Blink issue 23 june28 2014

HIGH ON HEMP A group of seven college friends tap into the potential of hemp and hope to transform it into food, clothing, even shelter p5 saturday, june 28, 2014

subir roy

The stories of crimes against women in eastern Uttar Pradesh tell a complex tale of complicit officials, indifferent neighbours and a few brave individuals who dare to speak out and report p10

Live from Banda

COP WITH THE HEART A top Chennai policeman creates a ‘green corridor’ for an express organ delivery p4

MYSTERY ON THE NILE Gorging on history is all very well, but solving new puzzles in Egypt is more fun p20

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A long shot on grass Will Roger Federer grab an eighth Wimbledon, after lifting the Halle grass court trophy for the seventh time this year?

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ennis grand slam players have had Wimbledon is not high as happens in the French Open to become just the eighth man to only two weeks to transition from Rome Masters vis-à-vis the French Open. All complete a career Gland Slam. That also hapclay at the French Open to the grass the top players participate in the Rome Mas- pens to be his seventh defeat in 13 finals at the surface at the ongoing Wimbledon ters, played on clay. majors. Even more worryingly, Djokovic has (till July 6). This gap will be increased to three In the warm-up to Wimbledon, however, now lost five of his last six Gland Slam finals. weeks from next year to help players adjust the high-ranked players are divided between He will likely face a repeat of last year’s final better to the surface change.

London and Halle. Since 2000 only Lleyton He- against the defending champion, Murray, in Grass, once the mainstay of tennis courts ev- witt and Andy Murray have won back-to-back the semifinals. erywhere but increasingly rare, is the fastest at Queen’s Club (called Aegon Championship) Meanwhile, Murray, the first British man surface with the ball bouncing to knee-level. and Wimbledon. This year, Grigor Dimitrov since Fred Perry in 1936 to win the Wimbledon On hard courts, it could be between the knee was the champion in London, while it was when he trounced Djokovic in straight sets and the shoulder, and on clay courts it is above Roger Federer in Germany. Dimitrov became a last year, goes into the contest in a worrying the shoulder. This makes the sensation after beating Alexandr form. He lost in the third round at Queen’s play technique on grass differDolgopolov, Stanislas Wawrinka Club to the 35-year-old Czech player Radek Steent from that on other surfaces and Feliciano López Díaz-Guerra. panek. Murray has been seeded third for Wim— it is relatively more aggressive.

According to the draw, and go- bledon. The latest Queen’s champion, The slowing of the ing by the seeding, the quarter-fi- Dimitrov, though could be Murray’s biggest games with longer Slowdown on grass nal line-up in Wimbledon is pre-semifinal threat should the former get rallies is meant to Points in Wimbledon were likely to be: Novak Djokovic-To- past Ferrer; he already has a Wimbledon title promote their scored quickly in the past. Chammáš Berdych, Murray-David Fer- to his two-room primary school. name, albeit in the boy’sVillages singles. such as Koentertainment value pions Boris Becker and Pete Samrer, Wawrinka-Federer, and Milos dina ka Jhonpra, Kesarpura, Ramraada and pras, for instance, would win a Raonic-Nadal. Till a few years Federer Swarupjika Khera have 35-45 children in each once more? point with four or five shots. ago, Djokovic, Murray, Federer Federer settlement no access to a school.

Babulal, may bebut confident about an eighth ti- a Now long rallies are seen more and Nadal constituted the quar- tle, parent says, “We the don’t have a single having captured Halle grass court literate trooften. TV channels flash the number of shots tet in Grand Slam semifinals. That quartet’s phyperson. children under thatch for the Our seventh time. study The father of atwin when a rally is long. The slowing of the games grip has loosened in more recent times. roof. A was government school with teacher daughters recently blessed twinconducts sons with longer rallies is meant to promote the enThe draw has put Murray in the top half andclasses, but they arespurred often cancelled due to the that has probably his resurgence tertainment value of the sport. Eminent com- with Djokovic, who won the Wimbledon in afterrains or heat.” showing in recent times. a lacklustre mentators, once leading players themselves, 2011 and was runner-up last year. ‘Rafa’ Nadal More Children also he’d sufferlike duetotoadd a lack healthimportantly, theof18th have said the grass is different from how it was is in the bottom half with seven-time cham- Grand careSlam facilities. which title toAanganwaadis, his existing record as should Nain the past and the balls are heavier, contribut- pion Federer. basic healthcare dal provide is closing in on him withto 14 children titles. and preging to the slower pace. Many are calling it the nant mothers, absent.

In Maangarh, seven Serena Williams,are Ana Ivanovic, Maria Shararaving the scorching they homogenisation of surfaces — fastersun, courts be- ar-In worrying which isform mined and owned by those with busi-pova children below five are years have died and Simona Halep in the race for due the to rived in tractors, buses and hiredWorld coming slower. nessNo interests textiles anda stone 1 Nadal,infresh from recordmines. ninthThewomen’s malnourishment andhaving five adult women title, the first an edge overdied jeeps. For the people ofhave Bijoliya block,French In tennis history, only six players made BhilsOpen in this area live inright settlements or villagesthe during title, exited at the opening There have been six deaths others.childbirth.

Ivanovic won the championship in south-west Rajasthan, attending a successful transition from clay to grass, win- afrom inthe thegrass forests.

Traditionally relied onon grass at Halle this year inthey a straightdue toattuberculosis, six new cases were deBirminghamand recently. withOpen the sub-district magistrate ningmeeting the French and Wimbledon back-wassetsthese for wood, shelter and livelihoods, loss forests to World No 85 German Dustin tected recently — all in a span of two years an economic consultant and tennis fandoesn’t more—important than (1925), earningFred a day’s wageBrown. to-back Rene Lacoste Perry including collecting herbs and sub-a seshan His previous twomedicinal visits to Wimbledon from is2012 to 2014.

“Our panchayat ranging from ₹100 to ₹300.

The meeting (1935), Budge Patty (1950), Bjorn Borg (1978,waswere sistence farming. to earn aplayers living,in most have a primary health centre. We have no facildisasters, losing Today to low-ranked culmination of Nadal a 10-day walkand — organised 1979the and 1980), Rafael (2008 2010) the of the young Bhils astoughest labourersdraw, at Bhil- ities, no roads for jeeps to carry someone to first two rounds.

Hework has the Rajasthan Manch andbyRoger FedererAdivasi (2009). Adhikar It is called the —facing wara stone mines —ofthe mostRichard commonly the hospital. How does the government exthe challenges Ivostone Karlovic, through 30 villages and settlements in the dis-Gasquet, ‘Channel Slam’. used for roofing housesbefore in Gael Monfilspukka and Raonic meetpect a patient to reach the hospitrict of Bhilwara. area.in the semifinals. ing this Federer tal for check-ups?” says Shaayari The to team walked through these villages lis- Djokovic Warm-up Wimbledon Although theplayed Bhils lack houshas not a grass court warmBhil of Maangarh, whose hustening, mobilising griev-up ing In the fortnight betweenand thecollecting two Slams,the there and access to 27-year-old bare necessities since 2010.

The Serb, the top band Gopal Bhil died of TB just ancesgrass of the villagers they met. The for yatra’sseedthey are four court warm-up tournaments not beenwon classified asof his for have Wimbledon, the last six In 28 years only three last year. agenda was to inform people men, of which the ones at Queen’s Club, Lon- ofmajors Below Poverty Line. This at the Australian Openstatus in 2013. But he people have If living in makeshift houses, literate right to heard and don, and Halle intheir Germany arebe especially pa-helpwaswould helpinthem thwarted his lat-build proper walking two kilometres to get emerged from them players. file theirBut complaints tronised by leading the est houses, get rations from the govattempt to drinking water, having no access the village the government probability of these with finalists winning the un-winernment at a subsidised rate, his first to schools and aanganwaadis, der the Right to Hearing send their children to schools, and no medical facilities don’t Act. The State govern- gain affordable access to electricqualify the Bhils to be classified ment, in 2012, passed the ity and other social schemes. under the BPL category, then Right to Hearing legisla- During the yatra, 372 Bhil families submitted what does? tion, which entitles a their applications demanding inclusion in For the Bhils gathered at Bijoliya block, their person to file a grievance the BPL category. main appeal to the SDM Gopal Singh Shekhaand receive a time-bound wat and the panchayat was inclusion under written reply addressing Deprivation and denial the BPL category. However, neither the panthe problem and its solu- Their lives are a constant struggle for survival. chayat nor the SDM provided them with the tion. On submitting a request, Either they have no access to water tanks or pink receipts. Shekhawat, who accepted the the complainant is given a pink the existing water pumps and connections lie application but made no written commitreceipt stating the day of the hearing. defunct. Pushpa Bhil of Sukhpura village says, ment, said, “We will try to deal with these isThis receipt is the only proof that can hold the “We walk two-three kilometres to get drinking sues, although we are not certain if we can local officials accountable to the fact that the water.” Caste discrimination adds to their wa- hold special camps to redress their problems.” government has registered the complaint and ter woes. Bhils from Jaawda district said, “Our The new State government has now anthat action will be taken. water-filled vessels are often thrown away by nounced a Good Governance Act. While policyBhils form almost 38 per cent of the adivasi upper caste people.” makers and politicians tweak and replace population of Rajasthan and are classified as A survey conducted by the Rajasthan Adiva- important legislations like the Right to Hearscheduled tribes under the Constitution. Al- si Adhikar Manch in Maangarh (with 96 Bhil ing, poor governance makes day-to-day survivthough the word ‘bhilwara’ means abode of families) indicated that in the last 28 years on- al an endless struggle for the Bhils. the Bhils, there is little that the Bhils can call ly three literate people have emerged from the their own. Most of them hold no registered village. But Maangarh is considered luckier digvijay singh is a member of School for Democracy, land holdings to claim their land, most of than other villages because it has access to a Rajasthan

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A 10-day yatra through Bhil villages in Rajasthan reveals that a community with no access to water, schooling or shelter isn’t considered Below Poverty Line

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An ongoing rally (right) Roger Federer lifts the men’s singles Wimbledon trophy in 2012 after beating Andy Murray ap/anja niedringhaus; and defending champion Murray practises at the same venue to take on a back-in-form Federer this year ap/john walton

Listen to us Villagers gather in Bijoliya to share their grievances digvijay singh

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Return of the super-thief?

Why an audacious car theft in the Capital earlier this month made the city’s police force sit up and gasp in disbelief

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n the evening of June 2, a man walked into a house in south Delhi’s posh Vasant Kunj neighbourhood. With the owners away, he asked the domestic help for the keys to the family car, a Volkswagen Polo, claiming it was blocking his way and he needed to move it.

The keys were handed over and the stranger coolly drove away with the car.

A week later, the same car drove up to a petrol pump in nearby Vasant Vihar, got its tank filled and sped away without paying a paisa.

The scene was re-enacted a few days later.

While these might, at first glance, seem like minor misdemeanours in a city that is habitually reeling from the shock of violent crimes, their modus operandi has left the Capital’s police force jittery.

Someone like Bunty For close to two decades, a super-thief had Delhi equally horrified and fascinated with similar capers. A resident of Vikaspuri in west Delhi, Devinder Singh, better known as Bunty, pulled off his crimes with an insouciance that left the police embarrassed and fuming.

The audacious car theft this month made them sit up — it had all the markings of Bunty, except the man himself was supposed to be behind bars in Kerala. On checking and confirming that the super-thief was still behind bars, the Delhi police now had a new worry — was a copycat super-thief on the prowl?

“With Bunty in a Kerala jail, we are afraid there might be ‘Bunty imitators’ on the loose,” says a senior police official.

“Investigations are on, and we are trying to get to the bottom of

these last two incidents. Even though this is and Bhojpuri superstar Manoj Tiwari. He not strictly Bunty’s style, the thieves do seem didn’t last long though; the organisers sent to be inspired by him.” him out on the second day of filming because News reports have breathlessly claimed he was “constantly hurling abuses, trying to that he has committed anywhere from 400 to cover cameras with socks and (had) complete 700 burglaries, mostly in the National Capital disrespect for the house rules”. The super-thief Region and surrounding States, but also in was also approached to host crime shows on other places such as Bhopal, Pune, Chennai Hindi channels, but nothing came of it. and Thiruvananthapuram. “The property he Last year, a Malayalam film called Bunty Chor stole from Delhi alone is valued at more than was released, but unlike its Hindi counterpart ₹7 crore,” says Inspector Rajender Singh, Spe- it was not a hit. cial Task Force, Delhi Police. Singh is a ‘Bunty expert’ of sorts, having tracked him down and A strange kind of thief taken him into custody twice in the last 12 “In one of his heists, Bunty stole a photo of the years. “I don’t think there are homeowner’s wife and daughter, many other criminals who along with the furniture,” recalls achieved this kind of notoriety Singh. “We were worried he may singlehandedly. Bunty is defibe planning to kidnap them…

The police assisted nitely one of a kind.”

When we arrested him though, Bunty in setting up a we found that he had placed the detective agency in Matinee idol photo frame in his living room Delhi when he asked Bunty’s antics even inspired a along with the stolen furniture, them to help him successful Bollywood film, Dibaand was pretending to be an NRI“lead a positive life” kar Banerjee’s Oye Lucky! Lucky businessman based in SingaOye! The lead character, Lucky, pore. He was really unusual in played by Abhay Deol, is based that sense.” on the life and crimes of the suAfter his arrest in 2007 and perchor. Released in 2008, the film shows Deol eventual release in 2010, the police assisted stealing a car, and for good measure a TV as Bunty in setting up a detective agency in Delhi well, using a similar technique. when he asked for their help to “lead a positive Banerjee sees the film as a “fable about mod- life”. Krishna Detective and Security Experts ern India”. “On the surface it is an often funny didn’t stay in business for long though, not afand thrilling ride. But at its core, it is about ter Bunty was arrested again in 2013. He had what the new and ‘liberated’ India is,” he had stolen an SUV from a businessman’s house in said, after the release of the film, which went Thiruvananthapuram and the police tracked on to become a cult classic. The film and fur- him down in Pune. ther acts of infamy gained Bunty not only a When we contacted K Padmakumar, ADGP, slot in the “most wanted” lists across States Kerala Police, he confirmed that Bunty was but also in Mumbai’s TV studios. still in their custody. Now all that the Delhi poRoped in for the fourth season of the reality lice can hope for is that the latest superchor inTV show Bigg Boss, Bunty found himself in spired crimes were nothing more than a flash rather exceptional company — Ab- in the pan. “The theft in Vasant Kunj is just a bas Kazmi, one of the lawyers who one-off incident. If we see more such cases, represented 26/11 terrorist Ajmal Ka- then we will have to consider them as copycat sab, former professional wrestler crimes, based on Bunty’s style,” says a senior Khali, former bandit and Samaj- officer. “For Bunty though, it was never about wadi Party member Seema Parihar the stolen property he amassed, it was always about how he got away with it. He was definitely a stylish kind of thief.”

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Caught in the middle The siren of an ambulance rarely parts the sea of traffic in most cities in India

An Indian puzzle in Egypt

m vedhan

A cruise on the Nile that turned out to be anything but calm, beset with stories of intrigue, murder, mystery, old and new A course in history Cruise ships drop anchor by the temple of Kom Ombo, north of Aswan shutterstock

waiting for an hour at Aswan airport, despite the fact that we were sleep and caffeine-deprived, it became apparent to everyone that staring at the luggage carousel wasn’t going to make Brand Ambassador’s suitcase appear.

There was nothing else to do but immediately divide ourselves into Team Brand Ambassador and Team Cornelia. Another hour of wait ensued, while the people in charge desperately looked around for possible scapegoats. Eventually, it was decided that Cornelia and one of the guides should share the blame. Eventually, we were told that we could proceed to item number one of our itinerary for the day, while Cornelia stayed back at the airport.

Unfortunately, things didn’t fare much better. The first stop in the itinerary was Aswan Dam. Both historically and economically, the 40-year-old dam is significant. For thousands of years now, the Nile has flooded annually, an event of such significance that even in temt is most morbid to wish for Poirot while these words aloud again. ples built 1,500 years ago, the level of the river starting a trip to aruna Egypt. Even I additional Sagar,though IPS, the It is the of the If you think of a day as it a period ofanother light be-day is For Sagar, was just indutifully the life recorded. dent.” Sagar alsoflooding points out that the traffic had read Death on commissioner the Nile and re-read it tween of police (traffic), Nile, so fer-in the city are two ofof darkness, it was Having my second daythe IPS a law enforcer. joined in which 1991, makes signalsthe at Egyptian importantplains junctions just before the trip (because I amthe thevalueinof Chennai, knows tile.police Nature was all very well, but are themanually unpre- controlled thetime, country.

I had arrived only a “the heYet, was driven by in theCairo belief that standalone, but they kind of person who does things like that), I few down to each life-saving second. dictability thepolicemen level of the floodpeak began to (8-11am and hours prior, flightmeans from Mumwas,after andaislong the best of delivering social ofby during hours didn’t ever harbour the his notion I’d actualLast week, teamthat pulled off the near-imposand after uniform a 10-year flow. effort, bai. Within minutes checkingto into the he ho-has,annoy justice.”of Belonging Bihar, over the Egyptians, 5-9pm) to ensure ly use any part of the Yet not only adid I tel, sible taskbook. of transporting heart for transAswan became with operational in 1970. It and reviewwe wereyears, shepherded out for a divisions fancy the led several different in the po- DamDealing traffic violations hark back to the book within hours of landing plant from the Government Generalbanquet.

Hospital,I remember quite interesting, if you’ve had on- a substantial bed at was lice force, stumbling such as theinto Crime Branch (CID)alland ing accidentbut statistics constitute in the country,near myCentral last thought asStation, I flew out Railway to the midnight, Fortis Ma- and ly two hours sleep and a four-hour for is on cases seemed Police. mere minutes had posted theit Armed Before being in of part of Sagar’s schedule. wait “My focus was also that a man of his talent would12km haveawaypassed lar Hospitals in Adyar in under someone luggage, over-speeding, it’s hard to bedouble-pillion imwhen Chennai the alarmto went offthe at 2am.

I had a he head traffic wing, was the else’s concerning ridbeen good to have at 14hand. minutes, beating peak-hourflight evening pressed. There wasrash much tut-tutting, the and fancy to catchCommissioner to Aswan. of Tirunelveli. ing, and drunkenand driving, In the book, just before boarded the ship this by creattraffic.he They accomplished bus declared thecharge Sar- of the trafTalking about the transportation intrepid of organstravellers’ number plates.

Sincethat I took t was at thefor airport that I Sagar realised how big for a cruise on the Nile, Poirot shared ing aHercule green corridor — a red light-free darthis Sarovar was far better anyway. And transplant, says, “We pulled off Dam fic division in December 2013,sowe have also thewastgroup was.

A dozen about precision 25 we boarded a compartment with Miss Schuyler, zone — Van to ensure that“an noeltime was busseveral and slept on. awareness campaigns because of journalists, the clockwork with the done seatbelt employees travelthe companies andpolice someand 50 the hospital derly lady with a very wrinkled a stiff that ed in theface, commute would ofwhich The Philae for Temple, our next restored to see the city traffic the public.

Andstop, it’s heartening intrepid travellers were rubbing their some humour. At last, it felthigh white sock, a good many diamonds and antaken ex- at have ordinarily least 45Indian like level we were doing staff coordinated the proceedof compliance among eyes and up to clear of a security line, something authentically motorists pression of reptilian contempt for theThe majoriminutes. transplant tookqueuing Egyptian. The temings. Operations this magniin Chennai with rewhichand was more a kilomety of mankind.” A big, clumsy young woman place almost immediately, ple is dedicated Isis.of road safety. tudethan have become second gardtotogoddess this aspect headtoofusthe line under 30 was sitting opposite the her. heart At intervals, was alive ter andlong. beat-At the She was the Even wife taxi of Osiris, nature as we have been credriverswho now pay heed to Since 2010, we Brand Ambassador, none almost evthe old lady looked over the top of her magaing inside the was recipient washave murdered and chopped into ating green corridors our campaigns.

Similarly, I have facilitated about less than a Bollywood star. We On had five zine and snapped an order at her.

“Cornelia within three hours. pieces14by hisnoticed brother Seth.

Isismajor pubs in ery month. that most Nothing jumpstarts such operations the flight Cairo, theinjournalcollect the rugs.” “When we arrive“Our lookplan afterof action was to instances pickedinup the his offering a the last six months. thefragments city have ofstarted a day likeMalar some Hospital alone ists had Brand my dressing case. On no account let anyone set into place by about 9amconcluded body and brought Osiris back to Since 2010, we Amhave facilitated driver-on-call service, which is blood and gore bassador wasabout accompanied by else handle it.” “Don’t forget myon paper cutter.” the day of the operation, life. She thendisplayed conceived Horus.

