Let me contextalise. Sonagachi is one of the largest Red Light areas in Kolkata (in fact in Asia). There are quite a few of them, but I had heard from people who know that Sonagachi is the best. Two others are harkata [near my alma mater: Presidency College] and Kalighat [near the famous Kali temple]. As a young student in Kolkata in late 1980s, I had noticed three things about these three places:
1. there are several middle class dwelling houses in, I mean in Sonagachi and they have a sign in Bengali on the front door "Grihastho Bari: Janasadharaner Probesh Nishedh"[Domestic Dwelling: No Entry for Public"]. These dwellings have been there as long as Sonagachi has been there. One has not mixed with the other!
2. The devotees at Kalighat and the customers at the nearby area did not get mixed up with each other [I am sure there was a small set of common patrons!]
3. The one at Harkata [Cut bone] was 200 metres from the entrance to the Calcutta University's venerable buildings and 250 metres from the main entrance of the Presidency College. But interestingly none of the day scholars I knew [they were by far the majority] knew where harkata was. Of course, my knowledge stemmed from the collective adventurous spirit of generations of adventurous presidency colege students who boarded at the famous Hindu Hostel.
By the way: Soliciting was illegal then as now, but the barabanitas of the three places carried out their trade quite openly. Also, those who did not know or where not bothered with the existence of these places were not in anyway prevented from knowing about these places [no law stopped them nor was any moderation done to their behaviour] It was a part of ecology. Law could not prevent the trade in as much as moderation or control was not neessary to determine the behaviour of people who lived, worked or studied nearby.
I am not giving you this example from my past life to titilate you. But to draw attenntion to the similarities that the case has with the discourse on internet and the need for moderation, need for law etc etc.
My take: Sonagachi, Kalighat and Harkata have flourished for a 100 years in spite of 100 year old laws to prevent them. For hundreds of years, devotees at Kalighat temple, or ordinary dwellers at Sonagachi or Students at Presidency college and Calcutta University have remained untouched by their existence.
Can we not see the parallels with Internet here? I can see it, if you can't you are either blind or Stupid!
Friday, October 27, 2006
Monday, October 23, 2006
Double Whammy
Yesterday Daily News and Analysis (Broadsheet published from Mumbai) carried an interesting news on the front page. Australian employees of a bank refuse to train Indians who would be replacing the locals after an outsourcing deal.
Sounds like another cry against outsourcing now from another part of the world? Give me a break. I mean jobs going to Indians is one thing, but training someone who is going to take away your job three months later.... sounds weird. And if these guys are not already trained and much better than the people they are replacing, why is the company outsourcing its services to them? Because they come cheap [never mind the quality!]
But this is not my story today. My story is more sinister and would blow the heads of many who are rabidly anti-outsourcing, anti immigration etc etc.
The old trend in India has been bridegrooms settled abroad get the best brides! The definition of best those days were moderately educated, extremely good looking, wealthy family etc. But the definition of best is chaging as the global landscapes is filled with footloose fancy free Indian professionals. Increasingly, best brides are being defined by professional qualification: never mind the looks. And these brides too are not like yesterday's happy making rotis at home or at most sitting at supermarket check outs. They are well qualified [sometimes more than their husbands] and looking for a career.
My fear is that this gang in the next five years is going to be a formidable force. And, the "guest country" would have to increasingly provide them with higher and higher jobs. So it will not a single "geek" or banker looking a a job but two of them actually.
I already know a couple of friends who have married Indians abroad and are more qualified than their husbands. At present they are lying low, understating their qualifications and working at sweatshops. But soon, once they have learned the ropes they will let themselves loose and demand their pound of flesh [paneer for the vegetarians]. Till then watch the space...
I wonder how the feminists of developed economists will treat these Indian "brides"....
Sounds like another cry against outsourcing now from another part of the world? Give me a break. I mean jobs going to Indians is one thing, but training someone who is going to take away your job three months later.... sounds weird. And if these guys are not already trained and much better than the people they are replacing, why is the company outsourcing its services to them? Because they come cheap [never mind the quality!]
But this is not my story today. My story is more sinister and would blow the heads of many who are rabidly anti-outsourcing, anti immigration etc etc.
The old trend in India has been bridegrooms settled abroad get the best brides! The definition of best those days were moderately educated, extremely good looking, wealthy family etc. But the definition of best is chaging as the global landscapes is filled with footloose fancy free Indian professionals. Increasingly, best brides are being defined by professional qualification: never mind the looks. And these brides too are not like yesterday's happy making rotis at home or at most sitting at supermarket check outs. They are well qualified [sometimes more than their husbands] and looking for a career.
