MEMORIES OF MAHALAYA

Mahalaya brings a lot of memories, mainly of childhood days. The earliest memory of Mahalaya remains, like any other Bengali, to be the renditions of Mahisasuramardini by Birendrakrishna Bhadra on Akashvani! This used to set the tone for Durga Puja. I was never an early riser. Getting up at 4 o'clock in the morning, despite my parents' insistence, was a tough task. Being half asleep and listening to the radio, the sound of chanting coming from almost all corners of the neighbourhood, was a dreamy experience at that time. However, if I hated Akashvani authority for airing the programme so early in the morning, I loved Doordarshan for telecasting the programme an hour later. DD used to care about those of us who would not be able to wake up early and missed Birendrakrishna Bhadra. The visuals used to compensate the voice for us.

 

I must admit, till date, I have not found anything as pure and holy as Birendrakrishna's chanting. But the main attraction of the television version of Mahisasuramardini was the emergence of Durga, how the manishis armed Devi and finally the fight between Durga and the Asura. One would lag behind among the friends if he didn't watch the television programme on Mahalaya. After all we had to discuss and share ‘expert comment’ on the details of the fight between Durga and Asura.  Even if one failed to claim, "I got up at 4 am and listened to the radio programme", he couldn't dare say, "I missed the TV's Mahalaya.

 

Another memory of Mahalaya is of course of my father going to Ganga for tarpan. It took me years to understand the significance of the ritual. I never had the opportunity to go with him to the river for tarpan. I was not supposed to go, as the ritual was restricted to those who lost their parents. I was told tarpan means offering water to the forefathers. But I could never comprehend why we offer water on the last day of pitripaksha and on the beginning of matripaksha!

 

Mahalaya means the puja is here. It is the day of chakhsmudan, drawing the eyes on the idol. We used to gather at the pandal waiting for the artist to do the most difficult job. For one month prior to the Puja, our afternoon adda used to be at the neighbourhood pandal where we used to get mesmerized seeing how a structure of bamboo, made of hay and clay would gradually come alive in the form of the Maa Durga and her children. My preference has always been of an angry Durga who is killing the demon!

 

Now the Mahalaya has lost the exclusivity of starting the day with Mahisasuramardini. In this age of youtube and CDs, Birendrakrishna Bhadra is no longer a once-in-a-year ritual; his voice is available throughout the year. Most importantly in Didi's regime, listening to his chanting is a must at every traffic signal in the city of Kolkata!

 

The funniest memory of Mahalaya draws me back to my journalism school. In the hostel, one of the Bengali friends brought a cassette of Mahisasurmardini. On the D-day that year our hostel mates, mostly non-Bengalis, gathered at a room early in the morning when the light had not properly come out. The room was full of the scent of incense sticks and the cassette was played. The sound box was on full volume. Though I was half asleep, I felt proud listening to Mahisasurmardini at the appropriate time even after staying outside Bengal and make it listen to our non-Bengali friends at the journalism school hostel. We all departed with a holy feeling. But at night during dinner, the enthusiastic friend who brought the cassette from Kolkata declared, "Friends, I am sorry. Today was not Mahalaya. It's tomorrow. I just called up home and found it. I goofed up with the date!" We all started laughing but one non-Bengali friend got really angry! He shouted, "You stupid fellow, you know I refused to eat non-veg throughout the day thinking this to be a holy day and stayed away from meat and fish! I will have to do without non-veg food again tomorrow only for you!"

 

I was not so serious about Mahalaya though!

REMINDER: ONCE AGAIN

"She is a prostitute. It was a deal that went wrong."

"What was she doing so late at night with her boyfriend and why did they take an empty bus at that hour?"

"They were intoxicated and must have felt a sexual urge. They must have enjoyed."

"What was the need for the photojournalist to go to an isolated area with her male colleague?"

Four different incidents of rape at Park Street in Kolkata, Delhi, Kamduni in West Bengal's Barasat and Mumbai. Four different comments, which reflect a common sentiment. It shows how majority of the people, not only men but women, too, perceive rape and rape victims.

I was excited to see a Tahrir Square-like agitation in New Delhi last winter. THe spontaneous movement created a hope of change. We demanded that the rapists be hanged. We wanted a change in law to bring in provisions for stricter punishment, better policing, fast track courts. Though the laws have been amended, the trial of the Delhi rape case is still on. The agitation has died down and women continue to be raped in different parts of the country. After Mumbai gangrape, the issue has once again hit the headlines. It seems we are back to square one. 