14 such operations in Maprominently as a noher personal assistant, a makeThough I was going on a cruise on the thanks to Nile our deputy com- lar Osiris became theon god of the othHospital alone. Cadaver tice their premises.” hairdresser.is I a serious isfrom Aswan to Luxor, in the exact oppositeSivanandan. di- up person missioner Two and er world, the judge of theentrusted dead, a transplantation Recently with the must admit wasand impressed by me that the rection that Agatha Christie took Poirot and officers, who acted as Isue, pride of place in Egyptian myit surprises profile of additional commisBy dinner it was estabher characters on,touch-points and much as forthe allentourage. com- creation And when grew up,order, Horusas avenged of though, red-light-free zones forthology. medical sioner,helaw and well, Sagar has his lished that the media had got it wrong.

The en- his I hoped nothing about the were munications, posted defeating Seth.

Nothing jumpemergencies is almost non-existent in father other bywork cut out.

Nevertheless, he is also eagerly merely friendsare—appalling two of — starts cruise wouldatimitate theandtourage the donor the recip-was cities. a day like some blood and gore. of EventuTheher statistics the numawaiting the completion work on the Chenwhom happened be editors ofexceeds celebrity plot of ient Death on the says hospitals,” Sagar. ally, theofpharaohs andRail, thewhich gods he would ber oftodeaths in a city the number nai Metro hopesallwould signifimagazines, and thepeople third, an editorial spouse.

Nile, I stepped into “A pilot vehicle accompanying merge into one longshift story wealth,ofwar andoff the roads. blind (yet transplants are few).”

What cantly theofburden traffic hour and half later, we alanded at Asship wishing the the ambulance constantlyAn alerted death, our first introduction to Sagar looks thisa means is that perfectly healthy pairbut of at Philae, Like most of us, the one thing wan.

That was when I first wished Missmatter) Van that someone had the control tower and the policethem was fascinating. meofshudder, eyes (or any organ, for that could forward toItatmade the end a long day at work, is Schuyler’s For and Brand Am- to spoken men manning the 12 traffic junc- words this idea thatspending in 285BC priests kings stood havewere beenspoken. harvested donated a reciptime atand home with his family. A vorabassador left often her luggage theor Caitions that fell along thehadient wherecious I wasreader standing anda saw exactly fails to outside reach him her inexactly the hour with “decent library” of his ro airport. She had expected the young what I saw. But ambulance’s route.”

I had snap out wheninviolable the of need. own, hetofollows butofaitsingle rule aforganiser trip, let’s call her Cornelia, toas Sagar’s The traffic policeman’s role was of theBut guide day revealed the — temple was originally there’s no time to lament terthat hours not answering any phone calls her.long Cornelia, vital to the operation ascarry it was her his luggage elsewhere, troubled by numbers the frequent floodstarts atfor 8am, before who rush-hour traffic and from known after 9pm. He would seemed to have the her“Every job morning, responsibility to block all the othing of theI Nile, in 1980, it caught for a picks upimpression in Chennai. that He says, rather not the lendUNESCO a ear to moved someone profile did not include the word ‘porter’, er traffic and give the ambulance stone by stone to itsviolation, new, dry location. am on the road with senior and junior officers, traffic looking for an easy way out. chose to only her suitcase.

After the right of way (an all-clear orcarry stationed at own arterial stretches across the city.

And even when Sagar calls it a day, book in green signal) at each junction. Ex- Our job is to ensure the smooth flow of traffic hand, there’s always the trusted walkie-talkie cept for one stretch where the am- during these jam-packed hours. The control by his side, cackling with static-laden updates bulance had to traverse the path of room warns us if there’s an accident or a from his taskforce. incoming traffic, it was smooth sail- breakdown of an MTC (Metropolitan Transing all the way. port Corporation) bus or any other such inci- bijoy bharathan

Making every second count

A traffic operation that brought Chennai to a 14-minute standstill last week — to transport a donor’s heart — was but another day’s work for one of the city’s top cops

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Leading the way Karuna Sagar is surprised that creating red light-free zones for medical emergencies is almost non-existent in cities other than Chennai m moorthy

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A different kind of high Seven college friends took up farming, and picked the non-drug industrial hemp as their crop of choice after stumbling upon a booming global industry around it

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Heady ideas A college field trip inspired seven friends to set up Bombay Hemp Company (Boheco) to create job opportunities for rural artisans and workers; (top) non-industrial hemp paul noronha

n 2010, students from Mumbai University’s HR College travelled to rural Maharashtra for a project to supply villages with solar lanterns. In that group were seven friends who saw in those vast fields, the unlit homes and simple rural lifestyle an immense potential waiting to be tapped. They resolved to work in the agriculture sector after completing their course.

When one of themk, Jahan Peston Jamas, visited his family in Australia the following year, he returned with another valuable lesson — industrial (non-drug) hemp, a variety of the cannabis plant, was being used in that country to manufacture a range of products, from clothes to foodstuff and building material.

He and his friends researched and discovered that a huge global industry exists around the industrial hemp plant. They spent days understanding the legalities involving hemp and its use, besides travelling to farms in Maharashtra to understand how other crops are dealt with. By 2012, they had done enough groundwork, and in January 2013, the Bombay Hemp Company (Boheco) was born. “We chose hemp because of the varied uses it can be put to while employing a rural workforce, including artisans,” says Sanvar Oberoi, a cofounder of Boheco and its director for finance and digital technology.

The National Policy on Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances, 1985, allows cultivation of cannabis for horticultural and industrial uses. The industrial hemp has only 0.3 per cent tetrahydrocannabinol (or THC, which causes the sedative effect). Around 10-12ft in height, the plant is not as much of a shrub or bush as its non-industrial variant, says Avnish Pandya, R&D director at the company.

Hemp is an ancient crop, believed to have been around for 5,000 to 6,000 years. In northern India, for centuries it was cultivated mainly as a subsistence crop. “We’ve modernised the techniques, making them more commercial,” says Yash Kotak, director of project and quality management.

Drapes naturally Hemp can be used to make nearly 25,000 products including textiles, oil, milk, paper, biodegradable plastics, tofu, flour, protein powder, bio-fuel and construction material. that cannot be a substitute for concrete. It is a “We want to create a new industry around more environment-friendly alternative to red hemp, beginning with the basic needs of food, bricks, which are manufactured using soil clothing and shelter,” says Chirag Tekchanda- needed for agriculture. ney, the director of marketing and HR. So BoBoheco is collaborating with an Ahmedaheco began with handloom fabrics. bad-based company for hempcrete. “We are The company collects hemp fibre from developing a binder that uses hemp. It is a growers in Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal breathable walling material and is in the testPradesh and Uttarakhand. “Then local artisans ing stages,” says Sumit Shah, Boheco’s director weave the cloth for us. We also work with Hi- of operations and supply chain. malayan Nettle (a perennial plant), which grows in those regions,” says Chew on this Kotak.

The third component of BoheBoheco sells hemp fabric co’s strategy is the edible one. alongside its blends with wool, While hemp flowers can be used Hemp can be used to silk and organic cotton, besides in biscuits and cookies, the seeds make nearly 25,000 Himalayan Nettle, at ₹650 to are a good source of protein and products including ₹850 per metre. Its 100 per cent essential fatty acids. textiles, oil, milk, and hemp shirts are now sold online “The protein content in hemp paper at ₹2,487 each. “It is not fair to is of a much better quality,” says compare it with other fabrics as Delzaad Deolaliwala, director of the industry is at a very nascent cultivation and legal corporate stage, with no economies of affairs. scale,” says Tekchandaney.

The company is ready with its hemp food Nevertheless, the fabric is a hit with design- products, but is awaiting government approvers, export houses and fashion schools. al. Hemp belongs to a list of novel items that “We are approaching people who are require a licence. “The licence is pending at tomorrow’s designers, as it is easier the final level. It (the products) will take anto convince them than those using other two months to retail in the market,” says age-old fabrics,” says Kotak.

Deolaliwala.

They are also experimenting with a natural, Green building block wild offspring of hemp that doesn’t require Work is on to create hempcrete, a hemp- care and monitoring. “We are developing a based composite material useful in con- breed of seed with an agricultural research instruction as well as insulation, but one stitute, besides importing seeds from other parts of the world for study,” says Pandya. Boheco aims to have a standardised seed for commercial cultivation.

The journey so far has been far from easy.

“No one else has worked with this crop in India. To create a product, we have to work with policymakers, research institutes as well as farmers to build the whole ecosystem from scratch,” says Oberoi.

So far this group of friends have relied on their financial savings from the jobs they held at various companies between 2011 and 2013.

“We have been approached by investors, but bootstrapping is better due to the uniqueness of this idea and its potential. We are building a long-term future and we can manage without investors,” Oberoi declares confidently.

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Writing wrongs

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orn in Moradabad, educated in Bahrain, Dehradun and Delhi, Deepti Kapoor worked as a journalist before she left it all behind to live in Goa. She took up yoga and began to write about the Capital, which despaired and inspired her. Intrigued by the city’s aggression, the male gaze and the threat of sexual violence, she reveals the bold escapades of her 20-year-old protagonist, Idha, in A Bad Character (Penguin).

Kapoor speaks about choosing not to write a run-of-the-mill love story and focussing on desire, pain and control. Excerpts from the interview:

Hitting its stride Bata has reinvented itself with a ₹3-crore, 360-degree integrated marketing campaign ‘Where Life Meets Style’ bloomberg/

prashanth vishwanathan

thapliyal

Stars and straps Defeats and victories at the neighbourhood gym

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here’s a gym across the street from where I live. I’ve been eyeing it ever since I moved into my apartment. Finally, after four months of dithering, I call the number. The owner, Jim, has a friendly, open manner. Within minutes we are talking of bowel movements and other excretions: “One of my clients thanked me for putHow realistic is ting the yellow back in her urine!” he tells me, as proof that this book? the powdered potions he markets for a well-known company Sexual liberation is not The city is real. I are truly beneficial. tantamount to sexual know all the places He’d like to get me on a total-body health program but equality. Do you in the novel, though eventually I opt for trying the three-days-a-week group sesagree? their representasion that’s available for a mere $80 a month. I go across to I do. Sexual libertion is often dismeet him the next day. He is a wonderful advertisement for ation against a torted and his training routine, a dark-haired man in his 30s , energetic background of amplified, built and fit with a mildly military cut to his personality. The gym is sexual equality from memory. composed of two rectangular rooms outfitted like brightly lit would be ideal, The Irish guy in torture chambers. Straps, chains, weights and other mystebut that’s wishful the hotel room in rious equipment hang from the walls or are tastefully arthinking today.

Paharganj is real; ranged on the floor. It makes me so nervous just to see the The mirage of sexI can still see his array that I miscount the money of my first payment and Jim ual liberation is often a tool, simply face. The Israeli cow story is real. has to ask for the extra $20 I owe him. designed to sell things, made by Aunty is just an aggregation of the I go for my first session the next day at 5pm. The trainer, marketing men, driven by money. In ideas of the Aunty, a necessary, wellBuzz, has chocolate brown skin the novel, my character Idha experi- meaning, but to the narrator, a sufand film star good looks packed inences a certain amount of sexual lib- focating presence. to a short, muscular frame. He is eration, but that in no way leads to amazingly focused, able to divide Half an hour speeds equality, either between her and her Are you like your protagonist, Idha? his attention between two or three by on sweaty wings boyfriend, or between her and the I wasn’t like her, and yet I was. We different groups, each one training city/society. In fact, it leads to a kind have been in the same places and sitat different speeds and levels in the of domination and more danger. uations, but she isn’t me. She’s persame room. There’s music over the Through sex she may seem to be- haps one aspect of me, brought out speakers and also a stopwatch on come free, but it leads to a state from a nightmare and magnified. the wall that he uses to keep track of who needs to switch to where she is dominated by him, his their left foot or begin the ball-bouncing routine. gaze, his ideas, and his actions.

How easy or difficult was it to put Half an hour speeds by on sweaty wings and I return to my hat Pandit Jawahar Nehru was a character grown into successes such apartment as Relaxo and Metro the Lal city’s aggressive piled-up stocks the distributors and feeling like themeant summer Olympics arefor surely withchampion co-operative What do you think about society’s of thewords on the other? withoutmovesetting aShoes stereotype? retailers, clogging the supply chain. in my reach. ment is well-known. littledouble standards on sexuality?

The CEO of Liberty Group, Adesh Gupta It took aBut longa time to hit upon a style heup wasthe in for even bigger trouble. In SepNeedless to say,says when I But wake next day my body factofis that extended It makes me angry andknown it is one the company approach to reminding thatheallowed methe to write without has reoriented tember 2005, Liberty Shoestoo signed whinesitsand complains, me that I am much old a 49:51 of India co-operatives not only banking, or complaining the greatest concept problems faces, to production, supply chain management and tojoint simply recounting ventureI pay withnothe then Kishore for such sudden shocks the system. attention, but Biyanifarming andrestricted sugar, but shoes When though it’s by no means retail strategy. longer aboutasit.well.

Novels by men, about men “We are no ownedThe Pantaloon Retail return for the rest of my month’s sessions. only man in (now an suchissue. shoeYet, co-operative him pushing to India; it’s aone global Indi- inpioneered distribthe city — by regardless of their our suf-products tothe Aditya Birla Group company). On group is about the same age as me, white-haired, short Karnal (Haryana) fell onfering bad times in a1954, an society, in in particular, does a wonutors and customers.

The — have swagger to them, a paper, onto theythe were anddaily stocky. He has a few blue stars tattooed side to of open 45 brothershypocrisy, bailed it out. certain DP and PD Gupta rederful job in two harbouring production freedom of the city. Theyis now interlinked stores inhair three yearsoff and target a his face. OneLiberty day he turns up with all his white shaved now works on tained the employees andpursue converted theinco-theirwith oursucprevious day’sand sale women stories, of ₹350 crore. In antici— as surprise!the Thepull restmodel... of his scalp isturnover also covered in small, operative into a company. As giving as customer feedback.

That ceed andcustomers fail, but she well remains the pation, Liberty increased capacipretty blue stars.

If it sells 100 pairs in a the freedom to choose was a priority in the Butmeans, producing what isAt inthe de- end of one month, I decide I can centre of attention.

I wanted to ty through newthe plants only afford $50 — two in day, it produces only newly Independent country, mandofrather an inwrite the fromcompany a woman’s point view, than creating Himachal Pradesh and one in Utunlimited access I leave 100fee. theSo next day the group to spend half an was suitably named Liberty Shoes. toevery us other day chugging along alone the point of view of theventory pursued.that could return tarakhand. added 60 per hour on the “We treadmill.

In the half-a-century that followed, six months,” he explains.

I decidedthe to comcombat after the city’s agnew capacity.”

But the joint It’s not as much fun with no friendly cent encouragement from pany thrived with its range of by innovative And that, says Gupta, has been gression becoming it, by embracventure never took off.

Buzz to keep me focused. Still, I chase the blinking red dots on products and soon became anand aspirational thealtering company’s move in ing it owning it, and it best-everthe “They (Pantaloon) treadmill’s digital monitor with my eyes, counting off the promised brand. But when globaltowinds of change decade.The Its earlier strategy was successful my own version of ahistory. ussweat. business worth hundreds of my crores on paseconds, enjoying the mild I listen to podcasts with swept the country, like most brands of its genbutofnot sustainable, hetiny concedes. city’s aggression, in terms writing But and it never came because iShuffle “Retailers clipped to myper.

T-shirt know thatto I’llus never lose they were eration, Liberty began to feel thegoes pressure. armed with tools to give usBut continwhat on in Arit, waswere quitenot easy.

I sourcing fromyellow! cheaper local my belly flab. my urine is primrose All’s wellbrands with in Agra chaic processes and a limited presence feedback. issues,” he says. haveretail soaked it up anduous absorbed it, We had legacy despite their commitment to us.

They would the world. pushed it to the fringes and of the industry byinsides for many it has eaten my always ask us to supply at ridiculously low 2004. The brand is today frantically Piling troubles years. All I trying had totodo was close my prices, usually the MRP,” says MANJULA PADMANABHAN, author and artist, tells half us tales of her parallel lifeGupta. (An make a comeback. But theeyes, question is: Can a write.

Gupta, who took over asinLiberty Shoes CEO in open them and email to the Future Group went unanswered.)

Elsewhere US, in this fortnightly series. marginalien. blogspot. in 60-year-old company stay relevant in a market 2004, then met dealers once in six months, onLiberty, already battling an outdated supply that now boasts the likes ARUNIMA of international gi-is a journalist ly to based find inout that most of the designs which chain and rising capital expenditure, was now MAZUMDAR New Delhi ants Nike and Reebok at one end and home- he thought would sell had no takers. That saddled with extra capacity. The final blow

Thinking on their Q feet R

Legacy footwear brands Liberty and Bata lace up for a fresh round of sales battles to win over customers online and in the stores

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Where shadows lurk Author Deepti Kapoor (above) matthew parker writes of being a woman in the Capital reuters/mansi

patriarchy and misogyny. Desirous women are labelled as sinful and wrong. They’re suppressed; they’re declared bad characters. They’re punished for it — get her married off, shame her, kill her. But you can’t kill the desire, can you?

It seemed things were beginning to change after the December 16 gang rape and murder of the paramedic student, but women say it’s worse now. That they have to plan their lives around safety, their public life is reduced, their private life threatened. What I want is to be in control of my own destruction.

manjula pandamabhan

Debut author, Deepti Kapoor, on the swagger of male novels and darkness of Delhi

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next day. We are not working on a forecast model, we produce according to demand.”

While the back-end measures are in place, the company will have to double its efforts to increase customers and sales.

“There has been a fundamental shift in the Indian market, as well as marketing strategy in the last decade. Young Indians are far more aspirational than they were 20 years ago, and that is a challenge for all brands of the previous generation,” says Arvind Singhal, chairman and managing director of the consulting firm Technopak.

“Their communication and product strategy have to be in sync with social media, print and digital platforms.”

Brand strategy specialist Harish Bijoor concurs: “Social media is becoming so dominant and relevant that being there is a hygiene factor.”

Net profits Adesh Gupta, CEO, Liberty Shoes; (right) the company is now focusing on young customers and on online retail through its own website and tie-ups with the likes of Flipkart and Jabong vv krishnan

came in the form of souring industrial relations. “In 2006, we had a huge strike, which we resolved in a day. A second one happened within a week and a third within a month,” Gupta recounts, laying the blame on politics.

“We were victims of a political climate that disturbed the system,” he says.

On one hand, the company went on capacity and retail overdrive and on the other, it was hit by a strike. The result was that its takeoff crashed. Till 2008, it somehow maintained its topline, but the expenditure rose sharply and profitability vanished.

Treading a new path Gupta decided to seek professional help. He recalls meeting consultants who wanted crores in return for coffee-table books that promised to tell him how to bail out the business. Finally, he approached the Vector Consulting Group, which is known for its Theory of Constraints. “They led us to work on the pull model, which means we just replenish the sold stock and there is no inventory. The reaction time is cut from six months to one day,” he says.

Liberty took four years to build this supply chain and system. “Till 2012, we were clearing dead stocks of our own stores and retailers through promotions or discounts. Now, if I sell 100 pairs in a day, I produce only 100 the

Young, affordable fashion A model walking on the ramp in a pair of Liberty trainers arunangshu roy chowdhury; and Liberty Force 10 lace-up shoes with a neon sole, aimed at youngsters

The comeback Czech Much like Liberty, yet another footwear brand is trying to create a buzz in the market to win back its customer base.

Czech brand Bata has been in India for 84 years and is now working doubly hard to reinvent itself at all levels — products, retail reach and media campaigns. Last quarter, Bata spent ₹3 crore (0.6 per cent of revenue) on its 360-degree integrated marketing campaign ‘Where Life Meets Style’.

“Bata needs to reinvent its lifestyle positioning… (it) has dominated on the basis of its products and prices. But the stays open on Sundays. price-and-product-generation has moved on, But its masterstroke was the voluntary remaking way for a stylised generation, which is tirement scheme that nearly halved its staff price-resilient. Bata cannot forever remain a strength from 9,631 in 2005 to 5,162 in 2012.

Employees also had the option to move to K bastion of lifestyle pricing,” says Bijoor.

Agreeing that pricing is no longer the dom- stores — a format that lets employees turn into inant factor it once was, Devangfranchisees, with a 7-8 per cent shu Dutta, chief executive at commission on sales. consultancy firm Third Eyesight, “Bata in particular has been a says, “Today there is a lot more comeback story in the last few Bata has re-modelled competition, with international years. They have updated the stores and shut down brands deepening their engagequality of retail ambience; the bleeding properties. ment with the Indian market. stores now look contemporary And in a major break Even consumers are willing to and the product range has exfrom the past, it has panded,” says Singhal. spend on higher-priced prodextended its working The results are showing. The ucts as long as it gives them an hours, and stays open edge — whether in terms of looks company’s net profit for the Jaon Sundays or comfort.” nuary-March 2014 quarter was After suffering losses in the ₹39.4 crore, with sales at ₹495.12 crore. In contrast, Liberty faces a early 2000s, Bata began setting its house in order. Since 2005, it long road ahead. While it is back has been downing the shutters of small out- to making profits (₹4.27 crore) alongside rislets and opening new large-format stores. It ing sales (₹142.05 crore), these are modest in has remodelled stores and shut down bleed- comparison with Bata during the same periing properties. And in a major break from the od. During FY14, its net profit was ₹13.21 crore, past, it has extended its working hours, and a third of what Bata made in just three months. And to think that at one time, around 2000, Liberty was considered the only real competition and threat to Bata.

