OPEN Magazine 4 August 2014

PERSISTENCE OF THE RAHUL QUESTION

l i f e

a n d

t i m e s .

PUTIN THE WORLD IS BAD AGAIN

e v e r y

w e e k

INSIDE Battle Between the State and Nature

4 AU G U ST 2 0 14 / R S 4 0

HACKERs

NATIONALISED

The clandestine recruitment of computer whiz kids as security warriors

Open Mail | editor@openmedianetwork.in Editor S Prasannarajan managing Editor PR Ramesh Deputy Editors Aresh Shirali, Ullekh NP art director Madhu Bhaskar Senior Editors Kishore Seram,

Haima Deshpande (Mumbai) Mumbai bureau chief Madhavankutty Pillai Associate Editor (Web) Vijay K Soni assistant editors

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Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has presented a wellbalanced Budget characterised by concessions to tax-payers, fiscal incentives for the manufacturing sector, besides a number of progressive steps beneficial to the common man (‘The Right Act’, 21 July 2014).

The Budget, which also encourages foreign investment, is certain to give a much-needed fillip to development and self-sustenance. Arun Jaitley has made an impressive Arun Jaitley makes an attempt at managing expectations of various impressive attempt at stakeholders while managing expectations staying committed to of various stakeholders long-term development while staying goals. It enables the committed to long-term Government to fulfill its development goals commitment to an inclusive approach while maintaining the fiscal deficit at an acceptable level. The assurance given by the Finance Minister is clearly a positive sign, given the current appalling economic scenario.  letter of the week

cfo Anil Bisht hEAD—it Hamendra Singh publisher

R Rajmohan

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Reproduction in any manner is prohibited.

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Volume 6 Issue 30 For the week 29 July—4 August 2014 Total No. of pages 64 + Covers

cover photo Michael Bodmann/Getty

Images

photo imaging Anirban Ghosh

4 AUGUST 2014

Junk Failed Policies

this refers to ‘Westward Ho!’ (30 June 2014). It is well past time to junk every failed policy since 1947. Most importantly, non-accountability, corruption and reservations. If this is done, there may not be a need to ape any Western models.

Talent and integrity will emerge and take India to where it should have been four decades ago. Or what Mysore was evolving into before it fell into the maws of the Indian Republic. No ideal state can be achieved if it is founded on trash. Mysore is a classic example of what can happen if it’s founded on ideals and what happens when those ideals are destroyed. Mysore had universal primary and secondary education with healthcare and nutrition and no reservations. Gandhi called it ‘Rama Rajya’ though His Highness Krishna Raja Wadeyar preferred to call it ‘Camelot’. When the British pushed ‘reservations’ as part of

their divide-and-rule policy into Mysore through the Maharaja, the Diwan, Sir M Visvesvaraya, who has done more for all the people of Mysore than any man, resigned. Today Mysore has been trashed more thoroughly than any other state of India because there was so much more to trash.  Suchindranath Aiyer

Food for Thought

i stay in a mixed neighbourhood and I find the presence of slaughterhouses hanging their raw carcasses of meat, poultry and animal innards outside most revolting (‘Off My Table, You Damn Carnivore!’, 28 July 2014). Their cooking stalls in the open are terribly unhygienic, and waste is disposed of in a disgusting manner. The issue is not about ‘one man’s food’ being ‘another man’s poison’, it is about respecting the sensitivities and sensibilities of vegetarians.  bharati

what’s the difference between a chicken and an egg? The answer is ‘21 days’. People who eat eggs and call themselves ‘vegetarians’ are deluding themselves.  mani

Modi’s Impressive, so Far

the way Modi’s Government is going about its work is impressive (‘Fear and Foreboding in South Block’, 28 July 2014). Tangible results will, however, take time to come. But one thing is for sure: Modi’s experience in the administration of Gujarat coupled with the majority that he has got in Parliament means that there is no excuse for failure.  subhasis ghosh

even if there are half decent results of the changes mentioned in the article, India will be a much better place. As Modi promised earlier, if he breaks the cabal of power brokers, that’s good enough.

The need of the hour is an alert administrative mechanism.

India cannot afford the so-called ‘freedom on all fronts at any cost’ attitude.  Hemant She jwalkar

Got It Wrong

this refers to ‘Yeh Duniya Pittal Di’ (28 July 2014). Dholna (not Dolna) doesn’t mean ‘a beautiful girl’. Dholna is normally used as a term of endearment for men by their lovers (women). ‘Tere bin nai laggda’ (Nusrat) is sung from the point of view of a girl deserted by her lover.  Harpree t Singh Jagdev

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openmagazine to 56070

the irony of labels A protest poster at Shalimar restaurant in Mumbai

No Cola Please, We’re Palestinian Sympathisers solidarity

Muslim-owned eateries boycott soft drinks this Ramzan to protest the US support of Israel

During Ramzan, the marketplace of Bhendi Bazaar transforms into a gastronomical destination, as the rest of the city converges on this crowded area after sundown to feast on various delicacies. According to those who run eateries here, one of the most popular items on the menu, along with the kebabs, is a fizzy bottle of cola to wash it all down. This Ramzan, however, there are no soft drinks available.

The operators of almost all Muslim-owned establish-

Mumbai

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ments in this area recently decided to boycott PepsiCo and Coca-Cola. They say that since these cola companies are US-based, this is a way to mark their protest against America’s sustained support for Israel at a time when the Jewish state has been bombing the Gaza Strip. “It is horrible to see the manner in which Israel has been bombing innocent civilians, and how, because of US support, Israel continues to [escape] international pressure,” says Mohammed Hussain, the

manager of Shalimar, one of the most popular restaurants in this area. “So we decided to stop selling all soft drinks to protest against what’s happening in a peaceful manner.”

Shalimar and a number of other Muslim-owned outlets enforced a similar boycott for almost two months in 2001, when the US invaded Afghanistan. Babu, manager of Noor Mohammadi, another restaurant, says, “We won’t lift this ban until Israel stops bombing Gaza, or the US takes some steps to ensure

peace.” According to Hussain, although most eateries are losing revenues—during Ramzan, Shalimar alone, it is claimed, rakes in a sum of between Rs 10,000 and Rs 15,000 daily on the sale of soft drinks—most patrons have been supportive of the move. “When customers ask for a soft drink, we explain our reasons for the boycott, and they have almost always shown support. We are offering fruit juices and other drinks like lassi instead.” n Lhendup G Bhutia

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apoorva guptay

small world

10

contents

14

cover story Hackers at the nation’s service

34

herbal king

Purveyor of potions

6

8

business

New rules for big banks

open essay

Being civil about development

24

locomotif

Romancing the rogue

congress

The Rahul question

person of the week justice markandey katju

The Whistleblower With a single Facebook swoop, the former judge has exposed the malleability of the last government as much as the frailty of our judiciary Lhendup G Bhutia

E

x-Justice Markandey Katju, the former Supreme Court judgeturned-chairman of the Press Council, is known to be a loose cannon.

He voiced support for Sanjay Dutt when the actor was being imprisoned, proposed an entrance test for journalists, called Salman Rushdie a ‘substandard’ writer, and even dismissed 90 per cent of all Indians as idiots.

This time, however, the cannon was anything but loose. The former judge revealed how the highest echelons of the Judiciary had conspired to let a High Court judge retain his position in 2005 despite being accused by an IB report of corruption. His revelations were not just damning of the three Chief Justices who allowed the tainted judge to continue, they also exposed how ineffective the last political regime was. Consider this: the regional party backing the corrupt judge, rumoured to be the DMK, threatens India’s Prime Minister, as he is about to leave for New York, that his government would fall by the time he’s back if the judge’s term is not extended; and the regime, yielding yet again to the pressure of this troublesome ally, interferes with the Judiciary’s independence. In a single stroke, through his Facebook account and blog post, Katju has exposed not just the malpractices of the former government and three of the country’s top judges, but also how susceptible the Judiciary is.

Katju is a fascinating individual. Many 4 open

and often dull passages on his experiences at various high courts and how he refused to visit gymkhanas. They are filled with his tales of travel and opinions on subjects that range from current-day issues to music and books. He quotes Urdu poets, puts out exhaustive reading lists for young people, and sometimes headlines his posts as ‘Addresses to the nation’. And he usually responds to most comments, regardless of how bizarre they may be. He answers those who complain of the length of his updates and the late hour of their publishing, even tree-savers asking him to ensure that petitions make use of both sides of the sheets they are printed on (he had retired, he told the latter).

He warns commentators of their tone and impertinence, threatens to ban them, and later asks those he has banned to send a message asking to be unbanned.

With his big news-making allegation, will his online approach change? It does not seem so. In a recent Facebook interaction—related to the corruption charges—an kunal patil/ht/getty images individual asked Katju to share his daily schedule (‘we are eagerly waiting to There are two types of people on social know how your morning start... wat you networking platforms. There are those do whole the day’). Another joined in, who are reserved (especially public sarcastically listing the probable order of figures), their comments always Katju’s morning rituals, (‘...and has tea measured and carefully thought-out. And sometimes with Marie biscuit and then there are those like Katju. One of his sometimes with Rusk’). Katju’s reply: Facebook accounts is a ‘like’ page and not ‘How on earth could you know my daily a regular profile account—this lets routine so accurately?’ You can never everyone see and comment on what he keep a good man down, can you? n shares. His posts here include detailed have wondered about his possible motivation for suddenly sharing details of an event that occurred about nine years ago. Could it be that Katju, the prolific blogger and Facebook junkie, was reminded of the episode by a twist of circumstance, as he claims, and thought it could make an excellent FB update? In a later post, Katju explains that his memory was jogged by the request of some ‘Tamilians’ that he write about his experiences of the Madras High Court.

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b p

books

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Diary of a Pakistani socialite

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39 heritage

raelians

The world of India’s alien worshippers

cinema

Chandni Chowk: The fall and the rescue

52

NOT PEOPLE LIKE US

Documentaries in movie halls

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Salman’s return to innocence

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ol h scho or Hig re Vibgy o l a g ban

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f o r refusing to take responsibili-

ty for the rape of a six-year-old schoolgirl on its premises Even as the country battles the issue of rape and violence against women, a top private school in Bangalore provoked a public uproar when it was revealed recently that a six-year-old schoolgirl was allegedly raped on the school premises by two staff members during school hours.

The police arrested a skating instructor, Mustafa, as the

After the CBI dismissed former Army Chief General VK Singh’s claim that he was offered a bribe for clearing a tender, the agency has now filed a chargesheet plot twist

“It will be difficult for us to prove such allegations unless we get more direct evidence. It is therefore unlikely that we will pursue the case further”

—A senior CBI official to The Indian Express, 9 September 2013

turn

tion le Institu b a n o s a e Unr of the Week

prime suspect after a laptop alleged to be his revealed images of child pornography, but the manner in which the school management refused to take responsibility for the incident was shocking. The accused is believed to have been fired from an earlier school called Deen’s Academy for ‘gross misconduct’, but Vibgyor High School had not checked this while employing him. After the incident came to light, the school was accused of not just trying to hush up the matter, but of concealing information and destroying evidence. This led to a huge surge of outrage in the city, with parents taking to the streets and demanding action against the culprits and the school. The police has now arrested the chairmanof the blighted school, Rustam Kherawalla. One can perhaps understand not wanting the reputation of the school to be tarnished, but rape is a serious allegation, and the school is responsible for the safety of its wards. n

“No case is 100 per cent for [a] charge-sheet.

But because the complainant here is (a former) Chief of Army staff, we decided to file it”

—Ranjit Sinha, CBI Director, to NDTV, 22 July 2014

around

A New Low Even for the Shiv Sena About a week ago, 11 Shiv Sena MPs reportedly force-fed a Muslim catering manager who was fasting for Ramzan. This incident, according to The Indian Express, occurred in Maharashtra Sadan in Delhi; the MPs were allegedly upset that the state residency was not serving Maharashtrian food. The catering service, which is managed by Indian Railways’ IRCTC, suspended its services in the state residency in protest. And the complainant who was forced to eat a chapatti claims

d i s TE M PER

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that the Sainiks knew he was a Muslim.

After manhandling the catering manager, the MPs are believed to have damaged the resident commissioner’s office and written ‘Jai Maharashtra’ on a wall. To behave in such a manner because Maharashtrian food is not being offered is a new low for the Shiv Sena. Far from apologising and disciplining his party, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray was quoted by DNA as saying, “There was no intention to hurt religious sentiments… it is an attempt to suppress our voice.” n open www.openthemagazine.com 5

business

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ICICI DEPOSITS

Standard Chartered

3,91,560

3,08,725

62,001

61,954

66,559

52,035

Citibank

PNB All figures in Rs crore

are picked by the four criteria will be ranked and placed in one of four categories, each of which imposes new capital requirements—from 0.2 to 0.8 per cent of the bank’s risk-weighted assets—in addition to what the usual norms mandate. A fifth category will have banks that continue to grow in systemic importance, and these will need even bigger cushions of safety. If the proposal is adopted, it would be put in place only gradually, though: done over four years, beginning in 2016. n ADITYA WIG

Source: A Profile of Banks 2012-13-Reserve Bank of India

LOANS

adequacy’ cushions, for example.

To identify D-SIBs and set safety norms, the RBI’s report draws on a framework established by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision in 2011. Accordingly, the RBI has marked out four indicators of ‘systemic importance’: the size, interconnectedness, substitutability and complexity of the financial institution in question.

By its rule of thumb, any bank that is greater than or equal to 2 per cent of GDP by size will be included in its sample for D-SIB screening. Of these, the banks that

SBI dominates the Indian banking sector, but private banks are getting larger by the day 2,92,613

12,02,739

SBI

tough love Reserve Bank Governor Raghuram Rajan is keen on strict ‘macro-prudential’ regulation

Bigger Isn’t Always Better

2,90,249

infographic by anup banerjee

10,45,616

R E G U L AT IO N It is not just public sector banks that need to raise extra capital in the years ahead. On 22 July, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) released a report on how best to deal with ‘Domestic Systemically Important Banks’ (dubbed ‘D-SIBs’). It takes note of the global financial crisis of 2007-08, and specifically the threat posed to an economy if its key financial institutions suffer a critical failure. If a large bank is unable to repay its creditors, and many of them are other banks, then the liquidity crunch could set off a domino chain of collapses all through the banking sector. To pre-empt such a catastrophe, the large bank would have to be bailed out by the country’s ‘lender of last resort’, its central bank. In 2007-08, for example, it was the US Federal Reserve that put in the money needed to save several large American financial institutions that were considered ‘too big to fail’.

Now the RBI seems set to adopt the same safety system. While India’s banking sector is dominated by State-owned banks, which are implicitly backed by the Government anyway, a set of private banks are to be deemed D-SIBs: too big to fail. The trouble with the assurance of a bailout with public funds, however, is the extra risk it may perversely encourage a bank to take under the assumption that its losses would be made good by the Government (at the taxpayer’s expense).

To minimise this ‘moral hazard’, the RBI wants to tighten safety norms for D-SIBs. They would have to expand their ‘capital

b. mathur/reuters

New Rules for Big Banks

‘The failure of one bank may have the potential to increase the probability of failure of other banks if there is a high degree of interconnectedness (contractual obligations) ... The larger the number of linkages... the greater is the potential for the systemic risk getting magnified’ RESERVE BANK OF INDIA, in its report, ‘Framework for Dealing with Domestic Systemically Important Banks’, dated 22 July 2014

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INNOCEAN-001/12

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S PRASANNARAJAN

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Romancing the Rogue

uddenly, the world is bad again. The badness is different from the familiar patterns of the past, which were identifiable in the clarity of the Incompatible Two. The Cold Warriors for more than four decades fitted perfectly into the comic strip perfection of Good and Evil; and there were oversized characters of history who could have come straight out of the sketchbooks of Albert Uderzo to make the period a Manichean saga in geopolitics.

Post-Berlin Wall, the communist donned the loose overcoat of the nationalist and played out the hate script in the Balkans for ethnic justice with retrospective effect. Later, it was political Islam that the tea-leaf readers of global trends thought would replace communism as the enemy of the free world, though the mullahs who promised a carpet ride to paradise to the suicide bomber and the ghettoised Muslim youth in the Arab world were unlikely successors to the commissars. In spite of 9/11 and Osama’s deification as Islam’s Che by his anti-American admirers in the Muslim world, an Islamic imperium in the 21st century was unfeasible, and not just because of the absence of a unifying authority. The idea itself was too pre-modern to be an alternative to democracy. The battles were global, and between two conflicting ideas of freedom.

The Big Bad World 2014 does not have the grandeur of the earlier editions; it’s an anthology of antagonisms spread across the world. The theme is still freedom. In Iraq, the jihadi-in-chief of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) fantasises about a global Caliphate. What is alarming is not the fantasy, but the withdrawal of the so-called free world from the Mesopotamian mess where the bloodlust of the tribes is only matched by the divisive power of the official regime. The liberation of Iraq from the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein did not, in retrospect, result in the freedom of Iraqis. Barack Obama’s America has no plans to pay the wages of an unfinished war. So in place of Saddamism, we have conflicting versions of Islamism, and no less lethal.

And elsewhere in the Middle East, the banality of the IsraelPalestine hate fest has acquired a new intensity, and the easiest explanation we hear is coloured by shades of anti-Semitism.

