Babu did not waste time to go home and get dressed in his best for my Parents’-Teachers’ meeting. He did not do it to avoid any pending work after the factory hours. He did not do it, so that he could be home on time, to look after me. To look after my food, to look after my studies.

With his meagre earning, he saved enough to send me to the best school in town and pay for my higher studies and build a cosy home for me. He cooked nutritious, however inedible food for me, played in the rain with me, taught me the bi-cycle, bought me the motor-bike and got me married to the girl I loved. He raised me, singly.

Yes, I understand certain things now. The blissful sound while sipping the tea was the result of the painful mouth ulcers he constantly had. He took care not to hurt his open ulcers and practically sucked the tea out of the saucer instead of sipping it. He was over-worked and poorly nourished and that’s why he always had those ulcers, the doctors said.

He was careful to save every extra penny to make my life better, I know now. I understand his wry sense of humour and understand why he has such a good rapport with my in-laws and my friends.

Babu is still the way he was. Today, when my children invite him to watch the old Bollywood songs on You-Tube, my Babu still writes a post-card to Vividh-Bharti to listen to his favourite numbers on Manchahi geet! And I must admit, all of us jump with excitement when Babu’s favourite Neemi Mishra on Vividh Bharti calls out, “Bokaro se Shri Jagadish Kumar ne Abhi toh main jawan hoo..sunnaa chaha hain...”

Yes, when we have an old baby like my Babu, who needs a grown up Dad anyway?

After all....
Zaheed yun hi badnaam hai
Gham se tujhe kyaa kaam hai
Yeh muskuraati zindagi
Zindaa dili ka naam hai
Dil dil se muskuraaye ja
Kuchh gaaye ja, bal-khaaye ja
Abhi to main jawaan hoon
Abhi toh main jawaan hoo

Rendezvous with a poetess...

2011-08-11T00:13:00.000-07:00

Is there a poet in each one of us, one who desires to break the monotony of prescriptions and presumptions and sees a world beyond? In an exclusive interview with My Little Magazine, poetess Shreya Chatterjee appeals to the dreamer in you. Listen to the musings....

MLM: What are the Musings of the Wanderer (you)?

Shreya: Musings of a Wanderer are thoughts, observations, and rarely opinions about incidents I come across. Several of my poems, articles and scribbles are to do with what I happen to see. A teacher had, once, told me-" keep the "I" away from your verses". But if "I" stays away, then somehow it doesn't work you see. Thus the "I" remains hidden in between the lines. My poems are to deal with my neighborhood, my city, and most importantly my mind.

MLM: How long have you been writing poetry?

Shreya: I have been thinking about poetry since my toddler years, under the benevolent guidance of my late Grandfather. He could speak in rhymes impromptu! I first wrote my thoughts out when I was in standard three. But it was one incident in standard four I remember quite clearly. We were asked to write on "If I were a bird"- and what I wrote turned out to be a poetic prose!! But even then, I had not started penning down thoughts seriously.
Life in between got punctuated with a great personal loss- a loss I can never accept. It was the demise of the ONE, who believed, " I know my words". And as for the little me, I just made a promise I would write as a tribute to HIM.It was not before standard five, that words began to speak to me and that was all because of this essay "a sudden holiday because its a rainy day". Mine was selected as one of the five best, read out in class along with the words of the English Teacher -"This was written within a very short time, for this student had spent most of the period, watching out of the window and ADMIRING the sudden shower...nevertheless, I am reading this out to you, without mentioning the name of the student...reading it simply because I never thought one could assemble brilliant poetic expressions in less than 10 minutes".And that was from were the journey as a poet started...

MLM: What inspires you most to write? Is there a story behind each poem? Can you share at least one such anecdote with us?

Shreya: I think everything around me has a story to tell, thus they find a place in my poems. Yes, nearly every poem I have penned down so far has a story behind. All my poems are dear to me. still, I think "WiReS" is one of the closest. Though "A Girl Scribbling..." surely has a good story behind it. It is about one of the two years old twin girls staying in my neighbourhood. One afternoon, while venturing out on my own, I saw her sprawled over their verandah, drawing mindless patterns over a piece of newspaper. I asked her in bangla (both of our mother tongue)- "Ki korcho?" (what are you doing?) She quietly replied-" Ami goppo ankchi" ( I am drawing a story). I sat beside her, on the steps of their house, and scribbled this poem on my notebook. She reminded me of my childhood and lonely afternoons, which I would spend scribbling on old newspapers- trying to act like grown ups.
After a while, She crept over my shoulder and softly whispered- "ki korcho?" (what are YOU doing?) I turned and replied-"Ami poddo ankchi".( I am drawing poetry.) She beamed and said two smart words- "goppo poddo"!!

MLM: How is the readership of poetry in today's mad mad race of life?

Shreya: People shy away from the words like 'poem' and 'poetry'. And I think it is because, many of the poets love to write their thoughts and feeling in the most-difficult-to-decipher manner! I think poetry is the shortest way to express oneself, provided if one is intending to speak to the person sitting next to him or her. My point is, we should write in all the forms existent, a hard hearted topic should be addressed with iron words, but a simple image of a baby sleeping can have soft and common imagery- something every mother can connect with.

MLM: Who is your target audience/readers?

Shreya: Anyone, who loves poetry,
Anyone, who desires,
To believe he/she can imagine,
Anyone who would like to know,
"She talks, just like I think and live my life",
And everybody else...
My words are written for all of them.

MLM: Which is your own favorite poem from the book? Why is it your favorite?

Shreya: I cherish thinking about "Downcast Eyes"- this poem is just a little one, short and crisp, so as to say, but was born out of several vivid incidents occurring in a single day. It talks about men who might be brave enough to face the wild world, but even they need a shoulder sometimes, for even they wish to cry out the bottled up pain and agony surging inside their beating heart.

"Downcast Eyes" can be read from my debut collection of poems called "Musings of a Wanderer".

MLM: What's next?

Shreya: I am planning for more poetry books, as well as short stories collection and a novel, in the years to come, hoping I can keep up all these promises made to myself.

Graft Craft

2011-08-04T05:42:00.000-07:00

By Abhishek Chatterjee
Singapore

To say that India's black money problem is a gargantuan one is stating but the obvious, but when some estimates peg the quantum of the parallel economy at USD1.4 trillion, it forces you to sit back and take notice. Remember Jim Carey in 'The Mask'? It’s almost as eyepopping, and then some. It’s a figure larger than the GDP of the country. Much of this wealth sits happily ensconced in tax havens and private banks, safe from prying Governments. While the Indian establishment tries its hardest to get its hands on some of this ill-gotten wealth (even recovering some part of it might significantly ease the country's fiscal imbalance), and even persecutes millionaire studfarm owner, Hasan Ali, not much headway has actually been made. And it’s unreasonable to expect any immediate results - some suggest another Voluntary Disclosure Scheme as a quick fix remedy, but that runs the risk of legitimizing the very scourge from which we need such an urgent cure. And the remedy must necessarily come from directly within the principal players in this sordid drama.

