Detectives are passé. Symbologists are in. Apart from the novelty of handsome academics cracking convoluted crimes, it gives the reader pleasure to be in the know of twists contained in ancient scriptures, works of art located in remote churches & famous museums and about religious sects with pagan practices. And there are attractive women, who seem to be integral parts of the plot. But nothing seems to happen between the handsome academic and the pretty damsel; I mean no sex. The pretty damsel seems to do nothing much except clutch the hero’s hand and run amid fires, explosions, murders and general mayhem. Occasionally she gives unintended clues to the handsome hero on where to look for clues. And occasionally she turns out to be the direct descendent of none other than the son of God who walked on earth, the one and only Jesus Christ.
The formula is getting tiresome. When the Lost Symbol was published amid great fanfare, I borrowed the book and read it. The twists in the story and the linkages to Freemasons were sounding wearisome and repetitive. It stretches credibility but the book has got away with a million plus readership. When did the CIA get interested in something as nebulous as the key to ancient mysteries buried in old buildings in Washington DC? Isn’t the CIA busy tackling terrorism in Middle East and South Asia? A chain smoking lady CIA operative of Japanese origin chasing a symbologist and secrets buried in old Washington monuments seems farfetched. It is one helluva way of investing scarce resources of the prime intelligence agency of the sole super power.
I saw the movie ‘Angels and Demons’ (adaptation of another book written by the same author- Dan Brown. I had read it some time back) on a flight. How does one seek hidden clues in ancient scriptures to future man-made tragedies? Throw in some science and a lot of mythology and you have a sure recipe for a winner. The writer seems to be doing well. With clever packaging, sale of movie rights and by courting controversy, he has made a fortune.
I am not reading the next book by Dan Brown, unless he desists from flogging the same dead horse again to produce a stereotypical novel with our famous symbologist hero. If symbology be his forte, why not an Indian astrologist and a complex plot of political manipulation in which the clues are hidden in the Brihad Samhita? Or a Telugu film producer’s fluctuating fortunes buried in the science of Nadi Shastra? Heh? Heh? A little research and a tight plot should do the trick.
********
I remember writing about P.D James sometime back. I also recall mentioning that she is knocking on the windows of the great detective novel in the sky and at a ripe mid eighty we may not see her next work yet. A slim volume called “Talking about Detective Fiction” landed in my hands. Published in 2009, it is an appreciation of the best detective fiction writers of this century. Surprises never seem to end. In true P D James style, her views of her peers and long dead writers display the keenness of observation that characterizes her novels. We might yet see another Adam Dalgliesh novel from P D James. Dalgliesh is undoubtedly one of the best fictional detectives of its genre.
Great works are often unappreciated. I remember reading a book called the Mandala of Sherlock Holmes a few years back. By Jamyang Norbu, a Tibetan exile living in India. I was quite impressed. It was about the legendary Sherlock Holmes’ fictional Indian sojourn, narrated by a character out of Kipling’s book. The book didn’t go places; it never created a sensation. It made a strong impression on me. I still recommend it to the discerning reader.
Talking of discerning readers- I am not too possessive about the books I buy. I share them freely with friends and appreciative readers. Some of my best possessions have been borrowed and have never been returned. “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” by William Shirer, an excellent reference book for World War II buffs, has been lost twice to friends. Last year I bought it for the third time from a second hand book shop. The seller wanted Rs 200 for the well thumbed volume. I was willing to settle for Rs 150. While hectic bargaining was going on, the Missus intervened and said it is OK- pay 200. The seller immediately said- see good readers understand the value of good books- Considering that I was buying the book and not the Missus-(who is not a great fan of WWII stuff) I put on my best injured look. Do I look illiterate? Do I look like a guy who is going to off load this book to the garbage collector? Am I buying it just to display in my book case? I promise myself that I am not again going to lend this copy of Shirer to anyone again.
Thursday 31 December 2009
Wednesday 30 December 2009
Constip(n)ation
I have well-wishers who advise me not to continue this blog. I have others suggesting that I stop taking pot shots at Babus- the class to which I belong. There are some who are waiting for my next post claiming that it is oxygen for their souls. (I find that hard to believe). All in all, life changed so much in the past two months and it is hard to find time to keep this going. The sensitivity of my job calls for high discretion. The pitfalls ahead suggest that I maintain a low profile. Some say that I could always write on non-controversial subjects- but I am not really cut out to be a good food/music/art/book critic. And I am sure my readers are not dying to hear what I have to say about such exquisite things in life. So I plod on, impervious to the dangers…
But I just can’t help being harsh to Babus- in spite of being one for the last 19 years of my life. I am no Minister whose tweets are read by millions. For the handful of readers, I can afford to open a window to my thoughts, I am increasingly irritated by the hierarchical, divisive and ossified Delhi Babu culture. Delhi's Babudom is almost a constipated republic by itself!!! A dialogue between two Babus is as complex as a medieval mating ritual. Sample this…. I get a call early in the day. It is from the Personal Assistant of an ex-Babu, who took voluntary retirement and is presently earning megabucks in the private sector. The PA explains that the worthy gentleman who is about to condescend to talk to me is actually a retired government official who belongs to (a) a certain ancient batch of the civil services (b) a three letter elite service (c) a certain state cadre. In other words, the name of the service, year of allotment into civil service and an abbreviation of the state which he lorded over are appendages to his name and are expected to open many doors in Delhi. I am supposed to feel privileged and tickled by the fact that this grey eminence has deigned to talk to me. The reason for this roundabout way of introducing oneself is simple- he expects a rebuff from me if he approaches me directly, as a private individual.
Every conversation in bureaucracy is preceded by foreplay ( yeah there is something intensely sexual about the whole thing- the restless anticipation, excitement, the fear of rejection, the heart-thumping sense of risk are all part of it) which seeks to establish power equations between the two participants. The swagger in your walk, the clothes you wear and the sheer confidence that you permeate makes a lot of difference to how you are treated. Add a dollop of weighty introduction and expect things to go your way. I wouldn’t say that this is typical of Delhi alone. It is prevalent in other societies too, albeit in more refined and sophisticated forms. It is just that in Delhi, it is all too brazen. Hence in this heartland, we have elderly police officers molesting 14 year old girls- and to top it all, goes on to persecute the family, drive the girl to suicide etc.
In Australia, my economics tutor was a well known head of a government- funded think tank. His classes were peppered with wry sarcasm and double entendres. Every other example he gave was from the distant past when he was a gas station attendant. You won’t hear a Delhi Babu talking of his humble origins. Most appear as if they are born to royalty, with a serious look plastered on their face. Every government office in Australia that I went to, was well-lit, clean and those at the counters were doing their best to explain things clearly- a bit too clearly when they see someone with a dark skin. Walk in to any government office in Delhi and try to find your bearings. Instructions are not clear, you don’t know whom to approach and most probably it will take a few visits just to achieve some familiarity with the system. There are just too many people hanging about; mostly service seeking citizens at a loss as to what to do, with touts, agents and swindlers trying to facilitate their interaction with government and take a commission for it. We have completely ignored the training and development of the Babu at the cutting edge-The section officer or Assistant who actually deals with the public. We ill-treat them, pretend as if they don’t exist and we don’t equip them to deal with masses. They make all the difference to the image of the government. It might be a good idea if self-important Babus try to get government business done like the Aam admi once in a while- waiting at the counters…it would be eye- opening.
*********************
After a long time I did some frenzied reading- Swedish crime fiction by Steig Larsson. It is also popularly known as the Millennium series. The first book,” The Girl with a dragon tattoo” is a classic. It makes sense to read these three books in the same order in which they were written. The author is said to have died after turning in the manuscripts. The books turned out to be a sensation in the publishing world. The protagonist of this series, a thin girl called Lisbeth Salander, makes a deep impression on the reader.
But I just can’t help being harsh to Babus- in spite of being one for the last 19 years of my life. I am no Minister whose tweets are read by millions. For the handful of readers, I can afford to open a window to my thoughts, I am increasingly irritated by the hierarchical, divisive and ossified Delhi Babu culture. Delhi's Babudom is almost a constipated republic by itself!!! A dialogue between two Babus is as complex as a medieval mating ritual. Sample this…. I get a call early in the day. It is from the Personal Assistant of an ex-Babu, who took voluntary retirement and is presently earning megabucks in the private sector. The PA explains that the worthy gentleman who is about to condescend to talk to me is actually a retired government official who belongs to (a) a certain ancient batch of the civil services (b) a three letter elite service (c) a certain state cadre. In other words, the name of the service, year of allotment into civil service and an abbreviation of the state which he lorded over are appendages to his name and are expected to open many doors in Delhi. I am supposed to feel privileged and tickled by the fact that this grey eminence has deigned to talk to me. The reason for this roundabout way of introducing oneself is simple- he expects a rebuff from me if he approaches me directly, as a private individual.
Every conversation in bureaucracy is preceded by foreplay ( yeah there is something intensely sexual about the whole thing- the restless anticipation, excitement, the fear of rejection, the heart-thumping sense of risk are all part of it) which seeks to establish power equations between the two participants. The swagger in your walk, the clothes you wear and the sheer confidence that you permeate makes a lot of difference to how you are treated. Add a dollop of weighty introduction and expect things to go your way. I wouldn’t say that this is typical of Delhi alone. It is prevalent in other societies too, albeit in more refined and sophisticated forms. It is just that in Delhi, it is all too brazen. Hence in this heartland, we have elderly police officers molesting 14 year old girls- and to top it all, goes on to persecute the family, drive the girl to suicide etc.
In Australia, my economics tutor was a well known head of a government- funded think tank. His classes were peppered with wry sarcasm and double entendres. Every other example he gave was from the distant past when he was a gas station attendant. You won’t hear a Delhi Babu talking of his humble origins. Most appear as if they are born to royalty, with a serious look plastered on their face. Every government office in Australia that I went to, was well-lit, clean and those at the counters were doing their best to explain things clearly- a bit too clearly when they see someone with a dark skin. Walk in to any government office in Delhi and try to find your bearings. Instructions are not clear, you don’t know whom to approach and most probably it will take a few visits just to achieve some familiarity with the system. There are just too many people hanging about; mostly service seeking citizens at a loss as to what to do, with touts, agents and swindlers trying to facilitate their interaction with government and take a commission for it. We have completely ignored the training and development of the Babu at the cutting edge-The section officer or Assistant who actually deals with the public. We ill-treat them, pretend as if they don’t exist and we don’t equip them to deal with masses. They make all the difference to the image of the government. It might be a good idea if self-important Babus try to get government business done like the Aam admi once in a while- waiting at the counters…it would be eye- opening.
*********************
After a long time I did some frenzied reading- Swedish crime fiction by Steig Larsson. It is also popularly known as the Millennium series. The first book,” The Girl with a dragon tattoo” is a classic. It makes sense to read these three books in the same order in which they were written. The author is said to have died after turning in the manuscripts. The books turned out to be a sensation in the publishing world. The protagonist of this series, a thin girl called Lisbeth Salander, makes a deep impression on the reader.
Monday 14 December 2009
Subaltern narratives
Ramlal drives a three wheeler in Lutyen’s Delhi for a living. This blogger was without personal means of transportation for a few weeks and was relying on three wheelers ( aka autorickshaws or eshcooters in Delhi lingo) for transportation. The difficulties of getting around in Delhi on Autorickshaws are that (a) you need to find an auto which is in need of a passenger (b) you need to convince the driver to take you to your destination and (c) you need to agree to the rate demanded by him. It helps not to be turned out in suits, but in sweaters. A well dressed passenger always gets a higher tab. I found Ramlal looking for a passenger around South Block- he reluctantly agreed to take me to South Delhi and wanted Rs 80 for the piffling deed. I can’t count in Hindi after 25, and I recognized the figure that he mentioned as something below 100. I agreed quickly and got into the auto. At every traffic light some car or bike would sidle up to him and ask for directions. Ramlal would give detailed directions.
I started chatting with him. He said that these guys presume that an auto rickshaw driver knows his way around- clearly a supposition that is not backed by evidence. Secondly some of them ask for directions as if they are owed an explanation by humble auto drivers. Ramlal regularly diverts such arrogant direction seekers in the wrong path. These Saab log (big guys) think they own you and hence they deserve to spend a few hours locating their destination. The auto is owned by Ramlal- no, it is not a hired one. Although CNG (fuel used in public transport in Delhi) is cheap, the autorickshaw with permit costs almost 3-4 lakh rupees. He has to earn at least Rs 500 a day to pay the interest on bank loans and for his sustenance. So don’t be surprised that he doesn’t charge by meter and occasionally has to overcharge passengers for short trips. He lives with his wife and two sons in Palam Gaon. No, he doesn’t cheat. He asks upfront for a high charge and usually gets it without a murmur. People seem to have plenty of money these days…..
