news.outlookindia.com | Bobby the Indian Monkey Ends Up in Pak Zoo

news.outlookindia.com | Bobby the Indian Monkey Ends Up in Pak Zoo

news.outlookindia.com | Bobby the Indian Monkey Ends Up in Pak Zoo

news.outlookindia.com | Bobby the Indian Monkey Ends Up in Pak Zoo

Delhi vs. Calcutta

Delhi: You? Picking a fight with me? What for? I’d win hands down, man! I am the freakin’ capital!

Calcutta: Capital? That toh only now! I was toh there before you!

Delhi: And before that? You bookworm! From time immemorial, every conqueror has desired me! I am the most…

Calcutta: Haan what? The most what? The most unsafe place for women?

Delhi: Err. You can’t think beyond what you read, can you? Ever looked at your dirty lanes? The crowds at Barabazaar? The stench that makes its way into your nose every time you drive on the Eastern By-Pass? It smells of rotten eggs! And oh dear, what narrow lanes, you have!

Calcutta: You toh are totally forgetting your Old Delhi then! Talk of hypocrisy! Huh!

And my narrow lanes are way better than your never-ending stretches!

Delhi: Yes. My never-ending stretches are clean and green. And I am sure no one really minds them. We have these cool looking buses, unlike the tin boxes that ply over your unkempt streets! And haven’t you ‘read’ about the Supreme Court’s decision to introduce more autos?

Calcutta: Your autos take so much money! Where your autos will extort 60 bucks, my autos will only take 6 bucks from each passenger! A little bit of sharing and ‘dada, budge a little’ in the auto can save so much! 

Delhi: Well done, miser! But look at it this way. Passengers who travel in my autos do not have to sit with obnoxious strangers. And dude! Seriously! Your metro? It sucks!

Calcutta: Haan. It was built in 1984, when you couldn’t even spell M-E-T-R-O! So stop bragging about yours! You copy cat! We are truly the cultural capital of India! Our heritage and history is so rich and…

Delhi: Okay. Drop it. You either have not been taking history lessons seriously or you are just pretending to be stupid. Ever heard of Red fort? Qutub Minar? India Gate? They are all mine baby!

Calcutta: Yes, I have. And boka, have you heard of Jorashanko Thakurbari? Kumhartuli? Princep? Victoria Memorial? Does any of it ring a bell?

Delhi: Angrez kii aulaad! And don’t speak in bong with me man! I don’t understand. And by the way do you guys really put aloo in biryani? Seriously? Aloo?

Calcutta: Yes and it tastes way better than yours! And why are you after my aloo? Ever wondered why you put meetha in your Phhuchkaa?

Delhi: It is called Golgappa, okay? And really you can’t beat me as far as food is concerned. Tandoori chicken, kebabs, tikka, qorma and the parathas from parathey waali gali! Even your fish eating public cannot resist.

Calcutta: Oh please. Ever tried our giant size momos? They are way cheaper than your tiny specimens and they taste even better. And none of your chicken preparations can stand up to my eeleesh or my chingri. By the way, don’t ever make fun of my maach eating public. Maach makes bongs intelligent and your Delhites definitely are in dire need of it.

Delhi: Excuse me? True that my people do not sit with books all day long unlike your spectacle wearing, boring lot, but they are definitely intelligent and yes, better looking!

Calcutta: Better looking? Could be but dear dear! When they open their mouths and speak in that despicable accent! Chi chi. No culture. Rich parents buy their chhokraas big cars and they drive at high speed playing such loud music. No respect or consideration at all. Spoilt brats.

Delhi: My people know how to live life.

Calcutta: My people appreciate higher sensibilities.

Delhi: My people dress well. We have Sarojini.

Calcutta: So what? We have New Market.

Delhi: Ghalib lived here.

Calcutta: Don’t get me started on my list of intellectuals.

Delhi: We have the parliament.

Calcutta: Arey man. We have Didi.

And like she says, er pore aar kono kotha hobe na. (Nothing can be said after this)

Wedding Woes

As a child, I hated attending weddings, not that I like doing it any better now. There was something so repulsive about those heavy benarasi saris that aunties brought out from their well-endowed wardrobes and the bright, gold that people decided to put on display. I distinctly remember the smell…something that makes me cringe till date. One of the disadvantages of being a kid is that people drag you to places you don’t want to go to. Hence, I would be dragged to these obnoxious events called weddings. Under compulsion, I found myself a reason to go…food! I went to weddings to gorge on yummy food.

Once I grew up a bit and learnt how to impose my decision, go on hunger strikes, blackmail and the like, I would always manage to convince my parents to let me stay at home. I would put on a good movie, order Chinese food and spend an evening with myself. There were times when my mom would come back home looking all upset because apparently someone had asked her if I was a normal kid and if I had friends and if I had trouble talking to people. She would rebuke me for not being social enough, for being too lost in my own world. There were threats from cousins, ‘you don’t come to my wedding, I won’t come to yours’, to which my answer always was ‘that eventuality shall never arise’.  