First, the government. It’s not particularly difficult to see why we have such a massive problem on hand. Clean business and clean money both need a clean financial and political ecosystem to flourish and circulate in, respectively. India clearly does not provide that ecosystem. The culture of corruption and gratification runs deep, so much so, that someone doing an honest day's work is looked upon with incredulity. So whereas in developed countries, while corruption exists, it seldom affects day to day life, in India it is all pervading and omnipresent, right from the traffic signal to the parliament. Successive governments have failed to show any degree of political will in tackling the problem and have never been close to showing zero tolerance for corruption. The current lot doesn’t even have disruptive coalition constraints to contend with, yet they have presided over the most damning series of scandals in memory. Clearly no one at the heart of government has been interested in reading out the riot act. And meanwhile...Rome burns. Some shrug and blame offshore havens, but it is important to note that we do have financial treaties with many of these jurisdictions, and the need of the hour is for us to work in more teeth into these treaties so that we can wield more than the current degree of power we possess to go after misappropriated funds hidden there.

An oft forgotten contributor to this problem is the private sector. It is easy to miss part that banks, tax evading corporations and greedy businessmen/professionals play in this monetary circus. Rich and unwilling to pay those worthless taxes with your hard earned rupee? You are almost certain to find an eager private banker willing to provide comprehensive 'solutions' to help you meet your needs. It is still not uncommon to overhear private bankers discussing customers walking in with suitcases full of cash. The profit motive in the private sector allows money, both legitimate and tainted, to escape the system, with willing customers ready to fork out hefty management fees to maintain the tax free status of their cash, which remains safe in complicated financial structures in off shore tax havens. In this regard, stricter Anti - Money Laundering legislation needs to be enforced and sometimes tenacious measures need to be taken against the big financial institutions, as seen in the case of the United States going after UBS AG. While most such institutions tend to remain on guard when it comes to links with drug money or possible terrorist funding, there remains a tendency to go soft when it comes to the rather vanilla issue of tax evasion. There are clear examples of willful collusion and examples need to be made of some of these 'reputable' names. Our rapacious capitalism, regardless of its nature, still needs to have morals, and just as the financial system seems to have learned from the 2008 financial meltdown (or has it?), we need to draw lessons from the constant use of the financial system both as a conduit for money laundering as well as a feeder of bureaucratic greed and tighten the gaps, fast.

The third and final corrective measure that needs to be put in place is one that needs to be directed towards ourselves. We cannot live as a nation of hypocrites. On one hand we pay lip service to Anna Hazare's or Baba Ramdev’s anti-corruption fasts, and on the other, we don't think twice before bribing the neighborhood policeman to escape a misdemeanor, a government clerk to move our file or the tax inspector scrutinizing our returns. We must remember that for every hand that takes, there is a hand that gives. And it is here that the bacterium of black money germinates, everything else is just a matter of scale and detail. We need to stop giving and we need to show patience. Only sustained action can lead to any sort of seismic shift in our embedded graft culture. While this might not bring back the billions already lost, it will at least help reduce this malaise in the ambit of our daily life. And that will be a significant battle won.

Poetry without words..

2011-07-31T20:48:00.000-07:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

It starts with a soft feathery stroke that sends the innermost chords of your soul vibrating in a poignant resonance. The next few minutes transport you to another land...you hear the rippling gurgling streams meandering through deep dark gorges, you float in the fluidity of that motion, prancing in circles, tiptoeing over the slippery rocky water bed. Then you hear the soft musings of a distant flute slowly weaving into that trance, further elevating you to a higher platform where each of your pulse is touched by a subtle yet powerful energy that brings you to submission. With each passing moment, the vision of the valley becomes more lucid in your mind. This is what happens when master instrumentalist Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma and music maestro Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia perform a Jugalbandi.

It was indeed poetry without words as the celebrated duo Shiv-Hari performed for a packed audience at the Esplanade Concert Hall, Singapore, last week. The magical pair was accompanied by Shri Vijay Ghate on Tabla and Pandit Bhawani Shankar on the Pakhawaj.

The evening opened appropriately with Raga Yaman, a solo composition played by Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, the undisputed king of Santoor. The raga popularly known as Kalyani in Carnatic is one of the most important and engaging ragas of Hindustani classical music and the composition by Pandit Sharma gave it a distinct character that revealed a sense of tranquillity. The accompaniment on the Pakhawaj added to that dimension. If I were left to translate my imagination in words, I saw myself sitting alone at the ghats of the holy Ganges, somewhere up north, near Haridwar or Rishikesh, watching a flood of floating diyas disappearing in the river after the evening aarti. If you have ever done that, you will know what I mean.

This evening raga was followed by a solo based on Raga Kirwani from the world renowned exponent of Baansuri (bamboo flute),Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia. Needless to say, the spotless and haunting rendition kept the audience enthralled. Though a strictly Carnatic raga, traces of Pilu could be found in the composition, the treatment was both romantic and passionate. Very easily the music could transcend the territorial limitations of space and take you by the Yamuna river to catch a glimpse of a divine poetry in motion. Vijay Ghate on the Tabla thundered like clouds rumbling in that backdrop and further accentuated the tempo and the mood.

The second session was the more energetic part of the evening as the two maestros left the audience mesmerised by a soulful Jugalbandi based essentially on the elegant late evening Raga Khamaj, skilfully improvised with popular light classical and folk music like Aayo kahan se ghana shyam and Okey aaj chole jete bolona Lolita. As the rendition unfolded phrases for each artiste to follow, the music intensified and the percussion accelerated the rhythm, the cadence conversing matchlessly with the Santoor and the Baansuri.

So spiritually enriching and soul stirring was the musical journey that I had to sit back and think, did I really need words to express myself, to convey my desires or passions, to elaborate on my dreams and fantasies, or to fight the innermost fears of my soul? Most of all, when there is music such as this, don’t I need to rephrase my prayers?

Musically yours,

Ananya

The Vision

2011-07-31T20:45:00.000-07:00

By Bilwanath Chatterjee
Kolkata, India

Tales from the Maximum City

2011-07-31T20:43:00.000-07:00

By Abdullah Khan
New Delhi, India

In his Booker-winning debut novel The White Tiger, Aravind Adiga exposed the ugly underbelly of the shining India. The antagonist of his debut book, Balram Halwai, was a country bumpkin, who learned the ways of city folks quickly to climb the ladder of the social hierarchy. He didn’t give a damn about the unethical and criminal aspects of his acts, and even philosophically justified his misdeeds, including his employer’s murder. Balram Halwai, in fact, was just an instrument for the author to paint a broader picture of the greed-infested and rabidly capitalist post- 1991 India- the country which once took pride in its Gandhian legacy but now being run by the carpetbaggers, pimps and middlemen. Adiga continues with the same leitmotif in his second novel (and third book) Last Man in Tower.

