The Starting Line

Aastha Sheikh was the only 9-year old in her class never to have seen Ellis Bridge. All her friends talked about the wonderful view from atop their fathers’ shoulders, staring down in awe at the serpentine river weaving its way through the heart of the city and up in amazement at the wonderfully illuminated bridge. They would speak of families walking along the pedestrian paths on the edges, laughing and smiling with kids on laps, kids on shoulders and kids on their backs slurping on an ice-cream or struggling with a fluffy candy floss. They would giggle and suddenly dive into hushed tones and burst out laughing, reminiscing about young couples walking hand in hand, engrossed in the view- some of each other and some of the manmade wonder above the natural one. They would speak wide-eyed about the groups of friends cutting birthday cakes on the famous bridge overlooking the Sabarmati and wistfully hope that someday soon they would be able to convince their parents to give them the same freedoms. Aastha listened mute to all these stories and true to her name, believed that one day she would see this great miracle too.

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As her father brought the vehicle around, Aastha’s face lit up with an unadulterated joy that only a kid can show. She nearly jumped out of the arms of her mother, who for some reason did not seem happy at all. Perhaps she did not take too kindly to being woken up at 4 am in the morning but young Aastha who had been put to sleep early last night, had no sleep and only hope in her eyes as she finally managed to wrestle her way out of the reluctant arms of her mother and made a beeline for the vehicle. Her father got out of the driver’s seat and waited as Aastha’s little feet made the fifteen feet journey an arduous one. He knelt down and with a smile greeted his only daughter and then lifting her up in his arms stood up facing his wife. As Aastha looked at the vehicle in awe- a vehicle which she knew her father drove but had never seen, her parents carried out a hurried conversation in hushed tones. She realised from the tone of her mother’s voice that she was not happy about something but too happy to care about what, she let it slide away from her mind.

Minutes later, young Aastha could not believe that she was in a car, at 4 am in the morning, wide awake and with permission. As she let the cool October morning breeze hit her face and ruffle her hair , she felt something she rarely felt – a feeling that she couldn’t quite define but a feeling that had sporadically engulfed her when her father had taken her to Sarkhej Roza the first time. It was only a few minutes from their house but the sheer size of the lush green hills, the old and enticing remains of gates and palaces and her father’s encouraging look telling her to run as much as she wanted to made wave after wave of the feeling lash over her, making her feel as if she was miles away from dirty little Sarkhej. She had ran about to her heart’s content that day, her father barely managing to keep up. As they climbed down the outer wall that evening Aastha peacefully sleeping on her father’s shoulder, her arms wrapped around his neck and her drool all over his shirt, her father knew that his daughter was not one to be tied down.

As memories of that wonderful day came flooding back into her mind, Aastha looked towards her father driving the car and then back out at the empty streets and flickering streetlamps casting temporary shadows on the strays that looked up sleepily at the vehicle that rushed past . She suddenly felt very brave and special, sure that none of her classmates had ever seen Ahmedabad at 4am. As the vehicle took a turn and continued along a beautiful road , Aastha saw to her amazement that on her side of the road there was no longer buildings and concrete but instead a huge chasm , across which was visible a skyline silhouetted against the early morning sky of Ahmedabad. At the gradually lightening sky with a deft stroke of orange here and a slight dash of yellow there against a canvas of a purplish-black shaped by fluffy and bulbous silver-lined clouds stretching across the vast expanse, Aastha stared and stared unable to contain her excitement on seeing a sky that changed colour so quickly . Her father smiled as he changed the gear, perhaps for the first time during this time of the day although every day at this time he had been exactly here for the past 12 years. He looked at his watch and hoped that he would be on time.

Five minutes later Aastha did not know where to look- at the huge structure in front of her that stretched across the river below, the reflection of which in the still waters presented a beautiful scene of illumination against the dark reflection of sky , at the water itself, guarded by high stepped walls on either side and protected by the many sentinels hung over it at generous distances bridging the gap that it created or at her father who escorted her down a flight of steps and lifted her atop a raised platform , smiled at her and urged her to stay put and did what any clueless 9-year old would- sit and stare.  She looked at his retreating back up the flight of steps, knowing fully well where he was going- back to the vehicle.

Aastha looked on in awe at the troika of a dark canvas gradually sprouting lighter shades, with a sudden leak of reddish hues and silhouetted skyline of a vibrant multi-cultural city still cloaked in the black of the night, a still, silent, powerful, ever-moving serpent, weaving its way across the city and the illuminated man-made engineering marvels slung across the lifeline connecting the city and completing the canvas. She was so engrossed in the scene that she almost missed what her father had brought her there for. She would have missed it had it not been for her father waving frantically from down below with a huge bucket in one hand and a broom in the other, pointing excitedly at the skyline behind him and quite extraordinarly following the line of vision of his outstretched broom Aastha saw a chrome ball rising above the minarets,kalasas ,amalakas and highrises. As the Sun rose above the city it gradually threw off the dark shroud the city had wrapped itself in and the canvas changed from a purplish-black to a soothing light blue bordered by white cumulonimbus. Aastha watched in wonder as the Sun illuminated the city and the artificial illumination on Ellis Bridge paled in comparison.

Having cleaned the stretch designated to him, as he had done for the past 12 years Ahmed Sheikh returned to where he had left his daughter. Not seeing her there, he kept the bucket and broom there and ran down the steps looking left and right as he covered two steps at a time. His heart racing, thinking now about his wife’s reprimanding, Ahmed rushed along the river not knowing where to look. He knew shouting was futile and huffing and puffing, just about to collapse Ahmed, saw to his amazement a 9-year old girl running on the platform above his head towards Ellis Bridge. Taken aback but still thankful that he had spotted her, he rushed along trying to find the next flight of stairs. By the time he found it, Aastha had reached the bridge. Climbing two steps at a time and knowing full well that his body might collapse any moment, Ahmed continued spurred on only by his love for his daughter. Finally having caught up with her, he fell down to his knees, famished and ashen-faced, his shirt soaking wet on an October morning and his face grimy already. He looked up at his daughter who excitedly pointed to the reason why her father had run so much. Still trying to gather breath, he looked up at a sight which even in that state, he had to behold.

Through the caged structure that was Ellis Bridge, the sun played hide-and-seek as it ascended the limitless sky, its light skidding off the metal and disseminating into multiple rays in all directions. As he looked on in wonder, the sun continued to rise up and while doing so, bathed the bridge in a warm haze of October sunshine and as the sound of crows crowing and dogs barking aggregated with the gradually increasing sounds of horns honking, gears clunking and the occasional train whistle in the distance, Ahmed realised why his daughter had run- to take in the true essence of an urban sunrise.

Aastha Sheikh was the only 28-year old among the competitors to have seen the sun rise through Ellis Bridge. Being mute since birth, she however could not tell anyone how beautiful it was but the daughter of the municipal garbage collector remembered how she had run that day to watch the scene in time. As she looked up at the track in front of her in New Delhi, Aastha Sheikh knew what awaited her at the end of a hundred metres, just like she knew that October day, 19 years ago. As the gun was fired and all the athletes took off, Ahmed Sheikh, municipal garbage collector of Ahmedabad City, standing in the stands knew that just like that day in October, 19 years ago, Aastha had again left everything in her wake.

The Living City

“The end justifies the means”, they say but if there is one entity that wakes up every day to prove them wrong and goes to sleep knowing it has succeeded, it has to be Kolkata. Unlike your other corporate cities, Kolkata sleeps and goes to bed early too and definitely on Sunday afternoons. By 10 pm the roads bear a deserted look and transportation is hard to get and yet it is perhaps only in this city that you can still walk home safely- for this is precisely what this city embodies and personifies – the journey more than the destination.