After 12^th standard, one of my classmates managed to get married. I attended her wedding and felt completely out of place. Thankfully, I was not close to her and I dismissed it by saying, ‘oh stupid, backward people!’ My parents had always told me that marriage should be the last thing on my to-do list and so it was. The most important thing was to make a life for myself. I have grown up to believe that if I failed to do anything with my life, I would get married. I have other issues as well, obviously, other than my ‘I hate weddings’ agenda. I cannot share my room with anyone…no, not even with the man I love. I have to stay up nights, work or no work. And no, I cannot wake up in the morning to make someone coffee and breakfast. And yes, I like drinking my morning coffee in solitude. I like having the house to myself. I love animals as much as I hate noisy kids. I cannot deal with my own parents, so in-laws are out of question. In short, I am not homely and definitely not the marriageable kinds.

All went well, till after college, one of my closest friends decided to tie the knot. And after that, all my friends ever spoke about was what they would wear at her wedding, what she would wear at her wedding, what she would wear on her wedding night, where she would go on her honey moon and the list goes on. What ate me up though was how things changed. She was no more the person I knew. She was this woman, coy and delicate, who had nothing except her man to talk about. What the hell. I could not even talk to her properly. I had nothing to talk about. We stopped having sleep overs and a girls night out was not the way it used to be. Now everyone would be accompanied by their respective boyfriends/fiancés/ husbands.

I moved out of the city but the wedding onslaught had begun. Friend after friend post on social networking sites their happy wedding pictures. I hear stories about how parents want their daughters to make a special kind of bio data to find a suitable groom. And then I receive these invitations to attend their weddings. I have the best excuse…work and lack of funds. But I realise, it is not about not going to family weddings anymore…these are people my age and it freaks me out. Every time I express my displeasure, I hear the same sympathetic reply, ‘oh don’t worry, you will find someone too’. But I don’t want to find someone. I want things to be as they are.  

Every time I see a close friend getting married, I go into depression. Not because I am not getting married but because I think something bad is happening to them, something that will alter them forever. I have a list of 3 people, and I keep telling them that the day they tie the knot, I will commit suicide out of sheer disappointment. I have no clue why such brilliant people with great careers ahead of them would suddenly want to spoil everything and get married. Being single is fun. Be married, and you are done.  

www.outlookindia.com | Nothing Happened

www.outlookindia.com | Nothing Happened

By Freya Dasgupta

Taught Man That Which he Knew Not

I had spent the whole evening editing news...the little bit that usually comes in on a festive evening. The diyahs and candles were flickering in their waxy ends, while the pigeons, residents of a corner in my balcony watched nervously. The storm of loud bangs from crackers that had kept me screaming at regular intervals had receded into a distant grumble. People like Narendra Modi and Asif Ali Zardari had finished wishing people and were smiling contently at having promised enough communal harmony. Having spent all of a lit-up evening in front of a laptop screen, I pulled up my jeans and decided to walk for a while. 

The air was a heavy concoction of the winter drought and sulphur dioxide. Charred remains of crackers crunched under my feet as I made my way to Jamia. Buildings glowed as they stood all decked up, their faces alight, their insides dark. The long stretch to Jamia lay deserted, except for an occasional car that zoomed past or a bike with rowdy boys who would make monkey noises for no rhyme or reason. After all they don't need to prove themselves, do they?  

Jamia is a child of the Non Co-operation and the Khilafat Movement of the Indian Freedom Struggle. In the Aligarh Muslim University, which believed in Western education of Muslims to make them British servants and literally so, a part of the Muslim intelligentsia decided that they would not co-operate with the British and yet get a western education in order to free the nation of the alien rule. It had all started as a protest against Aligarh's pro-British inclinations. The founders had started a separate institution inside Aligarh, which later moved to Delhi and classes were held in rented apartments. Jamia projected Muslims as Indian nationalists. The teachers who went to jail often, had absolutely no money and instead of taking salaries, paid from their pockets to keep the institution running. Later with the help of the Indian National Congress, Jamia moved to where it is today and grew bit by bit. While Aligarh propounded the two nation theory, Jamia stood for harmony. When the country was engulfed in communal riots during the Partition, Mahatma Gandhi had observed that Jamia's campus remained "an oasis of peace in the Sahara" of communal violence.

Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar Marg, which is named after the first Vice Chancellor of Jamia, is flanked on both sides by the green campus. Jamia stood exactly like it stood last Eid, all dressed up in festive spirit. Rice lights peeped and glowed through every nook and cranny. Little bulbs hung low with the flowers making them glow a pink, orange, red. The life sized statue of Ghalib stood watching over all festivities and had they given him a piece of cloth, he would have started knotting, like he did every time he came up with an immortal couplet. Ba'ab e Maulana Azad and Jahaan e Khusro watched me as I walked past. Maulana Azad's mausoleum and Jamia Masjid stood against the dark, moon less skies, brightening up every now and then to a successful rocket launch. 