Palestinian victimhood is a much shared item in Third World capitals and other places of Left-liberal sentiment. There was a time when Yasser Arafat, the statesman without a state in

8 open

his trademark keffiyeh and gunless holster, was the bestselling symbol of homelessness in places like New Delhi. Israel was the convenient villain, the artificial state. The falsity of that argument concealed the Palestinian origin of modern Islamist terror and the historical tragedy of a people abandoned and exterminated. The state of Israel is all about being alive—at any cost—amidst countries that deny them even the right to exist. Today, the Palestinian cause is represented not by the soft radicalism of an Arafat, but by the raw fanaticism of the faceless Hamas terrorist. At long last, India is refusing to oblige the Palestinian cause junkies—or to caricature the Jewish struggle for existence as the militarism of the usurper. In what Amos Oz calls one of history’s enduring real estate disputes, it is the much romanticised victim—immortalised by the poetry of Mahmoud Darwish and the polemics of Edward Said—who finds no difference between dying and killing. In the absence of a more nuanced expression, we call it terrorism.

But there is a terrorist in power who is not yet being called one. The faces of 24 of the 80 children killed in the downing of Malaysia Airlines’ MH17, published on the front page of London’s Sunday Times (see picture), alone will suffice to remind us of the horror this man, mythicised by the aficionados of ‘strong leadership’ in Delhi and elsewhere, is capable of. His annexation of Crimea went unchallenged, as if it was just another local border crossing; it was actually the first of its kind after World War II. His extraterritorial terror or autocracy at home has not stopped the big powers of Europe and Asia (no need to include Obama’s Washington here) from indulging the tallest rogue leader of our times. Vladimir Putin, the post-Soviet strongman, has borrowed the worst from his former employer (KGB) and mixed it with uber nationalism, which has greatly contributed to his soaring popularity. The plane was shot down by a missile fired from a Russian launcher in eastern Ukraine, where Putin’s warriors are at work. Ukraine has become the unlamented war of this century; and the terror of Putin, the nationalist with a Stalinist mindset, has not made him a Russian Saddam in the eyes of those countries that swear by freedom. His idea of a Greater Russia is sustained by the enemy’s blood—and it is an idea appreciated even by Delhi, which has not said anything about Flight MH17.

In the Big Bad World, it is again the Russian who happens to be the biggest baddie. n 4 august 2014

open essay

By SHIV VISVANATHAN

being civil about development

The IB report on NGOs brings out the battle between the state and nature

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I

ntelligence reports are fascinating. They carry the mystique of an imperial world, of the Cold War now passed; the nostalgia of Kipling’s Kim and John le Carré’s Smiley.

Someone once said that an ambassador is an honest man who has a duty to lie abroad for his country. Such a statement smacks of innocence in which Shiv Visvanathan ‘truth’ and ‘lie’ can be registered in sepaconsiders himself rate columns. Intelligence is the art of a social science confusing the two, of collecting facts nomad and presenting them in a manner that feeds the anxieties of the state. Often, it is suspicion amplified to the point of paranoia. Fact and exaggeration must exist side by side in the world of strategy. Intelligence as a social science is a genre of its own, with its own mystique of information and gossip.

Judged as a bureaucratic text, the IB report on NGOs against development did a good job. The report emerged as a news leak—in watertight Delhi—and became a sensation as the media devoted page after page to it. Its information was focused, intense, thematic. It realised that development was a strategic issue, critical for the nation state and the people. Predictably, it also assumed that these interests were the same; that groups challenging state-sponsored development are anti-national and anti-people by definition. The IB report still works on the old model which equates ‘Government’ and the ‘State’. The new model of governance believes that government is not restricted to the states, that civil society groups also perform the function of governance, and that the State and civil society are in a dialogue, in a quarrelsome relationship. But the spirit of rationality demands that one go beyond a critical nitpicking of the report. One should see it as an act of duty as the Ajit Dovals and Prakash Chandras click their heels to the new regime.

One notes also that this report can be used to serve the suspicions of both regimes UPA and NDA, of both Manmohan and Modi. In fact, that is the beauty of intelligence—it can serve two masters. What this essay shall attempt is to present the same data from the viewpoint of marginalised people as well as civil society, to show there is no such thing as a ‘fact’ until it is put in the context in which it is to be interpreted.

It is just that interpretations differ and therefore have different consequences.

One might admit that the idea of the report originally came from Greenpeace; but Greenpeace is almost slapstick, and lacks the sedate theatre of Indian NGOs. This report is a collective act of 21 NGO groups who felt it was their duty to report to the State, to a new regime which they hoped would be more responsive to them. Many, like the Kudankulam anti-nuclear groups, flew into Delhi to clear their name, only to discover that governments of any ilk need hearing aids before marginalised people come dropping in on them.

The report itself was written by Arjun Bhinde, a visiting professor at IIT Delhi. Bhinde, in turn, claimed that he had only served as a munshi, synthesising the views of various groups into a systematic response.

Development is a continuation of strategy by other means.

Development—and the models associated with it—determines who gets power or energy, why and when. Development links livelihood and opportunity, increasing or decreasing the possibility of a democratic society. Such development is usually conceived as a project, a technocratic act of expertise, when technical groups make decisions without consulting the people their decisions affect. When development is seen as a technical response to a technical problem, people become irrelevant or residual. Decisions of this sort are presented in numbers measuring progress, profit and productivity. It is true such reports have not been wise enough to recognise Camus’ observation that statistics do not bleed, that suffering and productivity operate on separate registers and invoke separate histories.

Sedition enters when these registers are mixed, when the clarity of nation states faces the muddiness of civil societies. One must also admit that as accountants, civil society groups—especially NGOs—are poor at audits, confusing gift and contract, conflating advance and payment, mixing up friend, kinsman and employee. NGOs are more like jajmani systems, more concerned with keeping relationships alive than accounts accurate. As a cynic once said, NGOs have too many social scientists and too few commerce graduates. One needs a professional dullness to be empirically accurate.

H

owever, as social scientists, NGOs are masters of the ter-

rain. They are tremendous listeners, understanding the dialects of pain and suffering, and can capture the consequences of development—its displacements, its silences, the real audit of power—which determines who gets what and who does not, followed by the inevitable ‘when’ and ‘how’. Development is not merely about who gains but also about who loses—and how much. Here, at the risk of pomposity, one must confess that NGOs are better accountants of the development process than the State. They do not confuse a stakeholder society with a shareholder state. Development as a progressive act provides little to those left behind. It is a project in a hurry, and sees protest, dissent and delay as acts of sedition. Delay increases costs, alienates investment, and convinces foreigners that India is not yet ready for modernity. In that sense, NGOs are harbingers of backwardness, spokespersons of backward people who refuse to join development.

The poignancy lies in differences of perception; whether it is the World Bank or Mother Teresa who responds to the pain.

NGOs generally fall in between. Life in an NGO is also a career, and one confesses it is easier to move from Andolan to Oxfam to World Bank. But some of us are not so mo-

The irony is that development can become a continuation of war by other means.

There is no truth commission to try the State but does that mean civil society cannot question it?

4 AUGUST 2014

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For renewable ENERGY Greenpeace activists and villagers from around Alibaug in Maharashtra make a windmill formation during a 2009 demonstration against fossil fuels

bile or ambitious. These types stick to one people and articulate their protest. What the Government sees as hypochondria can be genuine pain. Let us go further—the IB report is right in realising that ‘development’ and ‘anti-development’ are both careers; that the Naxals of today are often the World Bank consultants of tomorrow. In that sense, development is a great equaliser.

Speaking more seriously, the Intelligence Bureau is right in its choice of issues. Where it goes wrong is in its split definition of the word ‘foreign’. It is okay for a government to accept foreign aid, sign deals for French and Russian nuclear reactors; but local NGOs obtaining grants to fight ‘development’ triggers the paranoia of ‘the foreign hand’. We can borrow billions for nuclear reactors but it is taboo to receive thousands for a protest movement. Innocence and legitimacy is available to states, but not to individuals no matter how well meaning they may be.

Secondly, the Indian State is outdated. It thinks of security only in militaristic terms. It then reads internal security as a continuation of external security. Acts against outsiders and against one’s own people get conflated. The Naxalite joins the ‘foreign hand’ as an internal sibling. Unfortunately, security and sustainability are put in opposition. Ideas of food, livelihood and security are not caught in such a notion. In fact, a strange duality builds up between security as advocated by the nation-state and sustainability as argued by civil society. The two concepts struggle to protect two different worlds. The tragedy lies in the distance and suspicion this creates.

The IB report is shrewd in its understanding of NGOs in many 12 open

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ways. It realises that there are fashions in suffering and in protest. It points out acutely that foreign funds earlier went to battle against dams and human rights struggles. That front is quiet today as funds move to anti-nuclear, anti GM-food struggles. One must admit sheepishly that the subaltern and suffering are redefined by every generation, and that funding often determines fashions. One remembers a member of the Green Tribunal—a judge—claiming in an interview that “rights is overloaded with people, but sustainability can be a new career.”

I

n fact, in a deep and fundamental way, the conflict is about

citizenship. The issue today is that citizens want a voice, a right to make decisions about their own livelihoods; over the fact that millions have become homeless and cannot find another home. The question is: is it citizens that are seditious or it is the nation-state in pursuit of development that has become a threat to its own people? This is the poignancy of modern democracy, which sees development as the new Camelot. The irony is that development can become a continuation of war by other means. There is no ‘truth commission’ to try the State; but does that mean civil society cannot question it? The question also is who represents the marginalised sections of society—the State or civil society? There are open-ended questions, and for an IB report to ignore it verges on illiteracy. One recollects that dam displacement in Russia and the US was handled by the army. Evacuating people then becomes easy. Even with 4 AUGUST 2014

regard to the Narmada, army and police jeeps completed the evacuation of people. Yet, few sense the irony of such moves.

However, let us move from generalities to the specificity of cases. The crime of the foreign funded NGO is the act of protest against development. Protest creates delays, and delays not only increase costs but destroy pace. Governments feel embarrassed by recalcitrant citizens. Delays in development affect GDP. The insinuation is that foreign donors are investing in delays so that it affects GDP. It is a clever strategy where you intervene in the name of democracy to effect development. These foreign groups and NGOs are said to bring down GDP by two or three per cent.

The idea of a specific number is intriguing; there is a certainty to it. Yet one has to ask, does this GDP also measure suffering and loss of livelihood or only the cost of delay? Numbers conceal the conflicts that democracy has still to resolve.

Any NGO entering nuclear activism quickly realises that the discourse has ossified. The permissible is already specified, the taboo areas marked out. To question nuclear energy is to question the State, especially a state which refuses to question nuclear energy. It is a Hobbesian state that refuses to accept that citizens can think differently. There is confusion between security and sustainability. Security depends on secrecy, and sustainability feeds on transparency.

Secrecy depends on expertise, the closed, canned scientific opinion, while sustainability needs the clarity of governance that summons citizenship of all kinds. To bring them into dialogue is to violate the rules of the Atom Staat, and this is precisely what happened in Kudankulam.

When ‘the people’ are recalcitrant, you cannot blame them directly. One needs an alien hand, a contaminating virus.

Greenpeace fits the bill completely. It has elements of the circus, of ninja tactics, it is a guerilla and slapstick force; but it has a conscience. It feels responsible for the silences of development. Its shock tactics evoke surprise but hardly violence. What irritates is that Greenpeace is an act of conscience that reminds us of things that we refuse to look at.

For Greenpeace and the network of NGOs today, coal causes climate change. Carbon emissions caused by thermal power generation threaten the future, and any threat to the future is a concern for Greenpeace. More immediately, coal threatens current ways of life, often demanding displacement of people; and coal mines are often environmental obscenities. India needs to move away from this fuel; but this is not to deny the need for energy.

Instead of coal, one needs alternative, clean fuels.

The IB report describes Greenpeace as ‘spawning mass based movement against development projects’, arguing that Greenpeace is a threat to the economic security of India. Its effectiveness as an opposition is vouched for in the report’s claims that ‘Greenpeace has been growing exponentially in terms of reach, impact and volunteers… ’, pressuring India ‘to use renewable energy’.

What one sees is a battle between two paradigms of econom-

ics that has been presented as a battle between the Indian state and a troublesome NGO. Major corporations like Coal India, Hindalco, Aditya Birla Group and Essar are cited as villains.

What irritated the report writers most was that a Greenpeace activist stood as a candidate for the Aam Aadmi Party. Read holistically, it is a great campaign; read conspiratorially, Greenpeace is a piece of villainy slowing down India’s future.

It is a pity Intelligence serves immediate interests. If it were forward looking, it might have been a guarantor of security. Since Intelligence agents refuse this futurism, NGOs like Greenpeace appear crass, conniving and detrimental to the strategies of the State.

Reading the report, one senses nature and the State are battling it out. The State claims ‘eminent domain’—sovereign rights over the forests, coal and water—but nature seems to be fighting back through tribes, the marginalised and NGOs, demanding a new social contract that goes beyond the old ‘state of nature’ arguments endemic to political science. Every example the IB report cites becomes a new example of this battle. The social construction of ‘nature’ in these two discourses is critical.

One of the major dramas centres on the battle against genetically modified organisms.

With a report like this, hunches may be unerring, but as suspicions they can become misleading. It is true that Europeans have been suspicious of genetically modified foods and that Germans led a battle against GM foods. It is also true that a significant portion of the funding comes from these groups. But one has to recognise that India has its own legacy, inspired

by Vandana Shiva, Suman Sahai and later

by Kavita Kurganthi.

The IB report mentions four NGOs, all with an identical address, ‘a small unmarked room flat’, which contributed to the three-year moratorium on BT Brinjal.

What the committee ignores is that science itself has changed the nature of risk, demanding deeper thought. Moratoriums may be the standard delay tactic, but they also serve as moments for reflection rather than malign acts of disruption.

One senses a set of arguments in this spectrum, of resistance to unilateral acts of development by the State. First, these arguments demand that the displacement and destruction of livelihoods because of development be treated openly. Second, citizenship should be treated as agency, and every man and woman should have a say about the nature and location of their livelihood. Third, development cannot rely on the old Draculas of ‘foreign hand’ and ‘foreign funding’. As democracy reinvents itself, the idea of development will be challenged and debated.

Finally one has to realise that this is not an act of sedition, but an invitation to a debate our choices. It is an experiment in democracy as much as science. Instead of harassment, one must thank the NGOs and civil society for this gift of debate. Only then can the nation move to an evolved idea of governance and intelligence; and perhaps even graduate to wisdom. n

Security needs secrecy, which depends on expertise, on closed scientific opinion.

Sustainability needs the clarity of governance which summons citizenship of all kinds

4 AUGUST 2014

open www.openthemagazine.com 13

S EC U R I T Y

T H E

N A T I O N

W A N T S T H E

S M A R T H A C K E R

The clandestine recruitment of computer wiz kids as security warriors Ullekh Np

... And the Modi Government is all set for discreet hiring of potential candidates from schools and colleges. ULLEKH NP on the new frontier of national security

R

ichard Jeffrey Danzig, cyber securi-

ty adviser to US President Barack Obama, talks of a generation gap in understanding anything cyber. This former secretary of the US Navy under President Bill Clinton calls the senior leaders of cyber security programmes ‘digital immigrants’, those who came to this new realm late in life. Then there are ‘digital natives’, the young ones who believe that if you can imagine something, you can create it. “All countries would be well-advised to open channels for recruiting such younger people, including those who may not be traditionally trained,” Danzig tells Open, emphasising the need to co-opt young adults and teenagers to the cause of enhancing a country’s cyber security prowess. Which is why Obama’s new team of cyber warriors comprises young hires, except for a handful of its top leaders. “They should ideally be much younger, of the sub-18 age group,” says another senior US official, pointing out that the US National Security Adviser’s cyber team mostly has young adults, not teenagers. “We should do so if we have to com-

bat the Chinese, the North Koreans and even the Israelis who hire school children for the job,” he notes, “That is the most creative age [group].”

Israel started it, with its Talpiot Unit 8200 programme, by recruiting teen hackers and math wizards. Over the decades, it became an intelligence entity that snooped on data collected by friends and foes alike, and it is widely believed to have created the Stuxnet computer worm in 2010 that infected many industrial computers around the world, including Iran’s nuclear facilities. “Cyber defence and offensive capabilities go hand in hand. You can’t have attacking strength and pretend all is well. Sometimes, the best defence is offence. India has to keep that in mind and work faster. Otherwise, it will learn the hard way,” says a former Unit 8200 expert, now employed with an MNC in the US, with a chuckle. “I guess India has been damn slow, and has to now make up for lost time,” he declares.

Certainly, he is right about India. Asked about India’s cyber offensive capabilities, a Home Ministry official says, “There is none.” Vinay Mohan Kwatra, joint secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs responsible for counter

Nearly 10 years ago, the country’s military intelligence team got on board a few bright young people to work on a special assignment. These wunderkinds accessed Pakistan’s government networks

terrorism and cyber security, says that India has become a land of ‘no resistance’ for hackers. Jokes a former head of an ambitious intelligence project that is yet to take off: “If a Pakistani militant sends a Skype message to his Indiabased agent outlining a detailed plan to assassinate the Prime Minister, our guys can’t intercept it.”

