Life is beautiful

Recounting the events of an evening not long ago.

Today was one of those days. A day when things happen. And make your life a little more meaningful. But also a day that makes you question your life.

Saw Deepa Bhatia’s film, ‘Nero’s Guests’. The film itself is not spectacular but its protagonist most certainly is. The film follows P Sainath, a man who has devoted his life to a study of India’s rural affairs, and most notably its recent agrarian crisis. And Sainath is an angry man. Not hard to see why, for the last few years he has been following the trail of suicides in the cotton belt of India, a symptom, he says of the larger agrarian crisis of ‘corporatisation of Indian agriculture.’ It can’t be easy to be faced with the despair and helplessness in those thousands of faces, knowing that there’s little he can do to help them. God knows it was difficult enough to see the film without a lump in the throat.
He is also a good speaker, a fallout one assumes of the many talks he gives regularly. His knowledge of the subject is commendable, and his arguments forceful. I have read Sainath before, even some of the one-liners that he used in the film and later while interacting with the audience. (I guess in this country one ends up being repetitive in order to simply be heard.) He always comes across as well researched, and today was no exception. The pleasant surprise was to see his impressive personality and aura. Though maybe it should not have been.
The film was well made. It was a film about the agrarian crisis as seen through its protagonist’s eyes, and delivered on that front. It is high on emotional content, often resorting to emotion to drive home a point, sometimes to anger, sometimes sarcasm, and at other times to poetry and story telling. It’s the kind of approach I have often found in Arundhati Roy’s non fiction writings. It makes for very interesting reading, in this case viewing, but you come away wondering if you haven’t also been somewhat emotionally manipulated. Be that as it may, it is nevertheless an important film for the message it holds, which is urgent and yet much neglected.

I came back home to see a crowd at the corner of Ahimsa Marg, where our building stands. This street corner has been witness to much action over the last few days because of the attempts of the residents of the corner building to remove a vegetable vendor who sits on the footpath. He’s been around for awhile, as long as we have been. I never knew there was a problem with his location in the first place, after all he is just selling vegetables, like many other illegal hawkers and vendors in the city… how could he pose a problem to anyone? Besides, how do the residents of a building have any right over the footpath outside, even if it is the one adjoining their boundary wall? That is after all public property. A couple of days back when we headed towards the vendor to get some vegetables, we saw his entire lot strewn over the road, and a large crowd gathered around, with some of the ones in the centre looking rather self important. Even then I had wondered if the goons of some political outfit such as the Sena or the MNS were involved. That’s the one thing that makes us Indians brave. Connections. Backing by local rogue elements.
Sure enough today when I was on my way back from the film, I saw a small board with a picture of Raj Thackery and notice about illegal hawkers at the corner. There was also a row of stone seats installed around the corner, in place of the vegetable vendor, and the dosa and pani puri stalls that existed earlier. There was a crowd again, and upon enquiry I realized that there had been some sort of physical fight, and the police was expected to arrest the vendors.
The vendors?
I can’t help but wonder at our apathy. We want all the conveniences that the underbelly of the city provides us, such as our drivers and our domestic helps, and free home delivery of vegetables and groceries from the local kirana shop, but we’d rather not see them if possible. We believe in beautification drives. We’d rather have a row of stone seats at a corner of an intersection full of traffic, than a bunch of people trying to earn a livelihood. Where do they go, you ask? Well, that’s the government’s lookout, isn’t it?
Another story that the only one I’ve seen sitting on one of those seats ever since they have been installed, is the security guard ‘protecting’ them.

Got home finally. And found this touching photo essay, (link shared by a talented photographer friend, Zishaan Latif http://www.zishaanlatif.com)

Life suddenly seems beautiful in more ways than we find the time to appreciate.

Help, I'm lost!