My fear is that this gang in the next five years is going to be a formidable force. And, the "guest country" would have to increasingly provide them with higher and higher jobs. So it will not a single "geek" or banker looking a a job but two of them actually.
I already know a couple of friends who have married Indians abroad and are more qualified than their husbands. At present they are lying low, understating their qualifications and working at sweatshops. But soon, once they have learned the ropes they will let themselves loose and demand their pound of flesh [paneer for the vegetarians]. Till then watch the space...
I wonder how the feminists of developed economists will treat these Indian "brides"....
Friday, October 20, 2006
Writer's Block
Insomnia is a great advantage for those who "suffer" from it. It means you get extra four to five hours a day [night]
to think. In several of those thinking hours, I have thought of writing novels for a living. Please do not laugh, I have written a book and co-authored another and both are publised by well-known publishers. So my thinking is not exactly kite flying.
And, at the end of the day writing a novel can not be that difficult, all you need a plot at the centre of several plots played out by some normal and abnormal characters: just as you see in real life, albeit with a lot of embellishments. At my age I have seen too many real plots unfolding and folding up in real life...
I also have a fairly good command of English [in any case once you have put together the skeleton of the book, smart editors do the rest]
What is a novel after all? a piece of life, a slice of our day to day existence: joys, pains, successes, failures, love, hate: A nice concoction of emotions.
Mind you it can be darn profitable too. Most successful novelists earn much more than ordinary salaried persons, get huge advance payments in "foreign exchange" and also get to go to fancy parties and are elegible to wear whatever they fancy at work. They also do not to have to commute to work leaving behind their kids with ayahs. And of course, "bitching" is not a crime but a part of the job description.
Little wonder therefore that I have toyed with the idea of become a novelist, a professional novelist, i mean and take by moral, physical, metaphysical and most important, fianacial life to a higher plane.
I have gone even as far as thinking a title, charting out a plot and even open a new word document to start the first line. The first line is important, in fact very important [remember the first line of lolita? Lolita would not be lolita without the first line]. Once you have the right first line, it's easy as breeze!
But I must confess, in spite of the desire, ability and the driving forces, I have never been able to write the first line of a novel. And, as i grow older, the chances are getting dimmer.
No no, please do not get me wrong: It is not because of my day job which keeps me in office till long. Nor is a the fact that I live alone and have to do my household chores, Nor is it because of any other reason. Believe you me I have all the reasons and skills and knowledge to write a novel.
As a non-starter novelist, I have spent long hours on why people do not write novels [or long stories]. Certainly, we have no dearth of literate and thinking people in our country.
After thinking long and hard, I have reached my conclusions: Most people do not write novels because facts are stranger than fiction. All of us know facts that are much stranger than fiction and it requires an inhuman capability to either fictionalise facts or turn fiction into fact. So all potential novelists like me are faced with this situation: What you can write is not even one third of what you know and what you know is not good, safe, sane, enough to write.
My take: For every successful novelist there are at least a thousand who could have written a much better novel of they have had the courage to jot down that proverbial first line.
keep trying folks..... the greatest novelist is one who writes what she experiences in life!
to think. In several of those thinking hours, I have thought of writing novels for a living. Please do not laugh, I have written a book and co-authored another and both are publised by well-known publishers. So my thinking is not exactly kite flying.
And, at the end of the day writing a novel can not be that difficult, all you need a plot at the centre of several plots played out by some normal and abnormal characters: just as you see in real life, albeit with a lot of embellishments. At my age I have seen too many real plots unfolding and folding up in real life...
I also have a fairly good command of English [in any case once you have put together the skeleton of the book, smart editors do the rest]
What is a novel after all? a piece of life, a slice of our day to day existence: joys, pains, successes, failures, love, hate: A nice concoction of emotions.
Mind you it can be darn profitable too. Most successful novelists earn much more than ordinary salaried persons, get huge advance payments in "foreign exchange" and also get to go to fancy parties and are elegible to wear whatever they fancy at work. They also do not to have to commute to work leaving behind their kids with ayahs. And of course, "bitching" is not a crime but a part of the job description.
Little wonder therefore that I have toyed with the idea of become a novelist, a professional novelist, i mean and take by moral, physical, metaphysical and most important, fianacial life to a higher plane.
I have gone even as far as thinking a title, charting out a plot and even open a new word document to start the first line. The first line is important, in fact very important [remember the first line of lolita? Lolita would not be lolita without the first line]. Once you have the right first line, it's easy as breeze!