If I could, I would drag the politicians of our country today and show them this. Yes, Jamia is a minority institution and yes, we teach Urdu, Arabic, Persian and Islamic Studies and yes, the majority students studying here are Muslims and oh yes, we have Islamia attached to our name...but when has the presence of religion meant the absence of secularism or at least the Indian definition of it? Jamia may lack the grandeur of private institutions but it has something that they can never have...an indomitable faith, that teaches brotherhood, the celebration of another's joy. Jamia still stands as an embodiment of the spirit in which it was established...that it still dreams the dream of a progressive, united nation, that it still makes it compulsory of all its students to choose between Islamiat, Hindu Ethics or Indian Culture and Religion. 

On my way back, I read Jamia's motto inscribed on the wall..."Taught man that which he knew not..." It is actually a part of a verse from the Holy Quran. As it stands a witness to the winds of change, it is a mute reminder to the nation...this is how it was to be. This is how the leaders of this nation had wanted it to be.  

10 Reasons Why We Go to Office

It has been some one and a half months since the 4 of us have been going to office together, bound by the same mission to file PTI, our mutual contempt for authority and our inability to do what we really want to do at present. Initial days were all marred by complains...me not being able to pursue a PhD, Khushi's failed attempts at working for Marie Claire or any fashion magazine, Saloni's PG at LSE and Baishali, simply sticking around since she had not found a reporting job. Once we got tired of complaining and accepted our fate, we looked around and realised it was not that bad after all. Sub editors at Outlook could, for sure brag about their job. We started to find various ways to satiate our thirst for our actual ambitions. For one, Saloni and I have decided to read V.S Naipaul. Khushi has started her own fashion blog where she can post all the watches and clothes that she likes. Baishali...well, we need someone to work while we do all this. Hence we came up with 10 reasons why we like office, or like coming to offic

1. Food: We come to office to eat. Chinese from Red Chillies, Sandwiches from Baker's Bite, South Indian from Tea Corner, Chicken Tikka from Rajinder Dhaba, Chhole chawal from the normal, nameless dhaba, even the thali from Outlook, Coffee and Ice cream from Cafe Coffee Day and if nothing, then maggi from the pantry...anything will do. Sometimes its home cooked food. Rounds of chai, horrible coffee...we gulp down everything. In fact, we have been planning to stock up office with plates and bowls and paper napkins. We are constantly eating. Oh and there is also the chat wala...from whom we have the most mouth watering golgappa and alu tikki.

2. Entertainment: We come to office to get entertained. Be it my jokes, strange sounds that I make, impersonations, political satire, faking news, boss man, the creaking chairs or the songs from 'Bodyguard' that Khushi plays, we are constantly laughing. There is not a moment in office, when the 4 of us are together, when we are not laughing our asses of. There is also the more serious kind of entertainment...like sad songs, movie trailers, etc. But for us, office is a place, where we laugh and laugh, till we have tears in our eyes and cannot laugh any more.

3. Money: Yes, there is no denying it, we come to office for money. Had there been no money, we would not have come. We need money to fulfill our girlish whims, to go shopping and to buy books...to sponsor all the food that we eat and for other more serious, less whimsical reasons that I shall not get into.

4. Inspiration: Needless to say, we inspire each other. Khushi gets inspired to start a blog, I get inspired to write, Saloni gets inspired to sit for her civil service exams and both of us get inspired to read V.S Naipaul. We tell each other what we should be in doing in life and how we should be going about it and how life will be once we are out of this whole PTI filing thing.

5. Free Magazines: Outlook gives us a bunch of free magazine...Geo, Marie Claire, People, Traveller, normal Outlook, etc, etc. Now who does not want free magazines? Big reason, why we like going to office.

6. Time Killer: Going to office is a huge time killer. When we are at home, we have no clue what we should do, so we go to office and file PTI while we eat and talk. It is called healthy recreation and one that gives you money at the end of the month.

7. Excercise: We are on the 4th floor...which means climbing up is probably the most strenuous excercise that any of us do throughout the day. Its good for the heart and keeps diabetes down...burns some of the calories that we gain once we reach on top and start eating.

8. Brand Name: Telling people that we work for Outlook, has its own charm. Obviously, they have no clue what we do in office. Just the brand name, 'Outlook' does the magic.

9. Support group: Mommy-Daddy Issues, Boy friend issues, Flat mate issues, Career issues, all get solved here. We provide mature advice and solutions. Any trouble. Worry not! We are here, baby. To cheer you up, wipe your tears, make you laugh your bum off and pull your leg. We support one another against the wrath of the boss man and do naare baazi when he does not give a holiday of Eid.

