It is unlike Aslam, my former research student and good Samaritan, to call at 6:15 in the morning. His body-clock is normally geared to schedules that begin to function when the sun is higher up in the sky. So when I saw his name on my mobile display, I was a little puzzled. When he broke the news, a weighty silence descended upon me. A person I had admired, a woman of high scholarship, of integrity, of rare sensitivity had moved on to the realms of the ethereal. The final truth of being and nothingness had arrived.
She had not been well for many months and had been in and out of hospitals ever since her fall and orthopaedic complications a few years ago. The doctors and nursing staff at Kurji Holy Family Hospital had given her the best of attention and the very affable Fr. D’Mello shared books and prayers, encouraging spiritual resilience for a quick recovery. Months after she left hospital and I had been there to visit another colleague, he remembered to ask about her. Through the months other complications had developed and her condition rode the crests and troughs of uncertainty. Through it all, she kept in touch with us and us with her. She was absolutely delighted when our daughter Tara visited her after making it to St. Stephen’s and her blessings have been her strength. She donated a part of her collection of books to the seminar library of the Department of English hoping that her beloved students would be benefited.
Dr. Chhanda Roy, there will never be another such as you. We have lost a wonderful human being, a very sincere professor whose scholarship touched the many who knew her worth and value. Farewell Chhanda di.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Monday, December 19, 2011
Recasting the cliched theme of corruption: posted on request of friends
Corruption in our Society and how to come out of it through Participatory Vigilance
Prof. (Dr.) Shanker Dutt
When I received an invitation from Mr. Vijay Sharma and a telephonic prod from Mr. Ujjwal Choudhary to speak at this seminar it was impossible to decline the offer on two counts: one that both these gentlemen have set examples of impeccable integrity in their profession and possess a deep social sensitivity toward the disadvantaged. Both these issues are inextricably connected with the deliberations today. As I mentally juggled with the issue of corruption, I recalled the lexical precision of the political philosopher and orator Edmund Burke. It is indeed a topic on which it is difficult to speak and impossible to be silent. Burke was delivering his famous address on the impeachment of Warren Hastings, his own countryman who had ‘violated’ the ‘eternal laws of justice’. ‘I impeach him’, Burke said, ‘in the name of the people of India whose laws, rights and liberties he has subverted, whose properties he has destroyed, whose country he has laid waste and desolate’. This was a British public figure condemning an imperial representative of the Empire on grounds of injustice in 1787. I believe corruption violates the eternal laws of justice and hence these concerns need to be addressed. I wondered if there had been voices so articulate and strong on corruption in postcolonial India from Indians. When in the territory of morality, Gandhi is often the inalienable point of reference. Sadly, he is remembered grudgingly on the 2nd of October, though often cursed because it is a dry day, and occasionally on the 30th of January, the day the politics of hate silenced him. This is what Gandhi had to say in May 1939 when he heard of the pervasive corruption in six Congress ministries formed under 1935 Act in 1937, ‘I would go to the length of giving the whole Congress a decent burial, rather than put up with the corruption that is rampant.’ Gandhi’ disciples however, ignored his concern over corruption in post-Independence India. Again in 1947, Gandhi wrote in the Hindu: ‘It is the duty of all leading men, whatever their persuasion or party, to safeguard the dignity of India. That dignity can’t be saved if misgovernment and corruption flourish. Misgovernment and corruption always go together. I have it from very trustworthy sources that corruption is increasing in our country. Is everyone then going to think only of himself, and not of all of India?’
I shall come back to Gandhi later.
