tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-39091547976883930892024-02-19T22:31:46.774+05:30Darpan'sMusalsal ek nagin das rahi hai, saara shahar neela pada haiDarpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.comBlogger34125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-13713940020862464552016-06-05T11:43:00.001+05:302016-06-05T11:43:14.108+05:30How and why students in Bihar cheat, and it may not stop soon<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px;">More than eight lakh class 10 students of Bihar School Examination Board failed as the pass percentage dropped from 75 to 46 in a year. That it is also the state’s worst performance in nearly two decades mostly slipped under the radar. Patna fared worse than the state’s average. Only 10% students could secure first division marks, down from 21% last year. The percentage of second-division students dropped from 40 to 25. The number of students who registered themselves but did not appear doubled to 30,000. </span><span style="color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px;">All this did not happen suddenly. The state had to crack down after images of people risking their life and limb by clambering up a multi-storey school building and clinging on window ledges to help their wards cheat last year drew worldwide derision. Mass copying aided by relatives and friends was known. Now its scale and blatancy had shocked the outside world.</span><br />
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Authorities extended the ban on those caught cheating, organised more police teams to deal with ‘helpers’ lurking outside schools, dropped many dodgy centres, installed CCTV cameras in some, and announced exam schedules well in advance.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
This was a little like 1996 when an exasperated Patna high court stepped in after Lalu Yadav’s ‘jungle raaj’ had been allowing mass cheating of biblical proportions. Only 12% students passed that year. The executive had other ways to woo its electoral constituencies. Opposition to English was marketed as an anti-elite policy. I had to take the same school-leaving test without English as a mandatory subject. As the court’s grip soon loosened, the success rate climbed back to the 60s and 70s.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
A ‘no home centre’ directive that made examinees swap village blocks was a lazy, and clearly ineffective, measure to stop cheating. Family members and well-wishers traveled with examinees and stayed in rented rooms to cook and prepare cheat sheets from popular study aides such as ‘passport’, ‘guess paper’ ‘kunjika’ and atom ‘bomb’. Once questions came out, help was smuggled in.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Students also had mnemonics on hands, and short answers on clipboards. Memory prompts hid under watches and in socks and undergarments. While scraps of paper filled up sacks every evening, some students even took answer-sheets home so that they could write in free time, and deposit them when convenient. Teachers would themselves write answers on the blackboard to make things easy. It was all cleaned up when “flying squads” came calling, with prior intimation of course.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Bored policemen sometime used lathis, and very occasionally, fired warning shots in the air when crowds turned unruly. I remember one such occasion when some scared ‘helpers’ forced their way into a house in our gated community where a wedding was taking place. Cops went in and rounded up a few people. One guy pleaded innocence, but he and others were bundled into a jeep and taken to the local police station. Later, it turned out that he was the groom. He somehow made it to the main ceremony.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
After this year’s result, the state’s education minister said fewer successful students was actually good news because it showed the real merit of students, and they would be able to clear the toughest of tests. Days later, an embarrassed government has also had to call some of its class 12 toppers for a re-examination after they looked ridiculously clueless in public about the subjects they had excelled in. When ‘natural cheating’ is curbed, a more organised enterprise always kicks in.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
A few years ago, a friend while submitting admission documents at a DU college was scandalised. The clerk pointed to the cut-off list, and returned a candidate from Bihar his mark-sheet. The candidate nonchalantly took out a ‘better’ mark-sheet. He had to run away. More recently, a cousin at DU had problems with English instructions. He has as part of his Plan B admitted himself to another college back home where “things are easy”.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Bihar has in recent years done better in terms of taking students to government schools. But learning levels remain poor. The state has the worst student-teacher ratio after Uttar Pradesh. Faking degrees to land jobs is rampant. Thousands of teachers hired on contract have been officially found unable to solve questions a fifth-grader would easily do. Teachers overseeing construction, doing election and census assignments only adds to the problem of absenteeism.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
In such situations, 1.5 million government school students who mostly learn by rote or do not learnt at all take these make-or-break tests. Boys want degrees to apply for jobs and admissions. Girls in rural areas need them to qualify for decent marriage proposals. One cannot afford not to be a ‘Matric Pass.’ Cheating on these memory-testing exams kill creativity and logical reasoning, but families feel compelled to help, often climbing for the ultimate enabling act that corralled international headlines last year.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Poor learning is not unique to state education in Bihar. Only 55.32% class 10 students passed in Chhattisgarh last week. Haryana fared worse. Last year, more than half of Madhya Pradesh students failed. We must shift from rote learning to modern skills-based training as India needs millions of skilled people. Buxar has fared the worst in Bihar with a pass percentage of only 27. We must identify and monitor such districts. Families have to realise that children will not learn unless their help in cheating stops.</div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-58470637322117520792016-05-30T17:11:00.002+05:302016-05-30T17:11:59.996+05:30Ek Tha Lokpal: Why a corruption watchdog eludes India 30 months after Parliament passed a historic law<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
On a typically cold winter day in December 2013, a frail-looking Anna Hazare broke his fast as Parliament ended years of dithering and passed a law to appoint a watchdog for punishing corrupt lawmakers and bureaucrats. As the 76-year-old Gandhian activist accepted a glass of coconut water from two children at his native village in Maharashtra, his supporters waved flags in jubilation, and people elsewhere celebrated a law that came after 10 failed attempts in Parliament over the last five decades. Opposition leader Sushma Swaraj spoke eloquently about “an old man who keeps fasting to fight corruption, and appeals to our collective conscience.” That year India was ranked 94th on Transparency International’s global corruption index of 177 countries.<br />
Thirty months later, the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013 has not been implemented. India is yet to have it first Lokpal. These 30 months include the first two years under Narendra Modi, who became PM with a massive mandate to push growth and fight corruption. His government’s defence is: a search committee could not be formed as there was no leader of opposition (LoP) in Lok Sabha. After it lost a string of state polls, Congress had pushed the Bill before the 2014 national elections to fight the taint of scams, but it slumped to its worst performance, not winning even 55 seats to have an LoP.<br />
The Modi government instead of urgently sorting out the limited issue of LoP introduced a 10-page amendment in December 2014. The matter has moved to a Parliamentary panel. The law required public servants to declare not only their assets and liabilities but also for their spouse. The government is in favour of making only immovable assets of officials public. While in opposition, BJP wanted a strong and independent Lokpal. Now the party is accused of both diluting the law and delaying its enforcement.<br />
The PM believes he is doing fine without a Lokpal. “Corruption had eaten away our country like termites. So if I have stopped so much corruption, there will of course be many who will curse me. Only those who looted the nation are not enthused by this government,” said Modi at a five-hour ‘telethon’ on Saturday, while giving full marks to his two-year-old government. But the delay follows a pattern. The posts of chief information commissioner and central vigilance commissioner remained vacant for over nine months under Modi’s watch, and the government was accused of being afraid of transparency and action against the corrupt.<br />
Modi’s remarks come days after the Supreme Court questioned why his government had not appointed anyone as Lokpal. “What is holding you back? You cannot sit over it,” the court told the government, while seeking to know by July 19 the steps taken for the appointment. The court was hearing a PIL filed by NGO Common Cause that alleged that the government and other parties were dragging feet. The top court had in 2002 asked the government to appoint a Lokpal to “end the headache of a scam every day.”<br />
Hazare was apprehensive when the central law was enacted, and had said it would be meaningless unless implemented and enforced properly. The ‘old man’ recently accused the Modi government of delaying the Lokpal’s appointment, and questioned its intent and credibility to fight corruption. While he continues to make noises, his aides like Kiran Bedi and VK Singh have accepted top government positions. Arvind Kejriwal who oversaw protests in 2011 that forced UPA to introduce a Bill in Parliament has since formed a party, and rules Delhi. Kejriwal passed Delhi’s Lokpal law late last year, but faced charges of weak provisions and no consultations. The law awaits the Centre’s nod. But he also claims to have reduced corruption in his 15-month rule.<br />
The Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013 is not the best law India needs. It applies to states only if they give their consent. Similarly, the requirement of reporting by authorities to the Lokpal on action taken has been removed in the Act passed by Parliament. But a law is always better than no law. The civil society had found the RTI Act weak. It still turned out to be a game changer in india.</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-60261895385767172252016-05-26T17:39:00.002+05:302016-05-26T17:39:21.505+05:30Of a President, illegal halts and caste rejigs in Bihar<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Varahagiri Venkata Giri was born in a Telugu Brahmin family in Odisha, and I grew up a thousand kilometres away in Bihar. He had no connection with my hometown Dumraon. We never met. In any case, he passed away a little before I came into this world. I often thought what made me wonder about him, India’s fourth President, and not so much about our own Rajendra Prasad.<br />
Linked to my hometown through a dirt track was Ramsar Mathia, a village of 1,000-odd people. Most of them shared VV Giri’s surname. They fondly remembered him on his birth and death anniversaries as if he was one of their own. A village committee with members from six panchayats organised these events. Two-three of these men were our ‘bataidaars’ (share-croppers).<br />
Someone would stand up and speak about his achievements: how he served in Nehru’s cabinet; his tenures as Governor; his work as India’s High Commissioner to Ceylon; how he became Vice-President, acting President and finally President. An ex-MLA from the area would often mention how Giri and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi gave each other the Bharat Ratna in a span of three years.<br />
They also tried to institutionalise him. A few minutes from Dumraon is Twininganj railway station. It was perhaps named so to honour Sir Twin, a British responsible for pushing indigo cultivation. It became Turiganj like our famous Girls’ Training School was known as Gooltrainee School. Between these two stations, the Giris of Ramsar Mathia built a tiny railway station in 1996. It was named VV Giri Halt. It was illegal, but passenger trains running between Mughalsarai and Patna stopped there.<br />
While Giris elsewhere in the state demanded to be included in the list of other backward castes (OBCs) for more government jobs and college seats, authorities demolished the halt, saying it was illegal and commercially unviable for trains to stop there. Giris kept writing letters to the railway board demanding the halt be rebuilt. Ironically, the ex-President was also a founding member of the All India Railwaymen’s Federation. I wonder if he would have appreciated his name being used for such an enterprise.<br />
Giri went to University College, Dublin, where Thomas MacDonagh taught and radicalised him. When he returned from Ireland, he joined the Congress party and the trade union movement. As President, he made 14 state visits to 22 countries. The closest he came to Ramsar Mathia was perhaps when he occupied Raj Bhawan in Lucknow. There still was a distance of some 400 km.<br />
But VV Giri was not the only halt. In the mid-1990s, when Lalu Yadav ruled Bihar, illegal stations—mainly platforms and no shelters—mushroomed under political patronage. During our commute we would crib when passenger trains stopped at Lalu Halt, Rabri Halt, Sarvodaya Halt, Parasia Halt and Dharali Halt. It allowed ticketless travellers to stream in with sacks of vegetables, herds of goats, huge milk containers and large cotton saree-wrapped paneer chunks. Bicycles also travelled, hanging from window bars.<br />
Trains stopped as drivers and guards feared being bashed up. Some express trains also stopped as people would snip off the vacuum hose. Sometimes people would get off, run, finish a chore in one of those houses along tracks, and get back to the seats unapologetically. Because of back-breaking roads and rickety public transport in those days, trains were the only options for small traders and students to reach nearby towns and cities.<br />
When Mamata Banerjee became the railway minister some of these halts were discontinued. Violence over scrapping of these structures was common. There were also numerous smaller stations created legally. Every time the country had a new railway minister, some trains would skip some of these stations. Mobs torched coaches and damaged tracks in protest.<br />
VV Giri Halt was demolished when Lalu became the railway minister. But chief minister Nitish Kumar was to fulfil a bigger demand. Years later, he moved Giris into the OBC list to win over the 25-lakh-strong Brahmin sub-caste after he split with BJP in Bihar in 2013. The structure was gone, but caste rejigs to stay in power has not halted in Bihar.</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-68543030912619700002016-05-22T19:05:00.001+05:302016-05-22T19:05:16.927+05:30The Congress-mukt Bharat that BJP wants <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
When Narendra Modi became BJP’s campaign committee chief three years ago, he gave a call for a ‘Congress-mukt Bharat.’ Then it was at best treated as a war cry to charge up cadres and wrest power that had eluded BJP for 10 years. Recent electoral reverses in states have prompted some to object to the slogan. They said it was undemocratic to seek to kill robust contests and oppositions. But what the ruling party at the Centre seeks is its own political ascendancy: its governments in state after state. First, wiping out of Congress as a political party is not possible. Second, it is in BJP’s interest that Congress loses power but retains some of its vote.<br />
After Modi became PM in 2014, BJP and its allies have won Haryana, Maharashtra, J&K, Jharkhand and now Assam, and made inroads in vergin territories of Bengal and Kerala. These were mostly states where BJP had direct fights with unpopular Congress regimes. But in between the Modi juggernaut had halted in Delhi because the contest was different: there was a three-term Congress government, but there also was Aam Aadmi Party with a clean slate, hungry to exploit the anti-incumbency.<br />