The protagonist this time around is Yogesh Murthy- a retired schoolteacher known as Masterji among his neighbours. An atheist and a highly principled man he lives in an old crumbling housing society known as the Vishram Housing Society. Built during the 1950s the society is the only ‘absolutely, unimpeachably pucca’ structure in the entire Vakola area of Mumbai, which mostly comprises of slums. The society in itself is a miniature of India; with all its religious and cultural diversity. The residents vary from a retired accountant, a small time real estate broker, an internet café owner, to a social worker, etc. There are Hindus Muslims and Christians. They are Punjabis, Gujaratis, Sindhis, Bengalis, etc. But despite their different culture and faith the residents live like one happy extended family.

One day, a well known Mumbai-based builder Dharmen Shah’s prying eyes fall on this society and he decides to buy it to build his dream project- a luxurious residential complex. He sends his emissary with tempting offers to all the society residents to sell their apartments to him. As the last date of the offer deadline nears, all the flat owners give in except ‘Masterji’. For Masterji the house harbours the priceless memories of his long gone daughter and recently deceased wife. His neighbours do not understand all this and start considering him a big hurdle in the way of their prosperity. At first, they try to convince him but when he refuses to budge, they start conspiring against him. Even his close friend Albert Pinto abandons him.

Thematically speaking, the novel is a discourse on the changing yardsticks of morality of the Indian middle class where values and ethics mean nothing, and where material possession stands for everything. Masterji here symbolises the last remnant of the ideals on which the idea of India was conceived. Dharmen Shah, on the other hand, represents today’s India. Like Balram Halwai he rises from the dirt and becomes a shining star. He does not shy away from performing morally or ethically wrong deeds if they guarantee him success. Just like Balram Halwai.

During the last two decades India has witnessed rapid economic growth that has created a big middle class and even bigger lower class. The former has great material aspirations and is simply brutal in its approach to achieving its goals. This upward mobility among the middle class has also created a huge demand for real estate. In the absence of any real government control, real estate has become a haven for unscrupulous and unethical businessmen. Under the political patronage, these builders function like the mafia- conducting their business with the stamp of legality. Adiga, undoubtedly, has created the character of Dharmen Shah from those real people.

Aravind Adiga has worked equally hard on all the characters. From the strange and secretive Secretary of the society to the guard Ram Khare, he has fleshed out each character equally well.. But, the central character Masterji doesn’t get the space he deserves. Even Dharmen Shah should have made his appearance more frequently. Further, the way Masterji’s neighbours behave after committing a ghastly crime doesn’t appear to be plausible. At places, the dialogue seems to be in the need of the tightening.

An apt commentary on the contemporary India but when it comes to literary merit , his last book Between the Assignations was better.

Expectation...

2011-07-30T06:13:00.000-07:00

By Aziz Rahman
Manama, Bahrain

The Charm of Battered Books

2011-07-30T05:42:00.000-07:00

By Aloke Kumar
Kolkata, India

Broken-backed and dog-eared, the more decrepit these volumes are the more I love them. How about you?
Some days back my friend Sundar (Dhritiman Chaterji ) posted an article from The Guardian or was it the Times London about the charm of battered books and the author stated that he loves them and asked 'How about you ?' .... I wanted to scream to him ...." Me too!! Me too!! "
You see, I inherited my father's antiquarian library and some of the books are battered. In spite of my best intentions, I have not been able to get them repaired as the old Muslim binders are either deceased or have returned to, what we call Bangladesh.
But that aside, I love battered books. Even if you give me the opportunity to exchange them for new books I will not. I absolutely adore these books.

Even those battered, tattered paperbacks . They have no manners. They always give away at odd places. Loose. Vagabond. More like Jack Kerouac on the road. But I love them . Even if you give a new paperback instead, I will decline. I have, you see, already got a copy. You might think that, given the rather sad state of it, being torn and tattered, I would jump at the chance of a clean, fresh, free copy. But that never occurred to me. My old 1960s paperback might be battered, bruised and beaten, but it is truly beloved.

I'm not sure how long I've had those paperbacks . Thirty years at least; probably twenty. Maybe more. I've read it perhaps half a dozen times. And each time I take it from the shelf, another sheaf of pages has come loose. The glue in the binding has deteriorated some more. The spine is scuffed and ripped, the cover is fading by degrees. But I could no more consider getting rid of it than I could get rid of my pet dying of old age.
The book doesn't have any particular emotional ties – it wasn't given to me by a loved one, nor found in any special place. I didn't read it for the first time one unforgettable night. But – for reasons that seem unclear and perhaps a bit odd now I come to examine them – I just wouldn't get rid of it, or replace it with a new copy.

Perhaps it's because my books have travelled with me all my life, their numbers swelling, becoming a much more unwieldy herd whenever I've had to move house. They've been lent out, brought back; their spines have been cracked and their pages spread-eagled on tables and floors; they've been rubbed with remains of food as we carry them to our dining tables and their corners turned down.
Perhaps it's because they mutely accept such abuse with the faithful, unconditional stoicism that I don't part with them. They've toiled hard for me, in difficult circumstances. Many a night lending company, helping me to draft a note or even help prepare a project for my son. When my son Rahul wanted a poem to read out in the next day’s class I took out the Poems of Yesteryears and realized that the book is much older to him. In fact most of the books are. It is because of this, like some benevolent squire of old I feel it's my duty to provide a comfortable place for them in their twilight years.
I have different relations with my antique books and paperbacks. For the antique books I treat them with kid gloves. I take the book from the shelf, avoiding too much dragging. I place the book gently on its spine and on a flat surface. Using a hand on each side, allow the book to open somewhere near the middle. I turn to the place I want by turning sections of the book over. I never press down on the pages near the joint or force the boards back beyond the flat position.

Whereas for the paperbacks,the rules are different. They shouldn't be wilfully mistreated, but we shouldn't handle them with kid gloves. If they pick up imperfections and blemishes, so what? A less than pristine book is a book with character. As we might, in time, come to look at our books as our friends, come to share with us the scars and scratches of life.

Truly Madly Deeply....

2011-07-26T07:04:00.000-07:00

Everyone has a love story; yes, irrelevant of the time in which we are born, irrespective of the socio-economic or cultural backgrounds we come from, each one of us has a love story, one that takes us hostage and slowly begins to regulate our lives. Leaning on this thought and to discover a bit more, My Little Magazine brings to you a tete-a-tete with Faraaz Kazi, author of Truly Madly Deeply…

MLM: How did Truly Madly Deeply happen?