Last December, when I had gone to interview a woman activist,she, on hearing about my excitementover the angry reaction, asked me, "Are they really reacting?"

Now I believe, no spontaneous or made-for-TV agitation or movement can bring down the number of rape incidents in the country. Neither any change of law nor better police patrolling can prevent rapes. Unless we change our mentality towards women and rape vistims, nothing can stop the menace. All administrative measures can work as a catalyst, bu the real change will have to come from within.

The problem is as long as the horror doesn't hit out near and dear ones, we brush it aside as others' problem and feel free to cast aspersions on the tape victims before anything is proved. We go off to sleep happily saying my daughter, my sister or my wife don't go out late at night. The society remains vulnerable.

THE CRY FOR ALTERNATIVE

West Bengal panchayat elections have just got over and the ruling Trinamool Congress has emerged as a clean winner wiping out the Left from the rural bodies except in a few pockets. Since the perceived outrage against the TMC government didn’t really work in the panchayat elections, the results will definitely give a boost to the chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s belief that everything is concocted by the media and her leaders, party and the government are going in the right direction. In this situation the opposition can’t find much political space in the state, atleast in near future. It gives rise to the perennial question Bengal is facing for decades.

Will West Bengal keep on suffering simply because there is no alternative to the political formation that is ruling the state? Since my childhood I had seen my grandfathers and uncles lamenting about the Communist rule, or the misrule. As I grew up I have seen there were allegations and instances of atrocities by the Left. Despite that in every election the Left came out with flying colours. The name of the chief minister of Bengal would not change. It remained to be Jyoti Basu. Everyone criticized the government but asked themselves: Where is the alternative? I used to wonder why the Congress couldn’t defeat the Left in West Bengal when the same party is coming in and going out of power in various other states of the country! Cynics used to claim the Congress leaders were happy to be the regional satraps with their pockets of support base and enjoy the facilities provided by the Left leaders under the table. They wouldn’t like to take up the huge burden of running a government. 

Mamata Banerjee broke away from Congress with the allegation that it was not really opposed to CPIM and she launched a massive anti-CPIM movement. She enjoyed a huge popularity among a section of the people and created hope among them although her capabilities were suspect given her maverick style of functioning. Then there was also a problem of divided opposition. So question still remained: where is the alternative?

As the people, both at the urban and the rural level, were so disgusted with the Left rule, they, to my mind, without thinking much voted Mamata’s Trinamool Congress to power. Nandigram and Singur worked as the catalyst to the culmination of the anti-Left movement bringing together fringe socio-political groups which forced the change of guard. Many thought it was more like a mandate against the Left than for Mamata.

Now there is so much outcry over the failure of the new government, its functioning and most importantly the chief minister’s denial mode! The TMC rule seems to be the other side of the same coin we saw during the Left regime. Why is the opposition Left, which many thought would be a smart opposition, is failing to act? It seems the Left is waiting for the situation to be too ripe to take the Mamata government head on. No one can see the Left coming to power in near future. Are they waiting for a Singur or a Nandigram to happen? Probably they are. The way the Left’s organization has eroded, it will take time to repair. Before that there is an urgent need for an alternative leader which is missing. People who voted the Left out of power would not so easily repose faith in the leaders like Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, Biman Bose or Gautam Deb. So the Left wants to go step by step and wait for the people’s anger against the government to grow and explode. 

The problem is the anger against the rulers has always remained among the people. We saw it there especially in last 10 years of the Left rule. But it took time to take a shape electorally. It needed a leader to anchor the anger. We saw how Mamata Banerjee, on a rainy day, was shouting outside the gate of Taj Bengal hotel when Beni Santosha, the Indonesian industrialist, had come visiting Bengal to discuss chemical hub and other projects. There were five or six people behind her. We also saw how that sustained campaign turned that five or six into lakhs behind her during Singur and Nandigram. 

The Left is failing to capitalize on the issues which are creating outrage among the people against this government. Due to presence of electronic media, their job should have been easier. But the TMC government sees no political challenge before them in near future.

The unfortunate part of the West Bengal politics is it is so polarized that sporadic movement by fringe socio-politico organizations can’t do much in the state. Any movement to turn big and be electorally decisive has to be anchored by either the Left or the TMC. Till then one will continue to rule at their will and we will continue to lament: where is the alternative?

