THE GREAT INDIAN TAMASHA

India knows its drama. The land has had many traditional forms of theaters be it in the forms of tamasha, jatra, nautanki or something else. Every part of the country has its own form of drama. Thanks to the Indian media and our very special politicians (and may I add the resurgent civil society groups?), there is never any dearth of drama in this country. I recently overheard a young boy telling that if you want entertainment watch the Hindi news channels! Probably nothing else describes the condition better.

The recent insurgence to fight against corruption has only heightened the drama. When Anna Hazare declared his resolution to fast, no one took him seriously. But within 24 hours, the real tamasha unfolded and immediately it became a media circus. I don’t want to go into the details of what happened. Too much has been said and written about the entire event. I will suffice by saying that everyone was entertained in process and probably the real fight against corruption got a true impetus.

However, if this wasn’t enough, came our very own yoga guru who changed the way Indians ate, drank, slept, etc in the last decade. He has taken it to himself now that if Hazare can fight against corruption almost single-handedly, he too can rake up an issue and fight it similarly. So came the issue of black money and our yoga guru becomes the self-appointed crusader for the ‘aam aadmi’.

Now this event has real drama. Usually it is said that films are inspired from real-life. But here is one exception where the opposite happened. A real-life event apparently seemed out of a film. Here I am mentioning Aamir Khan’s Peepli Live. The events of 4^th June are a case in this regard. After midnight when the police attacked the sleeping crowd pof the Ramlila Maidan, one could literally feel the poor news channel crew hurriedly waking up to capture the events of a live tamasha. The shots that are now repeatedly shown on the channels are shaky (as was the case in the film), you could really feel the journalists and camera crew fighting to get the best shots. However, like in the film, the protagonist manages to escape from all this cacophony unseen. Can you believe 10,000 or more policemen, hordes of mediapersons did not see a single person escape!! And if this wasn’t enough, the very next day Baba Ramdev is seen wearing a salwar kameez in which he had apparently disguised himself to escape briefing the media about what had happened!! Now I say, beat this!! Impossible.

As I write this, the Baba’s condition is detoriating, the UPA is up in arms to protest the fight, the Sangh Parivar is dancing its way to support the Baba’s cause and there doesn’t seem to be a end to all this soon. As this drama continues, we the poor ‘aam aadmi’ can simply stay glued to our TV sets to see the tamasha unfold further. Who knows tomorrow, the Congress and Baba may declare to be long lost brothers!!!

The memoir ends...

It is time to continue the memoir. It is time once again to chronicle the events in the past few months in the new city.
But once the flow of actually doing a job goes, so also goes the easy flowing manner in which the ideas and memories were coming. Thus i conclude it was a bad idea the other day to end the blog. I should not have bothered about the number of words but should have continued. Today as i sit to write, I feel that its a homework and not something to be done happily. Thus the memoir ends where it did in the other blog.

A long-awaited memoir

It has been so long that I havnt written something that now whenever i am reading an article, the novice writer in me wakes up and my hands itch to hold that pen and start writing. But the not-so-busy yet never finding time me gets too lazy to sit and actually do what her heart wants.
It has been more than six months that the city of joy opened its arms and allowed me to stay and work here. Being the quintessential small-town girl, the spirit of the ‘big’ city awed me, amazed me, thrilled me, scared me and above all made me realise how much i loved my home town.
It seemed to me that almost all of Kolkata was always on the streets, always running, always late and always ready to argue and fight. At times it seemed silly and at other times it irritated me. Then I realised these are the very qualities that make Kolkata what it is. This busyness, this hyper-active state is really the pulse of the city.
Durga puja 2010 was the first time i was away from home. A time of my life I wil not easily forget. Another instance that made me realise that i loved my home, loved shilling, loved everything there. I had always heard Durga puja should be experienced in Kolkata. This is where the Goddess really comes home to. But I was dismayed at the way people celebrated pujas here. According to what i observed it was simply a mockery of the best religious time Bengalis have. It was a case of simple commercialisation of the festival. Pujas are essentially for three days, but here it starts a month back and the goddess actually stays for 5-6 days quite easily breaking the age-old religious belief. Hinduism is by nature a very open religion, it is always open to adapt and change and this is the very reason why it has survived for so long. But even then, there is a limit to adaptation. One can’t keep pushing and pulling all the strings of the religious beliefs and have the attitude ki yeh sab chalta hai. Nahi chalta hai. Its awesome to be a tolerant group but it definitely isn’t cool to forget ones culture and core customs. I am no authority on my religion nor do I know everything. I don’t even mind saying that I haven’t read the Gita. But believe that whatever I know, have learnt I should maintain. This is enough. Like me, most of the young generation Bengalis have very little knowledge of the religion. And if we start destroying or playing with this, our next generation will be left without this culture, this custom.
Anyway going back to what I was saying about Kolkata, pujas became a time when people cashed on the image of Maa Durga and her children. There was one ad of a Bengali television where Saraswati, Lakshmi, Kartik, Ganesh were all represented as reporters report about the mega commercial even of the pujas. Incredibly disgusting!!
I guess I have too much to chronicle and one write-up isn’t enough. Hence I stop here tonight with a satisfied heave that I managed to write some 500 odd words!!