************
Sukhwinder Singh runs an auto in the Andrews Ganj area. He is an elderly Sikh, with a big wart on his nose. I could smell liquor as soon as I got in. He drives very fast. I clutched my heart and hoped to reach my destination. Usually he is seen cleaning his auto in the market along with a few other younger Sikh drivers. They invariably refuse to come wherever you want to go. Sukhwinder agreed to take me to South Block at an astronomical rate. (I’d rather not mention it here. I was desperate to reach a meeting and had to agree) As soon as I got in, I asked him why do you guys stand there polishing the autos without taking any passengers? I have tried several times to take an auto from Andrews Ganj. He said these youngsters are all badmashes (Rogues) who have no inclination for hard work. They have some prefixed rides to take school children and Memsahibs here and there and they earn enough to decline every other offer. No, he doesn’t own this auto. He pays Rs 150 per day as rent to the owner who lives in Badarpur. Hence he has to take every ride to earn enough and maintain his family. He has a grown up daughter who has to be married off. So he can’t charge passengers as per meter and they have to pay what he demands….
***************
Chathu and I were standing in front of the opticians shop in Lajpat Nagar. The Missus had gone to buy some winter wear. We were gazing at the crowd of shoppers on the street. A pretty young girl was crossing the road. Suddenly I could hear the loud squeal of brakes and a big car driven by two elderly Sikh gentlemen hit her. She screams and lies on the road. People come and lift her up. While she was being attended to, the car leaves nonchalantly. Chathu was so distraught. Couldn’t these monster-drivers at least have attended to her? He demanded to knowhere his mother was; worried that she might also be knocked down while crossing the street. The girl was finally helped into a cycle rickshaw by passers by to go to a hospital…Nobody went with her.
*******
I have a car now and I don’t travel in autorickshaws anymore. Preet Singh is a business man’s son. A young twenty something with fire in his veins- In these tough recessionary times he makes do with a Mercedes C Class Kompressor- Porsches are, alas, out of his league. He has an attractive girlfriend in GK 1 and spends Friday & Saturday nights out at a disco. He had a drink too many that night and with his girl friend by his side drove over five labourers sleeping on the pavement at 2 AM in the morning. Newspapers went wild next day. Channels kept harking back to the infamous BMW case where the son of an arms dealer rode over sleeping pavement dwellers. The media frenzy has died down in two days. How many such stories can they run? How can they sustain viewer/ reader interest in the peccadilloes of these poor sons of rich businessmen? Are there any lessons to be drawn from this incident? Yes- but no, it has nothing to do with safety, drinking and driving. Work hard in Delhi, wallow in the dust of the construction sites, let your children roam free in the concrete jungle, earn your pittance, drink hooch, go to sleep and live happily… but never, ever , ever, sleep on the pavements…Wild ones are on the rampage…
I started chatting with him. He said that these guys presume that an auto rickshaw driver knows his way around- clearly a supposition that is not backed by evidence. Secondly some of them ask for directions as if they are owed an explanation by humble auto drivers. Ramlal regularly diverts such arrogant direction seekers in the wrong path. These Saab log (big guys) think they own you and hence they deserve to spend a few hours locating their destination. The auto is owned by Ramlal- no, it is not a hired one. Although CNG (fuel used in public transport in Delhi) is cheap, the autorickshaw with permit costs almost 3-4 lakh rupees. He has to earn at least Rs 500 a day to pay the interest on bank loans and for his sustenance. So don’t be surprised that he doesn’t charge by meter and occasionally has to overcharge passengers for short trips. He lives with his wife and two sons in Palam Gaon. No, he doesn’t cheat. He asks upfront for a high charge and usually gets it without a murmur. People seem to have plenty of money these days…..
************
Sukhwinder Singh runs an auto in the Andrews Ganj area. He is an elderly Sikh, with a big wart on his nose. I could smell liquor as soon as I got in. He drives very fast. I clutched my heart and hoped to reach my destination. Usually he is seen cleaning his auto in the market along with a few other younger Sikh drivers. They invariably refuse to come wherever you want to go. Sukhwinder agreed to take me to South Block at an astronomical rate. (I’d rather not mention it here. I was desperate to reach a meeting and had to agree) As soon as I got in, I asked him why do you guys stand there polishing the autos without taking any passengers? I have tried several times to take an auto from Andrews Ganj. He said these youngsters are all badmashes (Rogues) who have no inclination for hard work. They have some prefixed rides to take school children and Memsahibs here and there and they earn enough to decline every other offer. No, he doesn’t own this auto. He pays Rs 150 per day as rent to the owner who lives in Badarpur. Hence he has to take every ride to earn enough and maintain his family. He has a grown up daughter who has to be married off. So he can’t charge passengers as per meter and they have to pay what he demands….
***************
Chathu and I were standing in front of the opticians shop in Lajpat Nagar. The Missus had gone to buy some winter wear. We were gazing at the crowd of shoppers on the street. A pretty young girl was crossing the road. Suddenly I could hear the loud squeal of brakes and a big car driven by two elderly Sikh gentlemen hit her. She screams and lies on the road. People come and lift her up. While she was being attended to, the car leaves nonchalantly. Chathu was so distraught. Couldn’t these monster-drivers at least have attended to her? He demanded to knowhere his mother was; worried that she might also be knocked down while crossing the street. The girl was finally helped into a cycle rickshaw by passers by to go to a hospital…Nobody went with her.
*******
I have a car now and I don’t travel in autorickshaws anymore. Preet Singh is a business man’s son. A young twenty something with fire in his veins- In these tough recessionary times he makes do with a Mercedes C Class Kompressor- Porsches are, alas, out of his league. He has an attractive girlfriend in GK 1 and spends Friday & Saturday nights out at a disco. He had a drink too many that night and with his girl friend by his side drove over five labourers sleeping on the pavement at 2 AM in the morning. Newspapers went wild next day. Channels kept harking back to the infamous BMW case where the son of an arms dealer rode over sleeping pavement dwellers. The media frenzy has died down in two days. How many such stories can they run? How can they sustain viewer/ reader interest in the peccadilloes of these poor sons of rich businessmen? Are there any lessons to be drawn from this incident? Yes- but no, it has nothing to do with safety, drinking and driving. Work hard in Delhi, wallow in the dust of the construction sites, let your children roam free in the concrete jungle, earn your pittance, drink hooch, go to sleep and live happily… but never, ever , ever, sleep on the pavements…Wild ones are on the rampage…
Thursday 10 December 2009
Home again
Home again! I landed back in Delhi on a winter night. The sky was a smoky haze and the teeming humanity outside the airport hit me hard. At midnight, the Rao Tula Ram Marg was clogged with traffic. Suddenly I felt boxed in by the whole atmosphere. The air was thick, with the collective egos of self important babus and politicians pitted together against the man on the street. There were more cars on the road and everyone seems to be in a hurry. My friend, Nandikesh from the old Victorian network had come to receive me at the airport. He had been living in my house the past one year and had gone to great pains to keep it inhabitable.
Almost immediately I felt that I have been living in a cocoon all this time. I had got used to the garbage strewn around, filth on the streets and the cows grazing on busy roads before I left. Reality hits you hard when you are back after a long break. Almost as soon I fell ill. Stomach problems and a debilitating lower back pain. I have been trying to overcome my condition and get back to work. Getting back to work meant commuting and I no more have a car. I am reluctant to call up my old associates and ask for a chauffered car for my commute. Like the common man I depend on auto rickshaws.
I tried to go by bus one day. It was a very harsh initiation into Delhi’s reality. It was a creaky Blue Line bus. The conductor kept tapping aggressively on the door. The crowd consisted largely of metro workers in helmets going home after a hard day’s work. I booked a car and took what was immediately available.
I am back at work. Seems like a strange world- in a job that is not half as enjoyable as my earlier stint. My friends tell me to be careful and that I could land in trouble with the kind of stuff I am dealing with. I no more sit in South Block but in Sena Bhawan that is undergoing modernization. There is a lot of dust all around and the rooms are dinghy and airless. My work days are much longer- partly due to my unfamiliarity with the nature of work and partly due to my apprehensions of blundering on the job. Shall find time to post something soon. Ciao
Almost immediately I felt that I have been living in a cocoon all this time. I had got used to the garbage strewn around, filth on the streets and the cows grazing on busy roads before I left. Reality hits you hard when you are back after a long break. Almost as soon I fell ill. Stomach problems and a debilitating lower back pain. I have been trying to overcome my condition and get back to work. Getting back to work meant commuting and I no more have a car. I am reluctant to call up my old associates and ask for a chauffered car for my commute. Like the common man I depend on auto rickshaws.
I tried to go by bus one day. It was a very harsh initiation into Delhi’s reality. It was a creaky Blue Line bus. The conductor kept tapping aggressively on the door. The crowd consisted largely of metro workers in helmets going home after a hard day’s work. I booked a car and took what was immediately available.
I am back at work. Seems like a strange world- in a job that is not half as enjoyable as my earlier stint. My friends tell me to be careful and that I could land in trouble with the kind of stuff I am dealing with. I no more sit in South Block but in Sena Bhawan that is undergoing modernization. There is a lot of dust all around and the rooms are dinghy and airless. My work days are much longer- partly due to my unfamiliarity with the nature of work and partly due to my apprehensions of blundering on the job. Shall find time to post something soon. Ciao
Thursday 12 November 2009
Diary
Mornings, I wrestle with pushing Chathu off to school- a daily event interspersed with many tantrums and uncertainties. His sartorial sense is becoming closer to that of king kong. A strange non-acceptance of blue jumper with black pants is not understood. Why does he carry earphones to school? All the guys sport it, fixed to the mobile phones, he says. Well, you don’t- I say, in my best firm, authoritarian style. No way, he says. I give up…
I broach the idea of going to a play at Canberra theatre in the evening. He said he’d be a dead man if his friends see him in the company of old fogeys at intellectual pursuits like plays. Instead, he invites me to an evening of multi player mode game session of ‘Assassin’s Creed’ on Play Station-3- with only the splatter of machine guns and loudly uttered four-letter-words to break the peace and quiet of the evening. We could order pizzas and sip coke to make the evening somewhat richer` and meaningful, he offers. I politely turn down the offer. Off he goes to school.
9 AM. The driver in the ACTION Bus had tattoos on his forearms and wasn’t smiling today. The lady sitting in front is sorta cute. But does she have to expose the crack in her bum to the ogling public? But then, why do I look there? Aren’t I too old for this sorta stuff?
9-30 AM Reached University. I picked up the newspapers. Read some stuff about verbal duels between liberals and labour in parliament. The language used in these debates is sure colourful- could note down a few twisted terms for future use, I tell myself. Some stuff about pub brawls by rugby players- no language was used: only fists. Apparently the middle aged labour MP is having a baby by the daughter of the Governor General. Apparently they aren’t married to each other but to other people. Marriages are in trouble but the baby is on schedule. Why do they complicate lives?, I think...
11 AM Why do boys and girls at the University carry a coffee cup or a coke can to class room at 3 dollars a pop. Is it part of the uniform or is it a style statement? I wonder...
12 PM Didn’t realize that Melbourne cup for horse racing is a national holiday. Australians are so low in the hypocrisy index. Can you imagine India having a national holiday on the opening day of races in Calcutta. We might indulge in informed debates on why the long-dead leader ought to be honoured with a national holiday or why his family ought to be granted pricey real estate in Lutyens Delhi for a memorial. Indians take the cake for hypocrisy...
Sightseeing in Delhi is already a rushed visit to several graves of dead leaders. Tourists might think that Delhiites are masochists with a predilection for graves. We see them, photograph them, grow flowers around them, nurture them and trim them. If they’d give building permission, I’d love to shift to a small tent near a national leader’s grave. One could spend a life in peace and harmony and be at one with nature. Electricity and water supply assured round the clock. One could also shut oneself off from the cruelty of Delhi…
1 PM I overheard conversations among school-kids (Chathu’s age). They have bunked school and are just shooting the breeze at the bus interchange. One boy was talking of fibbing to Dad that he is at Mom’s place & promises to get to the friend’s place with a ‘deck of smokes’. Mom & Dad are apparently separated and living with other partners; Parents believe that their children are either at school or with the other estranged spouse, while they are actually not at school and are busy puffing smokes at the bus interchanges.
2 PM Back home. I am on the couch trying to read a huge tome called ‘The kindly Ones’ , by Jonathan Littel, a novel, nay, true story of the 2nd world war. I give up: pour a glass of wine, sip some and doze off. Chathu is back from School. He creates a racket about the PSP(play station portable) not being in its’ place where he left it. It is normally kept in the dressing table at an angle of 60 degrees facing east.