But I must confess, in spite of the desire, ability and the driving forces, I have never been able to write the first line of a novel. And, as i grow older, the chances are getting dimmer.
No no, please do not get me wrong: It is not because of my day job which keeps me in office till long. Nor is a the fact that I live alone and have to do my household chores, Nor is it because of any other reason. Believe you me I have all the reasons and skills and knowledge to write a novel.
As a non-starter novelist, I have spent long hours on why people do not write novels [or long stories]. Certainly, we have no dearth of literate and thinking people in our country.
After thinking long and hard, I have reached my conclusions: Most people do not write novels because facts are stranger than fiction. All of us know facts that are much stranger than fiction and it requires an inhuman capability to either fictionalise facts or turn fiction into fact. So all potential novelists like me are faced with this situation: What you can write is not even one third of what you know and what you know is not good, safe, sane, enough to write.
My take: For every successful novelist there are at least a thousand who could have written a much better novel of they have had the courage to jot down that proverbial first line.
keep trying folks..... the greatest novelist is one who writes what she experiences in life!
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Maximum City
Mumbai has had many epithets. The lastest one and also the the title of a brick sized novel (fiction or non-fiction not known), is the Maximum City. Even without reading the novel, you will know why it is so called. All you have to do is to spend six months in the city.
It is a great place to live (mind you, I am not a Mumbaikar hence my assessment is not biased).
1. people on the street actually guide you to your location
2. Cabbies do not normally cheat
3. Local municipal body actually works (whatever the critics say)
4. There is constant supply of electricity and it is of good quality (It is the only city in India, apart from Kolkata, where you do not have to buy a UPS with your PC or a voltage stabiliser with your fridge).
5. Water supply is sufficient (whatever the ciritcs say)
6. Jobs are aplenty
7. People have a "professional' approach to their work from the bais to the bhais everybody is a professional
8. people are socially and politically conscious
9. Petty crime is low including crime on women
The list can go on......
I have started liking this city (I do not know of any other city anywhere in the world and not certainly in India where booze is home delivered!).
Just a few points of caution to the citizens (I am still an alien)
1. Your fourth floor window is for the breeze to come in and not the exit point for garbage and used STs and hair to the coutyard below
2. Filmstars wear "work clothes" while shooting for films: Please do not wear them to your place of work
3. The BMC did not re-lay the pavement with fancy tiles so that you could extend your shop
4. There are no vegetarian Chinese, Mexican, Italian meals. People selling them are taking you for a ride
5. This is not the last weekend in your life, and it won't harm you if you stayed indoors this weekend. It is not compulsory to visit a mall on the weekend, you can read a book at home
6. And please do not blame the traffic if you are late (you started late!)
7. Finally, you need good schools for kids. At least the number of good schools should be more than the number of malls
Cheers!
It is a great place to live (mind you, I am not a Mumbaikar hence my assessment is not biased).
1. people on the street actually guide you to your location
2. Cabbies do not normally cheat
3. Local municipal body actually works (whatever the critics say)
4. There is constant supply of electricity and it is of good quality (It is the only city in India, apart from Kolkata, where you do not have to buy a UPS with your PC or a voltage stabiliser with your fridge).
5. Water supply is sufficient (whatever the ciritcs say)
6. Jobs are aplenty
7. People have a "professional' approach to their work from the bais to the bhais everybody is a professional
8. people are socially and politically conscious
9. Petty crime is low including crime on women
The list can go on......
I have started liking this city (I do not know of any other city anywhere in the world and not certainly in India where booze is home delivered!).
Just a few points of caution to the citizens (I am still an alien)
1. Your fourth floor window is for the breeze to come in and not the exit point for garbage and used STs and hair to the coutyard below
2. Filmstars wear "work clothes" while shooting for films: Please do not wear them to your place of work
3. The BMC did not re-lay the pavement with fancy tiles so that you could extend your shop
4. There are no vegetarian Chinese, Mexican, Italian meals. People selling them are taking you for a ride
5. This is not the last weekend in your life, and it won't harm you if you stayed indoors this weekend. It is not compulsory to visit a mall on the weekend, you can read a book at home
6. And please do not blame the traffic if you are late (you started late!)
7. Finally, you need good schools for kids. At least the number of good schools should be more than the number of malls
Cheers!
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Game for Gandhigiri?