You may be wondering why I called the city an entity. Anyone who has stayed in this city will be able to tell you that Kolkata or Calcutta (as some of us still prefer) is nothing less than an emotional living organism. Much like your average Bengali girl, the city is moody – sometimes the rains cheerfully cascading off the lush green foliage and old buildings and sometimes lashing gloomily against the concrete jungle and black umbrellas. The rapidly expanding city sometimes burns under the ferocious glare of the enraged sun and yet it is the same sun which smiles down mildly on Sunday mornings, touching the feet of the lazy citizen devouring the newspaper. There exists within this macrocosm a city which exists for everyone – for the bibliophile who believes in the journey of discovering the book more than actually finding it , there can be nothing more satisfying and more romantic than walking through the cobbled roads of College Street , popping in and out of every shop, feeling century old second-hand yellowing books in their own hands, perhaps enjoying an enriching conversation with the old shopkeepers over a steaming cup of cutting chai or a cooling gulp of Paramount sherbet. That is not to say that the city does not have the Starmarks and the Oxfords and Crosswords – it does and they too have embedded themselves into the rich versatility and diversity that this city is. At the end of the day, no matter whatever complains you have about the city, you cannot say that it is not accepting for Kolkata will not suck you in instantly into a vortex of revelry and celebration, nor will it ignore you and let you be but the city will slowly entice you and seduce you into discovering it, into delving into the city and in doing so it will compel you to listen to your heart and discover yourself.

Kolkata is like every Bengali girl, an amalgam of opposites. For every narrow, winding, heavily branched North Calcutta bylane you have a 4 or 6-lane avenue or overpass. For every Dacres Lane, MNM Row or Camac Street serving thousands every day with the best in street food, locally reinvented global favourites from Chinese delicacies to Maharashtrian and Gujarati favourites, from Lebanese rolls to kathi rolls, from Mughal influences to South Indian strongholds, from Punjabi dhabas to pice hotels there are fine dining experiences and multi-star restaurants that are not so pocket friendly. For every slow and unreliable, yet soothing and romantic tram ride there is a metro that rushes beneath the city every 5 minutes. For every sleepy Sunday afternoon there is a city wide awake, decked up and crowded during Durga Puja. For every report that lambasts the squalor and dirt of the city that has seen famines and floods, wars and embargoes there are citizens and tourists who can’t stop raving about the City of Joy. For every Nandan, Navina, Star and Mitra there is an Inox and a Cinemax. For every Rabindrasangeet and Nazrulgeeti function in makeshift temporary constructions under poorly lighted shamianas, there is the heady dash of jazz in Trincas and rock and roll in Someplace Else. For every connoisseur of everything fine and coarse in life, there is something in Kolkata. The city will never leave you disappointed. If versatility and diversity could be a city , I have no doubts that it would be Calcutta for few or no other cities can boast of having a Turkish settlement, a vibrant Parsi community, an Armenian church, a Bangal-Ghoti rivalry, the largest cricket stadium and the second largest football stadium in the world, the house of the Bard and a market selling just lard,  British era museums and art galleries, hand-pulled rickshaws and an underground metro, a Gujarati business community and a Marwari real estate one, a Punjabi locality having dhabas and gurudwaras, Protestant churches and mazhars, masjids and Catholic churches, a tremendously Calcuttan Chinese area in Tangra and an Anglo-Indian one in Bow Barracks, one of Asia’s largest artisan communities in Kumortuli, one of the country’s largest goldsmith communities in Bowbazaar and one of the subcontinent’s largest red light area too. Kolkata is the home to one of the oldest footballing rivalries and the newest football champions. It is the one place where even test cricket brings alive the stadium. Having said what I have, I must however also present the disclaimer that Kolkata is an acquired taste. It is not for the fast-paced, in-and-out personalities, nor is it for the précis loving character who reads only the reviews but doesn’t watch the movies, who reads just the summary and not the book. Kolkata is not for you if you are not in sync with your senses, it is not for the unemotional robot who refuses to feel for Kolkata is not merely a city to visit, not merely a metro to live in but it is a feeling, a sensation to be felt, to be inhaled and to be submerged in.

Having lived in the city for 23 years, I obviously feel strongly about this city and what it has given me and most importantly, what it has taken away. I do not believe that a city, any city, is simply the brick and mortar buildings or the metalled roads, the beautiful parks and the majestic monuments. They may comprise the body of the city but the heart of any city lies in the gastronomical delights that it has to offer and the soul of the city lies in the people that make the city what it is- alive. If this is true, then the huge heart that Kolkata has stretches from the alur chop and beguni shacks of North Kolkata to the vada pavs and pau bhajis of Camac Street, from the puchka stalls of across the city to the biriyani outlets competing for space and profits, from the liver and brain kathi rolls of Zeeshan to the dumplings and momos of Tiretta Bazaar, from the halim and nihari of Zakaria Street to the ice-cream on hot brownie of Bon Appetit, from the authentic Ghoti cuisine of 6 Ballygunge Place and Bhojohori Manna to the lip-smacking Dhakai cuisine of Kasturi, from the kasa mangsho of Golbari to the cutlets and kabirajis of Anadi Cabin , from the steak and beer of Olypub to the microbrewery of Beer Republic, from the Fairlawns to the Wise Owls, the Bachchan and Azad Hind Dhabas to the Chillis- Kolkata has place for everyone , be it a global giant or a local David . As far as the soul of the city goes, you can ask any random stranger on the street for directions, chances are that you will be shown eight different routes to your destination and if you’re lucky you may even be informed about what’s best about each route. The city where even a rickshawallah can quote a Nobel laureate, a street food vendor can effectively talk politics and a Taxi driver can hum any song and mouth any dialogue from any film, that city is Kolkata. The city where love letters are still hidden under pillows, where hands are still held on streets, where boat rides and tram rides are romantic and not tedious, where poetry is an everyday truth and every corner, every nook and cranny is brimming over with stories, that city is Kolkata.

Kolkata is not a city that will hit you in your face with its extravagance , neither is it the city which will bowl you over with its grandeur but it is the city which will slowly make you fall in love with it , the old kind of love , the one that lasts. You can travel from the north to the south in under an hour, taking the underground metro and perhaps soon from east to west, under the river, in half an hour too but it is only by walking on the roads of this erstwhile capital of the British Empire that you will realise the enigma that is Kolkata. It is on the most disappointing day of your life , on the saddest day of your life when nothing seems to be going your way , when your famished feet land on the royal roads, when your broken body gives in to the cool breeze, when your spent senses breathe in the green freshness of the foliage , take in the aroma of the street food that wafts in slowly through your walls that your fatigued form will be reinvigorated by the indomitable spirit, the contagious energy of the city that will heal you. Kolkata is an emotion meant to be felt not only analysed, a food meant to be devoured not only digested, a song meant to be memorised to the extent that it flows through your veins, not merely listened to, an enigma that must be enjoyed not decoded.