I was reading this rather interesting article a couple of days back about sign design (http://www.slate.com/id/2245644/) and its importance, and it struck me how often I have complained about the lack of proper signage in this country. It doesn’t seem awfully complicated to get signage right… if at all, it is probably very logical. Why then are we so poor at it.
The best-marked roads that I have seen here are undoubtedly in Delhi. At some point a few years back, the government woke up to the need for these, and we have clearly marked big blue overhead boards announcing where the roads are headed. Even so, every once in awhile one finds a major turn unmarked, leading to much inconvenience, such as happened with us a couple of months back when we were headed to Sonepat in Haryana. For the longest time my parents were talking about this turn they needed to take towards Sonepat. But in the absence of any proper signs, they had to rely on memory to figure it out. Sure enough we missed it, and overshot by several kilometers before they realized their mistake. And this is an experience of someone who has lived in Delhi for decades now, and has in general a very good sense of direction. God help directionally challenged people like me.
I’m reminded also of my recent trip to Japan, a country where the train network is extensive and excellent, and therefore the preferred mode of travel, and where almost no one speaks English. So did we have problems traveling in Japan… not at all! Apart from the fact that the people are extremely helpful, and do all that can to be of assistance in spite of the language barrier, their maps and signs are excellent guides. Tokyo for instance has the most intricate network, of railways and subways. But all the stations have assistance booths with the exact same map with colour coded routes. One may make a mistake like choose the more crowded train, or the longer route, but it’s almost impossible to pick a wrong route… everything is so clearly marked. Then again, in the stations, the platforms and lines are clearly marked. And make no mistake, I am talking about big underground stations here, and long corridors leading from one line to the next… so much so it seems like another city underneath! The assistance counters too are logically placed. The point is there is a standard logic that has been followed in the design. Once your mind gets used to that logic, it automatically looks for signs in the right places. This would be crucial I imagine for the kind of traffic that the Tokyo rail network handles everyday.

(This brings back such nice memories :) Of lots of pouring over maps, friendly Japanese wanting to help out, and walking endlessly in large underground stations. We were staying in Ikebukuro and used both the Subway and train lines extensively in the three days we were there.)

I’ve never really had that much of a problem traveling by Indian railway either, but then I have grown up in this country. I do wonder how foreigner friendly our signages are. Certainly our road signs can do with some improvement, especially in b-tier cities, towns and villages, heck sometimes even in the metros, as we realized that day on our way to Sonepat.

On the Women's Reservation Bill

Why is it that in our country reserving seats, for SCs, STs, OBCs, other minorities, and now women is seen as something of a ‘solution.’ Is it really a solution or an easy way out of a problem we no longer know how to address because it is too steeped in history, and complicated?
I am all for women’s empowerment, and if reserving seats can indeed lead towards that goal, then sure enough it’s the way to go. But where is the evidence to support this claim? For years now we’ve been relaxing entry requirements and reserving seats in colleges, and even in government jobs. Has there been a study to show much exactly this has helped?
My argument in this case is not very different from what it was regarding reservations in schools and colleges. The challenge is to create opportunities so that people from disadvantaged sections of society can rise up and compete with the rest on a level playing field. Spoon feeding jobs and seats in educational institutions, or now elected bodies, to undeserving candidates cannot and should not be the solution.
Women’s empowerment will be a reality when the men in our society learn to respect every woman, not just the elected representatives they must. It calls for a change in mindsets, a socio cultural revolution that can hardly be brought about overnight. But we do need to identify steps that we can take right away that might eventually lead to this miracle, even if it takes decades to fructify.
Is reservation then one such step? I’m not sure. We have seen enough puppet women leaders, being used as affronts for their husbands and fathers who are really the ones in charge. This is a dangerous phenomenon, though a natural extension of the gender hierarchy prevalent in society.
On the other hand, thanks to the reservation for women in local government bodies, many women have been elected to office in the last decade or so. Even if a small percentage of these women have subsequently realised their potential and assumed power the way they were meant to, the move could then be called something of a success. It should then be replicated yes, in other government bodies, but more importantly the success stories told and spread so other women can follow in their footsteps. And it is this that needs to be studied and offered as evidence that reservation actually works.
It is not a small job that we offer these women, we are talking about running the country here… a job that has admittedly lost much charm because of the dubious credentials of the many men who hold public office. Nevertheless, its importance cannot be undermined. And so it should necessarily require a certain amount of competence to be elected to a governing body, being a woman should hardly rank as eligibility criteria.

About the Delhi Metro

Four months, unbelievable! And this will probably be last post of the year too… My New Year resolution should most decidedly be to write more regularly!