BONOMALI TUMI....

Aaj jemon kore gaichhe akash/temni kore gao go

I have always tried to keep myself detached and indifferent to any mrityusangbad. I have seen many people, near and dear ones, die but in most cases I have stayed away from their funerals or sraddha. The news came and went not leaving a long-lasting impact on my mind. There have been only sudden attack of memories that tell me about their absence in my life. Off late I have realized I fear death. I am scared of facing death in any form. 

But a person’s death, quite surprisingly, has left me devastated. I never realized how much the person had filled my heart and mind with his life and work. At 10 in the morning, one of my journalist friends told me, “hey Rituparno is no more”. I could not believe his words. After crosschecking the information, when I called my newsdesk, as the phone at the other end was ringing, I wondered if I was about to give them correct information or if it was a rumour. I doubted myself. The news of course came as a surprise to all. No one thought that the man would leave us so early. That was the moment since when the mon kharaper dista started piling up. I started missing him terribly. It was as if I had to speak to him, but I missed the bus.

In my journalistic career I had the chance to speak to him three or four times. It was for purely professional reasons. Many a time he refused to speak. But that was not the connection I had with Rituparno Ghosh. At the end of my school life, Unishe April, made its appearance on the big screen. Rituparno made his appearance in the industry in a big way and in my life as well. One of my uncle-friend actually took me inside Rituparno’s world as I watched one film after another. He taught me how Rituparno delved into women’s psychology and handled relations in his films, how he took care of details like Manikbabu used to and what his language of cinema was.

Apart from his films, my bonding with Rituparno’s thoughts was first through his chat show on Bengali channels and then his editorials in Sangbad Pratidin’s Sunday magazine Robbar. I have found he had a huge fan following of First Person, the editorial column. His style of prose and personal intimate words were really refreshing. His attachment to his parents, his loner-self, the symbols of Bengali middle class sentiments was evident from his writings. Probably that is the reason why I could probably relate to him, his world.

His immense knowledge about almost everything, his way of internalizing Rabindranath Tagore, his interest in Mahabharat, his sense of beauty, his dream to do films with Hollywood stars sitting in Kolkata and, most importantly, his desire to be a woman and subtle support to the LGBT movement through his own life were all signs of his superior intellectual self. His achievements were not his films but his life as a whole. A star has fallen off the sky of Bengal’s intelligentsia.

Standing in front of his house on that cloudy and gloomy Thursday morning, I realized I used to adore Rituparno Ghosh silently. I actually wanted to listen to him silently. I wanted to read as he did. I wanted to enrich myself following his words, works and apparent discipline in life like a voyeur. He had a lot more to give us. Like most of the talented rebels, Rituparno left us too early.

As his body was being taken out of his home, he was still smiling with his eyes closed. The sorrow was deep inside my heart. The painful feeling lingered.

A song still hovers in my mind as I look back to his face at the last journey:

Bonomali tumi porojonome hoiyo radha.

CURIOSITY

Some say if necessity is the mother of invention then curiosity is the father of it! But there has been no specification to the level or area of curiosity and if ‘father’ comes first or the ‘mother’. So, many a time, we have been misled and directed our energy in the wrong direction. 99 per cent of the population is curious about almost everything under the sun and beyond it too. Most people can let their work wait and poke their nose anywhere to satisfy their curiosity. They don’t bother to think if they even need to ‘know’ what is happening at that moment.

The field reporters often find such ‘curious’ people on their assignments. Nowadays, people understand a lot about media. They know where there is a camera there is ‘bawal’. So the curiosity and adrenaline level goes up whenever they see reporters and camerapersons. How can one miss the opportunity to ‘be informed’ about a piece of information before anyone can get to watch it on TV or read it on the newspapers next morning?  How can one miss the chance to gossip with his or her friend that he was privy to news as it happened and as the Tvwalas captured it?