Kolkata is as sweet as the sweetmeats and cottage cheese delights it is famous for and as tart as the tamarind water, without which it cannot imagine its puchkas. It can give you a high as high as the Shahid Minar or make you feel as low as the underground metro tunnels but rest assured Kolkata will bring you back. The city is as shy as a newlywed bride peeking from behind the betel leaves and as outspoken as the local uncle criticising your haircut. The city is as free as the Maidan and as claustrophobic as New Market, as spontaneous as the Ganga and as difficult as Park Circus 7-point. The city is everything and yet nothing, it is hilarious and serious, it is contented and disheartened – all depending on which pair of perspectives you choose to put on. The city of Feluda, Byomkesh, Kiriti and many more prove that Calcutta is like the mother that welcomes her sons, prodigal or otherwise, with open arms. The city has for centuries welcomed foreigners onto her shores and in her railway stations , embracing the Portuguese and the French, the British and the Chinese, the Marwaris and the Biharis, the Gujaratis and the Tamilians, the Punjabis and the Malyalis, the Parsis and the tourists and making them an integral part of the history and story of the city. The legacy of the great city lies not only in its rich Bangla heritage but in its pan-Indian and global appeal. Kolkata exists in the sounds of the dhaaks that fills up the minds of the Calcuttan living abroad when autumn comes knocking, in the smell of freshly made sweets which waft in through the senses of the Calcuttan living abroad, in the memories and fantasies of Calcuttans across the globe because, my dear , don’t you know that a city like her cannot be caged by brick and mortar, by cement and stone ? 

Homecoming

As she crossed the busy Phoolbagan crossing quickly , her tresses bouncing playfully, bordering her face and invading it , her fingers moving up to deftly place the errants behind her ear and her eyes darting to the platinum watch on her wrist , she looked at ease in this old city despite returning only yesterday. Looking smart in a white shirt , tucked neatly into her black jeans, sprinting across the now dug up , previously bustling, square she glanced over her shoulder towards her left.

A nervous teenager in a printed t-shirt and ankle-length jeans waited below a black stone statue in the centre of the busy Phoolbagan square fiddling away her time twiddling her fingers anxiously glancing furtively over her shoulder. She adjusted the strap of her handbag and crumpled the piece of paper in her hands as she lifted up her wrist regularly to check the time on her Minnie Mouse plastic watch.

The statue had disappeared , giving way to absolute nothing as the old city continued her journey to becoming a modern one. The modern girl's heels clattered onto the century old pavement seeped in history as she hurried towards her destination. As she walked past the street food stalls lining the pavement , her eyes lit up as she recognised the now much older but still as busy puchkawala. She stopped for a second , watching him serve an array of customers clamouring for the delicious snack , smiled to herself and continued walking . As she rounded the bend heading west, she looked up and as if involuntarily her body slowed down. Her eyes picked out a tree to her right , about 50 metres ahead just opposite a confectionery shop.

An old man got up from his usual position on the bench of a tea stall and walked across the road . As he approached the tree opposite the confectionery shop he unstrained his eyes ,now sure that he had seen correctly from the other end of the street. He walked up to the young girl sitting under the gulmohar tree and said, "Excuse me miss but I've been watching you for a long time and you look like a nice girl. Are you waiting for someone ?" The girl looked up at the concerned gentleman, smiled and said, " Yes , I am actually."
"For 40 minutes ?"
"For 3 hours actually", she smiled back. "He'll come", she assured herself.
The bewildered gentleman left but only on her repeated insistence that she was comfortable there. She looked again at her Minnie Mouse plastic watch and looked up hoping it would rain that day.

Slowly she regained her brisk pace, reorienting her senses to the present as she walked past the gulmohar tree, smartly towards her intended destination but her mind was flooded with countless images, all clear yet dissolving into each other. One memory deformed and reformed instantaneously into another one and her mind took an overwhelming swim into a tumultuous onrush of memories, taking her through a plethora of emotions and gamut of feelings. Her face betrayed the tremendous upheaval she was experiencing within her as she maintained a stoic facade.

A young girl screamed loudly and clutched the shirt of the boy sitting beside her as the movie got scarier. In the dark hall no one noticed as she buried her face deep into his arms and dug her fingers into his thighs. The dark hall was suddenly alight with a thousand tiny stars as a young girl looked down from the terrace at a boy standing on the lawn below and shouting her name . "Happy birthday " , he managed to scream before the guards accosted him. Her peals of laughter reverberated across the night as she opened her eyes to find herself walking along a lake . Looking down to her right , she saw intertwined fingers and smiled to herself, happy. The darkness of the night was dispelled by the first rays of the sun as she boarded the school bus and out of the corner of her eye saw him jogging strategically parallel to the bus. Soon she was falling and falling past balloons and cards, cakes and patties, dosas and puchkas, letters and texts- oh so many texts . It seemed like she would sink in an ocean of texts but she wriggled right through and fell onto a boat on the Ganges below the Vidyasagar Setu, apparated magically onto Park Street on Christmas Eve and before she could take in the lights and revelry , she was praying silently in St. Peter's Basilica on Christmas Day. She opened her eyes to morning kachouris and jalebis in Balwant Singh's Dhaba and hopelessly running after him across the Maidan. The greenery vanished and old houses cropped up all around as they walked below the starry skies enjoying ice cream. Everything dissolved and in the darkness a girl pleaded desperately, " It doesn't matter that I'm Bangali and you're not. We can fight everyone but only if you're with me . I can't do it alone". She kept falling fast as she heard herself cry out loud screaming "Please!!" over and over again. The screaming would not go away and neither would the sounds of sobbing and they were reaching an intolerable crescendo.

She wiped a tear from the corner of her eyes and adjusted her hair as she stepped into the cafe and located the seat she always used to take and finding it empty , she made her way to it. She composed herself as she sat down and prepared herself for what she had been waiting for . She glanced at her watch and smiled to herself as she realised that as usual she was on time but still too early . She took out her phone and was about to dial a number when the door opened and she looked up expectantly. Her heart skipped a beat as their eyes met across the room and his warm smile seemed to induce a strange nostalgic pull in her. They were the same eyes , the same heartwarming smile that greeted her below the black statue, the same arms that had wrapped themselves around her , the same fingers that had enlaced themselves with her. He walked across the room , only his body reflecting his age , and took the chair opposite her. There was absolute silence as the sounds of clattering cups, clinking glasses, clanking spoons, cookies being crunched, soups being slurped, coffees being gulped down and doors being swung open became too conspicuous for her liking. She decided to break the awkward silence but could not frame the correct words to say . She was struggling with her thoughts when as if from a far off land an old friend whispered something . She looked up puzzled.

"He....hi....hey", managed the boy, his throat parched.

She gathered up all the courage she had and with her heart beating dangerously fast said, " Hey, long time huh ?"

"Yeah, I was surprised you called actually" ,  he said, "Happy but surprised", he added.

" 6 years actually and I was surprised I called you too", she said and both their eyes met and they afforded a chuckle. The mood lightened many folds , she trudged on, " So there's a reason I wanted to meet you. . . "

He looked on expectantly, perhaps spurred on by her affability.

". . . that being that I just can't seemed to get over you . I mean it's been 6 years . It shouldn't be this hard", she added conjuring up every last bit of conviction in her gut.

He placed his hand on hers and began, " I've been thinking the same thing and especially after seeing you like this , you look. . ."

"What I needed and did not have all these years is something which only you can give me", she said cutting him short . She knew exactly what he would say and she had no intention of hearing it again . Removing her hand from under his , she said, " Closure".

Confused he looked at her as she continued , now boosted by how perfectly this was shaping up ," I wanted to meet you with the intention of getting closure because I wanted to move on with my life and I had imagined this to be multiple folds tougher than this but right now there is nothing clearer than my mind and for the first time in many many years , I seem free ."

