A belated happy birthday note

A young man recently visited us and noticed a sketch of Gandhi up on my wall. He asked if I liked the man. I said I did. He said he didn’t. I asked why. He said, “We were better off under the British”. So I said, “Do you know what it was like with the British?”

He changed the subject, hopping from one general statement to another about how Gandhi didn’t work. I was about to argue, then I realized he didn’t read, and hadn’t seen much of India outside of his family business and an urban college with a fairly high tuition fee.

I could have told him about satyagrah. But that gets you into trouble with most authority figures including your parents and sometimes involves a stint in jail. But perhaps, I should have told him anyway.

I’ve been thinking about Gandhi all this month. The papers were full of photos of schoolkids dressed up like him – shirtless, bald, round spectacles. It’s one way of remembering Gandhi, to suggest that we want our children to be like him. But the baldness or spectacles were the least significant aspect of him.

The critical difference between him and other Indian leaders was that he embraced our greatest nightmare – poverty. He chose hunger. He chose to walk. He chose jail.

Gandhi could have stayed out of jail. With his determination and intelligence, he could also have served the interests of our colonial masters. He could have bent the backs of other Indians further. He could have bought a car, and sent his children to London. And the children could have done the same.

Instead, Gandhi cleaned toilets because he wanted to smash a social system where some human beings are forced to do ‘dirty’ work that other human beings don’t want to do. He believed in peace between communities and was subjected to assassination attempts – from Indians – much before partition.

Gandhi dressed poor and worked like the poor because he needed to remind us – and himself – that the poor exist, and that India was a place of exploitation. The main problem with imperialism is that it leads to exploitation. People become poorer and are kept that way through unjust laws. If they rebel, they are accused of working against the ‘national’ interest.

Today, the ‘national’ interest is no longer British interests. And yet, food godowns overflow and farmers kill themselves and ‘advanced’ technology allows seeds to self-destruct. Slum-dwellers get 24 hours to move before their homes are demolished, but builders must provide comfortable alternate accommodation for ‘flat-wale’ people whose buildings must be demolished. What would Gandhi do?

Some people in Chhattisgarh must have asked themselves this question. I saw photos from Gare village in Raigarh district, where an organization led a coal satyagrah, just like the salt satyagrah in Dandi, led by Gandhi. On Oct 2 this year, villagers decided to pick up coal from the open cast mines. They were willing to pay royalties as well, and they invited local officials to measure the mined coal and give them receipts for the tax purposes. This was their way of asserting rights not only over the land but also over mineral resources.

Were they are breaking the law? I do not know. But I think they are right to want to do this. There are problems of exploitation in every district, every village. But Gandhi did leave us tools with which to fight. And perhaps, if schools had modules on Gandhian philosophy, or at least on human rights, civil rights movements and non-violent political tools, we might feel less powerless.

Published here

Of rice and ministers

What do Kashmiri militants, traditional caste-based panchayats in Haryana and the Chhattisgarh police have in common?

No, not various kinds of illegal violence. (Well, who knows?) But today, what I’m talking about is a hatred of denim pants. Jeans. That is, women wearing jeans. We’ve heard of girls getting shot at for wearing jeans in Kashmir. And now there are reports that the Chhattisgarh Police Training Academy is frowning upon policewomen in jeans.

Not just jeans, though. Apparently, they’re not supposed to wear slacks, leggings or any kind of western outfit during office hours. The funny thing is, most policewomen on active duty are actually supposed to be wearing pants. They don’t go chasing robbers (or alleged Naxals, for that matter) in sarees.

This rejection of ‘western’ denim is confined to its appearance on women’s bodies, incidentally. Male police officers are not obliged to do their bit for the preservation of Indian culture. Which makes me wonder — what were the two cops — now suspended — wearing when they molested school teachers in Rajgarh? And what were the male cops wearing when they were torturing Soni Sori? Were they in their khaki uniform pants or denim?

The Chhattisgarh police have been busy with other kinds of problematic actions too. There are allegations that one young man in Raipur was beaten up by the police, and he suffered hearing loss as a result. One Anwar Hussain was beaten up allegedly after he asked the chief minister Raman Singh a fairly reasonable question at a rally. The question was about rice production.

Perhaps Raman Singh wasn’t responsible for the thrashing. He may have asked the cops to just remove the guy who asked the question. But it was not the smartest thing to do. Especially when he’s just made the appalling public statement that a father should be punished for crimes committed by murderer or rapist sons, because it is daddy’s fault for passing on bad DNA. Clearly, his views on crime and punishment are a bit wonky.

At any rate, rice seems to be sore point with Raman Singh. Other reports suggest that he had yelled at a journalist who asked a question about rice procurement. Which wasn’t such a smart thing to do. When a politician lashes out at those who raise questions, it just confirms everyone’s worst suspicions. So, now, I’m really starting to wonder what’s going on with rice in the troubled state of Chhattisgarh.

Because troubled it surely is. If Raman Singh was serious about fixing it, he’d get serious about rice. He might look at reports coming in from citizens, and hear of people in Surguja district who have not been paid their dues for six months. He would hear of anganwadi workers in Bastar who have not been paid for months.

He might hear that forest-dwelling people would prefer not to have agricultural universities, as minister Sharad Pawar seems to be promising. They might think that they already know their agriculture. They might prefer it if forest land was not given over to coal mining.

Raman Singh would do well to prepare himself for criticism in coming weeks. If the India Against Corruption workers are to be believed, they’re busy digging up dirt in the state because they believe that “Corruption is the root cause behind the Maoist problem.”

I don’t know about the Maoists, but the people of ‘affected’ districts like Dantewada probably don’t want a college for the unemployed, which Raman Singh seems to be offering. I think they would prefer not to be made unemployed in the first place.

First published here.

Five reasons I am angry this bright Tuesday morning

I live in a country where a woman chief minister can attribute the awful, unforgiveable crime of rape to men and women, boys and girls actually acknowledging each other's existence on the same planet, and she can remain in office. This leader seems not to know the difference between violent assault and voluntary holding of hands, and she is expected to make and enforce laws.

I live in a country where feudal dens of patriarchy that have consistently defied the Constitution of my country are allowed to function. These community 'leaders' can attribute the unforgiveable crime of rape to the eating of chowmein, and they are not taken to the nearest mental asylum to be locked up until their own hormonal or moral imbalances are sorted out.

I live in a country where a popular Punjabi rapper sings of bloodying panties and instead of being being spanked bloody (I'm almost certain he secretly longs for this), he's given work in the mainstream Hindi film industry. Not one singer/lyricist/filmmaker sees it fit to send him to the re-education program he very obviously needs. I live in a country where it seems people fork over their hand-earned money to pack concerts where this creature performs, and I can't do a damn thing about it.

I live in a country where I suspect bribes were paid on my account (though without my knowledge) to enable me to rent a house. And I can't do a damn thing about that either because there's no way of proving anything now, and if I tried, I'd only raising hell for both the real estate agents who were helping me actually find a place.

I live in a country where no service - public, private or cooperative - responds easily to any kind of customer request. Whether it is information or the actual service being offered, you have to claw your way to it. And despite the internet being available, there is no way of reaching companies or their complaint addressal systems. You send an email, no response. You call and you refer to the email, no response. You shout and threaten an escalation of the issue at hand, and you may get a tiny grudging response. You will probably still have to spend time and money going to their offices and drain yourself out by shouting some more.