10. Friends: Personally, I feel that with Saloni, Baishali and Khushi, God is making up for the friends that He never let me have in Jamia, where my only friends were 40 year old bearded men. So obviously I go to office because I know I will get to meet them, share moments of maniacal laughter and craziness which Vinod Mehta and his minions cannot buy back from me. 

Eid With An Old World Twist

The sun flooded through the green leaves as I walked past the Church. The air smelt of festivities...of sewai and tender meat being cooked in spices. Families in shiny clothes and bright smiles walked past me on their way to meet extended families and friends. I definitely stood out as far as purpose was concerned. I craved to run back, put on a shalwar kameez and visit my 'other family'. But that was not to be. I obviously had to postpone all my 'Eid meeting sheeting' as I termed it, for later. For now, I was on my way to office. I-pod clutched in hand, wearing my very un-festive jeans, I almost dragged myself down the gali to the auto stand or rather the place where autos stand. There was just one auto waiting at the stand. Beside it, stood a man, with a big smile on his face. It was not one of those creepy smiles that make you want to run away lest you get molested. It was a genuine, generous smile, the sort that tells you, you are home. The kind of old world smile that you don't see any more.

Old world...he was barely 60. Tall. Well built with north western massive hands. He had a strong jaw and sported a stubble. Apart from that irresistible, 'you are home' smile, he wore an immaculately white Pathani Shalwar. For a moment, I didn't know if he was the auto driver and if it would be appropriate to ask him so. I mean, how many auto drivers dress like that? They are usually skinny, sweaty, nose diggers. No offence meant, but they are skinny and sweaty and they do dig their noses...we shall simply term it as a professional hazard.

Anyway, I asked him if he would go to Safdarjung Enclave, and he replied that he would. What sounded elixir to my ears was the impeccable Punjabi Urdu that he spoke. Old world he was. After I sat in the auto, I didn't quite know if I wanted to plug music in my ears because I was simply dying to hear more of that language. All I could think of was Lahore, at which of course the smell of food wafted back into my nostrils.

I am a part of a generation that is usually not very emotional about the Partition, barring exceptions of course. But how I wish I belonged to that Old World. I remember how fondly my grandfather spoke of Dhaka, where my whole family came from and how he would love the fact that among all his grandchildren, at least one loves to hear stories about 'those days'. My grandma whose family had been given shelter and hence saved by their Muslim neighbours during communal riots, told me the story often, emphasizing that people are essentially good. In fact, I promised by grandfather that one day I would go back to our house in Dhaka and write a memoir. Probably this is how I developed my affinity for the old world. And this guy in the auto simply brought it up again...the melancholy that would fill my grandparents every time they told and re-told the stories to me...the fondness and love for the land of their childhood...the one black and white photograph which I promised I would preserve to show the next generation...how I crave for the irreversible!

After work, I was supposed to have dinner with Wasey sahab and family, my head of the department in Jamia, it being Eid. People were sitting and talking in the living room, so he asked me to go and sit with his wife and mother inside. The women, which included all the women of Wasey sahab's family and the wife of this particular Rajya Sabha MP were busy chatting. I am pretty close to his mother and wife and hence I knew I would not be as bored as I usually am in such 'separation of sexes' situation. And to add to my day's Partition flavour, they were discussing, well, the Partition. Wasey sahab's mother was ruing about how half of her family got left behind in Lahore and Karachi and how her parents got her married off at the age of 12, left her behind in India and settled in Pakistan. There were frequent sighs followed by a 'I have not seen my brother for so long' or 'how beautiful Lahore looked'. Of course there were comforting statements such as 'take a month's visa and go visit relatives' but I knew it was not the same.

Whether we like it or not, we have wounded a nation fatally. Whoever's fault it was, whatever reasons there were, nothing can justify what people have had to go through...those who stayed back and those who left. I am not simply talking about physical pain or riots. It is about the heart ache and injury caused by tearing away from what was one, something that 60 plus years of progress has not managed to heal.

P.S: Dinner was awesome, except for that MP's wife exclaiming about my Urdu and a particularly irritating woman who turned up to rub secularism on our faces by her constant ramblings about her array of Muslims friends till Wasey sahab decided to shut her up for good. 