True, cyber security has long been an alien concept for the Indian Government. Not anymore.

On the Fast Track

According to at least two officials privy to information, the Narendra Modi Government plans to go on a discreet ‘recruitment spree’ across schools and engineering colleges to hire “potential hackers who can safeguard and if required target projects aimed at destabilising India”. This will complement New Delhi’s efforts to bolster its cooperation on the cyber security front with countries such as the US—which, ironically, was found to be snooping on the activities of Indian ministers and senior officials—to combat common threats such as China. Says Danzig: “I am very supportive of India-US cooperation on cyber-security. There are several governmental and non-governmental dialogues between our two countries on this topic, many involving your National Security Adviser’s (Ajit Doval’s) office. We face common vulnerabilities, both nations have the skills [needed] to contribute to common efforts, and the actions of one of our countries can affect the other. We should work together more.”

An official of India’s Defence Research & Development Organisation reveals that India is actively pursuing Israel to help train cyber security divisions in India for cyber warfare, given that cyber terrorism, unlike conventional warfare, is like a hydra-headed monster—constantly adapting and changing form.

The problems that India faces in cyberspace are far too many. Not long ago, Chinese hackers broke into sensitive naval computer systems in the headquarters of the Eastern Naval Command at Visakhapatnam with the apparent intention of accessing secret Naval documents and gathering information on India’s nuclear submarine programme. Similarly, Israel, too, has been keeping an eye on the technology of India’s Klub cruise missiles, a variant of the Russian Yakunt missiles that Iran has. In recent years, cyber attacks emanating from overseas locations have been on the rise: sensitive computers at India’s space department have been hacked into; there were also reports of explosions being caused in gas pipelines in various parts of the country by Stuxnet-like malware, as well as attempts to sabotage power supply systems.

The greater dangers that many experts warns of are: blackouts caused by power grid failures, transport systems such as Metro services getting crippled, stock exchanges and banks being hacked and mauled, law and order problems triggered by disinformation (such as what caused an exodus of northeastern students some time ago from Bangalore), and so on.

4 august 2014

Gulshan Rai DIRECTOR GENERAL, CERT-IN

“We have to act swiftly.

India at the moment has about 40,000 cyber security professionals in the country. The demand is projected to rise to 500,000 by 2016”

Gabi Siboni

Director, Institute for National Security Studies, ISRAEL

“In the field of cyberspace, there are both risks and opportunities for Israel.

Similar to other developed nations, cyberspace exposes Israel to significant risks, including damage to critical infrastructure”

Richard Jeffrey Danzig CYBER SECURITY ADVISOR TO US PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA

“I am very supportive of India-US cooperation on cyber-security. We face common vulnerabilities, both nations have the skills needed to contribute to common efforts. We should work together more” open www.openthemagazine.com 17

Past Forward

The new plans are not really new. But the earlier Government wasn’t able to sustain some of its bold experiments in strengthening its cyber security infrastructure. Nearly 10 years ago, the country’s military intelligence team got on board a few bright young people to work on a special assignment that involved what’s now termed ‘hacking’, a word that was unheard of back then.

According to a person who was part of the team, vouched for by a Defence Ministry official, these wunderkinds were put to top-secret work; they accessed the Pakistan government’s networks and also snooped on the US embassy’s network in Islamabad, retrieving what news portal Rediff—which reviewed the ‘hacked’ documents—called the ‘US road map for Pakistan’. The leaked documents had the entire US gameplan in the region and dwelt upon various sensitive subjects, including Kashmir. According to reports, these documents also revealed an American plan for what South Asia Tribune, a US-based online newspaper, termed ‘clipping General Pervez Musharraf’s wings’ by 2004. The US, for its part, denied the existence of such any such plan. Yet, as a hacking job, it was a success. As a military intelligence official tells Open, “That experiment showed that our boys can do it.”

Dr Gulshan Rai, Director General of Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), too, maintains that India’s cyber-capabilities are not all that bad.

cracking the code A Key government agencies for cyber offence: National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) and Department Intelligence Agency (DIA) B Agencies focused on cyber defence: Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In): set up in 2004 as a unit of the Department of Information Technology; since 2012, it has been shielding non-critical assets National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre: carved out of CERT-I to protect assets in critical sectors such as energy, transport, banking, telecom, defence, space exploration and so on.

C Government websites that have come under repeated attacks: MEA, Prime Minister’s Office, ITBP and DRDO

18 open

However, internecine wrangling among various cyber agencies has been an obstacle to a coordinated action in cyber security. Rai was tipped to become the first National Cyber Security Coordinator, which would require him to coordinate the efforts of various agencies involved in cyber security, but the friction between these departments meant he wasn’t named for the job. A senior National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) official confirms that “for sure, there is a turf war”.

Thanks to such bickering and concomitant delays, India’s cyber capabilities are not good either. India, according to experts in both the private sector and the Government, has so far not been able to fight off cyber attacks from outside the country. Rai admits such shortcomings: “Cyber attacks originate from different locations in the world. Indian cyberspace is also penetrated by a number of perpetrators from the cyberspace of other countries.

Their cyber technology offers [them] complete anonymity and virtuality, and it is difficult to pinpoint the original location of the attacks. Based on the footprints of the attacks observed in Indian cyberspace, one can only say that ‘these attacks are coming from the cyberspace of so and so country’. In reality, these attacks may not have originated from the country whose footprint we see in India. It is therefore difficult to attribute any attack to any particular country.”

Rai continues, “Newer and newer technologies are being introduced in the world, and at the same time, newer vulnerabilities are being observed in existing hardware and software. Therefore, keeping all such scenarios [in mind], steps… have been taken to strengthen the security posture of IT infrastructure in India.”

A former senior official of the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO), which along with the Defence Intelligence Agency focuses on cyber offensive warfare, says that unless large-scale hiring is done to tap the young, India will remain vulnerable to cyber attacks from rogue states and commercial intelligence gatherers.

Rai agrees: “The young generation need to be involved.

Steps have been initiated, as outlined, to create awareness, upgrade skills and engage them in R&D in the area of cyber security.”

Young, Bright and Restless

An engineering graduate from Delhi, now based in London, left India because he found “commercial opportunities” overseas. Before departing, he had dabbled in Indian corporate life and made “some money” as an ethical hacker, tracking ‘weak points’ in computer systems and programmes used by various top companies. The 30-yearold wanted to work with the Government “to help it stay ahead of the global cyber race” and to “combat crippling attacks from China” and other countries keen on cyber espionage. “We could have done it,” he says, “But I knocked on many doors and then decided to leave India when I met a guy at an international hackers conference who offered me a job that requires me to work for democracies else4 august 2014

According to official data, in the first five months of 2014 alone, 62,189 cyber security breaches were reported in India and 9,174 local websites hacked

where and earn a hefty sum.” He is cautiously optimistic about the Modi-led Government’s plans to re-equip the national cyber security apparatus. “I am told that the new NSA Ajit Doval means business,” he says, “I am ready to help if I am asked to.”

An NTRO official says that this time round, the Centre plans to actively hire whiz kids from schools and IITs. “I am told this time the Government will, while training, inculcate a sense of patriotism in these children so that they don’t go ahead with plans to make money, like how it happened in China,” he says.

With 62,189 cyber security breaches reported in India and 9,174 local websites hacked in the first five months of 2014 alone, both the Government and the private sector would need 23-year-old Saket Modi and his ilk to safeguard their systems.

As a high-school teenager, Saket Modi, who was weak in chemistry, had hacked into his school system to steal an exam question paper. He did succeed, but overcome by guilt, confessed his theft to his school teacher. Today, he is CEO of Lucideus, a firm that offers ‘ethical hacking’ services. “We are the good guys,” he says. His team comprises cyber analysts and security experts, all in the age group of 18-30, and claims to provide web space security to customers that include—a list that Open could not 4 august 2014

verify—the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Ministry of Defence, Ministry of Home Affairs, Criminal Investigation Department, Reserve Bank of India, IBM, Microsoft and various other Central and state investigative agencies.

Modi could be an asset for India’s cyber security.

“We would certainly go for those in their twenties, but ideally we would look for kids younger. That is the age to catch them,” says a government official. Rai has said that the country needs close to 4,00,000 professionals to address its cyber security needs. Currently, India has only about 32,000 such experts. “The situation is grim, and hence this drive to catch them young. Especially in protecting critical infrastructure,” says another official. He adds that malware like Stuxnet, Flame, Uroburos/Snake, Blackshades, FinFisher and so on can wreak havoc on critical installations.

What’s crucial in the ongoing plan, says a Defence official, is that the Government should not consider cyberspace any different from land, sea and air. In modern wars and skirmishes, cyber warfare offers an edge even to militarily weak opponents. For instance, the Gaza-based Hamas has had cyber troublemakers hack into phone systems of individuals in Israel and send panic-inducing messages to all those on their contact lists. Israel managed to neutralise such attacks thanks to its preparedness. open www.openthemagazine.com 19

Notes Gabi Siboni, Director, military and strategic affairs and cyber warfare programs, at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies: “Ours is a country that [has been] on its guard since the day it was founded. In the rapidly developing field of cyberspace, there are both risks and opportunities for Israel. Similar to other developed nations, cyberspace exposes Israel to significant fundamental risks, including damage to critical infrastructure, the defence establishment, the economy, and so on. Unlike many countries, Israel faces enemies driven to cause it as much harm as possible. There are a number of significant milestones in the country’s preparations for securing cyberspace; TEHILA—a Hebrew acronym for ‘Government Infrastructure for the Internet Era’—established in 1997 in the office of the Accountant General in the Ministry of Finance, was intended to provide secure browsing services to government ministries and institutions.” illustration anirban ghosh

Similarly, North Korea has often used its pool of young hackers to target American websites and installations, besides international gaming sites, as part of efforts to rake in millions that go into the nuclear programme of the communist dictatorship.

The Chinese Menace

By all accounts, Narendra Modi hit it off well with Chinese President Xi Jinping last week at the BRICS summit in Brazil, thanks to their mutual admiration. Modi, who has been gung-ho about China’s growth story for years, is an admirer of China’s leap to the big league of global power. He also wants to emulate that country’s model of infrastructure development in India. Xi, on his part, is reportedly deeply impressed by Modi’s mantra of ‘skill, scale and speed’ and his efforts to draw more Chinese investment to India.

However, cyber experts warn that none of that camaraderie is going to stop volunteers of the People’s Liberation Army from trying to access India’s military and administrative secrets. Beijing has already been quite successful at that. It has also managed to penetrate the American establishment for classified files. The secret of China’s success is a topic that Siboni has studied closely. According to him, China, which started focusing on cyber security around the same time India did, has made impressive advances in the area thanks to its young spies and whiz kids. In an exhaustive research paper he co-authored, titled ‘What Lies Behind Chinese Cyberwarfare’, Siboni explains that Beijing’s plan stems from an awareness that its armed forces are structurally inferior to those of the West. Therefore, along the lines of Sun Tzu’s key instruction in his classic The Art of War, the Chinese decided to “avoid strength and attack weakness”. According to Siboni, China knew that it had to confront an enemy with an edge in the flow of information.“The assumption is that during a confrontation, the ability to damage the flow of information would allow China to attain an advantage in the physical battlefield,” he says.

The major cyber attacks of recent times attributed to China include Operation Aurora, meant to gain access to Google’s password mechanism. Another is Operation Nitro, aimed at US utility companies. Others included The Night Dragon and Shady Rat attacks, which targeted government organisations, energy companies, communication networks, security and financial firms on foreign soil. The pivotal role of its attacks was played by China’s Skypiot programme, which, like Israel’s Talpiot, has units manned by teens. As of now, the strongest coun-

In accordance with Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, the Chinese cyber plan aims to ‘avoid strength and attack weakness’. Israeli expert Gabi Siboni says that China knew it had to confront an enemy with an edge in the flow of information 20 open

4 august 2014

Peter Yang/AUGUST

Obama’s team of cyber warriors comprises mostly young techies.

The US finds it tough to fight off hacking by the Chinese and the North Koreans tries in terms of cyber military capabilities are the US, UK, China, Russia, Israel and Iran.

The Big Challenges

Traditional military powers appear to be at their wits’ end trying to grasp the threat of cyber warfare. This is why the US statement that it would launch military strikes on countries that opt for cyber warfare against it evokes laughter among cyber security experts. “I am sure they know what they are saying. They are just resorting to posturing,” says a US military expert.

Typically, these cyber warriors infest spaces in the cyber sphere that are difficult to track, and they communicate with one another on the ‘Dark Net’. “One can’t afford to wage a war against them from outside cyberspace,” says Yoram Schweitzer, a Tel Aviv-based expert on terrorism and low-intensity warfare. “Cyber offence has the potential to change society’s balance of power because it empowers those engaged in asymmetrical conflicts [and] operate from a position of inferiority, especially terrorist organisations,” he says, “Already today global jihad terrorist organisations are making use of cyberspace, though still in a limited fashion.”

“We often underestimate the power of terrorism over the cyberscape,” says the London-based hacker of Indian origin.

Agrees a Defence Ministry official: “Currently they may be using it for collecting information and for communicating with each other and raising funds. They will do it in such 4 august 2014

a fashion that you wouldn’t know until you are struck.”

“Unfortunately, many of the ethical hackers are looking for more money. Once they taste the pleasure of a quick buck, they can’t stop. They may end up working for anyone, from government to terrorist bodies, both ethically and unethically,” says the London-based hacker, “A hacker, you see, can select the place and timing of the attack, and a defender has to be everywhere.”

The American military historian says that while a first strike offers a significant advantage, like in traditional warfare, it never decides who wins the war. Which is why, he reasons, countries should create both cyber defence and offensive strengths, but recognise that they can’t win by virtue of attacks alone. “You have to invest much more resources in protecting yourself than in launching an offensive,” he concludes, “Otherwise you don’t win a war.”

“It is true,” says the Defence Ministry official, “Cyber defence is of utmost importance, but then having offensive capabilities helps, too, especially in acting as a deterrent.”

Author Sunil Khilnani, professor of politics at King’s College, London, who has written extensively about cyber warfare, offers a word of caution on being sure of the “right group from which to recruit”. Indeed, as the Government goes ahead with its plans and scours the country for whiz kids, a judicious hiring policy could make all the difference to the country’s cyber security. n With additional reporting by Shruti Vyas open www.openthemagazine.com 21

PERSISTENCE OF THE RAHUL QUESTION leadership

As rebellion erupts and resentment grows in Congress, the leader is out of sight as usual.

PR RAMESH portrays a party sliding deeper into irrelevance

b. mathur/reuters

I

f there is still optimism about Congress Vicepresident Rahul Gandhi’s political future, it has to be because pundits have the habit of missing the wood for the trees. Predictably, the commentariat portrays the simmering discontent in the Congress as an ephemera. One close look at the Grand Old Party and you will see the cause of everything wrong with it: Rahul Gandhi.

There is a procession out of the Congress that is turning into a stampede. Senior party leaders who led

deconstructing the Decline The performance of the Congress and BJP in 2009 and 2014 in states where they were in a direct fight

Vote Share 2009

Vote Share 2014

Gain

Loss

Seats 2009

Seats 2014

SEATS

Assam Tarun Gogoi had meticulously quelled dissent and rebellion with his three-term win.

He had managed to create a space for the Congress and himself, defusing any electoral threat from the BJP and the Asom Gana Parishad.

Rahul Gandhi has neither upset the status quo nor bothered to hear out the rebels because Gogoi had managed to secure polls victories one after the other. But with Gandhi Jr’s political clout on the wane following the humiliating Lok Sabha setback, Gogoi, too, is feeling the heat of his master’s weakening authority within the party

INC

36.5

34.9

BJP

29.6

AIUDF 1

16.2

Party

Vote Share 2009

Vote Share 2014

Gain/ Loss

Seats 2009

Seats 2014

INC

24.7

22.9

-1.8

2

0

BJP

18.6

32.4

13.8

0

3

JKNC

19.1

11.1

-8

3

0

PDP

20.1

20.5

0.4

0

3

4

7

3

16.1 14.8

-5.3

20.3

-1.3

INC

BJP

AIUDF

Haryana Bhupinder Hooda thought the state was his fiefdom because he knew how to pull strings. In the past, whenever he ran into trouble, there were reports of his striking ‘deals’ with the Family to steer clear of any controversy. Hooda ran the system on a patronage network, with politicians, members of the judiciary and even journalists conniving with one another on their misdemeanours. With the party in disarray, Hooda may not find his usual tactics effective enough. With the BJP emerging as a powerful force in the state, which goes to the polls this year, the Congress’ future looks bleak. And Hooda’s too

7

3

SEATS

INC

41.8

BJP

12.1 34.7

INLD

15.8

22.9

24.4

-18.9 22.6 8.6

INC

9

1 BJP 0 INLD 0

7 2

Jammu & Kashmir The Congress-National Conference (NC) alliance thrived on personal rapport between two families, not political camaraderie. So far, NC leader Omar Abdullah has zealously ignored the Congress’ state leadership and has spent more time in confabulations with Nehru-Gandhi scion and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on what was to be done in the state. Without doubt, the cadres of both parties are disgruntled and frustrated. Much to the anguish of their leaders, it seems, rebellion cannot be swept under the carpet any longer

Maharashtra Party

Vote Share 2009

Vote Share 2014

Gain/ Loss

Seats 2009

INC

19.6

18.1

-1.5

17

2

BJP

18.2

27.3

9.1

9

23

17

20.6

3.6

11

18

19.3

16

-3.3

8

4

Shiv Sena

NCP 26 open

Seats 2014

Quintessential Delhi boy Prithviraj Chavan tried but failed to establish his local credentials. His stint as Chief Minister saw ally NCP increasingly distancing itself from the Congress. As MoS, he had a lacklustre tenure at the Centre. Though he enjoyed the confidence of 10 Janpath, he failed to act as a bridge between the Government and the party. True, nobody expected Chavan to transform himself into a leader of the stature of a YB Chavan or Vasantrao Patil, but the Maharashtra CM ended up being overshadowed by more powerful cabinet colleagues 4 AUGUST 2014

arvind yadav/ht/getty images

mukhtar khan/ap

the centre can no longer hold Tarun Gogoi (left) and Omar Abdullah are feeling the heat of rebellion from their own cadres as Rahul Gandhi’s authority wanes

it in past elections are now leading a rebellion. The attack on chief ministers chosen by the High Command in Maharashtra, Haryana and Assam has only advertised the diminishing clout of the leadership. And this could be debilitating for the party as assembly polls are round the corner in these states.