4. PM Chathu apparently doesn’t believe in God, is highly superstitious and believes in the devil and sundry ghosts. That is an interesting combination, I think. Well our experiences teach us what to believe in. I lost my faith in God when I was young. But luckily I didn’t see too many devils and ghosts amongst us to start believing in them. Poor Chathu…
5 PM Played with Saba, the landlady’s puppy
9 PM dinner and sleep
All that good life is coming to an end. I am leaving this wonderful continent in a couple of days and will be back in the thick of my troubled life in Delhi. It has been a great time and I loved every moment of it. I have met some wonderful people, had some great experiences and an ultra cool, relaxed time. But all that comes to an end next week. All ye believers… say a prayer for me.
**********
I used to feel sad while reading Pakistani media’s responses to terrorist attacks in India. One standard set of response was that there is no proof of Pak involvement- terrorists haven’t left visiting cards. It is a staged attack & that it is calculated to show Pakistan in a poor light. The second set of response was that the Indian police & army were kept engaged for several hours- it shows how inefficient India is. The third set of response was that if India attacks Pakistan based on these events they will get a fitting reply. One sentiment was glaringly absent. A lot of innocent lives were lost in the terrorist attacks. There is no sensitivity towards people who lost their lives for no reason.
Read about the responses to the string of attacks in Pakistan now in Indian media- I realize that we are not very different. Most responses are on the lines that they are getting a taste of their own medicine. The Frankenstein monsters that they created have turned against their masters and the genie is out of the bottle etc. Don’t we think about innocent women and children and sundry civilians who lost their lives just because they happened to be out there? How would we feel if our dear ones died in that cross fire? Let us hope that they win this battle against monsters that kill for no reason. Let us show a little bit sensitivity...
I broach the idea of going to a play at Canberra theatre in the evening. He said he’d be a dead man if his friends see him in the company of old fogeys at intellectual pursuits like plays. Instead, he invites me to an evening of multi player mode game session of ‘Assassin’s Creed’ on Play Station-3- with only the splatter of machine guns and loudly uttered four-letter-words to break the peace and quiet of the evening. We could order pizzas and sip coke to make the evening somewhat richer` and meaningful, he offers. I politely turn down the offer. Off he goes to school.
9 AM. The driver in the ACTION Bus had tattoos on his forearms and wasn’t smiling today. The lady sitting in front is sorta cute. But does she have to expose the crack in her bum to the ogling public? But then, why do I look there? Aren’t I too old for this sorta stuff?
9-30 AM Reached University. I picked up the newspapers. Read some stuff about verbal duels between liberals and labour in parliament. The language used in these debates is sure colourful- could note down a few twisted terms for future use, I tell myself. Some stuff about pub brawls by rugby players- no language was used: only fists. Apparently the middle aged labour MP is having a baby by the daughter of the Governor General. Apparently they aren’t married to each other but to other people. Marriages are in trouble but the baby is on schedule. Why do they complicate lives?, I think...
11 AM Why do boys and girls at the University carry a coffee cup or a coke can to class room at 3 dollars a pop. Is it part of the uniform or is it a style statement? I wonder...
12 PM Didn’t realize that Melbourne cup for horse racing is a national holiday. Australians are so low in the hypocrisy index. Can you imagine India having a national holiday on the opening day of races in Calcutta. We might indulge in informed debates on why the long-dead leader ought to be honoured with a national holiday or why his family ought to be granted pricey real estate in Lutyens Delhi for a memorial. Indians take the cake for hypocrisy...
Sightseeing in Delhi is already a rushed visit to several graves of dead leaders. Tourists might think that Delhiites are masochists with a predilection for graves. We see them, photograph them, grow flowers around them, nurture them and trim them. If they’d give building permission, I’d love to shift to a small tent near a national leader’s grave. One could spend a life in peace and harmony and be at one with nature. Electricity and water supply assured round the clock. One could also shut oneself off from the cruelty of Delhi…
1 PM I overheard conversations among school-kids (Chathu’s age). They have bunked school and are just shooting the breeze at the bus interchange. One boy was talking of fibbing to Dad that he is at Mom’s place & promises to get to the friend’s place with a ‘deck of smokes’. Mom & Dad are apparently separated and living with other partners; Parents believe that their children are either at school or with the other estranged spouse, while they are actually not at school and are busy puffing smokes at the bus interchanges.
2 PM Back home. I am on the couch trying to read a huge tome called ‘The kindly Ones’ , by Jonathan Littel, a novel, nay, true story of the 2nd world war. I give up: pour a glass of wine, sip some and doze off. Chathu is back from School. He creates a racket about the PSP(play station portable) not being in its’ place where he left it. It is normally kept in the dressing table at an angle of 60 degrees facing east.
4. PM Chathu apparently doesn’t believe in God, is highly superstitious and believes in the devil and sundry ghosts. That is an interesting combination, I think. Well our experiences teach us what to believe in. I lost my faith in God when I was young. But luckily I didn’t see too many devils and ghosts amongst us to start believing in them. Poor Chathu…
5 PM Played with Saba, the landlady’s puppy
9 PM dinner and sleep
All that good life is coming to an end. I am leaving this wonderful continent in a couple of days and will be back in the thick of my troubled life in Delhi. It has been a great time and I loved every moment of it. I have met some wonderful people, had some great experiences and an ultra cool, relaxed time. But all that comes to an end next week. All ye believers… say a prayer for me.
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I used to feel sad while reading Pakistani media’s responses to terrorist attacks in India. One standard set of response was that there is no proof of Pak involvement- terrorists haven’t left visiting cards. It is a staged attack & that it is calculated to show Pakistan in a poor light. The second set of response was that the Indian police & army were kept engaged for several hours- it shows how inefficient India is. The third set of response was that if India attacks Pakistan based on these events they will get a fitting reply. One sentiment was glaringly absent. A lot of innocent lives were lost in the terrorist attacks. There is no sensitivity towards people who lost their lives for no reason.
Read about the responses to the string of attacks in Pakistan now in Indian media- I realize that we are not very different. Most responses are on the lines that they are getting a taste of their own medicine. The Frankenstein monsters that they created have turned against their masters and the genie is out of the bottle etc. Don’t we think about innocent women and children and sundry civilians who lost their lives just because they happened to be out there? How would we feel if our dear ones died in that cross fire? Let us hope that they win this battle against monsters that kill for no reason. Let us show a little bit sensitivity...
Sunday 25 October 2009
The empty ball
Who are you? A bleeding heart liberal? a snooty conservative with empty pockets? What do you stand for? I ask myself. I really don’t know the answer to that. As a public servant, I shouldn’t be speaking of my political beliefs; but let me admit I have none. Long ago, I thought I stood for the weak. I liked to see the mighty bite the dust. I derived inspiration from tales of dark horses who came from nowhere and won races. Then? What happened to change all that?
I somehow started smelling bullshit in the bleeding heart liberal agenda. We have heard the social activists living in Jor Bagh houses, who went to elite schools and sniffed from cocktail glasses paying lip-sympathy to the poor and the marginalized. They roll their vowels and mouth these nothings to stay relevant and appear good on TV. An economic conservative can cut through a lot of bullshit. Unfortunately they are mostly well bred horses from the stables of corporate houses. Where do I stand then?
This angst flows from the stories about India England
I still receive a lot of responses for the story ‘Autumn of the Naxalite’ in this blog. Many people choose to talk to me or email me instead of writing public comments on the blog. Some are very critical and some appreciative (undeservingly)- some have (wrongly) concluded that I have dormant sympathy for the Naxal movement, while some say that I haven’t even scratched the surface of the problem by talking to one man. Some point out errors in the story, which I swear were inadvertent. I have only tried to highlight the human dimension of a poignant story; not of a failed movement- maybe I have failed in my task...
There is an even more tragic aftermath to that story that I haven't written about- about a father’s struggle to educate his children, the social ostracism that a jail term brings and a lot many other things. A doomed life is bad enough. The closed door of opportunities to build your children’s lives is frustrating. I have acutely felt this helplessness added to my inability to assist in any way. But that is no reason for anyone to go back to a violent movement. It is for us to open our eyes to see what is happening in our midst. Maoists, I am sure like all hard core leftists suppress the personal individual narrative for the larger cause they believe in. Just as there is no living model of a just society that a 6th century prophet spoke of, there is no living proof of the equitable, socialist societies that the latter day dogmatists of the left movement aspired for.
So what are they fighting for? What does violence beget? What have they achieved for society or for themselves? certainly not a just society; maybe just a few despondent fathers who tried and failed to rebuild their lives after a long jail term. India
Maybe I am a deconstructed Marxist, rushing to the finishing line with an empty ball clutched tightly to my chest- the ball of rationalism and inclusiveness. There is no hot air called socialistic society in that ball; nor personal greed working the magic of larger good. But I think I will add a dose of allergy to empty talk of failure of development in TV studios and a dislike of organized religion’s power to divert our attention from issues of livelihood to the salvation of soul.
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Some favourite quotes….
“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing”
Edmund Burke (1729 - 1797)
"With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil -- that takes religion."
Steven Weinberg (1979 Physics Nobel Laurete)
Saturday 10 October 2009
Puppy Love
Isn’t it wonderful to have a pretty young girl doting on you in middle age? What if it is a female pup with white mane and brownish long hairy ears, with a huge bellowy bark? I’ve found love again. The object of my affections is Saba, my landlady’s puppy. She came in May from Queensland by air, a small cute cross-breed of Golden retriever and poodle. She was tiny when she came but she has grown bigger and her white mane has started covering her eyes now. She spends her time out in the grass gnarling at passersby, twisting her head vigorously chewing something or running amok in the garden. In the mornings she would wait at the kitchen door for the Missus to give her breadcrumbs to eat. She would sun herself in the grass, sniff the air and drive away the parrots and Cockatoos that seek grains in the garden. She is an endless source of pranks and amusement. Let her in the house and she will make way with a pair of slippers or socks. But there is some bad news. She has a congenital kidney problem and the prognosis is that she may not last long. I am hoping that by some miracle she recovers. We would miss her more than anything else when we leave Australia.
Chathu was always keen to have a pup at home. For the last so many years we’ve been living in flats in big cities. The inconvenience of taking the dog out for its’ daily poop always deterred us. I had a dog called Benny long back, with a dark band around his neck. He looked like a cross between a mongrel and an Alsatian, but his ancestry is largely unexplained. During Vishu, a festival of fireworks, I tied some crackers to his tail and set them off. He ran away from home and didn’t reappear for several days. I started crying and my Mom sent delegations to search for him in the village, amid much admonitions of having got just what I deserved for treating the dog cruelly. After three days he reappeared out of the blue. I was overjoyed and swore never to scare away my dear puppy. He died years later at ripe old age. I didn’t think of having a dog ever after that. But Saba just might make me rethink my resolve when we get back to India. It is nice to have someone welcoming you when you get home.
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We finally did that trip to Alice Springs and the long road journey to Uluru. Alice Springs is typical heartland Australia. It is a small outback town. The long drive from Alice Springs takes 5 hours each way. We did that in a hired Toyota Kluger which drives like a breeze. There were acres and acres of desolation, with vast stretches of bare countryside with patches of bushes. There are four small outback stops with shops displaying the quaint inscription “No shirt, No service”. That sounds so much from another era, while aboriginals walked shirtless and white Australians wore top hats.
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One is more likely to find regular Aussie binge drinkers without a shirt these days. The Ayers Rock, a large monolithic rock looks as if it dropped down from another planet. We gazed at it at sunset and sunrise and drove to the Kata Tjuta National park nearby. While there were sandstorms while driving to Uluru, it was raining when we were driving back. The weather varies from day to day in this country. There are places where it hasn’t rained for twenty years. While it was hot when we landed in Alice, it was chilly when we left. The long trip fulfilled an old dream of mine. I remembered it was this vision of Australia in “A Town like Alice” that finally drew me to this country to spend a year.
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Chathu was always keen to have a pup at home. For the last so many years we’ve been living in flats in big cities. The inconvenience of taking the dog out for its’ daily poop always deterred us. I had a dog called Benny long back, with a dark band around his neck. He looked like a cross between a mongrel and an Alsatian, but his ancestry is largely unexplained. During Vishu, a festival of fireworks, I tied some crackers to his tail and set them off. He ran away from home and didn’t reappear for several days. I started crying and my Mom sent delegations to search for him in the village, amid much admonitions of having got just what I deserved for treating the dog cruelly. After three days he reappeared out of the blue. I was overjoyed and swore never to scare away my dear puppy. He died years later at ripe old age. I didn’t think of having a dog ever after that. But Saba just might make me rethink my resolve when we get back to India. It is nice to have someone welcoming you when you get home.
***************
.jpg)
We finally did that trip to Alice Springs and the long road journey to Uluru. Alice Springs is typical heartland Australia. It is a small outback town. The long drive from Alice Springs takes 5 hours each way. We did that in a hired Toyota Kluger which drives like a breeze. There were acres and acres of desolation, with vast stretches of bare countryside with patches of bushes. There are four small outback stops with shops displaying the quaint inscription “No shirt, No service”. That sounds so much from another era, while aboriginals walked shirtless and white Australians wore top hats.