The Big BANG-A

Once upon a time, there was a very hot and sexy 'Bong' man named Rahul Bose who belonged to a crazy kingdom in the 'Pashchim' (West), no wait, its in the East actually but its Pashchim...oh what the hell. Although, he did not really rule this kingdom (other crazy people did), he certainly was as handsome as a prince. But one day bad things started happening in his kingdom. A ruler called Mamata Banerjee came to the throne with promises so sweet that they would make you want to puke. All went well till one day, she planned an all new big bang and blew a kiss to the kingdom where hell broke lose. All the hot/sexy/intellectual or otherwise 'Bongs', ranging from Bipasha Basu to Amitav Ghosh to Amartya Sen to Satyajit Ray to Pranab Mukherjee turned into 'Bangs'. Now if you translate the word 'Bang' into the language of this Pashchim/in the East kingdom, you will find it means 'Frog'. Basically with the kiss, flew out this new name tag that this crazy woman wanted to bestow upon the crazy kingdom - 'Pashchim Banga'. There is nothing wrong with the name really, that is if only the people of this kingdom pronounce it with the rasgolla stuffed in their mouths as 'poshchim bongo'. The problem arose when the news spread outside the kingdom walls and reached the outside world where people failed to pronounce it and kept saying 'BANGA' and the people from Banga are obviously the Bangs or the Frogs. Now please forgive the sexual connotation that the word 'Bang' might have in your head or the allusion to food - Bang, the short of Banger(sausage) and yet another sexual connotation.

The fact remains that the Bongs or the Bangs (sigh) cannot go on living their lives as Bangs/Frogs from Kolkata/Kol'kada', 'kada' being the bong word for sludge and mud on the road after rains, because its simply too degrading. And you cannot call Bongs frogs because look at the number of great singers they have produced. They don't croak. The speak and sing and write and no matter what they do they get appreciated. Just that we need to find a way around this whole Banga/Bang curse that the crazy woman has handed us down. Please help me give the initial fairy tale that I had started with a happy ending.

P.S - Maybe Hina Rabbani Khar could be the princess who kisses the bang and makes it a bong ; )

What Is And What Was

There is something so attractive about that smell. Non alcoholic perfume. A Holier than thou air. Greeting whoever you meet with a salaam. Men with beards. Sometimes skull caps. Even if they wore normal westerns, there is something about the way they wear them. There is something in the way everyone smiles.

I walk up the stairs to the Outlook office and I want to greet everyone with a Salaam and then I realise this is not Jamia. Here lecherous men from the pantry stare at you. Here there are no Fayyaz from Hygienic Cafe who aspires to be an actor and would give you free performances everytime you ask him for a cup of coffee. I go up panting and say a hii to my friends. Unlike back in Jamia, I don't want to pull out my hair at the sight of them, which is a good thing. We share chit chat about how PTI is behaving and about traffic. But I miss the fire. The difference in ideology. The raised eyebrows if I walk in wearing a tight T-shirt. The squabbles about Islamic scholars.

I want to fast. Its Ramazan. I know I can do it even if I am sitting in Outlook but its not the same. Everyone in office constantly hogs. I miss fasting together, as a community. I want to discuss about the Iftaar party and what to eat. I want to know that the person sitting next to me knows exactly when to do Iftaar. I want to have people I can do Iftaar with. And even though I have people whose place I can land up at for Iftaar, its just not the same.

At 6pm, all of us rush down to catch a bite at CCD or some Dhaba or the confectionery but I want to walk to Central Canteen for bread pakoda or to the Engineering Department for the good biryani. Back in office, we get constant cups of tea and these are real cups. But I like my 'dip tea' in paper cups that I can sit and drink under a tea listening to professors chat about things that I don't understand.

The boss walks in late in the evening. But he does not come in to teach. And I want to learn. I still want to learn. I want to ask ridiculous questions and have debates. I want to tell him what I think of the Dawah Mission or about West Asia. I want to crib about how difficult Arabic is. I want to listen to people discuss Urdu poetry. I want to hear them recite Faiz and Ghalib at the drop of a hat. I want them to tell me about Parveen Shakir and Qurratulain Haider. I want to hear people sob over the Partition and fight over Maulana Azad. But all I hear is the incessant sound of keys, mouses clicking away to the silence and the boss pronouncing my name with utter cold perfection, "Freya, you filed that story?" I like my name being mispronounced as 'Fariya' or 'Fareha' because even though they are horrible versions of my name, they were always said with affection.

The freezing AC of the office tells me I need to smell old, musty, books in squiggly Urdu. That I need to watch the rain from dusty balconies. That I need to watch men pray down below. That I need to go where I belong...

No, I never fit. And No, I never left.

The Mouse story

We did not see him at first. It was the loaf of bread lying on the kitchen table that told us in the morning...he had been there. The plastic torn off...3 slices from the bottom nibbled at, what more evidence did we need. He was there alright. But how in the world did he get in? I found that out that very night. I was up as usual and when I heard stirrings in the kitchen, I just knew it. So without wearing slippers, I tiptoed out, passing Chintoo a jealous glance, who was sleeping like a dead mouse (Chintoo being a mouse anyway). I switched on the kitchen light and there he was...a small, grey, mouse holding a piece of bread in his two wee hands. For a moment he stared at me. I stared at him. The light blinded him, I guess. No sooner had he regained his vision and seen this monstrosity of a creature standing right in front of him, than he ran up the exhaust fan wire and with one swing vanished into the black shaft above. I told my flatmate the next morning and she disconnected the exhaust fan and rolled up the wire, so that my little friend would not be able to climb down.