Two things made me come back to this rather neglected piece of cyberspace… the first was some genuine appreciation showered, quite undeservedly, especially in light of my recent disappearance, of this blog by a friend I met after a good 10 years, at a college reunion. The other was an observation I couldn’t help making while traveling in the Delhi Metro.
I love the Delhi Metro… this city badly needs better public transport, and having seen how well trains work in Mumbai, I always thought the Metro would be a great idea for Delhi. Don’t get me wrong, I have no idea whether it is the ‘ideal’ solution, nor do I know whether all the people displaced or otherwise affected by the Metro have been adequately compensated. What I do know is that the trains are fast, and they criss cross the city connecting the farthest corners, making traveling much easier (and yes, this is relatively speaking, have you ever tried getting onto the buses in Delhi?) So in that sense, the Metro is fantastic.
Besides, having travelled to Japan, and extensively in the trains there, I have realized how well a good train network can work. So what’s irking me? The design of the train! I find it strange that in a country like India, with the number of people that take public transport, the jokers have provided exactly one rod with handles to hold onto in the centre of the train. So of course the vast majority of the people do balancing acts and fall over each other every time the train starts and stops. I can imagine providing such few handles in other countries where there may not be as many people per train. But here? In Delhi? Its criminal! Haven’t they learnt anything from the Mumbai locals? I just don’t understand this lack of basic design sensibility… there is something like adapting to context! Is someone from the Delhi Metro listening?

Kudos to Dr Shetty

And then there was this one about Dr Devi Shetty’s Narayana Hrudayalaya in Bangalore, titled ‘Heart in the right place.’ Dr Devi Shetty must be awesome human being, and is living the adage, where there is a will, there is a way.
In his interview he recounts how, as a doctor in a Calcutta in 1989, out of every 100 patients he saw, 99 could not afford heart surgery. He realized that to really solve the problem, he had to look at how to reduce the cost. Hence was born his idea of Narayana Hrudayalaya- a hospital with state of the art medical facilities, available at a fraction of their costs at other hospitals. This is achieved by staggering the cost across the day. So a brain scan that costs Rs 5000 at 2 pm, will cost only Rs 500 at 2 am- this is possible because the equipment is a one time cost. Coupled with the micro-health insurance scheme adopted by the Karnataka government, that is based on a model of economies of scale, modern healthcare has now been made possible for 80 percent of the state’s population. To quote from the article, ‘since they are so large, and can accommodate so many, the notional cost of each procedure drops drastically- a benefit they can pass on to those who really need it.’

This is a wonderful model, but can only work if welfare, and not only profits, stays a priority. And yet it is important to make it a sustainable model, for it to stay on course and not fall prey to corruption as many government welfare schemes do.

What an idea sirji!

Every once in awhile, I come across a news item that makes my day… maybe that’s why I religiously start the day with a newspaper… in the last week, it happened twice, thanks to the Hindustan Times’ Inspired India series.

The first one that I am writing about appeared in the Mumbai edition of Aug 7, and was titled, ‘An idea could change your life’. It was one of those news items that you read with a sense of excitement, and pride, and finish with a sense of hope. It spoke about the many simple ideas many simple people across the country regularly come up with. Some of them get implemented, and are able to make a difference to the people who they are able to reach out to, and others suffer a quiet burial in the idea makers’ mind, or as a thesis in a library, or government paperwork…
I can easily understand one of the examples given in the article… that of Same Language Subtitling, as a teaching tool. It’s ingenious… ask me, I know. Many years ago, when I was working with TARAgyan, I was involved in the development of an English Speaking course, under the guidance of Dr Jalaluddin. We developed this course and tested it in a centre (a slum school) in Delhi, before launching it in our local centres in Bathinda and Jhansi. We were always on the lookout for simple but effective ideas such as this, which would be interesting for the student, and help with language skills. And this exactly fits the bill, though admittedly for Hindi/ a familiar language, for a semi literate person. We all know how much Indians love to watch films and television… We produce the maximum number of films in the world every year! Now if people who already have a spoken knowledge of Hindi, but rudimentary writing/ spelling/ grammar skills, are regularly shown films or television programmes with Hindi subtitles, its bound to improve their language skills… the constant exposure to the written word in a language already familiar to them will make it stick in their heads better than any forced reading of unfamiliar text can. I don’t know if this idea has been tested, though the report suggested that it has, but based on my little experience in the classroom , I think I can safely say that it would be very effective. It can be adapted and used for any language teaching, in fact, at a later stage.
What an idea sirji!!