And it bothers me because things don't work like this in other countries. We do not have to be this way. We want to 'develop' but our idea of development is building glass-fronted stores instead of actually providing the service or product those stores contain. I'm sure the executives who man the customer call phone lines like to shop for foreign brands in new malls. They just don't want to be as good as the best brands who snap to attention the moment a customer expresses dissatisfaction. And I am tired and drained by the whole mess before I've even had breakfast.

Baby blues

I wonder who decided to name her. As a baby name, it isn’t one of my favourites: Ahuti means sacrifice. There she was — three months old and beaten to death. And nobody really knows why. Ahuti’s mother has been arrested. The police say she’s admitted to beating the baby, and being unable to cope with the child’s constant crying.

I think about Dharmishtha Joshi too (Who named her? What sort of childhood did she have?).Some counselors are already being quoted in snap articles, suggesting that we as a culture are getting to be more intolerant, angrier.

But I think of Dharmishtra Joshi, alone at home, trying to cope with two infants (and one recently dead); a frequently absent husband with whom she clearly did not have strong, tender bond. She was furious about something. Or about many things. And because she didn’t know what to do with her fury, she lashed out at the baby.

What life did Dharmishtha dream of? Did she want those children? If she did not want to bring up those children, what would she do with them?

We ought to condemn her violence, but we also need to think of the consequences of burdening women with reproduction without changing our social and moral ecosystem. In the current environment, a woman faces less flak for beating her own children than for refusing to have children, or offering to give up her children to foster care if she feels unable to cope.

For all our breast-beating about the falling sex ratio, there is less moral outrage about dead daughters than discotheque-going daughters.

Now, there is talk of updating our laws to check female foeticide. There are plans to monitor women’s wombs, keep tabs on each pregnancy. In effect, we’d like the female child to exist because we’re worried about a nation with not enough females in it, but we don’t particularly care about what the female child wants from her own life.

There is talk of amending anti-dowry laws, to prevent misuse. But there is no acknowledgment of the fact that any family willing to give dowry has no business crying about it later. There is not one politician in our country who is willing to run an anti-dowry campaign along the lines of: “Don’t stay with a husband who wants dowry. Get out. Don’t try to ‘save’ a marriage through money.”

In fact, some states encourage dowry indirectly, coming up with schemes that give money to girls when they attain marriageable age instead of giving it out in the form of scholarships or vocational training; chief ministers enabling ‘kanyadaan’ so that the community bears the cost of the wedding feast. There is no clear dismissal of unaffordable feasts.

The focus of most women-centric laws is prosecution: Who can you nail? The woman? Her husband? The doctor? The radiologist? But we refuse to grapple with the moral hypocrisy that makes such laws necessary.

We need to understand that we cannot protect baby girls in a culture where grown women are not protected. In an ecosystem where panchyats can declare that marriage is a good way of preventing rape, where people aren’t free to choose a mate, where there is no way of getting out of a motherhood that one may or may not have signed up for — can we expect gentle mothers?

And so, sad as I am about Ahuti, I am also sad for Dharmishtha. I cannot imagine what demons plague her mind, but I do know that marriage and motherhood are often just ways of gaining respectability, and buying peace, or freedom from assault. Which is a hard, cruel bargain.

First published here.

Try growing your LPG

A family outing was spoilt recently after we got into an argument about prices, economic policy and so on. It started with a comment made by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, to explain the new LPG and diesel prices. He reportedly said that upping prices wouldn’t hurt the poor directly, since LPG wasn’t meant to be the poor man’s fuel anyway.

Which brought me to that awkward question — what is the poor man’s fuel?

I agree that LPG and even kerosene should not be subsidised. Subsidizing non-renewable fuels is the worst long-term policy we could invest in. But these fuels are getting too expensive even for the middle class. So what should the nation cook with? Wood?

Even at the cost of my lungs, say I was willing to use a wood-fired stove. Would I then be allowed to cut trees? But in general, people are not allowed to cut trees without permission.

An argument was put forward — the poor should be planting more trees, and then cutting them down for the wood. But that brought me to another question — what have the non-poor done to deserve petrol or LPG?

If the poor grow their own firewood, they probably have a right to it. But how will affluent citizens ‘grow’ the gas they consume? And if they cannot replace LPG, then why do we expect that the poor will replace any trees they cut down?

One could argue that it is not the poor who ‘discover’ coal or gas. Somebody invests money in locating it. Somebody else extracts it, refines it, delivers it to the market. Those who can afford it, buy it. If most of us can’t afford to buy fuel in the market, how can it be helped?

But then, who is to say who had the right to the fuel in the first place? Say, person X wants to acquire fuel and market it. The fuel sits inside a piece of land owned by a village, ABC. Here, people have a bit to eat, and most people have work of some kind. The village does not want to sell to X. So X goes to the government to ask for help. The government has been elected by the majority of the people, mostly villagers like ABC. But instead of siding with ABC, as it ought, the government sides with X. It buys up land from ABC at low prices, claiming it is doing so for overall ‘development’, and gives it to X to exploit as he will.

The process might create some jobs. Say, A finds work, but B and C don’t. In fact, A’s job might place him in conflict with B or C. The soil or water or air may get polluted to the point of causing health damage.

X sells fuel to Y, who sells it further to Z, who sells it to all citizens, including ABC, who buy it if they can afford it. X makes a profit, Y makes a profit, Z makes a profit. As for ABC… well, too bad, eh?

Chances are that ABC can neither buy LPG nor do they have enough land or water for their work to translate into loose cash. If they migrate to cities, they may not have space to grow trees for firewood. And if they plant on public land, how do they prove that such and such tree is their own and they are entitled to cut it down?

So, although I understand the need to stop fuel subsidies, it would be really nice if the Prime Minister spent some time thinking about this – what, exactly, is the poor man’s fuel?

First published here.

Made of words

In the beginning, there was probably no word. More likely, it was a sound, or a tiny movement. Perhaps, it was no more than the invisible blink of a formless divine eyelash. Perhaps, it was a rogue electron. Or perhaps, the 'beginning' as we know it was the moment when we decided to be us - speaking animals with words as their primary currency.

Perhaps that is why we tip-toe around words. Because we trade through words before we give of our time and energy or possessions. We bind ourselves in word cages - legal agreements, contracts, the Constitution, the penal code. We conduct our rituals through words -- wedding vows, mantras, Quran readings, election manifestos and parliamentary speeches, obituaries. And of course, we educate and entertain ourselves with words - songs, fairytales, religious kathas, radio programs, and of course, books. Where we cannot easily depend on words, we turn to image -- election symbols, cave paintings, films.

So yes, we have reason to fear words. Words run us. And we can only make the world run the way we'd like it to, if we can control words. So we seek to contain the words that frighten us. We try to erase them from public view, and eventually, public memory. We hope they will die out, though we aren't yet sure what the world will be like without those words, without their meanings, without the people who utter them.

It is hard, of course, to control words. Harder than it is to control images. People talk all the time. They fight wars and give up their lives for the sake of the words they use, and the meaning those words lend to their lives. You can't shut up every whisper of the night. You can't fight lullabyes. You can't fight the language of dreams. You can't get rid of words that are written in sand or snow. The less tangible they are, the cleverer, the stronger. 

But you can fight words printed on paper, or spoken out loud on a stage. You can threaten to kill them because you can kill the people who speak them, write them. And so, you try.

In our own way, we are all part of this conspiracy to get rid of words. It's not just the right wing. It's every wing. We know of pseudo-religious militants who kill writers. We know of re-education programs in technically non-religious nations. We know of democracies who arrest people for writing a pamphlet. 

But we also know of ourselves, don't we? 

