Listening to the Help

A few years ago, I’d hired a domestic worker who looked like she ought to be past retirement. I had just moved houses and couldn’t afford to pay the lady who used to work for me before. But before I’d had a chance to scout for another ‘maid’, this lady showed up at my door. Gray hair, slightly stooped at the shoulders, not even bothering to look around the tiny two-room ‘house’ she was offering to clean. But she obviously needed the job.

I asked if she’d bring in a relative. That’s often how it works — an older woman negotiates, then passes on the job to her daughter or daughter-in-law. But she wanted to do the work herself.

I felt guilty about having her work so hard, so I tried to share the household work. Also, concerned about hygiene, I laid down some rules – Don’t use a broom to dust books; don’t use the mop to clean the mirror; wash your hands after swabbing floors. I bought a new cake of soap, and told her that it was for her.I cannot forget the way she looked at me that day. At first, I thought she was offended. I was starting to apologise when she caught my hand and took it to her forehead. In broken Hindi, she began to express gratitude.

She didn’t use the soap much to be honest. But she began to grin at me frequently. Slowly, it sank in. She had expected to be told what to do, but she did not expect me to think of what she needs. Decades of working in Delhi’s ‘kothis’ (middle-class bunglows), and she had never been bought a fresh cake of soap.

I’m thinking of her today because I’ve been reading about a public hearing organised by Shahri Mahila Kaamgar Union, focused on women who work in the unorganised sector.

For decades, domestic workers have been trying to get organised so they can claim basic labour rights. This is difficult, partly because most domestic workers have multiple employers, and partly because there is no proof that they work in such-n-such home for x number of hours. There is no guarantee of a bonus. Holidays are ad hoc, because most employers will not agree to a day off on weekends. This means the worker just takes time off whenever he/she needs it. It also means that she could be penalised or ‘scolded’ for such holidays.But most of all, they worry about their future. There is no hope of ‘promotion’ and most of them (the women at least) seem to want to retire at the age of 50. This is what came up when about 30 women addressed a panel at the recent public hearing.

Nearly 250 domestic workers attended. Some came from around Delhi and some from Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh too. They wanted a minimum wage, adjusted against inflation. They told stories of being brought from villages by ‘agents’, who do not let them quit jobs or return home so easily. A resolution was passed asking for a new law to protect domestic workers’ rights. This would mean fixing wages according to the number of hours worked, allowing maternity leave, weekly and annual vacations, and insurance.

Whether a new law is needed, or whether an amendment needs to be made to existing labour laws to cover domestic work with its specific employment problems, I cannot say. But I can say that I do not want to watch a stooping, greying woman mopping floors again. She deserved to retire with a pension. We all do.

Published here

More Q, more A

Another interview with Dial-a-book:

Farhan: Did you peek into the life of lovers when writing this book? Did you need to make any research before writing this book?

Annie: Not ‘research’ really. I did not go looking for lovers and their stories. I observed what was unfolding around me and then played it out different in my own imagination.

On my feet

I’ve been trying to walk at least a couple of times a week. I don’t walk myself breathless but I do try to walk in lieu of a motorized commute, so I don’t waste time or non-renewable fossil fuels.

Now that I walk, I remember again how hard the city is for pedestrians. Most pavements are so narrow, two adults cannot walk abreast. If someone walks from the opposite direction, one of you must step off the pavement. There is very little shade or green cover. Besides, the pavement is broken in many places. At times, it nosedives into a ditch for no good reason. And of course, you get the worst of the pollution, which is ironic and annoying, given that you’re doing your bit for a cleaner environment.

Even if you ignore the noise and fumes, walk past an empty stretch of land and you must deal with garbage. Piles and piles of it! Every time I walk past such a dump, I wonder what might happen if such a huge mound of rubbish was piled in the centre of the road – in the paths of the cars and trucks. Would it not be cleared for months? Could it be that the municipality (or whatever private party owns the empty stretch of land) doesn’t know about so much accumulated garbage? Has nobody complained?

But the only people who are affected by the filth are either people walking past or the homeless who actually sleep on the pavement. And who would act upon the complaints of the homeless?

All these problems sully my pleasure in the walks. Still, I walk. And I find myself taking road risks because sometimes there isn’t any zebra crossing or a split in the road divider for over a kilometer. The other night, I was walking with a friend. At a busy crossing, two cops waved the traffic this way and that. 

We waited patiently, hoping they’d notice. The cops did not hold the traffic up for pedestrians. Finally, I gestured angrily at one of the cops. He indicated a lapse (which lasted about three seconds) in the rush of oncoming cars, and gestured that we could run across. We did so but I couldn’t help snapping at the cop.

Recently, we learnt that in Mumbai, the majority of people injured in road accidents – nearly 57% – are pedestrians. Older studies showed that in most Indian cities, about one-third accident deaths are those of pedestrians. Here’s another statistic: between 1981 and 2001, the human population of six metropolises went up 1.9 times, but the motor population went up 7.7 times! Another decade later, studies indicate that the motor population increase is 9 times that of people population increase.

Even so, pedestrians and cyclists account for at least 30% of all trips on city streets. But, according to a 2008 study that surveyed 30 Indian cities, only 30% of these streets have footpaths. What these statistics add up to is the fact that millions of Indians face injury or death, walking on roads crammed with cars and bikes. They do this not because they are stupid or suicidal but because they don’t have an alternative. 

Whatever little safety could be expected by walking along the edges of streets is also taken away by double parked cars.

And so, I’m very pleased to hear that someone has announced an ‘Aam Nagrik Rashtriya Footpath Yojna’. It isn’t a ‘yojna’ (scheme) really, in the sense that it has no funds. But it has a mission – get a share of the road and reject a transport policy that favours cars over pedestrians and cyclists. Naturally, I’m walking on their side.