I must confess I was a trifle uneasy with the phrase ‘participatory vigilance’ large on account of the contexts of its usage. Participatory vigilance requires members of civil society to be alert about any suspicious, unlawful activity and to convey such information to the relevant authorities of the state. The strategy to enlist the support of civil society is to make civil society partners in preempting unlawful activity. My unease comes from two sources. Teaching Foucault for a number of years makes me share with the great French thinker the priority of freedom. He has been concerned with how people are classified and individuals are administered and controlled by a panoptic state. The structural model of the state, the panopticon was forwarded by the utilitarian Jeremy Bentham to ensure the moral health of society. The model envisaged each person be isolated in a small room where they can be observed at all times by a single person in the central tower. The building would be lit around the perimeter so that each person would be seen by the central observer while the inmates could neither see the central observer nor other inmates. An example of such architecture is the cellular jail in Andamans where a number of Indian nationalists were imprisoned. Secondly, images of the panoptic state manifested in the Orwellian image of the Big Brother, a haunting image for the coordinated surveillance apparatus of the state, continues to disturb me four decades after I first read Orwell’s dystopia 1984. The protagonist Winston Smith lives in abject terror of the omniscient gaze of Big Brother and his fellow citizens, combining fear and suspicion. The idea of participatory vigilance also contains the idea of mutual suspicion, whistle-blowing and the notion of otherisation. However if the observer in the first case and the Big Brother in the second were also to be observed by those being observed, I would be much happier. I must confess I am also substantially unclear about what the mechanics of the Participatory Vigilance is likely to be. So what is the solution? Would I advocate doing nothing on an issue that we had begun by describing as being impossible to be silent?
I went back to Gandhi. Just the manner in which Gandhi had sought to find equivalence between capital and labour in his theory of trusteeship, I wonder if it were possible to transpose that idea in the strategy to resist corruption. By the non-violent method, Gandhi sought to invite the capitalist to regard himself as a trustee for workers for the making, the consolidation and the increase of his capital. If the capitalist contributed through the deployment of capital, labor provided work. Interdependent, they were co-sharers of a process for mutual gain. The status of the worker was thus transformed from that of a slave to being a co-sharer. What if we became co-sharers of the development of India? How much of space would the state give to the people and what would be the mechanics of this process?
For a start, I recapitulated many of the young voices we gainfully heard on the 22nd when the Department of Income Tax had organized an excellent debate. The tools of vigilance are by and large sufficient to control corruption it was claimed although it needed to be accompanied by a moral overhaul. We ought to be the change we wish to see in the world.
The process begins with the identification of the causes of corruption. There seem to be some good reasons ought to why corrupt practices have flourished hence the necessity to intervene in these areas and work at a sustained overhaul. In a situation where multiple factors are involved there can be no quick-fix solutions, hence sustained efforts at multiple levels are required. Hence I believe that participatory vigilance merely as an administrative partnership will yield limited results whereas long-term participatory social vigilance is likely to be more effective.
1. The inadequacy of Education, little knowledge of rights. There is a lack of awareness about the effects of corruption. As a result, corruption is not visualized as an injustice. The fight against corruption must begin with education when students have begun to understand how dignity is demeaned by corruption. This is a critical area of partnership.
2. Absence of social security and resultant overcompensations. With inadequate institutional support to cater to core human needs particularly in terms of food, shelter, healthcare and education, there is always the desire to insure against misfortune. Insurance often goes beyond one’s known sources of income. This needs to be addressed with the sincerity of humane policies and good governance.
3. Family attachments : a) School and Institutional demands: capitation fees and parents wanting to live their ambitions through their children (outside village, town or state further enhances corrupt practices) b) Dowry System. Again requiring governmental intervention with social reform.
4. Consumerism and peer pressure to advance cultural value as opposed to use or exchange values.
5. The inversion of moral values where individual worth is measured in material terms supported by the stunning mediocrity of the media that gives precedence to lifestyle and celebrity fluff. Here the media must understand its responsibility and not lend a halo to the unscrupulous. I was appalled to watch a news bite wondering which one of the inmates of Tihar incarcerated for corruption would be the best brand ambassador for the sale of spices packed by prisoners before Diwali.
6. The sheer weight of population that slows down the justice system. Alternative justice systems at the local level could alleviate the problem. Also our system of governance which penalizes a wrongdoing ought to acknowledge an honest citizen and an honest official. Public acknowledgement motivates the good.
7. Dual consciousness: moralizing publicly, practicing the opposite privately. Not walking the talk and the absence of credible role models.
8. Overcoming resigned cynicism and inaction that lets corruption go unchallenged.
9. Among the educated: there is a perceived gap between truthfulness on the part of the government and expedience. Eg. The Planning Commission in its wisdom told the Supreme Court on the 21st of September resulting in a national outcry that the basic requirement for survival is Rs. 32 in urban areas and Rs. 26 in rural areas. It offered Re 1 for healthcare per day insufficient even to cure a simple headache. The reason is obvious. If the truthful figure, closer to Rs 100 were to be acknowledged, many more people would sink below the poverty line and India’s identity as a developing nation will be scrutinized under a glare of suspicion. So if there are covert practices on the part of the government, why should private individuals not fudge a few figures? There is also the belief that the revenue collected from individuals is squandered on wasteful expenses of the privileged and given the tardy implementation, money meant for development schemes hardly achieve their noble objectives.
