Final pdf for web 26th aug 13

Not every RAPE CHARGE is real

Former LAKSHADWEEP ROYALS want their kingdom back

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INSIDE ‘TV assumes the worst in people’ Imran Khan l i f e

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made in pakistan

The Kishtwar riots are part of a larger conspiracy to expand separatist sentiment beyond the Kashmir Valley Arsonists run riot outside Kishtwar main market on Friday, 9 August

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MANJIRI INDURKAR

This is a wonderful essay (‘The Unsafe Augusts of Assam’, 19 August 2013). It is almost like we no longer live in the same country at all. When I think of Independence Day, I can only remember school, the march past, the parade I attended at dad’s office; hopping from one place to another for sweets, and yes, the patriotic song competition. My mother would prep me for that each If I am not allowed to year. I remember my roam freely in my own first year in Delhi, on country on the day it got Independence Day some friends and I its freedom, then what wanted to go to India kind of freedom is this?

Gate and the security was so high and the fear almost palpable. We were not allowed to take many routes and we had to make several detours and walk a long distance to finally reach the place. Nothing compared with what you guys have been witnessing in Assam for years, but even this small thing makes you question the essence of this independence. If I am not allowed to roam freely in my own country on the day it got its freedom, then what kind of freedom is this? Not really independent, are we?  letter of the week

Australia. Oh yes, not to forget the posters. Sigh. Good times.

Thank you, Akshay Sawai.  ANISH KURUVILLA

Tit for Tat

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Volume 5 Issue 33 For the week 20—26 August 2013 Total No. of pages 64 + Covers

26 AUGUST 2013

The Culture of Growth

thanks very much for this wake-up call (‘A Historical Sense’, 19August 2013). That is exactly what we need in these times where industrialisation, infotech and economics are at the centre of people’s interest.

Not that they are not important. But for real growth and welfare there should be a balance of culture and economics. An understanding of one’s past is critical to build one’s future.  MARTIJN R OM COLTHOFF

we in assam have grown up (I’m nearing fifty) hearing about two great scholars in Sanskrit of the British period. They are Anundoram Barua and Krishna Kanta Handique. An ICS officer under the British, Anundoram Baruah died very young. KK Handique was the founder vice-chancellor of

Gauhati University. I am not sure whether the present generation of Assamese students know about these two persons as much as we did.

They all go to English medium schools, mostly CBSE schools where hardly anything about Assam is taught.  SHIVA LOCHAN KALITA

Spirit of Sport

i would have thought this was my story too (‘Growing Up on Sportstar’, 19 August 2013). I have a collection of Sportstar somewhere in my cupboard, issues of several years. I must mention also a certain Brian Langley who used to write about English football and some Roberts chap about West Indies cricket. One of the greatest joys was reading cricket diaries, especially of the English team when they toured the Caribbean or

this is an excellent article, finally someone has the courage to talk about how biased we as a society are becoming (‘People Tweeting from Glass Houses’, 19 August 2013). If someone jokes, mocks, uses sarcasm to describe a woman, then it is sexism. If the same woman jokes, mocks and uses sarcasm to describe a man, then it is wit? Playing the ‘abla naari’ card has been the fallback option of most women when cornered with facts and caught on the wrong foot. High time that such hypocrisy is exposed. If comments on Shobhaa De were sexist and deserved a rap, then so did comments by her. Is it so difficult to understand?  AMIT DE SHPANDE

i’m totally for equal rights and get the author when he says that men have also been at the receiving end of crazy comments. But the author has failed to point out that very often the tone taken by politicians while trying to defame a woman is very different from when they’re trying to defame a man.

Politicians rejoice in framing their comments in stereotypes. And everyone has these stereotypes so deeply rooted in their minds, that it becomes impossible to recognise any kind of prejudice in what they say.  ANUSHYA

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Mamata’s Muzzling Tactics persecution

Shyamal Ray, who runs an SMS newsletter, is being subjected to repeated police questioning

k o l k a t a On 30 July, Kolkata resident Dr Shyamal Ray received a summon to meet the Superintendent of Police, South 24 Parganas, on 5 August. “It was possibly the fifth or sixth time big bosses in the force remembered me during the last one year,” says the 72-year-old doctor and human rights activist, who has been running an alternative media network since 2010.

Dodhichi is a text messaging service circulating information generally unavailable in the mainstream media.

Alerting civil society groups to human rights concerns, the free service has over 700,000 subscribers. A text message to and from Dodhichi ensures 26 august 2013

quick mobilisation of activists when needed. Dodhichi’s operations arguably benefitted Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress by facilitating the opposition consolidation against the Left Front government.

But Banerjee’s government has little patience for dissent in its turn. Two plainclothed policemen landed up at Ray’s place on 11 November 2011.

After introducing themselves as patients, they demanded information about one of his SIM cards. Ray furnished a list of all 52 but refused to divulge more until they brought a written order. His well-wishers complained to the National Human Rights Commission

and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Meanwhile, Banerjee proclaimed her displeasure with alternative media mobilisations in the wake of an anti-eviction movement in Kolkata. Soon after, on 9 April 2012, Ray found all his 52 SIM cards deactivated. A pro-government Bengali daily attributed it to instructions from government authorities even as the police blamed the service provider. Ray carried on with new SIM cards.

“I have nothing to hide,” he says. “Every SIM card is registered in my name and they can always find me here at my study,” he says.

Madan Mitra, the state transport minister, complained on 16 July that he got a death threat in the form of a Dodhichi message. The message expressed concern at Mitra nurturing a Gestapolike formation persecuting every dissenter as a Maoist. It lamented that (if his moves passed unopposed) ‘the last day would be most horrible’, referring at worst to the Nazi idea of the Final Solution. One can understand Mitra’s discomfiture with the Nazi analogy. But it is hard to decipher a threat to his life in this text.

Ray has refused in writing to comply with that summon to the office of the SP. n Anirban Bandopadhyay

open www.openthemagazine.com 3

chhandak pradhan

small world

contents real india

A guinea pig turns into a fortune-teller

26 cry rape

Are false accusations common?

10 22

news reEL

The Miseducation of Jharkhand’s children

33 indi pop

30

Remembering the golden age

lakshadweep

Former rulers want their kingdom back

aids

cover story

Violence in Kishtwar

Five kids forced to live in a graveyard

Responding to the killing of five soldiers along the LOC, Bihar Rural Works Department Minister Bhim Singh said people join the Army for martyrdom. He apologised later behind the times

“Sena aur police mein jo jaate hain, shaheed hone ke liye jaate hain. Aakhir bharti hote hain shahadat ke liye na”

“I am sorry for my statement because it has hurt the sentiments of people”

Gandhi’s Gripe With Cricket BO U ND A R IES The versatile Marathi actor Dilip Prabhavalkar, known nationally for playing Gandhi in Lage Raho Munnabhai, was at a chat in Mumbai over the weekend.

Prabhavalkar, a colossus in Marathi culture, is also a writer and sports lover. In the 1980s, he would write satirical pieces on cricket and other sports in the

popular Marathi sports publication Ekach Shatkar, the editor of which was former cricketer and current chief selector Sandeep Patil.

But cricket has fallen from grace for Prabhavalkar, especially the IPL. “When what’s available in the stores comes down to the street, it loses value,” in his words. n

—Bhim Singh, as quoted in The Indian Express 7 August 2013

turn

—Bhim Singh, as quoted in The Indian Express 8 August 2013

around

Brad to Worse THE PITS It has been eight years since Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston divorced. But tension between Aniston and Angelina Jolie, who Pitt is who is Pitt’s current steady partner, endures.

Even now, they go to extraordinary lengths to avoid each other. On Sunday, Aniston was scheduled to fly from Los Angeles to London. But reportedly, when she learnt that Jolie was on the same flight, she delayed her trip by a day.

Last weekend saw the release of Aniston’s new film We’re the Millers, in which she plays a stripper. Don’t expect to see that DVD in the Brangelina household. n 4 open

Photo illustrations tarun sehgal

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The BhagwatiPanagariya fairy tales

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Return to Roots: My Granddad’s Car

BlackBerry Looks to Sell Out So long BlackBerry boys. The phone that revolutionised the market when it was launched has been unable to cope with the onslaught of smartphones and the competition they bring in terms of the number and variety of apps. According to The Guardian, the company previously known as Research in Motion (RIM) announced that it had decided to ‘explore strategic alternatives’. Buyers are being sought, though the company could also go private or be broken up. It

A PPED - O U T

F o r physically assaulting North

Indians in Kolhapur because a labourer from Jharkhand allegedly raped a child Yes, rape is a terrible offence and its perpetrators must be punished. But no, you cannot beat up rapists yourselves. You need to hand them over to the police. And you certainly can’t go about beating up members of a community because a rapist happened to hail from it.

Maharashtra’s two thug parties were at it again recently. After it was alleged that a 14-monthold child in Kolhapur was raped by a labourer from Jharkhand, Shiv Sena and MNS workers assaulted North Indian labourers and shopkeepers, and vandalised their shops, houses and motorcycles. It is interesting to note that some years ago when 14 Maharashtrian youths were arrested in Mumbai for molesting two women, MNS supremo Raj Thackeray asked the then Deputy CM to free them. He claimed Maharashtrian youths cannot do such a thing. n 26 august 2013

lost $84 million in the last quarter and announced 50,000 layoffs last year.

“The beginning of the end started some time ago,” said Stuart Jeffrey, analyst at Nomura Securities. He said the company’s statement suggested it no longer had any confidence in its ability to get out of its predicament. BlackBerry, he predicts, is likely to re-emerge as a software company, perhaps with contracts for super-secure government devices, but “without the handicap of all those uncompetitive handsets”. n

A Matter of Faith

h a l aa l o r n o t ? The first test tube beef burger was cooked last week and all everybody cared about was whether it tasted like the real thing. Well, everybody except Jews, Muslims and Hindus, who were struck by the question of whether eating the burger would mean cheating on their faith. Religious websites were abuzz with debate, reported News Daily. ‘Is the lab-created burger kosher?’ the Hasidic Jewish movement Chabad Lubavitch wondered on its website. Chabad’s Rabbi Yehuda Shurpin wrote that the Talmud tells of ‘miraculous meat’ that fell from heaven or was conjured by rabbis studying a mystic text. In India, Chandra Kaushik, president of the Hindu nationalist group Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha, told the India Real Time blog, ‘We will not accept it being traded in a marketplace in any form or being used for a commercial purpose.’ n open www.openthemagazine.com 5

angle

On the Contrary

The Superstar Deconstructed Why the success of Chennai Express is not good news for Shah Rukh Khan M a d h ava n ku t t y P i l l a i

6 open

Devendra Dube/solaris images

W

hat is a superstar but an irrational image etched in the hearts of a billion people. An image embellished day in and day out. Pilgrimages done to get a glimpse of them. Men and women falling in love, nurturing an imaginary relationship through decades as if it was flesh and blood. When unwell, nations rising in unison in prayer. An image crafted in hysteria and obsession. When everything is madness targeted at you, how do you survive it? And how do you survive it when it is slipping away, as inevitably it must as they grow old and flesh withers?

Chennai Express has now appropriated for itself a record in a brand new category, of the movie that made the fastest Rs 100 crore. It is precisely at this conveniently created moment of triumph that Shah Rukh Khan must perhaps ask all these questions of himself. Because, whether he understands it or not, his superstardom has long since plateaued. He is nearing 50.

All his movies in the past two or three years have been superhits and across genres. And yet, it just didn’t register when compared to what a Salman Khan or Aamir Khan was doing in terms of splash. Om Shanti Om was perhaps the last movie which added to his superstardom.

Now it is just momentum without fuel.

Chennai Express might seem like it has broken the mould, but then all you have to do is look at another superstar two decades ago living in the last throes of his enigma then.

When Agneepath released in 1990, it was as if some part of the Amitabh Bachchan of old had been reignited. It turned out to be an illusion. The ratio of flops to hits kept creeping up, until not a single movie worked, no matter who directed them, no matter how good or bad they were. By the peculiar economics of Bollywood today, it is impossible for any of the Khans to make a flop. There is no way that any of their movies will not touch or come close to Rs 100 crore. The number is something that has been bandied about for the past few years, starting with the Salman camp.

It’s a suspicious number, impossible for anyone to independently verify. The

the end is nigh Shah Rukh Khan greets his fans, but he is at risk of losing them in droves

Khans are like the permanent members of this club. Even a slow-paced thriller like Talaash goes on to that mark because of Aamir Khan. The formula is straightforward. Carpet bomb all theatres in the country. Spend on marketing as much as you spent to make the movie and you can do that because there is the cash. The biggest component of a movie is the salary

The curiosity of seeing a Khan movie will draw enough people to the theatres at least once. Rs 100 crore is a record that is broken even before the movie is released of the hero and the Khans usually don’t take that, instead going for a share in the profits. The massive amount pumped into promotions and the curiosity of seeing a Khan movie will draw enough people to the theatres at least once. Rs 100 crore is a record that is broken even before the movie is released. The definition of a superstar is now one who can do this. If

you can’t, then you are not. Ajay Devgn couldn’t with Himmatwala and, therefore, he is not as big as the Khans. The strange thing is that even though Himmatwala was said to have made more than Rs 50 crore, it was billed a flop.

Throughout the 1990s you saw Amitabh desperately hanging on to the image of a superstar and nose-diving. It is only when he gave it up that he made another space in the heart of India. Shah Rukh seems to be where Amitabh was at the beginning of his end. In interviews, he says that he has done different roles within the confines of popular cinema. It is true. But in all those movies, except perhaps Chak De! India, you only come back with the memory of Shah Rukh and not the character he played. It is far easier to remember his early movies. This is the case with almost all superstars, barring perhaps Aamir.

There is a reason for it. Till they become superstars, every actor has to give in to the director’s vision. He is one part of a larger whole. As they become successful, he becomes everything and movies are tailored around the image. For Shah Rukh to make anything memorable, he has to fail miserably. n 26 august 2013

india

A Hurried Man’s Guide to PV Sindhu

The 18-year-old Hyderabad shuttler Pusarla Venkata Sindhu has become the first Indian to win a women’s singles medal at the badminton World Championships. She achieved this feat by reaching the semi-final and winning a bronze at the latest edition of the tournament in Guangzhou, China. The last Indian player to win a singles medal in the tournament was Prakash Padukone in 1983. Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa won bronze in the women’s doubles in the 2011 edition in London.

What makes Sindhu’s achievement special is the formidable opponents she faced.

The 5’10” right-hander defeated the secondseeded Yihan Wang and the seventh-seeded Shixian Wang on her way to the semis. She lost in the semi-finals to eventual champion Ratchanok She was first Inthanon from Thailand. noticed in 2009 This was Sindhu’s maiden when she won a entry in the tournament. bronze in the Sindhu belongs to a family of sportspersons. Her parents, PV Ramana and P Vijaya, are former professional volleyball players. Her father is an Arjuna Award recipient. Sindhu started playing badminton at eight. It is said that Sindhu chose

str/afp

sub-junior Asian Championships in Colombo

defeating champions Eighteen-year-old PV Sindhu

badminton over other sports because she was inspired by Pullela Gopichand.

As a child, Sindhu trained under the late Mir Mahboob Ali in Secunderabad. Saina Nehwal was also a student of Ali in her early years. Sindhu has since then been training at Gopichand’s academy. She’s lifted several titles in various categories. She was first noticed in 2009 when she won a bronze in the sub-junior Asian Championships in Colombo. Last year, she upset Olympic champion Li Xuerui at the Chinese Masters in Changzhou, a month after the 2012 London Games. Her maiden Grand Prix gold title came earlier this year when she won the Malaysian Open tournament. n

It Happens

Furry logic From lab rat to fortune teller, the story of Ganesh the guinea pig A n i l B u d u r L u l l a rudra rakshit saran

real

the fortune-teller Govindaraj with his guinea pig Ganesh

A

guinea pig named

Ganesh sizes me up and selects a card from those spread out in front of him. He nudges it towards his master, S Govindaraj, a 68-year-old street fortune-teller near Shivajinagar bus station in Bangalore. “Very good, let’s see what’s in store for you,’’ says Govindaraj. He unfolds the card, which bears an image of Lord Krishna and several astrological signs. He then rattles off my rashi and the gods and goddesses upon whom I can count on.

“You are a very creative person.

Your hard work will take you places,’’ he says, “Shani is not going to trouble you. You have overcome most of your major troubles. The last two years have been very comfortable. The same will continue for some years in future. If you have children, focus on their education.’’ Ganesh climbs all over Govindaraj, as if expecting a reward. Govindaraj feeds him nuts and fruit before returning him to his tiny cage.

Ganesh has been with Govindaraj for five years. Normally in India astrology is the turf of parrots.

Govindaraj had a parrot too, called Gunda. But he was a rose-ringed parrot, a protected species under the Wildlife Protection Act. In 2010, he

was seized by wildlife volunteers and forest department officers.

Govindaraj claims Gunda also acted in eight Kannada movies as a fortune-teller. Govindaraj charges Rs 20 per customer. Extra questions cost more. He and Ganesh are also invited for birthday parties and other functions.

Why did Govindaraj replace Gunda with a guinea pig? “It won’t run away, for one. It’s small, convenient and not a protected animal. They quickly adapt “It’s small and and can be not a protected easily trained,’’ he says. He had animal. They a guinea pig as can be easily a pet some trained” years ago.

Guinea pigs are used by pharma companies for research and once they serve their utility, they are euthanised. Some of them make their way into pet shops.

Govindaraj recently bought a few months’ old guinea pig. It lives in the same box as Ganesh. A wire mesh separates their spaces. He calls this apprentice guinea pig Murugan.

By now, the crowd opposite the Shivajinagar bus terminal is curious.

“Did anything he said match with your life?’’ asks Shanmuga Das. I nod in the affirmative. n open www.openthemagazine.com 7

business

O i l A fortnight ago, Iran’s newly elected President Hassan Rouhani got an unusual greeting from US legislators: a threat of new sanctions that could cripple the Islamic Republic’s economy if it failed to comply with American demands vis-à-vis its nuclear programme. The US House of Representatives passed a bill that seeks to penalise Iran in the event of such a failure by choking its crude oil exports by 1 million barrels per day—though last year’s sanctions have already halved its exports to 1.5 million barrels per day.

Now, Tehran is aware that selling fewer oil barrels in the global market is far better than being at the receiving end of US/ Israeli gun barrels (Washington DC has not ruled out armed action against it), but the new sanctions, once approved by the Senate in September, will hurt nonetheless. Iran’s economy is reeling under last year’s Western sanctions—annual inflation is above 35 per cent and its currency has lost half its value since—and may not be able to survive on the export earnings of just half a million daily barrels.

If the threat does not dampen the resolve of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader (above Rouhani), to press on with uranium enrichment then the country is likely to pass the nuclear point of no return in mid-2014, according to a recent report by Roubini Global Economics, a New York-based thinktank.

The US pressure-and-negotiate strategy has been formulated to keep Iran from crossing that rubicon. Negotiations thus far have yielded little. Yet, “The election of a moderate-appearing president in Iran

atta kenare/getty images

What Middle East Volatility Might Mean

hidden drama Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani is no nuclear hawk but the US seems unsure of his influence

have re-ignited hopes of diplomacy,” says Robert McNally, president of the US-based Rapidan Group, “even if the odds are not high of succeeding”.

America’s latest push to keep Iran from going nuclear would no doubt upset the global oil market. To limit its impact, the US plan envisages offsetting the loss of Iranian oil with supplies drawn from oil reserves held by the International Energy Agency (it has 1.5 billion barrels in store).

“A 1 million barrels per day release from such reserves could easily replace the lost oil from Iran for over four years,” says McNally, who was once George W Bush’s

energy advisor.