Yes of course, I refer to the recent resurrection of Mahatma Gandhi through the rather dubious route of a Hindi movie, whose lead actor's brain to brawn ration is 10:90 and who, according to some, started by troubling his parents, then wife and finally the government with his villainous ways. But to be fair to him, he is the right person to espouse "gandhigiri" loosely translated "gandhi's way". For starters: both he and the original mahatma were traumatised at a younger age [for different reasons though]
Gandhiji was traumatised with what happened to him in South Africa [not only being thrown out of the train, but also the caste and communal rift that he had witnessed there among the Indian community. On his return to India he had the shock of his life looking at the then Congress leaders, who were more Brit than the brits themselves [very well captured in the movie Gandhi] . He was also traumatised by the brutal attacks on innocents especially at Jalianwala Bagh.
Our more recent hero too was traumatised early in his life: famous parents, drugs, untimely deaths of mother and wife and simply trying to live upto his macho image were some of the causes. Who better than him to resurrect the Mahatma?
So far so good. But which Gandhi are they we to resurrect?
Gandhi the suit-clad barrister? Gandhi the non-violent, half naked fakir? Or Gandhi the ultimate MAN?
Getting confused? I will explain.
The first Gandhi was what can be best described as an ideal native! Good family, well educated and trained for the most sought after imperial profession: Lawyer!. There were many aspirants for this Gandhi at that time and many more perhaps now [though for empire you have to read USA for contemporary aspirants and for Lawyer you have to read IT or investment banking]. This was the ultimate metrosexual man: successful, educated, sensitive, native at home, cosmopolitan outside. Why dont we revive this Gandhigiri: Easy to achieve, lot of aspirants, and under the current circumstances eminently do-able!
The second Gandhi: this is the Gandhi we know and believe in: lots of fad, indiosyncrasies, initially ridiculed. But showed an alternative way to "fight" and win a battle. The ultimate leader, communicator who more than anyone else deserved the title of Mahatma for his words and deeds. For me the greatest lesson of this man is just one: Complete and fully transparency in all public and private life. No one did it better than him and no one will. This is one lesson to be learnt from him. In his voluminous writing you will find him describing to his friend how to clear bowel movements at great length and of course, there is the ultimate admission of failure at abstinence!
This is a difficult ganshigiri to revive because this like the hindi movies is alomst like a make believe world - something that is good to hear and talk about but impossible to follow.
The Third Gandhi: No one knows and talks about. This is the most revolutionary time of his life and started probably from 1942 with the Quit India Movement. When for the first time, he did not call of a national movement just because it had turned violent. In fact his rallying cry was "do or die"! Who was this Gandhi? DO you know him? I do not think so. Let me introduce him with two incidents:
a) Interview with Louis Fisher circa 1945(?): Fisher: How will you redistribute the lands held by the zamindars to poor peasants after independence?
MG: The zamnindars will give their lands up voluntarily
LF: [laughs...] Do you really think so? What if they do not?
MG: We have other means?
LF: What other means? Would you resort to violence [to take the lands away]
MG: Yes, we will resort to violence if necessary
b) His suggestion that after independence the congress party should be dissolved since the purpsose behind its formation was to achieve independenc!
Can you revive this Gandhi? I would say please "do not try this at home". It's too hot for India Inc.
My take: At Noakhali {now in Bangladesh} in 1947 Gandhi single handedly stopped the riots [and probably saved many of my ancestors]. A feat which half of British Indian army could not achieve in Punjab.
That's what a real MAN is a real HERO. Of course, others are free to emulate him on the silver screen
Gandhiji was traumatised with what happened to him in South Africa [not only being thrown out of the train, but also the caste and communal rift that he had witnessed there among the Indian community. On his return to India he had the shock of his life looking at the then Congress leaders, who were more Brit than the brits themselves [very well captured in the movie Gandhi] . He was also traumatised by the brutal attacks on innocents especially at Jalianwala Bagh.
Our more recent hero too was traumatised early in his life: famous parents, drugs, untimely deaths of mother and wife and simply trying to live upto his macho image were some of the causes. Who better than him to resurrect the Mahatma?
So far so good. But which Gandhi are they we to resurrect?
Gandhi the suit-clad barrister? Gandhi the non-violent, half naked fakir? Or Gandhi the ultimate MAN?
Getting confused? I will explain.
The first Gandhi was what can be best described as an ideal native! Good family, well educated and trained for the most sought after imperial profession: Lawyer!. There were many aspirants for this Gandhi at that time and many more perhaps now [though for empire you have to read USA for contemporary aspirants and for Lawyer you have to read IT or investment banking]. This was the ultimate metrosexual man: successful, educated, sensitive, native at home, cosmopolitan outside. Why dont we revive this Gandhigiri: Easy to achieve, lot of aspirants, and under the current circumstances eminently do-able!