10. The tendency to refrain from partnering the youth in national objectives. On the contrary there is immense sense in harnessing the energy, idealism and enthusiasm of the youth for positive transformative action. Many a parent will remember that they gave up smoking being prodded by their children. It is for filial love that forms of corruption burgeon and it is for the same reasons that it can be combated effectively.
Hence social vigilance should be a combination of a public sharing of responsibility: one that involves prevention and participatory moral transformation: a trusteeship for a common goal.
Prof. (Dr.) Shanker Dutt
When I received an invitation from Mr. Vijay Sharma and a telephonic prod from Mr. Ujjwal Choudhary to speak at this seminar it was impossible to decline the offer on two counts: one that both these gentlemen have set examples of impeccable integrity in their profession and possess a deep social sensitivity toward the disadvantaged. Both these issues are inextricably connected with the deliberations today. As I mentally juggled with the issue of corruption, I recalled the lexical precision of the political philosopher and orator Edmund Burke. It is indeed a topic on which it is difficult to speak and impossible to be silent. Burke was delivering his famous address on the impeachment of Warren Hastings, his own countryman who had ‘violated’ the ‘eternal laws of justice’. ‘I impeach him’, Burke said, ‘in the name of the people of India whose laws, rights and liberties he has subverted, whose properties he has destroyed, whose country he has laid waste and desolate’. This was a British public figure condemning an imperial representative of the Empire on grounds of injustice in 1787. I believe corruption violates the eternal laws of justice and hence these concerns need to be addressed. I wondered if there had been voices so articulate and strong on corruption in postcolonial India from Indians. When in the territory of morality, Gandhi is often the inalienable point of reference. Sadly, he is remembered grudgingly on the 2nd of October, though often cursed because it is a dry day, and occasionally on the 30th of January, the day the politics of hate silenced him. This is what Gandhi had to say in May 1939 when he heard of the pervasive corruption in six Congress ministries formed under 1935 Act in 1937, ‘I would go to the length of giving the whole Congress a decent burial, rather than put up with the corruption that is rampant.’ Gandhi’ disciples however, ignored his concern over corruption in post-Independence India. Again in 1947, Gandhi wrote in the Hindu: ‘It is the duty of all leading men, whatever their persuasion or party, to safeguard the dignity of India. That dignity can’t be saved if misgovernment and corruption flourish. Misgovernment and corruption always go together. I have it from very trustworthy sources that corruption is increasing in our country. Is everyone then going to think only of himself, and not of all of India?’
I shall come back to Gandhi later.
I must confess I was a trifle uneasy with the phrase ‘participatory vigilance’ large on account of the contexts of its usage. Participatory vigilance requires members of civil society to be alert about any suspicious, unlawful activity and to convey such information to the relevant authorities of the state. The strategy to enlist the support of civil society is to make civil society partners in preempting unlawful activity. My unease comes from two sources. Teaching Foucault for a number of years makes me share with the great French thinker the priority of freedom. He has been concerned with how people are classified and individuals are administered and controlled by a panoptic state. The structural model of the state, the panopticon was forwarded by the utilitarian Jeremy Bentham to ensure the moral health of society. The model envisaged each person be isolated in a small room where they can be observed at all times by a single person in the central tower. The building would be lit around the perimeter so that each person would be seen by the central observer while the inmates could neither see the central observer nor other inmates. An example of such architecture is the cellular jail in Andamans where a number of Indian nationalists were imprisoned. Secondly, images of the panoptic state manifested in the Orwellian image of the Big Brother, a haunting image for the coordinated surveillance apparatus of the state, continues to disturb me four decades after I first read Orwell’s dystopia 1984. The protagonist Winston Smith lives in abject terror of the omniscient gaze of Big Brother and his fellow citizens, combining fear and suspicion. The idea of participatory vigilance also contains the idea of mutual suspicion, whistle-blowing and the notion of otherisation. However if the observer in the first case and the Big Brother in the second were also to be observed by those being observed, I would be much happier. I must confess I am also substantially unclear about what the mechanics of the Participatory Vigilance is likely to be. So what is the solution? Would I advocate doing nothing on an issue that we had begun by describing as being impossible to be silent?