Congress’ vote share in Delhi came down from 24% to 8%, and AAP’s went up to 54% from 29% for the simple reason most voters willing to ditch Congress preferred a non-BJP option because of social and religious ideologies the two old rivals are seen to represent. In Delhi’s recent municipal bypolls when Congress’ vote share went back to 24%, AAP’s came back to 29%. So in states such as Punjab where AAP has emerged as a third force, BJP would want Congress to stay alive. This will check AAP which is likely to target more and more states where BJP and Congress are in direct fights. The loss in Bihar posed different questions, forcing BJP to to go for a course correction, giving importance to local leaderships and alliances.<br />
But Congress has been performing exactly the way BJP wants it to: retain some votes, but not enough seats. It has shown little intent to regroup and bounce bank. Even when it lost the 2014 national elections badly, it directly ruled 11 states and was part of two state governments. Today the grand old party rules just six states, one UT, and is a small part of an alliance that rules Bihar. This is less than 16% of India. Unless it dramatically improves its show in coming state polls, Congress that leads UPA in Parliament cannot claim natural leadership of any future anti-BJP front.<br />
BJP and its partners rule more than 43% of the country’s population. This brings us to the ‘third front’ question. Non-BJP and non-Congress parties rule the rest 41% of India, but they are sharply divided. Parties like AIDMK and DMK or Left and TMC or SP and BSP are not likely to come under one umbrella to be BJP’s main challengers in 14 state battles going into the next general elections three years from now. It is in this context that the third front idea being pushed by the likes of Mamata Banerjee and Nitish Kumar does not hold much promise. Their friend Arvind Kejriwal’s party AAP has already said it will not be part of any such front.<br />
Kejriwal knows his history. All front governments at the Centre proved to be short-lived, toppled by Congress pull-outs. BJP also withdrew support to a government of great contradictions. History tells us any successful large alliance has to have a national player as its anchor. Some rivals may join hands, something that happened in Bihar in 2015, to check BJP in some states.<br />
But every state election brings its own script. A Bihar-like mahagathbandhan is not possible everywhere. While 2017 has UP, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur going to polls, 2018 has contests lined up in Gujarat, Karnataka, Himachal, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura. Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan will go to polls in a final round right before 2019. In some of these states, BJP will face a large alliance of opposition parties. In others, the party would not aim to decimate Congress.<br />
Congress can learn much from BJP that has had its share of disastrous showing. The ‘darkness did go away and the lotus bloomed’ under Vajpayee and Advani after the party got reduced to two seats in Parliament in the 1984 national elections. On the back of even more polarising campaigns under Modi, the lotus is now blossoming. Congress’ Digivijay Singh admitted a surgery was needed for his party to survive the latest poll debacles. But the question is: will the party show the courage to find the right surgeons?</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-13369469337299259292016-05-22T19:04:00.000+05:302016-05-22T19:04:04.738+05:30Remembering Dumraon’s Bismillah <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It’s heartening that the Narendra Modi government has plans to celebrate the life and music of late Shehnai maestro Ustad Bismillah Khan. The Centre gave him Bharat Ratna 15 years ago and later instituted a stamp, but the two states—one his janmbhumi and another karmbhumi—did little to honour his memory.<br />
Five-year-old Bismillah had his first audiences at Dumraon, the place where he was born a hundred years ago. Every time he played the Shehnai at Bihariji Temple in Rajgarh — a sprawling campus on which the headquarters of the erstwhile Dumraon Raj in Bihar stand — the tunes mesmerised people, including members of the royal family.<br />
There was a definite touch of brilliance in the boy’s performances, but not everyone would have imagined that he would become a maestro, bringing accolades by single-handedly raising the stature of the ‘obscure wind instrument’ he even then played with élan.<br />
His father Paighambar Bux alias Bachai Miyan, grandfather Rasool Bux, great grandfather Hussain Bux were court musicians of Dumraon Raj. They played in Naqqar Khana.<br />
Bachai and Mitthan initially named him Amiruddin, to rhyme with their first son Shamshuddin’s name. Rasool exclaimed “Bismillah!” (“In the name of Allah!”) when he saw him. It stuck. My late grandfather, a member of the royal family, would tell me that when Bismillah sang the Bhojpuri ‘chaita’ Ehi matiya me bhulail hamar motiya he rama (It’s in this place that I lost my pearl), the temple priest would reward him a ‘laddoo’.<br />
Born in Bhirung Raut Ki Gali, he spent his childhood playing ‘gilli-danda’ near the famous Chhatiya pond. He went to Urdu School near Naya Talab. He was fond of Dumraon’s daals. He was often accused of shying away from introducing himself as a native of Dumraon once he had made it big as a Shehnai player. It is not true. He would often think of his place of birth. Bismillah wanted to visit Dumraon, but could not.<br />
The kid was taken to Banaras when he was six and lost his mother. He trained under his uncle, Ali Baksh ‘Vilayatu’, a shehnai player attached to Vishwanath Temple. He and the shehnai were synonyms. He referred to the instrument as his begum after his wife died. He was a Shi’ite Muslim, a symbol of communal harmony.<br />
As Banaras, now known more as Modi’s constituency, became his workplace and Bismillah’s stature rose manifold, not many in Dumraon recognised his contributions towards the Shehnai’s journey from raj darbars and social functions to the realm of classical music worldwide.<br />
Perhaps most people in Dumraon — especially those raised in the feudal environment — could not fathom the meteoric rise of the son of an ordinary person. The Bihar government made several promises to honour him, but did little. Reports of the UP government’s reluctance to settle his hospital expenses were painful.<br />
The Centre now plans yearlong birth centenary celebrations which include performances and special programmes, and may also build memorials for these icons and institute stamps and coins and publish books in their remembrance.<br />
Khaan Saab deserves all this and much more!</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-89421960779175801292016-05-18T09:56:00.000+05:302016-05-18T09:56:02.856+05:30Motihari: Tales of a small Bihar that ferries Dilliwallahas<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="content" style="box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; color: #2b2b2b; font-family: Lato; font-size: 16px; margin-top: 5px; word-wrap: break-word;">
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
As Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and his Bihar counterpart Nitish Kumar bond over their common political interests, countless Biharis stream into Delhi for education and jobs, creating a link between two distinct and distant states. Biharis are a strong electoral constituency. Together with migrants from eastern Uttar Pradesh, they are known as Poorvanchalis, making up 35% of Delhi’s 13 million voters. The Bihari identity in Delhi has many stereotypes: the khaini-chewing construction worker, the ‘un-cool’ but studious DU student, and the aspiring civil servant of Mukherji Nagar.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Then there is the quintessential autowallah. You speak to any auto-rickshaw driver in Delhi, and you’re likely to be speaking to a Bihari. As it is, that incorrigible slant in the otherwise Khadi boli is unmissable. During my commuting in Delhi, I have been fascinated to see just how many of them are from a single place—Motihari in north Bihar. Next time you travel, just strike up a conversation!</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
It’s enriching to let people tell their stories. Poor Kalimullah left Motihari’s Mankarwa village and became an auto driver in Delhi two decades ago. His four uncles came here 10 years before him to take up the same job. When I met him for a second time, he took me to Minto Road, Ananad Vihar, Pandav Nagar and New Delhi railway station to let me meet hundreds of his Motihari colleagues. Unemployed Chandramohan Prasad Yadav of Motihari’s Rajapur left home with friends and landed in Delhi 20 years ago. His uncle Deolal Yadav was already here. His three brothers—Lakhinder, Surinder and Gubri—also became auto-drivers in Delhi.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
When I lived in east Delhi, I met hundreds of men from villages in Motihari’s Sugauli who drove auto-rickshaws in Delhi and lived in Trilokpuri. Rajiv Kumar Jha of Motihari’s Kotwa reached Delhi in 2000, started as a driver, but soon owned 20 vehicles and hired 40 drivers. In three years, he managed to get a new house constructed back home. His father and uncle also worked with him. Rajeev bought a house here and sent his kids to an English-medium school. “Maybe, this is the last generation of drivers in our family. We can now switch to “more honourable” jobs,” he told me during a ride from KG Marg to Mayur Vihar.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
So how did it all start? Ranglal Rai who came to Delhi from Motihari’s Pipra in 1973 said the first lot came in the early 1950s. A large number of men from areas around Motihari such as Basantpur, Bagahi, Medhiharwa, Chakiya, Dhaka and Kesariya became auto drivers in Delhi. While Vidyananda (Kotwa), Lallan (Kesariya), Raju Pandit (Kotwa) and Alim (Pahadpur) struggled in Delhi, Rakesh Pandey (Belwa) is proud that he married off his sister without any outside help.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Most of these conversations happened during commuting. I met a driver who sang very well. I often called him to pick me up from office. It’s not such a bad idea to unwind after a day’s of hard work in the company of a fellow Bihari, for long a synonym for ‘uncouth’ or ‘uncivilised’. Though such stereotyping is gradually declining. As my friend put it, “Nowadays colleagues are less horrified after listening to my Bhojpuri conversation with my mother over the phone.”</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
Sometime ago, I was in Motihari on an assignment. Once Mahatma Gandhi’s workplace during the Satyagraha Andolan, the area has seen some of the most gruesome political killings, and remained narcotics smuggling hub. I tried to see the families of some of the drivers I had met in Delhi. I had some phone numbers, so the task was slightly easy. I found Chandramohan’s father, Hira Prasad, himself working as a taxi driver. “I never wished to work in Delhi. There is more money there, but I like it here,” he said.</div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; height: auto !important; margin-top: 20px; max-width: 100% !important;">
I also met Ali Imam, a science graduate and once a civil service aspirant, who proudly said that Motihari is where George Orwell was born in 1903. He owned a few vehicles. Not too far, Rajiv’s grandfather, Satyanarayan Jha, also drove an auto-rickshaw. I finally met Kalimullah’s father, Hadish. He proudly showed his house renovated with the money his son sent from Delhi.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-10448431135882351622016-05-13T23:42:00.000+05:302016-05-13T23:42:03.151+05:30Bihar far from jungle raj, but Nitish must arrest the slide<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
For eight long years, Bihar under Nitish Kumar was all about repair and resurgence. Stories of ‘sushasan’ and development—sometimes exaggerated—routinely came out of a state still recovering from years of misrule. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
His parting ways with the BJP to oppose Narendra Modi's surge in 2013 meant that the buried narrative of ‘jungle raaj’ was to be revived soon. In the 2014 national elections, a perceived Modi wave decimated Nitish’s JD (U) and Lalu’s RJD in Bihar. Soon they came together, and won a high-stake state battle six months ago. All this while, every high-profile crime in the state has naturally made the political rhetoric of jungle raaj shriller. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
To understand the jungle raaj phenomenon and the state’s changing socio-political realities, one must look back. Nitish and Lalu came out of the JP movement of the 1970s. When Lalu became CM in 1990, Nitish was by his side. He left Lalu to protest Yadavs' domination in government schemes. Lalu quelled protests triggered by the Centre’s move to grant reservation to OBCs, while Nitish’s party fought national elections in alliance with the BJP. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
In a sharply divided society, vast chunks of population felt liberated and emerged victorious. New breeds of netas on both sides rose by breaking law—and patronising those who broke law—for political consolidation. A nexus of criminals, politicians, officials and businesses took control, ushering in an era of caste crimes, kidnappings, extortion, corruption and a complete infrastructure collapse. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
So has Bihar really slipped into a similar state of lawlessness? Numbers cannot capture fear, but let’s examine some of them to see if there is a trend. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
* Serious crimes rose marginally between 2014 and 2015, shows National Crime Record Bureau data. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
* More crimes took place in BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, and centrally-controlled Delhi during this period. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
* In the last six months of 2015, when RJD had replaced BJP in Nitish’s government, the number in fact fell compared to the same period the previous year. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
* But the first six months of the new government does see a 20% increase in crime cases. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
It is in this context that the killing of a young student by a ruling party legislator’s son in Gaya should be a wake-up call. The crime aided by a police bodyguard and committed simply because a politician’s son—drunk on power—could not overtake a car points to a culture of political impunity. And now the killing of a journalist. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
Other cases also show an increasing absence of fear of law among the powerful. Since Nitish took charge, there have been two political killings. An RJD MLA was accused of raping a minor, but police could not touch him for a month. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
Nitish must arrest the slide, and tackle the rogues within. Prohibition is good in many senses. But why expect too much out of it? Like AAP’s odd-even road rationing scheme has not cleaned up Delhi’s foul air, prohibition alone cannot contain crime. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
Nitish grew at the expense of Lalu. Moving with the tide, he completed long-delayed bridges, re-laid roads, revived health centres, appointed teachers, and contained criminal gangs. He did well because he wanted to do well. It was also because the state’s social realities had changed. One must not forget that voters backed his leadership even when he embraced Lalu after a decade of bitter rivalry to stall the BJP. </div>
<div class="_2cuy _3dgx _2vxa">
Nitish might be a nucleus around which an anti-Modi grouping may take shape. He has given a call for a ‘Sangh-mukt’ Bharat. But with general elections three years away, it's time to work towards an ‘apradh-mukt’ Bihar. Lalu should be shrewd enough to know that the longevity of the mantle he passed on to his sons depends on how Bihar fares.</div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-62459866649874658422015-11-12T19:02:00.001+05:302015-11-12T19:02:54.578+05:30 Why Bihar election was a really tough one for pollsters <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div id="p_1" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