Faraaz: The inspiration behind the tale was my school life. I knew I had to write about them, there was so much to write, so many events to capture on paper and I had to keep out a lot of things lest the book ended up looking like the Britannica encyclopaedia the protagonist in my novel drops on his leg in the library. Honestly speaking, the book stems from a short story I had written for a national story-writing competition of a popular newspaper, seven years back. Once it won there, I knew it had potential and six years and a creative writing course later, an idea came into my head that it could be expanded into a novel. People advised me against it, saying it will lose the flavour of brevity. But I believe if your heart says so, then there’s no use delaying it. I had the plot, I just changed the surroundings a bit and did all the things that fiction writers do, to make it more appealing and more pleasurable to the reader.

MLM: Is it everyone's story or your own?

Faraaz: Like most first novels TMD has some autobiographical shades but they have been amalgamated well enough to make it difficult for the reader to segregate fact from fiction. The story deals with obsessive love at an age where the same emotion is described by prefixing a ‘puppy’ to it. As each one of us has passed through that turbulent phase, TMD automatically becomes a tale that everyone can connect with. I have had many people, even grownups who told me that the tale takes them back to their own days of fun and glory.The primary target though has been young readers as the tale involves them.

MLM: What has been the best thing you have heard about the book?

Faraaz: The most common thing I get to hear from people is that the book takes them back to their own school days when there was no fear of tomorrow, no complaints against bosses and of course just careless fun with no responsibilities. All these things kept aside the best compliment for any author is when the readers connect to their work, feel the emotions of the character as theirs and laugh and cry with the protagonist. That way, I have been blessed to see many readers connecting to TMD and telling me such was their tale too. Many readers have reviewed it on their blogs and online bookstores, praising it no end. It feels good to see that and does make you feel proud.Of course, expectations go up then and I often encounter the question now ‘What’s next?’ and ‘When do we get to read it?’

MLM: What is the worst criticism about Truly Madly Deeply that you have faced so far?

Faraaz: I respect all my readers, irrespective of the fact that they liked my work or not. Critics are good as long as criticism is healthy but criticism done to malign someone, to push them down the ladder or just to avenge a personal grudge is immature and shows the critic’s unbalanced state of mind. I have had people (read ‘writers’) who have portrayed themselves like true friends while talking to me and behind my back; they posted a common template on most online sites advising people against buying the book. Next I have seen readers from the West who have gone through the error ridden draft copy of the book (read ‘The Kindle Edition’) through Amazon, thanks to a major irresponsibility on my publisher’s part and such people came down heavy on me through Online forums and the like. Some blamed it on their age saying that they are no longer that young to connect to this work, some said the writing style is a little self-indulgent and it went on.

MLM: What’s next?

Faraaz: Haha, I still dread the writer’s block and have been at the receiving end of it but these days it’s quite the opposite with me, I have a lot to write but I am not finding the time to sit and pen it down. I am working on a college romance, quite contemporary again and a book of short-stories with a little twist of fantasy. Then again there’s a literary story of a female protagonist that I have been working on since quite a while but have stalled it for the moment as my current focus is on the other two. I don’t keep deadlines in mind, so I have no idea when I will manage to complete them.

I love him and he does not like sambhar

2011-07-25T22:08:00.000-07:00

By Anindita Baidya
Anand, Gujarat, India

Illustration: By Prodipto Roy
Kolkata, India

So what? The yet-to-be married would question! Love will anchor you, what does Sambhar have to do when there is love? It has to. The married friends may agree.

I am Meenakshi, A Tam-Brahm (Tamil Brahmin) born in Tirunelvali, nurtured within a joint family, nourished with love, care, Karnatic music and Sambhar. Do not misunderstand me; I do not go about talking about my caste and religion to everyone I meet. But for the benefit of the story, I have to.

Well, after completing my BA in my home town, I proceeded to Mumbai for an MA and then my life changed forever.

There I met Shubhro, an aspiring Bengali architect and fell in love with him. And married him. So do I say, “Aur khatam ho gayee story?” No Friends, my story begins here.

Before the wedding, I often visited Madhu and Keshav, my friends, who were already married. I shared my deepest secrets, wildest dreams and worst fears with them. I also remember saying, “Shubhro and I think alike. We have no difference, except for the difference in food taste.” Madhu warned, “Wait and see how that difference proves to be a larger than life one!” I ignored her. Love will sail us through, I convinced myself!

After the marriage, I visited my in-laws’ rural household at Bardhaman. Relatives from far and near arrived to meet the MADRASI bahu.

“I am not from Madras, you see!” I tried to explain, “I am from Tirunelveli!” To that, the elder ladies said, “Oi holo...” which translated literally, implies, “It is all the same, dear!” but the attitude was more of, “Who cares...” and I was hurt! But then, to them, Madras was a Geographical area in the south India, which contained in itself, Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra...whatever. And residents of these areas, Madrasis.

But the younger generation listened to the interesting stories of my hometown and the young girls were interested in the herbal paste I used for bath and the saris I wore.

My palate was in for a shock, for sure. I have been a pure vegetarian throughout my life and here I was in a household where not one vegetarian meal could be thought of. If I chose only dal-chawal, there was the fish head in the dal and if I chose curry, I found shrimps with bottle gourd.

But my considerate in-laws helped me tide over those days and took extra care to prepare special vegetarian dishes for me but in that one month at Bardhaman, my tongue started tingling for tamarind taste.

Back in Mumbai after the holiday, I was on my own to cook whatever I liked and live as I wanted to. Or so I thought!

I was by then getting used to share a bed with another person; I was also, after a few protests getting used to Shubhro waking up in the morning and switching off the fan before leaving the room! He would often forget, he explained, that there was someone else in the room too!

My culinary skills were ready for the new challenge. So day after day I would prepare the best of Sambhar, rasam, curries but I also noticed that day after day Shubhro’s appetite was decreasing.

The cat was let out slowly. He did not enjoy Sambhar, he said. Ok, so I cooked Sambhar for myself and made dal for him, but he wanted Masoor dal, he said. So I had to cook two different dals.

I had decided to be a full-time home manager and thus took over the entire job of managing the household and kitchen on my own. So, Shubhro, once a great cook, as claimed by him, had to remain out of my work-station.

So began our new life with our new journey. I could not figure out why he wanted that sugar and cardamom in the potato curry and he was shocked to find that the spinach was put into dal, he wanted it dry, he said. Now that I had the control of the kitchen, my Shubhro craved for fish, which by default was not brought in.

Gradually my work space was expanded to accommodate Shubho and his fish. He was not much of a meat-eater and about eggs, I had no problem in boiling one or two for his breakfast which satisfied him. But fish was an integral part of his life and now that I was also an integral part of him, he was faced with difficult choice to make!