Published here.

Figuring out the short

From a recent interview with other writers, on short stories:

Yashodhara : What do you personally find most challenging about writing a short story?

Annie - The ending. I usually write short stories with a single image or character as a starting point. I begin to work my way through the story from this character's perspective, or an event I am trying to explain. But I often don't know what to do with this character and how to let go of her/him.

Altaf - Beginning with a sense of infiniteness, to let the reader settle in, and then quickly bringing the end into focus. This is always hard. Only when I have fully exhausted a theme in my head do I decide to make it a short story. Otherwise, it would be a novella or novel. Knowing that what one has begun must quickly end, this makes the whole exercise seem futile in a way. Conflicting impulses: the impulse to write, but also the impulse to stop writing.

Y : And on the other side, what do you like best about this format?

Annie - I like the freedom of being able to work on a small scale. It is like zooming into a small corner of a large painting, and realizing that you don't have to see the whole picture in order to make sense of it.

Altaf - I like that I can put a short story at the service of a larger theme. I try to avoid writing random stories in isolation. This way, if I ever decide to throw these shorts together, they can read like a coherent whole.

Delhi, after December

I suppose I had to revisit Delhi in order to recover.

I didn't even know that I had any recovering to do. When I heard of the gangrape-murder of December 16, 2012, I must confess that I didn’t feel shock. 

Anger, yes. But I read of brutal rape frequently; fresh reports poured in every day. After 'Nirbhaya' died, I tried to put my anger to work. I joined campaigns. I pledged to reclaim city nights. And I carried around a knot of resentment that I wouldn’t acknowledge.

Whenever anybody talked about how unsafe Delhi is, I was quick to leap to its defense. I've lived a few years in Delhi and those were good years. Years of personal and professional growth. No worse than years spent in Mumbai or any other town. But secretly, I felt angry at Delhi. How could I say I love a city that allows such terror? How could I talk of ruinous, scorching beauty, of balconies and terraces, of silver and cycle rickshaws? Every beautiful memory was scarred by December 2012.

So, I stopped defending the city. A part of me accepted quietly that no place in my country was safe, that I would never feel safe again. I accepted that if change did come, it would probably come too late for women of my generation. I signed the petitions and stood with the placards. But I stood with gall in my heart.

But last week I was in Delhi again. I sat in a small garden, reading a book. An older woman walked past. She maintains the garden, dotting it with bursts of bright spring flowers. I half-heard a friend telling her son the names of flowers. Almost physically, I felt my internal pall lift. I began, once again, to feel safe.

At a metro station, on the platform, I saw a young couple. The girl reached out, touched the boy’s face. And I felt safe. I stepped into a general coach instead of the pink one reserved for women. I noticed that several other women took the option of travelling in the unreserved coaches. Men of all ages boarded, and they stood at a respectful distance if they could help it. And I felt safe.

One afternoon, I stood at a chana-kulcha stall on the roadside. There were mostly male customers. Initially I hesitated, wondering if everyone’s stares would make me uncomfortable. Then I felt defiant and placed an order. I asked the vendor to hold the butter. He half-smiled, said, “Anything you want, madam.” And I felt safe.

I asked men for directions, and they directed me carefully, willingly. I asked men for food and I was served with a garnish of wit and charm. The knot of anger circulating in my blood stream began to melt. The city restored my sense of normalcy, even my self-respect.

I cannot explain how my self-respect was tied up with Nirbhaya and other women who are raped, killed or mutilated. Perhaps my anger came from humiliation. It was as if my countrymen were reminding me that I wasn’t an equal human being. And no matter how many cities I moved, no matter what I did for a living, I couldn’t win against that attitude.

But now, enjoying Delhi instead of being afraid of it, my ache has been blunted. I feel calmer, safer. So, to the home ministries of all states wanting safer cities, I say: Give us night buses. Give us gardens and well-lit trains and well-behaved men. Don’t sequester us. Don’t pamper us. Let us enjoy the city. And we will create our own feelings of safety.

Published here

The connection

I’ve subscribed to updates from CGnet Swara, a portal that uses technology quite effectively to offer a basic media platform to people in the Central Gondwana region, which would be mostly rural areas.

Some days, I go over each post – a schoolgirl’s poem, a folk song, a litany of corruption and its horrifying results. Some days, I cannot bear to listen.

Someone is seeking help in Dindori district because 70 percent of the adivasis from his area have migrated to Maharashtra in search of work. Since 2009, there is either no NREGA work to be had or wages aren’t paid. Someone else seeks help for a widow in Madri village. She hasn’t got her pension for eight months.

Someone calls to say that there isn’t a single state transport bus to his village. Someone called Bhadu Baiga went to work for a bore-well digging company in Chennai but hasn’t returned in three years. His wife is frantic and has filed FIR but needs help in making the police launch an investigation.

In Bijadhap, near the Bhoramdev sanctuary, someone alleges that forest department officials destroyed 15 homes belonging to people of the Baiga tribe.

Someone calls to say that the Chhattisarh Chief Minister had come to Bijapur for a rally and some adivasis were summoned to attend. But they complained that they were not given any food all day and were not transported back home. They had to walk back all the way, through jungles.

Someone went to the block development office in Chatra district and found that none of the officials were sitting there after 2 pm. A colony of construction workers in Rewa district applied for social security cards but didn’t get any. In Kharki and Pakhar villages in Jharkhand, NREGA cards have not been renewed since March 2010.