Yet, he admits that crude prices could rise “by perhaps $10 per barrel and possibly more due to tight spare capacity and the fear premium”. For a big oil importer that runs an unsustainably big trade deficit like India, that would be a bad outcome. But not as disastrous as the oil market volatility that might ensue ‘if the endgame in Iran includes some kind of military strike’, as the Roubini Global Economics report puts it. n SHAILENDRA TYAGI The US is about to impose new sanctions on Iran, which could mean oil anxiety is back

Tragedy or Farce: Take Your Pick Since January 2013, manufacturing activity in four major Asian economies has slipped below 50 on HSBC’s Purchasing Managers’ Index, a reading that implies contraction. India, while still in positive territory, might soon join the rest of Asia on current trends

Jan feb mar apr may jun jul TREND

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51.5 50.2 51.2 50.7

47.1 49.5 48.6

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48.8 46.4 48.5

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50.9 52.0 52.6 51.1

50.5 51.3 51.7 51.6 51.0 50.7

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compiled by shailendra tyagi

“A debtor cannot be jailed for failing to meet his contractual obligations if he doesn’t have the means to pay, unless there is [an intent to violate the order]… If he has and refuses, then he can be.

But if he once had the means and now doesn’t, or he has but has other pressing claims, he can’t” Ram Jethmalani, counsel for the Sahara Group, trying to convince India’s Supreme Court that the group is not guilty of contempt-of-court in failing to refund investors their money as directed

news

reel

skewed

The Miseducation of Jharkhand’s Children Imparted in a language they scarcely understand, the education seems designed to leave them unread pavithra s rangan

out a Hindi poem, while most children—it is difficult to guess their ages—stare impassively at books on their laps or at charts hanging on the newly whitewashed wall. Even before the reading is done, there is clamour among the students. As if in a clandestine pact, neither the teacher nor children seem concerned about the indifference.

The fading navy blue board outside announces the two-roomed structure as Dayanmali’s primary school. Hidden behind dense jungles in the 13-year-old state of Jharkhand, Dayanmali is accessible only on foot several kilometres

The teacher drones

down a cattle trail from the concrete roads of Ghatsila town.

It is barely past dawn, and remnants of June’s morning fog still hang in the air outside. From May to July, government schools in Jharkhand start at 6 am and end classes at noon. Outside the school a boy briskly washes clothes at a handpump.

Inside, barely ten children, all of Classes 1 to 5, sit on the cemented floor while their mid-day meal is cooked in the other room.

Squatting on the floor, Dakla stares at a crumpled school bag. He ignores attempts to lure him into a conversation and instead looks uneasily at the floor. An older boy

giggles at the failing attempts. “He does not understand what you are saying.”

Introducing himself as Essar Gop, a Class 5 student, he mumbles to Dakla in their tribal language, and Dakla meekly responds: “Dakla Bando”. The conversation thereafter is mediated through Essar, who can speak in Hindi. Dakla is in Class 2, speaks Ho, lives nearby and has regular attendance at school. He replies with the palpable nervousness of a seven-year-old who has seen nothing beyond the wilderness that surrounds his tribal hamlet. He is among the majority of his class who do not understand Hindi. Only three of them, including Essar, from Classes 4 and 5, have picked up some of this language. However, even Essar struggles with Dakla’s Hindi textbooks, painstakingly putting letters together, and can’t manage a fluent sentence.

In Dayanmali, most speak either in Bengali, Santhali or Ho. Hindi is rarely used outside the school premises; not even in the shopping areas. However, Dakla’s classes are almost always in this ‘foreign’ language.

Even the Bengali teacher conducts classes in fractured Hindi. “Children come to school only for the mid-day meal. They lost in translation Children in a primary school classroom in Dayanmali village, Jharkhand

are not interested in class as they don’t understand Hindi. Even their parents want them to work on farms instead,” says Lakshmi, the only teacher in the school.

T

he situation is no different else-

where in the state, even in areas that surround the capital, Ranchi. Over 80 per cent of Jharkhand lives in rural areas, and 12,000 of the 32,630 villages are Tribaldominated. Devoid of roads or any means of transport, several villages remain completely cut off, preserving local languages as the only means of communication. According to a socio-linguistic survey of Jharkhand, 96 per cent speak in 32 tribal and regional languages—with 12 of them being official languages.

Though a mere 4 per cent speak Hindi as their mother tongue, it remains the medium of instruction in government schools and Anganwadi Centres (AWCs) across the state.

With an alien language imposed on children from the very first day of school, most comprehend nothing of the lessons.

They are promoted year after year as teachers are concerned more with rates of detention than knowledge imbibed. The deplorable status of elementary education sees the recently-conducted Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) ranking Jharkhand 34th among 35 states and Union Territories in the country. Nearly 80 per cent of Class 8 students cannot perform simple arithmetic calculations like addition and subtraction.

This has a cascading effecting on higher education. “In a medical entrance examination recently, only 20 of the 34 seats reserved for ST students were filled.

Most applicants had not gotten the minimum 40 per cent needed to appear for the examination,” says L Khyangte, principal secretary, Department of Social Welfare, Jharkhand, who blamed it on lack of conceptual clarity at the school level.

Schoolgoing children are forced to bear the weight of an education system that works against them at every level. The teachers, the Panchayat and the Secretariat are all caught in webs of corruption, apathy and mismanagement.

The State Council for Education Research and Training (SCERT), which sets the curriculum and textbooks for children here, exists only on paper.

Textbooks are mere photocopies of Hindi-medium NCERT books: devoid of any local context for children who are far removed from urban India.

“Students here cannot understand even ‘A for Apple’. Children in most

26 august 2013

villages have never seen an apple. They struggle to grasp what is being taught, until they pick up Hindi a few years later,” says Professor Hari Oraon of Ranchi University’s Tribal and Regional Languages (TRL) Department.

The outcome of the existing system is not a surprise. With their mother tongue shunned as a medium of instruction, most children display learning disabilities. “Rather than treating children as empty vessels, there should be an effort to use the knowledge they have in their mother tongue. This will create strong foundations by bridging the gap with what they’re taught in Hindi,” according to Prakash Oraon, Advisor to the Governor on Tribal Affairs, Government of Jharkhand, “However, there are several problems with implementation of programmes at the district level.”

Until 2011, AWCs, which provide health and pre-school support to children, were just ‘khichdi kendras’ that

The outcome of the existing system is not a surprise.

With their mother tongue shunned as a medium of instruction, most children display learning disabilities strived only to meet the basic nutritional needs of children. Although pre-school education was introduced recently as part of their mandate, educational material for 3- to 5-year-olds is available only in Hindi.

In a training camp for Anganwadi Workers (AWWs) in Ranchi district, the sevikas unanimously say the centres hardly serve this purpose, and many children are discouraged from enrolling in schools. “How can a boy attending pre-school understand material that is in Hindi and English?” asks Srimati Mahato, an Anganwadi sevika. Most AWWs themselves do not know English and teach in the local language.

In several primary schools, mere communication, let alone education, is made impossible. The sarkari or permanent teachers most often do not know the local language as they are recruited from outside the community. Learning is stalled in the chasm between the teacher’s language and the students’ comprehension.

In a school in Mosabani, a block in East Singhbum district, the headmaster of 12

years, Rajesh Kumar Sinha, has been trying to learn Santhali from his students.

“I teach only middle and high school students because I cannot speak Santhali fluently,” he says. Primary classes are instead handled by Santhali-speaking Pithunath Murmu, a para (contract) teacher. On the days he cannot come to school, no one teaches the children.

Incidentally, though Santhali has the most number of speakers in the state— over 33 per cent—there is a significant dearth of teachers from the community.

Over 44,000 teaching positions across Jharkhand lie vacant and over 5,100 schools are run by only one teacher. For the past decade, the government has been hiring only para teachers who are recruited from within the community and are proficient in the local language.

“The government has now made it mandatory for teachers to know at least one local language. This ensures child-friendly methods of learning,” in the words of CP Singh, Speaker of Jharkhand’s Legislative Assembly.

However, applicants from outside the community who are fluent in Hindi and possess a Bachelor’s degree take crash courses to pass the test. These teachers cannot communicate in the language, but still end up getting jobs intended for members of the local community. “Several permanent teachers who are unwilling to teach in rural areas pay a fourth of their salaries as a bribe to block heads who commission quacks to teach children instead,” according to an official of the TRL Department. Monitoring mechanisms to avoid malpractices are ineffective, as nearly 50 per cent of all supervisory positions in the state are unoccupied.

The higher education scenario in tribal and regional languages in the state is just as bad. Even though there are only three professors for the nine language courses at the TRL Department, the government has not hired lecturers for them in nearly three decades. In any case, with such weak primary education, imparted in a language that children barely understand, very few students make it to the reaches of higher education. The dropout rate at the primary school level is high, and hundreds of thousands of people migrate annually to other states, primarily Assam, in search of employment. “The government’s policy framework ensures that rural children do not cross a certain threshold and remain uneducated,” says Girdhari Ram Gaunju, former head of the TRL Department.

“Educational policies are designed such that children born in working class households only learn how to labour.” n open www.openthemagazine.com 11

Av e n u e s

Sikkim

Achievement Par Excellence

launched the Chief Minister’s Meritorious Scholarship Scheme to sponsor meritorious children at Class V level in best public schools within and outside the State. The state fully sponsor students admitted to the 20 top universities of the world, Prerna Yojana and

Shri Pawan Kumar Chamling Chief Minister of Sikkim

S

ikkim joined India in 1975 and this year it completes its 38 years of statehood. Sikkim has emerged as one of the most progressive state of India and has defined the bench-mark for numerous development programs across various sectors. The state has successfully implemented various innovative socio economic planning programmes. With a comprehensive development coverage including basic necessities to creating world class infrastructure and with well defined Mission Statements in place, Sikkim is poised to take a quantum leap forward towards its goal of becoming a fully developed state. Some of the major achievements are: n ECONOMIC GROWTH

Sikkim registered an impressive overall growth rate of 22.8 percent during the 11th Five Year Plan. The State has integrated and dovetailed certain state programs with central flagship programs to achieve composite result, while providing rural housing and such other welfare measures. n EDUCATION

Currently Sikkim has an impressive literacy rate, of 82.2%, this is as against 56% in the year 1993-94. The teacher- pupil ratio of 1:14 is also one of the best in the country. The Government

Small Family Scheme, free education upto graduation level, free distribution of textbooks, exercise books, school uniforms, school bags, raincoat, shoes, socks and laptops, Grant of Rs.1 lakh cash incentive for school toppers of Class X & XII levels have boosted the education sector in the state.

Over 20% of total annual outlay is invested in the education sector, the government has recently started programmes to sponsor educated Sikkimese for coaching in IAS and allied services, training for army and banking service, aeronautical, atomic engineering etc. in reputed Institutes of Hyderabad, Chennai and Delhi. n HEALTH

Sikkim was the first state in the country to provide for free Hepatitis B vaccination for infants. Under the Chief Minister’sComprehensive

Av e n u e s Annual and Total Check-up for Healthy Sikkim (CATCH) program, health check-up for each citizen is undertaken annually at designated centres across the State. Launched on 26th August 2010, over 90 percent of the population has been covered.

A multi-specialty 575-bedded hospital is under construction in Gangtok. Introduction of Mukhya Mantri Antodaya Upachar Bima Yojana for BPL families and host of other health services including Mukhya Mantri Antyodayta Pustahaar Yojana, Mukhya Mantri Jeevan Raksha Kosh, Mukhya Mantri Netra Jyoti Yojana and Mukhya Mantri Sravan Shakti Samriddhi Yojana have steered the way for a healthy Sikkim.

Health programs including Deworming and IFA supplementation, calcium supplementation, MMR vaccine for children are being regularly administered. n INDUSTRIALIZATION

Private-public participation has given a huge impetus to Hydel power generation. Sikkim is commissioning the 99 MW Chuzachen Hydro Electric Power Project in the next few months which is slated to fetch about Rs. 50 crores annually. This is, in addition to the 510 MW Teesta Stage V and 60 MW Rangit Hydro-power projects. Once commissioned, the 1200 MW Teesta Stage III project will be the largest power project to be commissioned in the country. A significant number of pharmaceutical companies have also been established in the state.

development and aims to make Sikkim a poverty free state by following a beneficiary centric approach. Sikkim is the 1st Nirmal Rajya state in the Country. The 18 Central Flagship Programmes, which form a vital part of the development strategy in the State and more than 20 State Missions, are being robustly implemented.

Sikkim aims to become Kutcha House Free state by 2015.

While 99% of the households in Sikkim have been covered with electricity, the BPL families are provided 2 points of free electricity connections and free electricity upto 50 units. n SOCIAL JUSTICE AND WOMEN EMPOWERMENT

The State Government has introduced a number of welfare schemes. Women have a reservation of 50% of Panchayat seats and 30% in government jobs. A pension of Rs.600 per month is given to unmarried women 45 years. Folk dancers, singers, etc are acknowledged for their contribution to culture by way of an honorarium. Special allowance under Sishu Bhatta for children of different gender orientation has also been initiated. Launched in 2010, the Chief Minister’s Rural Universal Financial Inclusion Programme has helped the villagers tremendously.

n ORGANIC SIKKIM

n TOURISM

Sikkim is one of the most sought after tourist destinations in the country and the State Government has not left any stone unturned for exploiting its potential to the full.

Village and rural tourism, home stays and pilgrim destinations like Char Dhaam, Buddha Park, Samdruptse have been successfully promoted. Development of Ramayana Village, Tantra Mantra Jantra Centre, development of Birds’ Sanctuary, Butterfly Park Skywalk at Bhaleydunga and the Sleeping Buddha at Singik, North Sikkim are also in the pipeline. n RURAL PROSPERITY

The state Government has earmarked 70% of its budget for rural

Intervention towards organic farming has led to emphasis on soil testing; soil health and land management practices have improved the organic crop production. 50,000 hectares has been earmarked for organic conversion in a phased manner under Sikkim Organic Mission, 2015. n GREEN SIKKIM

Nature has blessed the State with rich biodiversity, exquisite species of flora and fauna. The State Government has implemented Compulsory Environmental Education introduced in all schools. “Smriti Van”, has been initiated to plant trees in fond memory of loved ones, along with a ban on felling, ban on killing of wildlife, ban on grazing in reserved forests, ban on use of plastic and poly bags, 10 Minutes to Earth, etc.

State Biodiversity Park at Tendong was created in 2001. The forest area has seen an increase of 3.53% from 44.06% in 1995 to 47.59% in 2009. Sikkim has been rated as ‘most sustainable’ State as per findings of Centre for Development Finance, Chennai. Chief Minister Shri Pawan Chamling was also awarded the Greenest Chief Minister Award by Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi, 1999.

The state government is pursuing comprehensive and holistic development with all sincerity and honesty. It is steadily working to integrate itself with the emerging trends in the national economy, yet has not lost sight of the rich culture and heritage, which are being duly preserved and promoted. n

opinion

Jat i n Ga n d h i

pa r l i a m e n t

The Games Congress Plays On Telangana, the party displays an attitude that will hurt it more than it realises the Congress Working Committee resolved that the UPA Government should move ahead with the creation of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy chaired a meeting of pro-United Andhra legislators of the Congress. After the meeting, Reddy shot off a letter to Congress President Sonia Gandhi saying that the local leadership had ‘resolved’ that the state should stay united.

Apart from the CM, the state Congress chief Botcha Satyanarayana, 18 ministers of AP and over 70 sitting and former MPs, MLAs and MLCs had signed the letter. Clearly, while the Congress’ central leadership claimed to have taken all affected parties into confidence before announcing the creation of Telangana, it ignored its own leaders in the state.

As a result of the confusion created by the Congress, violent protests continue to disrupt normal life in the Seemandhra and Rayalaseema regions of AP, with government employees in 13 districts on an indefinite protest. For the first time in nearly four decades, the bus service between Tirumala and Tirupati has been suspended; state road transport employees are off work to protest the bifurcation of the state.

Meanwhile in New Delhi, nearly half of the already delayed Monsoon session of Parliament has been drowned by the din over the state’s division. In five of the first seven working days of Parliament, barely any business was conducted by the Lok Sabha because of the ruling party’s own MPs shouting slogans in favour of a united Andhra. Disruptions on the issue forced the chair to repeatedly adjourn House proceedings, including in Question Hour. On 13 August, day 6, when a handful of MPs of the Telugu Desam Party still continued to oppose the move and shout “We want Justice” slogans in the well of the Lok Sabha, the House was adjourned repeatedly and the planned discussion on the Food Security Bill was put off till the next day. Disruptions continued on day 7. The bill can now only be taken up after the House meets again on 19 August.

The smugness of the Congress was on display when MP Sandeep Dikshit appealed on behalf of the party to TDP members to let the House function. Pointed out that the Congress had failed to rein in its own MPs earlier who were causing disruptions, Dikshit said his party colleagues had caused disruptions for “four-five days” which the party considers reasonable time for such “democratic protests”. But TDP MPs protesting over the same issue the sixth day, in the Congress’ view, amounts to holding the nation to ransom.

It was the same attitude that was at play when the Congress announced its Telangana decision on 30 July, ignoring the views of its state unit and leading to widespread protests. It had sat on the promise long enough and only reacted, not acted, for

A f e w d ay s a f t e r

14 open

the sake of political expediency. The creation of Telangana was included in the UPA’s Common Minimum Programme as early as 2004, but was left for the last lap of the UPA II regime before the 2014 polls, not because the Congress had thought out the issue or consulted various stakeholders, but because it wanted to contain losses in the next General Election.

Opinion polls have predicted that the Jaganmohan Reddy led YRS Congress will inflict heavy losses on the Congress.

With both the YSR Congress and TDP opposing the planned bifurcation, the Congress hopes that the announcement will give it a definite edge over the two parties in the Telangana region. But again, these calculations have been done sitting in Delhi by the central leadership without paying attention to sentiments in the much larger Seemandhra region, which has more than half of the state’s Lok Sabha constituencies.

More than a fortnight after the announcement, the Union’s officiating Home Minister P Chidambaram declared The Telangana that there is no timeline for calculations were the new state’s creation. done in Delhi without The last time the UPA had paying attention to said it would create sentiments in the Telangana, it was Chidambaram who had Seemandhra region, made the announcement— which has over half back in December 2009. of AP’s Lok Sabha Following similar protests constituencies earlier, the UPA announced it was putting the decision on hold to evolve a consensus first. Three committees were set up by the UPA to look into the Telangana issue. A part of the Srikrishna Committee report has been withheld while the outcome of the earlier Rosaiah and Pranab Mukherjee Committees is unclear. The kneejerk announcement has only created confusion over the status of Telangana today.

The Government is not likely to introduce a bill to effect the bifurcation in this Parliament session. Whether there will be another session before the next polls remains unclear. The UPA Government has been unable to run Parliament in the last few sessions. Yet, there is a section within the Congress that still believes that it need not try to run Parliament efficiently because it will not affect its electoral prospects as long as it gets its poll arithmetic right. Opinion poll after poll has forecast that the Congress’ tally of Lok Sabha seats will go down in the next General Election. The ruling party, on its part, has only a mix of gimmicks and smugness to offer in response.

All this will do is hasten the party’s downslide. n 26 august 2013

split

The Divide and the Design

Channi Anand/AP

The violence in Kishtwar bears the signs of an orchestrated plan to create a Kashmir Valley-like situation in this part of Jammu Rahul Pandita

A

bout ten days before violence broke out in

Kishtwar, Jammu & Kashmir, a news item that appeared in a Valley publication reported the presence of suspicious masked men with weapons in this town and the adjoining Doda district who reportedly came knocking at the doors of Muslim houses during Ramzan and terrorised them.

Though local police officers found these to be a hoax, Kashmir’s junior home minister Sajjad Ahmad Kichloo, a resident of Kishtwar himself, promptly announced a reward of Rs 25,000 for anyone who could catch one of these masked men. It came to naught.