I went back to Gandhi. Just the manner in which Gandhi had sought to find equivalence between capital and labour in his theory of trusteeship, I wonder if it were possible to transpose that idea in the strategy to resist corruption. By the non-violent method, Gandhi sought to invite the capitalist to regard himself as a trustee for workers for the making, the consolidation and the increase of his capital. If the capitalist contributed through the deployment of capital, labor provided work. Interdependent, they were co-sharers of a process for mutual gain. The status of the worker was thus transformed from that of a slave to being a co-sharer. What if we became co-sharers of the development of India? How much of space would the state give to the people and what would be the mechanics of this process?
For a start, I recapitulated many of the young voices we gainfully heard on the 22nd when the Department of Income Tax had organized an excellent debate. The tools of vigilance are by and large sufficient to control corruption it was claimed although it needed to be accompanied by a moral overhaul. We ought to be the change we wish to see in the world.
The process begins with the identification of the causes of corruption. There seem to be some good reasons ought to why corrupt practices have flourished hence the necessity to intervene in these areas and work at a sustained overhaul. In a situation where multiple factors are involved there can be no quick-fix solutions, hence sustained efforts at multiple levels are required. Hence I believe that participatory vigilance merely as an administrative partnership will yield limited results whereas long-term participatory social vigilance is likely to be more effective.
1. The inadequacy of Education, little knowledge of rights. There is a lack of awareness about the effects of corruption. As a result, corruption is not visualized as an injustice. The fight against corruption must begin with education when students have begun to understand how dignity is demeaned by corruption. This is a critical area of partnership.
2. Absence of social security and resultant overcompensations. With inadequate institutional support to cater to core human needs particularly in terms of food, shelter, healthcare and education, there is always the desire to insure against misfortune. Insurance often goes beyond one’s known sources of income. This needs to be addressed with the sincerity of humane policies and good governance.
3. Family attachments : a) School and Institutional demands: capitation fees and parents wanting to live their ambitions through their children (outside village, town or state further enhances corrupt practices) b) Dowry System. Again requiring governmental intervention with social reform.
4. Consumerism and peer pressure to advance cultural value as opposed to use or exchange values.
5. The inversion of moral values where individual worth is measured in material terms supported by the stunning mediocrity of the media that gives precedence to lifestyle and celebrity fluff. Here the media must understand its responsibility and not lend a halo to the unscrupulous. I was appalled to watch a news bite wondering which one of the inmates of Tihar incarcerated for corruption would be the best brand ambassador for the sale of spices packed by prisoners before Diwali.
6. The sheer weight of population that slows down the justice system. Alternative justice systems at the local level could alleviate the problem. Also our system of governance which penalizes a wrongdoing ought to acknowledge an honest citizen and an honest official. Public acknowledgement motivates the good.
7. Dual consciousness: moralizing publicly, practicing the opposite privately. Not walking the talk and the absence of credible role models.
8. Overcoming resigned cynicism and inaction that lets corruption go unchallenged.
9. Among the educated: there is a perceived gap between truthfulness on the part of the government and expedience. Eg. The Planning Commission in its wisdom told the Supreme Court on the 21st of September resulting in a national outcry that the basic requirement for survival is Rs. 32 in urban areas and Rs. 26 in rural areas. It offered Re 1 for healthcare per day insufficient even to cure a simple headache. The reason is obvious. If the truthful figure, closer to Rs 100 were to be acknowledged, many more people would sink below the poverty line and India’s identity as a developing nation will be scrutinized under a glare of suspicion. So if there are covert practices on the part of the government, why should private individuals not fudge a few figures? There is also the belief that the revenue collected from individuals is squandered on wasteful expenses of the privileged and given the tardy implementation, money meant for development schemes hardly achieve their noble objectives.
10. The tendency to refrain from partnering the youth in national objectives. On the contrary there is immense sense in harnessing the energy, idealism and enthusiasm of the youth for positive transformative action. Many a parent will remember that they gave up smoking being prodded by their children. It is for filial love that forms of corruption burgeon and it is for the same reasons that it can be combated effectively.