I will confess. I have thought to myself that some writers and speakers ought to be banned. Because I have thought of the consequences. I support controls on hate-speech after all. When a court summons a leader who is trying to cause rifts between communities, I am glad. I consider it a sign of sanity, of safety. When a leader is jailed for exhorting people to kill, I am relieved. 

Sometimes I begin to think, with what face do I say, 'Let's not ban books'? How can I say, 'Let us not discriminate between what is worthy of a ban and what isn't'? 

I worry about this question. Is it right to ask for uncompromised free speech? Where do we lay down the law? Free Speech can't be free if it is constrained by ideas of what is acceptable and what isn't. If, for instance, somebody believes in sex with minors, or minors born with mental difficulties, and writes a book extolling the idea, what are we to do?

If somebody writes a book putting forth the notion that parents should have a right to get rid of unwanted children at any point -- before or after birth -- what are we to do? If someone puts forward a proposition that anyone who eats the meat of fish should be quartered and drawn, what are we to do?

And if we are not to ban these ideas, what are we to do? How can we say that other people should not seek bans on ideas that we find harmless, or even necessary? 

I struggle with this question. Because hate speech worries me. Child pornography worries me. The extolling of plastic surgery as a lifestyle choice worries me. But if you are stupid enough to kill or maim yourself or someone else just because a book/advertisement/website is telling you to, who is to blame? The words, or you? And if it is you, what good will banning the book do? 

If you are a killer -- or even just a damager of property -- and the people who run the judicial systems in your country have not been able to deter you, what will be accomplished by banning the books that inspire you?

On the other hand, a child is made or unmade by the words s/he is exposed to. How do we hold a person responsible wholly for their crimes without also holding those responsible who formed their minds? 

Like I said, I struggle. But first of all, we must answer this question: Are we willing to let each person take the fall for his actions, or are we going to allow him to get away, using another man's (or woman's) words as his excuse. I suspect, when we have held each adult to account to his actions, we might fear his words a little less. 

Fish-eaters enclave

Blurbs that promise oddities – ‘a manipulative-philanthropist ghost of a chairman’s mother; a footless whore in Siberia…’ – make one nervous these days. An outlandish cast of characters and wild leaps of fancy are no longer novelties in modern fiction. But there is a risk that the fantastical elements plucked out for the back of the book might be the most interesting thing about it.

Happily, this is not true of Lopa Ghosh’s ‘Revolt of the Fish Eaters’. The nine stories in this collection are compelling and Ghosh does deliver on the promise of taking you into a zone of glass towers, elevators, and recession-struck businesses.

‘The Chairman’s Mother’ tells the fate of a high-flying, award-winning executive after his dead mother begins to haunt him. She distracts him from the pursuit of profit by talking incessantly of floods. ‘Siberia’ tells the heartache of a professionally content research analyst whose school sweetheart has gone off to work in Siberia, and their conversation is mainly online. ‘Red Shoe’ tells of the encounter between a gritty young woman who has worked hard to pull herself up the corporate ladder, and a red pair of sexy heels that can no longer be bought for love or money.

‘Corporate Affairs’ is the most corporate story in this collection. It tells of a senior executive, an American, who is handing over his own responsibilities and during the course of a farewell dinner, discovers the conspiracies that have been brewing behind his back.

‘Richest Man in the World’ is not strictly a tale of the corporate world. The main protagonist is a slum-dwelling school-girl who is receiving a computer education at a center run by an NGO, thanks to a very rich man, while her abandoned mother howls and shouts and turns to black magic.

‘Death by Pineapples’ is the only tale here that unapologetically dives into magic-realism, for it is set in a plains town that finds itself overnight transformed into a hill town. It tells the story of a talented executive who is thrown out of his job for no fault of his, but the reference to climate change is obvious.

‘The Lockout’ is this reviewer’s personal favourite. This is the only story that is not just set in the world of corporations and the conflicts presented to their employees, it most directly reaches for the gruesome edge of employer-employee relations. What makes it refreshing is that the story is told as witnessed by the very young daughter of a top manager dealing with irate workers during a factory lockout. The victim label is hard to attach and politics doesn’t tip the story off its centre.

The only story that is more politics than business is the one that lends its title to the collection. It is also the one that offers the least surprise, the least tension. It attempts to traverse so much terrain – art, class war, elections, media, love affairs – that the reader is left with only a hazy impression of its context and purpose.

Overall, these stories are memorable. Ghosh successfully imprints her protagonists with a human ache, so that their financial and social drive lies crumpled around their ankles. This, along with a lucid, insistent narrative style, makes the book a worthy inhabitant of your ‘new writing’ shelf.

Published here.

This awkward business of sedition

Once upon a time, a man wrote three letters. He wrote that he hadn’t heard from his correspondent in a while. He talked of the gulf between rich and poor, of the need for propaganda, of how their organisation needed to do more to achieve their goals.

These letters were carried by a doctor. The doctor was subsequently arrested. For sedition. Which means that his actions hurt the nation.

Dr Binayak Sen was already known for the years he spent serving the poor, providing medical aid that the government should have been providing. He was then accused of waging war against all of us. Those letters he carried were written by a sick senior citizen called Narayan Sanyal, who was in jail for Maoist/Naxalite activities.

In a new book, The Curious Case Of Binayak Sen, journalist Dilip D’Souza points out that the judge who found Binayak Sen guilty offered the interpretation that a letter describes certain murders as reactionary. But the letter does not mention the word ‘murder’ at all. At another place, the wording has been twisted around. Instead of a request for ‘MR’ to send funds for ‘friends here’, the judge interprets it as a request to send money to a person or group called ‘MR’.

D’Souza mentions that there are people who dislike Dr Sen because of his alleged support of Maoists, or even just because he was trying to help Sanyal in jail. The author describes his own brief brush with the law. 

D’Souza writes that he — along with some other men — was once arrested for travelling in the Ladies compartment of a local train in Mumbai. He was bailed out and asked to appear in court. The other men did not appear in court. They had already bribed their way to freedom.

Which brings us to this awkward business of corruption. Now a cartoonist called Aseem Trivedi is accused of doing the nation harm. He drew a cartoon that seemed to suggest that the lions on our national emblem have turned into wolves, their mouths dripping blood. Their motto reads: Bhrashtamev Jayate. The Corrupt Win.

Whether it was a good cartoon or not is a separate matter. But it did citizens no harm. It did the national emblem no harm. The emblem remains where it was, engraved on a pillar. As for our motto, Satyamev Jayate, it should be engraved on our hearts. But seeing how corrupt we actually are, how every law turns into an opportunity for someone in governance or administration to extract money illegally from harried citizens, Trivedi was probably just telling the truth as he felt it.

So who does that cartoon actually damage? It damages, I suppose, our image of ourselves. That image of us being lion-hearted defenders of the truth.

If only we were. If only our policemen arrested people who do damage the nation. If only the policemen themselves did not damage the nation.

In D’Souza’s new book, he quotes historian Ramchandra Guha, who has written of his encounter with a Muria tribal in a jail in Chhattisgarh. Dabba Boomaiah had a job as a labourer on a lift irrigation project. One day he offered to take a road-building crew to the Bhopalpatnam police station. The police began to quiz him about Naxal activity in the area and pressured him to become a vigilante, via the Salwa Judum. When he refused, he was arrested.

Neither Guha, nor D’Souza, nor I, know what has happened to poor Dabba since. Let us hope he is out of jail, at home, safe. Perhaps, he is considering engraving upon his lion heart, the words: Satyamev Jayate.

First published here.

Smoke that!

What would you make of a man who told your daughter that it is her duty to suffer violence? And what would you do if this man happened to be the person to whom we all turn for justice?