Birthday wishes and more…

“Many more happy returns of the day”, so read in the front page of a leading newspaper on 19th June, 2010. Here the noteworthy thing, apart from the birthday wish is the date. Not many of the younger generation would know that this is the date when Rahul Gandhi, the Prince of India celebrates his birthday. The fact that I am stating him as the Prince of India is simple. He is the heir apparent of Congress and thus also the Prime Ministers’ throne, the illustrious MP from Amethi and the General Secretary of the mighty Congress. All this roles when capped by the same person he is surely nothing else than a Prince, isn’t it?

Anyway, moving ahead, he celebrates his birthday on one of the 365 days of the year, like all of us do. True he is the “rather cool” MP of the recent times and an hot favourite of the youth, but does it justify the fact that birthday wishes are expressed to him on a quarter of a front page ad given by another member of the Congress. It can be understood when we wish people like Mahatma Gandhi in this manner, but I want to know, what has this Gandhi done to get to much respect. Does the fact that he once traveled on trains to understand the plight of the passenger or that he ate in a Dalit's house make him MAHAN? Did that Congress Committee member from the state of Tamil Nadu really want to wish Rahul Gandhi or did he want to show to the world that he has the money to flaunt and spend on an absolutely unnecessary ad. I am sure if he could have used that amount (which no doubt runs to lakhs) in a much better manner. And even if that money belongs to the Congress, there are much better ways to utilize them. An ad of such a thing is simply ridiculous.

Not only should the advertiser be blamed in this case, but the media too. It is well known today that newspapers really have to struggle to generate revenue but does it justify them publishing such ads. It is important here to mention that on the same day in the same paper two more such wishes came as ads. All the ads were by some Congress member and in colour too!! The amount of money that was spent on wishing this person! (Imagine what was spent on his celebrations??!!)

As I end, another question enters my mind. Is the situation inside Congress so bad that their own members need to wish their leader through a national newspaper? Couldn’t they do the same personally through a telephone, mail?? Strange are the way things work in this country….

The Country Roads

Who says dancing is not everyone’s cup of tea? In India, among most of the cultures dancing forms an integral part of traditions and merry-making. But in todays past paced world, these aspects of the various Indian cultures seem to be fast eroding and only those with a keen interest in this form of art are keeping alive the tradition.

As if understanding this sorry state of affairs, the Indian roads have taken in to themselves to keep alive the tradition. Now you may be wondering how a non-alive thing make such a thing happen. Well, anyone familiar with the interiors of India will find the link between the comparison. The roads are in most cases broken and never repaired. Heavy traffic in the form of heavy vehicles keep moving on these roads making the condition worst. and us poor souls travel on them without having much of an option. The combition can get fatal if you are on a really bad road on a bus which seems to have come straight out of ‘Malgudi days’ and whose the seats have been loosely put together and sadly have managed to get the last seat. The natural dance steps will make you see heaven and hell together!