My wise mother-in-law once narrated a small piece, in praise of the favourite Ilish (Hilsa) and Bengali’s love for it. She said according to them, “The Himalayas lie at the summit of the earth, on Himalayas, sits the Lord Shiva, from his head (summit again) flows The Ganges and on the Ganges is the Ilish.” So, teh Ilish is above all; above caste, creed, religion, sex. Thank you ilish for delivering the message of equality among us.

This piece of wisdom dawned upon me and I thus welcomed the fish inside my kitchen. After all, Shubhro had never had a meal without fish and how could I expect him to do so, now?

So, gradually peace was restored. He of course enjoyed the idli-chuntney as much as I loved the loochi (Poori). When I would be down with cold and flu, Shubhro would prepare a hot rasam and pamper me! But he could not develop any affinity for my humble sambhar and I continued running for life whenever the fish was fried in the mustard oil. That was double offence: fish and mustard oil.

There were some other differences which we never spoke about to each other too. I would often wish that he would read with me, Eric Segal, after dinner and he remained stuck before my Sauten, the television. I sulked for a few days and when I confronted, he said, how he wished I watch the Indiana Jones series sitting by his side! Oh, both of us had hidden wishes which never was vocalised.

“Shout at each other but don’t sulk!” Madhu and Keshav adviced us and we complied.

So amidst our agreement on quarrels, dislikes, differences, we also discovered how similarly we thought about our future, how alike we were in thoughts about what our children should watch on TV and we had no differences while deciding that both his and my parents should be with us at their old age. We shared the same passion for music, only if, he said I could understand the Rabindra-sangeet he sung for me, I wished he understood Thiruvasagam lyrics but we enjoyed music so Tagore or Thiruvasagam, both of us drowned ourselves in them.

And the roads we treaded may be similar to the ones most of the couples have done but for us, it was for the first time. Two weeks later, we will be celebrating our 25^th wedding anniversary. We have two beautiful angelic children. My daughter is a prodigy in Karnatic music while my son does the honours for his dad, cooking up the best of fish-dishes. He aspires to be a cook, he says.

No I do not eat or cook fish yet. But I love this fish-eater (No not a cat) called my husband. And he continues disliking sambhar till date.......

The God Maker

2011-07-21T19:42:00.000-07:00

By Prodipto Roy
Kolkata, India

To touch the face of the divine...

2011-07-07T21:40:00.000-07:00

By Pritha Lal
Springville, Utah, USA

Rocks with a million stories untold,
Sunsets that paint the valleys gold.

Still waters that run way deep,
Secrets of the universe within, they keep.

When time stands still as a million stars shine,
Maybe just for a fleeting moment,
you touched the face of the Divine…

I came back to the hotel that night after a night cruise on the Colorado River, gently gliding along the rock walls of the Canyonlands and I had no other words or feelings that could capture all that I felt. I cannot recall a moment in my adult life where I was that spellbound, humbled and in awe of the beauty of the Universe in a single moment.

The rock faces told of many stories of how the earth was formed, geologic and scientific the tales were real and interesting. The gradually setting sun told a myriad tales as the skies turned from the scorching ochres to smoother, softer blues and gentle purples. The soft sounds of the water told the tales of this amazing river that goes on to form the Grand Canyon that is visible from space. The quiet power and prowess of the Colorado River tells the stories and fables of history and carry with it so many memories.

The 40,000 watt illumination talk to the history of Utah, the ancient people, the tribes, the tales of love and sacrifice. The sound and light show is spectacular and is as beautifully presented, as is interesting and informative.

The final story teller of this night is the sky with a million stars and a few shooting stars and the soft glistening Milky Way. No one can decipher the stories they tell as one looks back in time and space to see their light reaching us through time. There are no words to fathom the surreality of the moment of the beauty of what one feels within. I recall looking up and finding my vision blurring at times. I thought my glasses were hazy, turned out it was just my eyes. Emotions that run so deep within you sometimes find no words, happiness, sorrow, pain, joy, at moments like this are transfixed and a few tears of gratitude spill out.

You are humbled to be a part of the universe and you realize how small and insignificant you are and yet, you have a role to play in this world, a bit of joy to give, a bit of love to get maybe.. who knows? Your past, your present, your future, all stand still in time and your soul is never the same again, because through all this, you were, for a fleeting second, able to touch the face of the Divine…

Aamchi Mumbai

2011-07-03T19:01:00.000-07:00

By Uday Deb
Mumbai, India

Kadambari

2011-06-30T20:42:00.000-07:00

By Bina Biswas
Hyderabad, India

The huge mahogany double bed lay in the middle of the room. The white bedspread was tucked in from all the sides, neatly. The side pillows lay at one side, now no use. The room was swept clean and the window curtains were pulled aside in the morning. Some medicines and bottles of syrup and a water jug kept on a peck table… an unusual silence and sadness gripped the bedroom. Many a night of embrace and love, laughter and whisper sweet nothings…the rustle of the starched sari, the tinkling of the bangles and the scent from her hair had belonged to the room…now empty. She rested on the bed, wan and unconscious and the beautiful eyes half closed and her long black tresses spread as if black wet clouds enclosed a soft white pale moon.

The husband, muted, stood there scratching his chin…could not really make out what next. The face bore no impression of pain rather expressed some compulsive feel-bad look. He came near the bed and touched her arm slightly and then left the room in a rush.

“From where did she get the stuff?” asked the inspector of Police. The Patriarch of the house nodded slightly and signalled others to leave the room…then he spoke something in a low voice to the cop and both left in a hurried pace for the living room of the mansion…

Somewhere in Jessore, an elite household had resounded with joy: “The groom has arrived, the groom has arrived, bor esheche, bor eshche”…the young girls’ cries filled the huge verandah where the marriage was to be solemnised. The ladies filled the air with Ulludhwani and blew conch-shells…laughter, hustle, commotion…’come this way please’…’no no this is not on’…’where are you all gone? Groom has come…’ and inside her room Kadambari, a child-bride stood decked up…her deep dark gazelle eyes now looked petrified…her heart heaved and feet trembled…

The groom and bride exchanged their first pious glance…shubhodristhi…the beautiful face uncovered, the big black eyes blushed and a slight smile appeared on her curved thin painted lips…

“Yadidong hridayan tabo, yadidang hridayan mamo”(I give my heart to you, you give yours to me), the priest chanted as the groom tried to steal a glimpse of the bride from behind her gossamer veil. The garlands were exchanged and the priest announced them man and wife…

The man and woman lay next to each other…her face bore the impress of exhaustion…crimson coloured cheeks, the sandalwood smeared forehead and kohl smudged eyes, spoke of an unknown pain and sorrow and the bride then turned and tried to catch up with some sleep as the groom snored away breaking the silence of the night in the room….

“Bouthan how was it in the night? But whatever said and done you look like a beautiful fawn…” said the naughty and handsome brother of her husband…Bhanu…who then walked away in a hurry.