Hence social vigilance should be a combination of a public sharing of responsibility: one that involves prevention and participatory moral transformation: a trusteeship for a common goal.
Friday, August 26, 2011
The Lila of Corruption
Two eleven will be remembered for the boundless frontiers of corrupt practices, the people’s initiative to battle it, the government’s recalcitrance, quasi-Gandhian fasts, arrests, releases, tricolor waving urban candlelight marches, emotional responses and unending media debates over the territory where the battle needs to be fought.
To be honest, like many educated Indians, I have been perplexed at its multilayered complexity. More newsprint, visuals and words have been dedicated to scams than on other pressing issues. Hence, civil society is concerned. But India is a parliamentary democracy where elected representatives are given the people’s mandate to make laws of governance. To overrule this constitutional provision by popular street resistance is to challenge the constitution itself. The moral basis of such a resistance is also untenable if we believe in our post-colonial democratic structure. This may seem like a Gandhian argument but I do believe that means must justify the end and our discontent in the times of crisis is because we have privileged the material over the moral. The lawmakers as we know, whether we approve or not, have been democratically elected. The leaders of the civil disobedience have not. There is no democratic mechanism by which I may convey my mandate to someone as worthy as Justice Santosh Hegde or Arvind Kejriwal to negotiate with the government on the Jan Lokpal Bill. The convincing arguments about the Lokpal being another centre of non-democratic, authoritarian centre has already occupied much space as is the hypothesis of double oligarchy. But then is the parliament superior to the people? If the elected representatives are deaf in one ear and cannot hear with the other, do we have the right to recall them? The way out is therefore to work through democratic processes that may need a scrutiny and legislation of appropriate election laws and their implementation.
While the lawmakers are elected representatives of the people, we are aware how elections are fought in this country. Without affiliated support, which include resources such as money, party, caste, religion, criminals and occasionally popular sentiment, a candidate’s security deposit is likely to be forfeited, however upright the candidate may be. So the first thing to do is to amend the election laws. The great urban heartburn about dynastic political heritage may be overcome by promulgating a simple election law: no candidate can represent the people in parliament or the state legislative assemblies for more than two terms. Democracy is after all about creating opportunities for greater people’s participation in governance. If that is the requisite for the President of India, or the most powerful person in the world, the American President, it can be for the rest of our elected representatives. The practice of corruption is licensed with the confidence that one’s political fiefdom can be perpetuated.
To be honest, like many educated Indians, I have been perplexed at its multilayered complexity. More newsprint, visuals and words have been dedicated to scams than on other pressing issues. Hence, civil society is concerned. But India is a parliamentary democracy where elected representatives are given the people’s mandate to make laws of governance. To overrule this constitutional provision by popular street resistance is to challenge the constitution itself. The moral basis of such a resistance is also untenable if we believe in our post-colonial democratic structure. This may seem like a Gandhian argument but I do believe that means must justify the end and our discontent in the times of crisis is because we have privileged the material over the moral. The lawmakers as we know, whether we approve or not, have been democratically elected. The leaders of the civil disobedience have not. There is no democratic mechanism by which I may convey my mandate to someone as worthy as Justice Santosh Hegde or Arvind Kejriwal to negotiate with the government on the Jan Lokpal Bill. The convincing arguments about the Lokpal being another centre of non-democratic, authoritarian centre has already occupied much space as is the hypothesis of double oligarchy. But then is the parliament superior to the people? If the elected representatives are deaf in one ear and cannot hear with the other, do we have the right to recall them? The way out is therefore to work through democratic processes that may need a scrutiny and legislation of appropriate election laws and their implementation.
While the lawmakers are elected representatives of the people, we are aware how elections are fought in this country. Without affiliated support, which include resources such as money, party, caste, religion, criminals and occasionally popular sentiment, a candidate’s security deposit is likely to be forfeited, however upright the candidate may be. So the first thing to do is to amend the election laws. The great urban heartburn about dynastic political heritage may be overcome by promulgating a simple election law: no candidate can represent the people in parliament or the state legislative assemblies for more than two terms. Democracy is after all about creating opportunities for greater people’s participation in governance. If that is the requisite for the President of India, or the most powerful person in the world, the American President, it can be for the rest of our elected representatives. The practice of corruption is licensed with the confidence that one’s political fiefdom can be perpetuated.