The situation may seem funny at first but if one looks deeper into it, who is to be blamed. We are a country who loves blaming each other. In this case, the people will blame the authorities, the authorities will blame the government and someone probably can also raise the issue of corruption here. It has become such a jungle of problems that even if someone tries to rectigy them, it will be difficult to identify where to start.

For my age, I have travlled quite a bit around India and have seen almost all kinds of roads, though a interiors are still to be explored. From fascinating highways that do not have a single crack on them to the roads that do not have any unbroken parts left I have seen them all. As a child I reme,ber naming one such road the ‘disco road’ because once on a rickshaw on that road I could only keep making the disco move, albeit involuntarily. Currently I am staying in an institution which have amazing infrastructure. Professionals coming to visit it get amazed at how beautiful and self suffiecient the campus is. However they hardly come by the road that we need to travel with. For them there is a smaller but better road available. On the road that the majority of the population moves in so dilapidated that the government has been turning cold shoulders from ages. The irony of all this is that beside a state-of-the-art institution lies a rundown road and no one can do anything to improve its situation.

At the end of the day, it is us the common people who have to bear the brunt of all this and let the country roads led us to heaven and hell together boogie woogiing all the way.

Luring the money minting machines

Giving voting rights to NRI’s, the Indian government is taking too big a step in making them part of our political system. True that they have been born and brought up here, it is their motherland. But they have been out of the country for too long to even understand how the country works today. The political system was changed over the years; the system is more complex and complicated now. There are more political parties now then there ever was. Regional parties are making a huge splash into the political scenario and have changed the way politics is envisaged here.

These non-resident Indians has been living in another system and naturally are more aware of that country’s political system. As human nature, they have adapted to a different system and understand that more easily. Some of them still do have strong ties with the country, but that no way means that they come here regularly or are part of the country like they had been before.

Some of the NRI’s are claiming that they have always been trying to improve the condition of the schools, hospitals and other facilities in the villages and that they should get the right to also have a say into the election. What they are doing is indeed noble and worthwhile, but how can they ask a favour back for that? Why can’t they contribute to their villages, towns and cities selflessly? Are they not contributing solely on humanitarian grounds or do they have some ulterior motives behind their support?

Even if they are given the voting rights, what will they benefit from it or as a matter of fact what will the people living in this country benefit. Will their contributions increase, can they ensure that corruption will decrease or can they ensure that the common man’s voice will be heard? What will they achieve by being a part of the political system when they have nothing to do with this system. Financial support is not the only thing that needs to be looked into, there are other factors too that are equally important for a politically active country like India.

The Indian government is obviously trying to appease these rich Indians as they can pour in a lot of money. Giving them voting rights is like luring them to pump in more money to fill in their coffers. How much will the money actually be used for the people is known to us. We only have to wait and watch what else will the people in power do to attract the people with money.

The Club that has arrived

S.L.F.C. four letters seemingly of no significance. But the impact these four letters have had on the Indian domestic sports scenario is huge and unimaginable. The first club from the North East to have made in to the national scenario, it has stunned big players with its performances and style. Just the fact that on one of their first national tournaments, they reached the finals is enough proof of this. Though they did not win the finals, it is not to be forgotten that they lost at a stage when the match could have been won by anyone

Yes it is football we are talking about and the Shillong Lajong Football Club that has gathered so many fans for itself. Football has always been the primary sports for the north-eastern people. In meghalaya too, the craze is so much that nothing usually stops the locals from playing their favourite outdoor game in any weather and in any circumstances. the humble start of the club in 1983 saw some dedication and hard work through all these years that have resulted in its thumping success today. It was about time too for the football crazy state and region to get its due and be finally recognized by the country.

As for the small town from where these four letter emerged….they have literally gone crazy. The club was first noticed nationally when it stormed into the Elite division of the I-League last year and stunned everyone with their performance. And as the saying goes the rest is history now. The colour RED has become the current favourite of the city and their latest accessories that of the club batches and logos. Even on a chilly winter they traveled by truck loads to watch their team in the Federation Cup finals in Guwahati. The stadium with a capacity of more than 20,000 people was filled with the colour red and slogans for the new club in town.

As for the country they have realized that on the football front the SHILLONG LAJONG FOOTBALL CLUB have definitely arrived.