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Saturday 19 September 2009
It's Spring!!!
The long hard winter is over. It was a time of chilly mornings, and icicles on the grass, interspersed with some pleasant afternoons, when the warm glow of sun bathed everything in gold. Winter, in a way summarized my mood. Despondent, sullen and cooped up at home with the central heating on. The night time temperatures would often dip down to minus 2. For a tropical creature like me, it has been a difficult time.
It is spring at last. The world around here is splattered with a profusion of flowers. Violets, hyacinths, daffodils, tulips, daisies and marigold are in full bloom. The Ginenderra Lake near my house is placid and the trees and strips of grass around it look greener. There is still a nice chill in the air, a distant reminder of the harsh winter. The sun burns bright and there are white wisps of clouds in the sky. The air we breathe is clean and pure. I realize what a beautiful small town this is. There are only 300000 residents and there is a forest in the middle of the city. If it weren’t for noisy automobiles zipping around in tearing hurry, I’d rename it as heaven.
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A few years back the Missus suggested that I read a book called “Foreign Correspondence” by an Australian author, Geraldine Brooks. She had got it from a library. I have hazy memories of the book. It was about the author’s lonely childhood filled with books and penpals. I saw a bit of myself in her. I too passed eventless days in my village walking by the river, staring at the endless greenery of paddy fields and reading whatever I could lay my hands on. An occasional letter from a pen pal in Czeckoslovakia, Morocco or Philippines was a big event and I would look forward to the postman’s arrival everyday. We liked the Geraldine Brooks’ book so much that we wanted to buy it. We couldn’t find a copy in the bookstores so we did something very unusual. We took a photocopy of the book, bound it and kept it with us. It still lies in our Delhi home. I just finished reading another book called “Nine Parts of Desire” by her. She is now a highly successful Pulitzer Prize winning Middle East correspondent of the Wall Street Journal. This book is about her journey to understand women in Islamic lands. She travels through Iran, Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and many other countries to discover the women behind the veil. She tops her journey by belly dancing in a Cairo restaurant to an audience of highly appreciative Arabs in head clothes and Egyptians. There are tales of women fighting all odds and spinning tales of success in the most oppressed & liberal countries. There is a chapter on the Prophet’s women, which is a storehouse of information. The book’s name comes from a saying of Ali ibn Abu Taleb (husband of the Muhammad’s daughter Fatima & founder of the Shiite sect) that Almighty God created sexual desire in ten parts and he gave nine parts to women and one to men. Geraldine Brooks has branched off into fiction also; and has written a couple of novels. She is really a writer to watch out for.
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It is spring at last. The world around here is splattered with a profusion of flowers. Violets, hyacinths, daffodils, tulips, daisies and marigold are in full bloom. The Ginenderra Lake near my house is placid and the trees and strips of grass around it look greener. There is still a nice chill in the air, a distant reminder of the harsh winter. The sun burns bright and there are white wisps of clouds in the sky. The air we breathe is clean and pure. I realize what a beautiful small town this is. There are only 300000 residents and there is a forest in the middle of the city. If it weren’t for noisy automobiles zipping around in tearing hurry, I’d rename it as heaven.
***********
A few years back the Missus suggested that I read a book called “Foreign Correspondence” by an Australian author, Geraldine Brooks. She had got it from a library. I have hazy memories of the book. It was about the author’s lonely childhood filled with books and penpals. I saw a bit of myself in her. I too passed eventless days in my village walking by the river, staring at the endless greenery of paddy fields and reading whatever I could lay my hands on. An occasional letter from a pen pal in Czeckoslovakia, Morocco or Philippines was a big event and I would look forward to the postman’s arrival everyday. We liked the Geraldine Brooks’ book so much that we wanted to buy it. We couldn’t find a copy in the bookstores so we did something very unusual. We took a photocopy of the book, bound it and kept it with us. It still lies in our Delhi home. I just finished reading another book called “Nine Parts of Desire” by her. She is now a highly successful Pulitzer Prize winning Middle East correspondent of the Wall Street Journal. This book is about her journey to understand women in Islamic lands. She travels through Iran, Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and many other countries to discover the women behind the veil. She tops her journey by belly dancing in a Cairo restaurant to an audience of highly appreciative Arabs in head clothes and Egyptians. There are tales of women fighting all odds and spinning tales of success in the most oppressed & liberal countries. There is a chapter on the Prophet’s women, which is a storehouse of information. The book’s name comes from a saying of Ali ibn Abu Taleb (husband of the Muhammad’s daughter Fatima & founder of the Shiite sect) that Almighty God created sexual desire in ten parts and he gave nine parts to women and one to men. Geraldine Brooks has branched off into fiction also; and has written a couple of novels. She is really a writer to watch out for.
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Thursday 10 September 2009
What we are
Imagine a tall hairy brawny Sikh, brought up in Scotland, holidaying in India. No, he doesn’t go to Taj Mahal with a video camera strapped around his neck or the Golden Temple in Amritsar to offer prayers. He doesn’t try to catch up with Pinky Aunty whom he knew as a kid or Bunty uncle who taught him how to ride bicycles. He visits cities in India and cooks English cuisine at the most unlikely places. Why English cuisine? Well I couldn’t quite appreciate his reasons, except for a strange belief that to understand a people you need to understand their cuisine. Well, we didn’t understand the English even after 200 years of English rule. Why bother to teach us? I thought they adopted our cuisine and went back. Imagine Karuppusamy’s thatched restaurant in Mahabalipuram in Tamilnadu. Imagine a Sardar with a clipped Brit/Scot accent cooking shepherd’s pie and stovies there to feed the customers. I can imagine the uncomprehending looks on the dark faces of people gathered around him. He must have been the source of amusement for many days. The book is ‘Indian Takeaway’ by Hardeep Singh Kohli, a broadcaster and newspaper columnist. It is a fun read but a bit poorly edited- could have done without the repetitions of phrases at many places. The descriptions of railway journeys and his observations of every day Indian life are truly hilarious.
Often we see ourselves better through the eyes of outsiders. The other book I am reading is ‘Holy Cow- an Indian adventure’ by Sarah Mac Donald. It is written by an Australian woman who courageously lived a life of sin with her fiancée in India and lived to tell the tale(living together outside marriage is not yet considered kosher in polite circles in India…although we get by with worse sins like bride-burning and female infanticide). There are tales of Delhi male bravado, the ogling and pinching of female flesh, the dirty water and polluted air, and the loathsome public habits of men with fingers in nostrils, constantly re-adjusting their crotch. She experiences all this in a secluded and tony neighbourhood in Delhi, reasonably insulated from the dark side of the cruel city. I wonder what would she say if she had to experience the middle class existence of Indian babus in Government Colony Delhi?
Surprisingly I wasn’t offended by the descriptions of unjust Delhi. We are often caught up so much in our daily lives that we fail to see what is apparent. We are a highly hierarchical society and our importance flows from our exclusivity. It stems from how many people do we manage to exclude from our cozy circle. We snap at drivers, we scoff at servants, we heckle clerks, we abuse fellow drivers on roads and we violate the queues at movie theatres. Our membership to exclusive clubs, our family lineage, our position in the bureaucracy, and the garish furniture and drapes in our living rooms, all scream for attention to our exclusivity. We revel in this importance and turn up our noses at all the unwashed people on our streets. I could understand Sarah. She sees us for what we are… a people smug in our exclusivity. And this exclusivity is constantly redefined by excluding more and more people from it. All this while our politicians talk of inclusive development. Might be a good idea to start some inclusiveness from Delhi and from within the government….
I still yearn to go back to the melting pot that is Delhi, despite all that. But I dread going back to work. I have enjoyed much of this past one year, on the couch, reading, browsing, studying a little and day dreaming. The good time is running out and the show is about to begin... I try practicing the evil look of a self important Babu before a mirror every day…
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I am hooked onto the song’ Heads in Georgia’ from the J J Cale & Eric Clapton album called ‘The Road to Escondido’. It has a dreamy, laid back beat to it. Wonderful blues music!!
Often we see ourselves better through the eyes of outsiders. The other book I am reading is ‘Holy Cow- an Indian adventure’ by Sarah Mac Donald. It is written by an Australian woman who courageously lived a life of sin with her fiancée in India and lived to tell the tale(living together outside marriage is not yet considered kosher in polite circles in India…although we get by with worse sins like bride-burning and female infanticide). There are tales of Delhi male bravado, the ogling and pinching of female flesh, the dirty water and polluted air, and the loathsome public habits of men with fingers in nostrils, constantly re-adjusting their crotch. She experiences all this in a secluded and tony neighbourhood in Delhi, reasonably insulated from the dark side of the cruel city. I wonder what would she say if she had to experience the middle class existence of Indian babus in Government Colony Delhi?
Surprisingly I wasn’t offended by the descriptions of unjust Delhi. We are often caught up so much in our daily lives that we fail to see what is apparent. We are a highly hierarchical society and our importance flows from our exclusivity. It stems from how many people do we manage to exclude from our cozy circle. We snap at drivers, we scoff at servants, we heckle clerks, we abuse fellow drivers on roads and we violate the queues at movie theatres. Our membership to exclusive clubs, our family lineage, our position in the bureaucracy, and the garish furniture and drapes in our living rooms, all scream for attention to our exclusivity. We revel in this importance and turn up our noses at all the unwashed people on our streets. I could understand Sarah. She sees us for what we are… a people smug in our exclusivity. And this exclusivity is constantly redefined by excluding more and more people from it. All this while our politicians talk of inclusive development. Might be a good idea to start some inclusiveness from Delhi and from within the government….
I still yearn to go back to the melting pot that is Delhi, despite all that. But I dread going back to work. I have enjoyed much of this past one year, on the couch, reading, browsing, studying a little and day dreaming. The good time is running out and the show is about to begin... I try practicing the evil look of a self important Babu before a mirror every day…
************************
I am hooked onto the song’ Heads in Georgia’ from the J J Cale & Eric Clapton album called ‘The Road to Escondido’. It has a dreamy, laid back beat to it. Wonderful blues music!!
Thursday 3 September 2009
Songs for the road
It is bad enough writing a funny babu-blog without Indian politics. It is something like wrestling Dara Singh with one arm tied behind your back. You start with a huge handicap since the biggest source of entertainment is taboo. Any opinion on it in this blog might violate service conditions of Indian bureaucrats. In spirit I don’t belong to the steel frame that is Indian bureaucracy Proof lies in that I have not cultivated that look of heightened self- importance even after 20 years in it. But nope; I shall not risk my job; though I run a serious risk of losing my sense of humour after a few more years in Indian babudom.
I read Indrajit Hazra occasionally ((columnist in HT). This thought comes from his recent column on the crisis in a major political party. Like he, I also had many suggestions recommending songs appropriate to be played at Chintan Baithaks of BJP, Congress Working Committee meetings with nice bolsters on the floor and CPM conventions held under huge khaki tents. You can take your pick between a Malayalam semi Reggae/ Hip Hop number called Lajjavatiye to the ‘Times they are a changin’ by Bob Dylan and ‘bend me shape me anyway you want me’, a 1968 classic by the American breed. I can laugh till my sides split, imagining kurta clad Netas doing a jig to popular numbers of yesteryears. But I shall refrain from setting forth such crazy ideas here.
American politics seem much better. The campaign starts with an important campaign-song choosing and a slogan choosing round. The slogans could sound variously like ‘where’s the beef’ (which had a lot of Hindus scratching their heads wondering what the forbidden piece of meat has to do with choosing the President of USA), ‘read my lips’, ‘shit gives’, ‘stuff happens’ and other such inane one liners which, if heard in isolation, make no sense. Only contemporary Americans can divine the deep, evocative messages that are contained within them. Before you start selling the $1000 a- plate dinners, booking airtime, appointing PR firms, sexy interns and other celebrity cheerleaders you need to choose a song that needs to be played incessantly on the campaign trail.