Every other call is a call for help and as you read, one message after another, you begin to wonder if anything will ever get fixed. How on earth are so many people going to get helped, and by whom? Will it really make a difference if I called up a district collector in Rewa and gave her/him a piece of my mind? Do we really believe that an ordinary citizen making a phone call or two can actually change anything?

But sometimes, it happens. Someone calls in to say, ‘thank you’. For instance, someone had reported that the public distribution shop in his village had been giving rations for just one month, while making people sign for three months’ supply. After listening to the complaint through CGnet Swara, the district collector ordered an enquiry. And the villagers received the rations due to them for three months.

And it gives me great hope to hear that. Because, sometimes, it really is a question of a word in the right ear. Corruption and bad infrastructure are major problems, and the press is a pillar of democracy only because it has the ability to talk about them, to spread the word. For the same reason, all those phone calls asking for help and intervention make sense. Mainstream media or even politicians might not be able to stretch itself far enough to keep track of problems in every village. But now they ought to be able to keep track at minimal expense. The national press could pick up a story and dig deeper, shout louder if necessary.

I wish every region would come up with a platform like CGnet Swara. There is no reason it can’t be done. After all, what good our great leaps in telecom technologies if we cannot achieve something as simple as connecting citizens with local officials?

Published here

The disappearances

Lately, I’ve been noticing photos of missing people circulating on social networking sites. Probably put up by frantic families or concerned acquaintances. It is difficult to imagine the ache of a loss that’s neither final nor explained. Why does someone go missing, how? What prevents him or her from coming back home? What physical or emotional anguish must he be suffering in the meantime?

These questions must run through the minds of those whose children – or parents, or grandparents – have disappeared. But imagine the fear and rage in the hearts of those who know that their daughter’s disappearance has something to do with the police!

A statement issued by an alliance of women’s groups says that Majoni Das, a teacher and women’s rights activist in Assam, has disappeared after being taken into police custody, allegedly due to “links with insurgent groups”.

Das wrote for a local fortnightly newspaper and also worked as a hostel warden in Jorhat. She had gone home to Sibsagar when the police summoned her. She sent messages to her colleagues, telling them this. According to her family, on February 8, two police officers (one of them was a woman) came to Das’ home while she was out. They left a message asking her to report to the superintendent’s office. On February 10, she set out to meet the SP of Sibsagar district, and hasn’t been seen since then.

One FIR has been filed in Jorhat by her employer, another in Demow by her family. The Sibsagar police allegedly told the family that Das has joined the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) and gone off to Nagaland.

This merits a whole wormy can of questions. What kind of police force summons a woman to the station if she is suspected of being an armed rebel? And how did the police already know that she went to Nagaland? Who told them? And if they know, why are they not chasing her, since they were so anxious about calling her over for a chat? How long had they been waiting to pick up Das? And if it was important to detain or interrogate her, why did they not drive the short distance to Jorhat where she was working? They knew where she lived and worked, after all.

Das’ family is worried that this might be another ‘EID’ case. In Assam, there have been several instances of ‘Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances’. In some cases, people who went missing have been found dead later. Yet, the local police officers have not taken Das’ case seriously, not even for the sake of preserving their own reputations.

As it is, the north-eastern states have suffered tremendously due to various armed rebellions as well as counterinsurgency measures, including the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. In Manipur, there are groups like the ‘Extra-judicial Execution Victim Families’ Association Manipur’ and ‘Families of the Involuntarily Disappeared’s Association Manipur’. In Kashmir, there is the ‘Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons’.

As for Assam, the website of the Assam Human Rights Commission lists a lot of ‘categories’ under which cases have been filed, including “illegal detention/arrest”, “police excess and negligence”, “mysterious death” and “mysterious disappearance”, it does not offer details of how many such cases were reported. It does say that of the 6,546 cases filed up until March 2008, at least 774 were cases against the police and 418 were cases of custodial deaths.

We can only hope that Majoni Das will be traced soon, that she will not become a statistic, and that the police will prove that her family’s worst fears are unfounded. 

First published here

Neck deep, and out of their depth

Do you remember them — standing neck-deep in water for 17 days? Did you understand what the farmers were trying to say to the state and to other citizens who might benefit from their dislocation?

They were saying that it wasn’t so much about land; their very lives were at stake. The Madhya Pradesh government had agreed to some of their demands, like lowering the height of the Omkareshwar dam across the Narmada (but when another group protested, asking that the height of Indira Sagar dam be lowered, the police forced them out of the water).

In recent weeks, while the Kumbh Mela was on in Allahabad, a ‘Jal Sansad’ was underway on the riverbank, discussing a crisis in the trans-Yamuna area. The organisers believe that upto 10 lakh people will be affected by three proposed thermal power plants. In summer, this could mean the Yamuna running dry, which will lead to a stop in sand-mining, river-bed farming, fishing, ferrying, not to mention extensive pollution due to burning coal.

Also, in recent weeks, a workshop on development projects was organised by a media advocacy group, Vikas Samvad (disclosure: I prepared a report for this organisation as an independent journalist in 2010). The workshop report points out that, between 2007 to 2010, about 395 MoUs (memoranda of understanding) were signed between the state and investors, of which 21 firms gave no addresses; 22 firms did not mention how much money they’d invest; 87 firms either changed their minds about investing or the government cancelled their projects. Anyway, the state went about procuring land for firms, regardless of how many livelihoods would be gained or lost. An RTI query revealed that over 2, 43,787 hectares of land had been acquired for 130 companies.

Other activists remarked on how gramsabhas — integral to the process of community consultation — were held. In one Chhattisgarh village, the meeting had 1,500 policemen in attendance.