A certain Justice Bhaktavasala has gained notoriety recently for his handling of ‘family matters’ — which means divorce or domestic violence cases. First he rebuked an unmarried lawyer for arguing a divorce case, implying that she couldn’t possibly understand the significance of marriage. He also forced the estranged couple to spend time together though they were reluctant; at least, the woman was.

There was a minor furor when this judge confronted another young woman who was getting beaten up by her husband — in public, and sometimes at night when she’d be thrown out of the house. Reports quote Justice Bhaktavatsala as saying: “Women suffer in all marriages. You are married with two children, and know what it means to suffer as a woman... Your husband is doing good business, he will take care of you. Why are you still talking about his beatings? I know you have undergone pain. But that is nothing in front of what you undergo as a woman."

He proceeded to ask the woman if her father had never beaten her mother, and cited the example of the film actor Darshan, whose wife went back to live with him despite reports of violence. When her lawyer produced photographs showing the young woman’s face after being assaulted, this judge is reported to have said: “You have to adjust… You have to give him a divorce or go with him... What is on your mind and what is on your agenda?”

If the honorable judge had been getting beaten up himself, he might have had a slightly different take on the matter. But anyway, my problem is not his personal attitude to wife-beating. That is his own wife’s or his daughters’ problem. My problem is his disregard for the law.

Petitions were sent out to the Chief Justice at the High Court in Karnataka and eventually, ‘family matters’ was taken away from Justice Bhaktavatsala. While this is a relief, it is also horrid to know that this man is not likely to be penalised for this blatant defiance of the very laws he is supposed to uphold. God knows how many lives have been destroyed along the way.

Last year, a Bangalore resident had filed a petition seeking to be reunited with his wife. He claimed that she was being illegally detained by her parents. Justice Bhaktavatsala had remarked that the Hindu Marriage Act ought to be amended so a girl under 21 could no longer marry without the permission of her parents.

And thisman, who would rather send a loving husband to jail than the violent man who beats his wife, is being paid by all of us. To think that I work hard and pay taxes to enable this man’s livelihood!

He isn’t the only one with strange ideas about women. V Shekhar who was representing the health ministry in the Supreme Court, made statements like: “Indian tradition doesn’t permit a lady to smoke.”

Which makes me wonder if Shekhar even knows who India is. With my own eyes, I’ve seen women smoking in Rajasthan, in Madhya Pradesh, in Maharashtra, in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh (I haven’t travelled much in the south or northeast). None of these women were urban, nor did they watch many films. They were as ‘traditional’ as they come. They had their beedis or chillums, often in front of children. And they enabled and passed on culture. Smoke that!

First published here.

Short 2

And here is a new short film I made. It was great fun working with the actors. The whole thing was shot in a day and a half. Feedback welcome.

The Millionaire Effect

When I first went to Dharavi I wasn't wearing my middle-class-gawker glasses. I was researching a story on successful businessmen and already knew the sprawling slum was host to industries ranging from plastics to pottery, tanneries and bakeries. I knew there was serious money involved and also that the slum once tagged the largest in Asia (currently, the Orangi township in Karachi is the largest, according to the United Nations) is no longer even the largest in Mumbai.

The UN defines a slum as a run-down urban area, "characterised by substandard housing and squalor and lacking in tenure security". While these characteristics do exist in the 557 acres that comprise Dharavi, that the definition is inadequate becomes apparent as soon as you set foot there.

Which brings us to the other question – if you could avoid it, why would you set foot in a slum?  Yet a whole lot of people are doing just that, and paying for the privilege. There are at least four tour operators within Dharavi that offer guided tours, charging between Rs 500 to 2500 per head, depending on whether you want a private tour or travel in a group. There are no clear figures, but based on operator estimates, in 'season' – roughly from the end of October until March – Dharavi has thousands of visitors.

Call it the Slumdog Millionaire effect, or just that old thing, curiosity. People have always wanted to discover the lives of the 'other': the phrase 'slumming it' comes from members of the upper class touring poor neighbourhoods in London and New York in the nineteenth century. Indian cities have no dearth of squalor, poverty or insecurity. Mumbai has slums, or slum-like conditions, in almost every suburb. But what distinguishes Dharavi is its unique economic ecosystem. The poor don't just go there to sleep. They create wealth.

Krishna Pujari, who runs Reality Tours and Travels, lived in the Prateekshanagar slums for two years but says that Dharavi offers a unique experience. He says since 2006, when he co-founded the firm, Dharavi has changed. "Slum policies are changing too. People also work for BPOs, MNCs, hotels. There are schools and hospitals. Infrastructure is better but nowhere close to good. And we get more and more tourists. Perhaps, people are developing a social conscience. Or maybe they are just intrigued."

This curiosity is not always appreciated though. Pujari himself admits it was hard at first. "When Chris Way, one of our partners, first visited Mumbai, I took him to Dharavi. People said, 'Take him to Malabar Hill or the Gateway. Why are you bringing him here to show off our poverty and filth?' So, I asked, 'Do you think you are poor and dirty?' They said, no. I said, 'So, let him see that you're not'."

Since then, resident tour guides have taken a measure of pride in 'their area'. Fahim Vora, 24, says that when he was first approached to be a guide, he baulked. "I felt, 'What? Bringing those people to my area?' But I did it once, and realised that nobody really minds."

Fahim was working with Reality at the time but soon developed independent ambitions. Along with partner Tauseef Siddiqui, he set up 'Be The Local' in 2010. Now they employ other Dharavi boys, mostly college students, as tour guides.

Pujari trains English-speaking students for a month on the history and economic spread of Dharavi. He says he prefers to take students "from humble backgrounds" and also works with government schools and local teachers. The firm also supports some NGOs either through money or the use of their space and skills. They help fund a girls' football team. But the tour itself, he says, is like an empowerment program for young people who cannot find jobs.

The guides agree. Despite 'knowing' English in theory, Fahim couldn't draft a coherent email until he started the job and Tauseef didn't have the confidence to talk to people until his first tour. For students, there's some pocket money to be made and the chance to meet interesting people. Nilesh Vaidya, a student who has worked with Reality for six months now, says that he has grown from being a shy, silent type into an aspiring radio jockey. Since he lives in the Mahalakshmi Dhobi Ghat area, his learnings have been greater. "I came here for an interview, and that was my introduction to Dharavi. I'd heard of the filth and the bhai-goondas (goons, often those with mafia links). But now I say every Indian should visit this place once," he says.

But few Indians do. Even those who live an easy cab ride away are uncurious, perhaps nervous about going into a slum. Deepa Krishnan, who organises tours through Mumbai Magic, says she gets at least 500 visitors a year but most are overseas tourists, ranging from "upscale" to backpackers.

Some like Emily Lawrence, 20, already have some exposure. "I'd seen a documentary. It looked interesting and I was curious." She'd never seen this sort of slum in the UK, but conditions were better than expected. "I was surprised by how people live together in these cramped spaces and are still so organised. I didn't expect that."

And then there are visitors like Anna Wagner, 22, who takes Bollywood dance lessons in Austria. She wanted to see the city where the films get made but she also wanted to find out more about Dharavi. To her surprise, the streets were not full of people begging on the streets. "They are all working," she said, adding that she wishes her Indian host, who lives in Mumbai, would visit too. "More upper and middle class Indians should go. It is more important for them."