“<em>Aap toh Bihar se hain, aap bataaiye</em>...” goes the routine line. If you are from Bihar, and also a journalist, you are expected, often quite mistakenly, to know who will win in the "Modi versus the rest" contest.</div>
<div id="p_2" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
It’s been one of toughest, most complex elections to predict a clear winner, with layers of conflicting factors at work. No wonder, most political pundits have disappointed with their "play safe" approach.</div>
<div id="p_3" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Even exit polls — with the exception of Chanakya that gave the NDA a tally of 155 in the 243-seat House — have predicted that the coalition, despite claiming to be riding on Modi magic, is fighting a neck-and-neck battle with the Grand Alliance of Nitish Kumar, Lalu Prasad Yadav and Congress.</div>
<div id="p_4" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
The people of Bihar have clearly stumped the pollsters, unless it is actually, and unfortunately, a "dead heat" or a "photo finish", pushing the state to the worst possible scenario — a hung Assembly.</div>
<div id="p_5" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
With the BJP, Nitish was seen to have built a fine partnership, putting Bihar back on track. His joining hands with Lalu, perceived to be the principal architect of Bihar’s unmaking, was said to have shrunk his following.</div>
<div id="p_6" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Senior editors in Bihar, some of whom have been seen to be cosying up with Nitish, however, said Yadavs, who had enjoyed power for a long time, were voting aggressively for Lalu and the Grand Alliance. Those seen on the other side of the fence said a sizeable section of the new generation of Yadavs was fed up with Lalu’s "cosmetic caste empowerment" and was voting for the BJP wherever Yadav candidates were fielded.</div>
<div id="p_7" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Some said 40 seats to the Congress, a party which ruled Bihar for 40 years before Lalu took over, were way too many. But then Nitish’s individual popularity, many said, remained a big pull. How does one know which factor will work, and which won't?</div>
<div id="p_8" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Since the election is being seen as a referendum on Narendra Modi, the prime minister pulled out all the stops, and held as many as 30 rallies, which were planned and executed by 20 Union ministers. This blitzkrieg, coupled with a multi-million dollar Bihar package announced by Modi, should have clinched the deal.</div>
<div id="p_9" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
But has it been so? We saw what happened in Delhi. The states where BJP won post-2014 Lok Sabha polls had a straight, two-party contest. Unlike in Delhi and now in Bihar.</div>
<div id="p_10" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
This is really a high-stake election. A defeat in Bihar may lead to a cascading effect and spoil the BJP’s plans to strengthen presence in states, without which many of Modi’s agendas will continue to be disrupted in Parliament.</div>
<div id="p_11" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
So there is a whole lot of people who catch hold of you with: “<em>Aap toh patrakar hain, aap bataaiye</em>...”</div>
<div id="p_12" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
And I am clueless. The mood among journalists cannot be better captured than this tweet: “Nobody has a clue what secret sleeps in Bihar's voting machines. One of the most complex elections. Each #ExitPoll is sheer timepass.”</div>
<div id="p_13" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
But even otherwise, do journalists really have the ability to predict who will win? Political reporters do have the advantage of covering rallies, speaking to voters and the netas themselves. But does it really help or clutter the mind even more?</div>
<div id="p_14" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Most commentators who come from outside see what they want to see. Those who belong to the state but live elsewhere with years of disconnect clouding their sense of judgment are the most wayward.</div>
<div id="p_15" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
The content of the "sons of the soil" argument does not change through various phases. Is this not because they say what they want to say and not what they see? Just watch them on TV discussions and read some of their pieces. Mid-level political reporters are in any case consumed by rhetoric.</div>
<div id="p_16" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
At 2pm on Sunday, Nitish may or may not sit for the last time in the chief minister's car and leave to give his resignation to the governor, but results will be announced that day. Let’s wait till Sunday. We would all be wise in hindsight, again.</div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-44837606495771949512015-11-12T19:00:00.000+05:302015-11-12T19:00:12.462+05:30 What it was like growing up in Lalu's Bihar and why I don't want him back<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div id="p_1" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
A group of children were playing cricket, oblivious of the commotion that surrounded them in an otherwise quiet neighbourhood. Another set of people were up to a different ball game — scaling the outer wall of a nearby school building to help examinees writing their papers inside.</div>
<div id="p_2" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Seemingly bored policemen started wielding their lathis. It was the Bihar of the 1990s. So the police action against unfair means was a bit of an aberration. There was panic and chaos. Some forced their way inside a house to hide. They later realised a marriage ceremony was taking place.</div>
<div id="p_3" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Cops went inside and got the culprits out. One guy pleaded innocence, but in vain. He and many others were bundled into a jeep and taken to the local police station. Late in the evening, it turned out that the person pleading innocence was the groom. He somehow had made it to the main ceremony.</div>
<div id="p_4" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Some of those, who were supplying chits, mixed with the cricket team. There was no differentiator. The children, including my elder brother and I, were also lathi-charged. Unable to take it, my brother tried hitting a senior officer with a stump. He also reached the police station. A family friend and also a local journalist used his contacts and brought the missing player back on a motorcycle. The cricket ball still in his hand.</div>
<div id="p_5" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
As I said, the police action was an aberration in times like these when the rules were seldom followed. Every year when board exams took place in our neighbourhood, the scene was almost festival-like. "No home centre" was the only measure adopted in the name of curbing unfair-means. This basically meant one would write his papers in a school other than the one where he studied. Often the exam centre was in a neighbouring town.</div>
<div id="p_6" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
During the exam, local students disappeared from our town. They were replaced by their counterparts from other areas. Family members and well-wishers also travelled with examinees. They came in droves. Apart from doing the "scaling the wall" act, they would hang around the whole day, cook, prepare chits, buy "guess papers". They were local tourists.</div>
<div id="p_7" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Brighter students were drafted to help examinees, often much senior to them. Once a teacher came out and revealed the questions, the job was to find the relevant portions from a literature called "atom bomb", tear them away for somebody to sneak the chits in.</div>
<div id="p_8" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
It was amazing to see how people worked in an organised manner to help their wards copy. Girls, who just needed degrees and got them, were not even involved in the run-up. They just smiled and accepted the chits.</div>
<div id="p_9" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Opposition to English was marketed as an anti-elite policy as Lalu Yadav sought to woo his electoral constituencies. In 1993, says Wikipedia, Lalu adopted a pro-English policy and pushed for the re-introduction of the language in school curriculum, but I vividly remember writing my class ten papers two-three years later without English as a mandatory subject.</div>
<div id="p_10" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
We were told that because of rampant unfairness, the high court said it would monitor the exam process and ordered authorities in all districts to ensure “free, fair and peaceful” exams. The result: more than 90 per cent students failed. I somehow managed to scrape though, but lost almost all my batchmates.</div>
<div id="p_11" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
You cannot blame the court, because before that happened, it was a free for all. Students would stab knives in the desk before starting to write (read copy) so that no invigilator disturbed them. At times it was very cordial. Teachers would themselves write answers on the blackboard to make things convenient. It was all cleaned up when “flying squads” came calling, with prior intimation of course. In some cases, you could take the answer sheets home, write at leisure, and return when convenient. Trust me I’m not exaggerating.</div>
<div id="p_12" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Lalu and his wife Rabri Devi ruled Bihar for 15 years. It’s a period that saw lawlessness and corruption of worst kinds. As a young journalist, I was kidnapped and thrashed for a doing a few crime stories. But the criminal neglect of the education sector is what I think has hurt us the most.</div>
<div id="p_13" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
It’s funny, but many know that the first story I wrote in 2001 for the paper I worked for till recently was on the malpractices of board exams. I wrote how girls needed degrees to be able to be married off. How boys needed certificates to able to get admissions, and also begin the everlasting struggle for jobs. My brother who returned from the police station with a cricket ball in his hand has been a very good student for a change. He got a government job only last month.</div>
<div id="p_14" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
I thank cricket that gave me a career. I listened to <em>AIR</em>'s running commentary that came alternatively in Hindi and English. I walked long miles for tuitions with a transistor set hanging around my neck. Trying to make sense of English was, perhaps, the toughest thing I then did. But I had to know the scores at all costs. Later, I developed a liking for <em>Radio Pakistan</em>, <em>ABC</em> and the more classically produced<em>BBC</em> commentary. For better pictures and graphics, I slowly switched from <em>Cricket Samrat</em> to <em>Sportstar</em>.</div>
<div id="p_15" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
With some heartbreak, I dumped my favourite writer Charanpal Singh Sobti for the likes of Peter Roebuck. But all this needed a helping hand. Sahni Shabdkosh (from English to Hindi) made room for (English to English) Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary. Since I picked it up, to some extent I stood out. A leading paper was looking for a reporter for our area in 2001. But that's a different story, and for some other time. The "Santosh" radio remained my constant companion for long, as I kept changing cities to earn a living.</div>
<div id="p_16" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
My brother was relentless. He got his job almost ten years after he wrote the test. We’re finally able to deal with the bitterness of not succeeding much in attempts at professional cricket. There were thousands others who have not been as lucky as me and my brother.</div>
<div id="p_17" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Nitish Kumar is seen as a good man. He fought Lalu’s "jungle raj" and tried to stem the rot. He built long-delayed bridges, re-layed roads, made health centres functional. He reigned in the criminal gangs. He also appointed thousands of teachers. It’s Nitish’s political compulsion, a battle for survival, owing to which he joined hands with Lalu.</div>
<div id="p_18" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
I’m not getting into whether or not he is right in trying to stall the BJP — a party with which he made a fantastic combination and was seen to be putting Bihar back on track. The question is: Will Lalu allow him (in case the grand alliance wins) to continue the work he was doing. Many of my childhood friends — still stuck in the proverbial backwaters — are not very hopeful.</div>
<div id="p_18" style="background-color: white; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
<span style="color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px;">http://www.dailyo.in/politics/bihar-polls-nitish-kumar-lalu-prasad-yadav-rabri-devi-jungle-raj-bjp/story/1/7190.html</span></span></div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-42189965277927986582013-12-16T00:58:00.002+05:302013-12-16T00:58:27.802+05:30The Dogs that We are <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
"I have been standing here for two hours; don't try to be smart. I will get inside first," the video journalist told me. I was in no hurry. The door was locked from outside, after all. I remember I stepped back a little. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
Soon, more people began to come up. The whole stairway was full of people, carrying cameras, cables, tripods, mikes and note pads. Everybody was waiting for the family. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
The mother appeared first. Before she could greet us, she was jostled by many rushing for the door. "Are we allowed to show her face," asked a young woman. "Let's shoot now. Baad me dekhenge kya karna hai," said her male colleague, struggling to hold his video camera high. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
The mother managed to reach the door but couldn't open it. Held up downstairs, her husband appeared after some time. He didn't have the keys either. Neighbours shut their doors. After a while, it turned out that their younger son had got the door locked from outside to keep the media at bay. He failed. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
He threw the keys from inside. In two minutes, journalists swarmed into the house. "Let us have a glass of water. We have been travelling the whole day. Please go outside. I will give interviews to all of you," the father pleaded. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
Nobody listened. Let's do the set up for now. We have been waiting for hours --- was the common refrain. One of the bedrooms turned into a makeshift studio. Women reporters invaded the washroom --- for make-up. They cracked jokes. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
Now the mother pleaded: "Don't we have any work to do? We cannot deal with so many people. We have not invited so many of you. Please come later." </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
Again nobody listened. They check audio, plugged in cables, set up lights as if it was their own studio. Interviews began. All exclusives. "Did you ever ask your daughter what exactly happened to her on that bus?" "Do you remember her?" </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
People grabbed the couple by their arms and took them to different directions for better angles. They were made to sit in particular postures. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
[Can you please look a bit sad?] </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
"Us kaali raat to nirbhaya jab ghar se nikli thi to kya aapko ek baar bhi laga ki darinde usko apna shikaar bana lenge?" </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
[Can we get a doll in the backdrop, just for effect?] </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