For water, the battle is larger because once rivers are dammed, local climate change is inevitable. The price is always paid by those who live nearby. One workshop participant spoke of how there are no major chemical factories near his village and yet, the Narmada water stank. Malaria was rare in the Tawa valley; now it rages freely.

When dams are proposed, the stated purpose is often ‘providing drinking water’ to urban areas and irrigating fields. But despite dams, parts of Madhya Pradesh remain thirsty. Fields in the vicinity remain parched in summer while Bargi dam feeds cement factories.

Since 1992, there’s been little addition to the net area irrigated by large and medium irrigation projects. Yet, the new Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC) set up by the Ministry of Environment and Forests reportedly considered 262 hydropower and irrigation projects since 2007, and rejected almost none.

They also allege that the EAC relies on fake Environment Impact Assessment reports and sometimes violate the law. The Himachal HC had appointed a committee that recommended at least 5km of flowing river water between any two projects. However, activists say that the EAC has been following a norm of just 1 km, and sometimes, zero.

In recent decades, the USA has also ‘decommissioned’ some dams to save certain species of fish. Indians who live by rivers, who make a living off rivers, must be wondering if their lives are worth less than that of American salmon or eel.

First published here

Not just love stories

I was at a bookstore recently, trying to figure out if my new book was in stock and where it was placed. The staff was kind. They let me sign a few copies. Then, trying to be helpful, the manager’s assistant asked if I would like them to move the book from the overcrowded ‘Indian Writing’ shelf to ‘Romance’, where it would find a focused readership.

I said ‘No’ quickly and my voice was sharper than I intended it to be. I felt I had to squash the faintest notion that my book, although it is about love, was romantic. Partly because it isn’t romantic. But also because I was terrified of being genre-ized, trivialized, un-serioused.

Much as I want to be read by millions, I’m not afraid of being ghettoized if it means being considered a more ‘serious’ writer. Like most women writers I know, I do write stories about relationships. But I’m damned if I’m going to be ushered into the corner – admittedly a better-paid corner – currently occupied by writers of romance novels or ‘chick-lit’.

It could be that I am only imagining this, but it seems to me that few women writers who get stuck with the ‘chick’ tag have been taken seriously as, say, informers of public opinion or social commentators.

Read the rest of the piece here: http://tehelka.com/women-in-love-only-if-youre-dh-lawrence/

Bans on truth

George Orwell’s Animal Farm is one book that I feel should be compulsory reading for students above 15. It is a fabulous way of introducing young people to the dangers of any political system where individuals fail to question their leaders. I think of it as an aide to democracy and so was surprised to see the book on a list of banned books.

Apparently, Animal Farm was found guilty of being critical of the USSR (which was an ally of the USA and UK at the time) so they didn’t want it published until the war ended. But even as late as 2002, the novel was disallowed in the United Arab Emirates, because it had talking pigs in it.

For curiosity’s sake, look up the list (http://bit.ly/g5sA4). It includes classics like Catch 22, Frankenstein, and Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland. You will note that most bans were imposed for political reasons, or to control religious sentiments. Some books were banned by communists, some by Islamic ones, capitalist and/or democratic ones, or by states within nations. Common to all is a terror of ‘obscenity’ or explicit sexual content, which rejected Ginsberg’s Howl for the same reasons as Jackie Collins’ The World Is Full Of Married Men.

Many historical eras are represented on the list — ancient Romans to modern fundamentalists of different denominations. But what is more interesting to me is the way religion, sex and politics are mashed in, the fear of one idea feeding off another.

For instance, I read that Uncle Tom’s Cabin was banned by the Czars in Russia for fear of undermining religious ideals. Religion wasn’t the issue, slavery was. But it is a very powerful idea after all — that people are equal. This means that everyone deserves justice in equal measure. It means that those who are in power must extend to everyone the same rights. 

It isn’t just about books, of course. A recent RTI query revealed that, between 2001 and 2011, the censor board denied certification (an effective ban, since a film cannot be screened without a certificate) to 256 films. These reportedly included odd titles like 'Jija Teen Taang Ka' and 'Frivolous Lola'.

But it also includes Rahul Dholakia’s Parzania, a film about the Gujarat riots of 2002. Rakesh Sharma’s Final Solution was initially banned too. Both films were screened eventually and there is absolutely nothing in either film that would damage India. If anything, they strengthen us. Documentaries are especially important for they speak the truth, which is key to human justice. 

Years pass, but people remain terrified of such truths. Anand Patwardhan had made a film called Ram Ke Naam over 20 years ago. Made before the demolition of the Babri mosque, it was cleared by the censor board, and won national awards. The film explains how the controversy started in 1949, and interviews both Hindus and Muslims residents, and a priest who mentioned corruption viz the proposed Ram temple, and who was murdered after the 1992 demolition.

This documentary was screened in recent weeks at a film festival in Ayodhya, and it is still being protested by the student wing of the BJP. The protest in turn was condemned by a group of citizens and NGOs. But it is still frightening to see how some of our citizens are so scared of the simplest truths about our own culture and history. It is frightening to think of how hard it is to stop people from inflicting violence, and how easy it is to get away with violence, if only the bogey of sex or religion is raised.

First published here

I Miei Luoghi

My first collection of essays, 'Known Turf: Bantering with Bandits and Other True Tales' was translated into Italian last year and published by Metropoli d'Asia as I miei luoghi. It has been well received by the Italian press. Here are some (rough) translations of bits excerpted from the reviews.