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For the young Gupta is all too aware of the challenges. Liberty has 450 franchisee cash-and-carry stores and 100 company-owned outlets. “We opened 100 stores in each of the last two years. We want to add 50-100 stores each year, half of them franchisees and the rest company-owned,” he says.

With ₹1 crore as the average annual sales per store, Gupta is keen to hit the ₹1,000-crore target in the next couple of years. Side by side, the company has launched its online store and tied up with e-commerce players such as Flipkart and Jabong. And its focus is the youth.

Says Gupta, “Liberty will never be a luxury brand. We’ll be a youthful, fashion-centric brand with affordability as a key criterion.” rashmi pratap

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Old loves, novel ways Not social, not media PRESENT IMPERFECT

Author of The Inscrutable Americans, Anurag Mathur doesn’t live in the hope of a literary If Facebook is a collection of carefully curated vignettes of pointlessness, Twitter is a madencore, choosing instead to live another life unlived between the pages of his latest book dash on mission me-too. The Secret is neither

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umour is a funny thing. It can crack you up unexpectedly. Or skip you entirely in a movie hall full of laughter. On paper, in particular, it has a difficult time expressing itself without the aid of gestures or a laughter track. Good humourists, thus, are in short supply. Ask the publishers of Wodehouse and Wilde. Or Rupa.

In its 50th reprint, Anurag Mathur’s Inscrutable Americans has, arguably, kept the 78-yearold publishing house in business for more than two decades. A coming-of-age novel of a blundering, fresh-off-the-boat Gopal set in the America of the early ’90s, the book’s continued popularity belies its birth in a pre-liberalised, not-so-well-travelled India, where Ross and Rachel were strangers yet. Mathur’s latest book, The Country is Going to the Dogs, is also a (geriatric) bildungsroman of sorts. One that Dog days... Spent traces belatedly the journey of the 74-year-old in the company of retiree Radhey Radhey (RR), “an innocent in nameless, faceless the wilderness”, as he acquaints himself with and kind phone the “sexual underbelly of Delhi”, while uncov- Cultural crossroads Anurag Mathur’s new novel explores the seaminess shutterstock friends of urban India mohammed yousuf; and ering the mystery of a missing filmstar, Miss (below) the author kamal narang Fifoo.reAlso publication, new reyou ainRupa on the Secret? Forthis a fortapp is a platform for anonymity. You can say outrage — against ISIS, against paid media, lease night marksnow, a ‘homecoming’ for the author. he says, “For, Gopal, was 20 at class,non-vegetarians irrespective of political allegiance, has since a friend introwhatscrutable...” you like and unless youlike have left Iclues against and non-vegans, (The six otherme titles hisbeen first book someitpoint in my life, but I’ve always been inherently right of centre.

A posiduced tothat thefollowed app, I’ve yourself, is fairly impossible to never trace been your 74.”against people who litter, people who swear, were waking mostly published

by Penguin.)

Is it to a lot harder then to write life untion thatwatch one imagines could put authors up to dozens of notifica- words back you.

For now though, it isofanaenpeople who sports, people who don’t like the protagonist whoIlives across lived?interesting “I’d have toplace say yes no.

There are cerhim at risk as they with the realities tions onUnlike my phone saying thatRR, people know dearingly to and be in.

It’s not soworship.

Everyone is grapple an aspiring social re- of street from a girl’sI am college theiftheatre tainisthings youAnd know a 20-year-old wouldn’t a new, India andmocks its duplicities have the shared their secrets. not — sure it is of cial, nor it media. therein lies the secret former, withshining a tone that either the read- and his fantasies, both imagined — Mathdo, whereas standards theshame context of sex, for inthe word secret or thelived ideaand that it is being to Secret’s charm. for a fictional character who is er or double threatens to nameinand them.

And ur’s apartment a sleepy south neigh- In much you’re never sure. And — a trope to his books. shared with me, but in it provides quite aDelhi thrillthe lastolder, few months, I haveentirely been increaswhenstance Mother’s Day common or Fathers’ Day comes bourhood allows for more creative licence, it Approached from yourself two endsor ofbe theswept age specing start to the day. is at least a kilometre away inglywhile wearythis of social media.

For someone who around, goodness, brace from two such His — retiregives youall more to make mistakes,” — from a virginal Gopal whose deflowerThe secrets themselves are acolleges. mixed bag livedalso pretty much daylicence on Facebook, this is a awaytrum by declarations of eternal gratitude and ment plans though, don’t inMathur. Mistakes that could puncture ing in the aircraft’s bathroom on his return some are confessions or invitations of a sexual hugesays turnaround.

When I started, I was work- the undying love. clude renting a room with ing a from carefully constructed version of Indianvirreality Alljourney a fitting climax nature, some are criticisms of politicians, pubhome, and Facebook provided of thistoisIndia oftenmade moreforforgivable than to a feminal view. Like a soft-spoken that RR inhabits.

One whereIt his “oversexed” RR’sbycolourful sexual lishers or writers (the app assumes that every- tual water-cooler conversations. wasinteractions where whatsurprisingly goes on in Twitter, trawled trolls and neighbour oneand might with Goburdhun, the proprietor editor of history — Mathur’s prose itnever one in your phone book is a friend, sinceoccayou could let off some steam, indulge and in some stuffed withand the fantasies smug. For most people, sionally exchangepublishpleasantries The exchange Daily Reporter, Anwar, a crime abandons but thrives in the my phone book is full of journalists, raucous of comments takes several rounds of praand gifts with, Mathur reporter, Tia, to a young teacher hopetoof its next ers and writers, it gives meDiwali a tailor-made ringbefore going back the story nayams gather the sexual courageencounto is, perhaps, best and an objectIncreasingly of his affection, side view of these worlds) and some are,defined quite by you were writing. justter. log“RR’s on.sexual And behaviour if you getis not The absence drawFacebook on issues of freedom, as uncommon as onethe would simply, observations.omissions.

The first kind, I ignore,of I any though, is press a place sucked into a conversation, either is real veiled arrogance, or that communalism, and sex- NMathur’s think it is,” he says,with “There’s am past the age where strangers’ prurience in-air of where people go tosexism outshine pings endlessly the an prose neverphone one is honest. confidence with awhich authors ual orientation, to revealand no underlining regret and resentterests me. The second kind — being journalone another.

The wall only is a warof half-a-dozen people abandons but thrivesjabber It’s just bunch of bestsellers protagonist’s populist, often in theahope ment I see in this age group. ist in Delhi, where of all more gossip recent is a possible zone the in this insane competition to fit deep thoughts into Like of its nexttrying blind folks wax eloquent and hypocritical they have missed the bus. They weapon in your arsenal — I follow keenly.onButeveryto beilliberal cooler, hipper, wiser. Eachviews.pompous of 140-characters. sexual encounter packages describing elephants thing tirade against the younger what I really look forward to is thefrom thirdtheir kind. craft time From I scrollhis down these days,lesbians it Ifprobably Facebookregard is a collection of lot marketingadstrate“fooling patriot- that don’t exist as bizarre…

These are simply revelationsand — common seems to me,honest, there upright, is no one carefully curated fortunate vignettes maybe, of gies to matters of ic Indians” himselfYou to platibut bizarre.” missions of an individual’s failings. whose life isn’t like fabulous. pointlessness, Twitter is a madnational imporlike “iffor theyour Hindus Set mission squarely me-too. in the genre Take this for example: “When the cheque wenttudes to Vietnam holi-hated dash on Nei- of tance, Muslims, loved film stars in India humour like books, comes and someone offers to treat memakes to din-Mathdays?the Look, I wentthe to most the South therall is his realother and no one barring is hon- one seema awkward named ner, my first thought isn’t ‘Wow,urthat’s nice Pole. wouldn’t You had be squid ink Khan”, risottoRR exposes himself each on travel est. and It’s poetry, just The a Country bunch isofGoing first, ordinary to censure, evenmy ridicule.

But heinstops to the Dogs unlikely to trace the spectacular gesture,’ it’s, ‘Damn, I should at have ordered for dinner?

I hunted own scallops Flor- just pompous blindis folks describing elephants even. man, short of becoming a caricature of himself. trajectory more’.” The author of this secret livesA in Sanwho, ida and then braised them in the olive oil I that don’t exist.of The Inscrutable Americans’ success. years after author, as authors areitwont to to do, re- Which But Mathur appearto to the live coy in the Jose, USA, and that’s all I know 23 about him or his pressedThe myself in Crete.

Nobody, seems is why doesn’t I am addicted ad-hope first book became mainstodetached from characters, emphaof such literaryWhere encores.

Hedo even brushes her, but the secret itself, I am certain, is a unime, goes Panchgani for his a holiday or eats missions in Secret. else you have off a orphenomenon, sising how take a life of their own and theconfessing informal distinction of being aor forerunner versal guilt. Most of us, at one time the oth- thairsadam and they papad foron dinner.

One bunch people to grief, loneliness selfappears to often say things that he may disagree with vioof I’d Chetan (“It’sthe a cycle.

After Chetan er, have been there, yet it is notstill an admission mocks people for their vocabulary and gramdoubt? ratherBhagat read about 40-year-old in have stumbled “But I do thinkpleas, people in that ageesgroup Bhagatwho there willsure be another anyone would make publicly. Or this: “When upmar, lently. another publishes which can Stockholm isn’t what he Chetan wants toBhagat”) do by accident. in India with a certain mindset havehot similar Bagchi’sfrom comment how he you see me texting in public on I’mfame really just sentially be summed up as, “if you aren’t with and his Amitabha life, the person Bostononwho In the comfort viewpoints.please Sure, don’t some send can be incredibly had methis/her many laundry who hadinonly ever reador The Inlooking at the weather app because I want to of and successful, me friend re-tolerhasn’t done three weeks his own living ant Facebook and liberal. areequivalent exceptions. scrutable Americans andonFive Point Someone. look like I am doing something.”

The fake textroom, quests.” is But thethose online ofMost the ‘friend’ who wipes snot restaurant tawithindulges his mother and sisothers come from a certain Reconciled, Mathur metaphor that inis a pretence that everybody in but the mean kids’ table at the schoolbackground cafeteria. when blecloths.

But most of all,offers I likeaSecret for the ter pottering about the Of India was a certain way, was a cerdicates a practiced nonchalance, a deliberate never owns up to. course, people aren’t alleducation like that. There fact that before you post a comment, it reMathur insists his tain way rejection a certain of Indian I am not sure what’shouse, in store for Secret, are people whoand postparental requestsupbringing for adoptinggave res- you minds you, in aofmanner so kind old-worldly thatwriting it subjects and settings have values, which have changed completeand literary critique — “Sachin didn’t score a whether it will grow to hundreds of millions cuedcertain dogs and people who actually believe now feels out of place, to ‘say something kind’. never borrowed from now,”ahephotograph says, obfuscatory yet intelligible century time he on tosocial the field, of users and thereby self-destruct the very rea-a real that ly Liking of a baby with a in You can keepevery the smart andwalked the smug or an institution. classic Indian sort ofaway. you — leaving one wondering, if formuson for its genesis, or person whether it will hang “In braina tumour will trigger medical miracle. media, I’llknow” stick with the kind. fact, The Country Going to veers to the doing generalgood elections and to la is such a bad thing after all. around for a bit and then quietly die. At aistime In fact, As ontalk social media, has its the Dogs is much the more own a mafia. middle-class India, therelentless milieu ofcalls hisfor books, t@veenavenugopal when users are hankering for celebrity, So there are the work of fiction than The In- Mathur concedes a certain section of that soity banerjee

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UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY

The chopper pilot It is hard to understand why people like Puneet did what they did in Uttarakhand. Would we have done the same? The fact is heroes are heroes because they are exceptional people

The blade runners Yet another helicopter sortie to rescue pilgrims stranded near Rambada in Uttarakhand after the floods last year afp/ indo tibetan border police

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Omair Ahmad is an author. His last book was on Bhutan

e live in a time when the term hero is usually only used ironically. I wonder what we lose in our imagination, and in our aspirations, when we dismiss heroism as something not to be taken seriously. A year ago a person I know, a friend, committed acts of bravery that are beyond the capability of most people. He is a helicopter pilot, a former Wing Commander of the Indian Air Force, who has been flying choppers for the last few years with private companies. Part of that involves trips to religious sites in the Himalayas, and Puneet has often told me how difficult it was for him to sometimes tell people that bad weather meant he could not fly them to a location that was the culmination of their lives.

A year ago, Puneet was stationed just outside of Kedarnath, among other chopper pilots catering to the needs of the pilgrims.

There had been warnings but nobody paid much attention to them, except for the helicopter pilots, whose lives depend on slight weather fluctuations. Puneet had flown over the areas on June 14 and had observed some of the bad weather conditions, but when he flew again on June 16, after two days of unrelenting rain, he saw that parts of Gaurikund town had been washed away, and all of the transit town of Rambada had been swept away. When Puneet tried to land near Garud Chatti, his chopper was almost mobbed by a desperate crowd whose only thought was of escape, and he had to scramble to save himself and his helicopter.

He came back, as did four other chopper pilots, all from the private companies that were operating in the area. They worked non-stop, with handlers pushing people back and lining them up so that they did not injure them-

selves or overload the helicopter. These pilots, are heroes because they are exceptional peoassigned by nobody, using their own re- ple. Among the people that Puneet saw and sources and risking their lives again and rescued was a sadhu clutching a potli that conagain, saved the lives of hundreds, maybe tained more than ₹90 lakh, there were women thousands, of people before the State author- carrying jewellery that was obviously not ities and the military arrived. Even then it took theirs, there were men who, after being resa while for the army choppers to start operat- cued from near-death, wanted to pay so that ing. Helicopters have about three hours of they could fly to their homes leaving behind flight time for each trip due to their limited those still stranded, there were TV reporters fuel tank, and it took half of that to just fly who wanted to film the tragedy, uncaring of them in from Dehradun. The only fuel stocks the fact that every additional reporter meant near Kedarnath were those maintained by the one less person rescued. private companies, none by the military.

Puneet, the other chopper pilots and the One place, near where Rambahandlers risked their lives day in da had been, offered an incrediand day out for people they did bly difficult landing. It was not know, some of whom were, barely 30sq ft of space, and about no doubt, not great human be300 people had been stranded ings. He told me how desperaThere had been there for four days, surrounded warnings but nobody tion had driven some people to by the dead, dying and desperwildness: “They were like anipaid much attention, ate. Puneet dropped his handler, except the helicopter mals, animals,” he said, talking a Mr Bisht, who guided the chopabout the events a couple of pilots, whose lives per in, squatting on his haunchweeks afterwards, marvelling at depend on slight es, rock steady, with the deadly how quickly people were reweather fluctuations whirling rotors just a foot away duced to their savage, atavistic from his face. Puneet has served urges. He attributed his actions in all sorts of operations, includto training, to a certain code that ing the Kargil conflict, but he pilots have, the camaraderie said that of all the people he has worked with, among the other pilots who flew their mahe has rarely come across the courage that chines, maybe even a sense of challenge that Bisht showed that day, as he guided the heli- the conditions created, so that he had to risk copter in. One tiny mistake by either could his life to perform even a simple rescue mishave led to their deaths. sion. I guess there are always reasons and exIt is hard to understand why people like Pu- planations for everything, and one of them is a neet, or Bisht or the other chopper pilots, did very simple one. Wing Commander Puneet what they did in those days. Yes, we would all Bakshi acted as he did because he is a hero, and like to say that we would have acted in a simi- that is what a hero does. lar manner were we in the same place, but I am not sure that is true. The fact is that heroes t@OmairTAhmad

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Actor Tisca Chopra does not want starry-eyed hopefuls arriving in Bollywood to face the heartbreaks she did, so she decided to write a book about it

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Though the case received extensive coverage, journalists Kavita and Meera Devi (below) show that life for women in UP is seldom free from fear priyanka kotamraju

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drunken Brajesh would accost the women of the family, flash them and ask to be sized up.

“The police knew him by reputation,” says Pawan. “They came in May and ticked him off.”

But the entire family has distanced itself from the case. Sushma went alone to file the report.

She was alone when they whisked her away to the Banda district hospital, depositing her after that at the Naari Niketan in Banda.

Yet, weeks after Badaun, there are no television crews or national newspaper reporters in Banda. Only arly on as a struggling actor in Mum- television shows and theatre. She shot back in- helpful. Years later, when Khabar he cameLahariya to watch(KL), a local bai, Tisca Chopra turned up excitedly to public consciousness with Aamir Khan’s her successful play Dinner with Friends, he was weekly tabloid, bears witness.

When Sushma’s cries at an audition with what she Taare Zameen Par in 2007. “I was completely impressed by her transformation.

“Tu kamal Started nearly 12 years ago by a grew louder, her thought was her ticket to coveted clueless. I turned down some big projects on a hai yaar, tu kaise karti haingroup (You are amazing, of women, KL now has 40 uncle simply roles — portfolio pictures in coloured contact whim. I kept thinking something bigger will how did you pull off this change),” she recalls sells 6,000 women journalists, extended the height lenses and tacky make-up. “Are those tests come my way,” she says. If it wasn’t for some him telling her after the curtain Last year,and circulates copiescall. every week of his compound wall shots for a fantasy film?” the casting director prodding by the TZP casting team, she would when Kapoor was casting in foreastern his TV show 24, UP, Bundelkhand and asked with a smirk. have missed that chance too. “The first time I he called up Chopra to play his wife.

“I think Bihar’s Sitamarhi district.

Two decades on, Chopra is older and wiser. was called, I didn’t go. I thought it is better to he was impressed that I didn’t give up.any I kept Was there outrage over BaFrom being rejected for having ‘too big a face’ not go for an Aamir Khan audition than to say working,” she says. daun in Bundelkhand? Meera to being asked to audition in a swimsuit for a ‘I went and didn’t get it’,” she explains. Her That’s the advice she gives heror readers too case — get talked says, “See, Badaun the Delhi B-grade movie, she has seen some dark days. next release, Qissa, starring Irrfan Khan, has to keep going.

Despite disappointabout when all the her public takes it up. In Banda, Her book Acting Smart, published by Harper- won acclaim at several foreign film festivals. ments, Chopra’s book is remarkably which is one of the mostpositive. backward areas of UP, Collins, records such instances And she is already writing her A Buddhist bythere preference, her beliefs areWe simis no such support. see many such for the benefit of other starryown film. ple: “Take whatever’s coming and excel atThree that. months ago, cases that no one reports.” eyed aspirants hoping to make it Recalling two of the “abys- If you’re goodinand well-behaved, then even ifwent to file an Mahua block, when a woman big in showbiz. mal” films she did in her 20s, you have a two-line part, the turned same guys will ofFIR, the police on her.

“Usko rape kiya.

I know of actors who “You need to be sharp and Chopra says she was lucky to fer you five the next If you Uski betitime. ko rape kiya.get Aurnegative usiko jail main daal dilike to say that life smart. I was sharp and bright in a have veteran actor Naseeruddin and jaded, creativity won’twrote comeabout close to ya. Nobody it”you.”

(They raped her, just shined upon way. I was academically inclined, Shah as her on-screen father in raped her daughter and put her in jail), says them... No one likes but not street-smart. The book is them. She pestered Shah to come mohini chaudhuri Meera. The woman is still in custody. to visit the dark alleys a desire to protect aspiring acgood on his promise to hold actAt the Kamasin police station, which is just of their life tors from the heartbreak I went ing workshops for working ac250 metres from Sushma’s home, Kavita asks through. I made a huge number tors. They attended regular for the Station Officer (SO) DK Mishra, who has of mistakes,” she says, stressing classes at his home and just walked in. “More and more women are filon the ‘huge’. farm. Chopra found she ing FIRs now,” she says, “But the problem is Writing books is par for the course in Cho- could immediately apply her newthat nothing happens after charge-sheeting.” pra’s family — her parents have a few between found knowledge in the TV shows she In 1973, when the NCRB first published crime them, her pilot husband Capt Sanjay Chopra was doing then. “He would feed us data, 2,919 rape cases were registered; in 2012, has a book of short stories to his credit and the great food, give us goodies and not 24,923 cases were reported. While the reportmost illustrious of them all is her granduncle, charge a penny. But yeah, if you get ing of crime has increased, the conviction the late Khushwant Singh. Perhaps that ex- fired by him, you can crash into an rates fell from 44 per cent to 24.2 per cent in plains why she confidently agreed to wrap up abyss of depression,” she warns. the same period. the book in just three months. However, she Another memory from those initial The police have charged Brajesh under Secended up taking four long years. “This is clas- days was a film she did with Anil Kations 376, 506 IPC, and the Protection of Chilsic me, totally misunderstanding the situa- poor, whom she remembers as kind and dren from Sexual Offences Act. “He could get a tion. This is how I proceed with life till I get life sentence. If the family presses charges, it wiser,” she says over a bland breakfast of egg could even be death,” says Mishra. Kavita tells whites and brown bread. him about the father’s notorious reputation.