Fleetwood Mac is a great band to listen to while walking or jogging. The drummer, Mick Fleetwood (after whom the band is named) can make an ordinary beat sound exciting and lift your energy levels. ‘Go your own way’ is a wonderful song to have playing in your ears as you walk a few miles and slowly trot into a brisk jog. But who thought that the Clinton campaign team would dust off their old song ‘don’t start thinking about tomorrow’ and play it continuously in the campaign. I wish we could also do theme songs for important occasions. For anniversaries, campaigns, party politburo meetings and cricket coaching camps. I am given to mouthing lyrics of favourite songs all the time: as I walk, run, work, eat and while in toilet. Although a non believer, I have silly superstitions- like it’s gonna be a good day if I sing ‘I can’t tell you why’ by the Eagles in the shower every morning. Even the name (‘Helplessly Hoping’) of my blog is from the famous classic vocal harmony by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. I can tolerate a load of crap; when accompanied with a soothing tune or lusty beat. Give me a song any day……
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I am teetering close to insolvency. Life is expensive here. The scholar ship amount is not sufficient to run a family. The Australian Government has given us student visa which contains permission to work 20 hours a week to supplement scholarship income. The Indian government forbids its’ officers from accepting financial support from other sources. I have borrowed a few thousands from my sis in law which is being repaid from my salary back home. The exchange rate being about Rs 40 to an Australian dollar, the said salary which would have given us a comfortable life in India, has rapidly vanished. Don’t be surprised if I am driven to working in a checkout counter of a supermarket (the only kind of jobs available for the asking) out of sheer necessity…. It is wages of sweat after all, not sin…. Some plight for a Babu who can sheepishly claim to have directly or indirectly controlled resources worth billions in the past. Another two months to go. Maybe this could be my last official foreign sojourn. It has been a great experience. But something tells me that it is not worth it if you don’t have enough of the green stuff. Scrounging was fun when young. Not any more…
I read Indrajit Hazra occasionally ((columnist in HT). This thought comes from his recent column on the crisis in a major political party. Like he, I also had many suggestions recommending songs appropriate to be played at Chintan Baithaks of BJP, Congress Working Committee meetings with nice bolsters on the floor and CPM conventions held under huge khaki tents. You can take your pick between a Malayalam semi Reggae/ Hip Hop number called Lajjavatiye to the ‘Times they are a changin’ by Bob Dylan and ‘bend me shape me anyway you want me’, a 1968 classic by the American breed. I can laugh till my sides split, imagining kurta clad Netas doing a jig to popular numbers of yesteryears. But I shall refrain from setting forth such crazy ideas here.
American politics seem much better. The campaign starts with an important campaign-song choosing and a slogan choosing round. The slogans could sound variously like ‘where’s the beef’ (which had a lot of Hindus scratching their heads wondering what the forbidden piece of meat has to do with choosing the President of USA), ‘read my lips’, ‘shit gives’, ‘stuff happens’ and other such inane one liners which, if heard in isolation, make no sense. Only contemporary Americans can divine the deep, evocative messages that are contained within them. Before you start selling the $1000 a- plate dinners, booking airtime, appointing PR firms, sexy interns and other celebrity cheerleaders you need to choose a song that needs to be played incessantly on the campaign trail.
Fleetwood Mac is a great band to listen to while walking or jogging. The drummer, Mick Fleetwood (after whom the band is named) can make an ordinary beat sound exciting and lift your energy levels. ‘Go your own way’ is a wonderful song to have playing in your ears as you walk a few miles and slowly trot into a brisk jog. But who thought that the Clinton campaign team would dust off their old song ‘don’t start thinking about tomorrow’ and play it continuously in the campaign. I wish we could also do theme songs for important occasions. For anniversaries, campaigns, party politburo meetings and cricket coaching camps. I am given to mouthing lyrics of favourite songs all the time: as I walk, run, work, eat and while in toilet. Although a non believer, I have silly superstitions- like it’s gonna be a good day if I sing ‘I can’t tell you why’ by the Eagles in the shower every morning. Even the name (‘Helplessly Hoping’) of my blog is from the famous classic vocal harmony by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. I can tolerate a load of crap; when accompanied with a soothing tune or lusty beat. Give me a song any day……
****************
I am teetering close to insolvency. Life is expensive here. The scholar ship amount is not sufficient to run a family. The Australian Government has given us student visa which contains permission to work 20 hours a week to supplement scholarship income. The Indian government forbids its’ officers from accepting financial support from other sources. I have borrowed a few thousands from my sis in law which is being repaid from my salary back home. The exchange rate being about Rs 40 to an Australian dollar, the said salary which would have given us a comfortable life in India, has rapidly vanished. Don’t be surprised if I am driven to working in a checkout counter of a supermarket (the only kind of jobs available for the asking) out of sheer necessity…. It is wages of sweat after all, not sin…. Some plight for a Babu who can sheepishly claim to have directly or indirectly controlled resources worth billions in the past. Another two months to go. Maybe this could be my last official foreign sojourn. It has been a great experience. But something tells me that it is not worth it if you don’t have enough of the green stuff. Scrounging was fun when young. Not any more…
Friday 28 August 2009
Road Rules
Australia’s countryside offers some spectacular visions. Roads are wide, clean and with clear road signs and indications. On either side the Australian countryside whizzes past. There are gum trees, eucalyptus, brown earth, distant hillocks and a patient blue sky as you drive by. I have spent all my time in the South Eastern hub of civilization. This is a vast country and we hope to visit middle Australia sometime in September. The drive from Melbourne to Great Ocean Road by the sea coast is great. The drive from Canberra to Sydney of about three hours and the drive from Melbourne to Canberra of about eight hours are uneventful. While one could drink in the pictures of the country initially, it gets very repetitive as you progress. There is hardly a soul on roads. If you have seen the first ten kilometers, then you have seen it all. One might as well start counting the number and model year of Toyota Corollas that whiz by. My love for long drives remains. I intend to take one more long drive, from Alice Springs to Uluru. That is the heartland of outback Australia.
I drive an eighteen year old Nissan Pulsar car, which was given to me by a kindly soul who was going home in a hurry. I have always driven first-hand cars kept in spanking good condition. I am skeptical about taking this old car out in the night or going on long drives. I don’t want the car to die on me. Initially I was driving it Delhi style. That is the old Punjabi might-is-right school of driving. My friends warned me that I could soon be cooling my heels in an Australian jail. So I did some serious study of Australian road rules and familiarized myself with lane driving, right of way and other such irritants of polite road behaviour. Still I can see some drivers raising their fists and muttering at me for breaking the rules. I am trying to sell the car at the earliest since the University is a parking disaster zone. I would be better off travelling in public transport.
But I miss the road journeys back home. India is a great place for long drives. The roads are pot holed. The weather is often oppressive and keeps changing from bright sunshine to intermittent rains. There are check-posts, processions and hartals to break your stride. Road works, toll booths, accidents, stray dogs & stumbling bullocks cramp your style. But the landscape offers a collage of colours, smells, languages and diversity as we drive by. From verdant greens to desolate stretches of barren earth, from winding mountain roads to breezy seaside roads… Dress patterns, languages and dialects change. Road side motels offer vastly diverse cuisines as we move from one state to another- all this in an interval of 200 kms lasting a short four hour drive. You are richer by the experience. Can’t wait till I get there. But I need to buy a car back home. I sold the last one.
******************************
Books read : Stranger to History by Atish Taseer. The author is all of 29 years old. He is the son of Tavleen Singh. He is the product of her rash romantic interlude with Salman Taseer, (presently Governor of Punjab province in Pakistan, ex PPP member) in the eighties. It is an intense personal narrative of a boy’s quest for his roots. His rootlessness springs from being raised without a faith or a father. I found it moving. As they say, one doesn’t become a father by impregnating a woman… but by investing in your child’s days- spending time with him, playing with him etc. In cyberspace one could see that the gentleman father is not exactly a popular guy. The antics of his legitimate children frolicking in violation of puritan Islamic code is splattered all over. In the eighties he apparently advised the journalist mother not to abort his seed and then made his glorious exit.
“Who are we: Challenges to America’s national identity” by Samuel Huntington presents a controversial thesis. Huntington (of the clash of civilizations fame) says that the embrace of Anglo protestant values is the way forward for America. He talks of it as a culture no more exclusive to a people endowed with light skin. Well I am open to the idea as we can see the results here. Indians boast of a civilization 5000 years old but don’t think twice before boorish public behaviour. Australia has not very proud antecedents, but they have built a highly livable, law abiding country. Huntington has a point there but his narrative on Hispanic intrusion in America’s mainstream is controversial. His arguments have a tendency to become prophetic. We will wait and see…
Trying to read : Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata. When we were young we would read the reviews of great literature by M Krishnan Nair. He would criticize a short story by some poor unsuspecting soul in a Malayalam weekly and then go and comparing it with Marquez, Kawabata, Yukio Mishima, Gunter Grass and other worthies. The unequal and rather contrived comparisons notwithstanding, it aroused curiosity in us about great writers during our years of innocence. I started reading Sartre, Camus and other existentialists after having read about them in his columns. Many of the great works went over my head. I never found Kawabata in bookshops. I am still looking for Snow Country which is supposed to be his classic. Shall post my impressions of “Master.. if I comprehend it and manage to finish it.
I have not been listening to much music. I always loved to hear the rich royal sound of Mridangam, a percussion instrument widely used in Carnatic music.
Naino Mein Badra Chaye by Lata Mangeshkar is an all time favourite. Also Kuch Door Hamare Saath Chalo, a Ghazal by Hariharan. These songs give me goose pimples and I hear them again and again. I have lost touch with Mehdi Hassan Ghazals of which I had been a great fan. My friends up north tell me that I haven’t enjoyed a tenth of it if I don’t know Urdu.
I have been out of touch with Malayalam songs too. But I love some old ones. Try this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIHFt9Skoxc
The women back then had large heaving breasts and were generously proportioned. They had thick natural eyebrows, not shaped thin. Mallu men liked them that way in the seventies. And the men? They took great pains to shape their moustaches pencil thin. And their unruly hair was tossed, shaped like a bird’s nest. Their faces had cakes of makeup and had a rather unhealthy glow. Look at them and laugh all you want… But the music? It is divine. Straight from heaven…The poetry is incredibly romantic and the voice of Yesudas uplifting.
I drive an eighteen year old Nissan Pulsar car, which was given to me by a kindly soul who was going home in a hurry. I have always driven first-hand cars kept in spanking good condition. I am skeptical about taking this old car out in the night or going on long drives. I don’t want the car to die on me. Initially I was driving it Delhi style. That is the old Punjabi might-is-right school of driving. My friends warned me that I could soon be cooling my heels in an Australian jail. So I did some serious study of Australian road rules and familiarized myself with lane driving, right of way and other such irritants of polite road behaviour. Still I can see some drivers raising their fists and muttering at me for breaking the rules. I am trying to sell the car at the earliest since the University is a parking disaster zone. I would be better off travelling in public transport.
But I miss the road journeys back home. India is a great place for long drives. The roads are pot holed. The weather is often oppressive and keeps changing from bright sunshine to intermittent rains. There are check-posts, processions and hartals to break your stride. Road works, toll booths, accidents, stray dogs & stumbling bullocks cramp your style. But the landscape offers a collage of colours, smells, languages and diversity as we drive by. From verdant greens to desolate stretches of barren earth, from winding mountain roads to breezy seaside roads… Dress patterns, languages and dialects change. Road side motels offer vastly diverse cuisines as we move from one state to another- all this in an interval of 200 kms lasting a short four hour drive. You are richer by the experience. Can’t wait till I get there. But I need to buy a car back home. I sold the last one.
******************************
Books read : Stranger to History by Atish Taseer. The author is all of 29 years old. He is the son of Tavleen Singh. He is the product of her rash romantic interlude with Salman Taseer, (presently Governor of Punjab province in Pakistan, ex PPP member) in the eighties. It is an intense personal narrative of a boy’s quest for his roots. His rootlessness springs from being raised without a faith or a father. I found it moving. As they say, one doesn’t become a father by impregnating a woman… but by investing in your child’s days- spending time with him, playing with him etc. In cyberspace one could see that the gentleman father is not exactly a popular guy. The antics of his legitimate children frolicking in violation of puritan Islamic code is splattered all over. In the eighties he apparently advised the journalist mother not to abort his seed and then made his glorious exit.
“Who are we: Challenges to America’s national identity” by Samuel Huntington presents a controversial thesis. Huntington (of the clash of civilizations fame) says that the embrace of Anglo protestant values is the way forward for America. He talks of it as a culture no more exclusive to a people endowed with light skin. Well I am open to the idea as we can see the results here. Indians boast of a civilization 5000 years old but don’t think twice before boorish public behaviour. Australia has not very proud antecedents, but they have built a highly livable, law abiding country. Huntington has a point there but his narrative on Hispanic intrusion in America’s mainstream is controversial. His arguments have a tendency to become prophetic. We will wait and see…
Trying to read : Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata. When we were young we would read the reviews of great literature by M Krishnan Nair. He would criticize a short story by some poor unsuspecting soul in a Malayalam weekly and then go and comparing it with Marquez, Kawabata, Yukio Mishima, Gunter Grass and other worthies. The unequal and rather contrived comparisons notwithstanding, it aroused curiosity in us about great writers during our years of innocence. I started reading Sartre, Camus and other existentialists after having read about them in his columns. Many of the great works went over my head. I never found Kawabata in bookshops. I am still looking for Snow Country which is supposed to be his classic. Shall post my impressions of “Master.. if I comprehend it and manage to finish it.