The Congress leadership’s favourite alibi for the party’s defeat in the last Lok Sabha election—that Manmohan Singh ran a weak government—may not be enough to shield the man who took all the key decisions. For, after Sonia Gandhi stepped back before the General Election of 2014, Rahul Gandhi has been at the helm. He enjoyed a free hand in the selection of candidates, state leaders and even the party’s political strategy.

Former Congress general secretary and Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament from Haryana, Chaudhary Birender Singh, has already moved into the waiting tent of the BJP. Singh, who is in touch with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, has been setting the atmospherics for the switchover by targeting Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda for converting the state Congress into his private holding company where politics and development are all about what’s beneficial to 4 AUGUST 2014

the first family in the state. “I have taken up the issue of the crisis in the state unit with the high command several times.

But there has been no attempt to put things in order,” Birender Singh said.

The crisis in the Maharashtra unit seems to be worsening by the day.

Although efforts are on to mollycoddle rebel leader Narayan Rane, who quit the state government, party leaders in the state admit that a truce is unlikely. Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, who was despatched by 10 Janpath to improve the Congress’ prospects in the western state, by all accounts, seems to be overseeing the liquidation of the party there.

Chavan had announced his ineptitude when the party won just two of Maharashtra’s 48 seats in the recently held Lok Sabha election.

The Congress has been hobbled by a worse crisis in Assam. Here, Rahul Gandhi himself has gone against his claim of democratising the decisionmaking process within the party. The rebels in the state, led by Himanta Biswa Sarma, had impressed upon the high command’s observer Mallikarjun Kharge that Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi has lost majority support in the legislative unit of the Congress. But Rahul

Gandhi made it clear that the party’s old ways were alive and kicking when he ordered that Gogoi stay in office as Assam’s Chief Minister.

The party leadership’s loosening grip and inability to broker peace between warring local leaders has been turning the party’s allies more assertive in the run-up to state elections. Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar and his lieutenants have bluntly told the Congress that the previous terms of endearment will have to be reworked. “We won more seats than the Congress in the Lok Sabha election,” as NCP leader Tariq Anwar has put it, “That was the last time that all parties tested their support in the state. The old arrangement needs a fresh look.” Put simply, the NCP is not willing to play the role of a junior ally in Maharashtra.

There are signs that Congressmen no longer believe in a magical ability of the Family—especially that of Rahul Gandhi— to revive the organization. In West Bengal, this was clear when three of its MLAs crossed over to the ruling Trinamool Congress. It is only a matter of time that even the emaciated legislative wing of the Congress in Delhi disappears from the national capital’s Assembly. open www.openthemagazine.com 27

‘‘

T

Hooda considers Haryana to be his fiefdom and what matters to him is his family.

I have placed my views before the high command several times. I will not be available to contest the election” BIRENDER SINGH

gurinder osan/ap

‘‘

Prithviraj Chavan, state Congress President Manikrao Thakre and I will meet Sonia Gandhi soon.

I feel the solution lies in accepting my resignation’’ NARAYAN RANE

ujjal deb

‘‘

Gogoi has lost support of the legislature party. It was verified by the leadership’s representative Kharge. The party leadership has to accept the reality” HIMANTA BISWA SARMA 28 open

here cannot be any quarrel with

those who maintain that an incorrect reading of the 2004 and 2009 General Election verdicts is to blame for the crisis engulfing the Congress. The election that returned it to power in 2004 was not a knockout victory for the party. It won on points and captured power at the Centre only on the strength of powerful regional players. It was also facilitated by the BJP’s failure to hold on to its traditional constituency. By no stretch of imagination had the party become an umbrella organisation with wide appeal across the country, as powerful caste and community groupings had voted for regional and smaller parties.

In 2009, the party won a convincing mandate by winning the bulk of urban seats. But deriving all the wrong conclusions from its increase in seats past the 200 mark in the Lok Sabha, it began tilting heavily towards loosely defined empowerment and entitlement slogans.

And the years that followed saw the party’s inability to appeal to diverse sections of India come to the fore. Still stuck with old themes of poverty alleviation and handouts, its refusal to understand the power of the aspiration bug left it grievously wounded. For a fastgrowing bulge of the country’s population reaching for middle-class status, mere promises of entitlement have no meaning. What they are looking for, instead, is an environment of opportunities, hassle free development and transparent governance.

Against this backdrop, the party’s 2014 rout offers an appropriate setting for a recalibration of its agenda and a relook at its political priorities. But does the leadership have the wherewithal to do it?

Not many in the Congress are willing to vouch for Rahul Gandhi’s capability and imagination to steer the party. The 44-year-old, many in the Congress say, remains indifferent to suggestions while seeming excessively cocksure about his own ideas. “He is happy with his own pet certitudes. He merely goes through the motions of listening to party leaders, [but] he never hears them out. And that is the problem,” says a Congress leader who does not wish to be identified.

This assessment is not off the mark.

That Gandhi’s ‘big ideas’ did not have any traction was clear from the drubbing the 4 AUGUST 2014

sameer joshi/fotocorp

dismal show Prithviraj Chavan had shown his ineptitude when the party won just two of Maharashtra’s 48 seats in the recent Lok Sabha election

party got in the Lok Sabha polls. The ‘primaries’ he had held to select electoral candidates proved to be a disaster, as just one such candidate picked through this process won a seat; elections to the Youth Congress wings have not rejuvenated the party in Tamil Nadu or Gujarat (two states in which the organisation is politically irrelevant); and its entitlement agenda only evokes yawns among the electorate.

Senior Congress leaders like Kamal Nath and Digvijaya Singh have been uncharacteristically candid while diagnosing the problems of India’s oldest party.

While Kamal Nath wants the young Gandhi to play a more proactive role in the party and Parliament, Digvijaya Singh has said a new message and approach were needed to counter a BJP that has broken down social and geographical barriers.

There is merit in this analysis, as the Congress now has to face a recharged BJP with a decisive leadership. The BJP has expanded its geographical reach, and any meaningful challenge to the ruling party would require vying for a slice of its new-found support base. “Narendra Modi is seen as someone who can deliver. BJP President Amit Shah has perfect chemistry with the Prime Minister.

4 AUGUST 2014

The NDA Government may not have done wonders till now, but its efforts to change the situation should work in their favour,” says the Congress leader quoted earlier.

T

he coming round of Assembly polls

will be a major test for Rahul Gandhi’s leadership. “By the time elections are held, there could be some softening of prices. There is also the likelihood of the

Poll setbacks in the coming assembly elections to seven states could change things radically.

Rahul Gandhi will have to take the blame in the event of the party faring badly

RBI going in for [an interest] rate cut in August,” says a Congress general secretary, “The situation could prove tough for the Congress.”

But if Congress reflexes are anything to go by, the party is just not interested in serious introspection on its 2014 debacle. Even the composition of the post-mortem panel led by AK Antony— it has no member from the Hindi heartland where it suffered its worst setback—suggests that the effort is mainly aimed at whitewashing its leadership deficiencies.

These efforts may shield Rahul Gandhi in the immediate future, but a defeat in the coming assembly polls in seven states could change things drastically. He will have to take the blame squarely if the party fares badly at the hustings. The terms of relationship between him and his partymen could be transformed beyond his retrieval. Even those in the Congress who claim that the Gandhi-Nehru Dynasty is the ‘glue’ that holds the party together might recall how Congress leaders, after its 1999 defeat, had begun preparing the ground to challenge Sonia Gandhi’s leadership. It was the collapse of the NDA that stalled that challenge.

Still, Rahul is not in the vanguard; as usual, the leader is elsewhere. n open www.openthemagazine.com 29

REJOINDER

Arundhati Roy’s Ahistorical Fiction How the novelist in her simplistic rhetoric on caste got Gandhi wrong MGS Narayanan

A

rundhati Roy came into the limelight when she wrote

a good novel about her village in Kerala, The God of Small Things, which won the Booker prize in 1997.

However, being a good novelist does not qualify her to comment on history or politics. Her complete ignorance of the history of the National Movement in India and the role of Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) who led the freedom struggle to victory has been exposed by her description of Gandhi as a ‘casteist’.

Roy has for some time been indulging in sensationalism,

man of conscience Gandhi during the Boer War (1899–1902) 30 open

making statements like this to catch the attention of the press.

Perhaps she thinks that the best way to please the followers of Dr BR Ambedkar (1891–1956), Ayyankali (1863–1941), Marxist politicians and the advocates of Hindutva all at the same time is to denigrate the Father of the Nation. It is not necessary to criticise Gandhi to show one’s respect for and admiration of Ayyankali, who was a bold reformer from the ranks of the social group formerly known as ‘untouchables’ (Dalits, now). It is worth noting that Ayyankali himself had great regard for Gandhi’s efforts to liberate the backward and marginalised communities of India.

Like every member of his generation, Gandhi was also born and brought up in a caste-ridden society. He was taught to look at the Varnashram Dharma as the great ideal of Hindu society, and interpret the attitudes of upper castes only as a manifestation of this ideal. In the course of time, he realised that the ideal itself had to be criticised and rejected. After his visit to Kerala during the Vaikom Satyagraha, and his meeting with Sri Narayana Guru, he published the view that the theory of Varnashram itself had to be abolished. Gandhi wrote about this in the columns of Harijan and Young India, publications that he edited.

From the time of Gautam Buddha in the 6th Century BCE, several great reformers have attempted to reduce or eliminate the

Gandhi was born and brought up in a caste-ridden society. He was taught to look at the Varnashram Dharma as the great ideal of Hindu society. In the course of time, he realised that the ideal itself had to be criticised and rejected 4 AUGUST 2014

getty images

mahatma to be MK Gandhi (centre-seated ) as a practising attorney in South Africa, flanked by his clerks HSL Polak (left) and Ms Schlesin

injustice and inequity created by the caste system in India. They did not succeed. It was only in the 20th century that, under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi, the people of India made the struggle against the caste system an integral part of their quest for freedom from British rule and succeeded in declaring untouchability a crime under the Constitution of the Republic of India.

Now the fiction writer in Arundhati Roy is trying to obliterate these facts and replace them with fiction to please the critics of modern India.

4 AUGUST 2014

A

part from exposing the colossal illiteracy of a good novelist on the recent history of India and the nobility of the Father of the Nation, this untimely outburst may yet have a positive outcome if it provokes a healthy debate on the caste system in India. It is unfortunate that many of the Left historians have blindly borrowed the ‘class’ concept from Western thinkers and completely or partially ignored the indigenous caste system, which had permeated Indian society and affected all aspects of life. This system has had a complex character and manifested itself in different ways. open www.openthemagazine.com 31

raul irani

The unquestioned authority of Brahmins, a caste group that migrated from north India to the south and then spread all over the country, was a significant aspect of the caste system. They were a group of intellectuals with privileged access to assorted knowledge resources. This, combined with the theory of rebirth, made the condition of the vast majority of ‘lower’ castes miserable. The system gave them no hope, since it didn’t offer any relief even after many, many rebirths. A large chunk of Indian society was always prepared to support any invader and serve him in the hope of self-upliftment, which caste rules didn’t permit ‘lower’ castes.

This began happening under the regimes of Muslim invaders and later European imperialists, from the Portuguese to the British.

Every sincere Indian must admit that caste is in his blood. Mahatma Gandhi was no exception to this rule. The greatness of Gandhi lies in the fact that in the course of his public life, he came to realise this, and once he did, he struggled hard to break out of it. He tried to exorcise the devil. He went out of his way to serve those who were referred to as ‘untouchables’, helped them gain a measure of self-respect by calling them Harijans, the ‘children of God’. He decreed that Harijans were to get priority in all welfare schemes, and he openly declared that the day when a Harijan becomes the President of India will be the happiest day for him.

By calling Gandhi casteist, Arundhati Roy might be hoping to play the heroine to a group of extremists, but she is actually wounding the conscience of mankind. She might succeed in creating a ripple in the media and on some TRP-hungry television channels, but beyond that, Gandhi’s name or greatness are not going to be affected adversely. But her own image as a writer and a citizen will suffer irrevocably. One cannot get away by peddling false impressions of a great man for the consumption of the Western press or disoriented bleeding hearts looking for an opportunity to find and celebrate any distortion of the truth by randomly picking up sentences and utterances.

The people of India and the world at large know who served them and who sacrificed everything for the sake of the poor and the marginalised. They have the common sense to distinguish between a person of empty words and a man of action and courage, between a person who is genuine and who is just a fake.

Ironically, even BR Ambedkar, who had differences of opinion with Gandhi, had many a time pointed out that any kind of debate over freedom for the marginalised and the ‘lowest of low’ castes would not have been possible had Gandhi not ploughed his

By calling Gandhi casteist, Arundhati Roy might play the heroine to a group of extremists, but she is actually wounding the conscience of mankind. She might create a ripple in the media, but Gandhi’s greatness is not going to be affected adversely

32 open

furrow through the political, cultural and social sphere of India.

Roy and her ilk must realise that she is a lesser being when it comes to understanding history and the message of Gandhi, who first said ‘God is truth’ and then said ‘Truth is God’, which shows how his thinking evolved over time. And that is what the novelist fails to fathom, and naturally so.

The Arundhati Roys of the world may have their 15 minutes of fame thanks to meaningless babble of the kind she tried spouting on Gandhi, whose name will endure through the ages for championing the cause of the poor and the disadvantaged.

It is a shame that a good fiction writer committed a sinful error by speaking about something she knows nothing of: history. History will forgive her because it will forget her empty talk. It was a kind of cocktail conversation, something she tried to engage in right before a meeting meant to honour a great Dalit reformer.

It was completely out of place, and she, out of her mind. n MGS Narayanan is a renowned historian and former chairman of the Indian Council of Historical Research 4 AUGUST 2014

profile

healing touch Rajaram Tripathi with traditional farming implements in a village whose members participate in his traditional herbal collective

photos rupesh yadav

Lord of the Jungle and the Magic Potion Once a bank officer, the determined herbal king of Kondagaon shakes money from trees in the Maoist strongholds of Bastar through a collective of 20,000 Tribals whose business looks to expand worldwide. Rajni George on the man and his empire

Jadi booti: literally, roots and plants, the extracts from the roots of plants and shrubs generally defined as herbs, popularly ascribed to India’s many-limbed kingdoms of green

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ythologised, problematised,

proselytised, traditional herbs are a national (and international) obsession and a huge industry worth around Rs 9,000 crore, according to National Medicinal Plant Board of India estimates. From the verdant, Naxalridden district of Bastar in Chhattisgarh where Bastar champagne (a rare beverage made from the sulfi tree) and tasty fruits called kurlu are found, a much-publicised local form of Viagra (a rare indigenous variety of safed musli) has made a name for itself—through a man who has been translating the bounties of the jungle for more than a decade.

“They call me ‘The Father of Safed Musli’,” says 50-year-old Rajaram Tripathi, a strapping figure in kurta and jeans, pale and Brahminical-looking in publicity shots from a couple of decades ago, now tanned and very much a son of the soil. “It combats diabetes, and rejuvenates your entire system, reverses metabolism. People will slowly say, after you eat it for three or four months, that your wrinkles have lifted.” Big talk? Local Tribals are said to have lived longer and better on traditional health practices, using the abundant herbs and roots at their disposal to stay vital and virile.

“I felt like Alice in Wonderland,” Tripathi says of his first experience with the jungle’s potent flora, when we meet him on one of his 10 farms. We walk through long, vertiginous rows of trees in his ethno-medico forest, stopping to pluck some sarpagandha (Rauvolfia serpentina, used to create blood pressure drugs) off the plant; look at a velvetyleaved plant which cures stomach problems; identify annatto (Bixa orellena), richest source of vitamin E. He rattles off Latin names like they are actresses’ names or stock market darlings.