Chopra lives in the Lokhandwala area, a “After consuming alcohol, who knows what a hunting ground for new talent. Hundreds man can do,” says Mishra, whose predecessor turn up each day to try their luck at the nuwas transferred before June 13, perhaps as part merous casting agencies in the neighbourof UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav’s reshuffle n June 17, at 4.15 pm, 15-year-old and Meera Devi. hood, film scripts get written at the coffee of IPS officers after the Badaun incident.

Sushma (nameatchanged) walked shops and six-pack bodies are sculpted the A day after the FIR had been lodged, Kavita “At least this guy (the SO) is doing sometothat Kamasin block gyms here. It is at her gym Chopra getspolice to station, in and Meera — reporters for Khabar Lahariya — Banda district interact with many of herthe readers.

“I really likeof Uttar Pra- turn up at Kamasin block from the district desh,understand and lodged an FIR. accused her 40- headquarters in Banda, 60km away. They find you and I really you.

If She you’re year-old of rape.

For bum,” the last three years, Sushma’s house locked. Her father is in custodown, this book puts afather cracker up your Brajesh Kumar (name a young aspiring actress toldchanged) Choprahad assaulted dy and she has been sent for a medical examinmid-workout.Sushma, threatening to kill her if she didn’t ation. When we find her cousin loitering comply.

When sheyou sought Chopra’s book doesn’t tell howrefuge to be-with her rela- outside, Kavita seeks him out. tives, he would haul back, beat her and come a star. It’s a practical guide to her becoming The third of four brothers of an upper-caste rape He had a working actor, noher. matter howraped smallher the earlier part. that morn- family, Brajesh is a known drunk in the village, ing as well.instances, such as acShe worries that freak notorious for his cussed invective and blatant Four hundred kilometres from Banda, the indecency. “Rakshas vyakti tha (He was a detress Kangna Ranaut getting spotted at a cofhorrific rape and murder two Badaun cou- mon),” says Pawan, his nephew and son of elfee shop or Preity Zinta getting her firstof break sins in the last week of brought UP’s law- dest brother Ramakant. He tells us that when she accompanied a friend to May an audiand-order problems the spotlight yet Brajesh’s first wife died 12 years ago… under tion, have deluded millions into into believing again. country where rape occurs every suspicious circumstances. Sushma was the they could be next In inaline.

Stories of aactors minutes, 10 per of rape cases reported second of the first wife’s three daughters. Four who steadily 22 worked their waycent up with grit are from UP, the third highest. and determination don’t excite them much.From 2006 to years ago, Brajesh married a younger woman. this numberthat increased by 55 per cent, But since last Diwali, she has been in a Luck“People like 2012, to promulgate fairytale the national saw myth. I knowwhile of actors who areaverage pushing thean increase of now hospital having sustained burns during a 26breaking per cent.itThe State accounts envelope, even open, and there’s for a 22 per cent prayer ceremony. of the and abduction lot of hard work thatcountry’s goes intokidnapping that. But they “We knew he was an alcoholic, but we had cases, and the upon highest number like to say that life just shined them and of dowry no idea what went on behind those closed Entry lines deaths.

Cases of to incest rapedark in India rose by doors,” says Ramakant. When Sushma’s cries yada yada yada.

No one likes visit the Actor Tisca Chopra 47 says. per cent from 2011 to 2012. in Acting alleys of theirnearly life,” she grew louder, Ramakant simply extended the has And authored 98.2 per cent of rapeHindi cases, offenders At 17, Chopra landed her maiden film, of his compound wall. “We didn’t know Smart,were a how-toheight for known to the Sushma’s Platform (1993), starring Ajayvictims Devgn.—Itlike wasin a dito do. He never sent the girl to school. thosecase. looking forwhat a break incase the headlines, Sushma’s saster, as were aBadaun couple ofmakes other films that folAnd he would get mad if we tried to interfere,” would have gone unreported.

If notfilm for industry Kavita he says. His wife begins to sob, she says a lowed. Next she worked on a lot of ad films,

Role with the punches

Stuck in time The grandmother of the victims of Badaun

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Crime against women in Uttar Pradesh might have hit the headlines, but following two Khabar Lahariya journalists on a day’s work shows that little has changed over decades in UP

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thing,” says Kavita, who adds that the police in the regionKHAMAJ often try to settle issues outside the MANJH thana. “Everyone tries to turn the victim into the perpetrator,” says Meera. In cases they have seen over a decade, families have discouraged women from filing complaints; the police has discouraged them from registering FIRs; and when they insist, these women come to be seen as the problem.

Through the revolving door

arunabha deb

Musical instruments that disappeared, and those that have recently emerged, tell a complex eing a woman journalist in eastern UP is story of loss, gainimmense and constant not easy.

It requires fortitude change

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and simple courage. Meera (28), who joined KL nine years ago was their youngest recruit at the time. She was married at 16, Kavita at 12.

They are childhood friends. Meera completed a BA from Jhansi in 2006; Kavita (32) has had no formal education. Both of them have children. When Meera’s daughter calls her, she gently chides her. “You know I am working on the field, I will be late.”

In the initial years, their families imposed strict codes. “We were only allowed to wear sarees, no matter the discomfort. We were asked to come home before sunset, no matter where we were. They didn’t like us travelling to places. Yahaan bhi khap hai,” says Kavita. In archive photos of KL, Kavita is clad in sarees, pallu draped modestly around her shoulders, much like her teammates. Today, she wears a bright blue kurta, with the dupatta thrown aside, and white sneakers. The reporters travel extensively in the region. Last week she was chasing Balkharia, the latest menace in dacoit-infested Bundelkhand. Before that she was reporting from Faizabad. Every month, she arrives in Delhi for editorial meetings. On production days, they work late. For the last decade, KL reporters have hitched rides, hiked on foot and cycled in sarees to villages in Chitrakoot and Banda to break stories of dowry deaths, murders, rapes and dacoity. And in the pursuit of these stories, they have transformed from homemakers into daredevil reporters. week, I out, got they a mail fromoften Soumik When ast KL started would reDatta —People a dear in friend, gurubhai and a ceive threats. power questioned brilliant sarod player.

He ask toldthem me their articles, bigger papers would an ensemble to lay offabout their turf.

In 2004, performance KL reported put together by his company in London. on a dowry death in Manikpur in While going through list of participating artistes, I which a localthe sarpanch was inpaused The at Saphwat Simab. volved. mainstream pa- I wasn’t familiar withhad the steered name. I clear paused pers of itbecause the list said he would playing the and KL’s be reporter wasrabab. The Afghan instrument is the fountainhead of the sarod, the threatened.

“But we almusical closest to my heart. I have ways hadinstrument evidence. And beencarry a regular we the listener stories of Hindustani music for the last 20 years; yet, I have never heard a that others don’t,” says live recital on the rabab. I wish I could be at The Royal Court Theatre, in London, to hear Soumik and Saphwat.

Amongst the many instruments that are on the wane, the Afghan rabab (there is also a Kashmiri variant) is an extreme case to ponder: it has not had a prominent exponent in India for more than a century. But instruments that featured in festivals even 20 years ago, such as the bowed instruments esraj and dilruba, the sursringar and the surbahar are rarely heard now. The esraj had two great custodians in Ashesh Bandopadhyay and his disciple Ranadhir Roy; the dilruba had Dakshina Mohan Tagore. After Roy’s death in 1989, there was a hiatus. Now, two young esraj players — Arshad Khan and Shubhayu Sen Majumdar — are reviving the instrument, but they mostly play in soundtracks; one seldom hears a solo classical recital on the esraj. The sursringar, which belongs to the rabab-sarod family of instruments, probably has less than 10 artistes performing on it. The surbahar, of the sitar family, still has competent exponents in Pushparaj Koshti and Irshad Khan, but the instrument has picked up an unfortunate ‘niche’ tag, and surbahar performances are hardly included in major music festivals.

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Bearing witness (clockwise from below) The house of a rape victim in Kamasin block; Station Officer DK Mishra holds an informal court; the scene of crime where a young woman was burned and her room in Pachhahan village priyanka kotamraju

Fretted ties The rabab, an Afghan instrument, is the fountainhead of the sarod. Here a man repairs them at his workshop in Peshawar reuters/fayaz aziz

Kavita. Government departments would often for dowry. But Kamala’s mother says, “She was refuse to share information. “I would go every burnt from waist down. He rolled up a cloth or day and ask for information, till they gave it to something into a ball and the fire ran down me,” says Kavita, who started off with KL’s pre- her limbs.”

On the outskirts of Baberu block, Meera cursor, a single-page, handwritten wall newspaper called Mahila Dakiya, which ran from points to the Kailashpati Inter College for Women. It is the site of another story that KL 1993 to 2000.

They had to deal with the families of their plans to work on. Shut now for summer break, reporters who didn’t understand the job. two liquor shops stand erect on either side of Women would often join and leave when their the college building. Less than 500 metres families frowned upon their work. “We held from the gates, men crowd the theka looking for their fix. “For the women workshops, we met the families. studying here, it is not just an anIt was an uphill task but we connoyance. It is a convenient locavinced them. Now, we have tion for harassment. Once the young girls eager to join,” says Everyone tries to turn college reopens, we will do a stoKavita. Despite the threats, both the victim into the ry. A few girls might talk to us,” Kavita and Meera love their jobs. perpetrator says Meera.

“Itna pichda hua praant hai (This The road from Kamasin to is such a backward area), it is onBanda is a treacherous one. On a ly here that I can talk to people, particularly nasty stretch the administration and government. We expose problems and we follow up speedometer is stuck at 10km/hr. When we see the PWD archway wishing one Aapka safar on the solutions,” says Meera.

While one copy of a vernacular paper is read mangalmay ho (May your journey be pleasant), remarksofattheir the instruments. irony. When we spot a disappearance these copy instruments byThe at least four persons,ofa single of KL is Meera sure posterity withof people perched on the top, signifies thanInthe mere loss their public read by 10more or more.

Chitrakoot andofBanda, Is it bus, the lack superstar representatives isinstruments how we travel.

Butjostled we avoid sounds.KLTheir intrinsic playing styles add va- she where sells 1,500 copies, the reporters douthatsays, cause“This some to be out roof.”

A KL stage? reporter clocks 30-40km every riety to Hindustani repertoire.

The esraj, blethe as the paper’s agents.

KL’s readers are the of the concert This is true of the rabab 100km on others.

They often start though similar sound theassarangi, has a day loyalinand are to now empowered and and the sursringar.

Esraj players Bandopadat 9am finish at 10pm at their raspier tone, and fretted bowed asbeing their areporters.

Weekinstruafter work hyay and Royand were maestros but—they wereown not the car as halts next, Iand getSharma. out to ment (as opposedweek, to thereaders fretless—sarangi), its risk. a majority nearlyWhen as glamorous Chaurasia my legs.

Kavitathe shouts behind playing style differsof significantly that of whom arefrom women — stretch The surbahar, unlike sitar from did not have the fig“Don’t come I amor taking leak.” the sarangi. The rabab is ideal for playing fast, write in, commenting on boot, ures like Pandit Ravihere.

Shankar UstadaVilayat the third such stop.have The given fields the are double-stroked passages.

One canquestioning hear these This issues and Khan.is(Annapurna Devipitcould of crop and the roads are bare.

Back in on the sarod, but theyarticles. are not KL’s quitemost like the de- shorn instrument a boost, but she gave up performme, “Don’t higher-pitched, less metallic renditions on the pendable sources are the ing,car, andKavita leadsasks a reclusive life.)you need to go?”

I ask herclassical if it’s safe.

Weren’t the Barabab. The surbahar is often playeditsprimarily readers. in the Abashed, All the popular instruments — the going the fields the same lower octaves — a distinctive bass sound. Its daun sarod,cousins the sitar, thetosarangi, theforviolin, the utside the KamaWasn’t sanitation also a major maesprobplaying style is characterised by long and reso- purpose? slide guitar — have had larger-than-life in awho carhave today.

Ontaught most generother nant meends (glissando). sin police station, lem? “We aretros also a small inno those buses.that Therethe is The esraj, the rabab andgroup the from Sard- days, we are travelling ously. It is surprise hand surbahar, though hua first village cousinshas of gathered. SO no option. There sitarare is no thepublic most toilets, popularnoIndian Mishra holds pumps,” saysinstrument Meera. “And can’t control it,” the sarangi, theDK sarod and the si- an informal in Ithe world: no IndiThe disappearance court. On June with 15, Kamala, a 22pipes in Kavita. tar are not interchangeable an musician can match Pandit of these instruments year-old Dalit girl from their village was moreWhat in this charisma region in and the last each other.

The ubiquity of the Ravi Shankar’s few signifies thanhas changed set on fire by her husband dowry inthe Pachfew years, I ask.

Very little, says Meera.

Once in latter instruments does fornot can claim to have honed as many mere loss of hahan village.

Her younger a while there is a decent district magistrate, a quite make amends for thesiblings, loss who were successful disciples as he has. their sounds visiting her, left that afternoon to return to good cop orPerhaps a helpful healthcareorphaned worker. of the former. instruments Sardhua.

“He was violent.

He wanted gold Women haveofnot made great eventually strides profesOne could seekvery solace in the such a figure end ornaments,” saysfamily Kamala’s sister. But, even as sionally. “Theyup doinallmuseums. the work in the fields but additions to the of Indian Kamala’s were making wanttime a job, families will tell ‘classical’ parents instruments in thetheir case, the little else. If youEvery I walk through the SO was advising against one. “He is tellto become a teacherGallery or a nurse.

Not a jour20th century.

Thethem bansuri (bamboo flute) and you Sharan Rani Backliwal of Musical Ining them tofor make a deal,” says Kavita, “They nalist,” saysat Kavita.

Alcoholism has risen in theI the santoor, instance, were not traditionalstruments the National Museum, Delhi, haven’t eveninstruments. examined the years.by“And sinceOfthe won from ly classical Theyhouse, were haven’t of folk last am three overcome gloom. theBJP 400-odd ineven met with thewere in-laws.” there been aI visible riseheard in crimes provenance and relatively late entrants Banda, struments onhas display, have not the Pachhahan village, findIn that Kamala’s Dalits,” Kavita, who is from the onAt the Hindustani musicwe stage. about seven against sounds of most. says I wonder what those now-unhusband is onbeen the run.

The mother-inand makes secret of the fact. decades, Umesh they have accepted as main- community heard instruments mustnohave sounded like in law andclassical aunts are taking care two concert.

What would they be doing if they stream instruments.

Thisofis her perhaps Because, really, what good is weren’t a musidaughters — aged three and 10 months.

Inside Kavita “I don’t even to because these instruments had superstar ex- journalists? cal instrument in snaps, a showcase?

And want I dread Kamala’s kitchen, a haystack liesfirst untouched that.” Forfrom now now, therethe are incidents ponents. Pandit Pannalal Ghosh brought think that aabout few decades esraj, the by fire. Next theclassical stove anarena. emptyAfter bottle of to report, officials convince, be thethe bansuri intoto the him, sursringar and the to surbahar willwomen inspire to simimitti tel (kerosene), dying made embersit and a heard and a region to be revealed — one article PanditkaHariprasad Chaurasia more lar thoughts in someone visiting the gallery. half-burnt mattress strewnSharma about. did The the in- at a time. popular. Pandit ShivlieKumar laws it was an accident.

They say there sameclaim for the santoor.

They also taught their arunabha deb is a Kolkata-based lawyer and music kotamraju were many fights and screams, butway it wasn’t writer shubhodeb@hotmail.com craft to several disciples — the best to en- priyanka

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Shelter from the storm There are 184 raen baseras or night shelters in Delhi. This one, which accommodates up to 25 people is at Meena Bazaar in Old Delhi.

The homeless pay a minimum of ₹5 per night to stay here

Sleeper class Temples are often a safe, quiet refuge.

Two men take a nap outside the Bada Hanuman Mandir near the Inter State Bus Terminus at Kashmere Gate

The invisible people For Delhi’s homeless — 56,000 and counting — home is where the street is

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n June 8 and 9 this year, when the heat wave was at its peak in the Capital, 41 people died on the city’s streets. Not six months ago, in December and January when the temperatures plummeted sharply, 174 succumbed to the cold.

India is estimated to have more than 78 million homeless people across its cities. Delhi alone, known for its extreme heat and cold, is home to more than 56,000 of them, according to a 2011 survey conducted by the United Nations Development Programme, the most recent attempt at mapping the homeless.

Coming into the city for a variety of reasons, the homeless are some of the least-documented, most neglected

people. Despite an average of eight deaths every day, the cause for their deaths is seldom investigated properly. The facilities and infrastructure to prevent more such fatalities also fall well short of the requirements. There are only 184 shelter homes across Delhi, for instance, and only 82 of these are permanent; the rest are makeshift structures, including disused DTC buses.

However, as Rani, a migrant I met outside the Chandni Chowk metro station, put it, “It is tough to survive this city without a roof over your head. But it’s harder to go back with nothing.” ramesh sharma

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Living in the shadows Dulled into slumber by the afternoon sun, a migrant worker sleeps under a rickshaw

Lunch break Thrice a day, eateries in the Jama Masjid area in Old Delhi provide free food as zakat or alms

Lost A man waits outside the Old Delhi railway station on a summer’s day

Status quo Rani has been living on the streets of Delhi with her 10-year-old daughter for the last three years. Here, she is seen begging outside the Chandni Chowk metro station

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Actor Tisca Chopra does not want starry-eyed hopefuls arriving in Bollywood to face the heartbreaks she did, so she decided to write a book about it

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drunken Brajesh would accost the women of the family, flash them and ask to be sized up.

“The police knew him by reputation,” says Pawan. “They came in May and ticked him off.”

But the entire family has distanced itself from the case. Sushma went alone to file the report.

She was alone when they whisked her away to the Banda district hospital, depositing her after that at the Naari Niketan in Banda.

Yet, weeks after Badaun, there are no television crews or national newspaper reporters in Banda. Only arly on as a struggling actor in Mum- television shows and theatre. She shot back in- helpful. Years later, whenKhabar he cameLahariya to watch(KL), a local bai, Tisca Chopra turned up excitedly to public consciousness with Aamir Khan’s her successful play Dinner weekly with Friends, he was tabloid, bears witness.

When Sushma’s cries at an audition with what she Taare Zameen Par in 2007. “I was completely impressed by her transformation.

“Tu kamal Started nearly 12 years ago by a grew louder, her thought was her ticket to coveted clueless. I turned down some big projects on a hai yaar, tu kaise karti haingroup (You are amazing, of women, KL now has 40 uncle simply roles — portfolio pictures in coloured contact whim. I kept thinking something bigger will how did you pull off this change),” she recalls sells 6,000 women journalists, extended the height lenses and tacky make-up. “Are those tests come my way,” she says. If it wasn’t for some him telling her after the curtain Last year,and circulates copiescall. every week of his compound wall shots for a fantasy film?” the casting director prodding by the TZP casting team, she would when Kapoor was casting in foreastern his TV UP, show 24, Bundelkhand and asked with a smirk. have missed that chance too. “The first time I he called up Chopra to play his wife.

“I think Bihar’s Sitamarhi district.

Two decades on, Chopra is older and wiser. was called, I didn’t go. I thought it is better to he was impressed that I didn’t give up.any I kept Was there outrage over BaFrom being rejected for having ‘too big a face’ not go for an Aamir Khan audition than to say working,” she says. daun in Bundelkhand? Meera to being asked to audition in a swimsuit for a ‘I went and didn’t get it’,” she explains. Her That’s the advice she gives heror readers too case — get talked says, “See, Badaun the Delhi B-grade movie, she has seen some dark days. next release, Qissa, starring Irrfan Khan, has to keep going.

Despite disappointabout when all the her public takes it up. In Banda, Her book Acting Smart, published by Harper- won acclaim at several foreign film festivals. ments, Chopra’s book is remarkably which is one of the most positive. backward areas of UP, Collins, records such instances And she is already writing her A Buddhist bythere preference, her support. beliefs areWe simis no such see many such for the benefit of other starryown film. ple: “Take whatever’s coming and excel atThree that. months ago, cases that no one reports.” eyed aspirants hoping to make it Recalling two of the “abys- If you’re goodinand well-behaved, then even ifwent to file an Mahua block, when a woman big in showbiz. mal” films she did in her 20s, you have a two-line part, the turned same guys will ofFIR, the police on her.

“Usko rape kiya.

I know of actors who “You need to be sharp and Chopra says she was lucky to fer you five the next If kiya. you get Uski betitime. ko rape Aurnegative usiko jail main daal dilike to say that life smart. I was sharp and bright in a have veteran actor Naseeruddin and jaded, creativity won’twrote comeabout close to ya. Nobody it”you.”