I have not been listening to much music. I always loved to hear the rich royal sound of Mridangam, a percussion instrument widely used in Carnatic music.
Naino Mein Badra Chaye by Lata Mangeshkar is an all time favourite. Also Kuch Door Hamare Saath Chalo, a Ghazal by Hariharan. These songs give me goose pimples and I hear them again and again. I have lost touch with Mehdi Hassan Ghazals of which I had been a great fan. My friends up north tell me that I haven’t enjoyed a tenth of it if I don’t know Urdu.
I have been out of touch with Malayalam songs too. But I love some old ones. Try this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIHFt9Skoxc
The women back then had large heaving breasts and were generously proportioned. They had thick natural eyebrows, not shaped thin. Mallu men liked them that way in the seventies. And the men? They took great pains to shape their moustaches pencil thin. And their unruly hair was tossed, shaped like a bird’s nest. Their faces had cakes of makeup and had a rather unhealthy glow. Look at them and laugh all you want… But the music? It is divine. Straight from heaven…The poetry is incredibly romantic and the voice of Yesudas uplifting.
Saturday 1 August 2009
Friendly neighbours
Even sane journalists and defence analysts of India these days advocate the strategy of keeping Pakistan on the boil and tying them down to their Western frontier. Forget peace overtures with that country, they say- in peace times they are busy destabilizing us. Keep them busy fighting a war on the west of their own making. Let us get on with the business of development. I have friends here who belong to the Pakistan Civil Services. The cab driver who picked us up from the airport was a Pakistani- a post graduate from Australian National University who decided that driving cabs lets him be in control of his life- a remarkable attitude to life. They are no different from us. They speak chaste Urdu (for a South Indian like me it is basically Hindi with some additional strange sounding words) and are quite affectionate towards Indians- (it is hard to believe how much). Although I have been a keen Pakistan watcher, I hadn’t really met a Pakistani in flesh and blood until I reached Australia. They are just folks like us. One people divided in the name of fuzzy religions.
But it surprises me how much animosity exists in certain parts of Pak media towards us. Things aren’t very different with Indian media. But they reach a crescendo during brazen external interventions like Mumbai attacks, Parliament attacks and Kandahar hijack. Then they sort of die down and get busy with gory tales of rape and murder in Indian hinterland, tinsel town gossip and displays of wealth by the nouveau riche. But what explains this animosity in Pakistan? I was listening to talks by this guy called Zaid Hamid in Youtube. His theories are strange to say the least. I am told (with a wink and a nudge) that he is an “Agency’s Man”- the “Agency” being a hushed reference to the ubiquitous ISI of Pakistan. Hamid has many interesting theories- that Mumbai attack was orchestrated by Indians…even that Ajmal Kasab’s real name is (clutch your stomachs now) none other than Amar Singh. He is a Pakistani patriot who believes that Pakistan should be ready for the next Panipat war which kick-started a thousand years of rule of Hindustan by the “righteous”. He also declares that the Swat agreement is a result of disillusionment with the English justice system and if Pakistanis want instant justice; let there be Sharia. There are such many more amusing nuggets that I shall not care to recount all of them. He seems to be heard widely and is favourably commented upon by Pakistanis. If this is the Agency’s man then may his God save his Agency.
It is this elitism/ chauvinism that supposedly lost them East Pakistan - A belief that the Bengalis are not sufficiently infused with religious and martial fervour and subsequent refusal to transfer power to them in spite of Mujib winning a legitimate election. The scope for forgetting the past and moving on with development appear pretty slim right now. But a peaceful subcontinent busy working towards development of its’ impoverished populace can make a lot of difference. What divides us in the trajectory of development in post colonial era? I do not hold many strong beliefs or convictions (except for a few naïve beliefs like vodka martinis go well with crab fajitas and that Bengali women are beautiful) But I subscribe to this theory about democracy. The beauty of democracy is that it enables a generational shift of power from the elite to the underclass. Watch the shift of post-independence breed of Oxbridge intellectuals, maharajahs and landed gentry of India who dominated politics to the present lot of politicians among whom there are cowherds, tailors and school teachers. Most of India’s states are today presided over by ordinary people who spent a lifetime in politics. This imperceptible shift has occurred during our life time. We sneered at it in the beginning. Today there are a lot more seasoned politicians from the masses who are holding or have held high office. Yet one might say, don’t we still have dynasties? Yes, we do. But many dynasties are sprouting without the baggage of the past. I believe this transformation is what prevents India from breaking up or fighting too many internal wars. But dangers lurk in every corner, let me hasten to add.
This transformation could never take roots in Pakistan. With democracy interrupted by bayonets periodically, even today, the leaders of mainstream parties are from the elite. There really was no leftist movement representing the Aam admi cutting across regional affiliations. The leader of the Mohajirs (so called under-class of Indian muslim migrants) sits in UK, reluctant to face politics at home. Take a reality check. The Bhutto family, the Sharif family, the Chaudhries of Gujrat, Imran Khan… They are all riding on family wealth and connections. For a young bright Pakistani, joining the Army appears to be a more legitimate method of wielding political power eventually. Can you think of a Pakistani who rose through the ranks of the dust and grime of electoral politics?
Do you then blame the disgruntled common man for gravitating to the mullah with piety in his eyes and fire in his heart? Do you grudge him for following the preacher who leads a life of modest means and constant prayer? I suppose not. In similar circumstances, we could be also swayed by these pious worthies instead of wealthy politicians riding in Toyota Prado with gunmen for protection. Maybe two or three generations of power shifts to the underclass through democratic elections could see beginnings of change. Let us wish them that. Instead of wishing them a million wars of their own making…
But it surprises me how much animosity exists in certain parts of Pak media towards us. Things aren’t very different with Indian media. But they reach a crescendo during brazen external interventions like Mumbai attacks, Parliament attacks and Kandahar hijack. Then they sort of die down and get busy with gory tales of rape and murder in Indian hinterland, tinsel town gossip and displays of wealth by the nouveau riche. But what explains this animosity in Pakistan? I was listening to talks by this guy called Zaid Hamid in Youtube. His theories are strange to say the least. I am told (with a wink and a nudge) that he is an “Agency’s Man”- the “Agency” being a hushed reference to the ubiquitous ISI of Pakistan. Hamid has many interesting theories- that Mumbai attack was orchestrated by Indians…even that Ajmal Kasab’s real name is (clutch your stomachs now) none other than Amar Singh. He is a Pakistani patriot who believes that Pakistan should be ready for the next Panipat war which kick-started a thousand years of rule of Hindustan by the “righteous”. He also declares that the Swat agreement is a result of disillusionment with the English justice system and if Pakistanis want instant justice; let there be Sharia. There are such many more amusing nuggets that I shall not care to recount all of them. He seems to be heard widely and is favourably commented upon by Pakistanis. If this is the Agency’s man then may his God save his Agency.
It is this elitism/ chauvinism that supposedly lost them East Pakistan - A belief that the Bengalis are not sufficiently infused with religious and martial fervour and subsequent refusal to transfer power to them in spite of Mujib winning a legitimate election. The scope for forgetting the past and moving on with development appear pretty slim right now. But a peaceful subcontinent busy working towards development of its’ impoverished populace can make a lot of difference. What divides us in the trajectory of development in post colonial era? I do not hold many strong beliefs or convictions (except for a few naïve beliefs like vodka martinis go well with crab fajitas and that Bengali women are beautiful) But I subscribe to this theory about democracy. The beauty of democracy is that it enables a generational shift of power from the elite to the underclass. Watch the shift of post-independence breed of Oxbridge intellectuals, maharajahs and landed gentry of India who dominated politics to the present lot of politicians among whom there are cowherds, tailors and school teachers. Most of India’s states are today presided over by ordinary people who spent a lifetime in politics. This imperceptible shift has occurred during our life time. We sneered at it in the beginning. Today there are a lot more seasoned politicians from the masses who are holding or have held high office. Yet one might say, don’t we still have dynasties? Yes, we do. But many dynasties are sprouting without the baggage of the past. I believe this transformation is what prevents India from breaking up or fighting too many internal wars. But dangers lurk in every corner, let me hasten to add.
This transformation could never take roots in Pakistan. With democracy interrupted by bayonets periodically, even today, the leaders of mainstream parties are from the elite. There really was no leftist movement representing the Aam admi cutting across regional affiliations. The leader of the Mohajirs (so called under-class of Indian muslim migrants) sits in UK, reluctant to face politics at home. Take a reality check. The Bhutto family, the Sharif family, the Chaudhries of Gujrat, Imran Khan… They are all riding on family wealth and connections. For a young bright Pakistani, joining the Army appears to be a more legitimate method of wielding political power eventually. Can you think of a Pakistani who rose through the ranks of the dust and grime of electoral politics?
Do you then blame the disgruntled common man for gravitating to the mullah with piety in his eyes and fire in his heart? Do you grudge him for following the preacher who leads a life of modest means and constant prayer? I suppose not. In similar circumstances, we could be also swayed by these pious worthies instead of wealthy politicians riding in Toyota Prado with gunmen for protection. Maybe two or three generations of power shifts to the underclass through democratic elections could see beginnings of change. Let us wish them that. Instead of wishing them a million wars of their own making…
Thursday 30 July 2009
Twittering Generation
For a guy pushing the wrong side of forties, I am reasonably techno-savvy. The most valuable testimony comes from my son Chathu. Once I was advising him on his choice of jumper (yeah, sweaters are called jumpers in Australia) with a hoodie; which I thought made him look like a drug dealer in New York streets. He said all his friends wear hoodies. They are the in thing, the new look. What do you know about fashion? About teenage styles? Agreed; you are good in gadgets; technology… But you know nothing about us. He went on. Yeah, the compliment slipped through and escaped from his lips in the middle of all that generational angst.
But I can’t figure out facebook and twitter. Do we need short sentences with dodgy acronyms to indicate what we are thinking while in toilet? Nothing like reading a nicely coined turn of phrase, a cleverly constructed sentence that delicately underlines the ironies of life… So blogs are OK- as long as they are not too self centred. I joined facebook based on an invitation from a friend. After joining I realized that an automatic invitation went from me to so many old forgotten acquaintances with whom I have infrequently kept up a correspondence. I had them crawling out of the woodworks and saying Hi nice to find you on face book. I am in California. Watch me on the vineyard round with my daughter. Someone from Japan writes, good to know you exist. It is raining in Kyoto. Yeah, it is a bit trivial.
The interminable wait for the postman, the anxiety and expectations that accompany it, have all vanished with emails and SMSes. Now my mobile flashes a silver light when emails arrive. Being a light sleeper and Australia being 5 hours ahead of India, most of my mails arrive at midnight. I am distracted by the flashing light. But I still get up, read the mail & go back to sleep. Some of the mails are forwards that I have seen before. Some very interesting ones, nevertheless. Chathu has an itouch and I discover the joys of touch-screen browsing these days. We also have a cheap, secure Wi Fi network at home to which two laptops, one VOiP phone, one PS3, one PSP, three mobiles and the iTouch are connected. It is a networked home, I bet.
We love technology for connecting us across mountains and seas in an instant. We love technology for making things easier by cutting, pasting, scheduling and reminding us of things to do. We love technology for putting us in touch with long lost friends who send funny forwards. We love it for the cozy comfort with which we send money and book holidays. But I guess technology has also extracted its’ toll by trivializing many aspects of our existence. For making us believe that the whole world might be interested in knowing who we chill out with, how the weather is out there and whether we believe Man U will win the next league outing. Technology tells us to communicate without thinking…and turns our youth into asocial creatures, cooped up before silly machines, playing mind numbing games which challenge pretty much nothing of our modest cerebral assets. Sometimes I wish, give me a few good books and no connectivity. I might spend months in our lonely house in the village which looks so empty without my mother. Maybe I will feel rejuvenated. I will start waiting for the postman to bring good tidings from old friends.
******************************
I read P J O’Rourke on the constitution of the US of A in twitter speak. It is hilarious. Here is the link.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000%5C000%5C016%5C721mjcvw.asp
Also discovered this author Christopher Mathew who has written the Crisp Report and Family Matters. Much in the style of Sue Townsend's Adrian Mole Diaries- of which I am a huge fan.
Also been reading Tariq Ali's Clash of Fundamentalisms and Duel-Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power. A bit repetitive but gives a different, new perspective. Also read Rashid Ahmed's book on Taliban. These works tend to be too pessimistic on Pakistan.
A friend suggests that I should read the Martin Beck series by Per Wahloo and Maj Sjowall, a team of Swedish writers. They are not in the library and are expensive to buy. If anyone finds them in Darya Ganj second hand market, please buy: Promise I shall reimburse..