All went well on that front till one fine evening, as my flat mate entered the kitchen to make her tea, she shrieked like I do when I see cockroaches. By the time I reached the kitchen the mouse was sitting on the kitchen window which opens into the living room and was planning his next move and my flat mate was practically shaking. The mouse leaped out and rushed into one of the living room cupboards. Unfortunately he chose the one that belonged to my flat mate. I cannot bear to think of rat poison, so I decided to catch him instead. I asked my flatmate to fetch me a small bucket and I asked her to scare him out of his hiding place, so that I could catch him. He came out but was too quick for us and went and hid behind the fridge. We shook the fridge. My flatmate scared him from one side while I stood in position with the bucket on the other. But all in vain. My little friend managed to give me the slip and landed up in one of the kitchen cupboards. Thankfully the cupboard was practically empty, except for a few baskets. My flat mate made me seal the cupboard door with thick tape. I knew he would die inside due to lack of food and oxygen. I have a pet mouse and the thought just made me really sad. I asked the maid the next day if she could take him out of there and set him free outside but she was scared as well.

A couple of days went by and we heard nothing from the cupboard. I thought he was dead and that I would have to dispose the body. On a Sunday morning, I stood making breakfast and my flat mate was fast asleep. I suddenly heard someone gnawing at the wooden cupboard door from inside. Then I saw something that made my heart melt. A tiny grey hand with pink palms came out of a tiny slit on the side of the cupboard door, as if crying for help. I couldn't contain myself. I sliced a piece of carrot and inserted it through the slit. It vanished. So I sent in another. It vanished too. Now I knew that my friend was alive and very very hungry. So I took off the tape, opened the door and popped in a few more pieces of carrot. But he would not come out. I caught a sight of him watching me from behind the baskets. I realised he was too scared. So I left him there, ate my breakfast and went off to college. When I came back, he was gone and he had left behind my hysterical flat mate.
And to show his gratefulness, my friend has stopped stealing from my kitchen. I wish he would visit sometimes though.

Jamia Mass Com issue - a different perspective

Jamia Millia Islamia is in the news again and this time the credit goes to our students from Mass Communication who have always done us proud and have contributed to Jamia's fame. It is the reason why thousand of students every year buy our prospectus, apply, appear for drilling admission tests, pray to all possible gods, try all possible means and pay not a very large amount for fees...and all because they want to study in the AJK Centre for Mass Communication in Jamia. Big name. Produces even bigger names. Big deal really. Once a student qualifies that entrance, beats some thousand others, gets it into his/her head that he/she is going to make it BIG (yet again) in the media industry, the dreary college life of Jamia, which includes attending classes, passing exams and earning a 75% attendance, obviously gets a little uninteresting and challenge-less for our future media professionals. Reason why many of them choose not to attend classes. Reason why under the regime of a strict Vice Chancellor, some 17 of them manage to get debarred from examinations. Oh no, of course they had medical certificates and of course the officials failed to understand their trouble to turn up for classes and of course called their medical certificates fake. So the students from our reputed Anwar Jamal Kidwai Centre for Mass Communication decide to communicate their displeasure at authority and follow the steps of the very founders of Jamia Millia Islamia who had stood up against the British in the Non Co-operation movement and established an institute, separate from Aligarh Muslim University (that believed in co-operation with the British).

Analogies apart, our students have been sleeping on the footpaths and keeping a hunger strike, protesting against the atrocities that have been meted out to them by the cruel cruel authorities that did not let them sit for their exams. They have been screaming 'Jamia murdabaad' and this is where my problem lies. What has Jamia done? Well, has been strict for a change. But is it so wrong for a University to expect its students to attend class? I have read comments such as 'oh they showed the same films over and over again' and 'oh the teachers were always absent'! well, then you should have protested against a slack faculty, instead of being slack yourself. And I cannot believe that people were not warned beforehand. I am in the Faculty for Humanities and Languages where people are way lazier and even then we were constantly told that this year attendance mattered and that we would not be spared. But of course, you had to be in class in the first place to hear the warnings! The protesters are calling it their 'right to education'. Of course everyone has the right to education but when you get the right, you also have duties to perform. Jamia takes you - your right. you attend class - your duty. You fail to perform your duty and poof goes your right to your right.

I guess we all have a certain resentment against anyone who is in power. That is alright. But we cannot blame them always for our own shortcomings. Of course they have flaws. Who doesn't? But we are not plain innocent either. Both parties do things to aggravate matters. I even read a comment from one of them saying that maybe the attendance sheets don't reach the authorities correctly. Well, I am from the student community and I can assure them that I have myself seen professors signing them, submitting to the department and the departments submitting them to the dean offices from where it goes to the Vice Chancellor. No one's attendance is tampered with. The authorities are not vindictive towards the students. They do want everyone to graduate. Its just that the line has to be drawn somewhere.