Tripathi, a bank worker turned agricultural entrepreneur and Bastar boy born and raised, has turned a cottage industry with one farm into a 10 acre, Rs 40-crore-a-year (Rs 10 crore domestic) herbal empire in Kondagaon district: the aptly named Maa Danteshwari Herbal Products (MDHP), extending as far as 36 open

The roots of Bastar’s endangered variety of safed musli (Chlorophytum borivilianum), are a natural aphrodisiac and source of vitality Ethiopia, Gulf countries and the Netherlands. (The Tribal nature goddess Danteshwari is worshipped in the area.)

Functioning as a collective, MDHP employs 300 Tribal families and works with around 22,000 farmers over 1,000 acres.

It all began with a rare variety of safed musli (Chlorophytum borivilianum), a herb with lanceolate leaves found in natural forests from east Assam to Gujarat and abundant here, its roots used medicinally as a source of virility (through the saponins and alkaloids they contain), setting him on a path of 17 years of “organic herbal medicinal and aromatic farming”.

“The biodiversity of this place is so great, endangered species thrive here.

There are 60 varieties of safed musli, of which one endangered species grows here [MDB-13 and 14]. I only work with this one,” says the entrepreneur, who has taken bare land back into the folds of the jungle. “I got organic certification from Germany, and Japanese agriculture [authorities] gave me certification that Ecocert [an inspection and certification body established in France in 1991] was not providing at that time.” The products rely on natural pest controls like neem and spiders, and feature ‘gold’ varieties.

Winning the Royal Bank of Scotland Earth Hero Award in 2012 and various national prizes such as the Desh Seva Ratna

Award, Tripathi has been honoured by former President Abdul Kalam and has met the BJP’s LK Advani and Rajnath Singh, his self-devised PR package proclaims. Trained in natural ingredients in Rotterdam and invited to speak at nature expos in Dubai, participating in herbal trade conferences everywhere from Jhansi to Japan, this single-minded businessman farmer is constantly at work.

Officials and local media in Chhattisgarh’s capital Raipur applaud Tripathi’s industry not just on its own merit, but because it offers an option to Tribals trapped in India’s so-called ‘red corridor’, even if they are critical of his PR. For, not much has changed in the way of infrastructure for Tribals in the last decade or so; rampant Naxalite guerilla warfare gathers many of the disaffected into its grip, seeking control of their lands.

“Bastar has historically been an underserved area in terms of health services.

Kondagaon district contains some of the most remote and forested areas in the district,” says Sulakshana Nandi, a healthcare worker of the Jan Swasthya Abhiyan, the Indian circle of the People’s Health Movement (a worldwide movement for health and equitable development), who has worked for 12 years in this area.

“People are poor and are rapidly losing control of natural resources like forests that they have depended upon for generations. This exacerbates the poor status of health in that area.” Tripathi’s effort is one of the few to bring Tribals together in a sustainable collective asserting their connection to the land.

“Naxalites are the excuse for much that doesn’t happen in Bastar,” he says, speaking to media coverage around violence in this region of about 10,000 sq km. ‘This is the only sustainable solution for Bastar and other [similar] regions,’ he says in his mission statement. It cites the 6,000 to 7,000 Indian medicinal plants used in Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani and Homoeopathy practices; about 960 species in trade, 178 of them annually consumed in excess of 100 tonnes for an output of about Rs 10,000 crore, exports being upwards of Rs 1,000 crore. (World figures are projected to reach trillions by 2050). Of course, violence is reported daily and there are unexploded bombs people fear discovering, but this doesn’t 4 AUGUST 2014

mean people shouldn’t visit this beautiful part of the world, he opines, hinting at a resort in the works.

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ater flows through Raipur’s plush airport under plexiglass panels, and through Chhattisgarh’s rural lands in the monsoon. Creosote puddles of water, sopping soil, rainbows just out of reach: here is the Bastar of villages, providing produce and profit. Yet it is ‘Jindal’s army’, the local nickname for the metal men who decorate the airport, that presides over ‘Credible Chhattisgarh’, the steel state’s hilarious take on the ‘Incredible India’ campaign. Development is paramount in this 14-year-old state (carved out of Madhya Pradesh) that produces more than 15 per cent of India’s steel and has been setting new benchmarks for rapid development; Tripathi and herbal entrepreneurs like him compete with a variety of concerns as they vie for governmental attention.

Raipur, an aspirational second-tier city of around 200 sq km steadily pumped with the steel wealth that passes

through, is the kind of place where you want to read the T-shirt: ‘When Money Talks You Don’t Listen To Its Accent’, as one local’s says. The city plays a doctored version of the national anthem before movie screenings, featuring local politicians, which everyone stands for. Its local restaurants, often christened ‘Madrasi’, compete with the usual low-cost fast food outlets, and it has eight frequentlyvisited malls. A new Hyatt on a promotional rate of Rs 3,000 a room per night has been sold out for two weeks, its management tells us. The state’s roads are neat and traversed in an orderly manner, still smoothly paved as they head into nearby Bhilai, the steel industry hub, or scenic rural parts. Naya Raipur, or New Raipur, lies 17 km away, about 8,000 hectares spread out over 41 villages, planned to house 450,000 residents; India’s fourth planned capital city (after Gujarat’s Gandhinagar, Punjab’s Chandigarh and Odisha’s Bhubaneshwar) with a Rs 2,000 crore budget, according to reports.

“Sab chahiye [I want everything],” says our driver, who once drove a lorry, now drives a car, and will soon drive a bus, he

vows. Second-tier city India is always looking in all directions, as are its architects. Land is the big challenge for them and for Tripathi: he needs more to fully capitalise on expanding demand. So do the state’sTribals, who try to keep pace.

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ne of seven brothers, Tripathi and

his extended family, 40 or so of them, are all farmers. He was a State Bank of India (SBI) probationary officer in 1989, a college professor in the past, he says. “I had lots of jobs. After three years, a promotion was waiting for me at SBI. I was a good officer, there were good career prospects. People said, ‘People are committing suicide in agriculture and you are joining?’ But when I was at the bank, I saw the economic viability of krishi (agriculture). If you take the price of land, you have to classify this as expenses. And if there is debit, there is credit.” He chose the Grameen Bank model and studied 17 conventional crops, showing the results to National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD). Loans resulted, and steady if slow growth.

POTIONS AND POWDERS MDHP workers display a basket of safed musli in its natural form with the packaged final product

Every year, 20 million tonnes of produce is stored in various storage sheds on Tripathi’s 10 farms; his processing unit is 100,000 sq ft. Agriculture Information, an online and print agrarian resource, mentions Tripathi’s work with varieties of lemon grass (MDL-14) and stevia (MDS13 and 14) as well, and boasts of Tripathi’s tie-ups with multinational companies.

His Ethiopia project is in its first phase: 14,000 acres for high-value herbal farming, with the Lootah group of companies.

Tie-ups with American and European companies are in the works, he says. A guestbook is signed by visitors from the US, Japan and other countries, not to mention countless visitors from all over India, usually in large groups; the company provides consultancy services to corporate entities that want to develop high value herbal farms. A tissue culture lab continues his experimental laboratory work; species like Guggul (Commifora wightii) and Vacha (Acorus calamus) were commercialised here.

“There were 15 years of mistakes,” says Tripathi, who was born in Kaknar, Jagdalpur, to a family which suffered the misfortunes farmers are vulnerable to.

“Tribals have one guru with 20 students; I had 20 gurus.” Abundantly educated— he has earned a BSc and an LLB in corporate law, MAs in Economics, Hindi and History, an Ayurved Ratna from Allahabad, an Ayurved Bhishgacharya from the World Academy of Ayurved (WAA)—he seems endlessly ambitious.

His small bedroom, in a humble yet relatively affluent home decorated with Bastar’s ubiquitous wrought iron work, is lined with books. “Those books I have read,” he says, pointing to shelves of academic-looking botanical books in Hindi, “and those I am going to read”—another section of faded covers.

“He was top in everything,” says wife Shipra, who had a “love cum arranged” marriage with the man she met at university. A Tribal of the Kamar community (Gonds are also populous here), she doesn’t call her husband by name, like many here, though her children are studying in Raipur and they have some of the trappings of modernity: computer, phone, rough terrain car. Tripathi is saved as ‘Father ji’ on her phone. Part of MDHP’s management, Shipra is secretary of Samagra Adivasi Medicinal Plant 38 open

Development Association (SAMPDA), a green NGO Tripathi founded ‘for total herbal revolution’, and involved with local women’s groups. Except for her features, her Tribal identity seems vestigial, like with many here; only older women go without sari blouses and bear tattoos.

Tripathi has raised several other commanders in his green army. He says he employs five experts who have studied medicinal plants at the doctorate level or are biotech engineers, 14 marketing experts and 10 managers. When more manpower is needed, all members pitch in to make up a workforce of around 1,000 people. “We don’t have a fixed salary,” he explains. “We distribute weekly or monthly honorariums to all our team members, including me, as per our work and responsibilities; from Rs 6,000 to 10,000 monthly. ‘Employees’ is not a suitable word. We say ‘associate tribal families’; 1,500 people are getting their livelihood from this farming.”

Dasmati Netam, from Keyoti 10 km away, leads a production team; an ambitious 36-year-old woman, she is head of MDHP’s All Tribal Women groups and President of SAMPDA. Unlike the other Tribals, known for their reticence, she has studied outside the state and speaks up often about her work, taking us home for rice wine. As the apparent leader of

Every year, 20 million tonnes of produce result in Rs 10 crore of annual domestic turnover

her village, she exudes confidence. “I’d like to go outside again,” she says, already seeming to have left its crude wooden fences behind.

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hat is Tripathi’s biggest challenge, aside from the need for more land? “Marketing. In India, until Amitabh Bachchan or Aamir Khan eats these things, people don’t.” Indeed, his main marketing platform is Central Herbal Agro Marketing Federation of India (CHAMF-INDIA); a far cry from Organic India domain. “And the next step is backward linkage,” he continues.

“Our fight is with middlemen. Now we have negotiation power—ashwamgandha, for example, no one will sell less than 100 kg. If they do, we will blacklist them.

We have to control the market. If everyone grows safed musli, who will buy it?”

Tripathi is set to launch ‘certified organic food supplements’ in select towns of Chhattisgarh before taking these to other parts of India. He projects sales of Rs 6 crore for these ‘value-added’ products. His teas and powders may look a little too rustic for the urbane consumer, but they are tasty and seem to find takers among the believers they are aimed at; the sales figure may well be realised.

With success, however, has come criticism. MDHP’s annual growth rate may be upwards of 14 per cent, but there are rumours of loans that were defaulted on, say sources in Chhattisgarh who feel he is encroaching on ‘jungle wala zameen’ (forest land); Tripathi refutes this, saying he paid the loan off two months ago.

Tribals who have farmed for many years can get patta (legal registration papers), but he is not one, say others. Yet, Tribals may have found their most viable leader in the bank worker who put his hands to work on the land of his birth.

In his mission statement, Tripathi offers 10 acres for a pilot conservation project across neighbouring states. Will the rumble spread through his jungle? Time may prove harsh, but for now he is effusive. During our walk, he spots a longtailed bird and we crouch till it takes off, feathers streaming. He asks us to close our eyes for two minutes, and while the gesture is stagey, the sound of green is unadulterated. “Take two deep breaths,” he says, beaming. n 4 AUGUST 2014

raËlians

Waiting for Elohim william blake/elohim creating adam 1795/c.1805

LHENDUP G BHUTIA steps into the world of alien worshippers in India who have been thrilled by the discovery of rock paintings depicting UFOs in Chhattisgarh

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he words, when they eventu-

ally emerge, are incredulous. But I’m surprised I am even uttering them. “But,” I say, “When… when will the Elohim reveal itself?” In the silence that ensues, I suspect I have been found out. That my disbelief and suspicion have been exposed. But when the voice at the other end of the line returns, it is deep and slow, and has the quality of a seer’s speech. “Everyone asks me this all the time: ‘Will the Elohim appear in Jerusalem? Will he show himself in 2025?’” says Anup Prasad. “Look up,” he says, and I look up to see a ceiling fan whirring in the room. “Look up

4 AUGUST 2014

at the sky,” he continues. “Do you think the Elohim will come? At this point in time? When we shoot down our own aircraft?” he asks, referring to Malaysia Airlines’ Boeing 777, “What do you think we will do when we see Elohim in his flying saucer?”

Raëlians will probably say, ‘We told you so.’

It was perhaps inevitable that for those unmoved by religion’s explanation of creation, unconvinced by science’s account of the start of life, and unimpressed with atheism, agnosticism and their ilk, a new creed would emerge that holds the following as its central belief: that man-

kind cannot be the only intelligent beings in existence.

Anup Prasad, who prefers being called Blazing Light because it masks the Hindu origin of his given name, is a Raëlian. And Raëlism, a growing international cult that considers itself a ‘UFO religion’, is gradually establishing its presence in India. Raëlians worship aliens from outer space. They believe that these aliens, the Elohim (which in ancient Hebrew means, ‘Those who came from the sky’) created humans through genetic experiments. The prophet of this religion, a former French automobile journalist, Claude Vorilhon, who now calls himself open www.openthemagazine.com 39

rupesh yadav

EVIDENCE? A rock painting found in a cave in Charama in Chhattisgarh’s Kanker district that Raëlians believe depicts a UFO

Raël (‘the messenger’), claims to have met extra-terrestrials who emerged from a flying saucer near a volcano in France in 1973. These aliens, small humanshaped beings with pale green skin and almond eyes who later took him to the Elohim planet in a flying saucer, told him—in fluent French—about the origin of human beings, and then asked him to spread the information. One day, as the belief goes, these aliens will return, and teach us, through cloning and the transmission of memories and personality, how to attain immortality. Until that day, Raëlians are to build an embassy to prepare for their return, convey the message to others, and wait.

Prasad, who is a Level 4 National Guide Raëlian, is currently excited about the discovery of over-10,000-year-old rock paintings depicting what look like aliens and UFOs in a cave in Chhattisgarh’s Charama region. According to a Times of India news report, these paintings were discovered by the state archaeology department, which also claims that locals 40 open

in nearby villages worship these and narrate ancient tales of small people landing from the sky and abducting humans.

“Can you imagine if this were true?” he asks. “It would be evidence that extraterrestrials were around back then and people were aware of it.” He plans to travel to the site on an exploratory trip next month.

P

rasad is originally from Tinsukia

in Assam and works as a digital marketing professional in Delhi. He claims he stumbled upon Raëlism in his search for an explanation of our true origins.

Several years ago, one evening, when Prasad was studying Commerce at a Bangalore college, he, along with a group of friends saw something in the sky that would put him on this path. “How do I explain it? There was suddenly this large object in the sky, a combination of mysterious lights, travelling upwards at an incredible speed,” he says. It was nothing like anything anyone in the group had

ever seen before. According to Prasad, some of his friends tried to rationalise it by claiming that it was either a meteor or military jet, and later forgot about it. But not Prasad. “I knew it was no meteor,” he says, “And it certainly wasn’t a jet. Our jets can’t move so fast. It’s not our science.” As he began to trawl the internet for answers, he learnt about Raëlism and came in touch with other Raëlians in India.

For those who eschew rites, the conversion process to Raëlism is an elaborate ritual. Called the ‘Transmission of the Cellular Plan’ and performed only four times a year—the first Sunday in April when the Elohim is believed to have created Adam and Eve; 6 August, when the bombing of Hiroshima began the Age of Apocalypse/Revelation; 7 October, when Raël met past prophets like Jesus and Buddha on board an Elohim craft; and 13 December, when Raël was first contacted by the Elohim—a senior member’s hand soaked in warm water is placed on an aspiring convert’s head, and thus is the 4 AUGUST 2014

‘DNA frequency’ of the aspirant hooked up with the Elohim’s mother computer.

Prasad, who is one of three members allowed to perform this ritual, explains, “The mother computer has the genetic information of all creatures on earth. The frequency of the one to be initiated, flowing through me, reaches the computer, as I inform the Elohim that the individual has accepted them as his creator.”

In India, there are around 80 registered members so far. According to Prasad, there are another 20,000 who have not converted in fear of the response of their family and friends. Members of the religion come from all walks of life, from young students unconvinced by their parents’ blind faith in God to older members who believe Raël offers the most convincing explanation so far of the origin of human beings.

Sai Subramanian, who uses the alias DJ Psy Inertia when he works as a DJ in Mumbai nightclubs, became a member, he says, because it helped him give up smoking. People have to renounce alcohol and nicotine once they become Raëlians. The group performs a set of breathing and meditation exercises that they call ‘sensual meditation’. After about six months of doing this, which he says helped him quit smoking, Subramanian once saw a woman, Yaho—a South Korean Raëlian who had helped set up the Indian chapter and whom Subramanian had met earlier— in a dream asking him to wake up and perform the meditation. “But it wasn’t like a dream. It was more life-like,” he says. When he wrote to Yaho about the experience, she wrote back saying she was glad to hear of it since she had been trying to telepathically connect with him for several months. She told him he was now purer than he ever was and could receive telepathic messages.

Subramanian hasn’t had an experience like this again and believes that he owes this lull in telepathic ability to the infrequency of his meditative performances.