But I can’t figure out facebook and twitter. Do we need short sentences with dodgy acronyms to indicate what we are thinking while in toilet? Nothing like reading a nicely coined turn of phrase, a cleverly constructed sentence that delicately underlines the ironies of life… So blogs are OK- as long as they are not too self centred. I joined facebook based on an invitation from a friend. After joining I realized that an automatic invitation went from me to so many old forgotten acquaintances with whom I have infrequently kept up a correspondence. I had them crawling out of the woodworks and saying Hi nice to find you on face book. I am in California. Watch me on the vineyard round with my daughter. Someone from Japan writes, good to know you exist. It is raining in Kyoto. Yeah, it is a bit trivial.
The interminable wait for the postman, the anxiety and expectations that accompany it, have all vanished with emails and SMSes. Now my mobile flashes a silver light when emails arrive. Being a light sleeper and Australia being 5 hours ahead of India, most of my mails arrive at midnight. I am distracted by the flashing light. But I still get up, read the mail & go back to sleep. Some of the mails are forwards that I have seen before. Some very interesting ones, nevertheless. Chathu has an itouch and I discover the joys of touch-screen browsing these days. We also have a cheap, secure Wi Fi network at home to which two laptops, one VOiP phone, one PS3, one PSP, three mobiles and the iTouch are connected. It is a networked home, I bet.
We love technology for connecting us across mountains and seas in an instant. We love technology for making things easier by cutting, pasting, scheduling and reminding us of things to do. We love technology for putting us in touch with long lost friends who send funny forwards. We love it for the cozy comfort with which we send money and book holidays. But I guess technology has also extracted its’ toll by trivializing many aspects of our existence. For making us believe that the whole world might be interested in knowing who we chill out with, how the weather is out there and whether we believe Man U will win the next league outing. Technology tells us to communicate without thinking…and turns our youth into asocial creatures, cooped up before silly machines, playing mind numbing games which challenge pretty much nothing of our modest cerebral assets. Sometimes I wish, give me a few good books and no connectivity. I might spend months in our lonely house in the village which looks so empty without my mother. Maybe I will feel rejuvenated. I will start waiting for the postman to bring good tidings from old friends.
******************************
I read P J O’Rourke on the constitution of the US of A in twitter speak. It is hilarious. Here is the link.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000%5C000%5C016%5C721mjcvw.asp
Also discovered this author Christopher Mathew who has written the Crisp Report and Family Matters. Much in the style of Sue Townsend's Adrian Mole Diaries- of which I am a huge fan.
Also been reading Tariq Ali's Clash of Fundamentalisms and Duel-Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power. A bit repetitive but gives a different, new perspective. Also read Rashid Ahmed's book on Taliban. These works tend to be too pessimistic on Pakistan.
A friend suggests that I should read the Martin Beck series by Per Wahloo and Maj Sjowall, a team of Swedish writers. They are not in the library and are expensive to buy. If anyone finds them in Darya Ganj second hand market, please buy: Promise I shall reimburse..
Sunday 19 July 2009
Missing something
Sorry about this long interlude. It is so cold out here. The temperature often dips to the minus zero ranges. These are days when one wants to curl up and read. Imagination freezes and one long for the sunshine and warmth of home country. Reports of fallen girders, monsoon failure, power cuts and water shortages fail to douse my enthusiasm for home.
I have been requested by a dear friend to write about MJ. My musical tastes have always followed a two- generation lag. I listened to most of my music in the eighties. We were not so clued in on Bee Gees & K C & the Sunshine Band. Instead, the music of Beatles, Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd & Simon & Garfunkel which belonged to an earlier generation filled our lives. When Michael Jackson broke into the scene, we thought he appealed to callow youth whose musical tastes weren’t as refined as ours was (sounds pretty arrogant, I know). Don’t blame us if we found white socks, shiny pants, wavy hair and moonwalk a bit crude. Over the years, I consistently made serious efforts to plug myself in on to contemporary music.
But then one shouldn’t sneer at musical phases spanning generations. When four boys from
Simon & Garfunkel are touring
********************************
I am constantly accosted with questions on
And
Tuesday 30 June 2009
Unique ID
The most exciting news that I have heard this month from back home is the setting up of the Unique ID authority of India. Nandan Nilekani has been appointed as the Chief of the UID Authority in the rank of Cabinet Minister. I shall not dwell much on why I find this one of the most important events in recent times; Apart from the various benefits of Unique ID for a billion Indians explained in various Press Information Bureau releases, there is something very personal about it for me. An old bitter experience when I went to the Malaysian High Commission in Chennai to renew my claim to citizenship. I was about 16 years old. My father was against the idea of retaining Malaysian citizenship. I had a valid Malaysian passport which shows my name with a minor spelling mistake. The future looked really bleak. I wanted to jump ship and make a living abroad. I was asked by the Malay lady at the counter about my Malaysian ID card. I didn’t have one since they were issued after we left Malaysia. She said sorry, you can’t renew your passport. I came away embittered by the experience. I threw away my Malaysian passport and severed my last links to my foreign identity. I was Indian, among teeming millions, where cattle and humans have no ID to tell them apart.
Today I own several identification documents. My driving licence issued by Tamil Nadu government shows my sister’s home address. My passport shows Calcutta address. My PAN card was issued while residing in my first house in Delhi. I have shifted to another place two years ago. My election ID card is new and shows the correct address. Address changes are very difficult to incorporate in any of these documents. You need an electricity bill or telephone bill to prove you reside at a place. Yossarian, (the protagonist in Catch 22) would find many amusing situations in the Indian scramble to establish identity. Even now, it is very difficult to open a bank account with all their KYC norms. This could be a great chance to link them all and establish single point identification. I suppose State Governments have a key role to play.
I have some unsolicited advice to offer. Although there is only about a one in a zillion chance that Nandan Nilekani would read this, let me set it forth. And these have nothing to do with linking of servers, developing software, procurement of hardware, deciding the platform or a million other things on which I possess no competence to offer advice. (Yeah modesty really is my middle name)
a) See no caste/ religion: Our caste and our religion is the cornerstone of our identity in India. Something that we are born with, something over which we had no control: Yet we flaunt it with great pride. We boisterously follow rituals, blare our prayers through loudspeakers and brazenly solicit votes in the name of our religion/ caste. Although it is rather comforting for psephologists, sociologists, political parties and harvesters of souls to have details of breakup of caste & religious denominations right down to the Panchayat level, I think we must resist the temptation to include it in the card. We should not even show SC/ST status in the card. Let the information (on SC/ST status alone) be embedded in the system to enable eligible citizens to receive benefits through public distribution system or free education / medical facilities. Let us be Indians, pure & simple for once. And not be East Indians, South Indians, Kayasths, Muslims, banias, tribals etc
b) Show Mom’s name: Can we have our Mom’s name in the cards? Not that the status of father needs to be relegated. But she carried us, raised us and cried over us. Doesn’t she deserve mention in our identity cards? At least the option to show Mom’s name ought to be given. Expect some political dividends and some brickbats too. It is probably the most natural and rational thing to do. Let political correctness begin from home.
c) Language tangle : A very touchy one. Leave it to poiticos to sort that one out. My advice would be to have the card printed in (maximum) three languages. It sure sounds unwieldy. If three languages in one card are a bit too much to handle, then English and one regional language should suffice. If a village Patwari cannot read the card, then the whole exercise is of no use. Some politicians from North could object to English in the card. Tread carefully. It is a minor political mine field. Let the genial Sardar handle that one.
d) Physical verification: Could we have customer friendly shop fronts which will incorporate changes to address if the individual himself goes and submits changes? For this purpose technology-enabled physical verification might be necessary. We aren’t an evolved society like UK where finger printing, DNA testing or retina scanning of citizens are seen as intrusions into privacy. Let us make it at least easier for those who agree to have their finger prints taken and retinas scanned. I can visualize dissenting voices from troubled regions. Keep the security boogie out of it. Let the law abiding citizen who has no problems with physical identification be given faster and better service.
e) Beware of the babu : I do not mean to denigrate my class. There are very bright ones among us. But we can also be very self-serving, condescending to technocrats and pretentious. Some of us could be very hierarchical in functioning and privilege conscious too. It is difficult for a Dire Straits- listening software professional to get a hang of the Babu work culture. Listen to the Babu, by all means. He has knowledge of the dusty, hot and noisy Indian reality. But when in doubt, trust the instincts of sweaty, grass-root politicians- not the Babu in sanitized, weather-controlled environs. Try to give an autonomous status to employees of the authority and give it a technology intensive, de-bureaucratized work culture. You might get some clues from NSE.
f) Could we have the headquarters of UID Authority in Bangalore? Heh? Heh? or Bombay or Shillong for that matter ? Just a stray thought; a loose cannon. I heard that it will be based in Delhi. Is it too late to change? Hate to see you and UID employees mired in the stifling Delhi culture. Enough of it has rubbed off on me. I am unfit to live in civilized corners of earth.
This mission could be unique, huge and one of its’ kind on earth. The successful implementation of this project could transform our country much the way the use of EVMs transformed our democracy. There are pitfalls ahead. Never before have I so fervently hoped that a Government mission succeeds!!!
Sunday 14 June 2009
Banned Books
Many would place a price on Rushdie’s head for writing Satanic verses- not for blasphemy but for writing tough-to-comprehend English. Just as a Mallu male, clad in a tucked up Dhoti would place a price on Lola Kutty’s head, for her jabs at us in Channel V. I am tempting fate by writing about books banned in India. I had heard so much about banned books on India’s China War- one by Neville Maxwell and another by John P Dalvi. It is not difficult to find and read banned books in India. We never tried it because it didn’t carry the excitement of reading pornography with rapid heartbeats and fluttering eyelids of 15 year olds. Nine hours to Rama by Stanley Wolpert (on the assassination of Gandhi) is difficult to find. It had bombed in the Box Office when made into a movie- it certainly was not a popular book either. The Polyester Prince is easily downloadable from the net and doesn’t tell us anymore than what we already know. But the easy availability here at libraries in Australia of the handful of books banned in India, made me curious to read them.
The China war took place around my birth in October 1962 and was considered to have dealt a blow to Nehru’s health and leadership. He didn’t last long after that. No matter how much modern India criticizes him for his mixed model of economy, economic planning and political naiveté on Kashmir, the man had a vision of where he wanted to take India. If our IITs and IIMs have brand equity and if we have an evolving secular democracy over the years, we owe much to him. Even the huge investments in public sector in those days were probably the only way to push the economy and it is arguably the control-freak Babus who failed the system. You could have a hundred grassroots politicians to win elections, rub the noses of opponents in mud and cultivate political foot soldiers from the back of beyond. But it takes dreamers to set out a vision and the rules of engagement for a nation recently freed from colonial rule.
I read Maxwell’s India’s China War. Neville Maxwell was the Times correspondent in Delhi those days. I read the relevant portions again and again. It is indeed unfair to India. It fails to consider how any other country would have dealt with the borders bequeathed on it by a colonial power. India had no choice but to hang on to the territory it inherited from the British in spite of the ambiguity that supposedly surrounded the rough terrain. Not for us to go into the legality of it. But Maxwell says it was Nehru’s proximity to and reliance on Lt Gen Kaul, a Kashmiri Brahmin which drove him into an unwinnable position which professional soldiers advised him against. It is unfair to suggest that Nehru, endowed with a western education and Fabian values, was susceptible to regional/caste considerations. I can’t imagine a Lieutenant General (below the rank of Chief of Army Staff) gaining the ear of the Prime Minister directly. Doesn’t happen today- I can say with fair amount of certainty. Maxwell is also less harsh on Krishna Menon, who supposedly stood against the forward policy which led to war. He came under harsh attack from opposition. With his left leaning ideological predilections, he was accused of being soft on Chinese. Menon was eventually swayed by his own rhetoric and had to prove that he was no less patriotic when it came to dealing with China. I was disappointed by the lack of historical information of the role of communist parties, which later led to the split in 1964. The book dwells extensively on the tactical blunders in the military campaign, which I shall refrain from commenting upon. Let me adhere to the conduct rules for serving Public Officials.
But what dawned on me as I read the book was the hidden but unintentional theme that was laced around it. Those were early days of parliamentary democracy. Most of the MPs were not privileged with an education; leave alone a Cambridge education as Nehru had. A far cry from today when industrialist MPs with false teeth, gold bracelets, clipped nose-hair and Armani suits straddle the Parliament Central hall. Nehru consulted the Parliament at almost every step, influencing the course of subsequent events; sometimes at great peril to swift decision making by the executive. There are reasons to surmise that the seeds of a noisy democracy that we have inherited were sown carefully by Nehru. He used the Parliament as a sounding board, as a vehicle for popular expression and to evolve national consensus. He believed that such matters of state need to pass through the process of rigorous consultations with elected representatives for transparency and acceptance. Despite his colossal status in Indian politics, it is a tribute to the man that he chose the path he did. I have seen senior officials setting norms to institutions to suit their own narrow interests, with brazen disregard to what others might see it as.