Like it happened last Saturday while the media waited outside the Kolkata airport. The ignorance about N Srinivasan doesn’t matter to these ‘curious’ people. It can be cross-checked or verified later. ‘Let me first see it’: is the motto for them. Many asked the waiting gang of media men, “dada who is coming”. If you reply, suppose, “Srinivasan”. Many of them will not know who this Srinivasan is. Still they will nod their head like a wise man and walk off. Some will stand by with the reporters to have a glimpse of the man, as he heard the name, Srinivas! Some will pass wise comments like, “oh that man…whose son-in-law is in jail”. Then they will confront the journo, “…aaarree what is the name of his jamai? Bolun na…” Some journalists ignore such questions. Those who answer will be charged with many more. It will seem as if he was briefing his boss! Many of the passersby will forget their near and dear ones are anxiously waiting at home or elsewhere. They will stand behind the camera, sometimes in front of it for no reason at all. Sometimes the situation will force you to think so many people have no work and the level of unemployment is indeed high.

Among many, a funny incident must be mentioned here. Some reporters and photographers were waiting outside a Kolkata auditorium near Nandan for a meeting of the State Election Commission. A curious passer-by stopped and asked the usual question, “Who is coming dada?”

 No one answered. After he repeated his question with more curiosity, one answered, “Sudipta Sen is coming.”

 The reporter thought this would be easier for him to satisfy the man rather than explaining about SEC meeting. But the man shot another question, “Why is Sudipta Sen coming here? He is in jail!”

To this the reporter replied seriously, “Yes, he is in jail. But he wanted to watch a film. So he is being taken from the jail to Nandan. This is a government cinema house.”

The man got furious and started abusing not the reporter but the government, “How can a government do this? The government’s job should be to see the dues are paid to the investors and it can’t allow a criminal like Sudipta Sen to watch a film!”

Last heard he left the place immediately. What is not known is his reaction when he told this to his friends or family and got to know the truth. Or it may be he hasn’t got a chance to know the truth and will believe this information to be true all his life!

So always remember when necessity is the mother of invention then curiosity becomes the father!

YOUR HONOUR, MY LORD

Court reporting is not as easy as it used to be, say ten years back. In the days of television and ‘tweeteretti’, a court reporter or, to put it in a sophisticated way, a legal correspondent has to be prompt in reporting what the lawyers argue and the judges say in court. Those days are gone when the reporter could depend on the summary statement of the advocates of both the litigating sides and go through the copy of the judgment before dispatching his report.

Trust me, it is also not as easy to be prompt in court reporting as the television producers demand a reporter to be. Even if you are present in the courtroom, the Indians I mean and to be specific in Bengal’s, there is no guarantee that at the first go you will be able to fathom what the lawyers are arguing and what the judges are muttering. Leave the district courts aside. Let us enter the High Court. Unless you know the subject of the litigation or lawyer decides to speak in an audible voice, you are going to stare at everyone’s face to understand what the drama is all about. You are lucky if you get to hear a ‘dramatic’ lawyer. At the end of his argument it will seem as if he has the case in the bag and the judge is about to deliver the verdict in his favour. But wait! The lawyer from the other side will change your whole idea about the case when he starts and finishes his argument.

My first professional entry into a courtroom was when a chartered accountant, Mr RS Lodha, claimed he became the owner of the Rs 5000-crore property of Mr MP Birla as, according to his documents, Mr Birla’s wife Ms Priyamvada Birla wrote the property in his name in her will. The whole of Birla clan contested the will. At the end of each day’s hearing, we used to go to the solicitors’ offices of both Mr Loda and the Birlas. My colleague still says, at the end of the solicitors’ briefings it used to look as if both the parties have won the day. 

Who doesn’t like to see two parties quarreling? Let’s admit it’s fun witnessing a legal argument. But when the advocate delves into voluminous judgments of the bygone days and hover over a single point of argument, it slowly begins to sound like a lullaby and sweet sleep beckons. Arguments are over. Now it’s time for the judge to give you a hard time. Most of the times only the judge and the court officer will manage to hear the verdict. And this is also a good time to test your hearing power. You will literally have to stretch your ears to get a word or two of the judgment. You will get to know which ear is functioning perfectly and which is not! Then you will have to run after the lawyers or the court officers present in the court to get the gist of the judgment. If the judge is loud, don’t conclude from his initial words what judgment he is finally delivering. In the first part of the order he may be recording the arguments of the lawyers, then his own observations and finally his verdict will come. So wait till the last moment. You can’t flash the final order until he is leaving his chamber or taking up the next case.

And if it is a trial court, it has happened that the reporters had to wait till 10 o’clock in the evening to know the order of a high profile case when the arguments were over at 2 pm in the afternoon. 