(They raped her, just shined upon way. I was academically inclined, Shah as her on-screen father in raped her daughter and put her in jail), says them... No one likes but not street-smart. The book is them. She pestered Shah to come mohini chaudhuri Meera. The woman is still in custody. to visit the dark alleys a desire to protect aspiring acgood on his promise to hold actAt the Kamasin police station, which is just of their life tors from the heartbreak I went ing workshops for working ac250 metres from Sushma’s home, Kavita asks through. I made a huge number tors. They attended regular for the Station Officer (SO) DK Mishra, who has of mistakes,” she says, stressing classes at his home and just walked in. “More and more women are filon the ‘huge’. farm. Chopra found she ing FIRs now,” she says, “But the problem is Writing books is par for the course in Cho- could immediately apply her newthat nothing happens after charge-sheeting.” pra’s family — her parents have a few between found knowledge in the TV shows she In 1973, when the NCRB first published crime them, her pilot husband Capt Sanjay Chopra was doing then. “He would feed us data, 2,919 rape cases were registered; in 2012, has a book of short stories to his credit and the great food, give us goodies and not 24,923 cases were reported. While the reportmost illustrious of them all is her granduncle, charge a penny. But yeah, if you get ing of crime has increased, the conviction the late Khushwant Singh. Perhaps that ex- fired by him, you can crash into an rates fell from 44 per cent to 24.2 per cent in plains why she confidently agreed to wrap up abyss of depression,” she warns. the same period. the book in just three months. However, she Another memory from those initial The police have charged Brajesh under Secended up taking four long years. “This is clas- days was a film she did with Anil Kations 376, 506 IPC, and the Protection of Chilsic me, totally misunderstanding the situa- poor, whom she remembers as kind and dren from Sexual Offences Act. “He could get a tion. This is how I proceed with life till I get life sentence. If the family presses charges, it wiser,” she says over a bland breakfast of egg could even be death,” says Mishra. Kavita tells whites and brown bread. him about the father’s notorious reputation.

Chopra lives in the Lokhandwala area, a “After consuming alcohol, who knows what a hunting ground for new talent. Hundreds man can do,” says Mishra, whose predecessor turn up each day to try their luck at the nuwas transferred before June 13, perhaps as part merous casting agencies in the neighbourof UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav’s reshuffle n June 17, at 4.15 pm, 15-year-old and Meera Devi. hood, film scripts get written at the coffee of IPS officers after the Badaun incident.

Sushma (nameatchanged) walked shops and six-pack bodies are sculpted the A day after the FIR had been lodged, Kavita “At least this guy (the SO) is doing someto that Kamasin block gyms here. It is at her gym Chopra getspolice to station, in and Meera — reporters for Khabar Lahariya — Banda district interact with many of herthe readers.

“I really likeof Uttar Pra- turn up at Kamasin block from the district desh, understand and lodged an FIR. accused her 40- headquarters in Banda, 60km away. They find you and I really you.

If She you’re year-old of rape.

For bum,” the last three years, Sushma’s house locked. Her father is in custodown, this book puts father a cracker up your Brajesh Kumar (name a young aspiring actress toldchanged) Choprahad assaulted dy and she has been sent for a medical examinmid-workout.Sushma, threatening to kill her if she didn’t ation. When we find her cousin loitering comply.

Whentell sheyou sought Chopra’s book doesn’t howrefuge to be-with her rela- outside, Kavita seeks him out. tives, he would haul back, beat her and come a star. It’s a practical guide toher becoming The third of four brothers of an upper-caste rape He had a working actor, noher. matter howraped smallher theearlier part. that morn- family, Brajesh is a known drunk in the village, ing asfreak well.instances, such as acShe worries that notorious for his cussed invective and blatant Four hundred kilometres tress Kangna Ranaut getting spotted at a from cof- Banda, the indecency. “Rakshas vyakti tha (He was a dehorrific rape and murder two Badaun cou- mon),” says Pawan, his nephew and son of elfee shop or Preity Zinta getting her firstof break sins in the last week of brought UP’s law- dest brother Ramakant. He tells us that when she accompanied a friend toMay an audiand-order problems the spotlight yet Brajesh’s first wife died 12 years ago… under tion, have deluded millions into into believing again. country where rape occurs every suspicious circumstances. Sushma was the they could be nextIn ina line.

Stories of aactors minutes, 10 per of rape cases reported second of the first wife’s three daughters. Four who steadily22 worked their waycent up with grit are from UP, the third highest. and determination don’t excite them much.From 2006 to years ago, Brajesh married a younger woman. this numberthat increased by 55 per cent, But since last Diwali, she has been in a Luck“People like 2012, to promulgate fairytale the national saw myth. I knowwhile of actors who areaverage pushing thean increase of now hospital having sustained burns during a 26breaking per cent. itThe State accounts envelope, even open, and there’s for a 22 per cent prayer ceremony. of the and abduction lot of hard work thatcountry’s goes intokidnapping that. But they “We knew he was an alcoholic, but we had cases, and the upon highest number like to say that life just shined them and of dowry no idea what went on behind those closed Entry lines deaths.

Cases of to incest in India rose by doors,” says Ramakant. When Sushma’s cries yada yada yada.

No one likes visit rape the dark Actor Tisca Chopra 47 says. per cent from 2011 to 2012. in Acting alleys of theirnearly life,” she grew louder, Ramakant simply extended the has And authored 98.2 per cent of rapeHindi cases, offenders At 17, Chopra landed her maiden film, of his compound wall. “We didn’t know Smart,were a how-toheight for known to the Sushma’s Platform (1993), starring Ajayvictims Devgn.—Itlike wasin a diwhat to do. He never sent the girl to school. thosecase. looking for a break incase the makes Sushma’s saster, as were aBadaun couple of other headlines, films that folAnd he would get mad if we tried to interfere,” would have gone unreported.

If not film for industry Kavita he says. His wife begins to sob, she says a lowed. Next she worked on a lot of ad films,

Role with the punches

Stuck in time The grandmother of the victims of Badaun

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Crime against women in Uttar Pradesh might have hit the headlines, but following two Khabar Lahariya journalists on a day’s work shows that little has changed over decades in UP

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thing,” says Kavita, who adds that the police in the regionKHAMAJ often try to settle issues outside the MANJH thana. “Everyone tries to turn the victim into the perpetrator,” says Meera. In cases they have seen over a decade, families have discouraged women from filing complaints; the police has discouraged them from registering FIRs; and when they insist, these women come to be seen as the problem.

Through the revolving door

arunabha deb

Musical instruments that disappeared, and those that have recently emerged, tell a complex eing a woman journalist in eastern UP is story of loss, gainimmense and constant not easy.

It requires fortitude change

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and simple courage. Meera (28), who joined KL nine years ago was their youngest recruit at the time. She was married at 16, Kavita at 12.

They are childhood friends. Meera completed a BA from Jhansi in 2006; Kavita (32) has had no formal education. Both of them have children. When Meera’s daughter calls her, she gently chides her. “You know I am working on the field, I will be late.”

In the initial years, their families imposed strict codes. “We were only allowed to wear sarees, no matter the discomfort. We were asked to come home before sunset, no matter where we were. They didn’t like us travelling to places. Yahaan bhi khap hai,” says Kavita. In archive photos of KL, Kavita is clad in sarees, pallu draped modestly around her shoulders, much like her teammates. Today, she wears a bright blue kurta, with the dupatta thrown aside, and white sneakers. The reporters travel extensively in the region. Last week she was chasing Balkharia, the latest menace in dacoit-infested Bundelkhand. Before that she was reporting from Faizabad. Every month, she arrives in Delhi for editorial meetings. On production days, they work late. For the last decade, KL reporters have hitched rides, hiked on foot and cycled in sarees to villages in Chitrakoot and Banda to break stories of dowry deaths, murders, rapes and dacoity. And in the pursuit of these stories, they have transformed from homemakers into daredevil reporters. week, I out, got athey mail fromoften Soumik When ast KL started would reDatta —People a dear in friend, gurubhai and a ceive threats. power questioned brilliant sarod player.

He ask toldthem me their articles, bigger papers would an ensemble to lay offabout their turf.

In 2004, performance KL reported put together by his company in London. on a dowry death in Manikpur in While going through list of participating artistes, I which a localthe sarpanch was inpaused The at Saphwat Simab. volved. mainstream pa- I wasn’t familiar with had the steered name. I clear paused pers of itbecause the list said he would playing the and KL’s be reporter wasrabab. The Afghan instrument is the fountainhead of the sarod, the threatened.

“But we almusical closest to my heart. I have ways hadinstrument evidence. And beencarry a regular we the listener stories of Hindustani music for the last 20 years; yet, I have never heard a that others don’t,” says live recital on the rabab. I wish I could be at The Royal Court Theatre, in London, to hear Soumik and Saphwat.

Amongst the many instruments that are on the wane, the Afghan rabab (there is also a Kashmiri variant) is an extreme case to ponder: it has not had a prominent exponent in India for more than a century. But instruments that featured in festivals even 20 years ago, such as the bowed instruments esraj and dilruba, the sursringar and the surbahar are rarely heard now. The esraj had two great custodians in Ashesh Bandopadhyay and his disciple Ranadhir Roy; the dilruba had Dakshina Mohan Tagore. After Roy’s death in 1989, there was a hiatus. Now, two young esraj players — Arshad Khan and Shubhayu Sen Majumdar — are reviving the instrument, but they mostly play in soundtracks; one seldom hears a solo classical recital on the esraj. The sursringar, which belongs to the rabab-sarod family of instruments, probably has less than 10 artistes performing on it. The surbahar, of the sitar family, still has competent exponents in Pushparaj Koshti and Irshad Khan, but the instrument has picked up an unfortunate ‘niche’ tag, and surbahar performances are hardly included in major music festivals.

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Bearing witness (clockwise from below) The house of a rape victim in Kamasin block; Station Officer DK Mishra holds an informal court; the scene of crime where a young woman was burned and her room in Pachhahan village priyanka kotamraju

Fretted ties The rabab, an Afghan instrument, is the fountainhead of the sarod. Here a man repairs them at his workshop in Peshawar reuters/fayaz aziz

Kavita. Government departments would often for dowry. But Kamala’s mother says, “She was refuse to share information. “I would go every burnt from waist down. He rolled up a cloth or day and ask for information, till they gave it to something into a ball and the fire ran down me,” says Kavita, who started off with KL’s pre- her limbs.”

On the outskirts of Baberu block, Meera cursor, a single-page, handwritten wall newspaper called Mahila Dakiya, which ran from points to the Kailashpati Inter College for Women. It is the site of another story that KL 1993 to 2000.

They had to deal with the families of their plans to work on. Shut now for summer break, reporters who didn’t understand the job. two liquor shops stand erect on either side of Women would often join and leave when their the college building. Less than 500 metres families frowned upon their work. “We held from the gates, men crowd the theka looking for their fix. “For the women workshops, we met the families. studying here, it is not just an anIt was an uphill task but we connoyance. It is a convenient locavinced them. Now, we have tion for harassment. Once the young girls eager to join,” says Everyone tries to turn college reopens, we will do a stoKavita. Despite the threats, both the victim into the ry. A few girls might talk to us,” Kavita and Meera love their jobs. perpetrator says Meera.

“Itna pichda hua praant hai (This The road from Kamasin to is such a backward area), it is onBanda is a treacherous one. On a ly here that I can talk to people, particularly nasty stretch the administration and government. We expose problems and we follow up speedometer is stuck at 10km/hr. When we see the PWD archway wishing one Aapka safar on the solutions,” says Meera.

While one copy of a vernacular paper is read mangalmay ho (May your journey be pleasant), Meera remarksofattheir the instruments. irony. When we spot a disappearance byThe at least four persons,ofa these single instruments copy of KL is sure posterity withofpeople perched on the top, signifies thanInthe mere loss their public read by 10more or more.

Chitrakoot andofBanda, Is it bus, the lack superstar representatives she says, how we travel.

Butjostled we avoid sounds.KLTheir intrinsic playing styles adddouva- that where sells 1,500 copies, the reporters cause“This someisinstruments to be out thethe roof.”

A KL stage? reporter clocks 30-40km every riety to Hindustani repertoire.

The esraj, blethe as the paper’s agents.

KL’s readers are of concert This is true of the rabab day and 100km on Esraj others.

They often start though similar sound theassarangi, has a and loyalinand are to now empowered the sursringar. players Bandopadworkand at 9am finish at 10pm at their raspier tone, and fretted bowed asbeing theirareporters.

Weekinstruafter hyay Royand were maestros but—they wereown not risk. When the car as halts next, Iand getSharma. out to ment (as opposedweek, to thereaders fretless—sarangi), its nearly a majority as glamorous Chaurasia stretch my legs.

Kavitathe shouts behind playing style differsof significantly that of whom arefrom women — The surbahar, unlike sitar from did not have the figboot,like “Don’t come I amortaking leak.” the sarangi. The rabab is ideal for playing fast, write in, commenting on ures Pandit Ravihere.

Shankar UstadaVilayat This is(Annapurna the third such stop.have The given fields the are double-stroked passages.

One canquestioning hear these Khan. issues and Devipitcould shorn of crop and the are bare.

Back in on the sarod, but theyarticles. are not KL’s quitemost like the de- instrument a boost, butroads she gave up performthe car, me, “Don’t higher-pitched, less metallic renditions on the pendable sources are ing, andKavita leads asks a reclusive life.)you need to go?”

I ask herclassical if it’s safe.

Weren’t the Barabab. The surbahar is played often itsprimarily readers. in the Abashed, All the popular instruments — the daun cousins going the fields the same lower octaves — a distinctive bass sound. Its sarod, the sitar, thetosarangi, theforviolin, the the purpose?

Wasn’t sanitation also a majormaesprobplaying style is characterisedutside by long andKamareso- slide guitar — have had larger-than-life in awho carhave today.

On mostgenerother nant meends (glissando). sin police station, lem? “We aretros also taught a small those buses.that There is The esraj, the rabab andgroup the from Sard- days, we are travelling ously. It isinno surprise the hua village hand surbahar, though first cousinshas of gathered. SO no option. There sitarare is no thepublic most toilets, popularnoIndian Mishra holds pumps,” saysinstrument Meera. “And can’t control it,” the sarangi, theDK sarod and the si- an informal in Ithe world: no IndiThe disappearance court. On June with 15, Kamala, a 22pipes in Kavita. tar are not interchangeable an musician can match Pandit of these instruments year-old Dalit girl from their village was moreWhat in thischarisma region inand the last each other.

The ubiquity of the Ravi Shankar’s few signifies thanhas changed set on fire by her husband dowry inthe Pachfew years, I ask.

Very little, says Meera.

Once in latter instruments does fornot can claim to have honed as many mere loss of hahanmake village.

Her younger were sounds a while theresuccessful is a decent disciples district magistrate, quite amends for thesiblings, loss who their as he has.a visiting her, left that afternoon to return to good cop orPerhaps a helpful healthcareorphaned worker. of the former. instruments Sardhua.

“He was violent.

He wanted gold Women haveofnot made great eventually strides profesOne could seekvery solace in the such a figure end ornaments,” saysfamily Kamala’s sister. But, even as sionally. “Theyup doinall the work in the fields but additions to the of Indian museums.

Kamala’s parents were making wanttime a job, families will the tell ‘classical’ instruments in thetheir case, the little else. If youEvery I walk through SO was advising against one. “He is and tell- Sharan you to become a teacherGallery or a nurse.

Not a jour20th century.

Thethem bansuri (bamboo flute) Rani Backliwal of Musical Ining santoor, them tofor make a deal,” says Kavita, “They struments nalist,” saysat Kavita.

Alcoholism has risen in theI the instance, were not traditionalthe National Museum, Delhi, haven’t eveninstruments. examined the last overcome three years.by“And sinceOfthe won from ly classical Theyhouse, were haven’t of folk am gloom. theBJP 400-odd ineven met with thewere in-laws.”

Banda, there been aI visible riseheard in crimes provenance and relatively late entrants struments onhas display, have not the Pachhahan village, findIn that Kamala’s against of Dalits,” Kavita, who is from the onAt the Hindustani musicwe stage. about seven sounds most. says I wonder what those now-unhusband Umesh is onbeen the run.

The mother-incommunity and makes secret of the like fact.in decades, they have accepted as main- heard instruments mustno have sounded law andclassical aunts are taking care two concert.

What would they be doing if they stream instruments.

Thisofis her perhaps Because, really, what good is weren’t a musidaughters — aged three and had 10 months.

Inside journalists?

Kavita “I don’t even to because these instruments superstar ex- cal instrument in snaps, a showcase?

And want I dread Kamala’s Pandit kitchen, a haystack liesfirst untouched thinkaabout that.” Forfrom nownow, therethe are esraj, incidents ponents.

Pannalal Ghosh brought that few decades the by the fire. Next the stove anarena. empty bottle of sursringar to report, officials convince, be the bansuri intoto the classical After him, and the to surbahar willwomen inspire to simimitti kaHariprasad tel (kerosene), dying made embersit and heard and a region to be revealed — one article Pandit Chaurasia morea lar thoughts in someone visiting the gallery. half-burntPandit mattress strewn about. did Thethe in- at a time. popular.

Shivlie Kumar Sharma laws claim it was an accident.

They say there same for the santoor.

They also taught their arunabha deb is a Kolkata-based lawyer and music kotamraju were to many fights and screams, butway it wasn’t writer shubhodeb@hotmail.com craft several disciples — the best to en- priyanka

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saturday, june 28,28, 2014 saturday, june 2014

Old loves, novel ways Not social, not media PRESENT IMPERFECT

Author of The Inscrutable Americans, Anurag Mathur doesn’t live in the hope of a literary If Facebook is a collection of carefully curated vignettes of pointlessness, Twitter is a madencore, choosing instead to live another life unlived between the pages of his latest book dash on mission me-too. The Secret is neither

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umour is a funny thing. It can crack you up unexpectedly. Or skip you entirely in a movie hall full of laughter. On paper, in particular, it has a difficult time expressing itself without the aid of gestures or a laughter track. Good humourists, thus, are in short supply. Ask the publishers of Wodehouse and Wilde. Or Rupa.

In its 50th reprint, Anurag Mathur’s Inscrutable Americans has, arguably, kept the 78-yearold publishing house in business for more than two decades. A coming-of-age novel of a blundering, fresh-off-the-boat Gopal set in the America of the early ’90s, the book’s continued popularity belies its birth in a pre-liberalised, not-so-well-travelled India, where Ross and Rachel were strangers yet. Mathur’s latest book, The Country is Going to the Dogs, is also a (geriatric) bildungsroman of sorts. One that Dog days... Spent traces belatedly the journey of the 74-year-old in the company of retiree Radhey Radhey (RR), “an innocent in nameless, faceless the wilderness”, as he acquaints himself with and kind phone the “sexual underbelly of Delhi”, while uncov- Cultural crossroads Anurag Mathur’s new novel explores the seaminess shutterstock friends of urban India mohammed yousuf; and ering the mystery of a missing filmstar, Miss (below) the author kamal narang Fifoo.reAlso publication, new reyouainRupa on the Secret? Forthis a fortapp is a platform for anonymity. You can say outrage — against ISIS, against paid media, lease night marksnow, a ‘homecoming’ for the author. he says, “For, Gopal, was 20 at class,non-vegetarians irrespective of political allegiance, has since a friend introwhatscrutable...” you like and unless youlike have left Iclues against and non-vegans, (The six otherme titles his been first book someitpoint in my life, but I’ve always beenwho inherently right of centre.

A posiduced tothat thefollowed app, I’ve yourself, is fairly impossible to never trace been your 74.”against people litter, people who swear, were waking mostly published

by Penguin.)

Is it atolot harder then to write life untionwho thatwatch one imagines could put authors up to dozens of notifica- words back you.

For now though, it isofana enpeople sports, people who don’t like the protagonist whoIlives across lived?interesting “I’d have toplace say yes no.

There are cerhim at risk as they with the realities tions onUnlike my phone saying thatRR, people know dearingly to and be in.

It’s not soworship.

Everyone is grapple an aspiring social re- of street from a girl’sI am college theiftheatre tainisthings youAnd know a 20-year-old wouldn’t a new, India andmocks its duplicities have the shared their secrets. not — sure it is of cial, nor it media. therein lies the secret former, withshining a tone that either the read- and his fantasies, both imagined — Mathdo, whereas standards theshame context of sex, for inthe word secret or thelived ideaand that it is being to Secret’s charm. for a fictional character who is er ordouble threatens to nameinand them.

And ur’s apartment a sleepy south neigh- In much you’re never sure. And — a trope to his books. shared with me, but in it provides quite Delhi a thrillthe lastolder, few months, I haveentirely been increaswhenstance Mother’s Day common or Fathers’ Day comes bourhood allows for more creative licence, from yourself two endsor ofbe theswept age specing start to the day. is at least a kilometre away inglywhile wearythis of social media.

For someone who it around,Approached goodness, brace from two such His — retiregives youall more to make mistakes,” — from a virginal Gopal whose deflowerThe secrets themselves are acolleges. mixed bag livedalso pretty much daylicence on Facebook, this is a awaytrum by declarations of eternal gratitude and ment plans though, don’t inMathur. Mistakes that could puncture ing in the aircraft’s bathroom on his return some are confessions or invitations of a sexual hugesays turnaround.