There are Indians who do visit slums on work, of course, but they'd rather not go as tourists. Suman, a volunteer at a social school (name changed, because she prefers to remain anonymous) is critical of this "exhibition of misery". She believes that instead of sensitising them, slum tours merely gives tourists something to talk about at home. "It's an ego boost, making them feel blessed because they don't have to live in such conditions." She was particularly riled by a note on the Internet (posted by 'Bollywood Tours') that says 'their life is full of struggle for existence but still make them happy'. Suman wants to know, "How can they be happy? There is a don in every lane; the men are crippled by bad habits and they force their women to work and bring home money to buy more booze... Slum tours show none of this. For God's sake, these people are not freaks or animals in a zoo that we need organised tours!"

People certainly don't want to be seen that way, which is why most tour companies have a no-photo policy. Rajesh Prabhakar, a researcher who co-founded the Red Press and Media, and a life-time resident of Dharavi, says that people have become especially sensitive after the movie Slumdog Millionaire. "They still hurt about being called 'dogs'. Besides, the depictions of life were false. That toilet scene, for instance, belongs to the 1950s, not the '90s," he says.

Some parts, according to Prabhakar, were shot guerrilla-style, which makes people suspicious of cameras now. Recently, a friend of his was interrogated in the Rajiv Gandhinagar area when he was out shooting without permission. When hutments near an important water pipeline were demolished last year, residents believe it was because of foreigners taking pictures and the media publishing them, though it turned out the municipality did so for different reasons.

On my first visit, attempts to discuss the fruit business with a banana vendor were firmly rebuffed. But I did have a long, rambling conversation with L. Kannan, who runs the Murugan Laundry. As I sipped on a bottle of cola (which he insisted on), he gave me the shop's history, living conditions – the lanes are so narrow that if you have a medical emergency and an ambulance needs to be brought in, god help you – and his hopes for his sons. All along, his hands were busy, ironing.

On that trip, I'd been led by Prabhakar, who doesn't do conventional tours. "I take people to meet people. I don't take them to pre-decided spots. I take them to families. I can arrange for you to spend a few hours just talking to a potter, for instance. But if you say you want to do a tour tomorrow, within two hours, I can't do that."

The debate about the ethics of slum tourism is an old one. Some claim that it helps to bridge the psychological divide between rich and poor. A Wall Street Journal article has talked about how 'philanthropic travel' – that seems to be politically correct term – is growing, with large international travel firms diversifying into slums. But it poses the question of whether this could help 'bridge' the gulf of understanding between rich and the poor, especially if the traffic is one-way. Surely, the poor too must be allowed to see how the rich live, and where they work?

The question is interesting but perhaps, a bit unfair. After all, the upper classes in India areexposed to the scrutiny of slum residents who work in their homes or offices. It is the reverse which almost never happens. Tour operators believe that they are helping tear down negative stereotypes. In fact, Deepa Krishnan emphasizes, "This (Dharavi) is not a 'slum' tour. If you are expecting extreme poverty and despair based on movie depictions, you will be disappointed."

Even in Indian movies, locals complain, Dharavi is represented as squalid and dangerous, full of dons, drunks or drug addicts. But the young men who work as tour guides insist that the problem is no larger than it is elsewhere in Mumbai. It is just that Dharavi's problems have nowhere to hide.

First published in the Sunday Guardian.

A little justice

A few days ago, there was much relief when Ajmal Kasab, the man who killed innocent people in Mumbai, would hang after all. The Supreme Court had decided. There was no doubt about his guilt, of course. It was only a question of time. And though the wheels of justice turn slow, we needed to know that they do indeed turn.

And therefore, it was an even bigger relief to hear about the conviction of BJP MLA Maya Kodnani, and Babu Bajrangi, formerly of the Bajrang Dal, for inciting mass murder during the Gujarat riots in 2002. About 29 others were convicted too, but we were actually sort of surprised about Bajrangi and Kodnani. These two won’t hang, but if the Special Court’s verdict holds, they might spend their lives in jail, especially Bajrangi. This is so rare for riot cases in India that even if we — well, many of us — were convinced of their guilt, we were sceptical of their ever getting punished.

We have had a terrible track record of punishing rioters, even those who commit horrific crimes, but most importantly, we have rarely punished political leaders or those who have links to the government. Justice Jyotsna Yagnik certainly isn’t the first judge to convict a rioter, but her judgment comes at a time when citizens have very little faith in institutions. Elected representatives, administrative officials, even judges and prosecutors are assumed to be either corrupt or cowardly. And nothing is as damaging to the fabric of a democracy as a lack of faith in the law. 

The road to justice is very long one. There are appeals and counter-appeals, especially if the rioters have more money than the victims. Gujarat 2002 is already a decade ago. Kodnani’s career actually flourished. As for the victims’ careers, I can only imagine how they’re doing.

Actually, I can’t imagine. But I did read a report about riot victims recently. This wasn’t about Gujarat 2002. It was about Kandhamal 2008. A wave of violence was unleashed after Laxamananda Saraswati, who was affiliated to the Sangh Parivar, was killed allegedly by the Communist Party of India (Maoist). Thirty eight people were killed. There were instances of gang-rape and torture. Around 5,600 homes were burnt and 55,000 ‘minority’ people across 415 villages were displaced.

Last month, a fact-finding team visited 16 of these villages. Most of the riot victims used to work as labourers in fields or homes belonging to ‘other communities’. Now they are either not given work or they are too afraid to go. They can’t get temporary work offered by the rural employment guarantee scheme, because that’s controlled by local leaders with majority muscle.

The team found that 10,000 people who fled during the riots have not returned home. Some tried to return, but were told they’d have to convert. Most victims in Kandhamal were Christian dalits or tribals. According to the fact-finding team, they can’t get caste certificates now because the administration issues certificates on the basis of "recommendations" from leaders, and these leaders are often affiliated to right-wing groups like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad.

Many people were convicted for the Kandhamal riots by a fast-track court, and cases are still pending. And the Odisha government did offer compensation — Rs50,000 for houses that were completely burnt and Rs20,000 for partly damaged ones. But people lost more property than that. They lost pots, ploughs, crops, documents (like certificates and land records), schools, hospitals, NGOs, churches. How do you go about compensating the loss of the things that people call ‘home’? How long does it take to collect all the pieces of life and start over?

First published here.

Knocking on god's door

So word is that our billionaire Member of Parliament Vijay Mallya, donated doors worth Rs60 lakh to a temple. With Kingfisher Airlines in serious trouble, employees have not been paid for months. Some of them finally began to strike, which led to flight cancellations. Instead of reassuring his employees, though, Mallya asked them to leave if they had no faith. His own faith, of course, is not in question, given that he is running to temples with such rich offerings.

I can’t help but wonder, what makes a man, perhaps one with a measure of self-respect, do this? 

Donating golden doors to the lord, but expecting the government — which is you and me — to help tide over a financial crisis? If he has Rs60 lakh to spare, the moral thing to do would be to pay his workers, or else, donate to the government. He could have created a welfare fund for his employees, so that those who face personal emergencies could borrow money. Or he could have donated to the Prime Minister’s Relief Fund. He could even have fed all the hungry people in Bangalore for a day. What made him spend on a door?

I suppose it comes from a certain conception of god. In Mallya’s conception of god, He prefers nice doors on one of His innumerable houses to a just society where people actually get paid on time. This god rewards pricey gifts, not a commitment to your own employees. But if you can only weigh yourself (and other people) against material possessions, then the only thing you will bring — even to the lord — is an expensive object.