The mother went into the kitchen to get water, but the light there was suddenly switched off, again without consent, because it was 'disturbing' the shoot happening in the next room. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
As crews began to pack and return, the mother said, "Look, they ransacked the entire house. I am paying Rs 2,000 as monthly power bills. They come and plug in all kinds of equipment. I will go mad. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
She turned to me, "Bhaiya, you didn't ask anything?" Her husband replied for me: "He never does." Having tracked the family for a year, I realised for the first time that I actually hardly ask anything when I meet them. I never have to. Just be with them and they have so much to share. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px;">
The father broke my chain of thoughts. "Tea," he said. He makes tea for me every time I visit him. Not because I am a better journalist [he doesn't know which paper I work for] or I am more sensitive than others. In fact, I also have my share of guilt. It's just that I am, perhaps, working with a medium less evil. </div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #232323; font-family: Arial; font-size: 18px; min-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-31678663085942587582013-10-27T23:50:00.000+05:302013-10-27T23:50:37.406+05:30It all helped us pull on<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">My grandfather was an avid follower of the game. So were my father's peers. Since ours was one of the rare households with a television set, they would gather to watch matches. Those were the initiation ceremonies.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: white; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;">Shashtri's Audi is one of the earliest memories I have. Maybe the famous victory lap shown for several years to come is what actually I saw because in '85 I must have been too young to seriously appreciate such celebrations and rewards for individual cricketing </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;">brilliance. </span></div>
<br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">In 1992, I was aware that Pakistan had won the world cup, but the first tournament I actually watched was Hero Cup in 1993. The last over going from Kapil to Sachin was a brave decision but also symbolised what lay ahead for all of us.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">By the 1996 world cup, I was mad about the game, playing for hours, worshipping Sachin like millions others. I skipped my intermediate exam, failed in the next attempt but couldn't shake the madness off. The arrival of Rahul, Saurav and VVS and later Sehwag provided more glue.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">People talk of cricket and they talk of joy. Some say when Sachin scored, India slept well. Some found it a source of national integration when India won.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">But for those torn between warring parents, suffering family feuds, fighting unemployment, the good results, though very few then, helped them pull on. Cricket also gave me a career.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I never covered cricket as a journalist, barring for a brief period in Ahmedabad. It helped me earn a living in a different way. I listened to AIR's running commentary that came alternatively in Hindi and English. Trying to make sense of the English bit was, perhaps, the toughest thing I then did. But I had to know the scores at all costs.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Later, developed a liking for Radio Pakistan, ABC and more classically produced BBC commentary. For better pictures and graphics, I slowly switched </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">from Cricket Samrat</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">to Sport Star. With some heartbreak, I dumped my favourite writer Charanpal Singh Sobti for the likes of Peter Roebuck. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">But all this needed a helping hand. Sahni Shabdkosh [from English to Hindi] made room for [English to English] Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I was surrounded by people who didn't know English. Even I passed class 10 exams without English --- it didn't feature as a subject, thanks to Lalu Yadav's magnanimity. Since I picked it up to some extent, I stood out when HT was looking for a reporter for our area in 2001. But that's a different story. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;">We had our mini battles in the neighbourhood. Initially, fights happened to prove Sachin was better than Kambli. When this became ridiculously irrelevant, we kept fighting for years to prove there's no connect between Sachin's centuries and India's defeats.</span></span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I began having to ignore cricket as I got busy with work, which I got to do because of cricket, and kept changing cities, my interest going up and down. But, Sachin Kitnya Banaya -- remained a constant query. And praises for Rahul's solidity, VVS' selfless service and Saurav's captaincy were never hard to come by.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Slowly, they started leaving the scene one by one. The void being felt is not only because Sachin is retiring, it's because all the greats we grew up watching are not around. It's more because the game that meant so much is suddenly not that important to me.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I can't be in Kolkata or Mumbai. But I want to be in Lahli. It won't be possible, I guess. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I can't claim I won't watch cricket now, I will follow Kolkata and Mumbai. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">But for me and many of my generation who saw the blitz and the poise from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s, the fun is surely gone.</span></div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-71402753848533099482013-08-25T11:11:00.005+05:302013-08-25T11:11:43.332+05:30My heart doesn't bleed...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
(This is the lecture I delivered at Miranda House)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Hello everyone!</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">It’s a great opportunity to be here. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">But before I speak, first a disclaimer: I’m no expert. I’m a journalist. So, I’m a jack of all trades. I will basically deal with media’s role in environment protection. I will also try and offer some tips on how to collaborate with media for the green cause. And, yes, I will spare you the environmental jargons. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Media has a great role to play in generating awareness on environmental issues. I’m sure reporters across publications are doing their job well. But I think we can do much more and less. What worries me particularly is the fact that the line between being a journalist and being an activist often gets blurred. That should not happen. Knowledge of the subject you’re dealing with always helps. But an environment reporter does not necessarily have to be an environmentalist.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">In my career, I never did the environment beat. In my last assignment, I in fact covered the opposite – infrastructure development. But that didn't keep me from taking to environment reporting a year ago, when I came to Delhi.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I will share some of my recent experiences not to brag but to let you have a sense of how things work. I exposed luxury hotels, mighty clubs and hospitals for wastage of resources and causing massive pollution. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">My articles helped in saving a number of trees from being axed in the execution of poorly planned infrastructure projects. I also took the forest department and pollution control authorities to task whenever they indulged in blatant wrongdoing.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Mention my name and you will find officials of the Public Works Department particularly cursing me. That’s because so many of their idiotic projects have got stuck, contractors are losing crores, thanks to my articles. Taking note of my writing, courts have also scolded them time and again. I assure you none of it is personal for me.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Having said all of that, I firmly believe there’s only so much you can do as a reporter. Many here may not agree, but I believe it’s not my fight; I’m not party to it.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> And now a line which I often repeat and which will not make me any popular here </span><span style="font-size: 12pt;">--- my heart doesn't bleed when I see a tree being felled. But I know what to do about it.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I am dispassionate, because I don’t want to lose my sense of objectivity. Being dispassionate doesn't mean having no passion for you work. It simply means you do your job without bias. It means you don’t pre-judge people.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I am not on a mission to change the world, make it a better place to live in. My job is to make people aware of what is happening around them and, in the process, if I happen to help mitigate some of the problems, I feel good about it and move on.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">But that’s for us, the reporters. You could be as passionate as you want. You have your convictions to drive you. Make interventions whenever required. There’s a tree helpline. Make use of that. Take to RTI; that’s a great tool when information is hard to come by otherwise.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">What does awareness do? It creates interests. It sets people thinking. And without being full-time activist, they can do a lot. Our job is to report and let people take informed decisions. Our job is also to suggest alternatives to people and policy makers. And you have to take our suggestions up for debate and discussions.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">With so much infrastructure development happening around and people taking to modern lifestyle, there's always a danger of natural resources being compromised. This is where you can come in.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">But climate change is a very catchy term. We need to figure this, breaking it down to more relatable, more doable and more tangible activities. You can start with saving water at home, asking your neighbour not to hack that tree and use public transport.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">There are 75 lakhs vehicles in Delhi. The daily addition is 1400. Every year, Delhi gets 6 lakh news cars. This means we need an additional 310 football fields every year to park these cars. 11% of Delhi has gone into parking. Only as much of this city is forest area. These vehicles also mean massive pollution.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">You need to promote public transport. You need to ensure car usage goes down. But even public transport eats into greenery. For every phase of Metro expansion, 10 to 15,000 trees are sacrificed. You need to keep a watch on compensatory plantation.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Despite crores spent and various court orders, Yamuna remains choked with all kinds of pollutants. The river is dead, almost. A total of 22 Delhi drains empty themselves into the river. 5.5 tonnes of arsenic is dumped into it by Rajghat power plant alone every year. DDA and DMRC have alone dumped 25000 truckloads of debris along the river.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Three of the four landfills are long overdue for closure and there are no fresh landfills available to take in the current daily discards of 9,000 tonnes. By 2020, the Capital needs an additional area of 28 sqkm, more than the entire spread of Lutyen's Bungalow Zone, to dump 15,000 tonnes of garbage per day.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Winter will soon be here. Delhi will soon face the smog problem. You need to check if Delhi has learnt its lessons. How are you going to do all this and more? That’s the question. </span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I’m not citing these examples to scare you. This is just to let you have a sense of the task ahead. Environment is no more a fashionable word. It’s a daily reality, reminding us of the fact that survival will only get more and more difficult.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Build good rapport with reporters. But that takes some doing. We are so intelligent; we don’t mingle with rookies easily. You need to challenge us intellectually!</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Kidding, but only partly. You actually need to convince us that not only you care for environment but you can also be a good source for the kind of reports we are looking for. After all, everything doesn’t get published. But that shouldn’t keep you from doing what is needed.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Every reporter has his own timings for newsgathering. If the subject you want him to pursue is not on his agenda, chances are he will avoid you forever.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Don’t lose heart. Don’t try and contact a reporter for not-so-important stuff, post-sundown. Because that’s when most of the stories are written.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">What we expect is tough to tell. You will get to know as you go along. Often even we’re not sure what we want!</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">One piece of advice --- read, research and do real work. Never go for your moment of glory. Quotes and interviews appear only when you have done enough and your words carry weight. So, don’t try and reverse the process. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The objective shouldn’t be lost sight of.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Together, we can make a difference.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Most of all, enjoy what you do</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Thank you very much.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<br />
<div style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; orphans: auto; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;">
<br /></div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-76024124352123680382013-07-28T14:52:00.000+05:302015-11-12T18:57:34.945+05:30Looking back<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<div id="p_1" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Sometimes a glimpse from the past makes you pause and assess the present. A decade-old NDTV video, put out on the web more recently, in which senior journalist Tavleen Singh interviews me for doing a story on homosexuality was one such opportunity. The video reminds me of the kind of stories I, and my contemporaries, then managed to do. I was in my early 20s. I had neither been to a media school nor worked outside my small hometown. The way those stories would be written made them stand out. The anecdotes now linger in memories. They set the right tone.</div>
<div id="p_2" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
We once discovered a village from where most families “contributed” at least one member to the business of stealing. The introduction featured a newly-married couple. The young man enthusiastically brought a cake of Pears, among other things, but his wife didn’t look impressed. She said her family used “this soap” for washing clothes. The man later discovered that her family members - who belonged to that village of thieves - had stolen cartons of Pears in the past but couldn’t sell all of those, and had to use the cakes for purposes other than bathing. Then the story, featuring interviews of policemen and locals, followed.</div>
<div id="p_3" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Sanjay Singh, who has been a mentor to me, did many such stories. He was not alone. There were many who were masters in telling such tales — away from the urban gaze.</div>