On 7 August, two days before the riots in Kishtwar, the Valley-based separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani claimed during a prayer meeting that Muslims in the

reignited BJP supporters protest against the J & K government during a curfew in Jammu on 11 August

Channi Anand/AP

deterrent Women Village Defence Committee members shoot during a training session by the Indian Army at Sariya village, about 140 km from Jammu

state’s Jammu region were being threatened. He asked people to join protests against Village Defence Committees (VDCs).

These VDCs were set up in several parts of Jammu, including Doda (of which Kishtwar was then a part) in the 1990s after militancy broke out there. The VDCs had mostly ex-servicemen whom the Central Government armed to enable them to guard their villages against militant attacks. Today, VDCs have around 25,000 men and some women, mostly Hindus. Across the mountainous areas in Jammu region, where there is no police or Army presence, these committees act as an effective deterrent against militants. In the Doda region and elsewhere, they have been able to repulse many militant attacks. In Surankote area, where large-scale infiltration of terrorists took place in 2003, a VDC of Muslim women helped the Army bust a major terrorist hideout. Sometimes, VDCs have had to pay a heavy price for it, like in one case in 2001 where 15 of them were burnt alive by militants in a village along the Line of Control in the Jammu region.

However, in some cases, these licensed weapons have been used by VDC members to settle personal scores or abuse their authority. There have been a few allegations of human rights violations against them.

On the same day as Geelani’s exhortation, posters of Afzal Guru, hanged in February this year after being convicted in the December 2001 Parliament attack case, and militant leader Maqbool Butt, hanged in 1984 on charges of murder, appeared in Kishtwar with messages written in Urdu of ‘Jihad through holy war.’

Kishtwar is nestled in the Himalayas along the Chenab river, about 230 km north-east of Jammu. Carved out as a district from Doda in 2006, the Hindu-Muslim popula18 open

tion here is in the ratio of 40:60. In the 1990s, terrorism spread to these parts as well, much like Kashmir Valley, resulting in an exodus of hundreds of Hindu families.

Many massacres took place, including the targeted killings of Hindus on a bus and the gunning down of a marriage party. As compared to the Valley, Indian security forces found it harder to fight militancy in Doda because of its mountainous terrain. At one point, this region became a stronghold of the Islamist militant group Hizbul Mujahideen.

As is the case in the Valley, militancy is on the wane in this region too. Security forces have eliminated scores of militant commanders, and the Hizbul Mujahideen has been wiped off. But the influence of Pakistan-based terrorist groups never went away. The three terrorists identified by the National Investigation Agency as key players in the September 2011 blasts outside the Delhi High Court (resulting in the death of 16 people) were from Kishtwar. While one of them, Amir Ali, was killed in an encounter in the upper reaches of Kishtwar in August last year, another one, Chota Hafiz, was killed in December there as well.

I

n the last few months, tension had been brewing in

Kishtwar. There had been at least three incidents of Hindu youth being beaten up by Muslim mobs. In May, posters of Hizbul Mujahideen surfaced in Kishtwar, barely metres away from the town’s police station. The posters issued by the Hizbul divisional commander Amin Butt called for a ‘Jihad’ and warned people against ‘helping the Indian agencies.’

According to investigations by the J&K Police in the last 26 August 2013

Shauib Masoodi/express archives

separatist sentiment A funeral procession of four people who died in the Gool firing incident in Ramban District on 17 July

few months, the Hizbul chief Syed Salahudeen, who also happens to be chairman of the Pakistan-based terrorist conglomerate, United Jihad Council, has been asked by his handlers in Pakistan’s ISI to take advantage of the fresh wave of anti-India sentiment in Kashmir after Afzal Guru’s hanging.

Over the past few months, the Hizbul has claimed credit for several terrorist attacks in the Valley that the J&K Police believe were the work of the terrorist group Lashkar-e-Toiba. This, the J&K police believe, has been done to portray that militancy in Kashmir is indigenous.

The separatist elements had already been successful in exploiting the situation in Gool area in the Ramban district (neighbouring Kishtwar) last month when four people protesting against an alleged desecration of the Quran died in firing outside a BSF camp. A week after the Gool incident, a security review meeting was held by a senior Army commander of the region. By this time, intelligence agencies had warned of a possible flare-up in the situation, aided by certain ‘separatist elements’ active in the area. Soon, on 29 July, there was an incident of eve-teasing during the local Kalash Yatra, resulting in two youths being injured. “Disturbances had been going on for a month. But the administration did not pay heed to the impending signals,” local Congress leader GM Saroori told journalists. Residents in Kishtwar say that the situation was so tense that many taxi drivers had been telling the pilgrims undertaking the annual Machail yatra to stay away.

Days before Eid, police sources reveal, they had prepared a list of people who were fomenting trouble, but they were prevented by the state’s junior home minister Kichloo from arresting them.

O

n 9 August, the morning of Eid, Muslims had gathered for prayers at Kishtwar’s Chowgan ground.

There were more than 20,000 people in attendance. By an

26 August 2013

account put together from what eyewitnesses say, what happened was the following: At about 9.30 am, a separate procession of around 1,000 people from the villages of Pushi, Hullar, Bandarna and Sangrambatta descended upon Kishtwar. These people were armed with guns and petrol canisters, and had Pakistani flags. As they passed through a Hindu locality called Kuleed, people in the procession started shouting anti-India and pro-Pakistan and pro-Aazadi slogans.

The mob was confronted by Hindus who asked them to desist from such behaviour. In the meantime, those praying at the Chowgan ground also reached the spot.

In the ensuing chaos, the motorcycle of a Hindu youth who went by the nickname of Chooha brushed a person in the procession, whose mood of aggression had been clear all along. There was an altercation, and in no time, members of the procession opened fire, injuring many people. The rioters then set on fire shops and other properties owned by Hindus. Three people died in the violence that followed.

At several places in Hindu pockets of the town, people retaliated. This included firing by VDC members at several places. Around this time, an arms shop in a shopping complex owned by the Kichloo family was broken into and a number of weapons including forty .12 bore rifles were stolen (reports of some weapons having gone missing from one of the houses owned by Kichloo have also surfaced). Normally, say locals, there is always adequate security during Eid prayers. But this time around, there was hardly any police presence. This meant that mobs had a field day. As they went on a rampage, the police presence was too sparse to deter them. Even where policemen were present, they could only watch as the mobs opened fire and selectively vandalised property owned by the other community.

While Kishtwar was burning, Kichloo and the local police chief and the District Commissioner sat tight in the Dak Bungalow with about 200 policemen. Pritam Kumar, open www.openthemagazine.com 19

a resident who owns a shoe shop in Kishtwar’s main market tells Open that as his shop was being looted, he had begged the District Commissioner to act. But as the violence spread to upper reaches, Kichloo and his men kept sitting there till evening, doing absolutely nothing. In fact, the J&K Principal Secretary (Home) Suresh Kumar and Police Chief Ashok Prasad were stranded for hours at the helipad without a police escort. “We had been telling the police for a long time that there will be major trouble here,” says Sunil Kumar, a local BJP leader.

It is clear that the state government failed to act on intelligence reports and did nothing to prevent the tension in Kishtwar going out of hand. It was only towards late evening on 9 August, after the Army was pressed into service, that the violence could be controlled. But the question remains: why were the police so unprepared to handle the developments even as they had enough reason to expect trouble? Why did Kichloo stop the police from arresting potential troublemakers?

The Hindu-Muslim polarisation here has reached such a level that even those injured in the riots were segregated according to their religion by local authorities. While

The question remains: why were the police so unprepared to handle the developments even as they had enough reason to expect trouble?

Why did Kichloo stop the police from arresting potential troublemakers? injured Muslims were treated at the district hospital, injured Hindus were taken to Army treatment facilities and hospitals elsewhere.

The violence soon spread to other parts of Jammu as well. Curfew had to be declared in several areas. But even a day later, the administration was not prepared for the fallout of the Kishtwar violence on other parts of the region. There was violence in Jammu city and some property owned by Muslims was burnt down.

T

he BJP was quick to cash in on the developments,

with senior leaders of the party launching a loud campaign against J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and his leadership. The party not only saw a potential upturn in its electoral prospects in Jammu, it sensed that the Kishtwar violence could reverberate with voters in other parts of the country as well. Modelling himself as a modern-day Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley landed up in Jammu to travel to Kishtwar, but was sent back by the state government.

20 open

In New Delhi, the BJP then launched a tirade against the Abdullah government in Parliament, with Jaitley saying that the developments in Kishtwar were like a repeat of events in Kashmir Valley in 1990 when Hindus were forced to leave in the wake of Islamist extremism. As the Union’s acting Home Minister (as Shinde was in hospital), P Chidambaram was quick to respond by assuring the House that the Centre would not let that happen.

But that may be easier said than done. The BJP’s protests may be motivated by a desire to score political points, but fears of an exodus of Hindus from the Doda region are genuine. Intelligence reports have suggested that there is an attempt to revive militancy in the region, much like in Kashmir Valley. There are reports of fresh batches of youth from Doda being trained for another round of militancy in this part of the state. This adds to the fear psychosis among Hindus in Doda. The Hindu business community has threatened to move out unless the government provides them adequate security. “We have faced a similar situation in the 90s as well, but that was of lesser magnitude,” says Rakesh Gupta, president of the Kishtwar Chamber of Commerce, whose garment store was burnt down by rioters.

Succumbing to pressure by the BJP and other political parties, Omar Abdullah has ordered a judicial inquiry into the Kishtwar events. This pressure also led to the resignation of Kichloo, which was accepted by the CM without ado. On 13 August, the Supreme Court asked the J&K chief secretary to file a detailed affidavit on the Kishtwar clashes and subsequent steps taken by the state government.

Four days after the riots, the state government arrested 11 people in Kishtwar, including two policemen. But right afterwards, Omar Abdullah launched a counter attack against the BJP on Twitter, citing the 2002 riots of Gujarat to make his point. Leaders of the Congress party, Omar’s allies in J&K, cautiously reacted to this by saying that two wrongs did not make a right.

At the time of filing this story, Kishtwar is still under curfew for the sixth day. Many incidents of violence have still been reported, despite that. The Centre has now moved in extra columns of the Army, but the division in Kishtwar is complete.

On his part, Kichloo defended himself by saying that he did his best to salvage the situation but did not specify what exactly he did. His party later claimed that he was trapped himself and had to scale a wall to escape. In an interview to The Indian Express, he claimed that the Kishtwar riots had been planned for two months; by whom, he did not specify.

But as is clear from the sequence of events in Kishtwar, Kichloo and others in the state government did not act on that information. If he had known of any such plan, there should have been an adequate mechanism in place to thwart the violence. That is why Kichloo has a lot of explaining to do. n 26 August 2013

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INNOCEAN-001/12

c a st o u t

Living Among the Dead The story of five orphans forced to stay in a graveyard after their parents died of AIDS Chinki Sinha Jamua, Uttar Pradesh photographs by ashish sharma

O

n Eid, just before the children went to the Idgah a few kilometres away, Ishratunissa counted her money carefully and handed the coins to her grandson Adil. They totalled Rs 5. It wasn’t much, but he might be able to buy himself some sweets.

He had been crying that morning.

Ishratunissa sat with him, wiping his tears. But when the other children arrived to take him to the mosque, he was cheerful again. He wore the new set of clothes a charitable man from a nearby 22 open

village had sent over. A green check shirt and a skullcap.

Adil doesn’t live in the village anymore. The district administration sent him to school in Narayanpur with his brother Iqhlaq—again, an act of charity.

The grandmother has tears of her own to wipe. She can’t see properly, she says.

A thin film of cataract covers her pupils, making them look like glass.

She casts a glance in the direction of her granddaughter Nishath Bano, and says, “Poor girl.”

J

amua, the family’s village in Uttar

Pradesh that is home to about 35 families, is surrounded by fields and a thick grove of trees. They also once had a house here to stay in. But after their father died of AIDS, the five children—Irfan, Nishath, Iqhlaq, Adil and Moonis—and their mother Aashiya Bano found life unbearable in that house.

They had to move out.

Aashiya, just 35 years old at the time, had contracted the virus too and was already afflicted by the disease. The old 26 august 2013

ostracised (Clockwise from left) Iqhlaq; Irfan and Nishath, who along with two other siblings were driven out of their home

house was too dark and mouldy for her anyway, says Irfan. She liked sunlight and fresh air. A few months before she died, Aashiya had asked Irfan to build a little hut adjoining the house. He did, but it collapsed in May this year.

The kids wanted to return to their old house, but their uncles refused to let them back in. “We were afraid in that house,” says Irfan, the eldest, “Everyone said, ‘Go away.’ Where could we go? They said ‘Go live in the graveyard’.”

They made a makeshift tent there un26 august 2013

der which all of them huddled. When Aashiya died, it was just the five of them left: the boys, aged 18, 13, 11 and nine, and the girl, 16. Only their grandmother would ever come near them. Now, they have been rehabilitated in their old house by district officials after a local reporter highlighted their plight. Taking note of a National Human Rights Commission report, the administration asked one of their uncles to unlock the old house and allow the children to stay there until it found a plot in the village to

build them a new house under a government scheme, the Lohia Awas Yojana.

B

efore she died, her son Iqhlaq recalls, Aashiya had walked hand-inhand with him towards the road. She was almost limping. “Walking looked like such an effort for her,” he says. They took a bus to the nearby tehsil Mandhata, and she bought him a length of checkered cloth that they took to a tailor to have stitched. Weak and frail, this was open www.openthemagazine.com 23

her last gift to her third-born.

Iqhlaq wears it on Eid, a white-andblue shirt. His mother liked those colours. Last Eid, Aashiya had handed him Rs 20 to go buy himself some sweets.

When she was alive, she would call for the children, ask after their health. Now they have to fend for themselves. There is a mobile handset the district administration has given them in case they need help. If, say, someone tries to force them out of the village.

For almost a month, they lived next to their mother’s grave. To them, she was extraordinary, even if fragile in her dying days. In the graveyard, it would be pitch dark once night fell, and the shadows cast by the moon made strange patterns on everything around. It was eerie. Nishath could not sleep. “It felt someone was calling out to me,” she says.

Salahuddin and Niyauddin, the two uncles, are now reconciled to the children. For months, Niyauddin, who lives in Bombay, kept the house in Jamua locked. Finally, after pressure mounted, he let the children live in his quarters.

F

or years after he dropped out of school to take care of his ill father, Irfan worked odd jobs and earned around Rs 100 per day. He doesn’t know how his father, Awazhuddin, who drove trucks in Bombay, got the killer disease. It doesn’t matter anymore.

It was on a Friday that their thatch hut crumbled. The villagers, including some of their own relatives, refused to come anywhere near them. Even while addressing them, they would usually keep a distance of about 150 feet. It was best, they felt, that the children moved to the graveyard. But a few thought even that was too much. They wanted them out of the village.

Their rehabilitation is incomplete. The land the government first allotted turned out to be disputed property. A second allotment happens to be land next to the school ground, a little away from the cluster of mud-and-brick houses that make up this village.

Under the Lohia Awas Yojana, the children have been sanctioned Rs 1.5 lakh and 1.5 biswa land. The state govern-

ment has also approved Rs 5 lakh for the five children. They are yet to get the money, though.

T

he children have spent many a

night huddled in the local graveyard.

Under a torn blue tarpaulin sheet, they had placed two cots and their meagre belongings—a few utensils and a plastic can for water. Three bricks that served as a stove are still lying next to that tree alongside burnt pieces of coal. That was how they lived before an anganwadi worker told her son, a reporter, about them. He alerted the media and then the administration.

The children have tested negative for HIV-AIDS, according to Pratapgarh’s Chief Medical Officer Vinod Kumar Pandey and another doctor of the Public Health Centre in Mandhata, reportedly.

Shunned for so long, that has come as a relief for the children. Earlier, parents in the village would not let their kids play or go near them. Now there is some form of repentance in almost everyone.

small mercy (Facing page) Curious villagers gather in front of the house in Jamua where the children are staying after their return from the graveyard; (left) where they had to stay for almost one month in a makeshift tent

Salahuddin, the uncle, says he didn’t know better and that they aren’t evil people. A poor farmer who sells his hens’ eggs and works on other farms (though jobless right now) for a living, he has three children of his own to worry about.

His wife says they didn’t have a choice in ostracising the family.

“We were just afraid,” Salahuddin says.

“We used to keep at least 100-200 metres away. We still don’t understand this strange illness. We didn’t want to die.”

The children are still in penury. Their mother’s old BPL card comes in handy.

They get 10 kg of wheat, 20 kg of rice, 2 kg of sugar, and three litres of kerosene from a PDS outlet in Mandhata.

That is not sufficient, but it helps them get by. The district administration has also promised the eldest son an MNREGA card and a new BPL card.

This Eid, their mother’s elder sister came to celebrate the occasion with them. She brought them a box of sweets.

“What strength these children have, to go through so much and not utter a single world of complaint,” she says, “I didn’t even know they had made them live in a graveyard.”

Nishath says her mother had wanted them to study. But she dropped out of school long ago, once her mother took ill.

She had to cook, clean and take care of her ailing mother, apart from minding the younger boys. Iqhlaq and Adil are now in a residential school in Narayanpur, but 26 august 2013

Moonis—still young—lives with her.

“When we build our new house, I would like to have three rooms,” says Nishath, “We have been in our uncle’s house for the last 20 days. It would be better to have our own place. Then we can look for a girl for my brother, and she will take care of them. I will get married then and go to my own house.”

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ill 2003, they used to live in Mumbai. Then tragedy struck. Their

“We were just afraid,” says their uncle Salahuddin, “We used to keep at least 100-200 metres away [from the children]... we didn’t want to die” father fell ill and they couldn’t pay the rent anymore. Their mother Aashiya made them all board the Mahanagari Express, and they returned to Jamua for refuge. Irfan had studied till Class 5 in Mumbai.

On their return to Uttar Pradesh, they consulted doctors at a government hospital in Allahabad and found that their father had AIDS. “My father never used to cry,” says Irfan, “He knew he was going to die soon, but held on.”

In Jamua, the grandmother let them stay with her. Awazhuddin would lie on a cot in a corner of the house, which was one long room, with his wife in attendance. He never spoke much.

Moonis, the youngest, was born in the village.

It was three years after their return from Mumbai that the father died. They buried him in the graveyard, and once every six months, Irfan would light a candle at his grave and read out an aayat of the Quran. The mother fell ill a year after their father’s death. The symptoms were similar. Unrelenting fever. The same pattern of ill health, more or less. They went to doctors, who confirmed AIDS. She did not have long to live, they said.

Irfan had to work. He assisted some truck drivers but never went too far, staying within the district on his travels. His mother, he knew, was so ill that he may need to rush home at short notice.

Sometimes, the drivers would be kind enough to let him call one of the villagers to ask after his mother. Once every three days, he would manage to make this call.

On Eid, he would return home and buy his siblings new clothes.

One morning, she was gone.

At 2:30 am at night, Irfan remembers, he had given her water. When Nishath got up, she nudged her mother.

Aashiya didn’t respond, so she called out to her brothers.

They buried her near their father. n open www.openthemagazine.com 25

mala fide

Cry Rape Are false accusations of rape common in India? Do the accused get a fair chance at defending themselves?

Lhendup G Bhutia

L

ast October, a 24-year-old lecturer

at an engineering college in Greater Noida got a phone call from his father. Sahir, who has requested his last name be withheld, had moved to the city from a village in western Uttar Pradesh four years earlier, and had spent less than a year on his first job; about a year ago, his parents moved in with him. He remembers his father’s voice on the telephone.

It was thick with shame. A woman, his father said, had visited home and was saying that Sahir had slept with her and reneged on his promise of marrying her.

“I was shocked and appalled by the allegation. I told him, ‘Don’t worry. I will explain when I get home’,” Sahir says.

Sahir did not get the chance. A few hours later, he was summoned to the police station and arrested. He was charged with rape and criminal intimidation.