Looking up to check the confused look on his face , she made a mental note to remind herself how happy she was feeling later on she continued, " Even a few minutes back I was a terrible mess walking down the streets of Calcutta but I just love how this city made me face my worst fears and in the end that was all that mattered . It's not you're fault . It never was . It was mine for thinking that you'd take the path less taken but you know what, thank you"

"For?", he croaked.

" For showing me that if I could love the wrong guy this much , imagine how much I will love the right guy. For showing me the immense love that I'm capable of giving".

As he fumbled about with words , trying to figure out what to say , she got up , pushed the chair in and his eyes following her , walked out into the cool breeze .

The Cashmir Conundrum

Apart from cricket and the extensive railway system,  the biggest legacy and the greatest obsession that we seem to have inherited from the British is undoubtedly Cashmir. Now,  when I say 'obsession' I of course,  do not mean obsession like a mother has for her child but more on the lines of a boss' obsession regarding his indisciplined yet top employee.  Yes when India is not talking about cricket or cursing the government , she is definitely talking about Cashmir and more so in recent times. However,  what most Indians do not know or realise is that Cashmir has experienced Hinduism,  Buddhism,  apparently Christianity too (according to some conspiracy theories),  Sikhism and Islam and the region finds mention in the Puranas apart from tiny dedicated columns in national dailies of course.

Ironically the hotbed of cultural diversity and melting pot of religious beliefs became undone in 1947 when the Hindu Maharajah of a Muslim majority state signed a deal with the Muslim leader of the single largest political party ( which allowed the Maharajah to flee and the leader to become the new democratic leader of the state) of the state to collectively join the Hindu majority Indian Union and use Indian troops to fend off approaching Pakistani forces. For personal political pleasure a Muslim and a Hindu sold off the entire state and their communities- a move for which the state is facing repercussions even today. Almost every day innocent and unhappy youths are ruthlessly murdered or raped or raped after death or killed after rape and the news fails to percolate through to  the country which took moral responsibility for Cashmir in 1947. Cashmir is the spoils of war - three wars to be accurate - and certain bravehearts of the Indian Army being the victors make no qualms about sharing the spoils. In fact the situation has worsened so much over the years that most people from the state and many more from outside want freedom for Cashmir from the Army. This is what presents, what I call,  the Cashmir Conundrum.

Let us assume the possible scenarios which can happen now.  The first scenario is something I call the 'Diffusion Dilemma '.  Remember those middle school science classes ? No?  Well,  you must be acquainted with your ex-girlfriend getting a new boyfriend once you leave her but you not getting a new girlfriend ? It's something similar. Diffusion is the phenomenon of anything moving from a place of greater concentration to a place of lower concentration.  Now imagine the Indian army moving out of Cashmir but it remaining a part of India,  it will not take long for foreign forces to rush in to secure their hold over Cashmir simply because a)they had been waiting for this moment since 1947 and b)the territorial location of the area makes it of paramount importance with regard to trade, tourism and defence strategy. The moment the number or concentration of Indian soldiers decrease in the area,  new soldiers from across the border will rush in to take their place. Being an optimist, you might say that maybe the new soldiers will be better humans and the common people will be treated better but being a realist,  I'll say that's not going to happen - the situation being similar to a blind man suddenly being able to see , the soldiers from across the border will perhaps enjoy the spoils of war even more,  having been denied for so long,  trying to make up for lost time. Also, once foreign troops occupy Cashmir there will inevitably be another war which would result in more death,  more loss and more destruction. One small attempt at making a few lives better will have a cataclysmic domino effect that will eventually cost more to kill more.

If you're happy the way the first scenario shapes up then please don't read further but if it pains you and hurts you then the second scenario is unfortunately, not going to make things better. This,  I call,  the 'Plebiscite Problem' . Let us assume the people of Cashmir hold a vote to decide whether they want to continue to be a part of India or not, the general feeling in the state gives the impression that the result of such a vote will result in the state seeking independence from India. Provided that India agrees to this then by a plebiscite , Cashmir will become a new independent country surrounded by India (on whose troops it was so far dependent but will no longer avail),  Pakistan (who have been thrice denied control over what they consider rightfully theirs) and China( the world's most populated country and the third largest army). Cashmir meanwhile will have no army and no resources . It doesn't take a PhD scholar to realise what's going to happen next. The last time something like this happened,  about 30,000 people died in Cashmir and that was in 1947. The blood has not stopped flowing since,  the screams have not died out since,  the silence has becoming overbearing and the anger palpable.  Are we really going to subject a dying man to crucifixion? Are we really that heartless?

The third and final scenario is of course the 'Static Solution' . Nothing changes. The army remains. The people remain.  Instead of a quick death in a war,  they die a slow painful death,  watching their furureless sons being stoned and assaulted, watching their never-to-be married or employed daughters being raped and molested, watching their wives wallowing in sorrow and despair,  drowning themselves in tears of helplessness. Cashmir remains. India remains.  Ignorant yet interested. Proud yet perfunctory. Pakistan remains. Waiting. The Army remains. Cursed yet coveted. Needed yet neglected. Far away from their lives yet abused by the saved lives. Armed and antagonized yet helpless and harassed . Humanity remains. Them humanists shouting slogans and painting posters. They wait for retribution . Retribution which they think will come from being miles away from ground zero.  Retribution which they think will come in the safe comfort of their living rooms on  Facebook walls and Twitter handles. The truth is no one cares enough.  After a few days the dust will settle and the news agencies will lose interest, the students will find a new wrong to protest against and Cashmir will diffuse to the cobwebbed backrooms of our minds. The screams of the people will be heard No more. Shah Jahan called Cashmir the Paradise on Earth but perhaps the people will prefer Paradise now over Earth. Perhaps they have had enough. Perhaps not.

Hope is a dangerous thing because it's an addiction but when everywhere else is inky black,  you wait in the darkness for that single ray of hope to pierce the overwhelming silence, the overbearing darkness and the sound of shattering will set you free but till then you're a prisoner to unseen forces, unheard silences.

The Legacy of LalitaDi

The legacy of a person is left behind more in the lives touched and souls guided than the paperwork stacked and literature concluded. Professor Lalitagauri Ray is an unique example of someone who leaves behind a legacy of both.

Lalitadi, as she is commonly referred to as by colleagues, juniors and seniors alike is a known and revered face in the main campus of Jadavpur University,  Kolkata.  Having stepped into the campus for the first time in 1975, then to pursue a B. Tech in Food Technology and Biochemical Engineering,  she was carried into the campus for the last time on 30th March, 2016 having spent most of the intermediate time enriching the very campus she loved. She loved the campus , the department and the university so much that she waited patiently for 17 years from 1980 to 1997 to join the department in a teaching capacity.

In the 17 years between obtaining a Masters and joining as a teacher, she achieved an unparalled body of research that is quite simply put the stuff of legends. In those 17 years she also struck a lifelong friendship with soon to be Dr. Uma Ghosh, who would go on to be her colleague. Inseparable like Juno's swans,  the two defied age and strutted the campus from the Dean's office to canteen, enveloping everyone around them in their bubble of laughter and camaradiere.

Lalitadi, true to her epithet guided numerous students like an elder sister through their research work, laboratory experiments,  doctorate and post-doctorate researches and in the process not only changed lives as a teacher and guardian angel but also touched lives through her ever smiling countenance,  her selfless helping nature and her calmness in situations of crisis. Her legendary work ethic and equally famous smile impressed one and all who stepped through the doors of the department that she made her own.