A

t the heart of the Raëlian core is

an adolescent pursuit, the question that drives the engine of every million dollar spiritual enterprise and religion: ‘Who are we?’ The answer they offer is safe. They do not dismiss the existence

4 AUGUST 2014

of divinities. They claim that what various established religions consider ‘gods’ are in fact aliens. That Jesus, Buddha, Muhammad and other prophets were all past ambassadors of the Elohim; it just so happened that we misunderstood their messages. They do not believe in the soul, but believe that through cloning and transmission, human lives continue.

They do not subscribe to scientific theories of the Big Bang and evolution, but insist on the supremacy of science and technology. They are not outright agnostics or atheists, but borrow strains of thought from them.

One of the most active Indian Raëlians is Jay Trivedi, who works for a recruitment firm. He claims to have always had a keen interest in paranormal activities and been highly perceptive to energy fluctuations around him. This awareness, he claims, has increased by practis-

ing Raëlism. “Can you explain how ancient humans built the pyramids? What is this vimaan (flying object) Ravan [of The Ramayana] is travelling on? I looked for these answers in religion and science, but found none,” says Trivedi.

“But these, as Raëlism will tell you, were all createdby aliens who in technology are far superior to us.”

Raëlians, however, have one major grouse. The manner in which sciencefiction films and books have depicted aliens. “Why do they always show them taking over earth, attacking humans?” asks Farnaza Governor, a Raëlian in Mumbai who works in the corporate social responsibility department of an MNC. “They created us. Why would they kill us?”

The Raëlian Movement International, as it’s sometimes called, is not an evil cult.

They are a benign group of laid-back apoorva guptay

“Can you explain how ancient humans built the pyramids? Or what this vimaan that Ravan travels on is?”

JAY TRIVEDI Mumbai based Raëlian open www.openthemagazine.com 41

apoorva guptay

“Why do they always show aliens taking over earth, attacking humans? They created us. Why would they kill us?” Farnaza Governor Mumbai based Raëlian people who believe in peace and oppose the imposition of restrictions. In the West, they are known to be liberal on matters of sex and relationships, on individuals having multiple partners without anyone claiming the right to feel jealous or possessive about anyone.

‘Osho meets UFO,’ as some commentators quip. In India, however, if you join the group expecting a smorgasbord of free love, you’ll be disappointed. Here, Raëlians mostly occupy themselves in meditation, telepathic communication with the Elohim, and attending Raëlian seminars.

Prasad claims he is selective about the people who are initiated into the group.

This is because requests to join the movement are often motivated by the group’s liberal stance on sex. “They often don’t 42 open

want to know about the Elohim or how to spread the message. They want to know how many men and women are in the group. If each one is equally open to lovemaking,” he says, “But I tell them, ‘That’s not what Raëlism is about. How will you face your creator if you think in this manner?’”

Among Raëlians in India, Prasad finds himself in a peculiar spot. Although he has been able to excuse himself from all temple visits and prayers (by telling his family he does not believe in deities), his family now wants him to marry. “But we don’t believe in marriage and its rituals, like other religions do. But my parents are adamant. So I have told them that if they forcibly try to get me married, at least pick someone who will not think aliens are imaginary creatures.”

Despite their stated objective of trying to spread peace, as this will facilitate the return of the Elohim, Raëlians can sometimes have momentary lapses of temper.

Recently, when Prasad shared the news of the paintings found in Chhattisgarh on Facebook, one of his friends on the website challenged the findings, claiming that there is no proof of aliens. A fellow Raëlian replied that a lot of evidence on intelligent alien life is being held in various secure locations around the world. Prasad, however, seemed more upset. ‘Even GOD can’t be proven...,’ he wrote, ‘and the scientists you talk about are corrupt and slaves of the power-hungry world government who want to enslave you… For ‘PROOFS’ I would suggest you look up in the sky minimum 1 hr @ night.’ n 4 AUGUST 2014

h e r i ta g e

mindspace

sspl/getty images

An acquittal too late

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o p e n s pa c e

Salman Khan Saif Ali Khan Sajid Khan

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n p lu

Hate Story 2 Begin Again

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cinema review

R-Kaid-R Monaco V4 Tourbillon Samsung Galaxy S5 4G

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gadgets

Evolutionary benefits of friendship Microplastics amd marine life The cooling effect of Arctic lakes

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science

The Return of the Butterfly by Moni Mohsin Transgressions by Vaiju Naravane Close to home by Parvati Sharma

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books

Theatrical releases of documentaries in India

cinema

The redevelopment of Chandni Chowk

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return to history Redeveloping the Mughal capital of Shahjahanabad 48

heritage

POWER AND GLORY A walk through the grand alleys of Mughal history and Shahjahanabad, which is now being redeveloped Sunil Raman

history on wheels A view of the tram system established by the British in Chandni Chowk in 1954 Sun Shadow

the imprints of the rise, decline and fall of the imperial capital of

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the times of india

fter over seven years of bureaucratic apathy, confusion, in-

difference and lack of long-term planning to revive the once Mughal capital, work on the redevelopment of Shahjahanabad has begun.

The name ‘Shahjahanabad’— the place itself laid out by the Mughal Emperor in the middle of the seventeenth century—might conjure romantic images of a bygone era, but the reality is far more cruel. A walk down Chandni Chowk makes this no easier to accept. Except for tourists, both foreign and domestic, most of those in New Delhi look down upon Old Delhi as a crowded and noisy place that is best avoided. Their lack of an emotional connection with a part of the city that was for over 200 years the actual capital can be blamed on the fact that successive governments of independent India have looked at Shahjahanabad the same way it was viewed by the British colonial government.

From the Red Fort, one has to cross the busy Netaji Subhas Marg towards Gauri Shankar Mandir; hopping over piles of garbage and pools of urine that have leaked out of broken public urinals and onto the uneven and broken pavements that have long since given way under pressure of encroachments and temporary stalls selling everything from unbranded inner-wear to footwear and flowers. One has to negotiate one’s way while getting elbowed by eager buyers, pushcarts and rickshaws, with motor cars honking wildly to get past the chaos and confusion under the decaying facades of Mughal-time and The capture of Art-Deco structures made uglier Delhi changed by the hoardings and billboards Chandni of umpteen commercial outlets.

In 1911, King George V anChowk nounced that the capital of forever. The British India was to be shifted introduction of away from Calcutta, at an extravtrams soon agant Delhi Durbar held in what is now Coronation Park next to saw tracks Nirankari Sarovar in north Delhi. criss-crossing The monarch had desired that a the area new capital—called New Delhi— be built, one that would be con-

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tiguous with the Mughal city of Shahjahanabad. His wish, however, was never fulfilled as the team of architects found the area in north Delhi marshy and full of swamps. They instead suggested that the area around Raisina and Malcha be developed into the new capital.

But, even as New Delhi arose in the 1930s, Shahjahanabad remained the main shopping area for Indians living in the city, while the upcoming Connaught Place would have stores selling imported food and wines to English administrators. New Delhi looked antiseptic and devoid of colour and life. My mother, now in her mid eighties, recalls visiting Chandni Chowk with her own mother in the early 1940s, travelling from Pusa (where her father was heading the Imperial Agriculture Research Institute), to shop for clothes and groceries. “The driver was instructed to get back to Pusa before sundown as the area between Old Delhi and Pusa was a jungle where jackals and hyenas lived,” she recollects.

The end of Mughal rule hastened the end of Shahjahanabad in many ways.

‘Dilli’, the capital of Mughal India, would soon witness a brutal transformation that would not just change its demographics but also its geography, social norms, language and cuisine. In a sense, the victory of the British East India Company signalled the end of the primacy of what has come to be known as Old Delhi or ‘Purani Dilli’ today. For over 200 years before this change, the Qila (renamed the Red Fort) and the neighbouring areas that housed both Mughal nobility and ordinary citizens, together with the kilometre-long Chandni Chowk from the Qila to Fatehpuri Masjid, had been the veritable centre of India.

The capture of Delhi in 1858 led to Shahjahanabad and Chandni Chowk being changed forever. The city was torn apart by the British army and its administrators as they unleashed a vendetta against the people. Makeshift gallows in front of what is today the Sis Ganj Gurudwara were set up, and large numbers of men, both Hindu and Muslim, were hanged for their ‘complicity’ in the uprising of 1857. Muslims were hounded out of the Mughal city and their properties looted and destroyed, while many mosques were ruined. A few that were spared—like the Fatehpuri Masjid— 50 open

were sold off to Hindu traders like Lala Chunna Mal. The exodus of a large number of Muslims from the Chandni Chowk and Chawri Bazar areas saw Hindu traders buying and then occupying their properties. In the early decades of the 20th century, a loan waiver announced by the government of undivided Punjab led many Hindu traders to settle down here as well.

According to official records, most of the British officers stationed at the Red Fort garrison sought early retirement after this posting. Being posted at the Qila meant that treasures like royal turbans, illustrated manuscripts, royal furniture and the like were all up for grabs; and officers and soldiers had the entire fort and

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A posting at the Qila meant that royal treasures were all up for grabs; and British officers and their soldiers had the entire fort and its palaces at their mercy

its palaces at their mercy. After the Red Fort was pillaged and royal artefacts looted, auctions were held for days on end in what is called Meena Bazar today.

The palace of the last Mughal ruler, Bahadur Shah Zafar, was demolished along with several other buildings; and in its place was built an army barracks, which, until recently, was occupied

by Indian Army soldiers. A visitor to the Red Fort today will see standalone buildings that remain disconnected and offer little idea of what a thriving royal city was like. Few know that not a single piece of paper was left by the British that either mapped or located the royal palaces inside. Even the Diwan-i-Khas, where Mughal emperors once sat on the Peacock Throne and presided over an em-

pire that included most of modern South Asia, was first converted into a courtroom for the trial of Zafar, and later, to denigrate the memory of Mughals, converted into an Officer’s Mess. Sepia tinted photographs of the period chronicle the sad decline of the Fort.

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ven outside the Fort , the character of Shahjahanabad was changed when the minarets of the mosques that dotted the skyline were pulled down one after the other. Some overzealous Englishmen were keen to pull down the Jama Masjid as well, to build a Christian cathedral in its place. While Muslims remained persona grata in the area for over a decade after 1857, Englishmen themselves fancied the vast courtyards of Jama Masjid as a probable party area, holding frequent evening parties and balls.

Documents well preserved in a little known building of Delhi’s Archives reveal the city redevelopment that the British had planned. Official orders of the Delhi Commissioner dating to middle of 1858 state that Darya Ganj and Dariba (areas containing silverware shops) were drastically altered. Shops and encroachments were cleared to make way for roads. In fact, the road in front of the Red Fort was created after the capture of Delhi. Soon, the road connecting the Red Fort to Fatehpuri Masjid—now called Chandni Chowk—was targeted for a makeover. Divided into four parts (Urdu Bazar, Phool Mandi, Jauhari Bazar and Chandni Chowk), the area boasted single storeyed shops on either side of a tree lined water channel. This is the place where Mughal nobles went to shop in the evenings, and according to an English traveller writing before 1857, cheetahs and handsome boys were on offer for nobles to buy.

The water channel was covered up to ease movement of traffic, while the octagonal pond was demolished. In its place came up a clock tower and, in true Victorian style, a railway station that took shape on the ruins of a royal garden right next to the Red Fort. The beginning of the Calcutta-Kalka train service in 1861 and the building of a railway station changed the skyline and look of the medieval city.

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gamma-keystone/getty images

THE POWER OF BELIEF A ceremony during Ramadan in 1937 at Delhi’s Shah Jahan-built Jama Masjid

The introduction of trams soon saw tracks criss-crossing what we know as Chandni Chowk. Gurbaksh Kaur, now in her eighties, recalls the excitement among students as they hopped onto modern trams and visited Paranthe Wali Gali to tuck into stuffed paranthas. Two of the eateries still selling paranthas are over a hundred years old and find prominent space in tourist brochures, but this trip is not for the faint hearted as the rundown look of the area is hardly inviting.

Over the years, Chandni Chowk and other historic areas have been allowed to degenerate. Unlike many old cities across the globe where both government and local communities join hands to preserve and conserve the past, there has been no such success here. The Shahjahanabad redevelopment plan needs to ‘think local’, and municipal agencies need to be made accountable. After all, basic cleaning services do not require any parliamentary or executive decision.

Shopkeepers have to be made responsible for waste disposal, pavements have to 4 AUGUST 2014

be repaired and made user-friendly.

Unlike VIP areas controlled by the NDMC, which, flush with funds, re-lays pavements regularly to justify its budget, Chandni Chowk has quite possibly never seen basic repair work take place despite tens of thousands of people visiting and living in the area.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rightly identified garbage disposal as a major challenge, and the Government has promised to take steps to boost tourism. Chandni Chowk, visited by every tourist entering Delhi, could be the place to start with. Like in the UK, India needs stringent laws on heritage conservation and the creation of a single window agency for locals who need to rebuild in heritage areas. The exteriors of buildings in Chandni Chowk need to be restored and protected; and for this, any rebuilding or renovation required should be allowed within reason, in keeping with the requirements of modern life. This has been successfully undertaken in historic London. In this manner, the historic na-

ture of the area and its buildings would be preserved while letting people living within it create new spaces.

The absence of public toilets needs to be addressed as well. Many a foreign tourist can be seen clicking away at men lining up outside a rundown urinal at Chandni Chowk where little is hidden from public view.

At the same time, surely no Delhiwala or Indian proud of her heritage would like the more-than-300-year-old city of Shahjahanabad to be replaced by hideous multi-storeyed commercial buildings. Government intervention and strong accountability are urgently needed. Excuses of population density and pressure from the local business community cannot be bandied about by corrupt, inefficient and incompetent government agencies while an important slice of India’s heritage is destroyed. n Sunil Raman is a freelance journalist, a heritage specialist and co-author of Delhi Durbar 1911: The Complete Story open www.openthemagazine.com 51

CINEMA Social Chic Documentaries, long relegated to alternative screens, are now wooing multiplex audiences in India with unprecedented creative fervour Sneha Bhura

“I

think somewhere at the

back of your mind, you still harbour the notion that documentaries are boring and dull,” Nisha Pahuja gently counters a question during a phone interview with Open. I had asked if documentaries need to be more cinematic to bring audiences to theatres. Her documentary, The World Before Her, has become the highest-grossing and most talked-about documentary in recent times, catapulting the Indian-Canadian filmmaker into the limelight. It released in multiple theatres across India on 6 June, just after a Right-wing dispensation came to assume power in the country with a decisive mandate. This film—with its conflicting worlds of a Miss India pageant and a Hindu fundamentalist camp for girls—always had the potential to capture the zeitgeist. After three weeks of successful runs in multiple

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metros across India, it released theatrically in Chandigarh on 18 July, making a foray into smaller territories—something unimaginable for documentaries in India. That it came with the Anurag Kashyap stamp of approval certainly helped. It has now been nominated for an Emmy award this year in the Outstanding Coverage of a Current News Story category—a first for any Indian documentary.

The Facebook page of yet another documentary, Katiyabaaz—which portrays the state of dystopia and desperation caused by electricity crises in Kanpur—is awash with updates of numberless glowing reviews in the media, and film festival screenings in places like London, Vienna, San Francisco, Berlin and Rio. The latest update proudly proclaims: ‘Finally presenting what you all have been waiting for. The first look of our movie that is all set to

hit the theatres on the 22nd of August.’

Proposition for a Revolution, which focuses on the phenomenon of the Aam Aadmi Party, is another documentary which is gaining momentum before its release. The film is being produced by Anand Gandhi of Ship of Theseus fame; and just like in Nisha Pahuja’s case, having a recognised name from the industry behind it has definitely added that extra edge to its already successful campaign to raise awareness in the run-up to a theatrical release slated for the end of 2014.

The documentary film form is steadily experiencing a ‘second wave’ of sorts in India. And backing this wave are theatrical releases, which are popularising a genre often perceived as staid and colourless. Or perhaps it is the other way around—since documentaries now have a substantial following, commercial distributors are toying with 4 AUGUST 2014

the idea of releasing them. Whichever came first, the fans or the support and infrastructure, the result is that a number of agencies in the internet era have conspired to make documentaries ‘cooler’ and more ambitious in scale.

Take the case of the ‘hybrid’ documentary Placebo by Abhay Kumar, revolving around the demands and anxieties of attaining academic excellence in India. The film has found many champions in the industry, Nisha Pahuja being one of them. “It is such a powerful film. It pushes the boundaries of storytelling beyond anything one can imagine. It is far more engaging than any other film playing in the cinemas today.” Anurag Kashyap’s company AKFPL is presenting the documentary in India. Its crowdfunding teaser on YouTube is an other-worldly experience and is testament to the chutzpah of a generation of filmmakers raised in a digital age. The trail of comments below the teaser has fans crying out to know the release date of this masterpiece-in-the-making.

Noted film critic MK Raghavendra is certain that the documentary film format can do well with urban audiences even though it may not be able to trump box-office figures of major Bollywood feature films. He sees the power of commercial documentaries as an extension of the visceral realism of filmmakers like Anurag Kashyap.

“Fiction films like The Lunchbox (2013) and Madras Cafe (2013) are already realistic in a new way for commercial cinema, and the documentary only stretches their limits,” says Raghavendra, “There is an audience which wants to see aspects of reality to which it was not exposed, and the documentary can step in. I can think of many subjects which will get the attention of this audience immediately: scandals in sport, the 2014 elections, etcetera.”