There is no way of verifying the veracity of Sahir’s claims. The case is currently being tried in a fast-track court in Delhi and its judgment is awaited. According to him, however, although he was romantically involved with the girl levelling the allegation for more than two years, they never had sexual intercourse, let alone his forcing his girlfriend to undergo an abortion (as he says she has told the police). He claims he never promised to marry her. What he cannot understand is the charge he faces—that of rape.

He says he has committed no act that could have him arraigned under Article 375 and 376 of the Indian Penal Code, the country’s anti-rape laws.

Sahir’s case is like those of many others that various men’s rights groups in India frequently point to. False rape cases are 26 open

on an exponential rise, they say, and few take note of it. According to these groups, fraudulent allegations of rape make up the bulk of ‘rape’ reports in India.

They point out that in 2011—according to the National Crime Records Bureau— only 25.9 per cent of rape cases resulted in convictions, thereby implying that the rest of the cases were based on false accusations.

While that may not necessarily be a valid assumption, given that the principles of jurisprudence dictate that an accused must be held innocent until proven guilty—and proof is always tricky in rape cases and so several individuals are acquitted on lack of evidence—there is

In a five-year long study of rape cases, Delhi-based NGO Swanchetan found that 18.3 per cent of the 113 rape cases in the study sample were fake reason enough to believe that false charges of rape are on the rise.

A Delhi sessions court made an observation to this effect in March this year while acquitting four individuals of rape.

In the words of Additional Sessions Judge Virender Bhat: ‘It is becoming a very difficult job, nowadays, for the courts to differentiate genuine rape cases from false ones. Cases like the present one create a well-founded belief among the public as well as the judiciary that the rape related laws are misused with impunity.’ In this

particular case, as the court determined, the husband of the alleged victim had made her file a rape case against two brothers and their parents (for abetment of the crime) to settle a personal grudge.

Two months later, the Delhi High Court made similar observations and directed trial judges to be vigilant on mala fide charges. Justice GP Mittal stated then, ‘Rape causes the greatest distress and humiliation to the victim, but at the same time a false allegation of rape can cause equal distress, humiliation and damage to the accused as well. The accused must also be protected against the possibility of false implications.’

Sahir had to spend 14 days in Tihar Jail before he was granted bail. He lost his job.

He had to change his apartment. And, since his arrest, he has not visited his native village in UP because news of his arrest has ruined his reputation there. He and his parents keep away from all social events in fear of being asked about the status of his case. “I finally got a job as an assistant professor a few months later— but by keeping my past secret,” he says. “I wish the case is resolved soon. But I’m also afraid. What if I am convicted?”

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eminists argue that false accusations make up only a tiny fraction of such charges, and that public discussions on this phenomenon only detract attention from the serious problem of men forcing themselves upon women. No doubt, this is a serious issue. However, men’s rights groups assert that the cause of justice is ill-served by ignoring what is now an equivalent malaise: the use of 26 august 2013

retrorocket/getty images

rape charges, with its heavy penalties, as a tool of mala fide intent.

How common false accusations are is hard to assess. Swanchetan, a New Delhibased organisation well known for aiding survivors of violence, abuse and trauma, carried out a five-year-long study from 2003 onwards that examined several rape cases lodged. In all, the group studied 113 cases, the number it was called in for during this period by various police stations to counsel rape survivors.

Swanchetan found that 18.3 per cent of 26 august 2013

all cases in the sample—almost every fifth, that is—were fake. On investigation of the reasons, the researchers learnt that 25 per cent of the fake rape complainants had animosity towards the accused as their motivation. Another 25 per cent had filed cases at the behest of family members. In about a fifth of the false cases, the individual was ‘coached’ to allege rape to settle a family dispute. In about 15 per cent of cases, the individual panicked and alleged rape after she had consented to sexual intercourse. And the

remaining 15 per cent, according to the organisation, defied categorisation.

According to Dr Rajat Mitra, director of Swanchetan and a clinical psychologist by training, “One should not look at those who falsely accuse [men] as liars. In most cases, they are being forced by someone else to file such a case.” Among the cases Dr Mitra discusses is the case of a woman who was gangraped by three men in Dwarka. However, she filed a case against three other individuals because her rapists had threatened to kill her if open www.openthemagazine.com 27

zack blanton/getty images

she pointed them out to the police. In another case, a 13-year-old had falsely accused a policeman of raping her because her father bore a grudge against the cop.

“There are so many occasions when the girl breaks down during counselling and confesses that she had consented to sex with the accused,” says Dr Mitra, “But she could not dare tell her parents this.”

The clinical psychologist admits that the study had a small sample and the figures are based on what accusers confided to him during counselling sessions.

“The number otherwise could be larger,” he says.

In April 2010, the Pune Police claimed that around 74 per cent of reported rapes involved consensual sex where the accused had later reneged on a marriage promise. According to Pune Mirror, a local paper, Crime Branch officials had put three years of rape cases registered in the city to scrutiny before arriving at this conclusion. The figure evoked outrage among women’s groups, which accused the police of distorting facts to shrug off their responsibility for the safety of women.

28 open

Himanshu, a singer and guitarist, is embroiled in one such case. He was arrested as an alleged rapist two years ago. His then girlfriend had accused him of sleeping with her on the pretext of marriage. According to her, they had been in a live-in relationship for over three years, but he had later moved out and started avoiding her. “I want the police to punish [him] so that he doesn’t spoil any woman’s life by making false promises,” she was quoted as saying in The Indian Express.

Himanshu claims that while he was romantically involved with the woman, he was neither living with her nor in a sexual relationship. He shows a medicolegal document of the medical examination conducted on the woman after her allegation that mentions an intact hymen. “See,” he says, “she was lying.”

This report, Himanshu’s lawyer has told him, is why he is likely to be acquitted by the Judiciary.

According to the singer, their relationship first ran into trouble when the two went to the UAE for work. Himanshu got a three-month long contract to sing at a

hotel, and he took her along as a co-singer. However, he claims, she did not put the required effort and the hotel refused to pay the duo. She was unhappy with him about this, he says. After a few months of their return to India, he found that a case of rape and cheating had been filed against him.

“The slur of a ‘rapist’ is not easy to live with,” says Himanshu, who has spent three nights in Mumbai’s Malwani Police Station lockup and another 21 days in a Thane prison. On his first night in the Thane jail, he was slapped by other undertrials as part of a custom that all rapists must be dealt with this way. No one, apart from his lawyer, came to visit him during this period. After he was eventually granted bail, he found his family members keeping away. All he could do was live alone in the city, visit his lawyers and try to get work. “On the day I returned, I googled my name,” he says, “Earlier, I would find links of my performances.

This time, there were news reports about my being a rapist.” Work has been tough to come by, and he has not got a single gig with his former band members.

26 august 2013

I

n 2010, a pilot with Jet Airways was arrested for having allegedly raped his stewardess girlfriend. Both were originally from Uttarakhand and had been in a live-in relationship. According to the woman, she had agreed to live with the pilot, Varun Agarwal, because he had promised to marry her. This, however, was a promise he did not keep.

On her complaint, Agarwal was arrested at Mumbai’s domestic airport and put behind bars for 14 days. It was widely reported in city newspapers. “The arrest was not fair,” says Laxman Kanal, his lawyer, “The case was quashed two years later, but the damage to his reputation was done.”

Kanal is seated on the fifth floor of Bandra’s Family Court in a room full of lockers with names of owners on them.

Agarwal’s parents, he says, were against the match and he did not want to disobey them. “In anger,” he says, “she had him booked under sections 376 (rape), 420 (cheating), 323 (causing hurt) and 506 (criminal intimidation).” While the pilot did not lose his job, the airport confiscated his airport entry pass until his name was cleared. “He could not work for almost two years,” says the lawyer, “It was also a shameful period for him and his family. His name was there almost every day in the papers.” During this period, Kanal mentions, Agarwal was resolute on filing defamation charges against the complainant once he was acquitted. Since his acquittal, Agarwal has married and resumed his job with Jet Airways. He refuses to talk about the case. “It turned out unfairly for me, I know,” is all he has to say, “I wanted the person who caused this to be held accountable. But once I was acquitted, I was just happy to have my name cleared.

I let it be.”

M

en’s rights groups contend that

India’s rape laws have a glaring loophole: the absence of a ‘misuse clause’ that could deter false accusations. According to Amit Deshpande, a member of Save India Family Foundation, a men’s rights group, innumerable presentations had been made to the Justice Verma Committee, which was set up last year to recommend amendments of sexual assault laws, for the inclusion of such a

26 august 2013

clause. But the plea was entirely ignored.

Many believe that such a misuse clause could work against the casue of justice overall. Padma Deosthali, a coordinator with CEHAT, a research and health advocacy group that works closely with rape survivors, points out that rape remains highly unreported in India. “We need to understand that because of the stigma associated with rape, very few women report it,” she says, “In such a scenario, if one brings in such a clause, fewer victims will likely come forth to seek judicial redressal.”

S

ince the 16 December Delhi gangrape case and the subsequent protests and demands for tougher penalties for sexual assault, some lawyers fear that the public campaign has adversely impacted justice in rape cases. Sitting in a cabin on the first floor of a South Mumbai building crammed with law-

Some lawyers fear that the public campaign for tougher penalties on sexual assault has adversely impacted justice in rape cases yers’ chambers, Parvez Ubharay, a senior advocate, opens a newspaper with a page full of rape news. “Look,” he says, “Every report almost assumes that the accused is guilty. That’s unfortunately what’s happening now. The media presumes every accused is guilty, the police don’t want to take a chance, and the judges want to appear tough.” According to him, even bail in rape cases is increasingly difficult to get.

A month ago, a sessions court in Delhi, while acquitting a 75-year-old man accused of rape by his domestic help, observed that since the 16 December gangrape, such a climate of opinion has been generated that ‘the mere statement of a lady that she has been raped, came to be taken as gospel truth, on the basis of which the accused was arrested and chargesheeted’. The judge, Virender Bhat, further stated, ‘It is these false cases which play havoc with the crime statis-

tics, leading to the labelling of Delhi as a ‘rape capital’. Nobody bothers to see in how many cases are the accused in fact convicted. Media turns a blind eye towards acquittals. The acquittal of an accused is not noticed at all and he continues to be labelled as a ‘rapist’ even after his honourable acquittal.’

As demands for speedy justice peaked after the Delhi gangrape case, as many as six fast-track courts to deal with sexual assault cases were set up in January this year. According to a report in Free Press Journal in February, around 500 cases of sexual offence were transferred to these courts. However, in the first month, of the 27 cases that had been disposed of, only 12 led to convictions. Acquittals were ordered in 15 cases. The judges found that the testimonies of most victims were either unreliable or they had turned ‘hostile’ during trial.

I

n 2011, a primary school teacher in Thane’s Asangaon region—married with two children—was arrested for the alleged rape of a colleague. According to him, he was involved in an extramarital relationship with the complainant when she joined the school as a teacher in 2006. The affair, he says, carried on even after the complainant got married in 2007. A couple of years later, fearing repercussions, they terminated their relationship. He claims that when the complainant’s husband learnt of the affair, he made her file a case of rape against him.

The teacher was imprisoned for seven months before being granted bail. He’s also been suspended from work. When we meet at Thane Railway Station, he wants to learn how he can conduct a sting operation to reveal the truth. “Let’s do it. Let’s do it,” he says repeatedly, keen to trap the police and complainant on record speaking of how they framed charges against him.

Once I dissuade him, he leaves dejectedly.

Sahir, on the other hand, claims he is regularly approached by his former girlfriend. She recently called to invite him for her sister’s wedding. “She says she is in love with me and that she will withdraw the case if I marry her,” he says. “We were considering this, me and my family. But it will be wrong.” n open www.openthemagazine.com 29

i n h e r i ta n c e

Royal Absurdity The former rulers of Lakshadweep want their kingdom back‌ or at least a modest raise in their royalty pension Shahina KK photographs by ritesh uttamchandani

O

nce upon a time, a queen lost

her kingdom to a foreign invader. Under the terms of surrender, she was allowed to retain her title, inheritable by the seniormost member of the royal family. She was also assured an annual payment to maintain her standard of living. It was a generous sum back then. Then came the passage 30 open

of time. Sovereigns vanished into history and elected governments came into existence. The royal family didn’t live happily ever after. Their annual pension, a fixed sum, was ravaged by inflation.

It began to look smaller and smaller, until it came to a point where it was not even as much as the monthly salary any of them earned.

And then the family decided to make a calculation. When they were first allotted that sum, how much gold could they have bought with it? And how much would that gold be worth today? This figure, they convinced themselves, was the sum that they should logically be getting. And so they went to the government and asked for it. Else, they demand26 august 2013

ed their kingdom back. They will probably not get either.

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hat, in short, is the story of the

Arakkal family that once ruled the city of Cannanore (now Kannur) and Lakshadweep Islands, a reign that lasted five centuries. The trust that governs their affairs recently made the bizarre demand that the Indian government either raise their pension or return Lakshadweep.

I had to wait ten minutes after ringing the bell at the present queen’s residence in Talassery, a town 20 km away from Kannur. A huge house modelled on the original palace that is now a museum of history, it is as silent and empty as any other house along the Malabar coast whose members have left for greener pastures abroad. The queen has three sons, all working overseas, and one daughter.

It is the daughter, who looks around 50, who opens the door and welcomes us in.

She had been busy with her evening prayers and apologises for making us wait. She and her mother are the only two residents of this palatial house.

I am taken to the queen’s room, where the 92-year-old Sultan Arakkal Adi Raja Sainaba Aishabi, also known as Arakkal Beevi, reclines on a bed. More than three years ago, she had suffered a stroke and never fully recovered. But she welcomes me with a gladdening smile. I have to bend forward to catch the words of her broken voice. “Journalists often come here,” she whispers, “though I am not well enough to talk. You may get sufficient information from my children.

Please don’t forget to have tea and some food before you leave.”

I ask her whether she is aware of the Arakkal royal family trust’s demand. She answers with the same bright smile. It is

her daughter who speaks. “She is too old to get into such headaches,” she says.

For centuries, the royal title has been passed along to the seniormost member of the family irrespective of gender. A male king would be called Ali Raja Adi Raja (‘lord of the sea’) and a female, Arakkal Beevi.

According to historians, the Arakkal Dynasty was Kerala’s only Muslim family of rulers. There is no consensus on their origins, but some say their assumption of power dates back to the 13th century. According to a piece of local lore, the dynasty was founded by a minister of Kolathiri Raja (the then regional ruler) who converted to Islam and became a ruler. Another says that the Arakkal royal family traces its lineage to Mohemmad Ali, a nephew of Cheraman Perumal (a regional ruler before the region split into different principalities) who is said to have embraced Islam. The only thing cer-

shorn of glory (Facing page) Arakkal museum, Kannur; (below) 92-year-old Sultan Arakkal Adi Raja Sainaba Aishabi of the Arakkal dynasty; Ali Raja Adi Raja Hameed Hussain, the oldest male member of the Arakkal royal family at his warehouse in Kannur

tain is that the Arakkal Dynasty had sovereign control of Cannanore that later extended to Lakshadweep islands off the coast of Kerala in the Arabian Sea. The arrival of European seafaring powers bolstered their kingdom’s trade and commerce. They had a love-hate relationship with the Portuguese, the Dutch and the British. According to Dr A Sreedhara Menon, a scholar on Kerala history, the Arakkal principality of power came to an end in 1790, the year in which St Angelo Fort of Cannanore was stormed by General Abercromby, the then British Army general. Locally known as Kannur Fort, it had been built in 1505 by the Portuguese; it was later owned by the Dutch, who then sold it to the Arakkal king for Rs 1 lakh. The fort is now a tourist destination. The East India Company later forced the then Arakkal Beevi into an agreement under which she had to give up control of Lakshadweep islands.

She was allowed possession of Cannanore city, but deprived of any claim to sovereignty. The East India Company pensioned off the Arakkals the same way they did other local kings and chieftains in India.

By 1900, the family had lost every trace of power. In 1905, they had to make another agreement with the British giving up all sovereign claims on Cannanore and Lakshadweep. In return, they were entitled to receive an annual pension, termed malikhana, of Rs 23,000. This is a sum they still get, though from the Government of India, which took over the obligations of the departing British.

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n 10 July this year, a decision was taken at a meeting of the royal family trust to press the demand for a raise (or a return ‘surrender’ of their kingdom).

“It is not the first time we have made this demand,” says Ali Raja Adi Raja Hameed Hussain, the eldest male member of the royal family. We are at a shop he has in Kannur, where he runs the family business of spice exports. He takes a bundle of papers off a wooden shelf to show us. The stack includes copies of representations submitted to Central and state ministers to raise their malikhana. “We have been demanding a reasonable hike for long,” he says, “This time we decided to make it public through the media.”

32 open

While that may be so, why they consider their demand reasonable remains a mystery. India, after all, is a democracy and there is nothing that entitles them to such a payment. “We need money because we want to continue the charity work which had been done by our ancestors,” says Hameed Hussain. But why demand public money for purposes of charity? “Because we are descendants of a sovereign ruler,” replies Ali Raja Mohammed Rafi, younger son of Arakkal Beevi Sainaba Aishabi, who runs an advertising agency in the UAE. “As per the contract of 1905 with the English East India Company, we are entitled to receive an amount sufficient to maintain the standards of royal living.”

The agreement, a copy of which is with Open, reads: ‘The Government would pay to the Adi Raja and to his heirs and successors a Malikhana of Rs 23,000 per annum in equal monthly installments one half

Under an agreement that was struck with the East India Company in 1905, the Arakkal royal family was entitled to an annual pension of Rs 23,000 being paid to him during his life and after his death to the head of the family for the time being as a personal grant for the maintenance of his position and dignity and the other half being paid to him and to his heirs and successors as heads of the family.’

Mohemmad Rafi, who is the managing trustee of the royal trust, says that Rs 23,000 was a huge amount in 1905. If calculated in terms of gold, he says, it would have bought 64 kg of the metal in 1905.

“Considering the value of gold [now], we should get around Rs 14 crore per annum,” claims Mohemmad Rafi. “We know that is not practically viable and so we are demanding only a reasonable hike in the annual pension.”

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his is not the Arakkals’ only family tussle over ancestral property. There is an ongoing dispute with

another family of Muslim landowners, the Keyis, over 1.4 million Saudi riyals—about Rs 2.2 crore—said to be lying in the Saudi Arabian government’s treasury. The exact sum cannot be verified, though many believe it to be in the tune of Rs 90 crore. About 150 years ago, a member of the Keyi family, Mayinkutty, is said to have built a guesthouse in Mecca to accommodate Hajj pilgrims from Malabar. In 1971, the Saudi government demolished this structure as part of a development exercise, allotting 1.4 million riyals as compensation to be handed over to the Keyi heirs. At that point, the Arakkal royal family also staked claim to the amount on the grounds that Mayinkutty had married one of their members, Aychi Beevi. “It is beyond dispute that we are the legal heirs of Mayinkutty Keyi and have legitimate claim over that property,” says Mohemmad Rafi.

The Kerala government recently appointed an IAS officer, TO Suraj, to look into the matter and take a final decision.

He says that neither family might have any right to it. “In my understanding, the property was dedicated to the Wakf for the welfare of pilgrims,” says Suraj, “The government is trying to attach the property [for use of] the Wakf Board by due process.”

Professor Rajan Gurukkal, a historian and former vice-chancellor of Mahatma Gandhi University, thinks that would be ideal. “It should go to the government and be used for a public purpose,” he says. Gurukkal also thinks that the demand to raise the malikhana has no legal validity. Dr KKN Kurup, a historian of the Malabar region, author of a book on the Arakkal family’s history called Aliraja of Cannanore and former vicechancellor of Calicut University, terms the demand “absolutely irrational”. He says there is no reason to spend public money on the upkeep of aristocracies and royalties of the past. “The malikhana was maintained primarily on the condition that they should be loyal to the English East India Company. How can they claim the same even after independence? Does it mean that the Arakkal family is still loyal to the British? What if all the heirs of rulers of princely states make similar demands?” n 26 august 2013

ec h o

Made in India Remembering the golden age of Indipop AASTHA ATRAY BANAN

P

riyanka Chopra’s diversification

from Bollywood to music has gathered momentum with the recent release of her new single, Exotic. Reviews of the song have been mixed, but there is no doubt about the scale and slickness of the endeavour. It features international pop star Pitbull. The video is shot in Miami.