Although our association with ma'am extends back only 3 short years, yet within this time the impact ma'am has had on us is tremendous. From her detailed explanations and hands-on training in the laboratory to her extremely well-planned out class lectures , which made the subjects easy to comprehend and analyse, from her incredible reserve of energy which compelled her,  despite not being the quickest,  to reach all her classes on time to her motherly nature which allowed her to personally pay attention to each students' problems- LGR Ma'am,  as we knew her,  was indispensable to us and the department.  Such was her universality that wherever we are asked about our department and we say "Food Technology And Biochemical Engineering " , we usually get the reply, "Oh,  Lalitadi's department? ". Everyone knew and loved ma'am and finding a fault in her would be akin to finding a hay-coloured needle in a haystack.

A connoisseur of everything Bengali,  Ma'am epitomised Jadavpur University - Inherently Bangali yet universal. A great admirer of Bengali theatre and history,  she preferred exploration of Bengal's past and heritage before soaking in the essence of foreign lands. She loved the quintessential Bangali evening snack - Muri (puffed rice) with beguni ( eggplant slices soaked in batter and deep-fried) , alur chop ( flattened spheres of batter and potato,  also deep fried) and piyanji ( sliced onion soaked in batter and deep fried) - so much so that she would often take a detour on her way home even at 9pm to make a stop at Shyambazar on her way home from Jadavpur , to buy her favourites from her preferred shop. She was an excellent singer and always supported the arts in the department,  ensuring personally that all the students got lunch during practise sessions for the cultural program for the reunion. She was also responsible for bringing excellent elocutionist Bratati Bandopadhyay as a special performer in the same cultural program.

Ma'am often scolded us for making noise and not being serious but she also assured us that a scolding in a heated moment did not amount to a grudge in the corner of a teacher's mind . She also made sure that the students she reprimanded the most also got taken care of the most.  A teacher beyond comparison and a person,  whose life is a story of inspiration - Lalitadi symbolises the 'good' that will always win in the end,  she symbolises the resolve to fight for our dreams no matter how difficult they seem to be,  she symbolises the glue that holds together a family and the life that makes many many others better.

Her sudden demise has left the campus that knew her so well,  sisterless and heartbroken,  it has left the people who knew her shell-shocked and numb and the students and teachers who were touched by her mourning and grieving. Lalitadi definitely had much more to give and yet her untimely death robs not only JU but also the city and the world of an exemplary human being above all.

The extra cup of tea that will greet UG Ma'am, the silence on the other side of the extension 2994 that will haunt RC Ma'am, the empty chair in the Biochemical Laboratory that will taunt PB Ma'am and the closed door to her empty room that will welcome DH Sir and the many ways the department will be rendered hollow by her absence will perhaps not be felt by us as much but in due time the reverberations will be heard,  loud and clear - the emptiness being shattered into a million tiny pieces by the selfish laugh of the Almighty as the enigmatic smile of Lalitadi charms him too.

The Mahabharata- Decoded.

The Mahabharata , dictated by Ved Vyas and written by the elephant-headed Hindu God Ganesha is widely regarded and generally accepted as the story of Bharata and his descendants , which again is believed to be an euphemism for India and India's children.  Note that till the Oscar nominated Mother India changed perceptions,  India or Bharata was considered to be a man but then again considering that India is a land of duality where every truth is an exception to an existing truth , the term India emanates from the river Indus which is again considered to be a woman.

Keeping in mind this existence of inherent duality and closely going through the epic, one realises that the 18-day War of Kurukshetra that the Pandavas and the Kauravas fought was in reality a fallacy. Considering that this battle is held up in Indian history and mythology (the two freely interchangeable of course in India) as the ultimate Dharmayudh , the conclusion of which symbolises the victory of Dharma and not necessarily good over evil (according to conventional definitions) , my assertion that the very war was a fallacy tends to ruffle a few feathers,  if not more and anger a few Bhakts, if not all. Before you break down my house and burn my effigy let me at least justify my statement.  The Kurukshetra War was basically a battle between brothers for control over Hastinapur and by default the entire Kuru empire but if we transcend the basics, it was much more.  Sticking to the basics for now,  like I said,  the Kurukshetra War was a battle between brothers for control of an empire to which both believed they had complete stake but the truth was that neither the Pandavas nor the Kauravas had the slightest right to the throne of Hastinapur.  To understand this we must crawl back a few generations to the birth of the very teller of this story,  Ved Vyas.  Ved Vyas,  also known as Dwaipayana was born on an island, as his name suggests,  out of wedlock,  to Satyabati (who would go on to marry Shantanu later and mother the Kuru empire)  and a travelling ascetic Parashar. So herein lies that great duality of India again,  in a country which looks down on children born out of wedlock,  the most revered text was elocuted by an illegitimate child.

The matter gets murkier when the same Satyabati marries Shantanu,  great-grandfather of the Pandavas and the Kauravas and the marriage of the king and the fisherman's daughter not only mocks today's Khap panchayats for labelling intercaste marriages as unIndian and unnatural but also becomes the inter-caste fountain from which the Kuru dynasty flows. The marriage of Satyabati and Shantanu would however not have been possible without the sacrifice of Debabrata, Shantanu's only living son from his ill-fated marriage with Ganga and the only pure-blood Kuru son of Shantanu.  Debabrata, as we all know , vowed never to marry or father a child and always protect the occupant of Hastinapur's throne.  He earned the sobriquet Bhisma and the power to die when be wanted by his immutable vow. In due time Satyabati gave birth to two sons - Chitrangada and Vichitraveerja.  Chintrangada,  the elder son,  died young and the last remaining pure-blood Kuru who could contribute to the progression of his progeny without breaking a terrible oath,  Vichitraveerja, in a terrible anti-climax turned out to be impotent.  It is here that the story of Mahabharata would have ended had it not been for the guile of Bhisma,  who picked up two princesses from their Swayamvara and bought them to Hastinapur as his step-brother's wives. However Vichitraveerja could not stand up to the occasion and the throne of Hastinapur lived in constant fear of loneliness till Satyabati thought of her illegitimate son Ved Vyas and like a true-blue twelfth man Ved Vyas entered the arena in place of the unsuccessful  Vichitraveerja and fathered Dhrithrarashtra and Pandu with Amba and Ambalika, the two wives of Vichitraveerja. The progeny luckily continued but at what cost?

The cost of blood. The bloodline of Bharata was lost forever in this scheme to hide the king's disability from the public eye.  Consider this, neither Pandu nor Dhritrarashtra had an ounce of royal Kuru blood in them and hence neither did their children.  The only true descendant of Bharata remained Bhisma but blinded by his devotion to his past he forgot to look into the future.  Bhisma defended the throne of Hastinapur in the battle of Kurukshetra but not the son of Hastinapur because indeed Duryodhana,  the king in power at Hastinapur during the war was as much a foreigner as Yudhisthira, the attacker or for that matter also Shishupala. So this brings us back to the statement which I was defending for so long.  The Kurukshetra War was a fallacy because the war which was supposedly about brothers fighting to stake their rightful claim to the throne of Hastinapur involved neither brothers,  in the truest sense of the term,  nor any rightful stakeholders to the royal throne of Hastinapur.  Considering that the Kauravas were conceived in earthen pots of Dhritrarashtra and Gandhari and the Pandavas conceived by Kunti and Madri without Pandu's involvement,  neither were the Pandavas and Kauravas related from their fathers' side nor from their mothers' hence debunking the accepted theory that they were brothers, I rest my case that the war was a fallacy.