If you are this sort of person, then you probably have very odd ideas about where wealth comes from, and what you owe people who help you get rich. The earth, its minerals, its capacity for heat, water, the trees, their fruit — all this existed before you were born, and in a nation, it technically belonged to all citizens equally. You were fortunate enough to inherit a larger chunk of these resources, and then you hired other citizens to work, so that you could harness even more resources. You took bank loans, which are enabled through millions of other people and their savings and investments. But if you are a decent sort, you try to acknowledge their very legitimate concerns about their future. You try not to sound like you were doing them a favour. You very definitely don’t take money that morally belongs to your workers, and offer it up to god as a personal gift.

Perhaps, Mallya should have offered his donation to the ruling party in his home state. The Karnataka government reportedly wanted to invest in a new form of drought relief — ordering pujas at about 35,000 temples to appease the rain gods. The money for this would have come from our taxes, if there had not been an immediate outcry.

Speaking of favours and temples, we certainly don’t seem to believe in the equality of all citizens, especially before the gods. It has taken us this long to stop the VIP ‘pass’ system at temples in states like Tamil Nadu. But the state still wants a list of ‘exceptionally treated’ persons, including IAS officers and judges, who can get special appointments with the gods. ‘Security concerns’ are being cited. Clearly, the administration doesn’t trust in god alone when it comes to personal safety. Perhaps they should look to their colleagues in Karnataka. As Mallya puts it, if you lack faith, leave.

First published here.

Anaaj to anaaj, bora bhi durlabh

I don’t know much about Latehar, a district in Jharkhand, and what’s been happening there. When I ran a search online, I found one news item about how there are fewer wolves in the wolf sanctuary in Latehar, and a few items about Naxal violence. For instance, an attack on an independent Member of Parliament, Inder Singh Namdhari.

There’s also an item about how a village called Sarju — or Sarayu — that used to be a Maoist ‘hotbed’ is on its way to development. A special development programme has been initiated to bring about political mobilisation, social justice and security. Security forces are camping out there already. There is now talk of education and drinking water and sanitation and even building a stadium. There isn’t much talk of food, though.

The reason I was interested in Latehar was that there was some mention of a recent protest in Manika block, where activists were demanding that the government’s grain godowns be opened and food distributed to the hungry. This was barely a day or two after Independence day, when the chief minister Arjun Munda made a speech promising food security.

Perhaps, there is reason to worry. The public distribution system is very important in Jharkhand, which doesn’t grow enough food to meet its needs, and has a very high incidence of poverty (official poverty, which means not enough calories) compared to the all-India average. The ‘poor’ constitute nearly 50% of the rural population. Besides, state scientists also fear a 40% reduction in rice harvests this year, thanks to the delayed monsoon.

Forty percent is a lot less than usual, and even the usual picture isn’t pretty. A June 2012 video on Videovolunteers, filmed by a community correspondent, suggests that people don’t get food grains every month at the local PDS shop and certainly not their full quota of 35 kilos. Most get only about 30 kilos. Meanwhile, a block official explained that about five kilos might have been shaved off to account for the weight of the jute sack.

This business of jute sacks is also quite strange. Apparently, last year India’s food production went up to 250 million tonne. This should be a cause for joy. But in Raisen, farmers were protesting — and the police was opening fire — because the state wasn’t buying their grain. Meanwhile, the chief minister of Madhya Pradesh was blaming the central government, and threatening to go on hunger strike. The reason was a shortage of jute sacks.

Because if there are no sacks, then farmers cannot transport their harvest. There was a similar problem in Uttar Pradesh. Reports say, some farmers in Punjab have committed suicide because of this. Oddly enough, reports also say that jute farmers in Bengal are burning their own crops because the prices of jute have crashed. Which is strange, given that there is such a great demand, and considering that India and Bangadesh produce most of the world’s jute.

Perhaps farmers in Jharkhand should try growing jute, or some organic substitute. The state also has high rates of unemployment, although the state’s per capita income is on par with the rest of India. Which means there are many more poor people who desperately need work, and a few people who have a lot of money. Which reminds me of activist Niyamat Ansari, who was killed days after he helped expose fraud in an NREGA scheme in Latehar district. Which means that some local officials were stealing our money by creating fake documents using the names of really poor — and hungry — citizens. I would like to know if these officials are in jail. I hope they are.

First published here

the rape sketch

When the latest rape-related story came to us via the morning papers, it came with some form of visuals attached. An attempted rape leading to the murder of Pallavi Purkayastha. Since her life is no longer under threat, pictures could be published. We know that she was an attractive, confident woman who appeared to be living on her own terms. And now she’s gone.

Since then, there have been other sexual assault crimes — what our much-celebrated Kiran Bedi might describe as ‘small rape’ cases — most of which feature as briefs. A seven-year-old; a schoolgirl-babysitter; a teenager looking for a hostel room. I have to confess I’m relieved they are no more than brief items because often, when news of sexual assault is given larger space in the papers, they come with illustrations – bent heads, hair covering the face, silent screams.

Murder or burglary cases are also illustrated (for the lack of photos) because newspapers seem to like ‘storyboarding’ events. The unstated assumption is that newspaper readers actually don’t want to read. When it comes to rape, perhaps imaginations fail. And yet, editors feel that we are unable to feel the impact of these horrific stories without accompanying sketches.

Therefore, every few days a generic sort of sketch or downloaded photo is tossed in, and it nauseates me. I am infuriated by photos of blurry silhouettes, palm prints, or broken dolls with their clothes torn off. I wish they’d stop showing us eyes wide with fear. Stop those sketches of girls huddled in corners, sitting on the floor with their knees drawn up, heads buried in their own arms. Stop those sketches of female faces screaming. Stop those trite, predictable little graphics done in shades of red or black. Also stop black-and-white grainy images of beautiful young women, a hand covering their mouths.

What is it about rape that needs to be visually represented? The actual crime? Probably editors feel — and rightly so — that rape is not the sort of crime that can be sketched, that it could only be invasive, inaccurate and hurtful to the victim, not to mention the psyches of children and young adults.

But if they must illustrate rape stories, I wish they’d find the courage to show the truth. Depict accurately. Depict a baby rape victim as a baby, and the toddler as a toddler. Show a maternal victim as herself, wearing the loose, shapeless kurta she usually wears. Why use sleeveless blouses and curvy backs and high heeled shoes? Show flab or wrinkled skin or malnourished ribs. Show school uniforms if you must. Don’t show us pictures of bare limbs and flimsy slips that have been modeled by some model (usually foreign) and taken off the internet.

In an environment where the rape victim’s age, clothing, profession, class, colour, and the time and location of the crime are constantly being referred to, how dare anyone misrepresent any of the facts in their sketches? Editors can’t remain oblivious to the importance of cracking stereotypes about rape victims when every other report of molestation or rape is ridden with insidious attempts at pigeonholing victims into a particular category of woman who had it coming anyway.

And if the argument is that the graphics intend to represent pain and humiliation, then perhaps illustrators and designers must be made to interview some victims of sexual assault. Surely anger is also an emotion they feel? At the very least, I wish media would refrain from publishing convenient graphics that suggest that the victim’s state of mind is a sort of generic shame and loneliness. I wish they’d just stop doing that.

First published here

What face, free citizens?

So, Independence Day is around the corner. I thought it would be interesting to take a very literal look at freedom. In the sense of who is technically a free man/woman, and who isn’t.

One woman who was recently freed is — rather ironically — called ‘Azad’ (the free one). Seema Azad is a human rights activist and a journalist who spent over two years in prison. She and her husband, Vishwavijay had been convicted by a sessions court in Uttar Pradesh of sedition.

The laws under which Azad was convicted refer to a ‘conspiracy to commit a terrorist act’, supporting a terrorist organisation, and waging war against the state. What it actually translates into is the possession of a few pamphlets or books.