<div id="p_5" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Another story was about a village, which was not on the Railways map, but most families had members serving India’s biggest transporter. The story began with a quirky, tiny tale from the British period. A bunch of people from the village were travelling on a train, ticketless. Upon seeing TTEs, they changed their coaches and landed in one crammed with those selected to work for the Railways. A goof-up started a long tradition.</div>
<div id="p_6" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Only such tales were stories. The rest was news. We were groomed the same way. Photographs for these stories were shot by those who also shot photographs at wedding ceremonies. It’s a sheer misfortune that these stories didn’t go online then.</div>
<div id="p_7" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
Not for a moment am I trying to ignore “anti-establishment” and “investigative” journalism. I’m only focusing on “tales”, which are rare now. Tales that people then told in most challenging circumstances.</div>
<div id="p_8" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
We then didn’t have cell phones or computers. We wrote in the light of a lantern, and faxed them to journalism demigods in Patna. Overhead stone slabs resting on termite-infested wooden beams seemed to act like deadlines as I worked on a really old typewriter. Walls had plenty of seepages. Bed sheets and ragged saris — used as curtains — hanged limp. My reaction to the musty smell in the room — doubling up as my office — depended on the amount of time I took to type out the right introduction.</div>
<div id="p_10" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
On days when your stories were not carried, you would tend to stare at flaking speckles of whitewash that often peeled off and, mixed with dust, lined the damaged floors.</div>
<div id="p_11" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
There were threats. I received a mild threat for highlighting — with Tavleen — how homosexual relationships in India did not come out of Western influence; how many elite men in my town traditionally had male partners despite being married traditionally. </div>
<div id="p_13" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
I was also kidnapped and thrashed. I don’t know for which story. Around the same time I had done a story on how the backwardness in telecommunication was taking its toll on the law and order situation. Buxar was then one of the only two districts in Bihar where cell phones did not work.</div>
<div id="p_14" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
A number of criminals who extorted money from behind the bars had been shifted to the Buxar jail, making the place and the prison sensitive with cavalcades of gangsters with sophisticated firearms frequently coming to meet their jailed bosses, opening a whole new vista of extortion and gang war.</div>
<div id="p_15" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
In her subsequent writing, Tavleen describes my hometown, Dumraon - filthy, decrepit and felt the road every moment of the journey because “we rattled and shook rather than drove”. She wrote: “I have driven down some seriously bad roads in my time but have to say that the road from Buxur to Dumraon is in its own [of] special category. There is not the tiniest stretch that is a flat surface anymore.” In her article, she described me “a clever, ambitious young man who seemed oblivious to the decay that lay all around”.</div>
<div id="p_17" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
What she meant was that when she pointed out roadside tea shops and vegetable sellers selling their wares on the edge of open drains clogged with solidified slime and plastic bags, I seemed to notice that for the first time.</div>
<div id="p_18" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
With due respect to the point she made, civic problems were not the biggest stories for us. We had grown amidst those problems, but never complained because nothing was going to change. Can you make every Dumraon a Delhi? We had not seen the outside world. People sometimes don’t fathom the contrast, a reality of small towns and rural India.</div>
<div id="p_19" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
My first story, for the paper I worked till six months ago, appeared in March, 2001. “Looted police rifle recovered.” A few days later, I got my first byline: “A cut in the fine will be fine for the cops.” It was about the police chief in the district asking for a share from the money realised as fine from examinees caught cheating.</div>
<div id="p_20" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
For the first couple of years, I didn’t get any money. Later, things changed but the monthly pay was still in three digits. A clip on “one killed, two hurt in road mishap” fetched one Rs 10. So did a Page 1 lead. You got Rs 10 per appearance.</div>
<div id="p_21" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
But passion drove us. Filing a report and waiting for the paper to arrive gave me goosebumps. In the morning, I straightaway looked for hawkers. I kept walking, covering long stretches on foot, hoping to bump into a hawker.</div>
<div id="p_22" style="background-color: white; color: #565656; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px; padding: 8px 0px 0px;">
<div style="color: #565656; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px;">
People always tried to avoid me in such times. If trains were late, the journey became longer. Finding out about the arrival of trains was also an important task. On several occasions, I reached the railway station only to find trains several hours late. If the report appeared, it felt great. The effort was worth it. I spread the word. I often bought two copies. One was for keeps. I kept the paper handy. I looked at the article. Several times.</div>
<div style="color: #565656; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px;">
<br /></div>
<span style="color: #565656; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span style="font-size: 20px; line-height: 27px;">http://www.dailyo.in/politics/bihar-homosexuality-gay-marriage-indian-railways-journalism-tavleen-singh/story/1/7318.html</span></span></div>
<br /></div>
</div>
Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-26324994112273372192012-05-14T00:40:00.000+05:302012-05-14T00:40:43.494+05:30Let me do it my way..!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The state of the house spoke volumes. The inside roof across the rooms looked threatening with stone slabs resting on termite-infested wooden beams. With plenty of seepages in the walls, everything smelled musty. Once could inhale the dampness all the time. <br />
<br />
Flaking speckles of whitewash often peeled off and, mixed with dust, lined the damaged floors. Disused furniture rotted. A couple of rooms had curtains, actually old bedsheets or ragged sarees, hanging limp and moth-eaten. The outside roof was green with moss and threatened to cave in at many places. <br />
<br />
The structures didn’t have a feel of a house because rooms were not separate. There were too many entrances and exists. It was, effectively, one huge hall with haphazardly erected walls creating living spaces and makeshift windows and doors, some never opened and others never closed, hardly serving any purpose. <br />
<br />
At one point, the house didn’t look that bad. The courtyard had plenty of trees and plants. The old structures had their old charm. Furniture were beautifully designed. Doors looked majestic. But things began to change when she, about a decade into her marriage, began taking control and tried to turn the bulky, ancestral house into her esthetically pleasing dream house, where birds would chirp, plants would blossom, separate entrances and exists for men, women and outsiders would mean complete privacy. <br />
<br />
The deadly combination of dwindling resources, financial constraints and her never-dieing zeal to “turn the house around” meant construction would often have to halt midway. The next time it began the basic plans were completely changed. Her imagination had taken a fresh set of wings, undoing what had been done till then and making room for further mess. <br />
<br />
The kitchen was shifted more than a dozen times. It was almost a routine to see some windows being closed with a layer of bricks shutting the outside view out. At other times, workers would break into a wall to create a new window, letting the much-awaited sunlight filter in. Nobody was really surprised to see a bedroom being turned into the bathroom. <br />
<br />
I could never solve the mystery of handpumps. The numbers kept swelling. Maybe, it was because of her love for water. Or her madness for cleanliness. The handpumps, strategically located, outnumbered the occupants of the house <br />
And, sometimes, the visitors too. <br />
<br />
(We don't extend such wishes. We never have. <br />
But since she perhaps cannot read it, let me say: "Happy mother's day!") </div>Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-42482230119568564962011-02-02T00:38:00.002+05:302011-02-02T00:44:48.150+05:30याद लखनऊ<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 25px; "><div><div>एक य़े भी मकान है, एक वो भी मकान था. </div><div>वो घर से भी प्यारा था कई मायनों में... (वो शहर भी तो कुछ ख़ास था)</div><div><br /></div><div>य़े मकान तो कितना बड़ा है, वो तो बस एक कमरा भर था. </div><div>उसी में वो आतंक मचाते थे, दिन भर, नींद ख़राब होती थी </div><div>मगर मुझे जागते देख उनका सहमा हुआ चेहरा...</div><div>कई बार सोते रहने का नाटक किया... (उनकी शैतानियाँ भी तो कुछ ख़ास थी)</div><div><br /></div><div>वो पैर घसीट के आना, वो कांपती प्लेटें, </div><div>छलकती चाय, सब्जियों से भीगते पराठे. </div><div><br /></div><div>यहाँ कोई करता नहीं शोर-गुल. नींद फिर भी जोरो से आती नहीं</div><div>रेंट तो तब भी दिया था, बस किरायेदार अब ही बना हूँ. </div></div><div><br /></div></span>Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-43782657362684192011-01-29T00:24:00.006+05:302011-01-29T00:46:32.696+05:30More than just a walkway<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6afcUmLvlmjpK2zH8kK4OLo5cXzo4B4Az7A9FazpV0DAwdpghzZkS8CEYuuyyiuO864fZnM2db6UZiqTOt9ANwCjmr0jEARVuBnDPPYy3n30jSOJ3W77vdbFN7aSrNF8pPTitM51ntZ0/s1600/haz.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 275px; height: 183px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6afcUmLvlmjpK2zH8kK4OLo5cXzo4B4Az7A9FazpV0DAwdpghzZkS8CEYuuyyiuO864fZnM2db6UZiqTOt9ANwCjmr0jEARVuBnDPPYy3n30jSOJ3W77vdbFN7aSrNF8pPTitM51ntZ0/s320/haz.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5567313061190735154" /></a><br /><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13px; ">Who says a leisurely walk in a bustling city is too much to ask for? H</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13px; ">azratganj has given you just that and much more and, in the process, gone back in time.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">I never was a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">beat ka pakka</i> reporter but spent time walking down that famous street.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">Mostly alone.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">Amid chaos.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">All my <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">kaam ki cheejein</i> were there: the offices of NE and NR, DM's and Commissioner's offices, plus some more. I discovered (and now miss) several exotic food joints.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">When I came to the city first, I was put up at the Halwasia guesthouse. I stayed there for months. The caretaker, who would wake me (and the office thought I was on the beat!) in the afternoon after bringing kulchhe from downstairs, still gives me buzz. He himself was once a small-time reporter and almost bored me to death with his stories. (This is true with all journalists. Why blame him?)</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">I never saw the old Hazratganj (how could I?) but it’s nice to know it’s changed for the better; that even cities such as Noida are thinking on those lines of makeover. (don’t miss reports on the sector 18 market plans here!)</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">When the makeover had barely begun I was in <st1:place st="on"><st1:city st="on">Lucknow</st1:city></st1:place>. The commissioner’s office was one of my beats. He, along with many other officers, and the media played a crucial role in restoring Hazratganj to its pristine glory. From ensuring uniform facades of all multi-storey buildings to removal of hoardings and encroachments — beautification of the historically famous lane remained a top priority for many.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">For months.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">We even brought out a special edition dedicated to Hazratganj. The commissioner was never press friendly. (all commissioner office reporters also covered the DM’s office and, thus, manage information) I was suddenly told to interview him. Surprisingly, he agreed to speak and spoke at length.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">We saw hoardings being removed (these were Anupam’s dear copies), power and data cables shifted underground, benches set up. Facades were resorted and painted uniformly. Traders agreed on a uniform colour code and size of signages.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">I was particularly attached to the three-storey building housing the Northern Railway DRM (<st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Lucknow</st1:place></st1:city>) headquarters. Also being a railway correspondent, I often ventured into this one of the several architectural masterpieces in Hazratganj. Incorporating the best of British and Mughal styles, it harmonises with the architecture unique to structures of the Nawabi era.<br /><br />I was surprised by the enthusiasm shown by DRM JS Sondhi. He helped immensely in putting together an article on the building for the special issue. He lamented the majestic structure, like several others in the famous lane, lost parts of the glory and grandeur to mindless commercialisation over the years.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana">He can rest easy now.<br /><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Verdana"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-17638395374677253132011-01-11T01:40:00.006+05:302011-01-16T16:47:07.390+05:30Of Dada, dreams and a village boyFans are angry. They even burnt KKR's principal owner Shah Rukh Khan in effigy. <br /><br />Why did Kolkata Knight Riders or the nine other IPL franchisees choose not to bid for Dada? Some term it a "political conspiracy.” Others say they will boycott KKR matches in Kolkata. <br /><br />Reputation did not count. <br /><br />Nor did emotions. <br /><br />It’s plain business. <br /><br />It’s all about money, honey. <br /><br />It’s not only about his being too big for the team’s comfort. It’s not about his being not fit enough alone. Let’s not get into reasons, for once. When something of this sort happens, dreams are dashed too, much beyond the immediate surroundings. <br /><br />Miles away from Kolkata, Sahara, a nondescript hamlet off the Agra-Fatehpur Sikri road, must also be disappointed. In 2009, it had suddenly found a new name — ‘Pawan Sharma Ka Gaon. This happened after a class IX dropout hopped on to a crowded general compartment of a train to Howrah to meet Ganguly. <br /><br />In Agra for launch then, I went all the way to his house and met Pawan. I so wanted to know the story. He told me, “I hung out outside Dada’s residence in south Kolkata’s Behala locality for days. I finally spotted him in his car and called out his name. He got down to meet me.”<br /><br />“After listening to me, he asked me to join the ongoing KKR camp at the Eden Gardens. He wanted to see me bowl at the nets,” Pawan said and added, “I troubled some of the best in domestic cricket. Dada kept a close watch and liked my bowling.”<br /><br />Pawan was invited for the next camp to show his prowess. <br /><br />He had hopes for a possible IPL ‘look-in.’<br /><br />True to his name, Pawan clocked 140 kmph — a great achievement for a youth of his age. With milk and curd his favourite food items, he left a number of local batsmen battered and bruised with his raw pace.