The track became the official song for the 2013 Guinness International Champions Cup football tournament in Miami, with leading European clubs participating to prepare for their respective seasons. At a party after the game, Chopra hobnobbed

with Cristiano Ronaldo and other Real Madrid stars. But despite all the gloss, contemporary Indipop cannot match the highs the genre achieved during the early to mid-1990s.

Some of the videos and lyrics of songs from that time may seem tacky now (Daler Mehndi’s ‘Tunak tunak’, for example), but Indipop had real mojo then.

Major studios invested money in it. The populist tunes and themes appealed to listeners. To many, Indipop defined the first half of the 1990s, when a bold new India was emerging post-liberalisation.

And then that beast called Bollywood swallowed the fledgling industry. As Chopra tries to revive Indipop, it seems an opportune moment to chart the genre’s journey so far through the memories of its stars.

“N

o one had heard music like this before,” says Anaida, one of the era’s marquee names. “[But] Bollywood caught on. They started composing music which was close to pop music. And their budgets were massive. I spent so

indipop divas (L-R) Mehnaz has left the Indipop world behind, but Anaida is still going strong

much money on my own videos and promotion. I spent most of what I made. No one could compete with Bollywood.”

Composer and singer Lesle Lewis of the band Colonial Cousins (which also featured playback singer Hariharan), who worked on Suneeta Rao’s album Paree, Alisha’s Bombay Girl, KK’s Pal, and Asha Bhonsle’s Rahul and I and Janam Samjha Karo, guesses Indipop worked in the 90s because the live band had gone into oblivion thanks to a tax levied on restaurants and because Bollywood music had grown jaded. “The generation was changing and they wanted new music,” he says.

He also names recording company Magnasound as a reason why many artistes flourished. “It was the only company which wanted to sign artistes who didn’t sing Bollywood or ghazals. These were essentially artistes who wanted to sing in English and agreed to sing in Hindi, but songs of a pop nature.”

Lewis remembers being one of the first people to include electronics and computers in the making of a song. “Be it Alisha, KK, Band of Boys—all the songs I created were different. I created stars,” he says. And then he worked with Asha Bhonsle on Rahul and I and Janam Samjha Karo. “After heralding the Indipop age, I got in the remix age. Jaanam Samjha Karo was such a big hit that they actually made a movie with the same name.”

Bollywood soon noticed that every club was playing Daler Mehndi instead of a film song, says Lewis, and that’s where the problem started. “They slowly imported the pop industry into Bollywood. They took over the talent— everyone started singing for films as they paid so much better. What was left was wannabes and hence the decline started.”

A

naida shuttles between Pune and

Mumbai now. She is single and still busy with her music, about to release a meditation album. Last year, she judged a Chinese reality singing competition, Asian Wave (which features contestants from various South Asian countries), and also recorded a Chinese version of Oova Oova, one of her 90s hits. “I will always keep doing what I do best,” she says.

Oova Oova, incidentally, is a song about a plain-Jane transforming into a hottie in a little dress. Us nineties kids were as fas34 open

shaielesh mule/fotocorp

cinated by her as Atul Agnihotri, who starred as the token cute boy in the video.

Anaida remembers how she got the recording deal for her first album Hotline.

She had taken part in a Madonna song competition organised by HMV in Mumbai and sung Like A Prayer. She won, and HMV offered her a recording contract.

But things didn’t work out. She then decided to sign on with a small recording company called Crescendo, and, at the ripe age of 15, Anaida the pop star was born.

Her first album, she remembers, was the first time an Indian artiste had released a song in the single format, that too on a cassette. “There were two songs on the cassette—Hotline on side A, and an introduction to Anaida on side B. It was a hit.”

The 90s were the golden era for independent Indian music. There were a handful of bankable names. There was Alisha Chinai and her Made in India, which made us feel patriotic that India had a model as hot as Milind Soman.

There was Mehnaz with Miss India, Baba Sehgal with Thanda Thanda Paani (a straight Ice Ice Baby lift, but never mind), Suneeta Rao with Paree, Shweta Shetty with Deewane, Lucky Ali with O Sanam, and the list goes on.

Anaida remembers the euphoria. As

someone with mixed genes (half Greek and half Indian), she looked exotic as it is.

Her music added to her appeal, inviting attention as well as jealousy. “I would get calls... people saying that ‘We know where you are going to be at a particular place at a particular time. We will throw acid at you’,” she says.

According to Anaida, the police found that the caller was a famous pop singer herself, who couldn’t deal with Anaida’s success. “I was shocked. I had actually given her clothes to wear for her first video,” she says. “She spread rumours about me with the press too—she used to say things like ‘I am dark, Anaida is fair, and hence more successful’.”

But along with the bad, there was a lot of good. “I got a lot of proposals. Some were very weird—a married doctor from Hyderabad had it in his head that we were getting married. He used to mail me saying ‘You need to stop wearing these clothes once we get married’,” she laughs.

“There were letters from lesbians too.”

M

ehnaz, who was also signed on by

Crescendo, is still remembered by some for her song Miss India. One of the lines in the song goes, ‘Main sundar na 26 august 2013

Sunny Borkar/SOLARIS IMAGES

indi innovators (Facing page) Suneeta Rao; (above) former Colonial Cousins Hariharan and Lesle Lewis

sahin, lekin chehra mera kuch bura bhi nahin. Dil sacha hai mera, yeh mujhko hai yakeen. (I may not be beautiful, but I’m not ugly either. My heart is true, of that I’m certain.)’ The video shows her ironing the clothes of models; by the end, she’s crowned Miss India.

Now settled in Seattle, Washington, USA, she shares her memories over email. ‘Miss India is an unforgettable song, album and period in my life. I remember driving home one night and Cuffe Parade, the area where I lived, was plastered with my posters. The response to the album was phenomenal. I toured extensively all over India, the Middle East, Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia.

My good friend Diana Hayden was my manager at the time and also was crowned Miss India around then. It was special to sing Miss India at the finals of the pageant when she won.’

In Seattle, Mehnaz sings with a band called Manooghi Hi (inspired by the word ‘banoongi’). They sing a blend of rock ‘n’ roll and Indian melodies. Manooghi Hi has released two albums and played at festivals in the US. But she remembers the Indipop years like yesterday.

‘The sound was hip and fresh. Labels such as BMG, Sony, Universal, Virgin Music etcetera started investing in the Indian music scene and tied up with local record labels. Indipop created this new wave for listeners and thanks to the entry of MTV and Channel [V], singers got a lot of exposure. We also had collaborations with international artists. I won the Channel [V] award for Best Female 26 august 2013

Vocalist in 1996 and that led to the recording of the duet You Are The Reason with Air Supply for the soundtrack of the film Split Wide Open.’

Mehnaz feels it was the shrinking budgets that eventually led to the decline of Indipop. ‘Unfortunately, the amount of money that was invested in the making of a pop album was not justified by the sales.

As a result, international record labels began to invest less and less. Indipop was always competing with the sales of Bollywood film songs and a lot of pop sing-

Bollywood soon noticed that every club was playing Daler Mehndi instead of a film song, says Lesle Lewis, and so the film industry took over the talent ers made the crossover into playback singing. Bollywood songs started sounding like pop in some ways and that became a more lucrative means of income and recognition for many talented singers.’

But all’s well that ends well. Mehnaz still records and plays in Seattle, and has left the Indipop world behind. ‘I don’t even perform Miss India anymore,’ she writes, ‘unless there is a special request.’

I

f Miss India made us all preen in front

of our mirrors, it was Suneeta Rao’s Paree we played when it was raining out-

side and we wanted a song to keep us company. The song’s video shows an unexplained relationship between an older man and a young girl and is backed by a suitably ethereal sound, composed by Lesle Lewis.

“The video actually released in 1993,” Rao recalls, “two years after the song was ready. It coincided with MTV’s launch in India. It was the best thing to happen. I performed Paree at the 1993 Filmfare Awards in Mumbai and I remember the roar as I appeared in a white sequined dress and performed the song. I then returned in a skimpy dress and performed It’s My Life. The stage was on fire.”

Rao, who lives in Mumbai, has just finished recording a brand new song which will be released soon. She says the fans she won at the start of her career have sustained her for 20 years. “I have had people tell me they named their daughter Paree.

Some people got married to it. On my YouTube channel, there are comments like ‘Why don’t they make music or pop stars like this anymore’. But even though Indipop’s time has passed, I am still a pop star,” she says. When Paree was conceived, she wanted to go the peppy, upbeat route like her contemporaries, but when she heard the song, she knew that the audience would love a change.

Two decades on, Suneeta says there is no Indian music industry anymore. “It’s only Bollywood,” she says. “I sang playback for a while, but this is my true calling. I have released songs on Artist Aloud online. I think we have to go with the times.” But one thing hasn’t changed: she still performs Paree at every show.

Indipop succeeded because it gave a whole generation music to grow up with; music that was not confined to Bollywood. As Pratichee Mohapatra of Viva—which was formed after reality TV auditions by Channel [V] in 1996, and claims to be India’s first girl band—says, “I only remember the good times. I remember our first concert at Delhi’s Shivaji Stadium and [how] we made it to the Limca Book of Records for being the first debut band to pull in over 50,000 people for its first concert.” The singer, who is also ready with her new single, says it was a golden age. “All the work that I have ever got since has been because I was a part of Viva—that’s the recall value of Indipop.

What can be better?” n open www.openthemagazine.com 35

co m e b ac k

Sexy Cop, Sexier Cop

ritesh uttamchandani

sexy spitfire Kavita Kaushik prepares for a scene on the set of FIR

After a brief hiatus, Chandramukhi Chautala is scorching TV screens again with FIR Aastha Atray Banan

I

n the first episode of FIR aired on Sab TV on 31 July 2006, we meet Police Sub-inspector Chandramukhi Chautala at the fictional Imaan Chowki in Rawanpur. She has a thick Haryanvi accent, wears a snug uniform that outlines her curvy frame, and is a complete spitfire. She flirts with her Brahmachari colleague Hanuman Prasad Pandey (among others) like a man. She tries to solve all the cases that come to the Chowki, cases that need not have much

to do with crime and often concern matters such as divorce, love and anything else that life throws at the people who walk in. She is surrounded by sidekicks, for whom she has such tough-cop lines as: “Na ke karoo mein? Ab teen second mein thare dimaag mein maara idea na aaya, toh chauthhe second mein tera Chautha kar doongi mein.” (Now what should I do? If your brain doesn’t grasp my idea in the next three seconds, I will conduct your ‘Chautha’—the traditional fourth-day 26 August 2013

ritual of mourning after a person’s funeral—in the fourth second.)

The show got the laughs and was a runaway success. Seven years and almost 1,000 episodes later, Chandramukhi Chautala, played by Kavita Kaushik, still has her audience spellbound. She is back, though, after a gap of a few months.

Earlier this year, Kavita had quit the show after 900-plus episodes to try something else (she did a show called Tota and Maina, where she plays a relatively meek character). In the interim, the FIR story took a 20 year leap, with Chandramukhi’s daughter Jwalamukhi Chautala, played

by Chitrashi Rawat, taking on the tough lady cop act. But, with a new lead character, it didn’t have the same appeal. Now that the original cop is back on air, as billboards in Mumbai scream, the show’s brains trust has conveniently revoked the time leap: it was just the dream of a constable, it turns out.

The episode that marks Chandramukhi’s return has her standing on two bikes to the tune of a soundtrack that goes, ‘Papiyon ko peetne mein degree milee isse… Chandramukhi Chautala, she’s back.’ She proceeds to apprehend a biker gang in the rain as she breaks into a song and beats them all up dressed in a new uniform that is tighter—and sexier—than before. She hasn’t lost any of her chutzpah either, and her Haryanvi accent is as grungy as ever.

I

meet Kavita at her home in Malad and we chat beside the swimming pool of her housing complex. She looks different from her onscreen avatar. Chandramukhi is sexy and strong, Kavita’s sexiness is softer. She is dressed in a white kurta and palazzo pants, and looks relaxed on her day off. Once she starts talking, you can see where Chandramukhi gets her charm from.

“The [TV Rating Points] picked up as soon as I came in,” she says, “We got our highest ever TRP score recently—1.5. You don’t go to a Chinese restaurant to eat tandoori, right? FIR means Chandramukhi Chautala, no one else will do.”

Kavita remembers how she got the call to audition for the show. In Mumbai for an acting career after pursuing a philosophy course at Delhi University, she was doing character roles in such

26 August 2013

Balaji shows as Kahaani Ghar Ghar ki, Kutumb and Kesar when Sab TV asked her to audition for the role of a Maharashtrian female cop. “When I reached there, I told them ‘Why don’t we try something different?’ There were many Maharashtrians on TV anyway.

They asked me to show them a sample.

I did. And Chandramukhi Chautala was born.”

Kavita says the inspiration for the character is her father Dinesh Chandra Kaushik, who was a cop. “I actually wanted to play a cop because my father had once told me that he wanted to see me in uniform once in his life,” she says. “The whole accent, mannerisms [and so on] are copied from my dad. He is Rajasthani but worked in Delhi and used to talk to his colleagues in Haryanvi. So when I say, ‘Balakon darwaja kholo,’ I am just talking the way my dad talks at home. In the beginning, I used to improvise a lot. I would

“Many women come up to me and say ‘My husband loves you and wants to watch your show all the time. We don’t like that’,” Kavita says with a smile get dialogues in Hindi and I would translate them.”

It’s rare to see a female cop with that kind of clout, even rarer to see a Haryanvi female cop in a sexy uniform.

Chandramukhi Chautala breaks stereotypes all the while but keeps it self-effacing and funny. “FIR works because it experimented and went against the pattern of the saas-bahu show,” she says.

In an earlier interview, Kavita had said that she made the police uniform sexy much before Salman Khan did. And sexy it is. “Have you seen the new one? It’s like stitched onto me,” she says. “But we don’t believe in showing flesh.” The uniform, and the lady in it, has got some famous fans. She laughs, “Recently, Salim [Khan] uncle called me for lunch at their home as they all love the show. Salman was there and he was watching me wolf down mutton and roti, and he was like, ‘You should work out. Dikhta hai you don’t work out.’ All I do now is eat healthy.”

She has many other male fans. Ask those who watch and chances are they would all agree that Chandramukhi checks all boxes. “Many women come up to me and say ‘My husband loves you and wants to watch your show all the time. We don’t like that’,” she says with a smile. “But Chandramukhi is not trying to be sexy. It’s a [strategic] decision to keep her like that. She is naturally sexy, but she is not the type who will flirt with your husband.”

Male attention, however, does not bother her. “I have always had a lot of it, so I can handle it. But a stalker recently came up to my building and that was unnerving. There are many who propose marriage, but I am commitment phobic yaar.”

As one might suspect, she doesn’t have many female friends in town. “In this industry, one can’t have friends,” she says, “People are jealous of your success and that’s just negative energy.”

Moving to cinema is not one of Kavita’s big aspirations. “TV is huge,” she says. “I am so proud of who I am on TV. I just ran into a fan at the mall the other day who watches my show even in the US. They wait for it. One of them started weeping on seeing me. It’s heartening.”

That doesn’t mean she will never work in films. She recently performed an item number in the upcoming remake of Zanjeer and will also appear in a movie called Democracy Pvt Ltd opposite Deepak Dobriyal.

K

avita’s fame is palpable. On her

Twitter account (@Iamkavitak; 8,000 followers) people leave messages such as ‘textbook definition of d word ‘gorgeous’ :-) for me d only celeb in d world who matters..’ and ‘Mne toh Kk aapki DP ko apne mobile ki Background Picture m set kr rkha h...bcoz u looks very charming and lovely Ever. Love u kk.’

Despite all the male attention, she remains single. “I am very high maintenance,” she says. “I may want to stay in a tent as I trek, but it has to be a luxury tent.

A guy will really have to look after me and handle my moods. But if I had to put it in one line, I want a guy who looks like he’s going to pick up an axe and cut a tree,” she laughs. Spoken like Chandramukhi Chautala. n open www.openthemagazine.com 39

between the sheets

Surviving the Scramble It’s inevitable, the parental panic over getting a match sonali khan

L

ast week was spent in anticipation of Eid. I was to fly to the capital and spend the weekend with two close friends and their mothers. I couldn’t wait for the inevitable passing out on the sofa, basking in the warm afterglow of calorific excesses. This year, however, the celebrations were going to be a tad sombre—Aunty 1 was recuperating after a stint of stomach infections.

I expected to find her huddled in bed. Instead, I found her in the study behind a computer screen, large glasses perched on her nose, expression arranged in a manner that meant business. I’d seen that look before. This is the day a girl must bid a teary farewell to life as she knows it.

I knew I’d hit bullseye as I leaned over to hug Aunty 1.

Staring at me from the computer screen was the blindingly white smile of profile number SH-Fibonacci sequence-007 on Lifetimesaathi.com or some such.

Later that night, the three of us compared notes. Four candidates stand out in our collective memory.

The Wardrobe Malfunction Match: Aunty 1 had been making noises about this ‘cultured boy’, so my friend wasn’t surprised when a meeting was sprung on her. After several hours of being plucked, scrubbed, waxed, and polished like a New Zealand apple at the fanciest parlour in the little town, 300 km from Delhi, where the boy lived, my minimal-clothing-activist friend was forced into a sequinned salwar kameez and presented before the firing squad. Despite his constantly beaming parents, an awkward three-second meeting at a separate table to ‘understand each other’ and the crispy samosas, my friend’s first meeting was an epic failure. Primarily because she couldn’t stop staring at his crotch, wondering how the family jewels were going to survive the death-grip of his jeans pant.

The Stalker: Learning from Aunty 1’s experience, Aunty 2 decided to play it safe. Handing out my friend’s number like candy was deemed better than driving for eight hours only to return, empty-handed. Of the telephonic gems, one left a mark. After a hi-hello-how-are-you chat on Whatsapp, my friend disappeared for a meeting. Two hours later, she came back to a phone groaning under the weight of 37 eloquent messages that ranged from ‘???’ to ‘hellllloooooo, you there……??????’, a Facebook friend request, Twitter follow and testimonial request on LinkedIn. Totally not creepy.

The Neil Nitin Mukesh of Grooms: In the days my parents still hoped I would give up on radical ideas like compatibility and conversation, and settle for the far more important ‘same-to-same community’, I was introduced to a boy with a cute butt. He was so fair and lovely that next to each other, we looked like the before and after in a fairness cream commercial. After sporadic bursts of conversation, we met for a drive late one night. Imagine his shock when he realised that Marry.com or whatever had yielded a tatty girl in pyjamas, unkempt hair and big glasses. We discussed chewing gum and the Falcon system of fraud management before he beat a hasty retreat.

The Revolving Doors: Existence on a matrimonial site follows a graph. There comes a point when parents don’t just hit, they collapse on the panic button. Customer service executives are summoned, and silver, gold and diamond packages are booked, with promises of ‘guaranteed responses, verified contacts and highlighted profiles’. The downside is that the system vomits out the same suitable matches for your entire friends circle. Worse, it works both ways. Three minutes of silence as you cringe while imagining grown men comparing notes on ‘the girl with the big hair.’