Having said that, let us consider for a tiny moment the fact that if anyone,  at all,  knew or could have worked out all of this,  it would have had to be Bhishma.  Having known that the Kurukshetra war was a lie,  a fallacy,  why did the educated and wise Bhisma allow such a bloody massacre culminating in the death of family and friends and almost the Kuru dynasty? The duality of India is such that,  to uphold a promise made to his blood father, Bhisma had to protect a foreigner on the throne of Hastinapur.  He made a conscious choice to honour his promise more than his hubris,  to honour his word more than his blood.

The battle of Kurukshetra might have been a fallacy but by no means are the lessons learnt from it anything but absolutely essential. The concept of honouring words above blood is observed even today in Indian culture when fathers honour childhood promises and marry off their reluctant daughters to the sons of their childhood friends. It is observed when different members of the same family contest elections representing different political parties.  It is observed when mothers and mother-in-laws support brutal rape of daughters and wives by moneylenders in exchange for the money lent. The battle of Kurukshetra might have been a fallacy but it's legacy lives on in every micropore of Indian society. Such is the duality of India and hence it's story,  that if the battle of Kurukshetra was indeed a Dharmayudh then whose Dharma was it that won or lost?  Was Yudhishthira's Dharma the better Dharma ? That Dharma which convinced him to kill his teacher with his words? That Dharma which convinced him to gamble away his family?  That Dharma which taught him to be a silent audience to his wife's public humiliation?  Or was Bhisma's Dharma the better Dharma? That Dharma which convinced him to be a silent bystander to an avoidable war? That Dharma which did not touch the righteous soul when a lady was being disrobed in his presence?  That Dharma which accepted Satyabati but not Karna ? Or was it Duryodhana's Dharma that won the Dharmayudh?  That Dharma which caused him to order the public rape of Draupadi?  That Dharma which convinced a young boy to poison his brother? That Dharma which allowed him to trick , trap and kill a teenager? Considering the duality of India,  it might just be possible that no-one's Dharma won the Dharmayudh.

The truth is that in a system so complicated that perhaps only we Indians can comprehend it, the concept of 'always' does not exist.  No one is always right or always wrong,  nothing is forever and truth in itself is relative.  The theory of Relativity may have been propounded centuries later but the concept was very much prevalent in both the Mahabharata and the Bhagavada Gita. The Dharma that won the Dharmayudh is not any individual's Dharma but the Dharma of relativity - everyone's Dharma and at the same time no one's. The very fact that a war that was a fallacy provides lessons that shape Indian society and culture even today,  is a recognition of the  duality of India.

Here is something to blow your mind even further. Years and years after the Kurukshetra War, which led to widespread annihilation and which was fought to justify the Dharma of Bhishma by brothers for an undeserved seat of power, another war ravaged the same subcontinent- a war which left the subcontinent gasping for breath out of trains sent across the border packed with dead bodies and raped bodies,  a war which was fought due to the 'moral' silence of a Mahatma by brothers for an undeserved seat of power.  The duality of Bharat was established again in 1947 - the duality of two brothers fighting for their own Dharmas - India and Pakistan.

The Hidden Doe

As I sit down to write what I intend to be a good enough send-off to one of my favourite portrayals of a literary character, I am lost for words. With fingers casting long shadows on my keyboard, a thousand childhood memories come flooding back into my memory, breaking the dam of deliberate barrier to nostalgia. I think of the long sunny afternoons spent lazily lying down across my bed with a book in hand, I think of re-watching the cinematic version of the same again and again on television and yet amidst all the pictures and images, the silent memories and lasting graphics only one word comes floating through, stamping its authority across the length and breadth of my mind – “Always”.

Born miles away from London and Hogwarts, in a city that the erstwhile residents of the British capital made their own, I grew up under the influence of a British schoolmaster much like most of my generation.  Professor Severus Snape was as important a figure in my life during my formative years as was anyone else and his importance cannot be discounted merely on the basis of his absence from the City of Joy on a continued basis. Maybe I did not learn much of Potions or Defense Against the Dark Arts (although I admit I am not bad at either of these two subjects and they mean as much to me as does Chemistry or Karate) from Professor Snape and maybe I did not like him the most in the beginning but slowly, yet surely I realized that no one has perhaps taught me as much has Professor Snape during my teenage years.

From teaching me that life is downright unfair and the best thing to do is to not stop and complain but trudge on (“Well it may have escaped your notice but life isn’t fair”) to teaching how wrong judging a book by its cover can be, from teaching me that heroes don’t need to be flashy or prominent but the real heroes are the ones in the most unlikeliest of places to teaching me about true love, from teaching me that every criminal no matter how big the crime deserves a chance at redemption to teaching me all I know about ultimate devotion to a cause- a devotion so powerful that in the end it consumes you, Professor Snape has been instrumental in making me what I am today.

When on a cold winter’s morning in February in 1946, the man who would go on to define Professor Snape on screen was born, little did he know that 19 years later a lady would be born who in 1995 would go on to immortalize his sallow skin, his large, hooked nose and yellow, uneven teeth, his cold, black eyes which end up saying so much. The “overgrown bat” had been immortalized and in 2001 I gasped with the world as he gave a name and face to my imagination, a perfect finishing touch to the character I hated.

Alan Rickman may have done a lot of other movies and played a lot of other characters on screen or on stage but to me and perhaps many others he will “always” be Severus Snape, Professor Snape because Mr. Rickman personified the quintessential antagonist in a non-quintessential way and revolutionized the way I thought and the way I looked at the universe. He hammered in through actions and merely one world, the true power of true love – something which Bollywood actors have been trying to sing and dance about for nearly 6 decades now. He made me hate him because he was Snape and Snape was him and yet he made me adore his devotion to his cause, to his redemptive cause , he made me fall in love with his quiet disposition , his silent work-till-you-die attitude from the darkness ,from behind the scenes while controlling the scene in the movie. He was someone who did not need to attract attention, his appearance demanded it. As much as I loved Harry and Hermione and Ron and the rest, the only Slytherin who made all the difference and yet never let Dumbledore “reveal the best of” him touched my heart.

As I received the news of the demise of Mr. Rickman earlier today, my first reaction was a momentary pause of disbelief followed by a never-ending avalanche of old memories, each memory laced with the lasting image of Alan Rickman collapsing against the wall of the Shrieking Shack and the words of JK Rowling rushed out from the depths of the dark abyss and hit my numb mind and left it rattled:

“Look...at...me..." he whispered. The green eyes found the black, but after a second, something in the depths of the dark pair seemed to vanish, leaving them fixed, blank, and empty. The hand holding Harry thudded to the floor, and Snape moved no more.” 

At the end of it all I am left with 7 books and 8 movies ,numerous memories and not enough words to express my immense gratitude to Severus Rickman for altering my life but instead with an enduring scene of a broken Alan Rickman hugging the dead body of his beloved and a distant voice that says, “Always”.

The first page I turn to while re-reading any Harry Potter book (after Prisoner of Azkaban) is definitely page 394.

Always.

Gone girls

As he ambled out of the Operation Theatre, barely being able to support himself, he felt his phone vibrate ferociously in his pocket for the umpteenth time that evening and knowing, who it was, he did not answer it. Seeing an empty chair, he slumped into it, allowing his tensed body to relax for the first time in hours. There was, however no scope of relaxation for his mind. Tears rolled down his lightly-bearded cheeks as his lachrymal glands succumbed to immense neural torture.