Therefore, on the basis of some hearsay evidence, and the fact that Azad and her husband read all kinds of literature, they were sentenced to life imprisonment. Thankfully, the Allahabad High Court has suspended the sentence, and granted them bail. The judges observed that there could see no evidence that the duo had been waging war against India.

But, of course, the case hasn’t been entirely dismissed. The couple is only out on bail. As is Dr Binayak Sen, who also spent over two years in jail on similar charges.

Also, 78-year-old Narayan Sanyal, who was supposed to be a CPI (Maoist) activist, was finally granted bail by the Supreme Court. He had already spent six years in jail.

But some Indians have not done any time in jail. These include at least a few men who assault other young Indian citizens for wanting to celebrate. Nor has anyone initiated serious legal action against colleges that refuse to let victims of such assault sit for exams.

If there is some legal action in the future, nobody will go to jail for holding the view that female students who get assaulted need to be punished further. Jail, clearly, is reserved for people who possess pamphlets.

And for people like Soni Sori, the adivasi school teacher in Chhattisgarh. She is still in jail. Although she alleged torture, although a subsequent medical exam in Kolkata proved her claim (scans showed that stones had been shoved into her rectum), although the Supreme Court expressed some anguish at this state of affairs, she was sent back to her home state.

Recent reports quote Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh as saying that naxalism can be ‘solved’ through dialogue. If the state truly believes that Sori is a Naxalite, or even a Naxal sympathiser, then she is the first person he should be talking to. And it should be easy, because she’s right there. Still in Raipur jail.

Since dialogue implies two parties talking and listening to each other, Raman Singh could begin by listening to Soni Sori. But clearly, he is not listening. If he was, she would not need to write letters to the Supreme Court.

She’s written one recently, alleging that she continues to be tortured and humiliated. She says she is stripped naked. She is starved. She is touched repeatedly under the pretext of being searched.

I’m waiting to hear what the Supreme Court does next. SP Ankit Garg, who allegedly conspired to get Sori arrested, was conferred a medal for gallantry. Now I’m waiting to see how the state treats the policemen who are in charge of Sori’s custody currently.

As for Raman Singh, I’m wondering if he’s read Sori’s letter. If he has, and refuses to react to it, with what face will he hoist the national flag this year? And what will our face look like as we turn to salute our flag?

First published here

Fraud kism ke log

What do you call a man who promises you a job if you agree to part with a portion of your wealth in exchange? A man you should be wary of. Correct?

And what would you call a man who takes your wealth — possibly the only wealth you have — and then fails to keep that promise of suitable employment? A fraudster. Correct?

We read about such ‘job scams’ in the newspapers. When victims of such fraud approach the police with a complaint, the cops swing into action. They raid premises and arrest the cheats. But when was the last time you heard about an industrialist or businessman getting arrested for failing to provide jobs, after taking away land? Land and water are the only real wealth a farming family has. These two elements ensure food, work, self-respect, and an inheritance. If someone takes away your livelihood, he better give you a darn good alternative.

That was the general idea in Yavatmal, a region that has seen too many tragic suicides in recent years. In 2001, former BJP MLA Uttam Ingle, on behalf of Chintamani Agrotech, acquired over a hundred acres of land.

Chintamani Agrotech walked in on powerful legs; there was Nitin Gadkari on board, apart from Ingle and other BJP politicians. It had promised to set up a sugar factory apparently. A decade passed. No factory. So the villagers demanded that their land be returned, or that their children be given jobs. Some people reportedly attacked the firm’s local office.

Chintamani said that it would set up a biogas plant instead, and use sugarcane residue to generate electricity. Whether this is true, or whether it will end up being a coal-based plant, as activists fear, I don’t know. But there is no definite declaration about how many jobs will be generated and whether those jobs will definitely be given to farmers.

The odd thing is that the state is supposed to have cleared 85 power projects across the Vidarbha region, where farmer suicides have long been a cause for concern. But power plants also need a whole lot of water. Finally, it will have to be drawn from “irrigation” projects.

Meanwhile, there is a similar land and power-plant situation in neighbouring Madhya Pradesh. Apparently, Moserbaer had acquired large tracts of land (including forest land) in Anuppur district. Reports quote farmers as saying that their land was valued at rates as low as Rs16 per square meter.

Others say that they had been assured of land in exchange for land. But the ‘letter of agreement’ did not specify whether or not the firm would follow the state’s rehabilitation and resettlement norms. It mentioned certain commitments as decided by the state revenue department, but the farmers were not told what these “commitments” would translate into.

Allegedly, bore-wells have been sunk and villagers assume that water will be drawn to feed the power project. Which means that even those who do not want to sell land will have less groundwater for their own use. And the loss of water is neither accounted for nor compensated.

When they protested earlier this year in Anuppur, farmers were faced with laathis, bullets, and a stint in prison. So, I imagine they have no warm fuzzy feelings for power plants these days. But the question is — what do you call a man who takes away your most prized possession, then claims it isn’t worth a lot, refuses to tell you how he intends to pay you back, and when you show up with your friends to demand that he return your valuables, he gets the cops to arrest you?

First published here

The Flautist - a short story

Our eyes first locked across the street but I may be mistaken about that.

Across a street, things look different from what they are. Like I once thought that I saw a man selling orange-pink phirkis. I had not had one since I was a boy and my father got me one at the Gadimai fair. That phirki was yellow and green. Like sunshine on new wheat. It was my beautiful possession and I kept it safe through the winter. But that was a long time ago. So when I saw a man selling phirkis, I crossed the street to buy one. But they turned out to be birds of paradise. Flowers!

I hadn’t seen any before, but I have since found out that they are very expensive. One flower costs more than a rice-plate. The young man was holding those flowers rested them casually on his shoulder, like he didn’t care about how expensive they were. Maybe he didn’t want to be seen holding a bunch of flowers the way a girl would hold them.

There was a girl with him and when I came close and asked the name of the flowers and how much they cost, she giggled. She said, in English, that it serves him right to be mistaken for a flower-boy. He dresses just like a sadak-chhaap, she said.

He doesn’t. I wanted to tell her, I know a sadak-chhaap when I see one. This boy’s jeans were like only the rich boys can afford. His belt was a slim one with bits of metal sprinkled on. His shirt was loose and his hair was longer on one side of his face than the other, with one tuft standing up tall like a silken minaret. And he wore open sandals. A real sadak-chhaap steps outside wearing shiny shoes and tight jeans. He colours his hair too, because he thinks that’s what rich boys do. But you can always tell which one is the expensive cut, and who got a third-rate job at the barber’s shop down the road.

I wanted to say all this but I was angry at myself. Why did I ask about the cost of the flowers? This boy was too rich to care about the cost. Besides, I didn’t like the girl. She was short and her hair was uncombed. She was obviously not so rich herself. Why was she laughing at the boy? Such girls irritate me, but there are a lot of them here.

You have to be careful with girls. Here, nobody knows where anyone is from. And sometimes, this is what I like. Today I am me, from Birgunj. Tomorrow I can be from Gorakhpur. And if I meet someone from Gorakhpur, then I can be from Champaran. But with girls, it is different. You must know where they come from, who their father is.

My father told me, if you must find a girl in the city, make sure you know where she is from. And he is probably right. Because one big lesson I have learnt is – things are not what they seem at first.

Like the other day, I saw some artists working on a big sculpture. From across the street, it looked like a model of a building. It was solid and shiny and wobbly. Just like houses in this city. Concrete, but so fragile. You look at them and you wonder if they are safe. Some have cracks running down the sides, pasted over with cement like strips of grey band-aids. This sculpture, though, had no windows or doors; just smooth round walls.