But there’s a silver lining. This scramble to nab suitable matches for their kids turns most technology averse parents into internet ninjas. My mother, who until last year routinely called me up to talk her through the process of attaching files to emails, can now dig up sites so obscure, Columbus would be proud. When popular sites failed to yield ‘suitable’ boys, new profiles from Ristonkasansaar and Bemysoulmate et al started landing in my inbox. Google Docs with cross-referenced pie charts, graphs and maps were created and edited by elders across the country, as eligible bachelors were systematically vetted by the management. In importance, this holy document now rivals the photographs that were salvaged during Partition. Every now and then, when I hear mum sighing heavily behind the computer, I know that a meticulous aunty has struck yet another desirable name off the marriage market. n

She wondered how his family jewels were going to survive the death-grip of his jeans

40 open

Sonali Khan was holding on to her virtue, and then she fell in love...with several men.

She drinks whisky, not Cosmopolitan 26 August 2013

true Life

Hail This Auto

63

O p e n s pa c e

Shah Rukh Khan Deepika Padukone Aamir Khan

62

n p lu

Chennai Express The Conjuring

61 Cinema reviews

BlackBerry Q5 Rado HyperChrome Court Collection Lemon Mobiles Aspire Full HD

60

Tech & style

Length of Pregnancies Autism and Labour Yawn Effect on Dogs

54

Science

Meena Kumari’s Love Imran Khan Grows Up

49

cinema

My Granddad’s Car

46

p h o t o s t o ry

India’s Tryst With Destiny The Cuckoo’s Calling

books

Rejecting Home

42 64

mindspace rituals of identity My Granddad’s Car 49

true life

ritesh uttamchandani

Rejecting Home

Troubled by the spectres haunting Europe, Claudia Richter is on selfimposed exile in India

I

n Anglo-Saxon England and in ancient Greece, and I presume in other traditional societies, exile was a punishment worse than death.

Bereft of kinsmen and family, the exiled protagonists in the Anglo-Saxon elegies The Wanderer and The Seafarer, for example, traverse a cold and hostile world, lonely and sad. Plunging his oars into the ice-cold sea, the Wanderer’s sole companion is sorrow,

while the Seafarer in a similar situation watches a flock of sea birds that bring back memories of happier days in the warm company of friends and kinsmen.

If you start to feel lonely and sad amongst your own kin, then something has to be wrong. It could be that you are depressed, in which case it would be appropriate to see a therapist, figure out what’s wrong, and may26 august 2013

be embrace spiritual practices or physical exercises that help stabilise the psyche, and then get on with your life.

If this depression, however, is not only linked to your personal history and childhood, but to a larger social climate, problem-solving becomes more challenging. What can an individual do if the sense of hopelessness one experiences is actually a collective issue, and owed to external factors that the 26 August 2013

individual cannot really influence?

Speaking to a well-meaning ‘aunty’ about my experiences with German institutions, she encouraged me to stay within the system and get over my negative feelings and experiences. To support her views, she quoted a piece of wisdom from the Indian spiritual tradition: ‘If you want to change something in the world, you have to change.’

Well, there are two ways of interpreting this. The correct way, I believe, is to say that any change in the exterior world starts from within. As I understand it, this means that if you start being true to yourself and your values and begin to act differently in the world, the world around you will be affected by it, and will be forced to configure itself in response to your different attitude. What she seemed to imply, however, was more to the extent of saying that I should change my attitude so that I could tolerate a situation that made me suffer. Perhaps it is a radical way to put it, but to my mind this equals telling someone who is being raped that she should try to enjoy the rape. I don’t think this is what the sages meant.

Long before this encounter, I had decided to follow other advice I had come across during a visit to the Kabbalah Center in New York many years ago, which in a way corresponds to the above-mentioned quote from the Indian tradition, as I understand it: ‘If you realise that you’re in an unhappy relationship, get out!’ I chose exile in India to recover, rethink, rejuvenate and re-energise, and perhaps to catch a clearer sight of the spectres haunting the home zone, although it is only now that I am even in the mood to think about my home zone again.

Eight months ago, all I wanted was to get out. India was an obvious destination, as I have always wanted to come back for longer ever since my first visit in 1996 as a 19-year-old backpacker. Many of the things I dislike about Western modernity somehow seemed not quite as bad over here. Why should I spend so much negative energy on critical analyses when I could just go and live in another world, where in-

teresting things pre-modern and nonWestern were still around? Of course there are other problems here, as my Indian friends never cease to point out, but these left aside, it turned out to be the perfect place to feel free, disconnect from all the things that bothered me, and press the reset button.

Upon my arrival in Mumbai, I found that I was not the only European who had chosen to shift to India for a while.

It was a completely different crowd from the kind I had encountered here 15 years ago. Instead of hippies, there were hipsters, young professionals and entrepreneurs. Not all of them are taking refuge from Europe, as I was to find out. The younger ones who had just left college were simply excited about the opportunity to explore the world, expand their horizons, and yes, pimp up their CVs. The decreased value of Bachelor and Masters degrees after the reform of higher education in Europe has left these youngsters with a sense that formal education is not everything, and certainly no guarantee of a job, which is why they choose to take life into their own hands. Work experience abroad, especially in a country with a rising economy like India, will make them more attractive in the labour market, they believe.

Others in their mid-thirties like myself are a bit more sceptical and perhaps more perceptive of the alarming undercurrents of recent developments in the political and social arena in Europe. The euro crisis crystallising in the collapse of the economy of Greece, once the cradle of European culture, has left many people uncertain whether politicians of mainstream parties are really capable of managing this grand EU project that was set up with the promise to give us a better Europe. Not that Europe was in such a rotten state that it needed a complete makeover, really. Or was it?

At least before the introduction of the euro, Spanish youth did not have to leave their country to work. Central Athens did not look like a war zone, and people did not shout slogans of hatred against the German Chancellor, and represent her with a swastika and open www.openthemagazine.com 43

a toothbrush moustache. And the middle classes constituting the majority of the populations in Europe were not struggling to make ends meet, as they are now. What’s more, the European people were never really asked whether they wanted the EU. It was shoved down their throats with slogans like ‘open borders’ and ‘multi-culturalism’, against which, of course, there is nothing to say. Unfortunately, however, the concept of multi-culturalism is beginning to look like a mono-culture designed by bureaucrats in Brussels, who pay themselves astronomical salaries for restructuring and centralising everything from educational systems to the size and shape of tomatoes.

What seems to be emerging is not a better Europe, but a more totalitarian Europe, and the cultural destruction of a truly multi-cultural continent by political leaders and bankers who do not appear to have much culture in them in the first place.

Apart from a failing EU project, other things also make you wonder. The NSA surveillance scandal revealed that in Germany, up to 60 million private emails, text messages and phone calls were scanned daily by the US government, making Germany by far the most targeted country in all of Europe.

If you grow up being taught that the US is your friend, role-model and saviour, this feels a bit odd. As if all this was not enough, just recently, Harald Schumann, prize-winning journalist of Spiegel TV, resigned and made it unmistakably clear in an interview that in Germany, freedom of press is not common practice. Not that we hadn’t guessed it already, but it is now confirmed that there is media censorship in a Western democratic country.

My own research proposals on Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung, who is considered ‘taboo’ up to the point that he is completely absent in any theoretical discourse in the humanities, were submitted to German research foundations and backed by letters from the most respected scholars in my field, but were rejected twice—not unexpectedly—for reasons that sounded biased rather than informed. I concluded that truly interdisciplinary and original thinking is not really wanted in this ever more bureaucratised academic environment, even if any call for research proposals issued by the EU calls for exactly this.

44 open

Luckily I have now managed to create other options for myself, but I do feel for all those highly gifted people who have set all their cards on this career and will be spending their lives as intellectuals who are not meant to use their intellect for truly relevant questions.

Apart from these political issues of sorts, other developments in society are not exactly uplifting either. A friend, who has been working as a kindergartner in Berlin for 20 years, tells me that he has never witnessed so much insecurity among parents when it comes to raising children. This is a kindergarten in the bourgeois neighbourhood of Berlin-Schoeneberg,

If you start to feel

lonely and sad amongst your own kin, then something

has to be wrong.

What can an individual do if the sense of

hopelessness one experiences is actually a collective issue, and owed

to external factors that the individual cannot really inf luence?

where parents are fairly educated and well-to-do. Nevertheless, they do not know what values to teach their offspring, and seem to be incapable of setting boundaries and giving guidelines.

I also came across a survey that stated that among the world’s industrial countries, Germany’s youth was the saddest, despite relative economic well-being. Now, I am probably the last person to blindly follow statistics, but on my last trip to Goa, I had a conversation with a restaurant owner when he spotted other Germans walking on

the beach. I asked him: “But how do you know they’re German?” His reply: “They look sad.”

Is Germany really that sad? If so, I don’t know how much of it could be owed to the results of EU policies, the challenges of modern life in an industrialised nation, or the psychological long-term effects of war guilt which still affect everyone who grows up in this country, or perhaps some other cultural factor resulting in lower emotional intelligence and sensitivity, which I have come to think about especially since coming to India.

The situation is confusing indeed, and it will take some more time to understand what is happening in Europe. Meanwhile, I want to thank my host country and its people for being so kind and welcoming, and for not giving me any reason whatsoever to feel like the Wanderer on a wintry sea. I have found new friends, whose warmth, compassion and sensitivity keeps astonishing me; I enjoy the refreshingly different aesthetics of the environment, especially a seashore with black ravens and plastic hanging in the trees, which at low tide looks better than many an art installation in any Western museum.

I am pleased like a child when the rickshawallah takes a short cut on the wrong side of the street. And it simply feels great to be in a country where one of the most ancient civilisations of the world is still alive, where millions of people sing cleansing prayers to a river every single evening, and have done so for thousands of years, long before it got polluted. It fills me with new hope to see young entrepreneurs succeed with socially and environmentally responsible projects, and to witness a country known for its problems with corruption display more integrity than any Western country when it comes to big pharma companies (I am referring to the decision of the Supreme Court of India in the case of Novartis in April this year).

Coming from a place that takes pride in being ‘poor but sexy’ (Berlin), I am impressed but also slightly uneasy about the wealth and money-chasing I see around me. And I am also beginning to feel that I might have something to contribute to a ‘modern’ India that is looking for alternative cultural choices beyond tradition and mindless consumerism. n 26 august 2013

Books A Class Apart While JK Rowling satirised small-town Britain in her last novel, she mocks London’s rich in this whodunnit DIVYA GUHA

cuckoo’s calling

JK Rowling as Robert Galbraith sphere | 449 pages | Rs 599

J

K Rowling’s pseudonymous-

ly-written crime thriller, Cuckoo’s Calling, is a book about misfortune, fame and survival in London.

Rowling’s observations are darker and sadder than in her previous book, Casual Vacancy. Her prose is literary but unassuming and remains faithful to her fundamental writing style where she never veers too far noir-ward.

And like all Rowling’s books, it begins with death when a promising young model, Lula Landry, falls off her Mayfair balcony. Adopted, mixed race and mixed-up, everyone thinks the ‘troubled’ model had jumped.

Lula’s lawyer brother, John Bristow, hires down-at-heel private detective Cormoran Strike to investigate.

Strike is an attractive creation. He is a rugged, blue-eyed, masculine, hairy and bulky war veteran who lost half a leg in Afghanistan but can still fight— the physical crippling being the most objective of his losses. As several of his wounds are to the heart, in times of trouble, he seeks oblivion by drinking copious quantities of a Cornish ale called Doom Bar in one of Central London’s many public houses.

We know Strike possesses sex appeal because his soon-to-be-married secretary, Robin, can barely veil her infatuation with him. Strike cannot afford to employ Robin, but is too generous to turn her away without work in recession-hit London. We also know that this amputee with a heart of gold looks good, because once when he scrubs up, puts on his only Italian suit, he unexpectedly seduces a supermodel. He is a character that can be richly augment-

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ed if a ‘Galbraith’ series does develop.

Rowling’s social and ethical preoccupations are clear throughout the narrative. Class remains the lens through which all her dramatis personae are seen. Strike survived an unconservative childhood, growing up with his ‘supergroupie’ mum who, like Lula, died suddenly. He grew up with a nonfamily littered with scores of half-siblings and a famous rock star father whom he has met twice in his life.

Lula, born of a White woman and a Black father of uncertain identity, is similarly dislocated, and though adopted by a rich family, she feels lost ‘growing up black in a white family’.

Like many modern crime detectives,

Set in post-recession London, this whodunnit might have it all, but would I read it if it weren’t for Rowling? Sadly, not so readily Strike’s personal crises form the basis of his sense of right and wrong.

Whereas in Casual Vacancy Rowling mocks the pettiness of small-town Britain, here she makes us laugh at London’s rich—superannuated, Valium-addicted, dying Lady Yvette Bristow, a Chelsea grand dame; oversexed, wife-beating producer Frank Bestigui; cuckolded Cyprian May, Lula’s uncle, whom we meet in a luxury restaurant, dropping in unexpectedly on his unfaithful wife who is discussing doomed infatuations and affairs over an expensive, and mostly liquid, lunch with her venal sister, the perpetually inebriated Tansy. Strike is newly out of a committed relationship,

shown battling memories of misspent years cohabiting with his vituperative, rich ex-girlfriend in her expensive Holland Park maisonette who has dropped him for a wealthy socialite— her rapid re-engagement announced in The Times by her parents.

In this book, British society is full of people with money who are ridiculous and unpleasant, while those without are often pathetic and scrounging; Black people are untrustworthy; and England is an island where mutual suspicion between the races and classes is rife. And there is Rowling’s deep sympathy for those who suffer the pain of lovelessness, regardless of race or social standing, which makes this book especially moving.

This tapestry is set against the backdrop of an ineffectual Metropolitan Police Service, referred to as ‘the Met’ and never by its glamorous metonym Scotland Yard, much eulogised in British popular culture. And in the wake of a Conservative government bent on making cuts in public spending, Rowling emphasises the importance of another bureaucracy, the national health service, where the rich and the poor are treated equally—and where Lula and her ‘hobo’ best friend, Rochelle, meet at group therapy.

At the end, how must a crime novel be judged? By your reaction at discovering who the killer is and how ghoulish his psychopathy, and how much of an adventure it was to find him, or by the book’s characters, its social and psychological themes? Set in post-recession London, this whodunnit might have it all, but would I read it if it weren’t Rowling’s? Sadly, not so readily, and one wonders if writing under a false name was a good or gratifying idea if the author was indeed out to measure the impact of her fame on sales vis-a-vis her gift as a writer. n open www.openthemagazine.com 45

Books Tall Tales Hoping to ‘debunk’ myths about India’s growth, Bhagwati and Panagariya spin some fairy tales of their own Hartosh singh Bal

india’s tryst with destiny

By Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya collins business | 284 pages | Rs 599

A

mong those who think that on the whole liberalisation in India has been for the better—and I certainly do—there are two ways to approach what has ensued. One is to believe that liberalisation has come with its attendant problems, some of them severe enough to raise serious questions about our developmental priorities and the need to refocus government efforts to ameliorate them. The other, however politely framed, is to dismiss all criticism as the work of Left loonies, overlook all contrary evidence, and tailor facts to suit their arguments.

Having invested so much of their academic career in promoting global trade, Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya have written a book that is as good an example of Panglossian economics as any you will find. It boasts of ‘debunking myths that undermine progress and addressing new challenges’ when it does nothing of the sort. All the book does is set up straw men and proceed to knock them down, while failing to address many essential criticisms of growth in post-liberalisation India.

Since it is easy to cherry pick examples, let me be guided by Panagariya on where to start with this book. In a recent interview, when Shekhar Gupta asked him to “talk about a couple of your favourite myths that you have mentioned in your book”, Panagariya said, “One of my favourite ones is that when we say poverty has come down and growth did help 46 open

the poor, it immediately comes down to this—that socially disadvantaged groups have not benefited. It turns out to be false. When you do the numbers, you see steady decline in the poverty rates for both Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. There is this widespread belief that because the socially backward are out of the mainstream economy, nothing has happened to them. That is wrong.”

It is an invitation to look at that section in their book—Myth 3.3: Reforms have bypassed, even hurt, socially disadvantaged groups. In support of this myth, Bhagwati and Panagariya quote a submission by the National

The utter lack of self-doubt as they traipse from myth to myth suggests a problem not just of attitude but of training. It seems equity arguments just do not seem to permeate through to their conscience Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) to the House of Commons of the UK Parliament and a piece by Praful Bidwai. For a myth that is believed to be widespread, that is a rather limited set of formulations to depend on. Surely there would have been more credible criticisms that deserved their attention. And then it turns out that they need this exact formulation to be able to assert that ‘sustained growth alongside liberalising reforms has reduced poverty not just among the better-off castes but across all broadly defined groups’. They then go

on to specifically focus on Scheduled Tribes and conclude that ‘the evidence of the decline in poverty among the Scheduled Tribes is quite unequivocal’.

In other words, all that these esteemed men are interested in showing is that there has been some decline in poverty during the period of liberalisation. They are not interested in debunking any claims that would suggest that the decline in poverty has slowed down drastically among Scheduled Tribes after liberalisation or that reforms have largely bypassed them. It is no wonder that they had to depend on the NCDHR and Praful Bidwai to provide an absurd formulation that they can knock down.

In doing so, they cite some data that speaks for itself: ‘Mukim and Panagariya (2012) calculate the poverty ratios by social groups for the expenditure surveys conducted by the NSSO…For the Scheduled Tribes, the ratio fell from 64.4 per cent in 1983 to 51.2 per cent in 1993-94 and to 46.3 in 2004-05.’ Thus, their own data suggests that the poverty ratio among STs, which declined by 13.3 per cent in the decade preceding liberalisation, declined only by 4.8 per cent in the first decade of liberalisation. Not only that, the percentage decline of the poverty ratio among STs in the five years from 1983 to 1987-88 was greater than for the entire first decade of liberalisation. In fact, by their estimates, if India had managed the 1980s rate of decline among STs in the next two decades of liberalisation, we would be looking at ST poverty ratios in the low 20s. Since STs are by far the most socially disadvantaged group in the country on most counts, it is safe to say this would have resulted in a sharply better overall poverty ratio than what exists today.

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str new/reuters

shutting them out The growth model that the authors favour ignores the plight of India’s most disadvantaged

When we talk of STs, we are not talking of a small number, we are talking of 104 million people. By Panagariya’s own calculations, a population larger than that of Egypt, Germany, Iran or the UK has been largely bypassed by liberalisation. What Bhagwati and Panagariya refuse to face up to is that while STs have benefitted marginally, they would have gained far more even in the stilted paradigm of growth of the 1980s. In an entire chapter, ‘Reforms and their Impact on Growth and Poverty’, there is almost no acknowledgment of this fact, but at the very end of the chapter when they discuss the impact of trade openness on poverty, this becomes blindingly obvious. They conclude the chapter by stating that according to the same Mukim and Panagariya paper, ‘one or more measures have had a statistically significant and favourable impact on poverty levels among the Scheduled Castes and non-Scheduled Castes in rural and urban regions and in both regions taken together. As regards the Scheduled Tribes, they find a statistically significant effect of openness on poverty in urban areas only’. Of the 104 million 26 August 2013

STs in India, 94 million live in rural areas. In plain language, what they have stated is that the opening up of the economy has had an impact on poverty levels of every section of Indian society but for those who are worst off.

Since this suggests increasing inequality, you would expect that this rather strong observation would merit some discussion in their chapter on ‘Reforms and Inequality’. It comes up briefly and they state that ‘critics often assert that the income differences between Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes on one hand and non-Scheduled Castes on the other have gone up during the years of rapid growth. But in a comprehensive analysis, Hnatkovska, Lahiri and Paul (2012) show that such claims are not supported by empirical evidence… Using EmploymentUnemployment Survey data from the NSS rounds conducted in 1983, 198788, 1993-94, 1999-2000 and 2004-05, they show wages of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have been converging with those of non-Scheduled Castes since 1983’. Considering that almost 50 per cent of rural ST households—the vast majority of all ST

households—were self-employed even as of the 2009-2010 NSS, this conclusion based on wage earnings is a non-sequitur.