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Goodbye Braveheart
I can't remember when I had met Vandana Datta for the first time. But I reckon it must have been to do with scholastic matters. It was after her eminent father's demise that she courageously took on the editorial and publication responsibility for Research, a biannual research journal in Literature, Culture and Creativity. Young as she was in a profession where grey hair is equated with wisdom, she balanced writings by acknowledged scholars with space allocated for young researchers without compromising the quality of the journal.
She attended UGC refresher courses in the Department of English, Patna University and impressed resource persons and organizers with her rare commitment, scholastic aptitude and sincerity. It is with the same sincerity that she taught and it is with the same commitment that she concluded her lectures while she had temporary reprieves from the effects of chemotherapy.
A few days ago, one of her dear colleagues who was at the English department on work, had informed us that Vandana was in hospital and not in the best of health. While we wanted to visit her, we were not too sure whether she would have liked us to see her not at her best. As May turned to June, we received the bad news. Vandana after battling cancer with courage and rare dignity was one with the elements of the universe.
I have often asked this question in a more prosaic manner than in Lear: why do the gods toy with good souls? In a world in which human beings transcribe their hopes and fears into a spiritual script, it must be comforting to know that Vandana is in the space of a painless destination. When I look up at the sky on a clear night, may be I will designate a special star to her memory. But as of now the catharsis must stem from the grief that we feel. She was a very good human- being and the world has been greatly impoverished by her absence.
Goodbye Braveheart.
She attended UGC refresher courses in the Department of English, Patna University and impressed resource persons and organizers with her rare commitment, scholastic aptitude and sincerity. It is with the same sincerity that she taught and it is with the same commitment that she concluded her lectures while she had temporary reprieves from the effects of chemotherapy.
A few days ago, one of her dear colleagues who was at the English department on work, had informed us that Vandana was in hospital and not in the best of health. While we wanted to visit her, we were not too sure whether she would have liked us to see her not at her best. As May turned to June, we received the bad news. Vandana after battling cancer with courage and rare dignity was one with the elements of the universe.
I have often asked this question in a more prosaic manner than in Lear: why do the gods toy with good souls? In a world in which human beings transcribe their hopes and fears into a spiritual script, it must be comforting to know that Vandana is in the space of a painless destination. When I look up at the sky on a clear night, may be I will designate a special star to her memory. But as of now the catharsis must stem from the grief that we feel. She was a very good human- being and the world has been greatly impoverished by her absence.
Goodbye Braveheart.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Did anyone buy a book this Dhanteras?
The car manufacturers have smiles that will last a while. So too with the major manufacturers of household utility and recreational goods: refrigerators, washing machines, microwave ovens, OTGs, dishwashers, plasma and 3D television sets, DVD players, music systems, play-stations, laptops, desktops. The list goes on.
Two thousand new cars, leave alone two -wheelers have joined the congestion on the roads and will now compete for space with pedestrians, cattle, hawkers, vendors and garbage. The carbon dioxide emissions will increase and the city’s temperature will rise. Jostling for public space will lead to jangled nerves, outraged emotions and heightened tempers.
Window shopping on Dhanteras late afternoon, I peeped into some bookshops on Ashok Rajpath and Fraser Road to check if buyers included books among the many items they sought to buy. The bookshops wore deserted looks, and I was not surprised. I asked a young student who mouthed a Good Afternoon if he knew the significance of the occasion. The doubtful looks made it amply clear that I ought to swallow my next question. In Bihar, the celebration of Diwali begins two days before the actual day of celebration as Dhanteras. It is celebrated in honour of Dhanvantari, the physician of the gods. He is believed to have risen with a pot of Amrit during the samudra manthan. Connected with this legend, people buy new utensils which are placed in the place of worship. This practice has now grown in variety and has been extended to include the entire consumerist range coveted by the middle class. The pious fast throughout the day and after sunset the fast is broken with sweets, puris and other traditional delicacies.