 On top of everything you cannot go wrong in giving any information about a case. You will be caught by the court, let alone by your boss. 

 And understanding legal jargons? Let’s keep the issue for another day. That’s another story.

NOTHING OFFICIAL ABOUT IT

 November 2007 

 I was sitting with a group of students when the phone vibrated and the news came. A scheduled protest by some minority organizations had gone violent. I rushed. I reached Park Circus walking a few kilometers as the traffic stood still. The scene was that of a battle field with cars burning, stones being pelted and the police chasing the protestors. What was the protest all about? We heard some minority organizations were to protest against the atrocities in Singur and Nandigram. It was supposed to be led by one of the minority leaders of the opposition party. We were clueless how it turned violent and gradually how Singur-Nandigram was being over shadowed with a demand for evicting author Taslima Nasrin out of the city. Everything got blurred in the face of rioting in central Kolkata. I was more curious to find out if my colleagues and, the obvious question that came to my mind, if our cars were safe. That was for the first time I saw army being called in the city of Kolkata. That was for the first time I saw how army was being defied. The men in uniform brandishing arms were flag-marching and hundreds of protestors, mostly young men, walked with them chanting slogans. The whole of Park Circus, Mullickbazar and Rippon Street sported a look of a battle field with army convoy passing through. The rioting didn’t stop till evening. The cars were again burnt, the stones were pelted and tear gas shells were hurled at the protestors. That part of Kolkata was shut down causing problems for school children, office goers and the public. Till late in the evening it was not clear what the protestors were demanding. The protests didn’t stop until a beacon-fitted car stopped in the locality and a smiling man from the car asked the protestors to calm down. The ‘issue’ was made clearer, after a while, by a left leader who claimed, ‘Taslima Nasrin should leave if she is not wanted.’ Taslima had to leave. She was whisked away to an undisclosed location in Jaipur. She never returned to the city she made her own. 

January 2013

Reports suggested author Salman Rushdie called off his visit to Kolkata, apparently under pressure from the government or the police. He was scheduled to address a press conference in a city hotel to promote the film ‘Midnight’s Children’, based on his novel. He was also supposed to be a surprise guest at an event in Kolkata Book Fair, the biggest literary fair in the city. But Salman was not coming. Why? The police apparently apprehended law and order problem with some minority organizations threatening to protest. They did protest without knowing the Jet Airways flight wasn’t carrying Rushdie to Kolkata that morning. More surprises were in store for us. Starting from the organizers of the Book Fair, Kolkata Literary Meet to the police and administration denied any knowledge of Rushdie’s proposed visit to the city. Some refused to comment and some claimed they didn’t have any such information. Only a few reacted.

Two days later when Salman claimed it was the Bengal chief minister and her police who prevented him from landing in Kolkata, a religious leader claimed he did make a call to the chief minister asking her not to allow the author to Kolkata and the CM obliged. An MP from the ruling party welcomed the ‘action of the government’. The government neither accepted nor denied such claims. No one reacted. There was nothing official about it after all.

I was a witness to both the incidents. The violent protests that forced Taslima Nasrin out of the city, eventually out of the country and the ‘silent unofficial’ plan that blocked Salman Rushdie’s way to Kolkata. Both were done apparently to appease the minorities. The policy of appeasement keeping the elections in mind was so strong that the opposition Left chose not to react, the administration or the CM didn’t have the courage to either accept or rebutt Salman Rushdie’s charges. We all watched the series of events silently as if nothing big has happened. After all Rushdie didn’t belong to Bengal or Bengalis.

Some have started to believe, with Rushdie not being allowed in Kolkata , that the cultural capital of the country has finally fallen from its grace. They are wrong. We haven’t lost the status in January 2013, not even in November 2007, may be before that when Taslima’s book was banned which was later lifted by the High Court. There were many such incidents that went unnoticed. Intolerance and this politics of appeasement have long ago breached the fort of culture we boast upon.

In last three decades the mediocrity of intellect was encouraged in such a way that, in majority of us, the thought-process works no longer. We accept these ‘small things’ casually and still love to take pride in our culture and pseudo liberal ideals. Democracy is limited to casting votes.

There is no hope that we can rediscover the lost intellect in near future, at least not under the present regime. We will keep our ideals under the carpet. There is nothing ‘official’ about it.