The rest of the chapter on inequality does not dwell on STs, but rather uses one of the favourite tools of economists to dispel claims about widening inequality—the Gini coefficient. Noneconomists intimidated by mathematics are easily silenced when these two economists cite that the change in the coefficient post-liberalisation has been insignificant. As a non-economist with some understanding of the mathematics they use, let me just illustrate what this coefficient actually measures and why it is largely irrelevant to the discussion. If you earn Rs 10,000 a month and your boss earns Rs 50,000 and you both get a 20 per cent hike and your income goes up to Rs 12,000 and his goes up to Rs 60,000, this makes no difference to the Gini coefficient of a society comprising you and your boss despite the fact that the gap between your incomes has gone up from Rs 40,000 to Rs 48,000. Another way to look at it is to realise that of the Rs 12,000 of wealth generated in the year, you get open www.openthemagazine.com 47

only Rs 2,000 while your boss gets Rs 10,000 and this is considered an equitable distribution of wealth by economists who rely on this coefficient. It is another matter that goods can never actually be bought in terms of relative measures of wealth. In a society like ours where STs have very low incomes to begin with, and a large population, even a very slight absolute increase in their incomes can ensure an unchanged Gini coefficient even when the top one or two per cent or so add an obscene amount of wealth to their incomes.

Given that their attempts to dismantle Panagariya’s favourite myth is so ludicrous, we can go on to other examples from the book. My favourite is the section where they deal with malnourishment in India and descend into biology that is even sloppier than the mathematics they have used in the example cited above. Stung by the oft repeated comparison that the percentage of stunted and underweight children in India is higher than even subSaharan Africa, they cite a National Family Health Survey of ‘elite’ Indian children which finds that even among these, the proportion of the stunted is over 15 per cent, far higher than the expected 2.25 per cent. They then conclude that the explanation lies in genetics—Indian children are genetically smaller on average.

Unlike economics, science requires a careful examination of facts before arriving at a final conclusion. Bhagwati and Panagariya lazily consider one other alternative, dismiss it and go on to pronounce on the genetics of a subcontinent. A recent working paper by Seema Jayachandran and Rohini Pande makes short shrift of their conclusions: ‘In this paper, we use 27 Sub-Saharan African and one Indian Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) conducted since 2004 to demonstrate the importance of parental preferences within the class of environmental explanations. We find a much greater height drop-off for later-born children in India than in Africa: Height-for-age is actually higher in India than in Africa for first-born children. The Indian height disadvantage materialises for 48 open

second-born children and increases for third and higher order births, at which point Indian children have a mean height-for-age lower than that of African children by 0.35 standard deviations of the worldwide distribution. We see the same pattern (a much steeper birth order gradient in child height in India than in Africa) when the estimation is limited to betweensibling variation. Thus, birth order is not just proxying for family background differences between smaller and larger families.’

‘This birth order pattern suggests that the prevalence of malnutrition in India is not an artefact of using child height to measure malnutrition rates (Panagariya, 2013). Genotypes do not vary with birth order, so a simple genetic predisposition to be short likely would not generate the very significant birth order effects we find.’

It doesn’t even matter whether Jayachandran and Pande’s own explanations are correct or not, their observations suggest that the world is a far more complicated place than Bhagwati and Panagariya can imagine.

The utter lack of self-doubt as they traipse from myth to myth suggests a problem not just of attitude but of training. It seems equity arguments just do not seem to permeate through to their conscience.

There are two good reasons for this.

One stems from the nature of their subject. If Sikhs, for example, had cited the treatment they received in 1983 when their vehicles were singled out for search and they were harassed by Bhajan Lal’s Haryana cops, as an example of lack of equity, an economist would be unable to factor this in. In any calculation of equity for 1983, all an economist would consider is that many Sikhs owned cars while most of their countrymen didn’t. The kind of inequity that cannot be quantified is treated as besides the point by such economists, which is why in Gujarat the riots of 2002 are ignored when discussing development, as if the right to physical protection lies outside the purview of development.

It is this absurd view of the world that led Panagariya in the interview

with Shekhar Gupta to articulate this gem: Gupta: “In conclusion, tell me one thing that you will say today to Dr Manmohan Singh and to Narendra Modi.”

Panagariya: “To Dr Singh, get back to reforms. I think we have waited long enough. To Narendra Modi, I would say, don’t lose sight of it. Once you get into power, it is very easy to.”

Gupta: “Will you also tell him to defocus himself from the puppies and the burkhas?”

Panagariya: “Yes, when this happens, it doesn’t help people like us who admire him.”

Gupta: “And, you do admire him?”

Panagariya: “Yes, for all that he has done for Gujarat and for the policies he has advocated. I have written about it.

But I think the puppies and burkhas, I can really do without.”

For Panagariya, puppies and burkhas are minor blemishes on a personality who has brought growth to Gujarat. Inequity does not even fit into this economist’s worldview. He does not even pay attention to the fact that growth has treated Muslims in Gujarat exactly as Modi’s language and administration has—by sidelining them.

This brings us to the second point.

Even when inequity can be measured, as is true of Muslims in Gujarat, economists such as these are so insistent on arguing for growth that they choose to overlook the evidence. In March 2012, the Planning Commission estimated that while Gujarat has an urban poverty ratio of almost 18 per cent, compared with almost 21 per cent for the country as a whole, 42.4 per cent of Muslims in urban Gujarat are poor, compared with 33.9 per cent of Muslims in urban India overall.

This takes us back to Panagariya’s favourite myth. In Narendra Modi’s Gujarat, as with the state’s Muslims, the evidence shows that STs have been left behind, as they have been by liberalisation in general. The Modi growth model, which is in the end what Bhagwati and Panagariya are quietly pitching for throughout this book, is a form of social Darwinism, a culling of the most disadvantaged. n 26 august 2013

photo essay My Granddad’s Car Two friends from immigrant families in the UK explore their cultural heritage through expeditions to bring their grandfathers’ cars to their adoptive country Karl ohiri: an artefact from nigeria All that is left of my granddad’s memory is a photograph and the car he once owned. When I was younger and went home to my granddad’s village, I saw an old battered car, more a rusty shell as all of its interiors were missing and the wheels gone. I wondered why the people in the village had not got rid of it. When I asked who it belonged to, they told me it was my granddad’s car.

With the last photograph of my granddad slowly fading, I decided to try and preserve the last artefact that represents his existence. The act of bringing the car’s remains to the UK and merging my ancestral past with my present life in London is an exploration of the importance of personal history, belonging and migration.

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Sayed hasan: a gestalt gift from Pakistan I was always fascinated by the car that would pick me up from the airport every time I returned to Pakistan. It would take me through the city of Lahore to my village, Qilasattarshah. It was my granddad’s car, and although he never drove it, it was always driven in his name, Syed Zamir Hussain. The car became synonymous with family. I have seen it age and my sentimentality towards it has grown with time. Sitting in the front or back, squashed against my aunts, with cousins on my lap, laughing; broken down by the side of the road, driving past cops that have signalled the vehicle to pull over; sitting in silence as the conversation in a language I hardly understand evaded me. When I decided to bring it to the UK, I realised that the car had begun to symbolise more than a sum of its parts. n

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karl ohiri

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sayed hasan

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karl ohiri

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photos sayed hasan

The photographers’ goal is to park the two cars side-by-side in the UK, where they were born, but it has been an unpredictable journey. Both cars still await shipment, held up for reasons that reflect the politics and cultures of the countries they remain in. Ohiri’s car stands in the Port of Owerri at the mercy of corrupt officials and Hasan’s must go through a bewildering court case in Pakistan in order to be legitimately shipped to the UK. Their journey continues 26 August 2013

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CINEMA A Love Story In matters of the heart, actress Meena Kumari knew no restraints. When the young, inexperienced actor Dharmendra got his first film alongside her, he didn’t realise just how much it would impact his life Vinod Mehta One look at him and you knew he was a product of ‘asli ghee’ (pure ghee).

Dharmendra got his breaks—but alas he nearly made a disaster of them.

His first film was a total failure and in subsequent efforts he showed no discernible talent. Fortunately, Shola Aur Shabnam, although a box-office failure, was pleasantly noticed and got moderate praise from critics.

And then the best thing that ever happened to Dharmendra happened— he met my heroine, and his entire life from that day onwards took a different direction.

The film they were signed on together was called Purnima, and Dharmendra would go around asking, “What is Meenaji like?” He was petrified at the prospect of facing her in front of the camera. Cast opposite an established star, the novice is surrounded with handicaps. Having got his break he must on the VINO one hand prove himself in D MEH his own right, and on the othT MEE A er extract a quantum of reKUM NA spect from the established star.

A R I (My The C lassic heroine was too absorbed Biogr aphy an artiste for malice, but some of the others are known openly to interfere in the casting.)

At Purnima, therefore, Dharmendra was unsteady. He approached someone who had worked with my heroine for solDharmendra ace and advice. “It’s no joke,” said had no uncle in this man, “playing opposite Meena the cinema industry), he made a Kumari without letting her comdaily round of the studios hoping for a pletely overshadow you. She can outsale. What kept him going was his grit, class you without a line of dialogue, a stubborn persistence, a faith that fiwith a mere twitch of her lips, or nally he would be spotted. glance. If I were you, I would simply Incidentally, he knew nothing about go and touch her feet before facing the acting, neither did he look like Cary camera.” For a man who was already Grant. What he did have was an earthy, unsteady, this advice wasn’t much slightly primitive, woodcutter charm. help.

The Life and Time s

of India’s

VINOD

MEHT A

AK AS H O UM K K . BA ARNKIER

MEEN

Greates Meena Ku t Traged mari’s life ienne a chawl was no less ‘spe drama India’s big ctacularly unfit for hum tic than her mo gest screen vies. Born an living’ of seven ico ns. , she to suppor in She was put to wo came to be one Actress with her t her family, wo rk of in films n the Film debut as and marria at the age a lea far universa ge with one of the ding lady, had e Award for Bes a fair t lly Aur Ghula feted for landm era’s finest film-m ytale courtsh ip ark akers and followed m. Then came the performances wa s in by alcoholism a series of unfulfi gradual unravellin films like Sahib Bib g , and fin lled rela tionships of the marriage, i ally her death fro , m cirrhos the descent int Vinod Me o is of the hta liver. her death, ’s riveting acc ount of we eks Me after the goes bac ena Kuma rele k in born, and time to Meeta ase of her swan-s ri’s life begins wit wa ong Pak to eezah. He h she worke the flats and ma la Chawl in Da dar East, d, where she cremated the hospital wh nsions she lived in, wa ere in. Havin were clo g never me she died and the the studios where s se t the sta cemete sisters, her to her – her mu ch-malign r, Mehta talks to ry she was inlaw s, her col portrait ed husban all those lea of who d ‘unfairly a woman who car gues and co-stars Kamal Amroh i, her exploited – to create efu a picture and betray lly cultivated a comple the image that blend ed by her after all, of someon x ed with lovers already e anointed her on-screen per and lady luck’. It was her Hind sona. Th i cinema’s e media First pub had ‘great tra lish gedienne’ , revised edi ed in 1972, bar . ely six mo tio n com of the mo nths afte es with a st r legend of respected nam fresh introduction the star’s death, es in this Indian cin by ema to a Indian journalism the author – one new rea – and int dership. roduces a ` 199

Cover desi gn and illus www.har tration Pin percollin aki De s.co.in

FILM/BIO

GRAPH

A

round now (in the 1960s) a

name called Dharmendra was being bandied about. This man had come from Punjab to make a name for himself with the sort of determination one reads in storybooks. Not deterred by the fact that thousands with ambitions similar to his arrive in Bombay every month, he stuck to his resolve.

With worn soles, an empty stomach and no chance of nepotism (Mr 54 open

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26 August 2013

express archives

during their romance Dharmendra and Meena Kumari in a candid moment; and in the film Kaajal

A serious student of Hindi cinema, Dharmendra had his own personal list of favourites. My heroine occupied top place in this list. As a result, this particular novice approached Purnima with the right amount of humility and willingness to learn. “I had always been an ardent fan of Meenaji.

I used to see her pictures and worship her. It was my ambition to become an actor, and it was my dream to act opposite Meenaji.” The note of reverence in this statement is of consequence for it played an important part later on.

Face-to-face they came for the first time at Chandivili during outdoor shooting. “Naturally, I was a bit nervous and apprehensive. But when I was introduced to her, she was warm and friendly and welcomed me with kind encouragement. I was thrilled, happy and gratified.” My heroine on her part liked Dharmendra, I am told, at first sight. There is no confirmation whether he touched her feet, but there is confirmation that she said, “This boy will rise. He is not the routine entry.”

Coincidentally, at this particular moment of her life, Meena Kumari required a stable and devoted man: big and strong, someone on whom she could literally rest her head, and someone who was not too famous. One of Mr Dharmendra’s associates who 26 August 2013

watched this relationship flower is on record, “In the beginning it was primarily work between them. Meenaji would spend all her spare time to enact Dharmendra’s scenes for him. With patience and affection she would explain each and every detail of the shot, put him right when he did something unsuitably, make him practise his part until he was perfect and natural. She helped him correct his weak points,

Dharam then and still enjoys his booze; but it is a lie that he persuaded or pressured Meena to drink.

If anything, he was unhappy about her drinking and tried to stop her while developing his abilities. She inspired confidence in the uncertain youth. She was the stimulus.”

Two aspects deserve attention here.

One, Meena got a certain kick in picking up people struggling in the industry. These strugglers were invariably male and young. “She always liked having a few puppies around her,” was how someone close to my heroine put it. Two, ‘grooming and

correcting weak points’ had an ulterior motive. Really it was a ploy. Meena Kumari wished to engage the attention of this young man. She was too dignified and renowned an actress to make an open pass; therefore, by feigning professional interest she was initially able to spend time with Dharmendra without making her real intentions known to him or to others. Nothing wrong, just good gamesmanship...

Dharmendra was almost a daily visitor at Janki Kutir. Together they would open a bottle and spend a few hours.

These were the good times.

Now there is an impression that Dharam (as she used to call him) was responsible for encouraging her towards the bottle. They say she drank because of him, because he insisted.

Like all good Punjabis, Dharam then and still enjoys his booze; but it is a lie that he persuaded or pressured Meena to drink... If anything, he was unhappy about her drinking and tried to stop her. He nearly succeeded: while Dharam was around, Meena’s imbibing was restricted, once he left it was rampant. Dharam was everything she wanted then: honest, reliable, large, loving and comforting...

She saw a lot of him at work and after work. In 1964, my heroine was involved in five films and in four of these—Purnima, Chandan Ka Palna, Phool Aur Patthar, Kaajal—he was very much in the scenes.

And with great abandon did she love. Meena, to her eternal credit, was an honourably honest woman when it came to the affairs of the heart; and since she truly loved this Punjabi youth she saw no reason either to be ashamed or to keep it a secret.

At cocktail parties, at premieres, Meena openly showered affection on Dharam. Sometimes she would take his hand and the next day it would be in print. On one occasion, mischievously almost, she recited a love couplet from Ghalib which left no doubt in the audience’s mind about Mr Dharmendra’s position in her heart. n Extracted from Meena Kumari: The Classic Biography by Vinod Mehta, HarperCollins India open www.openthemagazine.com 55

CINEMA “I don’t view cinema as a high art form” Imran Khan grows himself up as an actor through trial, error and humour Nikhil Taneja

C

hocolate boy. Good-looking.

Romantic. Dreamy. Cute. Sweet.

These are the sort of words that an average cinegoer would use to describe Imran Khan. ‘Brave’ isn’t used much for him. Nor is ‘actor’. Yet there’s something odd about Khan’s filmography, as it stands today. His first release this year was Vishal Bhardwaj’s Matru Ki Bijli Ka Mandola. His second will be Milan Luthria’s Once Upon Ay Time in Mumbai Dobaara! Besides a Dharma Productions’ romcom, Khan has a film each lined up with Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra, Tigmanshu Dhulia and Vikramaditya Motwane.

Khan’s upcoming filmography reads like a list of some of the most anticipated films of next year—with some of the country’s finest directors. What have they spotted in Khan that the audience hasn’t? Or is the audience so used to correlating an actor’s looks with the scope of his acting ability that they’ve missed Khan’s risk-taking?

Take a closer look at his filmography; the only pattern that stands out is the distinct lack of one. At first glance, the number of romcoms he’s been in seems high. But Break Ke Baad and Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu, two of his lesser successes, were not your stereotypical Bollywood romcom fare. Putting these aside, along with the somewhat more mainstream Jaane Tu… Ya Jaane Na, I Hate Luv Storys and Mere Brother Ki Dulhan, you are left with Kidnap, Luck and Delhi Belly. These three films are all remarkably different from each other, and while one may call into question Khan’s acumen in picking the first two, one cannot blame him for not trying.

Talking to him, it becomes apparent he is one of the smartest actors of his generation—commendable in an industry where everyone would much rather be a ‘star’. Much like his celebrated uncle Aamir, Khan is a polite,

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well-spoken and intelligent interviewee. He gives elaborate, articulate and well-reasoned answers. Unlike his uncle, though, Khan never pauses to think before an answer. He has a clarity and honesty rare in Bollywood. He swears casually every now and then, and when he’s talking about something he’s obviously passionate about, he stammers a little. But once he gets into the groove, he speaks with an urbane and informal eloquence.

He’s mastered the art of conversing with journalists. You’d be prudent to think of it as part and parcel of the media game rather than as mere likeability. But even if it is a rehearsed act, it’s refreshing to meet an actor who is evidently aware of the trappings of Bollywood and doesn’t hesitate to say say so—without naming names or insulting an individual or a sensibility.

“I’ve become increasingly aware of this PR bubble that all of us—from the actors and directors to the editors and journalists—inhabit,” says Khan, off the bat. “We’ve all stepped inside this plastic bubble, and all of us are bouncing these crazy balls around, and we’re getting hit by them (chuckles). All of us are starting to behave and react based on what we see other people doing.”

“For example, I read an article in Bombay Times about an actor getting so many crores as a signing amount and I think, ‘Bhenchod! Mujhe kyun nahin mila?’ Or someone gets a big opening and my friend says to me, ‘Bro, tujhe aaj tak nahin mila!’ These articles may have been paid for by that guy to build up his image, but I go and sign a film with a director whose films I may not otherwise like so I can beat that guy. What I’m really doing is responding to a mirage. And I’m now working for a dishonest reason. That’s an easy trap to fall into, and you can’t fall into it.”

Khan employs another analo-

gy to explain the bubble further: “Everyone’s life on Facebook is awesome! There are photos of the best coffee you ever had, of your shiny new sunglasses, the best Saturday morning ever. When you are looking at that, you think, ‘Yaar, kya zindagi hai iski. Why is my life so boring?’ Now all they’ve really done is gone to a Costa Coffee and taken a picture, but they’ve made it an event, and you start reacting to that. But you have to pull out of this bubble and this rarefied air and get some actual air. The PR machinery needs to be fed and you will be amazed how most of it has sweet fuck-all to do with being an actor. So you have to follow your motivations and let go of these distractions.”

Khan’s own motivations are quite elementary: do the work that satisfies you and lets you sleep at night. Perhaps 26 August 2013

ritesh uttamchandani

star-shmar “The day you pat your own back and go, ‘Bro, well done,’ you are screwed”

that sounds a bit too simplistic coming from an actor who commands crores for endorsements and stars, along with Akshay Kumar and Sonakshi Sinha, in this year’s potential Independence Day blockbuster, Once Upon Ay Time In Mumbai Dobaara!, aimed steadfastly at those mythic ‘masses’, replete with action, item numbers and dialogues like ‘Agar main hero ban gaya, toh meri pehchaan bura maan jayegi (If I become a hero, my identity will take offence)’.

But then again, it may well be that simple, since Khan insists he stumbled into acting by chance. “It was always a short term plan,” he says. “It kind of snowballed. I’ve always wanted to be a writer-director, but I kept getting 26 August 2013

interesting offers, and I like this work too. So I’m choosing scripts based on straightforward logic—will I watch it?

For me, it’s just about doing work that I like with people I like. There is no grand strategy.”