<br /><br />While admitting to the fact his story is fascinatingly akin to the critically acclaimed Bollywood movie ‘Iqbal’, the 19-year-old lanky fast bowler said, while feeding cattle at his house, “For me cricket is the only reason to live. I have harboured just one dream — playing for the national side.” <br /><br />Pawan’s spirit to conquer against odds and his flight towards destiny in cricket — inarguably the most idolized sport in India — got me a couple of good stories for the launch edition. I “commercialized” the fact his four brothers were all unemployed and his father worked in a Delhi factory. He had to drop out of school because of financial constraints.<br /><br />I could not keep track of his progress. Last year, I called him up. He said would tell me first if “anything” happened. I never thought of him even once, till Dada went unsold for two days. <br /><br />During our meeting, a shy Pawan said, “I was straightaway made a member of the Barisa Sporting Club and also given token money for encouragement.” <br /><br />Though there was no word on guarantee, Pawan says Dada hinted hard work could get him into good teams, the KKR included. <br /><br />Any regret? "I could not bowl to Dada. He was overseeing the ongoing pre-season camp.”<br /><br />He never would.Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-68987881000046017102011-01-03T01:41:00.004+05:302011-01-16T18:46:50.276+05:30A wait too longSo much has been written and spoken of this case, yet the curiosity never dies. <br /><br />If people had begun getting the grotesque speculations off their heads, the closure report has once again enlivened the case in public domain. <br /><br />Then working in Ahmedabad, I had come to meet a friend in Delhi when I first heard of the twin murders. I laughed at that annoyingly screaming TV reporter who was cursing the police for sending a team to Nepal while the servant’s body lay on the terrace. <br /><br />Despite several claims to have “solved” the mystery “for the first time” with contrasting theories, we still have no clue as to WHO and WHY. Now friends in Noida tell me how the task of ensuring round-the-clock “live feeds” from “ground zero” meant “excitingly taxing” for dozens of journalists. <br /><br />The madness was controlled a bit after a court gag. <br /><br />The other day some officers were at my place for lunch. We could not help discussing the issue. They said they were never in doubt. But then there was no concrete evidence. <br /><br />A local reporter, who managed stuff for the lunch, said his only wish in life was to “crack” the case before the police or any other agency could. <br /><br />Now working in the same city, I have been around the locality, chiefly meant for retired naval and air force staff, several times. It does make you uneasy. You want to know WHO and WHY, partly because of the kind of people, who “may have been” involved in the case. <br /><br />The sheer fact that the killer(s), who slit the throats "either like a butcher or a doctor", is roaming scot-free, possibly in the vicinity, is frightening.<br /> <br />A lot has happened during these two and a half years. The beating that the two agencies’ image has taken all this while has been one of the most pronounced developments. <br /><br />The parents are free, but not cleared. The three helps have almost been cleared, but their life ruined, beyond repair. Their lawyers are now talking of defamation and compensation. <br /><br />I have no hesitation in admitting to the fact that I am, unlike most people in the city, no expert on this case. Though it’s been written and said a million times, it’s actually ridiculous that officers suspected the “missing” help immediately and went on to announce a reward of Rs 20,000 for information on him while he lay dead on the terrace. <br /> <br />Precious hours were lost, sealing the case’s fate. Later, heads rolled. Helps, drivers became suspects one by one. Several scientific tests were conducted. All inconclusive. Their lives ruined, they have been cleared. The parents were, and still are, suspected. <br /><br />A lot of irresponsible comments have been made by the police, the press and the public. <br /><br />Not getting to the motive is very disturbing. <br /><br />I actually shudder to think the killer(s) is amongst us, either smoking a “bidi” or driving a car.Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-40254139105192075082010-12-11T11:27:00.004+05:302011-01-16T16:30:20.878+05:30I miss you...Blogs are supposed to be your being honest about thoughts and emotions. At times, it’s difficult to keep the promise. Reliving the pain of loss is not easy. <br /><br />Exactly three months after I left Lucknow for Noida, I was back in town for sometime early this month. The purpose was to attend the wedding of a friend’s sister and visit the family where I stayed as a tenant for so long. <br /><br />Pankaj, my landlord, an ever-smiling man, died barely two weeks after I left Lucknow. So shocked, I could not call the family up. I just did not know what to say. I was in a state of disbelief for long. I would call him Bhaiya, but he was more of a friend. Extremely close to me, he was a very important person in my life. <br /><br />Pankaj was the kind of a husband many women dream about. He easily gave in during arguments with wife, loved taking the family out, ensure peace when wife and mother fought, did shopping, managed household repairs and, more importantly, always smiled. Despite serious temptations, he would keep resisting liquor or non-veg food, saying, “Wife would find out and beat me.” This is not to say she actually did. It’s just that he took care not to annoy her. <br /><br />It was tough for me walk to the place again. <br /><br />They had provided me a small portion of the house. It was like being a paying guest. His two kids – Dhroov and Mishti – used to bring food, trouble me and play around. I would lovingly call them “twin terror.” They would always form parts of my daily discussions with friends. So much so that some of my friends began loving them without actually meeting them. <br /><br />The two liked my room, maybe because of the laptop, stacks of newspapers, my unusually long conversations on the phone and also because of the random chocolates they would get. Bhabhi, a pleasant lady and a great cook, would not talk much but took a great care of me like your own family does. I could not prepare myself enough on how to face them. <br /><br />It was tough. <br /><br />Very tough. <br /><br />Loss of husband changes a woman’s life. There is no sanity in the transition. The house looks topsy-turvy. But you do sense a numbing calm. She knows life will never be joyful again. Dhroov was running fever. There was no one to take him to hospital. I promised to do so. I was carrying chocolates for him and his sister. I handed the packet over there was no excitement. Time and patience are the best advice I could give. “He would not return. But think of the kids’ future. Stay strong for them. They will lessen the pain, give some joy,” I said. <br /><br />The wedding was in the same locality. <br /><br />Everyone was busy. <br /><br />Happy.<br /><br />I asked if she would attend. “I don’t want to spoil the mood there. No one wants to see a crying woman. What will a widow do there?,” she asked. <br /><br />While at hospital, memories came rushing back. When the schoolbus developed some snag, I used to take her there on my bike and bring the kids home. The kids liked my company, but would never speak much. The way she prepared food and fed me was out of this world. I had never thought I would savour the kinds of delicacies I actually did. <br /><br />But that’s gone now. <br /><br />Forever, almost. <br /><br />She had never expected – no one does -- her husband would die. “A lot of people get electric shocks. They don’t all die. His father worked for the electricity department. Even he ran his canteen in Shakti Bhawan (the department’s building in Lucknow),” she said, aimlessly staring at Pankaj’s garlanded photograph kept in the drawing room. <br /> <br />It’s tough to learn how to cope on her own after many years of sharing life’s chores. She does not have the help of grown children or friends. (Pankaj had no brother. His father died years ago.) The emotional adjustment takes a lot of doing. “We shared so much, went to weddings together and the stuff. Now, every such occasion is a constant reminder of his absence,” she said. <br /><br />She looked paralysed. <br /><br />While serving tea, she cried. <br /><br />And the society never lets a widow get even close to normal. People make her feel guilt even if she is even remotely awake to a moment of joy. It’s a huge loss, but why remain bitter for the rest of the life. “His sisters say I’m not sad enough, not that affected. I only know what I have lost. My world is gone,” she sobbed. <br /><br />The couple spent eight years together. She is yet to come to terms with the loss. She remembers everything. “You went to Noida. We were all sad. The kids will miss you a lot. He never had dinner before texting to know if you were eating alright. The day you left, Mishti went to your room and cried. Seventeen days after you left, my world came crashing down,” she said, no control over tears. <br /><br />And the loss is not only personal. One sister has taken over the running of the canteen. The (life) insurance amount has also been hijacked. When Pankaj bought the plot for construction of the house, one of his sisters paid Rs 50,000 – half the price paid for the land. Today, the land cost has gone up ten times. Plus, he constructed a reasonably well house. Now, the sister wants half of the house for her. No one is sparing a thought for the widow, the two little kids and their future under the danger of being no as bright as it would have been but for the loss. <br /><br />Fortunately, she has recognised the value of keeping busy and pursuing her interests. She always loved teaching. She has joined a private school in Barabanki as a teacher. The salary is not much, but that’s keeping her busy. A school cab picks and drops her. <br /><br />The room where I stayed remained vacant for sometime. “You were, and still are, part of our family. I did not like the idea of letting someone else in. But security was a concern. Plus we needed money for sustenance too. Two boys have taken that portion on rent,” she said. <br /><br />But the kids don’t go there anymore.Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-66578436243300713242010-11-07T19:00:00.003+05:302011-01-17T19:29:47.399+05:30Cricket tamasha, the TV way!After stumps at Day III of the Ahmedabad Test match, a TV correspondent makes the worst possible mockery of the game of cricket, courtesy his blissful ignorance. <br /><br /><br />(Bored by all-Obama bites and visuals on TV, I chose to go for some cricket analysis) <br /><br />Anchor in the studio: What do you make of today’s play? <br /><br />Reporter: The century by Rose Taylor (Jessy Rider was the lone centurion) has put NZ back on track. (So far, not so bad. Maybe, just a slip of tongue)<br /><br />Anchor: You’ve covered many matches at Motera (Expectations heightened!). What should be the strategy of MSD tomorrow, on Day IV?<br /><br />Reporter: See, the match is headed for a draw. (It wasn’t by any means then). If Indians manage to take a couple of wickets by lunch and a couple more at stumps (taking total wickets to fall to 9. Why leave one?), India can get crawl back in the match. <br /><br />(He preserves one wicket for the last day !!! and expects the remaining two innings to finish in less than a day’s play) <br /><br />The anchor senses that his colleague was not making much sense and chips in: Dhoni must try and bowl NZ out before lunch and, by way of a possible blitzkrieg from Sehwag, India can set a target for NZ. <br /><br />The reporter, bent on putting his nonsensical theory across, insisted: If India take two wickets by lunch and another two at stumps, Day V can well turn India’s way. Otherwise the match is poised for a tame draw. <br /><br />(Why two wickets a session??? After the NZ skipper, there was not much batting to follow. And why leave one wicket for Day V?)<br /><br />The anchor changes the subject: The NZ spinners took the last seven wickets. Why do you think our spinners failed to use the track to their advantage?<br /><br />The reporter makes several retired players and those who did not bowl at all “roll their arms over” without much success. (He was not even aware of who all are playing – keeps looking at sheet of paper he’s holding while presenting his idiotic ideas) <br /><br />He again gets back to his “incredible” theory of India trying to take wickets of four tailenders in the three sessions of play, with the same élan, leaving the last one for the final day! <br /><br />The anchor, while politely dismissing the idea, concludes the chat by putting a theory across (and rightly so) that India must bowl out NZ quickly and score briskly to set a target and make a match out of what may be heading for a draw. <br /><br />And he sheepishly thanks the reporter. <br /><br />Phewww!!!Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-51281998156781540962010-11-03T22:06:00.005+05:302011-01-16T16:32:24.432+05:30Anjali was a great teacher, It always is<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix4OsrcXMq8A2JfSnxkWxXNMAskafqrj-hK6bfbZUiBlzrMRvW4zXxNiSyVq4AfQyaxeU3zbTd7l3_PsYU90Tm94IlEaaa0qLtzGsSOvL09Zsv37s7F6DNcN56zroxR6nSLTd6-AVA-ro/s1600/000_0353.JPG"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 238px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix4OsrcXMq8A2JfSnxkWxXNMAskafqrj-hK6bfbZUiBlzrMRvW4zXxNiSyVq4AfQyaxeU3zbTd7l3_PsYU90Tm94IlEaaa0qLtzGsSOvL09Zsv37s7F6DNcN56zroxR6nSLTd6-AVA-ro/s320/000_0353.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5535363944222935554" /></a><br />Recent mention of Anjali on FB brought back old memories. <br />I still remember Sir's announcing in the class that Swabhiman, an NGO, was going to organise a children’s festival (for special ones), Anjali, in Bhubaneswar. He wanted some of us to go there and cover the event. This has been a tradition at IIMC. Every year two groups of students — English and Oriya — go to Bhubaneswar and take out camp bulletins on a daily basis for about a week.<br />Sir chose me, Dipshikha Chauhan, Dipshikha Bhattacharya, Amrita, Puru, Shishir, Sudip and Himani and a few other Oriya journalism students. <br />Most IIMCians came out to see us off. We were all very excited. We reached BBSR in the evening, had dinner in a restaurant, the girls had a lot of fun with the timid waiter. We finally got to the place where we were to stay for close to a week. <br />It was a huge festival with participants from all over the country. There were separate halls for girls and boys — but we stayed together, almost. We were to talk, have fun and enjoy every bit of the life that we had got outside the campus. While some made the most of it by interacting with people from abroad, others looked to eat whatever came their way. Some actually tried to understand children with special needs. <br />I effectively headed the team and studied the camp bulletins of previous years. From tomorrow, we had to do the same job, but in a better way. Sir, while briefing us about the task before we left the campus, had termed the performances of previous batches very good. <br />But going by the print-outs, I straightaway knew we could do a better job of it. My experience was to come in handy. I could get better stories, give more attractive headlines and make neater pages. I discussed this with other team members. We took the task seriously. We were raring to go. <br />I didn’t go looking for stories. I gave ideas and assigned stories to other people. Short of ideas, I roamed around at the venue. I revised copies and gave headlines. Each member did his/her job. As not many people were familiar with QuarkXpress, I did the bulk of page-making with assistance from Amrita. We had a small makeshift office to ourselves. <br />There was a slight distance between the place where we put up and the festival venue. We used the organisation’s bus to shuttle, and while doing so we always thought of stories and planed pages. It may sound stupid, but the camp bulletin was quite a task. <br />We would take some time off and go around the camp. We would also go to a nearby restaurant and have good food. We had loads of ice-cream and coffee throughout the camp. We had the maximum fun while getting back from work at night. <br />We brought out camp bulletins with smarter stories and better design. It was also acknowledged by the CEO of the NGO, Shruti Mohpatra. She called us and said, “I’m proud of you boys. You have all done a great job.” <br />At the last day of the camp, Sir and our other friends joined us to take us back. It was like a reunion. We met after more than a week. People cried, screamed, hugged and kissed. A photo session ensued. Sir looked happy with our performance. I went up to him and touched his feet. He said, “Good job done.” <br />I convinced Sir that we, the reporters, could not leave that night with him and other batchmates as the concluding ceremony of the festival had still to be covered. So, we stayed back, worked hard and once the job was over, had a lot of fun. We ate, sang and danced. We proved ourselves. <br />We were to return with a lot of positives.Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-18624992249408205832010-10-21T20:40:00.004+05:302011-01-16T16:48:13.375+05:30The tacit graveyard of unspeakable horror covered with layers of dust, weedsOne of the things that was on my mind when I was setting out for Noida was D-5 — the house where children and women were raped and murdered reported as Nithari killings in 2006. Reports of cannibalism also surfaced. When all this was reported, I was working in Patna. And to say that I was disturbed big time would be an understatement. <br /><br />On reaching Noida, other priorities needed redress and getting to the “place” took a backseat. Once settled a bit, I tried finding out where exactly the bungalow lay. I was shocked. The house I have taken on rent in Noida was located not far off. Once there, I found I was mistaken. I was under the impression the area would be deserted with D-5 still haunting the locals. <br /><br />About four years after Nithari shocked the nation, local people are learning to move on. I found carefree bunches of small schoolchildren walking past the bungalow, in which Pandher’s car continues to rust, covered with layers of dust. Our photographer was disappointed too. He had the typical images of some bhoot bangla in his mind. But everything looked “normal.” <br /><br />Though weeds have enveloped the sealed entrance of the tacit graveyard of unspeakable horror deserted structure, eateries — Lallan Tea Stall is always crowded — have come up on the roadside (the CBI had dug out skeletons from a drain behind D-5). Cops deputed to protect the case property look bored. Real estate, or at least, rentals are limping back to normal. And, more importantly, locals look to leave the killings behind. <br /> <br />I confronted a middle-aged man standing nearby. “I’m Satyaveer Pandeet. I run a grocery shop,” he said. Okay, but what he said after that was surprising. Asked where he stayed, he said, “I have bought the house opposite D-5.” He said he was sure about the property he intended to buy in sector 31 some three months ago. His family members were not. A regular house alright, but it stood bang in front of D-5. <br /><br />“I knew exactly what I was doing. The deal was good,” Pandeet told me. “Pandher’s servant Surinder Koli has got three death sentences. Many more may come. Life for others has to move on,” he said while rushing to work. Pandeet runs his shop in Nithari. Pandeet’s wife Babita Sharma said, “We know the area would always be known for all the wrong reasons. But we cannot keep looking back.” For kids, though, reasoning is not that easy. Their 15-year-old son Tarun studies at Model School in sector 11. “My friends ask don’t I fear living in front of D-5. I don’t know what to say,” he said at his A-24 house. <br /><br />Head constable Krishnawtar Gautam, posted in a makeshift picket in to ensure the bungalow’s security, hurriedly began wearing his uniform on seeing us (blame it on the camera). He has observed Koli. “Koli is paying for his sins. His health has worsened. Even he has a family and children to look after,” he said. <br /><br />Right next to the “killer house”, there stands D-6. Its security guard Raju Chaudhary (45) joined duty a month ago. Did not he think of avoiding the assignment? “Is ghar se mujhe kya matlab? Iske liye toh police hai. Akhbaar me toh sab nikalta hi rahta hai. Mujhe toh kahin bhi duty karni hai. (I am not bothered about Pandhre’s house. Cops protect it. Newspapers write about it. I have to work somewhere or the other,” he said. <br /> <br />After Nithari become synonymous with murder and horror, people began avoiding the area, rents went down, and people left houses. “Locals chose to address themselves as residents of Sector 31,” said a tea stall vendor, Kishan. In 2006, the land rate in Sector 31 was between Rs 40,000 and Rs 45,000 psqm. Things have not changed much since then. But realty experts sense some restoration. Sahil Khan, a property dealer, said, “Nithari is or should be history now. The rentals in sector 31 are not very less compared to other areas. For 1 BHK accommodation, you have to shell out Rs 10,000. For 2 BHK, the rental is Rs 13-14,000.” “See, the basic problem is that of the three blocls, block B is okay but portions of block A and C are quite rural in character, marked by presence of cattle heads and encroachment. That’s why the stagnation in land prices,” he added. <br /><br />I also wanted to know how the killings came to know. And here’s how: Before December 2006, children kept going missing and no body had any clue. A girl, Payal, was one of the unfortunate kids. Her mobile was put on surveillance and, after six months, it was traced to a PCO in Mamura. The shop owner had purchased it from a rickshaw-puller. The rickshaw-puller, on spotted, said he had ferried someone in Nithari and the passenger had forgotten the mobile on the seat. The SIM card being used was found to have been obtained by Koli. After his arrest, Koli broke and confessed to the killings. <br /><br />Retired defence officer and currently an RTI activist Lokesh Batra has used RTI to expose government indifference and failure in handling Nithari massacre. I had met him during the recent HT Conclave to announce our launch in Noida. When I was planning to write on Nithari, I called him up for assistance. For him, the killings were not just about the master-servant duo, currently lodged in Ghaziabad’s Dasna jail. <br /><br />“It was a systematic failure. Had they paid attention to these cases earlier, these serial killings would have been prevented,” he said. He was convinced that if the drains around the bungalow were cleaned regularly, the bodies could have been discovered much earlier. In response to his RTI application, the Noida authority informed him that the drains in Noida were cleaned after a gap of every 15 to 30 days. The last time the authority cleaned the drain outside D-5 was between December 20 and 23, 2006- just six days before the Nithari killings became public.<br /><br />“If the cleaning of the drains was taking place as usual, then why did not they find anything unusual?” asked Batra. He filed RTI application in the Noida police asking what it did to trace the missing children. According to the information, the Noida police went to 34 locations to investigate the Nithari killings. However, the first visit was made only in march 2006 (nine months before the expose) when Nithari post in -charge K.P. Singh went to seelampur and brahampuri in North East Delhi. Noida Police’s reply to the RTI application came on February 19, 2007 and till then no police official had claimed any expenditure for these trips. “On whose cost they travelled then?” <br /><br />When a special CBI court late last month sentenced to death Surinder Koli — servant of businessman Moninder Singh Pandher — for rape and murder of a nine-year -old girl, Rachna Lal, one of the many victims in the sensational Nithari killings in 2006, the deceased’s family was only partly satisfied. This was the third case related to killing of young children and women in which Koli has been awarded capital punishment. But members of the family lament the fact the Pandher — who they believe was also involved in the gory acts — was not chargesheeted in the case. Koli is accused of rape and murder in all 19 cases. Pandher has been co-accused in six of them. <br /> <br />The girl’s father Pappu Lal told me, “Pandher has been let off the hook because of his wealth and its consequent political connections. A servant alone cannot resort to such barbaric acts. I am pained. We will move the High Court.” Mother Laxmi said, “The judgment is out. Now the hanging should take place immediately.” Her parents on the basis her belongings and a DNA test report identified Rachna.<br /> <br />The killings came to light when the remains of the victims were found dumped in a drain behind Pandher's house in Noida’s sector 31 in December 2006. A total of 19 FIRs had been lodged in connection with the Nithari killings. Chargesheets were filed in 16 cases. Though Koli has been sentenced to death in Rimpa Haldhar and Aarti murder cases too, the angst is widespread and not limited to the Lals alone. <br /> <br />Durga Prasad, father of Aarti (a Nithari victim), said, “I cannot rest easy till Pandher is hanged. He must have been farmed for being part of the conspiracy.” Rimpa’s father Anil Haldhar, said, “The High Cort acquitted Pandher, but we will move the Supreme Court. We want justice.” <br /> <br />On February 13, 2009, Pandher and Koli were sentenced to death in the Rimpa Haldar case in the first verdict in the Nithari killings. However, Pandher was acquitted by the Allahabad High Court in September 2009. Pandher is still lodged in Dasna district jail in Ghaziabad.<br /> <br />Parents of other Nithari victims such as Payal, Jyoti, Madhu, Max and Harsh echo similar sentiments and seek a fresh probe or constitution of an inquiry commission. The CBI has already said it will not submit chargesheet in the rest of the cases as they were found to have no links with the Nithari killings. <br /><br />The last four years have seen the families of victims run from pillar to post, trying to get justice and reliving the horror of 2006 again and again. The victims mostly belonged to families of migrant workers from Bihar and West Bengal living in shanties or slums in Nithari village of Noida’s sector 31. Parents had filed several complaints with the local police about missing children between 2005 and 2006. The police allegedly refused to help them. The families alleged since they were poor, the police shooed them away.<br /> <br />Early this year, three girls, students of Government Inter College in Noida’s sector 12, went missing. The parents made rounds of the Sector-24 Kotwali and the SSP’s office daily for a month. No one gave them a hearing. Aged 13, 15 and 16 years, the girls are yet to be traced. The helpless parents have moved the High Court for justice. <br /> <br />And they are not alone. The police have no clues about more than two dozen kids who went missing in Noida Post-Nithari, leaving the parents distraught. Only on September 29, a 12-year-old girl was reported missing from Sector 31 in Nithari area. <br />The Nithari killings had prompted the Supreme Court to issue a detailed list of dos and don’ts on missing children. A hue and cry soon led to “constitution” of special cells in each district and a centralised database in Lukcnow. Each police station was supposed to keep the district crime record bureau updated on missing kids, so that the figures can be sent to Lucknow for further follow-up. <br /> <br />But hardly anything is happening on this front in Noida. Post-Nithari there was a clear instruction from the police headquarters in Lucknow to all police stations across the state to lodge kidnapping cases if missing kids are not traced within three days. But parents continue to run from pillar to post for justice.<br /> <br />The parents who are generally shooed away by the police are those who are migrant workers from living slums. In the case of Nithari, parents had filed several complaints with the local police about missing children between 2005 and 2006. <br /> <br />That did not interest the police. The police still take details but do nothing. They often blame parents for being uncaring or even say the children had left on their own.. And it’s not only the fear of another Nithari, but there are chances of these missing kids working as cheap labour, prostitutes, porn actors or beggars, he added. <br />More than a hundred minors, both girls and boys, went missing from Gautam Budhha Nagar district this year. The data available, of case registered by the Noida police alone, puts the figure at 45. Some kids have been restored to their families but police sources estimate post-Nithari, more than two dozen unfortunate ones are still missing.<br />When I asked SP City H.N. Singh what all was being done to set things right, he had an answer ready, “The special missing cell was set up after in the aftermath of Nithari killings. Right now, the system is slightly decentralized — cases are being registered, investigated and worked out at the level of police stations.”Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-6747806412833693052010-10-20T10:49:00.003+05:302011-01-16T17:05:57.870+05:30Aap toh patrakar hain, aap bataaiye…“Aap toh Bihar se hain, aap bataaiye…,” goes the routine line. If you are from Bihar, and also a journalist you are expected to put things into “perspective.” Who will win is what people want to know. <br /><br />But do reporters really have the ability to predict things? Let’s not talk about exit polls and pre-poll surveys. Political reporters do have the advantage of being in touch with the netas and observing their activity. They also interact with the electorate. But does that actually help gauge the mood? I don’t think so. Maybe to some extent. Maybe the exercises empower one to be part of political discussions on TV shows or write the so-called analytical pieces. <br /><br />A month and a half ago, when I was going through the process of hiring a house in Noida, the landlord, Ajay Devan, a retired Army colonel, sought to know: “How do you see things unfold in Bihar?” While going for a dinner with travel writer Shalini Mitra, the lady looked curious too. “Will Lalu manage to get back to power? I mean, I would not like him to, but who stands a better chance?” <br /><br />There are a whole lot of people who catch hold of you with: “Aap toh patrakar hain, aap bataaiye…” And I am always clueless. <br /><br />I think burdened by reports and capsules of allegations and counter-allegations and bhashanbaaji, people look fatigued and want some clarity or at least freshness. I certainly do. What is written is often routinely boring. Delhi accuses Bihar of misusing central funds. Bihar hits back, blames Centre for state’s mess. Some are distributing cycles. Others pick goats! <br /><br />Last year, I was in Agra for a launch. During the same time, the Samajwadi Party was holding its national convention in the city of Taj. A dear friend was there to cover the event for his paper. He had been put up in a very good hotel. He made it a point to let me know how he was enjoying costly – he never made any mention of the taste of it -- food and beverages. There was a whole lot of activity – big leaders, an army of reporters from across the state, banners, hoardings. The city was packed. And I was a sufferer. Despite efforts, I could not get any space in any of the hotels. <br /><br />They were full with party delegates and journalists. I had by the way high expectations from my friend. His report the next day began with “Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav said Mayawati was responsible for Uttar Pradesh’s backwardness and urged the people to bring SP back to power…” <br /><br />Coming back to Mitra and Devan, elections in Bihar are peculiar. The watchers say it’s a battle between Lalu (who ruined the state during his 15-year rule) and Nitish (who at least began the process of checking the rot before the actual rebuilding can take place). So it’s the development card. Till 2005, I lived all my life in that state. And after Nitish came to power (I was then at IIMC and I still remember the ToI headline – WATERLALOO), I have been there quite often. I can sense the improved law and order situation, the improvement in infrastructure. I’m not sure about the employment claims though. <br /><br />What has not changed though is the caste factor – a major cause for the backwardness of Bihar. And this could spoil hopes of Nitish trying to translate his claims of good governance into political success. In 1990, when Lalu became CM, he virtually created a separate electorate referred to as MY: Muslims and Yadavs. Development took a backseat. Crime went up. And it happened on purpose. <br /><br />Now, things are improving but people, especially in not-so-urban pockets, still look conscious of who they are going to choose. No wonder, Nitish too has been playing his caste card. I fear a sizeable chunk of backward Bihar may get back to being more backward, swayed by caste considerations. I’m equally intrigued by the fact that Congress had RJD as its ally at the centre for so long and now Manmohan and Sonia are citing the “20-year” misrule to woo the electorate. <br /><br />My first encounter with elections took place in 2005. I was in Govindganj (East Champaran) to cover Bihar assembly polls. Bhojpuri artist Manoj Tiwari had by then became a famous TV face. He, while appearing on various poll-related shows, appealed to the people of the state to desist from voting for aspirants having criminal background. But he also campaigned for the then incarcerated MLA and LJP nominee from Govindganj seat, Rajan Tiwari.