Soon the room filled with the laughter and giggles and teases of the young married and unmarried girls as Kadambari tried to make her way to the Walnut chest kept in the corner of the room.

Kadambari was barely in her teens when she was married to Jyotirmoy who was almost fourteen years elder to her. Her parents were only too content to find an alliance from such a family of great repute and sophistication. Without any fuss she was married and she did not know what lay in future for her. The child-bride hardly understood the meaning and responsibilities of a marriage… what they could understand was to follow whatever was asked of them and obey without question. She studied in a convent and had already gathered the mannerisms and sophistications of the elite society. She was a perfect match for the groom with élan.

“I asked you Kadam, so many times that you should never leave your hair open in the evenings…but you won’t listen…one day the ghost will come and catch you by hair…” her mother would admonish while plaiting braids of her long dark tresses. The beautiful eyes wondered at every word of her mother and she would retort, “No, maa nobody can catch me…I can run away always…nobody can catch me” her mother would feel unhappy at this and keep quiet.

“Bouthan, I have composed a poem…would you please like me read it out to you?” Bhanu would announce when every woman in the mansion were having afternoon siesta and the men folks away on their work.

“No, I don’t like you to read. Give me I will read it myself. Oh! You have become a great poet of the world,” cried Kadam, when Bhanu approached her with his poem.

The room filled with soft reprimands, recitals and then either the Bouthan or her brother-in-law would leave the room in a scurry…probably after a serious literary tiff.

Jyotirmoy’s work used to keep him away most of the time from Kadam. He had to produce and direct the plays and dramas that he wrote and saw them enacted too by a group of artistes. When he came back to Kolkata to his wife, he would be busy discussing all his works with his elder and younger brothers…forgetting about Kadam. Within no time she grew up into a woman and from where she learnt all that to entice her husband she also could not figure out. But she had learnt that she had to pine for his attention as it would not come easy.

Like the parasite creeper that grows on the main tree and then slowly becomes strong on the sap and creeps and engulfs and also bears some wild flowers…Kadam’s love for Bhanu blossomed in the same manner…and thoughts about him she could not keep away from her mind. Bhanu would always tease her and praise her looks and rhyme it up in a poem.

Slowly they became playmates. The duo was unmindful of the conventional norms of the elite household and society. They started enjoying each other’s camaraderie and little had they realised when they became soul mates.

“Kadam, come and help us in the household work and stop wasting time with poems and rhymes…you are not going to get any award …” the elder women in the house rebuked her. Her big black eyes would fill with tears and she would run away to her room on the third floor and close the door behind her. She wept alone. Her mind and thoughts were blurred with one forbidden thought…the more she tried to keep it away, the more it came, overpowered and possessed her.

Slowly the sinister dark outside her room danced wild with fireflies, behind the bamboos a small lonely star twinkled...she would feel pang for her beloved…alone in the lonely dimly lit room and her heart would wrench at the sound of every footstep near her door.:.

Away in the family owned houseboat Jyotirmoy busied him with production and direction activities and enjoyed the pleasures of boat ride with his friends…little did he care to remember Kadambari whom he had left behind alone at the mansion in Kolkata.

“Kadam, will you come with me and stay for a few days on the houseboat? But remember you can come back only when I bring you here…it is not easy to see and enjoy the waters for a long time…understand?”

“Then if I don’t like to stay on boat with all your friends around then?” wondered Kadam.

“Then also you have to stay on,” replied the man in a stern voice.

“Then take Bhanu along with us,” requested Kadambari, “you will be busy with dramas and I can listen to his poems.”

“Oh! Sure,ask him tomorrow whether the poet can come right along with us or wants to join later,” agreed Jyotirmoy.

The husband’s embrace and touch would stir forbidden thought in the woman and her mind ventured out somewhere, away in the attic where one poet relentlessly scribbled love poems on pieces of paper hating and admonishing himself every time for the wrong selection of words…

Slowly the whispers grew into talks and then into complaints. The eldest daughter-in-law who had acquired the reins of the entire household after the death of her mother-in-law was a strict disciplinarian. Her husband, the eldest brother of Bhanu, held a high rank in the government and this needed all of them to follow a strict code of conduct, when they were around. The mansion was too messy with people and slowly became unlivable for the sophisticated officer and his family. They moved away to central Kolkata...to a posh locality with their two children.

Kadambari used to criticise severely whatever Bhanu wrote. Jyotirmoy would subject it to even more severe scrutiny and the young poet would feel disheartened only to gain confidence once he was back to the rooftop room…where he felt like a king.

“Jyoti, take your wife along with you this time. Take a house and start your family life. Kadam is not able to stay alone here without you”, the warning came from the Patriarch, Jyotirmoy’s father and this time he was given no choice. Kadambari and Jyotirmoy moved out and Bhanu was left alone in the mansion with the muse as his sole companion. The young poet started penning poems with vengeance and went on dedicating those to the ‘lady born out of his mind’. The heart-broken poet wrote verses…resembling his own feelings as the words laughed at the poet and the pang of separation compelled him to write more.

“Believe me this not a love letter…I have to write it into a dialogue”, the husband tried to even out.

“Then why is it addressed to you?” asked Kadambari softly, disbelieving her own words.

Tears rolled down the fair cheeks as the young mind could not believe what her husband had just told her. She remembered her happy and carefree days in the Mansion…and felt a pang for the one she had left there…

…Bhanu had to be married. The elder ladies of the house felt that it was their responsibility since Bhanu’s mother had passed away long back. The men of the house decided to start looking for alliance for the young poet who by now had already started acquiring name amongst the Bengal literati.

“Bouthan, I don’t want to marry,” he would reply when teased about this by Kadam. But as the word “marriage” was uttered, an unspeakable fear gripped Kadam’s mind and her deep black eyes would become moist.

“Bouthan, I will marry only when you find someone as beautiful as you…” and then he would leave the place in haste.

Kadambari had already invited a lot of wrath from the women of the house for her open display of love towards her younger brother-in-law. The eldest strict sister-in-law would take her aside and rebuke her for wasting her time. The women watched every step and movement of hers...now, when she came back from their Chandranagar’s house. Kadam was deeply hurt by this. Jyotirmoy remained indifferent and preoccupied and behind his knowledge his wife grew into a beautiful, young woman…that he neither cared nor noticed.

The husband’s stolid neglect gave her a chance to find love and emotional bond outside her marriage. The more the elders tried to restrain her, more rebellious she became. Slowly she started breaking away from the dead relationship with Jyotirmoy…mentally….

The suffocation in the mansion made her feel hollow within. Her surrogate companion, Bhanu, kept on dedicating his poems and books to her bringing her a lot of agonies…unfeeling and unmindful of what she could go through, the young budding poet remained ceaseless in his endeavour.