Around 2005, Khan came to India from Los Angeles, where he studied screenwriting and direction at the New York Film Academy, looking for work as an assistant director or writer. He landed himself a meeting with a TV channel that produced an hour-long thriller once a week and narrated a story to them that they seemed to really like.

“After much back-thumping and hand shaking and finger snapping and ‘Awesome to meet a young guy like you, bro’, they said ‘thanks’ and promised to call back,” Khan recalls. “Two months went by, but they never called back.

And then one day a friend of mine who

was acting in that same project told me that one of the stories sounded similar to [the one] I had gone to them with.

When I saw the script, I was shocked.

They had converted my story into a full-fledged script and, forget giving me credit, they hadn’t even called me!”

Khan tried to get in touch with the gentlemen from the production house, but to no avail. Livid and frustrated, he didn’t know how he could possibly work in such a messed up system.

When Abbas Tyrewala offered him a lead role in his youthful, indie-ish romantic comedy Jaane Tu… Ya Jaane Na, he agreed so that “my name would have some recognition and nobody could ever steal a script from me again”.

It was always going to be difficult to pull out once he got into acting.

Especially for a cinephile like Khan, who got into the field just for the love open www.openthemagazine.com 57

of movies. “I remember sitting in this very room with my best friend and being blown away on so many different levels by Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels,” Khan reminisces, referring to the study-cum-lounge of his ancestral home, Nasir Hussain bungalow, named after his grandfather, the late legendary filmmaker.

“So when the script for Delhi Belly came into my hands, my heart started going, ‘dhak, dhak, dhak’... I couldn’t believe it was happening,” he laughs. “I was getting to be part of a movie that was emotionally and spiritually like Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels.

But I swear to God, when we were making it, not for a moment did I believe it was going to see the light of day. I believed in the movie, and I hoped it would find an audience, but I really didn’t think it would release. And then it did, and it worked. So when these things happen, you continue your journey and keep experimenting.”

Of course, all of this is easier said than done, and Khan has tasted as much failure as success. After the successful Jaane Tu.. Ya Jaane Na, Luck and Kidnap flopped miserably. Other risks he took down the road, like the quirky romcom Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu, in which—spoiler alert!—the girl and guy don’t end up together, or the political satire Matru Ki Bijli Ka Mandola, in which he plays a Haryanvi activist, didn’t quite pay off.

Critics’ reactions to his acting have, more often than not, been unflattering, to the extent of being hostile.

But Khan has learnt to be undeterred by box office results and critical flak, as long as he’s constantly working on improving himself. “Imagine if a film of mine fails, and I go on the sets of the next one I’m filming and ask the director to make it a comedy instead. Or if I read a puff piece in Cosmo in which a girl says my eyes are dreamy and I tell the director, ‘Bhenchod, eyes ka close-up le, I’m telling you, chicks dig my eyes!’

Here, of course, it’s very important for the director to be strong and tell the actor to hold course,” he laughs.

“NK Sharma, who trained me for Matru..., turned life coach to me in the middle. He told me that for one critic who writes bad [things] about me or my films, there are a hundred people who watch and like me and my films.

So if I’m giving weightage to the critic, I should give the exact same weightage to a member of the audience.”

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“At the same time, without being overly critical of myself, I keep asking, ‘What could I have done better?’

I mean, forget as just a creative person, but in any field, the day you pat your own back and go, ‘Bro, well done,’ you are screwed. That is the day you stop any kind of growth. For example, I love cooking and I cook a lot. After I’m done, I’m always asking everyone, ‘What do you think? Enough salt? Too spicy?’ That’s part of the entire process, man. You’ve got to keep doing that. You can’t sit back and be satisfied.”

Khan admits that, apart from training specifically for a movie, he’s learning to act by trial and error. He watches playback of his takes to see if he did alright, he watches other actors he’s working with and even actors on screen to understand the nuances they bring to their roles. He learns gestures from directors or picks them up from actors onscreen and pieces together his

“Imagine if my film fails and I ask the director of my next to make it a comedy. Or if I read a puff piece in Cosmo which says my eyes are dreamy and I tell the director, ‘Bhenchod, eyes ka close-up le, chicks dig my eyes” performances by working hard. “It’s like walking down a maze,” he says.

“Something doesn’t work out, and you hit a bump, so you go another way. As long as you keep learning.”

For this reason, despite being acutely aware of his limitations, Khan says he never lets his fears or doubts interfere with taking on a challenge or treading outside ‘the box’. “I feel, very often people limit themselves by imposing restrictions that no one else has imposed on them. ‘I’ll only do this type of film.’

But for God’s sake, why? You’re bloody building a wall. As a creative person, it is your job to stretch your boundaries, and hence stretch the boundaries of other people. If you voluntarily restrict yourself, how will you show the audience something they may not have seen before? If you don’t take risks, how will the taste of the audience evolve?”

It seems important to him to be able to contribute to the evolving tastes of the audience—even as his own

sensibilities evolve. He compares the exposure of audiences to new kinds of cinema to eating sushi for the first time.

“At first, you go ‘Yuck! It’s raw, and old and clammy.’ And then you reach the point where you love it. But for that, you’ve gotta try it first. So for those of us who’ve seen different kinds of cinema and have had more exposure, it’s important that we create an appetite in the audience for such movies. That’s the way I look at it. You bet on first time directors, small-budget but contentdriven films and try to get audiences interested, movie by movie. But you don’t back away from what motivates you and what you like just because the box office isn’t a hundred crore.”

If there’s one thing Khan doesn’t like, it’s “pandering to the audience”. This is why he doesn’t watch television; he believes it assumes the worst in the audience. “It assumes that you are dumb, that you are shallow. And then it reaches out and it finds that, somewhere inside you, there is dumbness [and] shallowness, and it finds that point [in you] and massages it. When you’re actively believing the worst in people, and then encouraging the worst in people, I think you are directly contributing to the decline of society. This phenomenon has seeped into the movies as well, and I can never stand for it.”

That sounds like a paradox, in light of his forthcoming masala flick, but Khan laughs and tries to convince me it isn’t. “It’s a very classic movie. I mean, I watch movies to be entertained. I don’t view cinema as a high art form. I view it as something that is meant to make people laugh, to thrill them, or move them emotionally in some way. My romcoms have generally dealt with first world problems like, ‘She doesn’t understand me, bro,’ and the directors I’ve worked with like Shakun [Batra] or Danish [Aslam], who are my friends, shy away from making a scene too emotional because they think it’s melodrama... When I read the script of Once Upon Ay Time...Dobaara!, it had heightened drama; it made me cry and it made me laugh. These were life and death situations. I found it very satisfying. It came with jeera powder and masala on top. It was just very tasty...

Obviously, I was full of doubt when I took it up, but then, it was another way of pushing my boundaries. And I love doing that. I can’t hope for anything better.” n 26 August 2013

science

autism— a developmental disability that can pose social, communication and behavioural challenges—affects approximately one in 88 children in the United States

Variable Womb Stay The length of healthy human pregnancies can vary by as much as 37 days

Autism and Induced Labour

A new study, published in JAMA Pediatrics, suggests that pregnant women whose labours are induced or augmented may have an increased risk of bearing children with autism. In this study, researchers looked at records of all births in North Carolina over an eight-year period. Among male children, labour that was both induced and augmented was associated with a 35 per cent higher risk of autism, compared with normal labour.

While induced labour alone and augmented labour alone were each associated with increased risk among male children, only augmentation was linked with increased risk among female children. Researchers, though, say that more investigation is needed to understand these preliminary results. n

T

he lengths of healthy pregnancies have been known to vary between 37 and 42 weeks. In fact, previous studies have shown that only four per cent women deliver on their due date. And scientists have tended to believe that these variations occur because of poor estimates of conception.

Researchers have now found that pregnancies naturally vary from woman to woman. Sometimes by as much as 37 days. According to a study, which was published in Human Reproduction, the average time taken from ovulation to birth is 268 days (or 38 weeks and two days). Most doctors calculate due dates of pregnant women as 280 days after the onset of a woman’s last menstruation.

The study was conducted by researchers from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Durham, US. It was carried out by examining information from daily urine samples collected by women taking part in an earlier study, which took place between 1982 and 1985 and followed 130 pregnancies from unassisted conception through to birth.

The women had discontinued contra60 open

ception in order to become pregnant.

The researchers contacted the participants in 2010 for the current study.

They did this to obtain information on their labour and whether birth induction or a Caesarean section had been required.

The current study also found that the length of a pregnancy could be affected by various factors. For instance, older women tended to deliver later, with each year of age adding roughly one day to a pregnancy, and women who had been heavy at birth had longer pregnancies. They also found that the length of previous or subsequent pregnancies was related to the length of the one being studied.

The authors write in the journal: ‘The length of human gestation varies considerably among healthy pregnancies, even when ovulation is accurately measured. This variability is greater than suggested by the clinical assignment of a single ‘due date’. The duration of previous pregnancies may provide a useful measure of a woman’s ‘natural’ length of pregnancy and may help in predicting an individual woman’s due date.’ n

Yawn and Your Dog Will too

Dogs yawn contagiously when they see a person yawning, but respond more frequently to their owner’s yawns than to a stranger’s, according to a study by Teresa Romero and colleagues from University of Tokyo. Explaining the significance of the results, Romero says, “Our study suggests that contagious yawning in dogs is emotionally connected in a way similar to humans. Although our study cannot determine the exact underlying mechanism operative in dogs, the subjects’ physiological measures taken during the study allowed us to counter the alternative hypothesis of yawning as a distress response.” The study was published in PLOS ONE. n 26 august 2013

aspect ratio Videos and movies are made in a variety of length-to-breadth aspect ratios. The only time there are no black bars on a viewing screen is when a video or film being viewed has been shot in the same aspect ratio as the screen— say, a film done in 1.78:1 displayed on a 16:9 screen

tech&style

BlackBerry Q5 A great entry-level BlackBerry 10 smartphone at an attractive price gagandeep Singh Sapra

Rado HyperChrome w Court Collection

Price on request

Rs 24,990

This tennis-inspired collection has three new models; each represents a different playing surface.

The hard court is represented by the brilliant blue version, grass by gleaming green and clay by an audacious orange. The dial details and hands of each model contain Super-LumiNova® to glow in the dark. Each chronograph is made of scratch-resistant lightweight black matt high-tech ceramic. n

I

f you were waiting to upgrade

your BlackBerry and were not happy with the price tags on its last few launches of the Z10 and Q10, the allnew Q5 is here, and is available at an attractive price too.

At the outset what you see when you compare the Q5, which is the third handset from BlackBerry running its brand new BB OS 10, is that it does not use premium materials like the other two models, though BlackBerry manages to keep the feel of a quality handset intact. Also the screen is smaller at 3.1 inches. The great part is that this new handset is responsive, quick and agile on its heels.

The 3.1 inch screen is touch sensitive and the handset works with both touch and type. The lower screen resolution is not really visible to the naked eye till you put the Q10 next to it. It is bright and sharp enough to be used both indoors and outdoors.

The Q5 sports two cameras. First, a 5 megapixel rear camera that is about average for everyday pictures and 26 August 2013

can be used only for your social media sharing. Then, its front camera, which captures good crisp images especially if you are on a video chat, either on BBM or Skype.

What I also liked is that BlackBerry finally has a non-removable battery, and you access the SIM or micro SD card from the side of the phone. So you don’t have to bother with opening the back cover anymore.

In this price range, quite a few handsets are available, but if you have been a BlackBerry user, or just want a handset that comes with both a full Qwerty keyboard and touch screen, and works seamlessly, the Q5 is a good option. It comes in black, white and red colours.

The only downside I find on the phone is its screen’s 1:1 aspect ratio. If you watch movies or stream YouTube videos on your phone, you find that awkward. But for everything else, which includes a great battery backup, good performance, and great keyboard layout, I love BlackBerry’s latest offering. n

Lemon Mobiles Aspire Full HD

Rs 17,999

This Chinese phone is actually well built and can give a scare to most of the bigger brands.

With a big 5 inch IPS screen that is bright, sharp and responsive to touch, a slim profile, dual SIM capability, running on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, and with HSPA+capability, the phone impresses you in its first go. The build quality is superb, except the back plastic panel, which seemed flimsy. The camera, albeit a bit of a laggard, captures quality pictures. The Aspire is a huge phone that fits into the phablet category, and sells at an attractive price point too. n Gagandeep Singh Sapra is The Big Geek at System3. He can be reached at gadgets@openmedianetwork.in

open www.openthemagazine.com 61

CINEMA

the haunted The Conjuring is based on a family’s ‘encounters’ with spirits in their farmhouse. Andrea Perron, one of the members of this family, has written of their nearly decade-long experience in a three-volume self-published book, House of Darkness House of Light

Chennai Express At this rate, Shah Rukh Khan will be left with a rather dull filmography ajit duara

o n scr een

current

The Conjuring Director James Wan cast Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson,

Lili Taylor

Score ★★★★★

khan, deepika Cast shah rukh mani iya padukone , pr shetty hit ro r to ec Dir

A

t the end of the day, Shah Rukh

Khan is not going to have much of a filmography to talk about, and he really doesn’t seem to care. Apart from Swades, Chak De! India and a few Yash Chopra productions, a long career at the top has yielded little of quality. A generation from now, he might well be judged poorly as an actor.

Almost all actors at some point display a curiosity to explore their range as performers. Not Shah Rukh.

On the contrary, you see a kind of inverse movement, a tendency to cut down on diversity of characterisation and actually limit his expressions and restrict his voice modulation to a much slimmer range. In the 20 years between Darr (1993) and Chennai Express, he has, on his own volition, got rid of half the skills he was gifted with.

Here, too, the vessel is empty.

Chennai Express is a cliched comedy about the divide between North and South India, with Rahul 62 open

Mithaiwala meeting Meenalochni Azhagusundaram on a train. The cartoon strip acting of both Shah Rukh and Deepika Padukone disappoints greatly. All Deepika does is rework the Malayalee-accented English and Hindi take-off of ‘Lola Kutty’ into an acceptable Tamil version and all Shah Rukh does is treat the locals, villains and aamas alike as characters from Quick Gun Murugun, who must, necessarily, be treated as the caricatures they are.

Director Rohit Shetty starts the film promisingly with Rahul, an energetic lad from a family of Mumbai halwai store owners. Dadaji passes away and Rahul is given the responsibility of taking the ‘urn’ to Rameshwaram.

En route he meets Meenalochni, the daughter of a don who owns half of Tamil Nadu. This amusing introduction over, the rest of the film is directed on a single flat key right through.

There is not one variation in note and this makes for a very dull film. n

This film is about a haunted house and about ghost busters who exorcise it of demons. But here the busters are called ‘paranormal investigators’ and belong to the New England Society for Psychic Research. The film is a ‘true story’ in the sense that Ed and Lorraine Warren were actually a husband and wife team—he a ‘demonologist’ (since deceased) and she a ‘clairvoyant’— who ‘solved’ a number of horrific cases.

The illusion of ‘truth’ goes a long way in getting you an audience. We cut between the actors playing the Warrens and an actual case they solved—the haunting of the Perron family home in Rhode Island—and this technique tweaks the horror genre somewhat. It turns demons into a subject of social documentation.

The audience nods in intelligent agreement as it is informed by the Investigators that the problem is caused by a witch called Bathsheba. The Church is then informed, and a shocked priest is shown the video footage and photos. He says he has to send a message to the Vatican to permit an exorcism, like a local police chief asking for assistance from the FBI. No matter how sceptical you are, this docu-drama style of presentation somehow works. The audience simply wills it to work. n ad

26 august 2013

Not People Like Us

R aj e e v M asa n d

Casting Woes

After searching high and low for a newcomer to cast opposite Shah Rukh Khan in Happy New Year, Farah Khan has gone back to her Om Shanti Om discovery, Deepika Padukone.

According to unit members, Farah had considered Parineeti Chopra and Sonakshi Sinha initially, but decided to go with a new face because she wasn’t entirely convinced that either would do justice to the part of a Bhandup bar dancer.

It was reportedly Shah Rukh who suggested that they go with a well-known leading lady instead of a new find.

Farah and Shah Rukh eventually agreed that their musical comedy could do with at least one more A-lister. The rest of the cast includes Abhishek Bachchan, Boman Irani and Vivaan Shah.

There’s also been some back and forth over the casting of the film’s fourth male lead. While Aiyya star Prithviraj was initially cast, there’s been repeated talk of the Malayalee actor being subsequently replaced. Commando tough guy Vidyut Jamwal has been mentioned as a possible replacement, as has Mohit Raina, who plays Lord Shiva in the popular television mythological Devon Ka Dev Mahadev, whom Farah’s son Czar is apparently obsessed with.

The four men will play friends, each cursed with two left feet, who sign up to win a World Dance Championship.

Farah has cast Jackie Shroff as her bad guy, and the unit leaves for Dubai at the end of August to begin a long schedule at the Atlantis Palm Hotel. Now that all of the casting has more or less been sorted, Farah and Shah Rukh can only hope that Sanjay Leela Bhansali will finally wrap up the production of his long-in-the-making Ram Leela so that Deepika can be on their set on schedule.

The Impossible Actor

Aditya Chopra, convinced that he has a winner on his hands, is reportedly making every effort to ensure that Dhoom 3 remains wrapped in secrecy till as long as necessary.

Apparently the producer has made an arrangement with postproduction and FX giant Prime Focus to create a temporary facility within the walls of Yash Raj Film Studios, so that all footage of the film remains within the 26 August 2013

premises. Chopra wasn’t keen that VFX work be done, or the film’s trailers be cut, anywhere else.

Meanwhile, Aamir Khan, the film’s chief star, is said to be responsible for the film’s laboured pace of progress. The actor, who is apparently closely involved with the film’s production, collaborated with music director Pritam on Dhoom 3’s score. And sources in the production unit reveal that the actor has been so picky that he only approved two numbers in two years. Some of the tunes he allegedly turned down have gone on to become big hits in films like Cocktail and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani. In fact, there have been murmurs that the recent chartbuster Badtameez Dil, filmed on Ranbir Kapoor in YJHD, was originally offered to Aamir for Dhoom 3, but didn’t make the cut.

A Female Aamir Khan

She is regarded as one of the most professional actresses of her generation, but her commitment is allegedly taking on a whole new turn on the sets of her latest movie, where unit members say she is calling the shots—much to her director’s chagrin.

Based on the life of a celebrated achiever, the film is an important one for the actress and will likely be an awardsbait when it releases next year. She famously beat several hopefuls to land the part, and while the heroine has thrown herself into the project completely, not everyone is comfortable with the fact that she has been taking all the important decisions on the set. Some say she has assumed the role of the showrunner because of her director’s inexperience—he’s a successful technician making his directorial debut here.

Unwilling to take any chances, the actress is said to be sitting in on the choreography of action sequences, and freely discusses shot breakdowns with the cameraman. Meanwhile, the poor director, keen to reclaim authority on the set without upsetting his leading lady, is slowly asserting himself with the team. n Rajeev Masand is entertainment editor and film critic at CNN-IBN

open space

by g u n j e e t s r a

photos nathan g

Hail This Auto

Annadurai, an autorickshaw driver in Chennai, was standing outside a railway station two years ago when a man asked if he could use his mobile phone to make an urgent call. Annadurai let him make that call for free and that’s when inspiration struck. Inside his vehicle now, passengers can charge and recharge their mobile phones and DTH packages, enter their names for prize contests, even avail discounts on special days. Annadurai also spends Rs 4,000 on monthly subscriptions to 35 magazines and newspapers and another Rs 1,000 for a Wi-Fi facility he offers passengers. If they don’t have their laptops on them, he lets them browse the net on his tablet.

He says that he doesn’t care about money, only customer satisfaction. His main customers work in the infotech sector and almost always need the internet. He drives between 8 am to 1 pm and from 5 pm to 11 pm and makes an average profit of Rs 1,000 a day 64 open

26 august 2013