The dam had burst and now his mind raced through his life- flicking through image after image with an uttered word here and a heated argument there, sprinkled with generous does of loving moments and spoonful of disagreements , all garnished in blurred monochrome. Finally it stopped at a singular image, which had first popped into his head when he had returned home to find his wife lying on the bedroom floor in a pool of blood. The image of where it all started.

He still remembered the day he met her very clearly – it was a memory that his brain was not willing to forget. The setting was nothing dramatic. It had been a cool monsoon evening in Kolkata and his eyes had fallen upon her while he had been trying to locate his seat aboard the Delhi-bound Jet Airways flight. She had been seated on the seat adjacent to his and he had continued to take stolen glances at her while shoving his suitcase into the compartment above. Having made himself comfortable he had taken out his cell phone and was searching his pockets for his earphones when she had volunteered, “Lost something?” He had mumbled something inaudible and still embarrassed had vehemently shaken his head, which, as he remembered with a smile on his tear-soaked lips, had caused her to laugh out loud. The ice, having been broken and the earphones forgotten, that had been the beginning of it all.

As his mind reverted back to the present, he realized that it had been the beginning of the end. Five days together in Delhi had made sure that they knew each other too well to be simply acquaintances. On their return to Kolkata, they had exchanged addresses to keep the phone numbers, previously exchanged, company and one thing had led to another and a flight together had translated into frequent coffee breaks and stolen meetings in restaurants and lounges and soon their friendship had blossomed into something more meaningful and both had started to introduce each other to friends and family. He had attended her sister’s wedding and had quite a nice time too, dancing without a care in the world, under the groggy effect of alcohol albeit. She had in turn attended his mother’s funeral and provided ample solace to the grieving son who had been bereaved. Their closeness had become the talk of the lanes and by-lanes around their residences and the topic of hushed conversations in both their offices. These conversations annoyed him- could a man and a woman not be just friends? He had thought that the childish link-ups would have left his back once he had left the four walls of the college building but clearly he had been proved wrong. She, however, knew that she was falling for him and even though she had tried to talk herself out of it , slowly but surely she was losing control over her Platonic feelings.

As he looked at his watch, he realized that it was already a new day. Only two hours back, his life was about as perfect as it could get- a loving wife, two children who jumped onto his the moment he returned home and everything he could have asked for when he had passed out of college. A lot had happened in the two hours, however, that had wrecked his life and perhaps changed it forever. He thought back to how he had rushed home an hour back, ran up the stairs and opened the bedroom door with the sense of foreboding making his heart pound on his chest feverishly. The sight that welcomed him did not help ease the pressure on his heart but having been blessed with a cool head he managed to quickly dial the hospital and then his sister, the former to save his wife and the latter to take the children for the night. Perspiring heavily on a cool monsoon evening, he bandaged his wife’s slit wrist and cleaned the blood from her body and carried her downstairs. Without changing out of his blood-soaked shirt he accompanied his senseless wife into the ambulance and urged the driver to drive faster. In 10 minutes he ambled out of the OT.

His phone vibrated ferociously in his pocket. He sighed and taking it out, switched it off. He already had one uneasy conscience to answer to for now. He sighed again and cleared his parched throat. He was thirsty but neither did he have the strength to get up to quench his thirst nor could he brush away the fact from his mind that the sequence of events that threatened to turn his life into ashes had all started with a glass of water. His mind wandered back to the water-cooler near his cubicle in his office about two hours back when he had been taken aback. She was the last person he had expected in his office in the middle of the day but he suppressed his astonishment at her sudden appearance and proceeded to hear what she had to say. His sudden inability to talk had not been helped by the fact that she had been wearing the same shirt that she had worn when they had first met.

His pulse had quickened gradually, the smile had vanished from his face, his eyebrows had gradually arched into a frown and beads of perspiration had appeared on his forehead with every word that she uttered. He wanted to make her stop but he also wanted to hear the extent of damage that had been caused. When she had finished and sighed, gulping down the water from his glass, he had risen and cursing himself for forgetting his cell-phone at home, walked out of the office before anyone could stop him.

In the car, his mind had been not on the road and the drive home was all a blur now. All that his mind had focused on was the imaginary memory of his wife receiving the call on his cellphone and listening to a female voice exonerating her love for him. She was possessive, he had thought but perhaps she would not do anything rash. His hope had disappeared with time and by the time he had parked his car outside his front door, he had just prayed for her life. Having seen his cell phone on the floor, near the front door his hope had vapourised and he had rushed upstairs. Something had broken inside him as he had run in on his wife lying in a pool of blood.

As he sighed and stared longingly at the doors that opened into the OT, he wished, foolishly, that the doors would swing open and his wife would step out in her favourite sari, majestically sweeping her fingers through the air, showing off her Bengali pride but moments turned into minutes and yet the door remained firmly shut. As he took off his spectacles and allowed the tears to flow freely, he wished he had not forgotten to pack his earphones that day and how he wished he had not forgotten his cellphone today.

About ten kilometres away, she tried to call him again but his cellphone was still switched off. Her hands trembled as she withdrew a pair of earphones from her pocket, the same that had fallen out of his bag on that plane to Delhi, which she had never returned, and clutching them close to her heart she jumped off the bridge into the Ganges.

The doors of the OT swung open and he looked up hopefully, just in time to see the doctor walk slowly towards him.

“Sorry”,Dr.Dutta uttered, placing his hand softly on his shoulder, as he stood up.

He collapsed back onto the chair.

The Injustice of Equality

If half a century down the line a book is ever written on the wars that had been fought fifty years back, then the war-cry that must be featured in the book has to be ‘Equality’. No matter what battle is being fought, be it at the macroscopic global level or the microscopic societal level, it is based on one and only one war-cry and that is ‘Equality’. The global villagers are up in arms demanding equality in the workplace, in educational institutions, in boardrooms of multi-national conglomerates, in parliaments across nations and most importantly amongst themselves.

The most controversial demands for equality being made today are perhaps in the context of gender and sexuality. Now to start off, the very concept of ‘Gender Equality’ baffles me – it is confusing in its very core because it tries to equate to unequal entities which as anyone with basic knowledge of Mathematics will tell you, is not possible unless there is a ‘division by 0’ involved somewhere. Man and woman were created (by God or by a fusion of sperm and ova, depending on your religious inclinations) to be different in many respects. If you had paid attention to the Biology lectures in secondary school, you would have realized that men and women are physically different and are wired differently internally – both in terms of internal plumbing and mental acuity. Men and women react differently to different situations and think differently and beyond the similarity of white bones and red flesh barely any similarities exist. Having established, for the sake of the people incapable of complete use of their perceptive powers despite existence of all necessary senses, the fact that men and women are different, we can now focus on the second part of the problem.

The concept of ‘Gender Equality’ is absurd for the simple reason that it is not possible. Actions supporting ‘Gender Equality’ tend to me reactions against a patriarchal society which defeats its purpose completely. The present concept of ‘Gender Equality’ goes something like this –“If my husband cheats on me , it means I now have the right to cheat on him and he cannot say a thing about it” or “If a man molests and physically assaults a woman it is a crime but if a woman does the same to a man , he probably deserved it” or “If a man lecherously gazes at a woman it is derogatory yet if a woman does the same then it is unrequited love”. I can go on and on about such examples but that is not the point – the point is that equality is a utopic dream of a fool, not a possibility which can be successfully translated into reality. The aim of ‘gender activists’ seems to be projecting ‘women as the new men’ which is absurd and completely detrimental for society. Women don’t need to be men-like for them to be taken seriously or for them to deserve a place in society – they don’t need to smoke cigarettes to prove that they can, they don’t need to sleep around to prove that they can, they don’t need to be molesters and assaulters to prove that they can.