The garden in the front of the mansion had burst into flowers in autumn…in different colour and hues. The air brought in fragrance of Shiuli flower to the poet’s chamber and to the third floor room… where two lonely hearts swayed in silence…

Another child-bride, now somewhere from the interior village came to the mansion. It was a plain and simple wedding following Brahmo rituals. This time the child came to her husband’s house with a doll in her hands. She cried whole day missing her playmates in the village…the ponds where she swam with Beli, another girl of her age, till the sun came overhead…or for the mongoose and the squirrel that she had petted…the ten year old missed everything what she had left behind in her village…

The young poet, who had moved away from his “Bouthan’s” orbit, wrote poems and dedicated to his “Bouthan” even after his betrothal…caused the unfanciful heart immense injury and grief.

Behind the bamboos the fireflies twinkled, a solo boatman ferried back home, the dark on the other side of the river was dotted with dim lights from the huts, somewhere a jackal howled, a wan moon rose…inside the room on the third floor of the elite mansion…a woman searched for the box she had kept away to rid her off her pains, tears and ignominy… denied of any vent for the emotions, feelings and sorrow…she carried all these with her…consumed it all and this time she made sure that she died… at the age of twenty-five.

“…yes, please clarify, where she got the poison from? So much of opium…from where?” repeated the inspector of police as the Head of the house kept mumbling something inaudible. A court sat at the elite house. The suicide note and the letters of Kadam were destroyed and the body was cremated.

In another house in Jessore, unaware Kadam’s mother waited for her dear daughter to come back to her during the festival time and run wild around the house saying, “Catch me, if you can.” Her giggles and laughter resounded in the empty house. But, that was never to be!

Rainmakers

2011-06-23T04:08:00.000-07:00

By Aziz Rahman
Manama, Bahrain

Prisoner of the Dark Sun

2011-06-12T09:45:00.000-07:00

By Prodipto Roy

Kolkata, India

Mixed Media , 8.5"X11.6"

All the World's a Stage...

2011-06-10T22:03:00.000-07:00

By Ananya Mukherjee
Singapore

When the third bell rings and backstage murmurs fade, theatre lights are dimmed and the curtain is raised. In Stage Utopia, the life of an actor begins with conjuring a tale that persuades you to laugh and cry with him in the next few hours, and ends with bringing you on your feet in a rush of applause or sending you home with a lingering thought to ponder upon much after the applauds have faded into silence.

However, in today’s i-centric social context, (and I don’t just mean iPods, iPhones and iPads), the power, impact or success of theatre as a tool of any socio-political revolution is debatable.

“Although the primary purpose of theatre is to engage an audience with their imagination through a shared time and space, once that has been achieved it is possible to draw their attention to pressing
socio-political issues. At that time of performance it is possible to evoke strong feelings among the audience. But once they leave the theatre, how much of what they experienced they will carry forward into their lives is hugely speculative,” Mahesh Dattani, Indian director, actor and playwright, observes.

Mahesh, who has many successful and popular plays like Final Solutions, Dance Like a Man, Bravely Fought the Queen, On a Muggy Night in Mumbai, Tara, and 30 Days in September to his credit also feels that Indian theatre is at a crossroad at the moment. “We are at crossroads with our form-heavily borrowed from western models and yet, self-consciously aware of our roots.”

However, the first playwright in English in the country to be recognised with the Sahitya Akademi Award, quickly adds that he is optimistic about the future of theatre in India and sees a great deal of talent amongst young theatre practitioners.

“I am confident they will create a theatre that is alive and relevant to our times. I find more and more youngsters are aware that theatre gives them training and discipline. They can also do cinema or television which is definitely more paying. Yes, there are thousands and thousands who would love to do cinema or television under the misguided assumption that is more rewarding in outreach and money, but these are the ones who rarely make it. Not on their own steam, at least” Mahesh says.

So where does its future lie in the hands of those who are truly passionate about it? “Theatre eventually would go in smaller spaces as cities get more and more unwieldy, offering an intimacy between the performer and the spectator, and that is where its power will lie,” he predicts.

Mahesh ends our conversation by sharing an interesting anecdote, one of the many rewarding experiences he has had in many years as a playwright: “I remember once after my play Final Solutions on the Hindu-Muslim divide, a young man came up to me and said he was Bobby but his name was Babban. After watching the play he found pride in who he was and was thinking of changing it back to Babban. A character in my play has the same name and issue.”

Mahesh’s personal experience only corroborates my belief that theatre, no matter how “unprofitable” in terms of numbers on a cheque might be, is that powerful instrument of performing arts that can change perceptions, alter lives or provoke you to think what may have escaped your rationale otherwise. Theatre is not about deception. It’s simply about presenting a tale that relates to you and me, the portrayal of a truth that often might go unnoticed in the ordinary business of life.

Cycle-Acrylic on Canvas

2011-06-07T18:15:00.001-07:00

By Jeet Ganguli
Goa, India

Trrring Trriing...HELLO!

2011-06-06T18:51:00.000-07:00

By Shubhomoy Banerjee
Surendranagar, India

I stand outside Chetan Pan and Cold drinks corner, just across the road from the NDDB office, as you take a right from Upasna circle and move towards Ahmedabad. Hey! Don’t get bored by the vivid description of where I stand. I know it hardly matters to you, or for that matter to anyone who comes to Chetanbhai’s shop for paan, cigarettes, cold drinks or simply to spend some time away from the scorching heat, Surendranagar subjects its residents to. But I too have seen days of glory. It’s a different matter that now Chetanbhai uses me as a store room for the cold drink crates. It is easier for him doing so rather than taking them inside every night before he downs the shutter for the night.

I must admit, I have started looking ugly. It has been more than six years since Chetan bhai last put a coat of fresh paint on me. Those were, I must say, my heydays. Mobile phones were yet to become a rage and internet telephony was just making its way in. In fact there must have been only one shop which had facilities for internet telephony, the cyber café in the lane beside Axis bank. The Navratras were a rage for Chetanbhai. Long before he would worship her, on Diwali, the Goddess of wealth, Laxmi would have already showered her blessings on him. People especially those staying in the societies in and around Wadhwan, would line up till late into the night to talk to their relatives settled at the other end of the world. I would often feel surprised, when people would say “Good Morning Beta, Kem Chhe” at 9 in the night. But slowly I came around to come to terms with the fact that while its night here in Surendranagar, it must be day in the other part of the world.