"We are far from the trivial triangle of poverty-spirituality-impetuous economic growth that is commonly used while writing about India... Against all stereotypes, Annie Zaidi wrote a book that can be read with pleasure"

- Sunday Literary Supplement

http://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/cultura/2012-08-19/tragedia-tutta-femminile-081502.shtml?uuid=AbbQeWQG

"A book so compelling that your mind registers it as a personal experience... After reading I Miei Luoghi, Annie Zaidi's will be the only conceivable India"

- Il Foglio

"Annie Zaidi is never neutral. Central to this books are her reactions, her dislikes, her passions, and her awareness of the fact that she is a privileged and fragile woman in a country where the birth of a female is still considered a disgrace. Thus her reportage turns into a coming of age story" 

- Rolling Stone

"Annie Zaidi tells India by telling her life. And she shows how a book can become the starting point of the relation ship between a writer and herself."

- La Lettura, Corriere della Sera 

Saving money, spending health

Ever lost someone dear to cancer? Heard of young friends and family members battling a disease at great personal and financial cost?

Oh, what we’d not do to prevent cancer, right? We debate radiation from phones. The government makes us watch gruesome videos showing oral and lung cancers in theatres.

Oddly, the state isn’t reminding us of another health risk — toxic pesticides. No warning hoardings for farm workers. No cinema slides about contaminated water. For years, we’ve known about the ‘Cancer belt’ in Punjab. In 2008, the state, well aware of the link between pesticides and cancer, started a cancer registry programme.

A recent door-to-door survey in Punjab has confirmed a higher incidence of cancer compared to the national average. It reports 33,318 cancer deaths over five years. The survey covered over 97 % percent of the population, found 23,874 patients and over 84,000 people with cancer-like symptoms. Greater numbers lay in Malwa, a region of southern Punjab that was reasonably dry, but after the Green Revolution, was irrigated heavily — often using groundwater — and pumped full of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Result?

Unsafe water, not nearly enough for drinking and bathing. Rivers and wells were found contaminated with heavy metals, chemicals or uranium. Carcinogenic residue was found in blood samples. A report from Punjab University in Patiala mentioned a high rate of DNA damage among farmers using pesticides. Those who worked with cotton, paddy and wheat suffered the most damage. A lawyer, Jagmohan Singh Bhatti, has reportedly filed a PIL against the state for not safeguarding the lives of Punjabis.

This isn’t, however, about Punjabis. There are concerns that water and food pollution will lead to more cancers of the bladder, prostrate and kidneys in other states. In Gandhinagar, Gujarat, a survey showed a worrying rise in the number of children diagnosed with cancer. Doctors from the Gujarat Cancer Research Institute were quoted as saying that child patients have nearly doubled. These findings have to be researched and double-checked, but pollution and pesticides were hinted at as possible causes.

In Karnataka, a Lok Adalat bench stated that the use of banned pesticides was leading to cervical and breast cancer among women farm workers. The court asked the department of health and agriculture to conduct a survey and also to affix responsibility – ask pesticide manufacturers to cut back on toxicity levels, reduce the hundreds of crore worth of subsidies for pesticides and fertilisers, encourage organic alternatives.

This isn’t even about farmers. Contamination goes from soil to plant to food and water. This is about all of us who live here. And yet, how great is our resistance to our own well-being!
Kerela and Karnataka are the only states to ban Endosulfan, a pesticide linked to birth defects, brain damage and reproductive toxicity. Yet, a nationwide ban did not follow. The Supreme Court finally imposed a ban in 2011, but now the government is asking the court to reconsider, because existing ‘live stock’ is due to expire, that safe disposal would cost a ‘huge amount’, that other states are willing to be Endosulfan-ned for another few months.

This ‘huge amount’ is reportedly Rs210.82 crore. I doubt the government can build and run a good multi-specialty hospital for that much money. So I’m not going to express my horror at the evil of this bargain. I’m just going to ask — do you think any baby deserves the risk of birth defects, does any farm worker in any state deserve DNA damage, just so Rs210.82 crore might be saved?

First published here

The Good Indian Girl

is now an ebook too! Those who have not possessed this delight yet, go possess at once! It used to have a much longer title before, and was rather nicely received. 


Reviews of 'The Bad Boy's Guide to the Good Indian Girl (or The Good Indian Girl's Guide to Living Loving and Having Fun)'

"At quite a few instances, it felt like reading my own experiences on print, replete with all the thrill and anguish. It was heartening. Feminist, and subtly so. I’m not given to cliches like these, but I think I’ll risk it for this particular book – this is one book that’s gonna stay with me for the rest of my life" - The Pensieve

"...it is certainly a guidebook to the interlacing lives of a group of young girls and women, the Rashomon-like dappled truths they tell about their betrayal, longing, rebellion, temptation and that minefield hopscotch of right and wrong, good and bad, in matters of friendship, status, sex, desire and occasional aspiration that makes up the lives of many Indian girls." - Paromita Vohra in Tehelka

"The GIG is full of casual mischief, surreptitious acts and carefully kept secrets... Zaidi and Ravindra’s storytelling and commentaries suffer bouts of laboured poetry but by and large, there’s a lightness in their tone that ensures The Good Indian Girl reads engagingly" - Deepanjana Pal in Mumbai Boss Recommends.