When I started, I was work- the undying love. clude renting a room with ing a from carefully constructed version of Indianvirreality Alljourney forforgivable a fitting climax nature, some are criticisms of politicians, pubhome, and Facebook provided of thistoisIndia oftenmade more than to a feminal view. Like a soft-spoken that RR inhabits.

One whereIthis “oversexed” RR’sby colourful sexual lishers or writers (the app assumes that every- tual water-cooler conversations. wasinteractions where whatsurprisingly goes on in Twitter, trawled trolls and neighbour oneand might with Goburdhun, the proprietor editor of history — Mathur’s prose itnever one in your phone book is a friend, sinceoccayou could let off some steam, indulge and in some stuffed withand thefantasies smug. For most people, sionally exchangepublishpleasantries The Daily Reporter, Anwar, a crime abandons thrives in the my phone book is full of journalists, raucous exchange of comments takes several but rounds of praand gifts with, Mathur reporter, Tia, to a young teacher hopetoof its next ers and writers, it gives meDiwali a tailor-made ringbefore going back the story nayams gather the sexual courageencounto is, perhaps, best and an objectIncreasingly of his affection, side view of these worlds) and some are,defined quite by you were writing. justter. log“RR’s on.sexual And behaviour if you getis not The absence drawFacebook on issues of freedom, as uncommon as onethe would simply, observations.omissions.

The first kind, I ignore,of I any though, is press a place sucked into a conversation, either is real veiled arrogance, or that communalism, and sex- NMathur’s think it is,” he says,with “There’s am past the age where strangers’ prurience in-air of where people go tosexism outshine pings endlessly the an prose neverphone one is honest. confidence with which authors ual orientation, to revealand no underlining regret and resentterests me. The second kind — being a journalone another.

The wallonly is a warof half-a-dozen people abandons but thrivesjabber It’s just bunch of bestsellers protagonist’s populist, often in theahope ment I see in this age group. ist in Delhi, where of all more gossip recent is a possible zonethe in this insane competition to fit deep thoughts into Like of its nexttrying blind folks wax eloquent onButeveryand hypocritical they have missed the bus. They weapon in your arsenal — I follow keenly. to beilliberal cooler, hipper, wiser. Eachviews.pompous of 140-characters. sexual encounter packages describing elephants thing his tirade against the younger what I really look forward to is thefrom thirdtheir kind. craft time From I scroll down these days,lesbians it Ifprobably Facebookregard is a collection of lot marketingadstrate“fooling patriot- that don’t exist as bizarre…

These are simply revelationsand — common seems to me,honest, there upright, is no one carefully curatedfortunate vignettes maybe, of gies to matters of ic Indians” himselfYou to platibut bizarre.” missions of an individual’s failings. whose life isn’t like fabulous. pointlessness, Twitter is a madnational imporlike “iffor theyour Hindus Set mission squarely me-too. in the genre Take this for example: “When the cheque wenttudes to Vietnam holi-hated dash on Nei- of tance, Muslims, loved film stars in India humour like books, comes and someone offers to treat memakes to din-Mathdays?the Look, I wentthe to most the South therall is his realother and no one barring is hon- one urthat’s seema awkward named ner, my first thought isn’t ‘Wow, nice Pole. wouldn’t You had be squid ink Khan”, risottoRR exposes himself each on travel est. and It’s poetry, just The a Country bunch isofGoing first, ordinary to censure, evenmy ridicule.

But heinstops to the Dogs unlikely to trace the spectacular gesture,’ it’s, ‘Damn, I should at have ordered for dinner?

I hunted own scallops Flor- just pompous blindis folks describing elephants even. man, short of becoming a caricature of himself. trajectory more’.” The author of this secret livesA in Sanwho, ida and then braised them in the olive oil I that don’t exist.of The Inscrutable Americans’ success. years after author, as authors are itwont to to do, re- Which But Mathur appear to to the live coy in the Jose, USA, and that’s all I know 23 about him or his pressedThe myself in Crete.

Nobody, seems is why doesn’t I am addicted ad-hope first book became mainstodetached from characters, emphaof such encores.

Hedo even brushes her, but the secret itself, I am certain, is a unime, goes Panchgani for his a holiday or eats missions in literary Secret. Where else you have off a orphenomenon, sising how take a life of their own and theconfessing informal distinction of being aor forerunner versal guilt. Most of us, at one time the oth- thairsadam and they papad foron dinner.

One bunch people to grief, loneliness selfappears to often say things that he may disagree with vioof I’d Chetan (“It’s the a cycle.

After Chetan er, have been there, yet it is notstill an admission mocks people for their vocabulary and gramdoubt? ratherBhagat read about 40-year-old in have stumbled “But I do thinkpleas, people in that ageesgroup Bhagatwho there willsure be another anyone would make publicly. Or this: “When upmar, lently. another publishes which can Stockholm isn’t what he Chetan wants toBhagat”) do fame by accident. in India with a certain mindset havehot similar Bagchi’sfrom comment how he you see me texting in publicon I’m really just sentially be summed up as, “if you aren’t withand his Amitabha life, the person Bostononwho In the comfort viewpoints.please Sure, some can beme incredibly had methis/her many laundry who hadin only ever reador The Inlooking at the weather app because I want to of and successful, don’t send friend re-tolerhasn’t done three weeks his own living room, ant Facebook and liberal. areequivalent exceptions. scrutable Americans andonFive Point Someone. look like I am doing something.”

The fake text quests.” isBut thethose online ofMost the ‘friend’ who wipes snot restaurant tawithindulges his mother and sisothers come from a certain Reconciled, Mathur offers metaphor that inis a pretence that everybody in but the mean kids’ table at the schoolbackground cafeteria. when blecloths.

But most of all, I likea Secret for the ter pottering about the Of India was a certain way, was a cerdicates a practiced nonchalance, a deliberate never owns up to. course, people aren’t alleducation like that. There fact that before you post a comment, it reMathur insists his tain way rejection a certain of Indian I am not sure what’shouse, in store for Secret, are people whoand postparental requestsupbringing for adoptinggave res- you minds you, in aofmanner so kind old-worldly thatwriting it settings have values, which have changed completecritique — “Sachin didn’t score a whether it will grow to subjects hundredsand of millions cuedcertain dogs and people who actually believe now and feelsliterary out of place, to ‘say something kind’. never borrowed from now,”ahephotograph says, obfuscatory yet intelligible century time he walked on tosocial the field, of users and thereby self-destruct the very rea-a real that ly Liking of a baby with a in You can keepevery the smart and the smug or an institution. classic Indian sort of away. youI’llknow” — leaving one wondering, if formuson for its genesis, or person whether it will hang “In braina tumour will trigger medical miracle. media, stick with the kind. fact, The Country Going to veersmedia, to the doing generalgood elections and to la is such a bad thing after all. around for a bit and then quietly die. At aistime In fact,As ontalk social has its the Dogs is much the more own a middle-class India, therelentless milieu ofcalls hisfor books, t@veenavenugopal when users are hankering for celebrity, mafia. So there are the work of fiction than The In- Mathur concedes a certain section of that soity banerjee

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PAPERWALLAH UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY

The chopper The play ispilot the thing janice pariat

It is hard to understand why people like Puneet did what they did in Uttarakhand. Would we Literature that sport is no mere entertainment, instead tells us of apeople worldview have done theshows same?us The fact is heroes are heroes because they are itexceptional

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f Pindar, Ancient Greek lyric poet from Thebes, were alive today, he may, for a day job, work as chief sloganeer for an advertising agency. “Become what you are,” he wrote in a Victory Ode in the 5th century BC, long before Nike brainstormed over what would best accompany the swoosh. Victory Odes, or epinikion, was a poetic genre, usually in the form of a choral song, commissioned for and performed at the celebration of an athlete’s victory in the Panhellenic Games. I have little doubt that absolutely no one is giving Pindar a thought during this year’s football World Cup — the beautiful game is swift and absorbing — but in his poems may be found, as on the field, a Shakespearian range of human fragility and immortal aspirations. Beneath the triumphant gilding —“Theron, for his victory with chariot-four, is the man we must sing [of] now”— runs an abiding love of play. And something more. An insight into what was held in esteem, valued, emulated: their notions of masculinity (for Ancient Greek sportsmen were only men), physical prowess, gestures of piety and generosity — throwing up a very rich array of anthropological observations.

The blade runners Yet another helicopter sortie to rescue pilgrims stranded near Rambada in Uttarakhand after the floods last year afp/ indo tibetan border police Play, far from mere entertainment, points us to an understanding of, and sometimes encapsulates, a worldview. Likewise, in literature, most ecommonly in when science live in a time thefiction term and selves or overload the helicopter. These pilots, are heroes because they are exceptional peofantasy, ‘sport’ rarely an used accoutrement. heroisisvery usually only iron- assigned by nobody, using their own re- ple. Among the people that Puneet saw and You might imagine the most ically.

I wonder whatcomplete, we lose and sources and risking their lives again and rescued was a sadhu clutching a potli that conbone-chilling, employment of ‘play’ novelin our imagination, andasin again, saved the lives of hundreds, maybe tained more than ₹90 lakh, there were women istic structure is Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger our aspirations, when we dismiss heroism as thousands, of people before the State author- carrying jewellery that was obviously not Games not (theto first the trilogy; the next something bebook takeninseriously.

A year ities and the military arrived. Even then it took theirs, there were men who, after being reswereI severely jaded), committed forever damning ago atwo person know, a friend, acts the a while for the army choppers to start operat- cued from near-death, wanted to pay so that line “Let theare games begin.” the totalitarian of bravery that beyond the In capability of ing. Helicopters have about three hours of they could fly to their homes leaving behind people Sport, beto it chess football, throws up still a richstranded, array of anthropological Panem, 12 districts, mostly poor and mostnation people.ofHe is a helicopter pilot, a former flightPawns time and for each trip due theirorlimited those there were TV reporters hindu archives observations mustofsend child Wingexploited, Commander the two Indian Air‘tributes’ Force, to fuel tank, and itthetook half of that to just fly who wanted to film the tragedy, uncaring of participate in the Hungerfor Games, who has been flying choppers the lastorganised few them in from Dehradun. The only fuel stocks the fact that every additional reporter meant as a companies. reminder never tothat rebelin-again Glassthose Bead maintained Game in Herman ‘volley’ across a net.) The winner is one who reyearsannually with private Part of near mysterious Kedarnath were by theHessone less person rescued. against regime.sites Thein tributes are forced to e’s companies, novel of thenone same Set in Castalia, a Puneet, plies in questions, with nopilots repetition, hesitavolves trips tothe religious the Himalayas, private byname. the military. the other chopper and the battle to the death in me a dangerous public fictional province of Rambacentral Europe, a place re- tion or handlers synonyms.

My their favourite exchange? and Puneet has often told how difficult it are- One place, near where risked lives day in na,him while spectators watch the ‘live served solely for the life of the mind, this mon- After a heated ‘set’: was for to sometimes tell people that televised bad da had been, offered an incrediand day out for people they did event.’

Whether critique of winner-takes-all Rosencrantz: ‘What in god’s namewere, weather meant he could not fly them to a loca- bly umental difficult ‘biography’ landing. Itfollows was Joseph Knecht, not know, some of whom capitalism panegyric work designed who, is going tion that was theorculmination of their lives. to rebarely 30sqasftaofyoung space,boy, andjoins aboutthe Castilian Order noon?’ doubt, not great human bemindago, us how grateful we shouldjust be tooutlive in300 a and is nurtured to stranded play the game. There had been Guildenstern: A year Puneet was stationed people had been ings. He‘Foul. told No merhetorical how despera‘free’ society, The Hunger Games is inarguably Thefour rules aresurrounded merely alluded to, and but thenobody questions.’ side of Kedarnath, among other chopper pi- there for days, tion had driven some people to warnings discomforting. perhaps, as much as Glass Bead Game is defined a “synAt thewildness: heart of the play,were of course, lies the lots catering to theYet, needs of thenot pilgrims. by the dead, dying and desper- mostly “They like anipaid as much attention, latebeen Iain Banks’ The Player of Games, second thesis of humanhis learning,” crisis ofmals, existentialism, which itself is a Therethe had warnings but nobody paid ate. Puneet dropped handler, of aesthetics animals,” he said,intalking except theand helicopter the Culture novels, set in scientific arts, mathematics, mu- lives query with no the answer.

What, if any, of is the muchofattention to them, except forathe heli- a Mr Bisht, who guided the chopabout events a couple pilots, whose post-scarcity, semi-anarchist uto-on slight per in, squatting on sic,his logic, and philosophy. meaningweeks of life?afterwards, marvelling at copter pilots, whose lives depend haunchdepend on slight pia fluctuations. of various humanoid races. and ambitiously realBut inhow fantastically fiction, weather Puneet had flown over es, rock steady, withIntricate the deadly quickly imagined people were re-as in weather fluctuations Jernau of some of whirling rotors just ised as these Ancient World Cup the areas on Morat June 14Gurgeh, and hadmaster observed a foot awaynovels may be, fic- life, whether ducedin to their Greece savage, or atavistic In science fiction and anyweather intellectually stimulating tional must be silly. Kurt Vonnegut’s the bad conditions, but when he flew from his face. Puneet has games served — rather than 2014, games urges.

Healso attributed his actions fantasy, ‘sport’ is of 16, diversion, invited to formingincludskeletal structures — German to Batball (played a “flabby ball the againgame on June after twoisdays of unrelenting in all sorts of operations, training, to a with certain code that very rarely on parts a secret mission to may also honeydew Douglas Adams’ rain, journey he saw that of Gaurikund town had ing the Kargil conflict, butactheas subtle mirrors, size of apilots have,melon”), the camaraderie accoutrement to participate inof what to magnify Brockian Ultrapilots Cricket players beenAzad, washed away, and all the may transit town said that of all theplaced peoplein hethe hastext worked with, its among the other who(where flew their ma-must be the most complex themes.

RR Martin’s grow at least extra legs to amuse of Rambada had been sweptgame away.inWhen Pu- he has rarely come acrossGeorge the courage that Cychines, maybe eventhree a sense of challenge that the vented a humanoid form.his chop- Bisht showed thatvasse, inhe hisguided A Song of and Fire crowds), JKcreated, Rowling’s Gobstones neet tried toby land near Garudlife Chatti, day, as theIcehelithe conditions so that he had (if to you risk lose It shapes empire social crowd copter in. One tiny series, which callscould a mix of you’re sprayedeven with foul-smelling liquid), per was almostthe mobbed by—aall desperate mistake by he either his life to perform a simple rescue mispositions, from was the lowliest clerk empeStratego, and Blitzkrieg,” mimics most hilariously-named whose only thought of escape, andto hethe had have “Chess, led to their deaths. sion.Aldous I guess thereHuxley’s are always reasons and exror, areto ‘won’ playing — his andhelicopter. has outcomes It isalarmingly the real-life scheming, Centrifugal Bumble puppy, and to scramble saveby himself and hard to understand whywarring, people like Pu- planations for everything, and one ofmost themglorious is a life back, or death.

The disquietude springs escapades of its players.

Rosenall: Billone.

Waterson’s Calvinball. InPuneet which one Heof came as did four other chopper pi- not neet,bloodthirsty or Bisht or the other chopper pilots,In did very of simple Wing Commander from frenetic actioncompanies sequencesthat butwere how the andin Guildenstern an absurdist, makes rules as onehegoes along.and Hence, lots, all from the private whatcrantz they did those days.are Yes,Dead, we would all Bakshi actedup as the he did because is a hero, gamein forces Gurgeh to think as non-stop, an Azadian, to tragicomedy that expands the misnowhat Calvin balldoes. game is like another. Perhaps, operating the area.

They worked like to say that we play would have acted upon in a simithat is a hero force of arms over diplomacy, conquest adventures two characters Shakesthis, played by a six-year-old and his pet with value handlers pushing people back and lining lar manner wereofwe inminor the same place, in but I cooperation, possession over sharing. peare’s TomThe Stoppard inserts sporadic stuffed tiger, is closest to life. t@OmairTAhmad themover up so that they did not injure themam not sure Hamlet, that is true. fact is that heroes “Escape,” Banks wrote in 1988, “is a consumer ‘question’ games of verbal tennis. (In the 1990 good like another.” Far more elusive is the movie adaptation, Gary Oldman and Tim Roth janice pariat is the author of Boats on Land

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Writing wrongs

ELSEWHERE

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orn in Moradabad, educated in Bahrain, Dehradun and Delhi, Deepti Kapoor worked as a journalist before she left it all behind to live in Goa. She took up yoga and began to write about the Capital, which despaired and inspired her. Intrigued by the city’s aggression, the male gaze and the threat of sexual violence, she reveals the bold escapades of her 20-year-old protagonist, Idha, in A Bad Character (Penguin).

Kapoor speaks about choosing not to write a run-of-the-mill love story and focussing on desire, pain and control. Excerpts from the interview:

Hitting its stride Bata has reinvented itself with a ₹3-crore, 360-degree integrated marketing campaign ‘Where Life Meets Style’ bloomberg/

prashanth vishwanathan

thapliyal

Stars and straps Defeats and victories at the neighbourhood gym

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here’s a gym across the street from where I live. I’ve been eyeing it ever since I moved into my apartment. Finally, after four months of dithering, I call the number. The owner, Jim, has a friendly, open manner. Within minutes we are talking of bowel movements and other excretions: “One of my clients thanked me for putHow realistic is ting the yellow back in her urine!” he tells me, as proof that this book? the powdered potions he markets for a well-known company Sexual liberation is not The city is real. I are truly beneficial. tantamount to sexual know all the places He’d like to get me on a total-body health program but equality. Do you in the novel, though eventually I opt for trying the three-days-a-week group sesagree? their representasion that’s available for a mere $80 a month. I go across to I do. Sexual libertion is often dismeet him the next day. He is a wonderful advertisement for ation against a torted and his training routine, a dark-haired man in his 30s , energetic background of amplified, built and fit with a mildly military cut to his personality. The gym is sexual equality from memory. composed of two rectangular rooms outfitted like brightly lit would be ideal, The Irish guy in torture chambers. Straps, chains, weights and other mystebut that’s wishful the hotel room in rious equipment hang from the walls or are tastefully arthinking today.

Paharganj is real; ranged on the floor. It makes me so nervous just to see the The mirage of sexI can still see his array that I miscount the money of my first payment and Jim ual liberation is often a tool, simply face. The Israeli cow story is real. has to ask for the extra $20 I owe him. designed to sell things, made by Aunty is just an aggregation of the I go for my first session the next day at 5pm. The trainer, marketing men, driven by money. In ideas of the Aunty, a necessary, wellBuzz, has chocolate brown skin the novel, my character Idha experi- meaning, but to the narrator, a sufand film star good looks packed inences a certain amount of sexual lib- focating presence. to a short, muscular frame. He is eration, but that in no way leads to amazingly focused, able to divide Half an hour speeds equality, either between her and her Are you like your protagonist, Idha? his attention between two or three by on sweaty wings boyfriend, or between her and the I wasn’t like her, and yet I was. We different groups, each one training city/society. In fact, it leads to a kind have been in the same places and sitat different speeds and levels in the of domination and more danger. uations, but she isn’t me. She’s persame room. There’s music over the Through sex she may seem to be- haps one aspect of me, brought out speakers and also a stopwatch on come free, but it leads to a state from a nightmare and magnified. the wall that he uses to keep track of who needs to switch to where she is dominated by him, his their left foot or begin the ball-bouncing routine. gaze, his ideas, and his actions.

How easy or difficult was it to put Half an hour speeds by on sweaty wings and I return to my hat Pandit Jawahar Nehru was a character grown into successes such as Relaxo and Metro the Lal city’s aggressive piled-up stocks the distributors and apartment feeling like themeant summer Olympics arefor surely withchampion co-operative What do you think about society’s of thewords on the other? withoutmovesetting aShoes stereotype? retailers, clogging the supply chain. in my reach. ment is well-known. littledouble standards on sexuality?

The CEO of Liberty Group, Adesh Gupta It took aBut longa time to hit upon a style he up wasthe in for even bigger trouble. In SepNeedless to say,says when I But wake next day my body factofis that extended It makes me angry andknown it is one the company itsand approach to reminding thatheallowed methe to write without has reoriented tember 2005, Liberty Shoestoo signed whines complains, me that I am much old a 49:51 of India co-operatives not only banking, or production, the greatest concept problems faces, tosimply and tojoint recounting complainingsupply chain ventureI pay withnothe then Kishore for management such sudden shocks the system. attention, but Biyanifarming and restricted sugar, but shoes When though it’s by no means retail strategy. longer aboutasit.well.

Novels by men, about men “We are no ownedThe Pantaloon Retail return for the rest of my month’s sessions. only man in (now an suchissue. shoeYet, co-operative him pushing to India; it’s aone global Indi- inpioneered distribthe city —by regardless of theirour suf-products tothe Aditya Birla Groupshort company). On group is about the same age as me, white-haired, Karnal (Haryana) fell onfering bad times in a1954, an society, in in particular, does a wonutors and customers.