To make documentaries commercially viable in India, new material needs to be delivered in visually arresting ways. Previously released documentaries like Gulabi Gang (2014) and Supermen of Malegaon (2012), both of which had moderately successful runs at the box office, have combined the attributes of fiction films with 4 AUGUST 2014

“Documentaries becoming commercial is good for the medium because they won’t be judged by their nobility and the baggage of good intentions, but by interesting subjects, intellectually addressed” MK RAGHAVENDRA Film Critic

waiting in the wings Posters of upcoming documentaries Placebo (top), Katiyabaaz (above) and Proposition For a Revolution (facing page)

hard-boiled reality to highlight the human drama.

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hiladitya Bora is the program-

ming head of PVR’s Director’s Rare, an arm of the prosperous multiplex chain PVR Cinemas, and the only mainstream platform for documentaries in India, apart from slots on some television channels. Director’s Rare has access to 43 cities in India, but most of the documentary releases take place in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Pune, Chennai and Hyderabad. He confirms that the most successful Indian documentary in terms of box-office collections has been Nisha Pahuja’s The World Before Her . He also claims that the highest number of screening days for any Indian documentary has been five weeks, registered by Dylan Mohan Gray’s Fire in the Blood (2013). There are several important factors that are taken into account before allowing a documentary to be released under Director’s Rare. “The first question we ask ourselves is ‘Will I pay Rs 200 to watch it on the big screen?’ In addition to that, the demand for the documentary, the buzz around the film, festival screenings and awards, the response if released abroad [are some of the other elements taken into consideration].” Bora reveals that the number of people coming to watch documentaries has increased by a factor of four or five since PVR’s Director’s Rare was started in 2011, although international independent films and regional films are still the most sought after and generate the most revenue.

But securing a commercial release is hardly the most cherished dream of Indian documentary makers, painfully aware as they are of the many frustrating stumbling blocks along the way.

And the biggest is that of funding. No other multiplex chain or prominent standalone cinema hall in the country has followed the PVR example of creating a separate slot for alternative cinema. Besides, Director’s Rare does not bear the costs of publicity and promotions for any documentary. Procuring funds for making a documentary is hard enough in India, and open www.openthemagazine.com 53

Truth, cleverly told Nisha Pahuja released her documentary in India on 6 June 2014

for an independent filmmaker to release a movie theatrically, there has to be an intensive cost-benefit analysis to factor in all the added expenses that come with creating the requisite buzz around a movie.

Nisha Pahuja is one of the few filmmakers who devised a smart strategy to make her documentary reach the widest possible audience. It took her four years to complete her film, which was bankrolled primarily by funding agencies in the UK and Germany. It went on to win numerous awards in some of the most prestigious film festivals, including Tribeca (New York) and the Hot Docs film festival. After the gruesome episode of the 2012 Delhi gang-rape, Pahuja knew her documentary had gained a new salience. “Every ideology needs some form of manifestation for it to remain a talking point. My film had to be seen, so that the focus on women’s rights did not shift. I devised a campaign around the film. I started reaching out to NGOs, launched fundraisers, and enhanced our social media presence. What I needed was a theatrical release. Shiladitya Bora was interested in the documentary for a long time. But I wasn’t willing to release the movie until someone big from the film industry came on board. Roping in Anurag Kashyap was part of the strategy.”

Her ‘Kickstarter’ campaign was initiated in February 2014, and she managed to raise more than Rs 32 lakh through crowd-funding. She considers herself singularly lucky to have achieved this success as a documentary filmmaker. “You need a market model that is supportive of your kind of vision.

We just can’t keep showing movies for free anymore.”

However, even with a spike in audience interest, very few documentaries in India have actually managed to rake in profits through commercial releases. Sanjay Kak, the firebrand filmmaker of critically acclaimed documentaries like Jashn-e-azadi and Red Ant Dream, considers the benefits of theatrical releases to be extremely limited.

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“Every ideology needs some form of manifestation for it to remain a talking point.

My film had to be seen, so that the focus on women’s rights did not shift. I devised a campaign around the film accordingly” Nisha Pahuja

Director of The World Before Her

“Filmmakers have to invest in a Digital Cinema Package and then find the money to do their own publicity. At the very least, we are talking about Rs 1020 lakh. To recover that, you need ticket sales to cross twice that amount at least—even at very inflated multiplex rates. That’s a lot of tickets to sell in order to recover just this initial investment, forget about the cost of production of the film,” he reveals. Besides, all theatrical releases have to follow the censorship rules of the land. This eventuality usually discounts the possibility of viewing on the big screen creations of documentary veterans like

Sanjay Kak and Anand Patwardhan, who would not allow any deletions or re-edits of their unflinching critiques.

In India, as in the West, theatrical releases engender a form of documentary film production that does not disturb the status quo too much and attempts to meet the standards of what is seen as viable. Kak defines ‘viable’ as “films that must be ‘character-driven’, that must have a clearly discernible ‘narrative arc’—and if possible, give us redemption at the end”.

While it is true that the alternative screening circuit—which includes film festivals, cultural centres, cafes, books stores, educational institutes, museums and galleries—is much more vibrant in India, there is no denying the almost mystical charm that the big screen holds for any filmmaker. The commercial release of a documentary earns that enviable review in a broadsheet or a magazine,which in turn stimulates a good deal of chatter around the film, especially on important issues and concerns the filmmaker had set out to unravel in the first place.

Surely, this new band of intrepid filmmakers dissolving boundaries between art house and masala films to inform, educate, cajole, shock and mesmerise us also deserve a chance, don’t they? n 4 AUGUST 2014

books The Truth Behind the Laughter The hilarious diary of a Pakistani socialite returns in its third sortie to cause a flutter yet again faiza s khan

The Return of the Butterfly

Moni Mohsin Penguin Books India | 240 pages | Rs 299

S

ome of my favourite moments in The Return of

BUTTERFLY Moni Mohsin

in di a to day im ag es

the Butterfly—the third in Pakistani journalist Moni Mohsin’s immensely popular series chronicling the life and times of Butterfly, a malapropism-spouting Lahori socialite—remind me of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch in which four men, comfortably off, try to outdo each other’s accounts of humble beginnings. One says, “We lived in one room, all 26 of us, no furniture, half the floor was missing.”

Another responds, “Eh, you were lucky to have a room! We used to have to live in the corridor!” The Pakistani equivalents of this (admitting to humble origins, make no mistake, is tantamount to social suicide) are seemingly fantastical descriptions of how wonderful things were. You can’t escape it in drawing rooms: stories of cabarets at Karachi’s grand Metropole hotel, people insisting their grandmothers cycled to college in shorts, the ghastly socialite I once found myself seated next to on a Karachi-Lahore connection who took one look at the other passengers and conspiratorially told me: “In the good old days, we used to know everyone on these flights.” Or, as Butterfly says of her mother’s youth: ‘when both of them wore saris and beehives and meat was ten rupees a ton and only the deserving had cars and even those who took their six children to school on a bicycle had happy smiles and only nice prayers for their car-driving betters’.

Indeed, if anecdotal evidence is to be believed, Pakistan’s finest hour was one in which it was so utopian that pesky irritants like social mobility simply didn’t exist. Now it’s so bad her mother’s new ‘phone wallah’, who replaced the guy who called her ‘Huzoor’ and ‘always did jhuk ke salam’, ‘barges into her sitting room and stands on her carpet without even removing his shoes’ and ‘calls Mummy “Anti”, as if, God forbid, he was related to us’. It’s enough to make Mummy want to leave, till Butterfly reminds her: ‘with your passport you have only two choices; either you can go to Afghanistan or else, Upstairs to Him’. One of Mohsin’s many masterstrokes.

Starting in 2009 with Benazir’s assassination when Butterfly’s husband Janoo—the very model of rectitude and foil to Butterfly’s frivolity—heads to his ancestral lands to campaign for Benazir’s party, lest her death be in vain, The Return of the Butterfly takes us through the worst of times. In doing so, Mohsin provides a timely reminder that even in countries freefalling into chaos and despair, life, in all its sublime and ridiculous forms, still goes on. And so, while Janoo starts exhibiting signs of clinical depression watching everything he loved about Pakistan slip away, Butterfly buys Birkins, attends and critiques lavish weddings, plans summer holidays in London and trades ‘Ramzan’ for ‘Ramadan al Kareem’—succumbing to the Arabisation of Pakistan (which the press describes as ‘creeping’, whereas it’s making a mad dash at one in the manner of a bull to a matador).

Mohsin hits the target every time. Butterfly goes to ‘the pools’ to vote after Benazir’s death, saying ‘Thanks God we live in Gulberg and not some slump type area where we would have to vote alongside all the bhooka nangas’. She is shaken by former governor of Punjab Salman Taseer’s murder and much of the country’s grotesque reaction: ‘Even friends of ours whose kids are in college in the US and who serve drink in their home and would sell their grandmothers for a green card, even they are saying that he wasn’t a good Muslim.’ She attends candlelight vigils but only the ones for ‘khaata peeta types’. In 2011, she goes the way of her more vapid friends and ‘feels a deep connection with Imran Khan’ because ‘Imran is also a PLU, na’ and ‘he will do sullah with the Taliban so they will aik dum drop their weapons and become all lovey dovey with us’. But even Butterfly can’t swallow the theory that ‘Amreekans’ shot Malala because they ‘want to give Pakistan a bad name’.

While Butterfly’s concerns are still her wardrobe, her horror of upstarts, and the distress caused by the local supermarket running out of avocadoes, the book is at moments just too horribly true to even laugh along with.

You can tell the country’s really gone down the tubes when even Butterfly’s diary saddens as much as it entertains. n

4 AUGUST 2014

open www.openthemagazine.com 55

Faiza S Khan is a critic and editor based in New Delhi

books Death in Paris The tragic story of an Indian woman trying to fit into aristocratic France paints the dark side of the city of love Divya Guha

inattentive lover, Kranti leaves everything she owns—her flat, cash, jewellery and expensive art—to him. Also, two diaries, telling of her miserable childhood in India with a Vaiju Naravane deranged mother, libertine father and an evil elder sister.

HarperCollins India | 290 pages | Rs 350 Still, why did the woman die at her own hands?

There are several red herrings along the way: did her lover, heir to her worldly possessions, legally prescribe a basketn Indian-born 50-something society lady living in ful of deadly drugs to a suggestible and lonely woman? Was Paris, Kranti Goray de Lorel, decides to die. French it her docteur therapist Pierre Kellar, ‘a scumbag, the world’s in mannerisms—artistic, cosmopolitan and compenumber one sham’ who drove her to her death? Or was tent—she is intent on taking herself out in style. She puts Kranti a true schizophrenic? The diaries, too, ponder on a purple dress she wears to the opera, a wig and fresh nail her and her doomed parents’ transgressions. And thus, paint, lies on her gilded bed in her kitsch-laden apartment on Naravane, who has lived in Paris for twenty years reporting St Michel, and poisons herself, her operatic style in death a for The Hindu as a Europe correspondent, splices alternating revelation of her histrionic personality at the outset. In chapters about Kranti’s troubled past back home in India reality, though, her death is lonely and tragic. Her corpse is and her tinsel-trimmed omnipresence in Paris, remembered discovered by close friend Olga Savic, who, days later, finds by fond friends. an awful stench coming from her dear friend’s apartment.

Naravane does not believe the two cultures present a clash: ‘The very people who had appeared so kind, so enchanté by rather, they are like two ships passing in the night, entities her joli French accent, were mocking her gaucherie, cutting that share a mutual incomprehension. There are similarities her dead,’ we read. too, she says: “The infiltration of the Right when the ‘other’ But Paris has given Kranti a lot: freedom from her oppresis being made to feel like an outsider, when in fact they are sive roots in India, a considerable fortune, an aristocratic very much a part of the fabric of society.” As a speaker of ex-husband and a lover, Robert-Pierre seven languages in a mostly monoglot claude paris/ap Perrin, a psychiatrist who has tried France, she says she often feels at to keep his own married life separate an advantage. “Because of colonisafrom her in an arrangement as French tion, I know much more about the as it gets. The late party girl lived a French than they know about me. So wild life, we soon discover, having when I speak to them, I know they married Comte Guillaume-Marie are at a disadvantage. And of course Jean-Jaques de Lorel: ‘She had scored there is some social envy—France with unerring accuracy—like a guidis going through a deep economed missile latching onto a powerful ic recession, after all. But they love source of heat.’ an intellectual. And as I dress in my At the wedding, Ravi Shankar feamother’s silk saris, I am taken for an turing Jean-Pierre Rampal is played ‘intellectual princess’.” rather than Debussy. And Paris loves The novel has a clean storyline, her, too; she becomes a part of its though little literary weight. It fails in swishest circles, which slowly discovdealing with the brute ground realier she is exotic, beautiful and a competies in France around race and immitent artist and designer. There is an argration. The French, for all their fixagument in France that people are too tion on egalité and fraternité, are never integrated, while there is another that sure whether integrating with othseems to consider them too alienated. er cultures is good or bad; take their The book makes both ring true. ban on the hijab and their on-again-off In a masochistic tangle with her (by again political affair with America, as her own account) unsatisfactory and Naravane shows us. n parisian flair Vaiju Naravane Transgressions

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books The Real Deal This elegant novel about young people in Delhi is a quietly subversive commentary on urban Indian life—and one of the most original voices in recent Indian fiction Rajni George

Close to Home

Parvati Sharma Zubaan-Viking | 200 pages | Rs 399

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ender, acute and pulsing with real Indian life, Close to Home is the tale of Mrinalini, a young woman who floats through a life of privilege—in the tradition of many a south Delhi lovely—with flashes of concern for those on its margins. One of these outliers is Jahanara, dear friend and would-be lover, a useful foil and counterpart. It all begins with a small, affectionate kiss between the two young women in their Jangpura barsati full of soupy Maggi and idly puffed marijuana, the playful imagining of a future together—more seriously conceived by the besotted Jahanara— and then a casual betrayal: ‘Since it was clear as a blinding June afternoon to anyone except Jahanara that Mrinalini wasn’t throwing her eggs into any kind of lesbian basket, ever, Mrinalini hardly thought it necessary to mention that she was also going down to call Siddhartha.’ Young urban utopia was never so carelessly dismissed.

A few months later the dotcom Mrinalini thought of joining goes down, Siddhartha returns from England—as always just the right height (5 foot 10) for her to rest her head on his shoulder—and she decides to moot all her lazily considered options (publishing, journalism, advertising) and settle down with this nice boy with the nice (albeit termite-ridden) Jor Bagh house. She is won over by how he won’t flaunt his privilege, how ‘his light brown eyes brimmed with a nameless, ahistoric, empathy—particularly when he bought, like everyone else, his cigarettes by the stick and drank cheap, warm beer from the bottle’. Of course, this doesn’t mean Siddhartha won’t tease her, though winningly, about the awful hooch she drank with her old girlfriend in their den of iniquity (‘Whitehorse is not a nice whisky’). Meanwhile, Jahanara takes up with queer groups and the PhD world, dismissing romantic love as bourgeois, heterosexist, politically regressive and making do with ‘a girl who liked to fuck Jahanara but not only Jahanara, abjuring as she did not only marriage and family but also monogamy’.

Five years later the girls meet and all is not lost, though Mrinalini worries Siddhartha will dismiss her friend (‘JNU?’) and, awfully, asks Jahanara if her new girl is ‘a real lesbian’.

Jahanara is understandably furious—‘Do you want me to

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take out my lesbian handkerchief? Oh, but wait! Will it fit your big straight nose?’—and Mrinalini is left yearning for her one-time intimate, even as she continues to enjoy the absolute love of her amiable husband. Only the blank Word document of her unembarked-on novel haunts her, and the consideration of the value of money in her drifting life, when her husband leaves his job: ‘With all this time and freedom at their disposal, how would it hurt to splurge a little less on whatever citronella-scented establishment serving dainty helpings of water-chestnuts by another name surfaced in South Delhi next? But by the time Siddhartha returned, she wasn’t sure whether to curse or console him—him and all his eating-out-at-home business. Well now she knew, didn’t she: they couldn’t afford the real thing.’ The commentary is sweetly perceptive in these moments of self-realisation, and relentlessly honest about the economics of choice.

Of course, after Siddhartha considers cooking classes and other Renaissance man options, privilege asserts itself and his father finds a government position for him at the Planning Commission. All is well for a while. But when Mrinalini begins to take Anjali—the maid Beena and cook Chhote Lal’s little daughter—on bored excursions in the inlaws’ old Maruti 800 and an interest in her education, real trouble begins to brew: where do the lines between the woman of the house and her help blur? When Chhote Lal gets into a fight over his wife’s suspected infidelity and his employer has to intervene in an all-too-familiar scenario, this upper middle-class household finds its casual balance upset.

Little Anjali has been given the run of the television in her memsahib’s bedroom, enjoying the Little Ganesh show that causes Mrinalini embarrassment and making Siddharth wrinkle his nose at her smelly hair oil. Suspicious, Beena is convinced her mistress is just trying to fill the space of the child she won’t have. But how can she ever broach the subject with her employer? And so, the young couple, possessed of a comfortable sex life and great camaraderie, begin to quarrel over class and caste, facing up to the sociopolitical reality of modern life in India. Even they, cocooned as they are from the world, cannot deny society its way with them.

