Is the Sun Rising Over Bihar?

As a young boy growing up in Bihar one of the less lurid and suggestive local songs I heard went something like this.... "धीरे धीरे लागे कलाई थामने; उनको ऊँगली थामना ग़ज़ब हो गया" This was sung by a woman, narrating the fact that "misfortune" stuck her the day she gave an inch to a wily man! This song could not have been a more realistic representation to what happened in Bihar in the last 60 years since independence, especially since the mid-1970s - a period which also marked the height of political movement in बीihar under the leadership of the formidable JaiPrakash Narain. Those were heady days when most Biharis thought that the Sun would rise in Bihar. Little did they realise that that was the beginning of a long sunset for Bihar. Each successive government since then has taken advantage of the ungli [finger] and gone for the kalai [wrist] and much more... and Bihar all the while has acted as the helpless girl who can't say no, taken over by the persuation.... The result was for all of us to see.
It might sound unbelievable to many that till the early 1980s when my cousins used to literally fail exams due to what was known in Calcutta as Load Shedding, we in a small town in Bihar did not know what power cuts were. Of course, by the 1990s, we did not know and did not need to know that there was a something called the Bihar State Electricity Board we were connected on private gensets.
But for the past two years, we have been hearing informally that things are changing and last week there was some proof in the sense that a leading English daily carried the story of turnaround in Bihar as headlines. It was after many years, most certainly since I started reading English newpapers daily, that Bihar made the headlines for all the right reasons.
Of course, there is still a long way to go to reach just where we were in 1980s. But it still feels good to know that there is a group of people who are taking us back to where we began.
We biharis are practical people, please do not show us dreams of an utopia, light at the end of the tunnel, bright future etc etc. Just please take us back to what we left behind, give us back what we had, we will be happy with it. In fact we never wanted more than that...

Bihar Loot-ney

I was much enchanted by a hindi song rendered on the screen by Dr Shilpa Shetty. It went something like this "Dilwalon Kay Dil Kaa Karaar Lootney; Main Aayi Hoon UP Bihar Lootney". I will not attempt to translate it because much will be lost in translation. Having lived 16 years of my life in that state [in the real Bihar and not the current Jharkhand], I read more meanings into the song that many others. For one, like miss Shetty, the rivers in Bihar also have patli kamar [narrow waists], they are beautiful, dangerously attractive, and lethal when they strike:) And of course, they come to loot Bihar once every year, unlike Ms Shetty who has never set foot in Bihar.

True to tradition, this year too with the arrival of August Bihar is again on our TV screens with large parts of it flooded and with our leaders making sorties on helicopters to "assess the damage". And true to tradition of the last forty years, media is presenting this as something that has happened only this year. Hence statements like biggest flood in living memory et al. I have seen this story repeated every year since at least 1980 when I was old enough to separate bull from bullshit and it pains me to see that the trend - of repeated floods, air sorties by politicians and the reporting remaining the same. No one has ever done anything about it nor will. The reason is simple, Bihar is the most backward state in the country it neither has any money to give to anyone no do it's people ever voted on the basis of "economic and social achievements of its leaders". And of course, since the 1980s most resourceful biharis [like myself] cutting across class, caste and religion have chosen to migrate to Delhi and Mumbai if not New York and California never coming back anywhere near the Patna airport. And of course, Biharis are too good to harm anyone, all they do is to kill each other in their own state - never taking the violence out of the state nor killing anyone who pass through that state. It is, therefore, a completely autarkik society and economy, about which no one need fear and hence not do anything about anything and anyone.
For those who do not know this, there are districts in Bihar notably the Maithili heartland of Madhubani and Darbhanga where the land is flooded for almost nine months in a year. It would need a super economist to explain how people live off the land which is flooded for most parts of the year - but they do and its a miracle. The endemic flood seems to be spreading its wings to parts that were not usually affected even a decade ago, such as Champaran in the west and Katihar in the east.
I have taken the escapists route, but there are two people currently deciding on where Bihar goes tomorrow, both respectable, both with vision and both with the required talent to wind their ways through the byzantine alleys of Patna and Delhi politics to steer Bihar not to a bright future but at least to what it used to be when my father as a young 20 year old migrant landed up in the unknown town of Katihar in 1954. Oh you would also want to know the names of the two gentlemen who could "do something" about Bihar - here they are : Nitish Kumar and N K Singh.