"... a book of surprisingly subversive tales in which girls interact with men, climb down rope ladders (“BIG Girls”), flirt and draw back (“Strangers”), cut themselves (“Out of Here”), are nervous and afraid around men but simultaneously willing to play along (“Finger Play”) and manipulate their perceived goodness for their own ends (“Daddy’s Girls”). They are less about emphasizing the restrictions placed on Indian women than they are about how women use and test them" - Aishwarya Subramanian in Mint 

"... unlike the more annoying fractured narratives that found currency in Hollywood movies like Crash and Mexican ones like Amores Perros, these stories grow organically, branching out and reaching heights of joy or digging roots deep down to the darker side of being a young woman in India" - Saudha Kasim

"Good Indian Girls does provide important insights into why many Indian women do the things they do, sometimes even without knowing it." - Anjana Basu in Women's Web 

"If I were asked to name this book, I would have called it “Splendid Stories of Good Indian Girls, Which Can Be Enjoyed By All.” And man, what classy stories they are. Some of them are not more than two pages long and some run to ten pages or more. Each of them is about an Indian girl, mostly good, a few bad and many who are not so good, but manage to get away with it. Zaidi and Ravindra write in excellent unobtrusive prose which is akin to high quality corn flour used in good chicken soup. You don’t really get to taste the corn flour and don’t even think of it much as you gulp down the soup, but without the quality corn flour, the soup wouldn’t be half as enjoyable." - Blog review by Vinod Joseph 

More reviews: At Justfemme

About the Good Indian Girl in The Hindu, Bangalore MetroPlus.
Desperately Seeking Savitri in Mid-Day

So, what's the story?

In his introduction to The Oxford India Anthology of Twelve Modern Indian Poets(1997), Arvind Krishna Mehrotra wrote: “To edit an anthology is an opportunity to revise the literary map, bring neglected works back in circulation, and shift the emphasis from certain poets to others.”

Over the last decade or so, there have been half a dozen anthologies focusing on modern Indian poetry, mostly in English. The Harper Collins Book of English Poetry has sought to redraw the map, and perhaps, broaden the sweep of the net. Editor Sudeep Sen writes in his foreword: “There are not enough discerning anthologies of contemporary Indian poetry published in India and even less abroad — and the few that exist have tended to be rather narrow, inward-looking, and unsatisfactory.”

Has the book succeeded in broadening the pantheon? Has it revised the literary map? Well, there are definitely a couple of new voices, such as Aditi Machado. However, one of the joys of anthologies is discovering the editor’s tastes and his engagement with the themes explored by the writers. Of what do our young poets sing? And how different are their voices from the voices we heard before?

In his introductory essay, Mehrotra dismissed Sarojini Naidu’s work outright, but also winced at how he’d compared anthologies to graveyards. He acknowledged the ongoing tussle between “the language we licked off our mothers’ teats” and English. Subsequently, in an introduction to The Bloodaxe Book of Contemporary Indian Poets , editor Jeet Thayil contended that English is no longer the ‘outside’ language. It is all around. Sen takes the argument no further. He simply sidesteps the issue by saying that including translated poems would make the book too voluminous.

The Bloodaxe anthology had 73 poets, many of whom lived outside India. The book was not such a long way off from Fulcrum’s Give the Sea Change, and It Shall Change: Fifty Six Indian Poets , also edited by Thayil, and Penguin India’s 60 Indian Poets . Many of them, if they were born after 1950, find room in the Harper Collins book. All these anthologies were published just a couple of years apart. Therefore the question begs to be asked: What changed? How different is the Harper Collins book from its cousins?

There is also the question of cohesion. Sen has arranged the 85 poets alphabetically. He chooses not to dwell on how old each poet is and when they began writing, so we get no sense of how Indian poetry has changed over the last few decades. Newness here seems a facet of age rather than sensibility. The poets are united by an Indian ancestry and the fact that they’re born after 1950. This means that contemporary poets like Adil Jussawala are not part of the ‘new’, even though his new book of poems was published recently.

Besides, there are thousands of young Indians who write poetry in English today, and hundreds who write quite well. If you add the Diaspora, the number is staggering.

Sen believes the poems speak for themselves. And there is no doubt that each poet adds a new note to the program. On the question of language itself, in Tamil, Sharmila Voorakkara writes: “ I hacked down a jungle/of a tongue from myself ”. Priscilla Uppal’s ‘Identity Crisis’ is so unexpected in its avoidance of cliché that she forces the reader to think about the cliché of identity itself. Priya Sarukkai Chabria conducts flagrant experiments like footnoting poetry.

But for an anthology to bear his imprimatur, the editor must speak for the poems too. Does Amitava Kumar’s prose-leaning ‘Forty Takes’ converse with the crystal form of Anand Thakore’s ‘Ghazal’? Do the Caribbean-influences in David Dabydeen’s ‘Slave Song’ correspond with Daljit Nagra’s ‘Phallacy’? Is the politics of Rabindra K. Swain, Amitava Kumar and Monica Mody the same colour as Rukmini Bhaya Nair’s ‘The Terrible Calamity’?

To be included in this sort of anthology is to be seen as part of a generational narrative. So the question remains: what’s the story?

Published in The Hindu Literary Review

"Burn, baby, burn" she says

"The narrative is strong and sublime in just the parts they should be, not letting the weight of the words take down the scenes you build. And, even though some pain from the prose and that striking cover picture lingers on after a read, you love it, for it’s as bitter yet true as love gets."

From HT City 

"With this collection, Zaidi presents a refreshing syntax. Poignant and poetic, each story makes one explore the magical depths, colours and the very soul of this emotion like a deep sea diver"

From The Tribune

For the love of the land

The other day, I went to a movie. As usual, we stood up for the national anthem. For some reason – perhaps because there was no video accompanying the singing – I found myself concentrating on the words of Jana Gana Mana.

An anthem is supposed to express the love a citizen feels for the nation. Our anthem is a hymn. It addresses a higher force – whatever force controls the destinies of nations – and seeks blessings for a victory. It also describes what ‘Bharat’ implies. It hints at languages, at diversity. It speaks of mountains and rivers. When we sing this hymn, we are really praying to protect all this, and the people who live on this land.