And others notice. Jahanara surfaces, only to return to her allotted corner. Brajeshwar, their tenant, who tells his Aurangzeb story at every dinner party, puts the couple into his own book, making Mrinalini wonder yet again what the world thinks of her; she herself hasn’t quite figured out.

‘Caste is fraught’, his book begins, telling of his encounter with a ‘dark young student of Political Science… dressed 4 AUGUST 2014

raul irani

E X C E R P T

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PLAYING WITH BOUNDARIES Parvati Sharma

in the kind of shiny, tight-fitting T-shirt favoured only by the very poor and the very ironic... Rakesh—that could easily have been his name’. The Brahmin-hater, whose poetry ‘sucked’, is quoted extensively: ‘Today one fellow says we are living in a “post-caste society”. I said, you’re living inside your own asshole, bhai. Look around. They’ve made Mayawati “reactionary”, that is the latest. Arre, you can’t take it if a Dalit has a handbag?’ The man is lying about various caste-related woes, Brajeshwar asserts in his book, moving to Simran and Raj (the Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge reference is intentionally snide, Mrinalini is sure), the fictionalised versions of his landlords, who he says tiptoe around caste like an NRI introducing ‘a white girl to green chutney’. ‘Raj’ says, ‘India was littered with crutches and anyone—anyone who wanted—could stand up and walk’; perhaps one of the book’s most topical messages. And ‘Simran’ says if he is ‘going to be involved [he] should be responsible’. The situation in her own home has dissipated, but in a way that leaves us in no doubt that ‘responsibility’ is much more complicated than anyone wants to admit.

Parvati Sharma, a journalist, is also the author of a qui4 AUGUST 2014

he quarter’s door was closed – foolish idea in stuffy weather – and Mrinalini stood a moment, debating what to do. The low mumble of Chhote Lal’s voice filtered through the wood and since Beena seemed to offer no audible rejoinders, Mrinalini thought there was no harm in hurrying the process along a bit, and raised her hand to knock.

As if on cue, Beena spoke up.

“Bastard! Drunken bastard! So easy to fall at your bhaiyya’s feet! So easy to get rid of me! Murderer! You think I don’t know what you’re planning! What does it seem to you? I don’t know what your plan is?”

If Chhote Lal tried to interject, he wasn’t successful.

“You think you’ll get rid of me so easy? Bastard! Only you can talk-talk to your memsahib on the phone? Who gave you that phone, haan? Get rid of me, keep your money, then what-what – you’ll get a new woman? You think it’s so easy?

Falling here and there from drinking! Do you have any shame left? Any izzat? Bastard, say, why are you silent now? Shall I give you the phone to cry into? What stories you told! Putting me to work, giving your daughter as a toy to your owners!

Haan?

“And your great didi! What, she can’t have her own, so she’ll snatch at mine? Whenever she wants, Anjali come here, whenever she wants, Anjali go away – and you show your teeth like a monkey! Did you tell her, who will pay this month’s fee? All forgotten after two months of playing no?

You and your didi – what a jodi!”

Mrinalini, her legs paralysed and her cheeks burning, might have stood there indefinitely if an elderly neighbour hadn’t shouted across the wall in tones as stentorian as Beena’s were wild. “Quiet!” said the voice. “This is a shareef area, not some mohalla! Quiet!”

et short story collection (The Dead Camel and other Stories) that earned her a niche cult following four years ago, if more GaysiFamily (a queer desi forum) than Literary Foundation of India (a private literary club in Delhi). Earning praise from the likes of Girish Karnad with her debut, she has grown into a mature voice of her own. Her eye for the fine lines of relationships is superb, as is her gentle laughing at our vulnerabilities and keen ear for young Indian concerns and idioms.

Most of all, her ability to wryly question every underpinning of our quasi-feudal yet modernising society is unsurpassed.

Everyone has their India book, of late more likely to use the voice of the underdog to tell the nation’s story; Booker prizewinning The White Tiger, for example, which did not quite manage to translate class authentically. Sharma manages to use the voice of the elite to tell that story more convincingly.

Only the book’s length—it has the potential a larger book might have made even more use of—takes away from its success, though perhaps the author, wonderfully spare, has kept her lessons brief and poignant on purpose, making big game of the small story. Close to Home brings us one of the most authentic voices in Indian English literature of late. n open www.openthemagazine.com 59

science

plastic menace Plastic is part of our everyday lives and has grown in use substantially over the past seven decades—from 1.7 million tonnes in 1950 to an estimated 288 million tonnes in 2013

Natural Selection The evolutionary benefits of friendship

Microplastics and Marine Life

hy do we make friends? Could

friendship also be serving an evolutionary purpose? A new study has found that humans tend to be more genetically similar to friends than to strangers. According to this study, conducted by researchers at University of California, San Diego and Yale University, and published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, friends often share the same number of genes as shared by fourth cousins or those who share a greatgreat-great-grandparent.

The scientists claim that this could be the result of an evolutionary trait of forming social networks.

According to them, ancient humans with similar specific genes, because of the survival benefits of staying together, became closer friends, and grow more likely to reproduce and pass on these genes than other people who didn’t have these genes. The researchers claim such a social network understanding of evolution possibly explains why some genes change faster than others.

For the study, the researchers examined genetic variations between nearly 2,000 unrelated subjects. Most of these individuals comprised three generations of Irish- and Italian-

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Americans from a small town close to Boston. All pairs of individuals who were even slightly related were excluded from this study. When they compared the genetic markers between those individuals who were friends with each other—a total of 1,300 pairs of friends—and also compared individuals’ genes with strangers’, they found that friends share the same level of genetic closeness as what has been found among fourth cousins. The researchers also developed a genetic test: just by examining individuals’ genes they could predict whether pairs of individuals were friends or strangers among 450 participants.

The authors write, ‘More than any other species, humans form social ties to individuals who are neither kin nor mates, and these ties tend to be with similar people. Here, we show that this similarity extends to genotypes... Friends may be a kind of ‘functional kin’. Finally, homophilic (positively-correlated) genotypes exhibit significantly higher measures of positive selection, suggesting that, on average, they may yield a synergistic fitness advantage that has been helping to drive recent human evolution.’ n

The Cooling Effect of Arctic Lakes

chris linder/getty images

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According to a study published in Environmental Science and Technology, tiny plastic particles polluting our seas are not only orally ingested by marine creatures, but also enter their systems through their gills.

Scientists have also discovered that when microplastics are drawn in this way, they take over six times longer to leave the body compared with standard digestion. Lead author Dr Andrew Watts of Biosciences at the University of Exeter said: “This is highly important from an ecological point of view, as if these plastics are retained longer within the animal, there is more chance of [their] being passed up the food chain.” Ten per cent of the plastic that is thrown away ends up in the marine environment. n

Countering a widely-held view that thawing permafrost speeds up atmospheric warming, a study published in Nature suggests arctic thermokarst lakes are ‘net climate coolers’ when observed on a millennial time scale. Found in the Arctic and cold mountain regions, thermokarst lakes occur as permafrost thaws and creates surface depressions that fill with melted fresh water. Researchers observed that roughly 5,000 years ago, thermokarst lakes of North Siberia and Alaska began cooling instead of warming the atmosphere. ‘While methane and carbon dioxide emissions following thaw lead to immediate radiative warming,’ the authors write, ‘carbon uptake in peat-rich sediments occurs over millennial time scales.’ n

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tech&style

R-Kaid-R A tribute to the origin of video gaming, this machine is exclusively for the dedicated gamer gagandeep Singh Sapra

arcade games While arcade games were still relatively popular during the late 1990s, this mode of entertainment saw a sharp decline in popularity in the Western hemisphere when home-based video game consoles made the transition from 2D graphics to 3D graphics

Monaco V4 Tourbillon w

Price on request

造2,499

This timepiece from TAG Heuer uses a micro-belt to drive the tourbillon, which ensures absolute fluidity of rotation. This avant-garde timepiece is equipped with an automatic linear rewinding system, and the mass is guided by a linear railroad instead of a traditional rotating system. Its four notched micro-thin (0.07mm) transmission belts create an efficient shock absorbing system. n

Samsung Galaxy S5 4G

R

emember those arcade games

we were all crazily putting our coins into to get a few minutes or hours of joy? Yes, we all wanted to take home one of those, but had neither the space nor energy to store it, and this is where the R-Kaid-R [Read Arcader], a luxury retro looking console game, comes in.

The R-Kaid-R comes in a tailored leather shoulder bag. Take it out and pull the lock knob, open up the box, and use the lock knob as an eight axis joystick. There is also a hidden posidrive in case you need one. The R-Kaid-R is powered by a built-in battery that lasts about eight hours on a full charge, and is charged using a USB 5 volt connection.

The console comes with a 16 GB SD card that has the game menu interface and Cave Story pre-installed on it. The menu supports games from Sega, Mame, Neo Geo, PC Engine, Play Station1, Atari 2600, Game Boy, 4 AUGUST 2014

Game Boy Advanced, Nintendo, Super Nintendo, Sega, Doom, Duke Nukem 3D and many more; you will have to source the games yourself, though.

The mono speaker, placed next to the 8-inch LCD that supports an 800x600 pixel resolution, takes you back to your younger days, and if you loved your PacMan, or Super Mario Brothers or even Duke Nukem, you are going to have hours of fun.

The R-Kaid-R folds down to a small portable 27 cm wide by 17 cm high and 9 cm deep box, and each R-Kaid-R unit is handmade from solid wood; and it comes in dark walnut, black ash, dark emerald green maple, emerald green maple and walnut wood options.

There are only 50 of each colour option available, and they come numbered, so your prized possession retains its value even after you have played all the games endlessly. n

Rs 53,500

Designed for people who need speed, the S5 4G is powered by the Qualcomm 8974 Pro 2.5 Ghz processor and supports eight 4G LTE bands. There is also an advanced camera (HDR mode, Selective Focus), and like the Galaxy S5, the 4G variant is dust and water resistant. Its battery is designed to run for 24 hours in standby mode even with a 10 per cent charge. It has two internal antennas that doubles your connection speed. Anyone with a Galaxy S5 can upgrade to the 4G variant by paying an additional Rs 10,000. n Gagandeep Singh Sapra is The Big Geek at System3. He can be reached at gadgets@openmedianetwork.in

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CINEMA

punjabi tadk a Surveen Chawla has grabbed eyeballs with her bold Bollywood debut Hate Story 2. First seen in Ekta Kapoor serials, Chawla is a star of the Punjabi film industry where she made her debut with Jimmy Shergill. Next up is Anurag Kashyap’s Ugly

Hate Story 2 A cut-and-dried execution of a good concept renders this film an insipid watch ajit duara

o n scr een

current

Begin Again Director John Carney cast Keira Knightley, Mark Ruffalo,

Adam Levine

Score ★★★★★

gh, SURVEEN Cast sushant sin LI BHANUSHA JAY A, WL CHA A DY PAN L Director VISHA

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he ‘Hate Story’ idea, as it seems to be evolving, is conceptually quite interesting. The films are about women who reach a point of no return. The Hollywood archetype of this character is the gangster’s moll from ‘film noir’— a woman who is cynical about love and sex, uses a gun very effectively, and who often ends up either dead or not bothered about her own mortality.

The sexually suggestive publicity of Hate Story 2 is just a hook. A couple of bikini and bedroom shots don’t really justify it. What is interesting is how the film develops the persona of a young girl forced to become the mistress of a gangster politician in Goa. The mechanism of his cruelty and the psychological effect it has on her behaviour is closely watched. Violence and forced sex is visually connected in the film. In one scene, Sonika (Surveen Chawla) watches the politician, Mandar Mhatre (Sushant Singh), beat a man to death with a hockey stick. The next cut is 62 open

Mandar pounding away, with equal force, on top of Sonika in the bedroom.

It is a surprising metaphor—with no erotic content at all.

Her sadistic keeper soon turns Sonika into a nervous wreck. But when her young boyfriend, from the photography classes she takes, is viciously attacked, she is transformed into a terrifying gun-toting woman. The Goa Police, of course, are on the side of their politician mentor and paymaster, but a lone honest investigating officer (Siddharth Kher) comes to Sonika’s aid.

Hate Story 2 could have been a much better film. There is none of the ambiguity and darkness that such a subject inspires. Instead, we see an abruptness to the narrative and hyperbolic performances. Surveen Chawla has her occasional ‘bat out of hell’ moments, but Sushant Singh gives you a completely stereotyped ‘baddie’ in Mandar Mhatre.

Good in concept but average in execution, this film disappoints. n

This is a movie about how the search for good music is as important as the making of it. The single prerequisite for the success of a recording company is a passionate scout. But in the age of labels and brands, the essential idea of presenting the soul of music seems to have lost out to the notion of selling good looking singers with average voices.

This is not a new idea, and during the telling of Begin Again, you get the feeling of having been there and done that.

It’s about Dan Mulligan (Mark Ruffalo), who used to work for a record company till he lost the plot and became a drunk.

One day, at a bar as usual, he hears Gretta (Keira Knightley) sing, and is, predictably enough, enchanted. But his record label has no use for him anymore and doesn’t accept his enthusiastic recommendation of her music. How is he going to record her?

That’s when the brainwave—the best part of the movie—strikes. Dan gets hold of his old contacts and uses New York city as the studio. The metropolis provides the ambient sound to the track—on the streets, down in the subways, on the rooftops. This gives the music in the film an unusual surround resonance.

Unfortunately, the film turns a little slushy about the joy of uncovering hidden talent, thereby losing credibility.n AD

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Not People Like Us

R aj e e v M asa n d

Saif Passes the Buck

Saif Ali Khan isn’t mincing any words when it comes to Humshakals, Sajid Khan’s tasteless comedy that has evidently cost him some faithful fans. The actor admitted in an interview recently that doing the movie was a mistake, the kind he will not repeat again. He has also made it very clear that he will no longer be making a second movie with Sajid, although he had verbally agreed to work with the director again. “My consent depended on how this film performed.

Now obviously I’m not going to do another movie with Sajid.” In what must have come as a crushing blow to the filmmaker, Saif also added: “Looking back, I can see today that I didn’t enjoy a single minute spent on the Humshakals set.”

While the film’s critics (and there are many) evidently feel vindicated in the wake of Saif’s comments, many industry insiders have criticised the star for disowning the film after its failure. Saif’s Hamesha director Sanjay Gupta took to Twitter to make his point, without naming names, however: ‘A film is your baby even if it fails to perform at the box office.

It is so not cool for actors to thrash it after release.’

Even his Humshakals co-star Riteish Deshmukh is reportedly disappointed with Saif’s comments on the film, and has privately condemned the actor’s reactions among friends. Ajay Devgn, who starred in Sajid’s last dud Himmatwala, made it a point to say he accepted that film’s failure, but took full responsibility for it.

Salman’s Return to Innocence

Salman Khan has already begun filming Sooraj Barjatya’s Prem Ratan Dhan Payo (yes, that really is the film’s title, I kid you not!), and he says the film’s proving to be way more challenging than he’d expected. He still has a great rapport with his Maine Pyar Kiya director, but admits he’s a far cry from the character Sooraj has cast him as.

“In the years since we last worked together [in 1999’s Hum Saath Saath Hain], Sooraj has continued to make family films, whereas I’ve gone on to make films 4 AUGUST 2014

like Wanted and Dabangg, which are of an entirely different genre, so it’s hard fitting into that mould again,” Salman told me. “Actors tend to lose the innocence they had in their early films. But Sooraj wants exactly that,” he explained.

Apparently the filmmaker has asked Salman to give him over 120 shooting dates to complete the film—an unusual request, considering most producers tend to wrap Salman Khan-starrers in 80 days or less, given the actor’s chock-ablock schedule and his multiple film commitments. The star’s managers are reportedly not pleased, and more so since he’s already taking a sizeable pay-cut for his mentor’s film.

When the Going Gets Tough…

A currently down-on-his-luck actor has realised that there’s truth in the old saying that you come to know who your real friends are when you run into rough weather. After having suffered three flops back-to-back, the young star seems to have been left out in the cold by the same industry that not so long ago welcomed him with open arms, even throwing crores at him after he’d delivered just his first hit. But what appears to have hurt the actor immeasurably is the volte-face of a leading producer—and a close family friend at that —who reportedly dropped him like a hot potato from at least one project, and was instrumental in having him replaced in another outside film.

The actor isn’t hiding his disappointment. He has apparently been critical of the producer’s recent business expansions, insisting that what’s missing in his movies now is the personal involvement he once used to invest in every project. In one film that he was particularly looking forward to, and in which he’d already invested time and effort, the star was replaced by a new actor whom this producer recently launched. n Rajeev Masand is entertainment editor and film critic at CNN-IBN open www.openthemagazine.com 63

open space

An Acquittal Too Late

by R AU L I R A N I

Mohammed Aamir, photographed here offering prayers at his father’s grave, spent 14 years in jail for crimes he did not commit. In February 1998, at the age of 18, he was arrested from Old Delhi and charged with 17 counts of murder, terrorism and waging war against the nation. He was acquitted of all charges in 2012. He says that despite being alive and free, his family has been destroyed by the false charges. During his incarceration, his father, Hashim Khan, died of a heart attack, and his mother suffered a stroke that left her paralysed

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