Yes, I know I sound like an authority bum licker. I do see the student perspective as well. But all you had to do was attend class. If spending money and not being able to sit for an exam is an issue, wasn't spending money and not attending class one? I don't mind students protesting. They can protest all they want. I simply do not like the way they are maligning Jamia. I love my university, with all its history, heritage and shortcomings and I do not want a bunch of kids who are too big for their boots to do it any harm.

P.S - The very fact that I have written after so long should convey how much this means to me. Apologies to anyone whose "right to education" this might have hurt. thank you.

Kitne Pakistan...

I was told by an elated department that Jamia Millia Islamia has at last achieved the status of a minority institution. I never understood the true implications of such an occurrence and I decided to leave it just there, although it somewhere certainly felt slightly sick. But if everyone can be so happy about it, it cannot be something that bad after all.

I tried to put forward certain arguments which did not seem very competent at all. Are we too comfortable with this 'minority' word? Is it actually some sort of solace? An excuse where we find refuge in for all our shortcomings? A security blanket is it, that we brand ourselves so proudly as 'minority'? Is trying to gain government sympathy always the right way? I was patiently explained that educationally, Muslims are even more backward than the SC/ST and OBC's. There are villages where people do not even have enough to eat, let alone receive proper education. Should they not have the opportunity to study in a university? Moreover, most people in support also seem to be believing that Jamia was ultimately established for the education of the Muslims and hence granting it the minority status was the right thing to do. And I completely agree with all that.

But lets face it, is the community only backward because Jamia was not a minority institution? And now that it is, will the community suddenly be how we want to see it? Firstly, I really don't think Muslims in general understand their religion very well and most clerics seem to be worried about very mundane things to actually sit up and do something as far as education is concerned. The Jamaats also are too hung up on their own ideologies to do much for society. The Muslims can still produce intelligent men and I am not going to cite big names from antiquity but even now they have the potential to produce the most intelligent and sensitive of men. The point is, even now with the large number of Muslims that do study in Jamia, how many are actually into studying? They all get degrees and know nothing. What will happen with all the reservation? We will hand out more degrees to people who know nothing. Why is it that we always concentrate on the quantity and never on the quality? Just because out of the hundreds, one will turn out to be a man of substance? I just think that if improvement of the community is what our main goal is for all this reservation, then we must look elsewhere. Things need to change at a grass root level. Getting a university degree does not change mind sets and that is what needs alteration. I do understand that there are not many schools in villages but then we need to ask for minority institutions there. Primary education - that is what we need. Basic literacy - that is what the constitution guarantees. Why not claim that? If education provided at a basic level is of a standard, then people will automatically be competent enough for university. We would not even require reservations then. Like I said, Muslims can produce the most intelligent of men, but their foundations have to be laid much before. And anyway what has potential or intelligence or poverty got to do with religion? And it is in school, that character building takes place, where children formulate their value system, where they learn to think. Why not improve the basic education in the community instead of wasting energy on whether there is reservation for higher education?

As far as the argument that Jamia was built for the education of Muslims is concerned, well, Jamia was also built in a national spirit, in a spirit of unity. It withstood the Partition of 1947 but unfortunately could not withstand the division of 2011 - 50% yours and 50% mine.

Jinhe naaz hai Hind parr woh kahan hain...

I taught you love. You taught me responsibility.

I taught you passion. You taught me patience.

I taught you desire. You taught me abstinence.

I taught you melody. You filled in the words.

I taught you to dream. You taught me realisation.

I was chaos. You taught harmony.

I taught the rise...You taught the fall...

I taught the holding on...you taught the letting go...

I taught you doubt. You taught me faith.

I chose supremacy. You taught submission.

I taught ego. You taught the absence of it.

I taught you Self. You taught me the Supreme.

In a Flicker

I do not know how that house looks now or that room that remains lit by that single bulb, in my mind’s eye, fluctuating every now and then, just like it used to. Often the lights would go off and then the oil lamps would burn with their blackened faces. A big wooden table stood in the middle of the room…unpolished and yet smoothened by the years of use. It always felt moist to the skin, moist and soft and so did the benches around it. This table would witness the chopping of raw mangoes in summer and would often be their restig place when at the end of the day, when they would be brought back inside from the sun, a little more dried than before, just a little more shrivelled, just a little more close to the pickle they were destined to make. In the rains they would bear the heat from the steaming cups of tea and plates of pyaanjii. By then the wooden almirah with glass doors would be full of big jars of the most delicious pickles in the world. In winters, it was always red berries that were spread on this very table to be smeared in oil, salt and all the spices. Fresh vegetables from the garden outside would concoct the most seductive fragrances from the kitchen. And by spring the kitchen window would witness the mango trees outside blooming with tiny little mangoes...the little plants would be bending with fat, red tomatoes...bright purple egg plants would hang to touch the ground... When the maroon banana flowers turned into green yellow sweet bananas, they would be distributed to everyone known. It was like a child's first picture book...fruits, flowers and vegetables...know their names, their colours, their taste...their feel...