Later, I spot a girl, a teenager at the traffic signal. It’s a bit nippy in the evenings, and I start to wonder if she has warm clothes, where she lives, and what her daily sales targets look like. In her wake, a little boy appears. Shorts and a torn shirt, barefoot in the winter, waving an Indian flag.

There’s no getting away from the sight this week – tiny, cheap, China-manufactured flags in the hands of little children at traffic signals. Perhaps they were made in India after all. But how much would the worker get paid for making a cheap plastic flag?

And the kids – even if we ignore the child labour aspect, how do we ignore the fact that they are possibly homeless and almost certainly don’t have health insurance. If they are sick, they will go to hospitals where it will be impossible to get a bed. And if they cannot find the money to eat, how will they buy medicines?

For too many of us (readers of English newspapers), patriotism remains confined to the national anthem; flags; cricket matches; taking offense if somebody says India is a dark, desperate place.

But that’s just what it is for the majority. There’s a 2012 report by the Working Group on Human Rights in India and the UN. It reminds us that 77% of us live on less than Rs 20 a day. Although the average growth rate was 8.2%, the decline in poverty levels was only 0.8%. Which means that more and more people find themselves pushed to the margins.

At least 92% of our workforce is unorganized. Which means that they cannot effectively demand a share of India’s growth in the form of better working conditions or social security. Most workers lose jobs easily, are hired only occasionally, and have no pension or provident fund or health insurance.

Besides, where we have grown, the growth has been costly. The Indians who paid the price were the most vulnerable. The report estimates the number of people displaced since 1947 by ‘development’ projects at 60-65 million. 40% of them were tribals and another 40% dalits and the rural poor.

Not that our cities are glowing with health. 60% of Mumbai and 50% of Delhi still lives in slums or “informal settlements”. India’s urban slum population is over 158 million, most of whom don’t have access to safe water or sanitation.

And slums will continue to grow, because the farming sector is facing such a crisis. Official figures for farmer suicides are available for 2010 – that was 15,964 in the year, or one every 43 minutes.

This, then, is our republic – ranked 134 out of a list of 187 on the UN human development index. And while I’m glad that we’re a sovereign nation, we’d better start thinking real hard about how to make political democracy translate into human democracy. Buying flags at traffic signals won’t cut it.

First published here.

A Bill on the Table

Can you think of one thing that is common to all festivals? This element cuts across race, religion, class. This element is at the root of all civilization. This element is food.

Human beings have always appeased their gods with food and water. It is our way of saying that we acknowledge what is dearest, and we hope to always have this. If there was only one thing we could guarantee for ourselves, it would be food (and water and air). But, although we live in a democracy where the will of the masses – the undernourished masses – is supposed to prevail, we have not been able to guarantee this one small, sacred thing. Food.

I wish they’d just put it in the Constitution – that every citizen has a right to food. After all, fundamental rights such as equality, free speech, or the right to practice your religion – all of it hinges upon the right to life. A citizen who doesn’t have the means to produce food for herself/himself and the kids – a citizen who has not inherited enough land, whose access to water has been cut off – how do we guarantee life to such citizens?

For starters, a decent Food Security Act might help. Yet India has been dawdling on the National Food Security Bill. Although it aims to cover over 67% of our 1.2 billion population, the bill itself is far from ideal. Activists have argued against too much emphasis on APL-BPL. There will be questions like: Is s/he above or below the poverty line? What is the poverty line?

The Bill was cleared by the Union Cabinet in 2011 but Parliament has always been distracted by other debates. Finally, the Parliamentary Committee on Food, Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution has reportedly adopted the Food Security Bill, so this draft can be tabled in Parliament.

But the BJP in Chhattisgarh has beaten the UPA on this front. Last year, the state pushed through the Chhattisgarh Food Security Act (CFSA), whereby nearly 90% of the population will be entitled to basic foods through the Public Distribution System. It also allows free meals for children and pregnant women, and even rations to taken home, through anganwadi centres and schools. Also, keeping protein needs in mind, Chhattisgarh has followed the example of states like Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh, and included subsidized pulses in the ‘grain’ package, as well as iodized salt.

‘Priority’ households include not just landless labourers but also those who work in urban areas in the informal sector, and construction workers. What’s more, to avail of these benefits, on the ration card, the eldest adult woman in the family will be considered as the head of the household.

Computerizing the PDS is one way of trying to plug leaks, and the state is also working towards bringing these records into the public domain. It hasn’t happened overnight though. Chhattisgarh has been working at this since 2004, and reportedly, these moves are showing results. Reports say that there is a dramatic decrease in the amount of ‘diverted’ subsidized grain.

The big question, of course, will be whether we can ‘afford’ this ‘burden’. But as anyone who feeds a family knows – we just have to! We’re not talking about new toys or a fresh coat of paint. We’re talking about food. Even if every single resource has to be diverted from every alternate use, we must do it.

Unless we can commit to making land available to all citizens so we can grow our own food, and enough water for irrigation. Until that happens, we owe ourselves this much – the right to food.

Published here.

Reviews of Love Stories # 1 to 14

"Tantalisingly subtitled and numbered 1 to 14, yet arranged haphazardly—like random numbers in a slot machine—these stories tell of the chanciness of love, the odds you may or may not bet on.... The tonic to your seasonal cheer" - Outlook.

"Zaidi doesn’t distort or overly complicate her subjects, merely studies their symptoms and the effect of their desires on their actions. Neither indulgent nor critical, Zaidi offers, if not liberation, at least the comfort of sharing a fraught human emotion." - Time Out.