As the evening drew out, the traffic became a nightmare. Patna was shopping: competitively, feverishly, and furiously. I decided to finish the chores of customary greetings, caught up with friends on the net and then I curled up on the lounge sofa and started to read a book: the short stories of Catherine Lim, the highly acclaimed writer from Singapore. And for the next three hours, I was at peace. It was a kind of peace that a superior engagement with the intangible can provide. Between the Amrit and the Pot as Dhanvantari’s metaphors, I had chosen Amrit.
Two thousand new cars, leave alone two -wheelers have joined the congestion on the roads and will now compete for space with pedestrians, cattle, hawkers, vendors and garbage. The carbon dioxide emissions will increase and the city’s temperature will rise. Jostling for public space will lead to jangled nerves, outraged emotions and heightened tempers.
Window shopping on Dhanteras late afternoon, I peeped into some bookshops on Ashok Rajpath and Fraser Road to check if buyers included books among the many items they sought to buy. The bookshops wore deserted looks, and I was not surprised. I asked a young student who mouthed a Good Afternoon if he knew the significance of the occasion. The doubtful looks made it amply clear that I ought to swallow my next question. In Bihar, the celebration of Diwali begins two days before the actual day of celebration as Dhanteras. It is celebrated in honour of Dhanvantari, the physician of the gods. He is believed to have risen with a pot of Amrit during the samudra manthan. Connected with this legend, people buy new utensils which are placed in the place of worship. This practice has now grown in variety and has been extended to include the entire consumerist range coveted by the middle class. The pious fast throughout the day and after sunset the fast is broken with sweets, puris and other traditional delicacies.
As the evening drew out, the traffic became a nightmare. Patna was shopping: competitively, feverishly, and furiously. I decided to finish the chores of customary greetings, caught up with friends on the net and then I curled up on the lounge sofa and started to read a book: the short stories of Catherine Lim, the highly acclaimed writer from Singapore. And for the next three hours, I was at peace. It was a kind of peace that a superior engagement with the intangible can provide. Between the Amrit and the Pot as Dhanvantari’s metaphors, I had chosen Amrit.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Magic Realism: how a teacher can make all the difference.
Two identical-looking buildings house the Soshit Samadan Kendra, a fully free English medium residential school for Musahar children. This community is possibly the state’s most oppressed and disprivileged community of rat-eaters who have been living in conditions of abysmal and degrading poverty. Most work as bonded labourers and live at the edge of villages defined by demeaning social cartography.
Soshit Seva Sangh is the brainchild of its founder and Chairman, Mr. J.K. Sinha, who after a long and distinguished career in the Indian Police service, returned to Bihar to make a difference to this uneven state. SSS in partnership with Samadhan, a Delhi based NGO established Shoshit Samadhan Kendra that provides students education, boarding, lodging, clothes and healthcare to the two hundred and twenty students. Aside of the school curriculum, there are other activities that define the transformative miracle of this project.
An economist by training, Mrs. Geetha Prasad volunteered to teach communication skills to a group of students drawn from the sixth to the ninth grade and this is what she has been pursuing with meticulous determination for twenty months. Both Mr. J.K. Sinha and Mrs. Geetha Prasad had invited me to visit the school over some months. Mrs. Prasad wished that I could evaluate the work that her students had done and the progress they had made. On the 6th of October, a day that turned out to be unusually busy for me, I decided to put my conscience to rest and visit the school. Mrs. Prasad very graciously picked me up from home and explained the kind of language exercises that she had devised for the children while we drove to school. On our arrival, I was taken to a room with many computers, an LCD projector, a white laminated board and paste-boards that displayed charts with phonemic symbols. Here I was greeted with choric cheer ‘good-afternoon Sir’. I greeted them in turn and told them by way of an introduction that I taught at the university and that I had come to learn what they had learnt. Once the ice was broken, I was amazed at the confidence with which they spoke during a communications exercise, the kind of vocabulary they used, the logical sequence of thoughts they were able to articulate and their desire to learn.
Many of the university students I know would come a distant second to their skills and we must bear in mind that twenty months ago they knew no English.