And to think that every engineering student in every engineering college in this country submits such an idea as her thesis at the end of her degree, not to mention the hundreds and thousands of other smart people who are brimming with such simple but wonderful ideas… we could transform this country if only we could tap into all that potential. How many of us have even heard of the National Innovation Foundation, the government body that is supposed to encourage such ideas, and facilitate their implementation on a larger scale. The annual funds available to the NIF is 1.5 crores?! That is ridiculous! If studies could be conducted to scale the benefits, both monetary and the more intangible, we’d find that many of these innovative ideas would probably pay for themselves, and beyond… why then is such a miniscule amount dedicated to finding and tapping them?

Our country is so incredible in so many ways, and it is a tragedy indeed that so many people are never able to attain their true potential.

A friend wrote a book!

Finished reading KK’s book today.
Kamini Karlekar or KK, as we fondly called her in school, is now an Independent Human Rights Consultant, working with the UN. In ‘(Un)settled: Notes from a shifting Life’, her maiden writing venture, she recounts her experiences of working in refugee camps in post conflict Sudan and Liberia, conducting interviews to determine eligibility for granting refugee status in the camps in Sudan, and to assist in return and reintegration of returning Liberians as well as continued protection of existing refugees in Liberia.
(Un)settled: Notes from a shifting Life, is just that: notes. Written in an almost conversational style, the book reads like entries from a journal. And thus it is that it is able to traverse a whole range of concerns, and talks of history, culture, politics, as well as her travels, love and personal needs with equal ease.
KK talks not just about the experience of working in the camps, but the whole journey that it involved. From immigration stories, to first impressions of every place that she visited, the book reads as much like a travalogue, as a memoir. She includes brief political histories to put things in context, and comments on all that she sees around her, the camps in the middle of the Sudanese desert, the supermarket in Khartoum, the lack of electricity and running water in the capital of Liberia, that also has a five star coffee shop catering to those who can afford it… there are many contradictions in all that she sees around her, and indeed in her own life, especially when she talks of her regular voluntary breaks, and all that she does on them, as also some of the thoughts, of her favourite places, and restaurants around the world, that keep her going on particularly difficult days. The contrast with her work is stark, but she seems comfortable with it, straddling both worlds with equal ease.
Her writing about her work in the camps is reflective. She doesn’t get into too much detail about the individual stories she must have encountered, concentrating instead on the fractured feelings of what home must mean to the refugees, as opposed to what it means to her. She is constantly reflecting on the questions that bother her, even if she is unable to find satisfactory answers to many. Her perspective seems unique, by virtue of the fact that she is a single woman, and Indian. This lends a sensitivity to her viewpoint, as I imagine, to her work.
Her writings about her voluntary breaks and about finding love, are delightfully travelogue-y. She paints verbal pictures of the places she visits, and the people she meets. These are interspersed with personal concerns such as getting manicures and pedicures, and stocking up on groceries, breathers in her otherwise introspective writing. Her efforts at setting up house in Liberia is a case in point.
‘(Un)settled…’ was for me, an easy read. I could identify with KK and her questions and concerns completely, though the closest I have ever come to being in a situation even vaguely like hers was when I volunteered to work in a Muslim camp in Ahmedabad for a week after the Godhra riots, conducting interviews to assess the displaced people’s claims to damage to property. For that week, I experienced the dichotomy that she lives everyday: a dear friend from Ahmedabad refused to let me stay in the dorm that was assigned to us volunteers, essentially a big empty hall in a college, with mattresses spread out on the floor. He picked up my bag, and off we went to his 11th floor apartment, in a relatively uptown neighbourhood. Thus I spent the next one-week, walking around in the heat and muck of June in the camps during the day, and enjoying wine and homemade Italian dinner and coffee in the evening. It was a contrast that I was unable to make peace with all these years; reading KK’s book has helped me achieve that, finally. Nevertheless, that experience had been an eye opener, and I imagine, in an alternate universe, if I hadn’t chosen filmmaking, I might well have been leading a life such as hers. But then again, my experience was all of a week, and she has been at it for years, in unfavourable weather, in isolated UN stations hours away from civilization, sometimes with unfriendly and uncooperative colleagues, many thousands of miles away from what she calls home. It’s an entirely different ball game, and I can only admire her for choosing the life she has chosen.