"So warm and attentive is the writing in Annie Zaidi's new short-story collection that it comes as a little shock when you think about what some of her characters are really going through. This book's tone is consistently hushed, reflective, shorn of hysteria — even in a description of two people arguing, with a lifetime of companionship on the line — but beneath its still surfaces there is much emotional turbulence." - Jai Arjun Singh in the Sunday Guardian.

"Zaidi rolls up her sleeves and digs in to the emotional core of her protagonists, with nary a nod to their externalities... There’s no excavation that the reader needs to perform to get to the emotional core of the characters, they’re stripped of flesh and laid bare for all to see. But in this book it works wonderfully, because Zaidi tells us such wonderful things... She has an eye for detail that would make a falcon blush... once she has you by those heartstrings, she rarely lets go." - Mid-Day

"None of the love stories in this collection by Annie Zaidi are comforting, happy-ever-afters – which is a good thing. Nothing’s tied in a bow and presented to the reader, nothing could present a danger to your teeth or sugar levels. Cloying, bland or limp, these are not." - Reader review 2 on Good Reads.

"Annie’s stories are not teen romances that are aspirational and otherworldly, but they open up small little worlds that are hidden to us and makes us wonder about the stories of people who we meet in our everyday life. Her stories are filled with real people." - Reader review 1 on Good Reads. 

"In the 14 stories, Zaidi explores every aspect of this ‘not so brief’ madness through situations that could belong to any part of the country. All the stories are characterized by a deep sense of compassion, though their titles – hashtags, aka and all – offset the compassion with a modern quirkiness." - Women's Web

"Twisted but alluring" - Indian Express

"It’s about love and its manifestation in its platonic, obsessive, unrequited, unattainable, complicated, and unpredictable forms... Zaidi manages to weave every nuance of this overwhelming emotion into stories that one can relate to. What sets the book apart is that through the fourteen stories, Zaidi covers the entire social spectrum and the complexities that accompany love in a conventional society." - Blog Review 1

More links:

http://mynascence.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/annie-zaidi-and-complicated-love/

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/twisted-tales-of-love/1047460/0

http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/JbmTaP13rI9WtcgNEC31GM/Book-Review--Halfhearted.html

A suspect piece of paper

Last week, I mentioned that a group of us had gone to Carter Road with a pledge to help create safer cities. Some men held up pledges saying they’d speak up against sexual harassment. Someone promised not to give sexist toys to kids. Someone else promised to use public transport.

One of the major reactions we got was from the police. A cop came up to ask what this was about. Since we were standing right next to a tiny chowky, it was natural for the cops to be curious. One of the girls explained, and invited a cop to join in. He declined politely, citing duties. So far, so good.

Carter Road faces a promenade lacing Bandra, a suburb in Mumbai. Families come to enjoy the sea. Joggers jog. Walkers walk. Friends of all ages sit on benches and gossip. It’s an ideal spot to address issues of public safety, without disrupting any of these activities.

Yet, minutes later, another police official arrived. He demanded to know what this was about, who we were, why we were here etc. I explained. But this cop was not satisfied. He said, “You’re supposed to take police permission.” I said, “But this is not a rally, nor a protest. It is just a bunch of friends standing with pieces of paper, taking a personal pledge.”

He wanted to know which NGO I represented. I said none; I’m just a citizen. He didn’t believe me. He kept saying that he needs to know who is ‘responsible’. I asked, “Responsible for what? Standing near the sea, holding a piece of paper?”

But apparently, establishing ‘responsibility’ was important, in case something happens. I asked what he thought might happen as a result of a few people pledging to take public transport. He had no answer. He did have a dozen questions – who I am, my full name, phone number, address. He took photos on his mobile phone. He even told me not to worry; the police wouldn’t bother me. Which would’ve been funny if it wasn’t so sad – that a citizen should have cause to worry while giving her address to the police?

I spent forty minutes arguing, persuading, pleading. He argued too, saying Mumbai doesn’t have the kind of problems other places do (aka Delhi). He began to blame youngsters for going down to the rocks, away from the promenade. Since we were talking about safety, I thought he was worried about youngsters drowning, until I realized that he was actually suggesting that their snatched moments of intimacy were a ‘safety’ problem. Then he asked us to clear off in a few minutes.

And all along, I kept wondering what kind of society we are that the cops can waste a whole hour asking people to leave a space that was created for the specific purpose of allowing us to communicate and mingle. They waste hours chasing away hapless couples, but don’t have the time or manpower to answer distress calls.

Recently, there was a report of a woman being assaulted on a beach. When she approached the nearest cops for help, they told her they had no personnel to spare, and asked her to go to the local police station. Naturally, no arrest was made.

At the heart of the security problem is this – the police force seems to be spending far too much time being suspicious of people who are not causing harm, just expressing opinions – or affection – and not enough time responding to citizens who are being subjected to violence. If the cops would only pledge to fix this one thing, we’d feel safer.

First published here

On how to begin

Begin at the very source of your need. Begin the way waterfalls begin – with a rush and headlong tumble towards the unknown depths. Crash into rocks.

Begin with the image of hurt. Most of us need to share pain, above all things. Our joys we sequester, most of us. We need them too much, and we are afraid of jealous eyes. Of jealous gods. Until we lose them. Then those joys become pain. And we are finally ready to share them with the world.

Begin with the sound of grief. Is it an absolutely still house at midnight, with the very faint sound of traffic filtering up from the bedroom window as you lie in bed, alone?

Begin with the shape of grief, its texture. Is it round, or mottled like a sulky, unattractive child? Does it look like stained gauze bandages? Does it feel like cracked heels in too-new sandals that were worn only once to a wedding where you felt you must look your very best even though you were related neither to the groom nor the bride?

Extracts from a guest post I did for the Bangalore Writers Workshop blog.