And with that fluctuating bulb, my memory flickers too...like a candle in a storm...turbulence of an ever changing world...now here and then gone. The candle melts into nothingness and revisiting is like visiting a grave...veiled by modernity, lies years, days, hours, minutes and seconds that flew by and I know not the grave....I only hold dear what was buried and what is lost in the dusts of eternity.

No-Man's land

Of recent, I happened to attend a two day Inter-Faith conference on Woman and Child's Health which was attended by religious leaders belonging to various faiths. I have no clue why I had an invitation in the first place, I am no religious leader but I shall blame my Head of the Department entirely for that. In order to avoid getting bored, I landed myself a translation job and managed to drag my mentor, Arshad bhai along with me to help the religious leaders with language interpretation. I remember sitting on one of the round tables and scribbling to Arshad bhai on the sheet containing the programme for the day while some religious leader who was bilingual went on and on in two languages, rendering the two of us quite useless. 'Funny, I am attending this conference, I don't even have a faith'. 'I do. You want to borrow for the day?', scribbled back Arshad bhai. I smiled back. After the religious leader had stopped talking, Arshad bhai turned to me and asked,"you believe I exist?". I poked him on the shoulder with my pen and replied, "Of course I do". "Well, then you have faith", said Arshad bhai and gave me the smile which I simply hate because it tells me that he is wiser than I am.

There was a part in the conference where all the religious leaders had to get into groups according to their faiths and discuss problems that women face in their own communities and come up with a plan of action to improve the situation. My biggest question right at that moment was which group would I go to. Arshad bhai would obviously go with his own faith group. And I would not know which way to go. In fact, I have always hated situations like these. I remember never wanting fill up my religion on the West Bengal Board of Secondary education forms before exams. I remember not taking a form to join the Indian Inter-Faith Coalition for HIV/AIDS because I had to specify which faith I would represent and the truth is I don't know. Anyway this group discussion was to take place in the post lunch session. During lunch, I went to my Head of the Department and asked him which side I should take, only to be met with yet another wise smile and a pat on my back. After lunch, when the next session started, I scribbled to Arshad bhai, 'which side?'. He wrote back, 'whichever your heart says yes to'. I swore at him under my breath and called him 'useless' but I appreciated him for not imposing and for not taking the decision for me. Oh damn, he is wiser than I am! The Hindu leaders were asked to form a group and move to a table. I did not get up. I could not. I have never belonged there. I could not go and barge into something that is not mine. And moreover, who am I to talk about the condition of women in Hindu society or how the religion can do something to make it better. How much of Hinduism do I know anyway. The Hindu leaders who knew me as the Hindu girl doing Islamic Studies gave me a look of abandonment (or so I imagine) and moved to their table. Arshad bhai smiled to my "now what?" The Muslim leaders got up to move to their table. Most of them knew me. The Imam of Okhla's Jama Masjid patted me on the back and said, "join us. You do Islamic Studies. You are one of us". I smiled courteously. I have no clue why I did not join them, probably because I will never understand fully their plight. I can only provide an outsider's point of view and give my own well-read solutions. They would never be those of a person who lives the faith. Arshad bhai was still sitting beside me. "Go join your clan".I said. "Nah", he replied, "I want to be faithless like you for a while. Lets go out for a walk". I grabbed my pack of smokes and walked out, smiling at the Christian leaders as I left.

The other thing that I noticed during the conference is that when the Hindu leaders spoke, I listened open mouthed. I hardly know anything about the religion I was born into. I was probably more oriented about Christianity, while I knew much much more about Islam than what the Muslim leaders said. Obviously, they were just making things simpler for everybody to understand. But I am so much closer to Islam than I am to the faith I was born into. A friend recently asked me what spirituality I see in Islam. The thing is I cannot put down my finger on spirituality and say, yes this is it. I can find a thousand things to criticize as far as our Muslim society is concerned. I can even tell exactly why we are this way. But somehow that never spoils the charm that Islam has for me. Even when I feel distanced, there is something that always pulls me back to it. And unlike many of our so called scholars, I have learnt not to reject any particular faith. The only thing that matters is that you HAVE faith. And that is exactly what each of our institutionalized religions say. And in this case faith does not indicate the language (religion) in which we receive it. It just means acknowledging the Omnipresence of a Power beyond our comprehension. As far as I am concerned, in some strange crazed corner of my heart Islam is the language I receive my Faith in.

For some reason I have not managed to get this incident out of my head. It told me exactly how I would react if I ever had to make a choice. I would simply sit in no-man's land and smoke a cigarette.