We in India, most ironically, have been gifted with an accessory of colonialism: the English language. For Macaulay, it was an instrument of subordinate recruitment to aid colonial governance. Today it is an instrument of empowerment; of liberation; of global access to knowledge and technology. Sadly our politicians in the name of linguistic chauvinism have equated English with colonialism and sought its ouster because of the fatuous belief that it had compromised national pride. Aijaz Ahmad most appropriately questions the propriety of some of the other things that came along with colonial rule such as the Indian Railways. Should we throw that out as well? I knew that the children of SSK were beneficiaries of a very special gift. However it ought not to silence the cultural traditions of their unique experience. And so I told the children that the next time I came, I would listen to all their folk tales. Time seemed to race by and the session of fun learning came to an end. I shook hands with each of the students and left the room to the choric resonance of ‘thank you Sir’.
As we sat in the library leafing through books and flip-charts, I said to Mrs. Geetha Prasad, ‘you have worked magic’.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Sense and Sensibility
I had always thought that there are some questions whose answers are likely to be: hey, hey hey. You know questions such as 'Did Adam have a navel?' or 'Was Lord Ram born under the central dome of what was once the Babri Masjid?' Ever since Nietzsche's famous proclamation 'there are no facts only interpretations' it has become increasingly more difficult to come to a single, unalloyed, unambiguous point of view. Law is after all a verbal discipline.
When the country, paralyzed with bated breath, on the afternoon of the 30th of September, switched channels to catch the first reports of the Ayodhya title suit judgment, I went to play a round of golf. By getting the news at the dot of 4p.m. I could not have altered the course of India's history. And nobody invited me to the television studios for my opinion. I am told that all those who's opinions truly matter in India are located in metros. When I returned home and gathered the different strands that constituted the larger picture, my response was one of disbelief. The setting was Shakespearean with the foregrounding of the numeral three. And out of the cauldron emerged a pronouncement that endorsed a three-way division of the land under dispute. I know little about law although many among my friends and family have attained positions of eminence in that field. But the one thing that I do know is that a decision in a title suit would mean deciding to whom a piece of land under dispute belongs by way of legitimate title, not the parties that may be given the land by a conciliatory verdict. I had always thought that the practice of law depended on the material facts and evidence that is conclusively put forth within the ambit of public legal procedures rather than private spiritual matters. But this judgment seems to have given a new dimension to jurisprudence.
When the Supreme Court dismissed the petition for deferment of the verdict, it established the superiority of constitutional democracy over contracted populism. Sadly, Thursday's decision partially undid those gains. To live in a modern, resurgent India does not mean to resurrect the ghosts from the past but to bury them and move on. To those that are religious, please build as many places of worship on the places you own directly, but please stay out of the public spaces. These are meant for the vibrant, energetic youth of our country: our hope for the future. History, Baudrillard says is often the source of humankind's problems rather than its site. Let us use history to understand our present and transform our future. And if we must be spiritual, then remember the lines of Harivansh Rai Bacchan and do the needful. That order could also have been passed.
When the country, paralyzed with bated breath, on the afternoon of the 30th of September, switched channels to catch the first reports of the Ayodhya title suit judgment, I went to play a round of golf. By getting the news at the dot of 4p.m. I could not have altered the course of India's history. And nobody invited me to the television studios for my opinion. I am told that all those who's opinions truly matter in India are located in metros. When I returned home and gathered the different strands that constituted the larger picture, my response was one of disbelief. The setting was Shakespearean with the foregrounding of the numeral three. And out of the cauldron emerged a pronouncement that endorsed a three-way division of the land under dispute. I know little about law although many among my friends and family have attained positions of eminence in that field. But the one thing that I do know is that a decision in a title suit would mean deciding to whom a piece of land under dispute belongs by way of legitimate title, not the parties that may be given the land by a conciliatory verdict. I had always thought that the practice of law depended on the material facts and evidence that is conclusively put forth within the ambit of public legal procedures rather than private spiritual matters. But this judgment seems to have given a new dimension to jurisprudence.
When the Supreme Court dismissed the petition for deferment of the verdict, it established the superiority of constitutional democracy over contracted populism. Sadly, Thursday's decision partially undid those gains. To live in a modern, resurgent India does not mean to resurrect the ghosts from the past but to bury them and move on. To those that are religious, please build as many places of worship on the places you own directly, but please stay out of the public spaces. These are meant for the vibrant, energetic youth of our country: our hope for the future. History, Baudrillard says is often the source of humankind's problems rather than its site. Let us use history to understand our present and transform our future. And if we must be spiritual, then remember the lines of Harivansh Rai Bacchan and do the needful. That order could also have been passed.
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