The second Gandhi: this is the Gandhi we know and believe in: lots of fad, indiosyncrasies, initially ridiculed. But showed an alternative way to "fight" and win a battle. The ultimate leader, communicator who more than anyone else deserved the title of Mahatma for his words and deeds. For me the greatest lesson of this man is just one: Complete and fully transparency in all public and private life. No one did it better than him and no one will. This is one lesson to be learnt from him. In his voluminous writing you will find him describing to his friend how to clear bowel movements at great length and of course, there is the ultimate admission of failure at abstinence!
This is a difficult ganshigiri to revive because this like the hindi movies is alomst like a make believe world - something that is good to hear and talk about but impossible to follow.
The Third Gandhi: No one knows and talks about. This is the most revolutionary time of his life and started probably from 1942 with the Quit India Movement. When for the first time, he did not call of a national movement just because it had turned violent. In fact his rallying cry was "do or die"! Who was this Gandhi? DO you know him? I do not think so. Let me introduce him with two incidents:
a) Interview with Louis Fisher circa 1945(?): Fisher: How will you redistribute the lands held by the zamindars to poor peasants after independence?
MG: The zamnindars will give their lands up voluntarily
LF: [laughs...] Do you really think so? What if they do not?
MG: We have other means?
LF: What other means? Would you resort to violence [to take the lands away]
MG: Yes, we will resort to violence if necessary
b) His suggestion that after independence the congress party should be dissolved since the purpsose behind its formation was to achieve independenc!
Can you revive this Gandhi? I would say please "do not try this at home". It's too hot for India Inc.
My take: At Noakhali {now in Bangladesh} in 1947 Gandhi single handedly stopped the riots [and probably saved many of my ancestors]. A feat which half of British Indian army could not achieve in Punjab.
That's what a real MAN is a real HERO. Of course, others are free to emulate him on the silver screen
Friday, October 06, 2006
Furore over Fart
Police is looking for a man in Poland who jumped bail after being arrested for insulting the head of the state. He did not have much respect for the President and his brother and when asked to apologise for his loose remarks about them, he farted loudly in the presence of police officers: at which he was arrested.
Real, funny and sardonic, isn't it?
Before the Victorian social norms cast its long shadow over much of the globe and colonised the minds and bodies of the colonised, bodily functions were a form of modeof protest against the high and the mighty especially in complex and hierarchical societies.
Earliest record of such modes of protest to my knowledge goes back to the late 17th century when the Jats apparently desecrated the tomb of Akbar protesting against the Mughal authority [desecreated in Victorian English means defacated]
Later, this was also adopted as a mode of protest by the plantation workers across the globe. In India, this urnating and defacating and plunging them into the burra sahib's bungalows was quite popular.
The practice can not be said to have died out totally. Growing up in Bihar in the 1980s I came to learn early that no one took punga with the Municipal "Bhangis/mehtars" and generously gave them Bakhshish whether they carried out their chores or not. The reason, you would not want a can of nightsoil emptied in from your door in the morning!
This seems to be a global phenomenon which seems to have outlived the Victorian diktats! Here goes an old Sudanese proverb: "When the great lord passes, the poor peasant bows deeply and loudly farts!
My take: Farting is a serious and real mechanism of venting grievances, Let a thousand farts ring!
Real, funny and sardonic, isn't it?
Before the Victorian social norms cast its long shadow over much of the globe and colonised the minds and bodies of the colonised, bodily functions were a form of modeof protest against the high and the mighty especially in complex and hierarchical societies.
Earliest record of such modes of protest to my knowledge goes back to the late 17th century when the Jats apparently desecrated the tomb of Akbar protesting against the Mughal authority [desecreated in Victorian English means defacated]
Later, this was also adopted as a mode of protest by the plantation workers across the globe. In India, this urnating and defacating and plunging them into the burra sahib's bungalows was quite popular.
The practice can not be said to have died out totally. Growing up in Bihar in the 1980s I came to learn early that no one took punga with the Municipal "Bhangis/mehtars" and generously gave them Bakhshish whether they carried out their chores or not. The reason, you would not want a can of nightsoil emptied in from your door in the morning!
This seems to be a global phenomenon which seems to have outlived the Victorian diktats! Here goes an old Sudanese proverb: "When the great lord passes, the poor peasant bows deeply and loudly farts!
My take: Farting is a serious and real mechanism of venting grievances, Let a thousand farts ring!
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