The — have swagger to them, a paper, onto theythe were anddaily stocky. He has a few blue stars tattooed side to of open 45 brothershypocrisy, bailed it out. certain DP and PD Gupta rederful job in two harbouring production freedom of the city. Theyis now interlinked stores inhair three yearsoff and target a his face. OneLiberty day he turns up with all his white shaved now works on tained the employees andpursue converted thein co-theirwith oursucprevious day’sand sale— as women stories, of ₹350 crore. In anticisurprise!the Thepull restmodel... of his scalp isturnover also covered in small, operative into a company. As giving as customer feedback.

That ceed andcustomers fail, but she well remains the pation, Liberty increased capacipretty blue stars.

If it sells 100 pairs in a the freedom to choose was a priority in the Butmeans, producing what isAt inthe de- end of one month, I decide I can centre of attention.

I wanted to ty through newthe plants only afford $50 — two in day, it produces only newly Independent country, mandof rather an inwrite the fromcompany a woman’s point view,than creating Himachal Pradesh and one in Utunlimited access I leave 100fee. theSo next day the group to spend half an was suitably named Liberty Shoes. that could return toevery us other day chugging along alone the point of view of theventory pursued. tarakhand. added 60 per hour on the “We treadmill.

In the half-a-century that followed, six months,” he explains.

I decidedthe to comcombat after the city’s agnew capacity.”

But the joint It’s not as much fun with no friendlycent encouragement from pany thrived with its range of innovative And that, says Gupta, has been gression by becoming it, by embracventure never took off.

Buzz to keep me focused. Still, I chase the blinking red dots on products and soon became aspirational thealtering company’s move in ing an it and owning it, and it best-everthe “They (Pantaloon) treadmill’s digital monitor with my eyes, counting off the promised brand. But when globaltowinds of change decade.The Its earlier strategy was successful my own version ofahistory. ussweat. business worth hundreds of my crores on paseconds, enjoying the mild I listen to podcasts with swept the country, like most brands of its genbutofnot sustainable, hetiny concedes. city’s aggression, in terms writing But and it never came because iShuffle“Retailers clipped to myper.

T-shirt know thatto I’llus never lose they were eration, Liberty began to feel thegoes pressure. armed with tools to give usBut continwhat on in Arit, waswere quitenot easy.

I sourcing fromyellow! cheaper local my belly flab. my urine is primrose All’s wellbrands with in Agra chaic processes and a limited presence feedback. issues,” he says. haveretail soaked it up anduous absorbed it, We had legacy despite their commitment to us.

They would the world. pushed it to the fringes and of the industry byinsides for many it has eaten my always ask us to supply at ridiculously low 2004. The brand is today frantically Piling troubles years. All Itrying had totodo was close my prices, usually the sayslifeGupta. (An MANJULA PADMANABHAN, author and artist, tells half us tales of MRP,” her parallel make a comeback. But theeyes, question is: Canand a write.

Gupta, who took over asinLiberty Shoes CEO in open them email to the Future Group went Elsewhere US, in this fortnightly series. marginalien. blogspot. in unanswered.)

60-year-old company stay relevant in a market 2004, then met dealers once in six months, onLiberty, already battling an outdated supply that now boasts the likes ARUNIMA of international gi-is a journalist ly to find out that most of the designs which chain and rising capital expenditure, was now MAZUMDAR based in New Delhi ants Nike and Reebok at one end and home- he thought would sell had no takers. That saddled with extra capacity. The final blow

Thinking on their Q feet R

Legacy footwear brands Liberty and Bata lace up for a fresh round of sales battles to win over customers online and in the stores

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Where shadows lurk Author Deepti Kapoor (above) matthew parker writes of being a woman in the Capital reuters/mansi

patriarchy and misogyny. Desirous women are labelled as sinful and wrong. They’re suppressed; they’re declared bad characters. They’re punished for it — get her married off, shame her, kill her. But you can’t kill the desire, can you?

It seemed things were beginning to change after the December 16 gang rape and murder of the paramedic student, but women say it’s worse now. That they have to plan their lives around safety, their public life is reduced, their private life threatened. What I want is to be in control of my own destruction.

manjula pandamabhan

Debut author, Deepti Kapoor, on the swagger of male novels and darkness of Delhi

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saturday, june 28,28, 2014 saturday, june 2014 A BUTTERFLY BREEZE FROM MP

next day. We are not working on a forecast model, we produce according to demand.”

While the back-end measures are in place, the company will have to double its efforts to increase customers and sales.

“There has been a fundamental shift in the Indian market, as well as marketing strategy in the last decade. Young Indians are far more aspirational than they were 20 years ago, and that is a challenge for all brands of the previous generation,” says Arvind Singhal, chairman and managing director of the consulting firm Technopak.

“Their communication and product strategy have to be in sync with social media, print and digital platforms.”

Brand strategy specialist Harish Bijoor concurs: “Social media is becoming so dominant and relevant that being there is a hygiene factor.”

The missing link joanna van gruisen

Is the river-linking project a simple idea that would solve all water security issues? Or is it another ‘mad project’? The Ken river in Bundelkhand would rather not find out

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Net profits Adesh Gupta, CEO, Liberty Shoes; (right) the company is now focusing on young customers and on online retail through its own website and tie-ups with the likes of Flipkart and Jabong vv krishnan

Young, affordable fashion A model walking on the ramp in a pair of Liberty trainers arunangshu roy chowdhury; and Liberty Force 10 lace-up shoes with a neon sole, aimed at youngsters

e have the good fortune to be situated next to one of the cleanest, most unspoilt rivers in India: Before passing us, the Ken River flows only through forests and rural landscapes, and thus avoids much of the pollution of our more urban areas. There is one small dam on the upper stretch but in general its ecology is pretty well-preserved, and its good health is evident in its clear waters and abundant aquatic life. It therefore, also supports a rich array of bird and animal life along its banks, especially within the Panna Tiger Reserve. Indeed a boat ride on its tranquil waters provides a holiday highlight for many of our guests.

The Ken, a tributary of the Yamuna, is considered one of the major rivers of Bundelkhand. However, for some time now a sword of Damocles has hung over its pristine waters — came in features the formprominently of souring industrial relathe Ken in discussions tions.

2006, we had a huge strike, which we of the“In oft-touted river-linking project. resolved inofa linking day. A rivers secondhas one happened The idea been around within a week a third within a month,” since the 19thand century but fortunately reGupta laying the onuntil politics. mainedrecounts, little more than a blame thought the “We were victims a political climate dis1980s.

Those thatofunderstand river that ecology turbed system,” hequite says. succinctly refer to and thethe environment On one hand, company on capaciriver-linking as athe ‘mad project’.went On the face of ty overdrive and on the other,toittake was it, and the retail idea of using the river systems hit by from a strike.

Theof result was that water an area abundance to its onetakeoff that is crashed.

2008, it somehow maintained its dry may Till seem an attractive, simple idea that topline, but the expenditure sharply and would solve all water securityrose issues.

In fact it profitability vanished.that even prime minisappears so attractive ters, presidents and Supreme Court judges Treading a new path Gupta decided to seek professional help. He recalls meeting consultants who wanted crores in return for coffee-table books that promised to tell him how to bail out the business. Finally, he approached the Vector Consulting Group, which is known for its Theory of Constraints. “They led us to work on the pull model, which means we just replenish the sold stock and there is no inventory. The reaction time is cut from six months to one day,” he says.

Liberty took four years to build this supply chain and system. “Till 2012, we were clearing dead stocks of our own stores and retailers through promotions or discounts. Now, if I sell 100 pairs in a day, I produce only 100 the

The comeback Czech Much like Liberty, yet another footwear brand is trying to create a buzz in the market to win back its customer base.

Czech brand Bata has been in India for 84 years and is now working doubly hard to reinvent itself at all levels — products, retail reach and media campaigns. Last quarter, Bata spent ₹3 crore (0.6 per cent A cormorant’s perch Ken supports a complex ecosystem, including several species of birds dinesh kothari of revenue) on its The 360-degree integrated marketing campaign ‘Where haveMeets been Style’. won over, and around 30 such pro- loom large. The proposed dam would flood a Life jects have been discussed and promoted. large area of the protected Panna Tiger Re“Bata needs to reinvent its lifestyle However, a more view of the positioning… (it)in-depth has dominated on details serve, home to many of India’s endangered immediately reveals inherent dangers the basis of its products and prices.

But and the stays open on Sundays. species, including the tiger. Several thousands disadvantages, and the potential in of But price-and-product-generation hasdisasters moved on, its masterstroke wasand theaffected voluntary repeople will be displaced as vilterms ofway environmental, and ecscheme nearly halved its staff making for a stylised hydrological generation, which is tirement lages, forests and that agricultural lands are subological costs. Bata cannot forever remain a strength price-resilient. from230km 9,631 in 2005route to 5,162 2012. merged. The canal cutsinacross It is strange thatpricing,” the ‘experts’, India’s Na- Employees also had themay option to move to K bastion of lifestyle says Bijoor. natural drainage and affect the movetional Water Development (NWDA) — asubsurface format thatgroundwater lets employeesincreasing turn into Agreeing that pricing is no Agency longer the dom- stores ment of seem factor so keen.

Theirwas, report says that our Ken the number of inant it once Devangfranchisees, with affected. a 7-8 per cent those adversely river basin water surplus, while shu Dutta,is chief executive at its sister rivcommission on sales.

And incredibly, the balance study for this er, the Betwafirm is “water consultancy Thirdstarved”.

Eyesight,Such disparity project seems to “Bata in particular completely omit has the been funda-a sounds questionable themore Betwa is also a Ya- mental issuecomeback says, “Today there is a— lot story in flow the last few of environmental requireBata has re-modelled muna tributary, and both rivers competition, with international years. updated the ments They belowhave the proposed six stores and shut down get their waters from Vindbrands deepening theirthe engagequality of retail ambience; the dams. Environmental flow refers bleeding properties. hya ranges central India.

Thus ment with ofthe Indian market. stores look and contemporary to the now quantity quality of And in a major break if drought or scanty Even consumers are rainfall willing afto and product range hasa rivexwaterthe required to maintain from the past, it has fects one, other suffersprodtoo. panded,” says Singhal. spend on the higher-priced er’s ecosystem.

World over this By 2025 more than extended its working In-depth analysis the them link proThe resultsa crucial are showing. ucts as long as it of gives an has become part of The any half and of the world hours, stays open posal—by the South Asia Network edge whether in terms of looks company’s net profit for the Jadevelopment project involving population may be on Sundays oncomfort.”

Dams, Rivers and People or nuary-March was river systems. 2014 It is aquarter particularly facing water-based (SANDRP) reveals losses how figures After suffering in the ₹39.4 crore, aspect with sales ₹495.12 significant foratthe Ken vulnerability seem to have been designed to fit crore.

In contrast, Liberty faces early 2000s, Bata began setting River since the waters not onlya thehouse concept, ratherSince than2005, a preits in order. it long ahead. it is back flow road through oneWhile of India’s dessentation of facts supporting has been downing the shuttersaof small out- to making profits (₹4.27 alongside risignated tigercrore) reserves but downrational conclusion. examlets and opening newFor large-format stores. It ing sales (₹142.05 crore), these are is modest in stream of the dams also the ple, remodelled for unexplained reasons, thedown figurebleedused comparison has stores and shut with Bata—during the same periKen Gharial Sanctuary another protected arto calculate water for irrigation in the od. ing properties.

Andneeded in a major break from its net specifically profit was ₹13.21 crore, ea, During and oneFY14, designed to protect Ken river basin is 830 cubic metre per hectare past, it has extended its working hours, and athethird ofendangered what Bataaquatic made gharial. in just three highly less than the one used for the Betwa basin — a months. think that at natural one time, around Water And is antoirreplaceable resource; 16 per cent difference. Strangely this irrigation 2000, Liberty considered the only real one that needswas to be handled intelligently.

It requirement figure changes again when cal- competition and threat Bata. has been estimated thattoby 2025 over half of culating the benefit of a Ken-Betwa canal — the the world’s population will be facing watereven lower figure used in this calculation, For thevulnerability. young based We need to make more sehelps increase the ‘benefits’ of the project.

Gupta is all too aware the challenges.

Liberrious assessments inofour management of But one of the main reasons why the pro- ty has 450 systems franchisee stores freshwater andcash-and-carry fully understand the posal appears unconvincing and more like and 100and company-owned “We opened nature environmentsoutlets. that sustain them. justification for a pre-conceived idea is that 100 in each of the last two boat years.rides We This stores is not just an issue of tranquil the study fails to look at, or take into account, want to addriver 50-100 stores support each year, half of for visitors, systems innumergroundwater potential and use in the respec- them franchisees and the company-ownable lives from single cellrest creatures to comtive basins. It does not look at rainwater as a ed,” says.like crocodiles and ourselves; they plexhe beings resource nor the potential of rainwater har- affect With ₹1environment crore as thefrom average annual the source to seasales and vesting to decide deficiency and surplus. per Gupta keen to hit the ₹1,000-crore waystore, beyond theirisbanks.

Indeed would it not be rational to explore target in the nextbe couple of years.

Side‘spin’ by side, We shouldn’t seduced by the of the feasibility of rainwater harvesting and the company launched its online store grand designs.has Local, cost-effective solutions other less intrusive and less destructive ways and tied up playerskeeps such its as are often thewith best.e-commerce If the government to provide the required objective of extra irri- Flipkart And itsoffocus is the youth. promiseand to Jabong. “take care… ecological congation? The negative implications of pro- Says Gupta, willshould never be belooking. a luxury cerns”, this is“Liberty where they posed river links are large enough to behove a brand. We’ll be a youthful, fashion-centric joannawith vanaffordability gruisen is a wildlife photographer, full and dispassionate study weighing all al- brand as a key criterion.” conservationist and hotelier based near the Panna Tiger ternatives. But we do not see this.

Reserve inpratap Madhya Pradesh For the Ken-Betwa link the disadvantages rashmi

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Caught in the middle The siren of an ambulance rarely parts the sea of traffic in most cities in India

An Indian puzzle in Egypt

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A cruise on the Nile that turned out to be anything but calm, beset with stories of intrigue, murder, mystery, old and new A course in history Cruise ships drop anchor by the temple of Kom Ombo, north of Aswan shutterstock

waiting for an hour at Aswan airport, despite the fact that we were sleep and caffeine-deprived, it became apparent to everyone that staring at the luggage carousel wasn’t going to make Brand Ambassador’s suitcase appear.

There was nothing else to do but immediately divide ourselves into Team Brand Ambassador and Team Cornelia. Another hour of wait ensued, while the people in charge desperately looked around for possible scapegoats. Eventually, it was decided that Cornelia and one of the guides should share the blame. Eventually, we were told that we could proceed to item number one of our itinerary for the day, while Cornelia stayed back at the airport.

Unfortunately, things didn’t fare much better. The first stop in the itinerary was Aswan Dam. Both historically and economically, the 40-year-old dam is significant. For thousands of years now, the Nile has flooded annually, an event of such significance that even in temt is most morbid to wish for Poirot while these words aloud again. ples built 1,500 years ago, the level of the river starting a trip to aruna Egypt. Sagar, Even though I additional IPS, the It is the of the If you think of a day as it a period light be-day is For Sagar, was justofanother in dutifully the life recorded. dent.” Sagar alsoflooding points out that the traffic had read Death oncommissioner the Nile and re-read it tween of police (traffic), Nile, so fer-in the city are two ofofdarkness, it was Having my second daythe IPS a law enforcer. joined in which 1991, makes signalsthe at Egyptian importantplains junctions just before the trip (because I amthe the Chennai, knows valueinof time, tile.police Nature was all very well, but are themanually unpre- controlled the country.

I had arrived only a “the heYet, was driven by in theCairo belief that standalone, but they kind of person who does things like that), I few down to each life-saving second. dictability the level of the floodpeak began to (8-11am and hours prior, flight from of Mumwas,after andaislong the best means delivering social ofby policemen during hours didn’t ever harbour the his notion I’d actualLast week, teamthat pulled off the near-imposthe Egyptians, and after uniform a 10-year flow. effort, bai. Within minutes checkingto into the he ho-has,annoy justice.”of Belonging Bihar, over the 5-9pm) to ensure ly use any part of the Yet not only adid I tel, sible taskbook. of transporting heart for transAswan became with operational in 1970. It and reviewwe wereyears, shepherded out for a divisions fancy the led several different in the po- DamDealing traffic violations hark back to the book within hours of landing plant from the Government Generalbanquet.

Hospital,I remember quite ing interesting, if you’ve had on- a substantial bed at was lice force, stumbling such as theinto Crime Branch (CID)alland accidentbut statistics constitute in the country, myCentral last thought asStation, I flew out near Railway to the midnight, Fortis Ma- and ly two hours of sleep and a four-hour waitfocus for is on cases seemed Police. mere minutes had posted theit Armed Before being in part of Sagar’s schedule. “My was also that a man of his talent would haveawaypassed lar Hospitals in Adyar 12km in under someone luggage,over-speeding, it’s hard to bedouble-pillion imwhen Chennai the alarmtowent offthe at 2am.

I had a he head traffic wing, was the else’s concerning ridbeen good to have at 14hand. minutes, beating peak-hourflight evening pressed. There wasrash much tut-tutting, the and fancy to catchCommissioner to Aswan. of Tirunelveli. ing, and drunken and driving, In the book, just before boarded the ship this by creattraffic.he They accomplished bus declared thecharge Sar- of the trafTalking about the transportation intrepid of organstravellers’ number plates.

Sincethat I took t was at thefor airport that I Sagar realised how big for a cruise on the Nile, Poirot shared ing aHercule green corridor — a red light-free darthis Sarovar was far better anyway. And transplant, says, “We pulled off Dam fic division in December 2013,sowe have also thewastgroup was.

A dozen aboutprecision 25 we boarded a compartment with Miss Schuyler, zone — Van to ensure that“an noeltime was busseveral and slept on. awareness campaigns because of journalists, the clockwork with the done seatbelt employees travelthe companies and someand 50 the hospital derly lady with a very wrinkled a stiff that ed in theface, commute would ofwhich The Philae for Temple, our next restored to see the city traffic police the public.

Andstop, it’s heartening intrepid were rubbing their some humour. At last, it felthigh white sock, a good many diamonds and antaken ex- at have ordinarily least 45Indian like level we were doing stafftravellers coordinated the proceedof compliance among eyes and up to clear of a security line, something authentically motorists pression of reptilian contempt for theThe majoriminutes. transplant tookqueuing Egyptian. The temings. Operations this magniin Chennai with rewhichand was more a kilomety of mankind.” A big, clumsy young woman place almost immediately, ple is dedicated Isis.of road safety. tudethan have become second gardto togoddess this aspect headtoof line under 30 was sitting opposite the her.heart At intervals, was alive ter andlong. beat-At the She was the Even wife taxi of Osiris, nature usthe as we have been credriverswho now pay heed to Since 2010, we Brand ating Ambassador, none almost evthe old lady looked over the top of her magaing inside the was recipient washave murdered and chopped into green corridors our campaigns.

Similarly, I have facilitated about less than a Bollywood star. We On had five zine and snapped an order at her.

“Cornelia within three hours. pieces14by hisnoticed brother Seth.

Isis ery month. that most major pubs in Nothing jumpstarts such operations the flight Cairo, theinjournalcollect the rugs.” “When we arrive“Our lookplan afterof action was to instances pickedinup the his offering a the last six months. thefragments city have of started a day likeMalar some Hospital alone ists had Brand my dressing case. On no account let anyone set into place by about 9amconcluded body and brought Osiris back to Since 2010, we Amhave facilitated driver-on-call service, which is blood and gore bassador wasabout accompanied by else handle it.” “Don’t forget myon paper cutter.” the day of the operation, life. She thendisplayed conceived Horus.

14 such operations in Maprominently as a noher personal assistant, a makeThough I was going on a cruise on the thanks to Nile our deputy com- lar Osiris became theon god of the othHospital alone. Cadaver tice their premises.” hairdresser.is Ia serious isfrom Aswan to Luxor, in the exact oppositeSivanandan. di- up person missioner Two and er world, the judge of theentrusted dead, a transplantation Recently with the must admit wasand impressed by me that the rection that Agatha Christie took Poirot and officers, who acted as Isue, pride of place in Egyptian myit surprises profile of additional commisBy dinner it was zones estab- forthology. her characters on,touch-points and much as forthe all entourage. com- creation And when grew up,order, Horusas avenged of though, red-light-free medical sioner,helaw and well, Sagar has his lished that the media had got it wrong.

The en- his I hoped nothing about the were munications, posted defeating Seth.

Nothing jumpemergencies is almost non-existent in father other bywork cut out.

Nevertheless, he is also eagerly merely friends two of — starts cruise would theandtourage atimitate the donor the recip-wascities. a day like some blood and gore. of EventuTheher statistics are—appalling the numawaiting the completion work on the Chenwhom happened be editors ofexceeds celebrity plot of ient Death on the says hospitals,” Sagar. ally, theofpharaohs andRail, thewhich gods he would ber ofto deaths in a city the number nai Metro hopesallwould signifimagazines, and thepeople third, an editorial spouse.