Men have made mistakes in the past and society has suffered because of those mistakes. It makes no sense for women to repeat the same mistakes in the name of ‘woman empowerment’ or ‘feminism’ – the concept of ‘If a man can do it, a woman can’ has to be done away with because I am sure a man can never do what a woman can. Women must be able to be comfortable in their own space, as women knowing that the monthly torture that they go through cannot be survived by an average male (“Mard ko dard hota hain”), as women knowing that they , only they, have been entrusted with the power to bring new life onto the planet. The ability of a woman to be a woman, who menstruates, who can give birth is not her weakness- It is her power.

If society is to truly move forward with both men and women leading from the front, then our aim should be towards ‘Gender Justice’, not ‘Gender Equality’ because in a country of over a billion and a world of over a hundred billion- where diversity is the be-all and end-all – equality cannot be achieved but justice can be extended. The steps must be pro-active rather than re-active and if any semblance of progress is to be achieved then serious efforts must be made to save the girl child, not to allow her a life amidst household chores and servitude but a life where she is educated, not merely schooled, allowed to love, not merely married off and allowed to be proud to be a woman, not merely ordered to look up to men. There must not be reservations for women in education or service but instead the ability of women to prove themselves as women amongst men must be respected. Women must be given every service made available to men, nothing more, nothing less because when two unequal beings are placed on an equal footing to start with then justice has not been denied.

Men and women can never be equal. They should never be equal because they, in their own way, shape our global village and in their diversity, their difference lies their strength. However, men and women can be given a just opportunity to prove their mettle, can be placed at the same starting line with none advantaged unfairly and to be placed at the same starting line, to be given the same opportunities to perform it is not necessary for women to lower themselves to the level of fallen men or for men to be pulled down from their pedestals but instead it is necessary for women to rise in their own eyes as women.

It is the collective duty of all men to ensure that justice is not denied because in a society where women aspire to be the ‘new’ men, there can be no place for us. Hence it is our duty to make us see women for what they really and truly are because without women, men will become extinct eventually. The society needs women and men of character, not pretenders and characters. 

The Last Plan

As the train chugged into Dum Dum junction, the crowd which had been thickening for quite some time now got ready for the daily ritual. Men grabbed onto other men and yet somehow managed to extend a few fingers towards the handle on the door of the incoming train. By utilizing the full potential of every finger, by pushing every sinew to the edge and by squeezing and twisting their flabby bodies into every available inch of space, modern men prepared for war. As the train shuddered to a slow halt, men rapidly placed feet on anything they could find. There were feet on feet, on metal, on leather, on cloth and barely any space to sustain more feet but still men found space not only to squeeze in more feet but entire bodies with heavy luggage. The heads inside the compartments let out sighs of exultation and those on the platform sighs of exasperation.

Amidst all the sweaty foreheads and flailing hands, Dinesh’s eyes, ever so ready to spot windows, literal or those of opportunities, spotted Mr. Bhowmick. The short and portly man had managed to secure a seat and his blue and purple checked half-shirt, laden with sweat and toil, hung loosely over his tired body. His fingers danced on his cheap leather bag which adorned his lap beneath which invisible to Dinesh was a pair of grey trousers torn in two places. His feet were dressed in a pair of sandals which he had worn ceaselessly for the last sixteen years.

“Bhowmick”, called out Dinesh over the sound of the engine which had hummed back to life. The portly man seemed not to hear as he stared absent-mindedly at the window. Dinesh was about to call out again when the old man standing in front of him, whom Dinesh knew only by face and not by name, interjected,” Leave him alone. He’s worried about losing his job.”

“Why?” asked Dinesh tentatively.

“Change in government is imminent”, murmured the old man.

Dinesh nodded knowingly and turned away.

As the train strolled into Sodepur station, Mr. Bhowmick got up and twisted and turned himself towards the gate and as the train stopped, the swarm of people pushed out Mr. Bhowmick depositing him onto the platform. Mr. Bhowmick started to amble towards the exit stairs as the train chugged out of the station. Dinesh looked out of the window hoping for an opportunity to wave goodbye but Mr. Bhowmick did not turn around. He simply looked up and sighed, peeked into his Sonata watch and sighed again. He knew exactly what he was walking home to, just like every other day.

After the routine 15 minute walk, as he turned left Mr. Bhowmick was not greeted by the usual dark, empty lane and the house at the end of it but a lane filled with people and smoke emanating from the house at the end of the lane. The house could hardly be seen by Mr. Bhowmick , partly because of the smoke which clouded his vision but mostly because all of Sodepur seemed to have gathered inside that tiny lane to watch a spectacle. As the bag slipped off his shoulders and his body went limp, someone placed a hand on his shoulder, someone else made him sit down on the road and some third person poured water into his open mouth. Someone else recognized the owner of the house and a sudden hush descended upon the crowd mocking the rising smoke. The crowd parted on its own to let the owner into his burnt possession. Mr. Bhowmick shuffled towards his house but before he could reach the front door his eyes encountered what they were searching for.

Mr. Bhowmick grasped his chest and withdrew a small bottle from his chest pocket .Hands shaking, fingers trembling, he struggled with the cap before finally opening it and poured the contents into his open mouth. The bottle, now empty, was disposed of into the gutter. He then knelt down beside the corpse covered by a white cloth and let his teardrops wet the cloth. He felt a cold hand on his shoulder and turned around to identify the face associated with the hand. 

Through his spectacles, now foggy with smoke and tears he recognized him to be a firefighter.

“Your wife, right?”, he inquired.

Mr. Bhowmick nodded and removed the cloth to look into the charred remains of what was his wife.  As he removed more of the cloth, his searching eyes failed to find what they were looking for.

He looked back up towards the firefighter and asked, “My son?”

“Sir before we answer that question , we are required to tell you that your wife had left the gas on , filling up the kitchen with inflammable hydrocarbons and striking the lighter one time too many had resulted in a blast which had charred her beyond recovery.”

Mr. Bhowmick nodded at the ground and thought back to that morning when he had walked into the kitchen and walked out sighing deeply. His wife had looked at him and smiled, a smile which remained unreturned. He had then walked over to the bed where his son was sleeping and smiled. His sleeping son had not smiled back.

“So where is he?”, asked Mr. Bhowmick again.

“Sir luckily your son had gone to school and hence was not here when disaster struck. He’s sitting in the truck right now”, assured the firefighter.

As the contents of the bottle spread through every artery of his body rapidly, Mr. Bhowmick looked up in despair- his sloth-like movements contradicting the rapid biochemical reactions disintegrating his body. It took some time for the ramifications of the firefighter’s words to register, for them to seep deep into the nooks and recesses of his mind and when they did, his blood was beyond recovery. His shaking hands betrayed the coolness with which he had executed his plan but his trembling heart knew that something had gone horribly wrong. He tried to get up , using his last remaining quantum of strength but couldn’t and fell back onto the street .

As his skin turned rapidly from the light brown, that it had been for the past forty-one years, to red and quickly to purple and finally assumed a bluish hue reminiscent of many Hindu Gods, all Mr.Bhowmick could discern were the sounds of panic around him, the sounds of whizzing brains not knowing what had happened and the silence of stunned hands not knowing what to do. All he could think of as his mouth filled up with froth and foam was that his last plan had failed, failed as horribly as he had in life. There were only two dead bodies where there should have been three.

In the fire- truck, 7-year old Anurag Bhowmick waited for his father to return and his mother to wake up.