<br /><br />Rajan was seeking reelection from the Beur jail. Suresh Sahni, the RJD candidate who was defeated by him (Rajan) in the 2000 assembly polls, left Govindganj and contested Motihari seat this year on LJP ticket! Locals said Suresh was terrorized into contesting the Motihari seat to damage the poll prospect of RJD nominee Rama Devi, as Sahnis constituted a vast chunk of voters there.<br /><br />I happened to talk to Manoj. He said, “Rajanji is not a criminal.” However, he also added: “I do not say Rajanji has a clean image either. But then who does have a clean image in today’s politics? “Help Ramvilasji become the next CM of Bihar and rid the state of the RJD misrule.” Rajan lost the elections and today the “promising” party and the “bad” party are together to fight a force which was not in the reckoning then. Locals said Manoj was campaigning owing to the terror tactics employed by the sitting legislature. Manoj said he agreed to seek votes for Rajan due to the ‘very special relationship’ he had with him, while refusing to explain the same. <br /><br />Closer home, the reality was even bitter. A college student then, I was working for Hindustan Times as its Buxar correspondent. I mostly operated from my hometown Dumraon. The results were shocking for me. In Dumraon assembly segment, then state Samajwadi Party president Dadan Yadav defeated independent candidate Anuradha Devi by a substantial margin of over 9,000 votes. Anuradha, incidentally, is the wife of heavyweight leader Munna Tiwary. But what really shocked me was the fact that the CPI fared badly with veteran communist leader Nagendra Nath Ojha, known as ‘Vikash Purush’ among locals for the kind of development work he did as Rajya Sabha MP, suffering a humiliating defeat. Ojha, contrary to all expectations, was relegated to fourth position.<br /><br />Somewhere deep down in my heart, I was terribly sad. Though I, while borrowing from contemporary election coverage, had written a report (campaign trail) that it remained to be seen if the work done by the communist leader, who led an astonishingly simple life, would actually translate into electoral success! <br /><br />Ojha had actually done a lot of work for Dumraon. And people generally respected him a lot. But that’s how elections work. <br />I vividly remember interviewing Dadan, who rose to the stature of a state politician from being a wrestler and a school teacher employing all kinds of tactics, at the Buxar collectorate soon after the results were announced. He said he was always assured of a massive win and termed his victory a slap on the faces of those trying to divide the society on caste lines. “I won despite the fact that I could do just a little bit of campaigning in my constituency as the police implicated me in false cases on the eve of elections at the behest of Lalu Yadav. He was earlier with Lalu. Later he parted ways with Mulayam. <br /><br />FIRST REAL ELECTIONS ASSIGNMENT<br /><br />During my stint at Lucknow HT, I covered the Lok Sabha elections. It was a very enriching experience. But the first real elections assignment happened in 2007. My editor in Patna asked me to go and cover the UP assembly elections. I noticed politics in Bhadohi contributed more to crime and corruption than the words famous carpet industry it was known for. No wonder, the industry, in which lakhs of people are involved, was in a shambles. <br /><br />The moment I entered the Ghazipur belt, I began thinking about Mukhtar Ansari and Brijesh Singh. I had been hearing about these two ganglords since my childhood. In the twin cities of Ghazipur and Mau, only ‘power’ ensured power. And absolute power did it absolutely! The town received power 22 hours a day ever since mafia don-turned politician Mokhtar Ansari’s elder brother Afjal Ansari won the Ghazipur Lok Sabha seat in 2004. <br /><br />As one enters Gangauli, a nondescript hamlet, situated on Kasimabad-Mohammadabad road, some 25 km from Ghazipur, and roams about, there is hardly anything that would suggest that the village is the birthplace of Dr Rahi Masoom Reza, one of the finest writers the country has ever produced. About half the population in the village is muslim (mostly Sunnis) and almost all of them are weavers. Reza’s house in the ‘dakkhin patti’ of the village collapsed long time back and it has now lost its existence. Both his Mardana and Janana imambadas, which is under the care of his distant relative, Saiyad Abdur Hussain, are also on the verge of collapse and being used for community purposes. The ‘nimbars’ in his house on which clerics would recite religious books during the ‘mazlis’, is lying abandoned. The ‘palki’, then used by women for visiting the ‘uttar patti’ and supposed to be the ‘aakhri nishani’ of his family has been left to the mercy of weather. <br /><br />To woo the electorate, contestants were employing novel methods. While some were trying to satiate their taste buds by organising ‘bati-chhokha’ party with ‘noorie-laila’ (country liquor) flowing in abundance, others were offering some music to their ears by holding ‘birha’ and ‘chaita’ shows. Hard pressed for time a sizeable number of desperate aspirants could be seen going all out to satisfy voters’ prurience. For the purpose, they were roping in bar girls, ‘nauch’ girls. Even male dancers were a hit!Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-22525875522890603972010-10-10T20:43:00.001+05:302011-01-16T16:34:55.254+05:30Fighting the fightsToday, one of my friends called me up. A young and successful businessman in a Bihar town, he calls only to share extreme states of happiness and sorrow. I felt jittery when his number flashed on my cellphone. He did not begin with the customary endearing abuses. I knew I had to hear him out. <br /><br />“What’s the matter?,” I began. <br />“Wife is expecting. Want to bring Bhaiya-Bhabhi over,” he said.<br />“What’s the problem then?,” I continued. <br />“Their fights have not stopped. They wont come together. Now wife does not want to deal with that when we have the baby. I think I will manage without them,” he sighed.<br /><br />After some useless advices, I promised to call him later and hear him out. The call brought back the memories of childhood. My friend was always timid, while his Bhaiya a fist-happy and vocal guy. I often wondered why siblings behaved differently. When we grew up, we had numerous instances of one being the bully of his friends’ circles, while the other looking totally unassertive. While some fought at all times, others gave in easily. “Keeping the peace” meant everything to the latter. <br /><br />I wondered despite having the same set of parents and a similar surrounding, what caused the difference. During schooldays, I did notice the difference. But I did not know then that both approaches meant taking extreme positions. That both were wrong. During street fights, we banked upon the bullies for that edge. The “pappus” would never join but play the typical “maugada” by reporting the matter to the family. <br /><br />When mohalla women whispered, during the afternoon gossip in the courtyard, about some neighbour being hit by his or her son or a bully “giving it back” to his parents, the listeners looked worried and derived some kind of sadistic pleasure at the same time. The women would also speak of the “good kid” in the same family, who would never speak up, always keeping to himself. <br /><br />It was only during college did I see some kind of a connect. I began to understand the contrasting siblings were affected by a common factor. For various reasons, such as sheer madness, financial crisis, lack of values and discipline, some parents in our mohalla often fought. When parents fight, children get affected. Efforts to keep the conflict away from children seldom bear fruits. Children often sense the tensions and hostility.<br /><br />Studies are the first casualty. Health — both physical and mental — is the second. Children often think they are in some way responsible for the fights and feel guilty. They suffer from low self-esteem. In order to get close to the warring parties at different times, the children get away from both. We also had the instances where the atmosphere at home was very peaceful. In those cases, parents got respect from children. Children did well in their life too. <br /><br />Disagreement is one thing. Fights are scary. They drain you emotionally. Harsh words, yelling and physical assaults impact children badly. Memories of fights can stay forever. And when instances of suicide bid take place, children seek isolation. Because “it is like living in a war zone” with children being pulled in two directions amid an atmosphere of violence and disrespect. <br /><br />Fighting is a habit. And it transcends generations. Parents fight. Then siblings fight with each other and friends. Finally, fights take place within the family with several members being involved. Irrespective of its effects, those used to it (yes, it happens) will find ways of fighting while not being very conscious about it. <br /><br />Those, like my friend, who don’t fight feel sad. Ashamed, when friends and in-laws are around. Even being angry is quite natural. And it becomes a vicious cycle. Finding the courage to express concerns about the behavior is often the hardest part of it all. No wonder, he keeps giving in.Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3909154797688393089.post-81256493539876314072009-10-12T21:39:00.005+05:302011-01-16T16:43:16.484+05:30E Gandhi Baba Kahan Rauaa Bani?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2pDRdzXI1YIGU9wWI-YdETdyXyVSxu-DTZDNQoCnBTbihy6omj7BUPBCD3zJDbbrCzSIMonU3p0nSMCBT30wvdHd2AE1FaeDrmnHipgtUJfG7_FwxFKlecUh4n5xFY9DEJUM3f4oq_Ds/s1600-h/rana+pratap.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2pDRdzXI1YIGU9wWI-YdETdyXyVSxu-DTZDNQoCnBTbihy6omj7BUPBCD3zJDbbrCzSIMonU3p0nSMCBT30wvdHd2AE1FaeDrmnHipgtUJfG7_FwxFKlecUh4n5xFY9DEJUM3f4oq_Ds/s320/rana+pratap.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5391748419439659394" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4YkuCG4s8qpDP9odPTMiusw42GLUc0MvtkVxL8fdY7c29XjoKe20unlq2hUjgM5n2nIpwxlP1x3hTQxCOeOnU_XsQN8JkFu-NdqfIYffENvFag4lcDYfH0Jrv2seujbWDuNPcdd_N44k/s1600-h/motihari+station.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4YkuCG4s8qpDP9odPTMiusw42GLUc0MvtkVxL8fdY7c29XjoKe20unlq2hUjgM5n2nIpwxlP1x3hTQxCOeOnU_XsQN8JkFu-NdqfIYffENvFag4lcDYfH0Jrv2seujbWDuNPcdd_N44k/s320/motihari+station.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5391748408930397490" /></a><br />About a year ago, I happened to visit Motihari. Today, I found some notes in my diary. It set me thinking. <br /><br />Two years prior to that visit, then railway minister Lalu Yadav had chosen to change the name of Motihari railway station to Bapu Dham Motihari as the region had been the workplace of Mahatma Gandhi during the Satyagraha Andolan urging people to make non-violence their weapon to achieve freedom from the British. <br /><br />However, the move has proved to be only a symbolic one as Motihari — which has perhaps seen some of the most gruesome political killings in Bihar — continues to witness unabated crime and remain a hotbed for smuggling of narcotics among other things. Due to the killings, tensions and fights of attrition between a number of crimelord-turned MPs and MLAs continue to take toll on the development of the town which could have otherwise been developed into a potential tourist destination as it has several links to the Mahatma and the freedom movement. <br /> <br />As I roamed about on the streets of the town, several busts and statues installed at important and busy places gave an idea of the “aggressive mood” of Motihari where the Mahatma once went all out preaching principles of non-violence. Near the railway station, there is a statue of Maharana Pratap, brandishing a sword, which was installed in 2003 on the occasion of Vijay Dashmi by the then RJD minister Rama Devi. Countering the move, a statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji, again with a sword, can be seen at the bus stand which was installed by the local BJP MP Radhamohan Singh. Not only this, about half a dozen other busts and statues of historical personalities, including that of Rani Lakshmi Bai, in aggressive postures with arms in hands can be seen at places located in the heart of the town. However, some of them lie in ruins with garbage strewn around them. <br /> <br />This aggression was more than reflected when the most pronounced protest against the MNS was reported from Motihari. Harshvardhan, a local, said, “Instead of addressing the problems such as lack of adequate drinking water, electricity and motorable roads, these were unveiled during the RJD dispensation. Later other parties too chose the same idea to score over their rivals.” But unlike the practice witnessed in the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh, these statutes were not bulldozed and brought down when a change of guard took place in the state. At Gandhi Chowk, there is a huge statue of the Mahatma too but, if locals are to be believed, it has been reduced to be a mere “landmark” for those looking for booze due to the wine shops located at a stone’s throw distance. <br /> <br />An IPS officer posted in Motihari told me, “Hundreds of people have been killed here in caste wars involving groups led by Rajput and Bhumihar leaders over a period of time. The trouble began when two brothers of Don Munna Shukla, currently LJP MLA from Lalganj, were killed. Even the infamous killing of the then Mujaffarpur DM took place during the death procession of one of his slain brothers. In retaliation, RJD minister and MLA from Adapur Brijbihari Prasad was shot dead in a typical gangster style killing inside a hospital. Later, Brijbihari’s wife Rama Devi made it to the state assembly from the Motihari constituency and also became a minister.” Police records say three Dons – Munna Shukla, Govindganj MLA Rajan Tiwary and LJP MP from Balia in Begusarai Surajbhan Singh -- and several others were made accused for Brijbihari’s killing. There are a number of other criminal cases pending against them. Earlier, Tiwary’s uncle and Govindganj MLA Devendra Dubey had been killed allegedly at the behest of Brijbihari Prasad. <br /> <br />Police friends told me that smuggling has been another source of headache for the region bordering Nepal. “After a few MNCs came to India about a decade back, smuggling of computer parts, watches, chemicals, medicines and bulb filaments from Nepal has almost stopped but in what is being viewed as a bigger threat, a lot of things are now being smuggled to China via Nepal from India,” said a cop. According to him, foodgrains, lentils, fertilizers, sugar and cotton were being smuggled to Nepal through a large syndicate in connivance with customs officials causing a huge revenue loss. <br /> <br />To buttress his claim, he even showed lists of seizers made recently while these articles were being smuggled to Nepal and went on to say that even the Union Home Ministry was aware of this latest menace. As a local said, “The renaming of the railway station has failed to do any good for the place as it continues to be a safe haven for criminals and smugglers with people continuing to suffer from poverty, unemployment and corruption. The government has never tried to make concerted efforts and actually turn Motihari into Bapu Dham.” According to him, only that will be a real tribute to the Mahatma.Darpan Singhhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14649987648614572516noreply@blogger.com0