Maxwell labours the point that Chinese claim to borders on Eastern and Western sectors challenging the colonial status ought to have been negotiated by India instead of rejecting it outright. But he himself has admittedly benefitted from the open society that India is, in writing the book. That is something that the Chinese can’t lay claim to after so many years of existence. On the contrary, things behind the bamboo curtain in China were shrouded in secrecy. According to Maxwell, the Chinese approach and strategy were cohesive. It certainly wasn’t as well articulated as the Indian position was. And it certainly didn’t have to go through the scrutinizing gaze of elected representatives, nor did it have to be subjected to unkind analysis by noisy media and editorials as in India. I am sure Indians are not going to throng the bookstores if the ban on this 40 year old book is lifted. It helps us see ourselves from another side of the prism. This is certainly no Tiananmen that we need to erase from collective memory…
The China war took place around my birth in October 1962 and was considered to have dealt a blow to Nehru’s health and leadership. He didn’t last long after that. No matter how much modern India criticizes him for his mixed model of economy, economic planning and political naiveté on Kashmir, the man had a vision of where he wanted to take India. If our IITs and IIMs have brand equity and if we have an evolving secular democracy over the years, we owe much to him. Even the huge investments in public sector in those days were probably the only way to push the economy and it is arguably the control-freak Babus who failed the system. You could have a hundred grassroots politicians to win elections, rub the noses of opponents in mud and cultivate political foot soldiers from the back of beyond. But it takes dreamers to set out a vision and the rules of engagement for a nation recently freed from colonial rule.
I read Maxwell’s India’s China War. Neville Maxwell was the Times correspondent in Delhi those days. I read the relevant portions again and again. It is indeed unfair to India. It fails to consider how any other country would have dealt with the borders bequeathed on it by a colonial power. India had no choice but to hang on to the territory it inherited from the British in spite of the ambiguity that supposedly surrounded the rough terrain. Not for us to go into the legality of it. But Maxwell says it was Nehru’s proximity to and reliance on Lt Gen Kaul, a Kashmiri Brahmin which drove him into an unwinnable position which professional soldiers advised him against. It is unfair to suggest that Nehru, endowed with a western education and Fabian values, was susceptible to regional/caste considerations. I can’t imagine a Lieutenant General (below the rank of Chief of Army Staff) gaining the ear of the Prime Minister directly. Doesn’t happen today- I can say with fair amount of certainty. Maxwell is also less harsh on Krishna Menon, who supposedly stood against the forward policy which led to war. He came under harsh attack from opposition. With his left leaning ideological predilections, he was accused of being soft on Chinese. Menon was eventually swayed by his own rhetoric and had to prove that he was no less patriotic when it came to dealing with China. I was disappointed by the lack of historical information of the role of communist parties, which later led to the split in 1964. The book dwells extensively on the tactical blunders in the military campaign, which I shall refrain from commenting upon. Let me adhere to the conduct rules for serving Public Officials.
But what dawned on me as I read the book was the hidden but unintentional theme that was laced around it. Those were early days of parliamentary democracy. Most of the MPs were not privileged with an education; leave alone a Cambridge education as Nehru had. A far cry from today when industrialist MPs with false teeth, gold bracelets, clipped nose-hair and Armani suits straddle the Parliament Central hall. Nehru consulted the Parliament at almost every step, influencing the course of subsequent events; sometimes at great peril to swift decision making by the executive. There are reasons to surmise that the seeds of a noisy democracy that we have inherited were sown carefully by Nehru. He used the Parliament as a sounding board, as a vehicle for popular expression and to evolve national consensus. He believed that such matters of state need to pass through the process of rigorous consultations with elected representatives for transparency and acceptance. Despite his colossal status in Indian politics, it is a tribute to the man that he chose the path he did. I have seen senior officials setting norms to institutions to suit their own narrow interests, with brazen disregard to what others might see it as.
Maxwell labours the point that Chinese claim to borders on Eastern and Western sectors challenging the colonial status ought to have been negotiated by India instead of rejecting it outright. But he himself has admittedly benefitted from the open society that India is, in writing the book. That is something that the Chinese can’t lay claim to after so many years of existence. On the contrary, things behind the bamboo curtain in China were shrouded in secrecy. According to Maxwell, the Chinese approach and strategy were cohesive. It certainly wasn’t as well articulated as the Indian position was. And it certainly didn’t have to go through the scrutinizing gaze of elected representatives, nor did it have to be subjected to unkind analysis by noisy media and editorials as in India. I am sure Indians are not going to throng the bookstores if the ban on this 40 year old book is lifted. It helps us see ourselves from another side of the prism. This is certainly no Tiananmen that we need to erase from collective memory…
Tuesday 9 June 2009
Bent Babus
If someone were to tell me that he joined the Government to change the world, I’d try hard to keep a straight face. Most join out of an earnest need for acceptance and importance. I had the silliest reason. I joined to escape banking. Never been sure I did the right thing. Also it was disappointing not to become a glamorous Babu in the Foreign Service or a pretentious Babu in the state government wielding a wide range of positions and immense powers. I ended up with a technocrat’s job in Government. One that doesn’t have much brand equity or acceptance and is often relegated to the bottom end of the cesspool that is Indian bureaucracy. But I had mournfully occupied controversial and hard posts without knowing that these jobs could, with the right enterprise, be turned into lucrative ones. Once a colleague proved me terribly wrong by turning the very same post I occupied earlier into a money spinner. Yeah for the imaginative and bent Babu, there is a gold mine out there waiting to be discovered.
Recent days have been very demoralizing. It is learnt that the chief of my organization has been caught with his hand in the cookie jar immediately after retirement. The two hundred year old parent organization I belong is being battered from all sides and I don’t feel like going back and continuing there. I have signed a bond to serve the Government for five years and hence cannot quit and start a chain barber shop in Delhi as a well wisher suggested in this blog. After twenty years in the bureaucracy, I have nothing to show for it; except a rich rainbow of experiences, lots of books and music, places travelled on a shoe string budget and some nice people I have come to know. Missus has an old flat in Chennai and I hope she won’t boot me out of her life unless I start wearing flowers on my ears or cross-dressing. I have always been suspicious of those who wear honesty on their sleeves or give boring lectures about integrity. The first guy who gave me a lecture on integrity in Government got thrown out of service for petty corruption. Like in every job, there may be occasions when we walk the thin line between scrupulous honesty and expedience. There was a time when I wouldn’t send my peon to book a personal train ticket or do a small home errand on government transport. I have changed a lot. Expedience says when important matters of state await you in office, better make life a bit easier. I have evolved over the years.
The corrupt bureaucrat in Delhi is an object of much admiration; much as a man with a second wife in Chennai is. A soul searching question I have often asked myself is this. Still why are many bureaucrats clean? I know not less than 50 officers in South Block who would not take a bribe. Our journalists are not interested in finding out with a sting operation. Sleaze sells: not honesty. I know that you will find this hard to believe. We also have clean politicians. Are some bureaucrats clean because they are idealistic? Or aren’t they adventurous enough? Are they scared of God or law enforcement? I don’t know. Mostly it is a matter of habit. Some are born with school teacher parents, who drilled a lot of morality into them. Some are either too poor or too rich to want more money. I guess I am lucky to be born to undemanding parents who lived a frugal life. Or to have a wife who brings home an equivalent packet. Also money matters less as you are older. My favourite repartee is of Michael Moore, the American satirist who made the documentary “Fahrenheit”- a damning indictment of Bush administration. When asked what he intended to do with the minor fortune he made out of Bush-bashing; he said. I lived my life well into my forties on an annual income of less than $ 30000 (pretty low by US standards). Millions at this age do not matter much to me….
I wouldn’t say the same thing although it is more or less true in my case. I earned a pittance well into my forties. But I am not entirely unclear what to do if I became a millionaire overnight. I might get good Hi Fi equipment, gadgets, lots more books, DVDs, music and a decent large LCD TV. Then what? Maybe get some decent clothes - although I can’t be too bothered about it. In Delhi the clothes maketh the man. Maybe I will be stuck knowing not what to do after spending the first couple of lakhs of money. It is difficult to turn a leaf and start a new life. I am almost certain that I can’t bring myself to be any different than what I am today. Let me try to explain why. This has nothing to do with Gandhian ideals, promise of heaven in afterlife or middle-class morality.
The Government is my employer. Pays me a pitiable salary but expects me to protect its’ interests. I should quit and join the suits in corporate world if I am not happy with the wages- too late for that now. But this fluid entity called government sometimes is not sure what it wants. So I think hard and decide what is good for my employer and try to be worth the money it pays me. It gives me a lot of freedom. I needn’t grovel before the serious looking guys who run it. The Government is also remarkably endowed with a sense of justice- often slow and slippery. I would feel diminished and less human, if I use my official discretion to fatten my purse to the detriment of my provider. I am not sure I have the same sense of loyalty in other matters. But this is my livelihood. I am grateful to my provider for keeping my home and hearth warm and my son clothed and fed- as simple as that. Not convinced? Well- it’s true…
But the flip side- If I was working for the suits or seths and I am expected to carry a bagful of cash to the bent Babu to advance my employer’s interest, would I do it? You bet I would- without batting an eyelid.
Recent days have been very demoralizing. It is learnt that the chief of my organization has been caught with his hand in the cookie jar immediately after retirement. The two hundred year old parent organization I belong is being battered from all sides and I don’t feel like going back and continuing there. I have signed a bond to serve the Government for five years and hence cannot quit and start a chain barber shop in Delhi as a well wisher suggested in this blog. After twenty years in the bureaucracy, I have nothing to show for it; except a rich rainbow of experiences, lots of books and music, places travelled on a shoe string budget and some nice people I have come to know. Missus has an old flat in Chennai and I hope she won’t boot me out of her life unless I start wearing flowers on my ears or cross-dressing. I have always been suspicious of those who wear honesty on their sleeves or give boring lectures about integrity. The first guy who gave me a lecture on integrity in Government got thrown out of service for petty corruption. Like in every job, there may be occasions when we walk the thin line between scrupulous honesty and expedience. There was a time when I wouldn’t send my peon to book a personal train ticket or do a small home errand on government transport. I have changed a lot. Expedience says when important matters of state await you in office, better make life a bit easier. I have evolved over the years.
The corrupt bureaucrat in Delhi is an object of much admiration; much as a man with a second wife in Chennai is. A soul searching question I have often asked myself is this. Still why are many bureaucrats clean? I know not less than 50 officers in South Block who would not take a bribe. Our journalists are not interested in finding out with a sting operation. Sleaze sells: not honesty. I know that you will find this hard to believe. We also have clean politicians. Are some bureaucrats clean because they are idealistic? Or aren’t they adventurous enough? Are they scared of God or law enforcement? I don’t know. Mostly it is a matter of habit. Some are born with school teacher parents, who drilled a lot of morality into them. Some are either too poor or too rich to want more money. I guess I am lucky to be born to undemanding parents who lived a frugal life. Or to have a wife who brings home an equivalent packet. Also money matters less as you are older. My favourite repartee is of Michael Moore, the American satirist who made the documentary “Fahrenheit”- a damning indictment of Bush administration. When asked what he intended to do with the minor fortune he made out of Bush-bashing; he said. I lived my life well into my forties on an annual income of less than $ 30000 (pretty low by US standards). Millions at this age do not matter much to me….
I wouldn’t say the same thing although it is more or less true in my case. I earned a pittance well into my forties. But I am not entirely unclear what to do if I became a millionaire overnight. I might get good Hi Fi equipment, gadgets, lots more books, DVDs, music and a decent large LCD TV. Then what? Maybe get some decent clothes - although I can’t be too bothered about it. In Delhi the clothes maketh the man. Maybe I will be stuck knowing not what to do after spending the first couple of lakhs of money. It is difficult to turn a leaf and start a new life. I am almost certain that I can’t bring myself to be any different than what I am today. Let me try to explain why. This has nothing to do with Gandhian ideals, promise of heaven in afterlife or middle-class morality.
The Government is my employer. Pays me a pitiable salary but expects me to protect its’ interests. I should quit and join the suits in corporate world if I am not happy with the wages- too late for that now. But this fluid entity called government sometimes is not sure what it wants. So I think hard and decide what is good for my employer and try to be worth the money it pays me. It gives me a lot of freedom. I needn’t grovel before the serious looking guys who run it. The Government is also remarkably endowed with a sense of justice- often slow and slippery. I would feel diminished and less human, if I use my official discretion to fatten my purse to the detriment of my provider. I am not sure I have the same sense of loyalty in other matters. But this is my livelihood. I am grateful to my provider for keeping my home and hearth warm and my son clothed and fed- as simple as that. Not convinced? Well- it’s true…
But the flip side- If I was working for the suits or seths and I am expected to carry a bagful of cash to the bent Babu to advance my employer’s interest, would I do it? You bet I would- without batting an eyelid.
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