I thought the artists wanted to say something about the city. Like this city doesn’t have enough air. Or that you cannot really leave this city. Buildings are like tombs without sunshine or friendship. That was what I thought.

But when I crossed the street to take a closer look, the sculpture turned out to be a shoe. One giant boot. I felt really stupid. But that is the trouble, you see. Things look different from far. When I was a boy, we used to chant a set of foolish rhymes about the illusion of distance.

“From far, I thought I saw Vyjanthimala drying out her hair/ turned out to be a buffalo wagging her tail while taking the air!”

“From far, I thought I saw a dozen eggs getting hard-boiled/ turned out to be a bunch of baldies getting their heads oiled!”

Nonsense rhymes like that. But it is true. You cannot make things out from a distance. That is why I do not talk much to girls. That is why I did not give much thought to that moment when our eyes locked across the street.

And yet, it seemed as if the breeze had dropped, as if the sun had trembled and begun to sweat. It seemed as if she was crossing the street only to come towards me.

I have a hard head. I know, she was not the type to look at me. She was surely a college girl. She was standing on the road divider, trying to cross the road. As for her eyes, who can say whether they were looking at me, or right through me?

But then, I saw her the next day too, clutching the railing on the road divider. She was looking right and left, but the traffic would not stop even for a moment. Every few seconds, she would squeeze her eyes shut as a bus growled past, tossing fumes and dust and light splinters into her face.

She stood there a long time and maybe she forgot why she was there. There was a gap in the traffic finally and all the others who were balanced on that divider began to rush across the road. But she just stood there, eyes at half-mast, looking at nothing.

She looked so sad in that moment. As if a passing bus had knocked her down and ridden right over her heart. She looked like a child might look when her bright paper phirki falls into a puddle. She looked like the girls in my village, when they were engaged to be married to someone who lives far away. In that moment, I suddenly felt like I knew where this girl comes from.

All of a sudden, she seemed to wake up to the street and its noisy horns, and she rushed across. Just in time, just half an inch from another growling bus. My heart almost stopped for a second.

She was wearing a saree that day. I saw her go into the library. I stood outside. It is a nice spot to stand. Nobody comes into the library so the staff does not glare at me if I hang around. But that stretch is busy since the big, new shop opened in the next building. Such a long shop! As long as six cars parked one behind the other. It has big glass windows and statues of men and women dressed in the same red color. During the Diwali season, these statues wear such rich clothes. Even the brides in our village never wore anything so rich. And during Christmas, these statues all wear red pants and shirts.

Many people come to that shop and they all walk past the library. They don’t always buy from me but sometimes they stop to listen. I weave a tune that will clutch at their hems, scraping its way into their blood. A song with painted talons.

Sometimes, they turn to their children and ask if they want a flute. They always buy the cheapest one. Some do not want a flute; they just want to listen to me. But they look at me and I look at them, and they know they should pay up. But they also see that I do not want a coin tossed at me. The only way to pay me is to buy from me. So they buy a flute.

I do not know whether they are good people but if they catch my eye, they look me in the eye. They do not stare at my clothes or my bare feet. They have the decency to lower their eyes if they are not willing to pay me for standing there and making music outside libraries that nobody wants to visit. Their hearts tell them that they are small, so they scurry away, running from their own gut, from a new ache that wasn’t there before they heard me.

Perhaps, I should say that I really play for money. If I did not play, nobody would buy my flutes. And except for playing the flute, and cooking and cleaning, I cannot do anything else.

Not that this city wants my music. These people would pay me more if I cooked and cleaned. Some of them might even let me live in their houses if I did this. I did it too. But only for a year. Two boys lived in that house and I did everything in return for staying there. I made their beds, cooked two meals, swept and mopped, washed their clothes. Then one more boy joined the house and he said I must wash his underwear. I refused, so they threw me out.

Now I am happier, playing the flute. It was very boring inside that house. Locked up all day. It is better to be outside. The street has so many possibilities. Every day, some new story unfolds.

What I like most is to watch the city slow down when I play. I am not boasting; it really does. When I play, I look at the feet of people walking past. As they hear the rising notes, their feet slow down. They linger even if they cannot afford to stop. If I play the theme song from Hero, more feet slow down. Sometimes I do ten different versions of Hero. A man from America once told me that I was a jazz pioneer in my own right. He did not buy many flutes though.

Another good thing is, when I am out on the street, I see a lot of girls. Like that girl. The day she wore a saree, she walked past three times. From the library, she walked to the museum, then to the college building, then back to the library.

I think it was a special day at the library. In the evening, many women walked in, and they all wore silk sarees. The men wore kurtas and coats. I played a soft tune that day, so soft that only those who were really listening for it would catch it. I saw her catch it. She looked around but she didn’t see me because I was hidden behind a pillar.

She came again the next day. Dressed in black with a white scarf round her neck. It was edged with silver gota. She was standing at the entrance of the library. I started playing my heaviest flute as I walked towards her.

She stepped forward. Then she took out her mobile phone, pressed a few buttons and held it a little away from her body. I knew she was recording my music but I did not stop playing. A minute later, she stopped recording and put away her phone. Finally she looked at me.

I looked into her eyes. She smiled. I took two steps towards her, still playing. Finally she spoke to me. She asked how much I was selling the flutes for. I told her the prices. I showed her how the air sounded huskier in the bigger flutes, and how you could blow into some from a hole cut near the top edge, but with others, you had to take the slim tip into your mouth. I played out a very simple tune of three notes on the most expensive flute I had.

It was two hundred rupees. She bargained me down to one hundred and fifty. It was worth more but I let her have it. She stuffed it into her bag, and walked back into the library.

When she came out, she was walking fast, heading towards the college. I began to follow her, playing all the while, watching the dozens of feet that slowed and quickened all the time.

When I caught up with her, she was at the sandwich stall. As she stood there eating, I went on playing. Twice, she turned around to look at me but she did not meet my eyes.

Then she went back to the library. From a distance, it looked like there was a black shadow across the doorway. When I came closer, I saw it was a young man. A dark man with a beard, and dressed all in black too. Leather boots with big heels and a leather jacket and leather cap.

She was walking quickly towards him. When she was six feet away, he opened his arms out. She did not run. She walked into his arms and then he hugged her tight so their chests were pressed together. They stayed that way for a long time.

Then she was looking at him like she was drinking in his face, and he was smiling down at her like he was enjoying the sun whispering its dying words. She tugged at his arms and they began to walk up and down the old pavements. I followed, just a few steps behind, still playing my flute.

Their heels clicked softly as they walked, and after a while, she let go of his arm. The sun had gone down and their shadows were pale and smoky. Their feet dragged. I had not seen any feet so slow on that pavement before. It was an old lovers’ walk.

They did not touch each other again. They would never hold hands again, even I could see that. But their feet clung to the pavement as if clinging to the last note of a song that you cannot bear to hear. If they hugged now, they would hurt each other. And I think they had decided to stop hurting each other.

From a distance, their long shadows were twisted out of shape. Like a strange beast born with wings so large, it can neither fly nor run. Still, it must leave. It knows that if it is not killed, it will simply die of waiting. It will hop if it cannot run. Crawl, if it cannot fly. There will be no grace in it, but is there grace anywhere? So after one last look, one last gulp of familiar air, the strange beast will leave. Get on a bus, and not return.

When they stopped walking, I fell back a little. And then, a little more. Slower and softer, my song changed and descended into some new note of plunging silence. There were twenty feet between us and then thirty and then fifty and then I stopped playing.

© Annie Zaidi

[This story was first published in New Woman magazine.]