Those were the days, when BSNL had not come out with the One India Plan and other companies like Airtel, Reliance and Tata had not made forays into the Land Line segment. They call it Fixed phone, I suppose. Sim cards were hard to come by. Not like today, when you get a sim card for as less as 5 Rs. with Rs. 30 talk time for a month. And yes, even incoming calls to mobile phones were charged. “What a fucking joke”, many of you would say. But that is true. And yeah, getting a land line connection at home was far tougher than getting a pass percentage in the board exams. So it would be me and only me in the moments of (now lost) glory. STD calls made between 11 in the night and 8 in the morning would be charged at one fourth. That would precisely be the time, when the working class would queue up to call up children and relatives studying or staying in “out states” (That’s what the Gujjus call other states). Of course, the shop would close at 12 in the night, but Chetanbhai, the shrewd businessman he is, would open it quite early at 7:00 in the morning. Chetanbhai had very tastefully done my interiors. I must admit he has a great aesthetic sense, though he has spent half his life applying gulkand to the betel leaves. There was a small fan which would not make much noise. There was a small sleek tubelight too. All that, however, is gone now. The fan holds a place of pride at a chemist’s shop in the bazaar and the tube light along with its frame lies in Chetanbhai’s house, that too because even a bhangaarwala had once refused to buy it.

I have been privy to so many intimate conversations of various aspects of peoples’ lives. Maganbhai’s son Jinkal found his love here. I still remember the day when Jalpa told “hun pan tane bahu prem karuchhu” (I too love you a lot). Now, stop getting ideas. I was not eavesdropping, but how could I have helped, if Jinkal had put the speaker on. Jinkal had started jumping on my wooden floor and I had started shaking out of fear. Thankfully, I didn’t come crashing down. However, I must also thank Chetanbhai for reprimanding Jinkal for jumping. Must admit, Chetanbhai took great care of me. It was here that Maulik, Jethabhai’s son got the news of his getting selected for some course in America. The 95 dialing had begun just a few days back and people were happy that they could dial 9579 instead of 079 for Ahmedabad even during the peak diurnal hours and charged lesser. Rameshbhai had availed of my services to convey the news of the death of his wife Shardaben to his relatives around the world. I felt sad for Rameshbhai. He seemed to love his wife very much as he would often burst into tears conveying the news of her death.

However, people slowly stopped realizing and acknowledging my importance in their lives. Post 2006,cheaper mobile phones started hitting the markets in a big way. You could get phones at as less as Rs. 1200. Chetanbhai had stocked many such phones for a long time. However, the odd labourer or a rickshawwallah would still use me. SIM cards were probably still hard to come by, you see. But my significance was totally lost when some, what do they call it here, Chinese phones started being sold in India. I still did not have much to worry, many would think, since they being “imported maal” would be costly. Right? Wrong. Now even the laariwaala across the road, you know, the one who sells aamras in the summers and khariseeng in the winter, possessed a mobile phone. And as if to rub salt on my already wounded self, SIM cards had also become cheaper. Everyone possessed a phone now. The truckwallah who would buy biris from Chetanbhai’s shop, the pastiwallah who used to come to buy old copies of Divya Bhaskar from Chetanbhai, even the guy who controlled the road roller when the road was being broadened. I was not needed anymore. What a fucking joke, I would often think.

I have been witness to changing times. And my diminishing importance as well. The asbestos cover above my head, to protect my interiors from the rains is now gone. The road infront is now a four laned one. There is a Hyundai showroom just down the road. Jinkal was here the other day, with his wife. He has just acquired a Blackberry. He was showing it off to Chetanbhai. I say “he was here with his wife” as it was not Jalpa. I know Jalpa far too well to forget her. They would often meet at the shop. I don’t know what transpired between them. Jinkal had left for Bombay just a year after the floods. Even if they had a break up it would have been on a mobile phone. It’s so easy with one, isn’t it? All you have to do is, type, “Get the hell out of my life” on your mobile phone and send it to the other party. What a fucking joke! Maulik is here too. For preparations for his thesis viva, or so I gather from his talks with Chetanbhai. I wonder what America has done to him. He shouts F words at his girlfriend on his mobile phone, that too publicly. Now, tell me is that what is expected? There is something called privacy goddamnit. I don’t know what the last word means, I just heard Maulik shouting it over his mobile phone. Rameshbhai has retired from his job. His daughter has been married off to an NRI engineer in Canada.He too doesnot require me,as, I gather he has got some “ISD plan” on his phone gifted by his daughter, the last time, she was here during Uttarayan. Maganbhai, Jinkal’s father does come here for his Mawa supari, but as I often see him, he is mostly glued to his Nokia 2700. And Jethabhai has got a new i-phone, so that he can read Maulik’s mails even on the move.

And here I am, the doomed STD telephone booth, with a rotten base (The rot started after the floods, there is a brick underneath to prevent me from falling off), peeling paint, laden with empty bottles of cold drinks, waiting to be sold off to the Bhangarwala.

The Blue Umbrella

2011-06-06T07:26:00.001-07:00

By Sudeshna Dasgupta
Singapore

The Indigo Files

2011-06-05T17:29:00.000-07:00

By Maitreyee Chowdhury
Bangalore, India

A character in one of Satyajit Ray's short stories titled 'Indigo' says " I have treated the natives here so badly that there is none to shed a tear at my passing away"..He was perhaps terribly correct, as they say realization reaches a man late, sometimes even after his death. The story goes on to show how the dead Englishman enters the body of an Indian traveler staying in a Dak bungalow at night, only to kill his pet hound so that the Indigo farmers don't stone him to death..Fear of such parameters is perhaps apt for the amount of atrocities that have been committed by the English on the Indigo farmers of Bengal. They were beaten mercilessly, starved and killed at the whims of the rulers and yet when these very farmers rose in revolt in the years 1859-60, it was a non violent movement.

Of course the Nawab of Awadh played as much spoil sport here as the Britishers, but his commanding high prices led to further atrocities on Bengal's farmers and their compulsion to grow Indigo, in spite of the miserly profits, health hazards and the fear of making the farm land go to waste....Amidst all the ghost stories that still do the rounds of those killed during the Indigo farming and their spirits doing the rounds haunting the Britishers, a small and rather hilarious story caught my attention.

It is said that the Indigo Planters had their estates and lived the comfortable life of planters on these estates. Of course their stay here assumes rather colorful proportions when it is allied with facts of them taking native women as mistresses. One can safely assume that this was done to not only satisfy the Britt libido but also polish off their sense of 'Social service' to the nation in giving birth to a breed of those whom we know today as Anglo Indians.

One such Indigo factory/estate in the district of Nuddea, was being overseen by Richard Aimes. No surprise in that except perhaps for the pretty fact that the gent in question was nicknamed as “Dick Saheb” by the locals. It goes without saying that the gent in question maintained not one but quite a number of native mistresses. To add detail to history his mistresses had been categorized under the variations of their color. They were of course given exotic names such as - Gora or Fair Anund, and Kala or Dark Anund, depending on the color the sahib preferred for whatever time of the year they rendered their services. It shall perhaps suffice to say that the localities found no traces of Dickie bird in the rather colorful Richard Aimes.

There is perhaps nothing exceptional to this piece of historical cross pollination except for the pertinent question that how did the natives get the 'Dick sahab' adage so damm correct!