Nile, I stepped into “A pilot vehicle accompanying merge into one longshift story wealth,ofwar andoff the roads. blind (yet transplants are few).”

What cantly theofburden traffic hour and half later, we alanded at Asship wishing the the ambulance constantlyAn alerted death, our first introduction to Sagar looks thisa means is that perfectly healthy pairbut of at Philae, Like most of us, the one thing wan.

That was when I first wished Missmatter) Van that someone the control towerhad and the policethem was fascinating. meofshudder, eyes (or any organ, for that could forward toItatmade the end a long day at work, is Schuyler’s For and Brand Am- to spoken men manning the 12 traffic junc- words this idea thatspending in 285BC priests kings havewere beenspoken. harvested donated a reciptime atand home withstood his family. A vorabassador left often her luggage theor Caitions that fell along thehadient wherecious I wasreader standing anda saw exactly fails to outside reach him her inexactly the hour with “decent library” of his ro airport. of Sheneed. had expected the young what I saw. But ambulance’s route.”

I had snap out wheninviolable the own, hetofollows butofa it single rule aftrip, let’s call her Cornelia, The traffic policeman’sorganiser role was of theBut guide day revealed the — temple was originally there’s no time to lamenttoas Sagar’s terthat hours not answering any phone calls her.long Cornelia, vital to the operation as carry it was her his luggage elsewhere, troubled bynumbers the frequent floodstarts atfor 8am, before who rush-hour traffic and from known after 9pm. He would seemed to have the her“Every job morning, responsibility to block all the othing of theI Nile, in 1980, the UNESCO it caught for a picks upimpression in Chennai. that He says, rather not lend a ear to moved someone profile did not include the word ‘porter’, er traffic and give the ambulance stone by stone to itsviolation, new, dry location. am on the road with senior and junior officers, traffic looking for an easy way out. chose to only her suitcase.

After the right of way (an all-clear orcarry stationed at own arterial stretches across the city.

And even when Sagar calls it a day, book in green signal) at each junction. Ex- Our job is to ensure the smooth flow of traffic hand, there’s always the trusted walkie-talkie cept for one stretch where the am- during these jam-packed hours. The control by his side, cackling with static-laden updates bulance had to traverse the path of room warns us if there’s an accident or a from his taskforce. incoming traffic, it was smooth sail- breakdown of an MTC (Metropolitan Transing all the way. port Corporation) bus or any other such inci- bijoy bharathan

Making every second count

A traffic operation that brought Chennai to a 14-minute standstill last week — to transport a donor’s heart — was but another day’s work for one of the city’s top cops

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Leading the way Karuna Sagar is surprised that creating red light-free zones for medical emergencies is almost non-existent in cities other than Chennai m moorthy

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A different kind of high

Reach erybody. Tourism is one of the largest industriEgypt Air flies directly to Cairo es in the country, and up until the Arab Spring from Delhi and Mumbai. Apart in 2010, employed 15 per cent of Egypt’s popfrom Air India, most Middle ulation. With the violence in Tahrir Square making news around the world, the number Eastern and African airlines also have of visitors has plummeted to a third of what it flights to Cairo with one stopover thrown used to be. More people in the cafés meant betin. You can start the Nile cruise from ter business for everybody. Our guide, Remon, Luxor or Aswan. Flights from Cairo ply to n 2010, students from Mumbaialso Universiconfessed his English had grown rusty in both destinations. ty’s HR College travelled to rural the Mahathree years of economic downturn.

Cruise rashtra for a project to supply villages At Edfu Temple, we were greeted by a giant There are some 600 cruise with solar lanterns. In that group were of Horus and scenes of war on the sculpture ships on the Nile. We were on seven friends who saw in those vast walls. fields,The the temple is believed to be built on the one from Sonesta unlit homes and simple rural lifestyle sitean ofimthe great battle between Horus and (sonesta.com/nilecruises).

Check out mense potential waiting to be tapped.

They re- avenging son from the Philae TemSeth, our reviews before booking and make sure solved to work in the agriculture sector ple. Aafter quick run through the large complex, a you take one where the food is praised. completing their course. peep down the Nileometer, a step well that reThere is very little access to restaurants When one of themk, Jahan Peston Jamas, corded the level of the river, and back to the on shore during the cruise. visited his family in Australia the ship. following The Valley of the Queens and later, the year, he returned with another valuable lesson Valley of the Kings, finally took us through the tip — industrial (non-drug) hemp, a variety of the terrain of Egypt that looked familiar from HolGo on the Nile cruise and cannabis plant, was being used in that counlywood movies. The walks to the tombs — then visit the pyramids at Giza. This makes try to manufacture a range of products, from Drapes prominently that of Nefertari among the naturally it easier to understand and appreciate the clothes to foodstuff and building material. queens and Hemp Tutankhamun among can be used to kings make — nearly 25,000 country’s long history, and provides a sort He and his friends researched and discovwere short but treacherous on the textiles, uneven desproducts including oil, milk, paper, chronology to your monument run. ered that a huge global industry exists around ert-like terrain.

Kings and queens whotofu, reinedflour, of biodegradable plastics, protein Certainly a bit of history the industrial hemp plant. They spent days from un- 1070 Egypt to 1550BC chose cut caves powder, bio-fuel andtoconstruction material. read thatupcannot be Egyptian a substitute for concrete. It is a before you go, else it’ll all be a forgettable derstanding the legalities involving hempthe“We through mountains want to rather create than a newbuild industry around more environment-friendly alternative to red of godsbricks, and pharaohs.

I read The Rise and its use, besides travelling to farms in Mah- pyramids. elaborate Tomb theft a realneedsblur hemp, beginning withwas the basic of food, which are manufactured using soil and Fall of Ancient Egypt

by Toby arashtra to understand how other threat crops and are theclothing royalty did want their after- Tekchandaandnot shelter,” says Chirag needed for agriculture.

Wilkinson. it’s a islittle dense, it’s with an Ahmedadealt with. By 2012, they had donelife enough disturbedney, by robbers and body snatchers.and HR. the director of marketing So Bo- While Boheco collaborating worth plodding through.

Reading for Agatha groundwork, and in January 2013, the Bombay Through these of tomb-raiding and hecolessons began with handloom fabrics. bad-based company hempcrete. “We are Christie’s on the aNile is optional.

Hemp Company (Boheco) was born.

“We useThe the proper of ox-fat for mummification, company collects hemp fibre from Death developing binder that uses hemp. It is a chose hemp because of the varied uses it canmore we took photographs and drank more Himachal breathable walling material and is in the testgrowers in Jammu and Kashmir, ith allbethis public relations putnegative to while employing a rural workforce, coffee. BrandPradesh Ambassador sportingly trudged and Uttarakhand.

“Then local artisans ing stages,” says Sumit Shah, Boheco’s director around the Nile, artisans,” I was beginning to ex- Oberoi, including says Sanvar co- but be definitive action.chain. alonga too, it couldn’t have easy forworkCairo, weave the cloth forbeen us. We also withthere Hi- would of operations and supply pect a whooshing, the for foundermenacing of Bohecoriver. and itsBut director finance the time his cruise ended in Shellal, Poiher.

The hordes of Egyptian — hawkersplant),By malayan Nettle men (a perennial which Nile was so passive and sotechnology. calming in its green- and hangers grows and digital of who had killed on — outside the temples in those regions,”would says rot had solved the mysteryChew on this ish-blue glory that was hardPolicy to think it as have TheitNational on of Narcotics and wreaked Psy- Kotak. when we rehavoc on her nerves. On figur- the heiress Linnet Ridgeway.

TheBut third component of Bohebeing capablechotropic of any destruction.

Fortunately, Substances, 1985, allows cultivation let’sstrategy call them ing out that the contingent from fabric India, ached Cairo, two ladies —co’s Boheco sells was hemp is the the edible one. unlike the temple, our ship in the spot and it industrial of cannabis forwas horticultural werehemp sisters from can be used they would yell, “India,its India, hello, Kareena alongside blends with wool, Bombay sisters because they While flowers Hemp can be used to was originally supposed to be, and afterhas the only uses.

The industrial hemp 0.3 perThe silk by an hour Kapoor.” rest and of us, not so cotton, lissomebesides and lu- Bombay — delayed the buses organic in biscuits andwhile cookies, the seeds make nearly 25,000 day we had had, sight of the tiny cabins cent the tetrahydrocannabinol (or THC, which putsource in jeopminant, tookHimalayan it as a compliment, it is sure Nettle, but at ₹650 to they ate fried chicken at KFC. are This a good of protein and products including and the tiniercauses bunksthe generated soeffect). much relief sedative Aroundto 10-12ft Cairo’s biggest haveingrated onper themetre. non-Kareena Kapoor ₹850 Its 100 per cent ardy our visit to Khan el-Khalili, essential fatty acids. textiles, oil, milk, and that for a briefheight, moment, a ship with Indi-of aBrand the in plant is not as85 much shrubAmbassador. or hemp shirts are now sold online souk. All things considered, bargains in Egypt “The protein content in hemp paper ans, you could haveasactually heard a pinvariant, drop. says Avnish at ₹2,487 each. “It is not fair to being what they were, theisintrepid bush its non-industrial travellers of a much better quality,” says if it was because of thefabrics stories as of decided no matter what, the In her pre-dinner speech thatat the evening, Pandya, R&D director company. don’t knowcompare girl seemed safe director of it with other Delzaad Deolaliwala, intrigue, and ismystery we and happy, and we should cultivation Brand Ambassador us that like a Hempinformed is an ancient crop, believed to have murder just proceedand to buy the industry at a verythat nascent legal corporate the time we reached the Valleyof of some fridge magnets and silver plot in a Bollywood film, herfor luggage been around 5,000was to res6,000 heard, years. but In bystage, with no economies affairs.bracelets. the Kings, wescale,” had a story of our own — an Indicued secondsnorthern before a India, bombfor squad exploded centuries it was cultivated We matchedThe Agatha Christie’s cruisers says Tekchandaney. company is ready with in its hemp food puzzle on Egyptian soil. Some it and was returned safely. The applause mainlyto asher a subsistence crop. “We’vean modernthedesigndisdain we showedbut foris the temples and Nevertheless, the people fabric isinathe hit with products, awaiting government approvbus had houses noticedand thatfashion a history in the room was We sailed to Kom isedthundering. the techniques, making themintrepid more travellers’ers, of Egypt.

Alas, we didn’tto have Poirot to items that export schools. al. Hemp belongs a list of novel middle-aged man was travelling with a teenOmbo that night, relieved for Brand Am-director commercial,” saysthe Yash Kotak, case. Like the Nile, andis pending at “We are approaching peoplesolve whoour are little require a licence.

“Thequiet licence Thedesigners, girl spokeas itsinister, bassador butofstill a little formanagement.

Cornelia, ager, who was not his daughter. project andsorry quality and will take antomorrow’s is easier it theremains final level.mysterious It (the products) to convey to the in- those who was by then shunned by many. The Kom only Bengali and managed unresolved. to convince them than using other two months to retail in the market,” says that shefabrics,” was with “her Ombo Temple is a two-in-one affair — one part vestigators in the bus age-old at the invitation of Ministry says Kotak. The writer travelled Deolaliwala. is dedicated to the crocodile god, Sobek, and uncle”. The man had been spotted with only a of Tourism in Egypt and Egypt They are alsoAir. experimenting with a natural, himbuilding in the room, the other to the falcon god, Horus. The reliefs towel wrapped around Green block and wild offspring of hemp that doesn’t require venugopal girl veena on the walls were painstakingly carved, the fact that he actively Work isdisallowed on to createthe hempcrete, a hempcare and monitoring. “We are developing a raised suspicion. and the priests, the pharaohs, the of- from talking to anybody based composite material useful in con- breed of seed with an agricultural research inof this to the ferings to the gods and even the cal- Within minutes the news struction as spread well as insulation, but one stitute, besides importing seeds from other endars were getting easier to spot two other buses. The journalists thought up parts of the world for study,” says Pandya. Boand decipher. Attached to it was a headlines, the tour operator — whose client heco aims to have a standardised seed for museum of sinister, charcoal the man was — washed his hands off the sorcommercial cultivation. did saga. And through the temple pylons black crocodile mummies.

The journey so far has been far from easy.

Each temple in Egypt is a and darkened tombs, hordes of in“No one else has worked with this crop in Intreasure trove of stories and trepid travellers tailed the man dia. To create a product, we have to work with even non-Egyptologists can and the niece. Any gesture they policymakers, research institutes as well as spend days studying a single made was subject of group disfarmers to build the whole ecosystem from wall. The intrepid travellers though cussions at the dinner table. scratch,” says Oberoi. devised another method. It involved There was much shock, horSo far this group of friends have relied on 60 seconds of listening to the ror and good intentions, and their financial savings from the jobs they held guides, 15 minutes of photogra- eventually calls for diplomatat various companies between 2011 and 2013. phy and an eventual hunt for a ic intervention. It was resolv“We have been approached by investors, but restroom or a café. This suited ev- ed that as soon as we reached bootstrapping is better due to the uniqueness of this idea and its potential. We are building a long-term future and we can manage without investors,” Oberoi declares confidently.

Seven college friends took up farming, and picked the non-drug industrial hemp as their crop of choice after stumbling upon a booming global industry around it

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Token presence Bikers replace protesters at Tahrir Square now afp/mohamed el-shahed; souvenir shops at Luxor peddle busts of Nefertiti and Tutankhamun death masks bloomberg/shawn baldwin

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Heady ideas A college field trip inspired seven friends to set up Bombay Hemp Company (Boheco) to create job opportunities for rural artisans and workers; (top) non-industrial hemp paul noronha

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A long shot on grass Will Roger Federer grab an eighth Wimbledon, after lifting the Halle grass court trophy for the seventh time this year?

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ennis grand slam players have had Wimbledon is not high as happens in the French Open to become just the eighth man to only two weeks to transition from Rome Masters vis-à-vis the French Open. All complete a career Gland Slam. That also hapclay at the French Open to the grass the top players participate in the Rome Mas- pens to be his seventh defeat in 13 finals at the surface at the ongoing Wimbledon ters, played on clay. majors. Even more worryingly, Djokovic has (till July 6). This gap will be increased to three In the warm-up to Wimbledon, however, now lost five of his last six Gland Slam finals. weeks from next year to help players adjust the high-ranked players are divided between He will likely face a repeat of last year’s final better to the surface change.

London and Halle. Since 2000 only Lleyton He- against the defending champion, Murray, in Grass, once the mainstay of tennis courts ev- witt and Andy Murray have won back-to-back the semifinals. erywhere but increasingly rare, is the fastest at Queen’s Club (called Aegon Championship) Meanwhile, Murray, the first British man surface with the ball bouncing to knee-level. and Wimbledon. This year, Grigor Dimitrov since Fred Perry in 1936 to win the Wimbledon On hard courts, it could be between the knee was the champion in London, while it was when he trounced Djokovic in straight sets and the shoulder, and on clay courts it is above Roger Federer in Germany. Dimitrov became a last year, goes into the contest in a worrying the shoulder. This makes the sensation after beating Alexandr form. He lost in the third round at Queen’s play technique on grass differDolgopolov, Stanislas Wawrinka Club to the 35-year-old Czech player Radek Steent from that on other surfaces and Feliciano López Díaz-Guerra. panek. Murray has been seeded third for Wim— it is relatively more aggressive.

According to the draw, and go- bledon. The latest Queen’s champion, The slowing of the ing by the seeding, the quarter-fi- Dimitrov, though could be Murray’s biggest games with longer Slowdown on grass nal line-up in Wimbledon is pre-semifinal threat should the former get rallies is meant to Points in Wimbledon were likely to be: Novak Djokovic-To- past Ferrer; he already has a Wimbledon title promote their scored quickly in the past. Chammáš Berdych, Murray-David Fer- to his two-room primary school. name, albeit in the boy’sVillages singles.such as Koentertainment value pions Boris Becker and Pete Samrer, Wawrinka-Federer, and Milos dina ka Jhonpra, Kesarpura, Ramraada and pras, for instance, would win a Raonic-Nadal. Till a few years Federer Swarupjika Khera have 35-45 children in each once more? point with four or five shots. ago, Djokovic, Murray, Federer Federer settlement no accessabout to a school.

Babulal, may bebut confident an eighth ti- a Now long rallies are seen more and Nadal constituted the quar- tle, parent “We the don’t have a single having says, captured Halle grass court literate trooften. TV channels flash the number of shots tet in Grand Slam semifinals. That quartet’s phyperson. children underofatwin thatch for the Our seventh time. study The father when a rally is long. The slowing of the games grip has loosened in more recent times. roof. A was government school with teacher daughters recently blessed twinconducts sons with longer rallies is meant to promote the enThe draw has put Murray in the top half andclasses, but they arespurred often cancelled due to the that has probably his resurgence tertainment value of the sport. Eminent com- with Djokovic, who won the Wimbledon in after rains or heat.” showing in recent times. a lacklustre mentators, once leading players themselves, 2011 and was runner-up last year. ‘Rafa’ Nadal More Children also suffer dueto to add a lack of 18th healthimportantly, he’d like the have said the grass is different from how it was is in the bottom half with seven-time cham- Grand careSlam facilities. which title toAanganwaadis, his existing record as should Nain the past and the balls are heavier, contribut- pion Federer. basic healthcare dal provide is closing in on him withto 14children titles. and preging to the slower pace. Many are calling it the nant mothers, absent.

In Maangarh, seven Serena Williams,are Ana Ivanovic, Maria Shararaving the scorching they homogenisation of surfaces — fastersun, courts be- ar-In worrying which is form mined and owned by those with busi-pova children belowHalep five are years have died and Simona in the race for due the to rived in tractors, buses and hiredWorld coming slower. nessNo interests textiles anda stone 1 Nadal,infresh from recordmines. ninthThewomen’s malnourishment andhaving five adult women died title, the first an edge over jeeps. For thesix people of have Bijoliya block,French In tennis history, only players made BhilsOpen in this areaexited live inright settlements or villagestheduring title, at the opening Therethe have been six deaths others.childbirth.

Ivanovic won championship south-west Rajasthan, attending a successful in transition from clay to grass, win- afrom in the thegrass forests.

Traditionally they relied onon grass at Halle this year in a straightdue toattuberculosis, six new cases were deBirminghamand recently. meeting with Open the sub-district magistrate ning the French and Wimbledon back-wassetsthese for wood, shelter and livelihoods, lossforests to World No 85 German Dustin tected recently — all in a span of two years is an economic consultant and tennis fandoesn’t more—important than earning a day’s wageBrown. to-back Rene Lacoste (1925), Fred Perry including collecting herbs and sub-a seshan His previous twomedicinal visits to Wimbledon from 2012 to 2014.

“Our panchayat ranging from ₹100 to ₹300.

TheBorg meeting (1935), Budge Patty (1950), Bjorn (1978,waswere sistence farming. to earn aplayers living, in most have a primary health centre. We have no facildisasters, losingToday to low-ranked culmination of Nadal a 10-day walkand — organised 1979the and 1980), Rafael (2008 2010) theof the young Bhils as toughest labourersdraw, at Bhil- ities, no roads for jeeps to carry someone to first two rounds.

Hework has the Rajasthan Manch andbyRoger FedererAdivasi (2009). Adhikar It is called the —facing wara stone mines —ofthe stone most Richard commonly the hospital. How does the government exthe challenges Ivo Karlovic, through 30 villages and settlements in the dis-Gasquet, ‘Channel Slam’. used for roofing pukka housesbefore in Gael Monfils and Raonic meetpect a patient to reach the hospitrict of Bhilwara. area.in the semifinals. ingthis Federer tal for check-ups?” says Shaayari The team walked through these villages lis- Djokovic Warm-up to Wimbledon Although theplayed Bhils lack houshas not a grass court warmBhil of Maangarh, whose hustening, mobilising and griev-up ing In the fortnight between thecollecting two Slams,the there and2010. access to bare necessities since The 27-year-old Serb, the top band Gopal Bhil died of TB just of the villagers they met. The yatra’s are ances four grass court warm-up tournaments for seed they not beenwon classified as of his for have Wimbledon, the last six In 28 years only three last year. agenda wasat to inform people men, of which the ones Queen’s Club, Lon- of majors Below Poverty Line. This at the Australian Openstatus in 2013. But he people have If living in makeshift houses, literate right to heard and helpwaswould don, and Halle intheir Germany arebeespecially pahelpinthem build proper thwarted his latwalking two kilometres to get emerged from them players. file their But complaints tronised by leading the est houses, get rations from the govattempt to drinking water, having no access the village the government probability of thesewith finalists winning theun-winernment his at firsta subsidised rate, to schools and aanganwaadis, der the Right to Hearing send their children to schools, and no medical facilities don’t Act. The State govern- gain affordable access to electricqualify the Bhils to be classified ment, in 2012, passed the ity and other social schemes. under the BPL category, then Right to Hearing legisla- During the yatra, 372 Bhil families submitted what does? tion, which entitles a their applications demanding inclusion in For the Bhils gathered at Bijoliya block, their person to file a grievance the BPL category. main appeal to the SDM Gopal Singh Shekhaand receive a time-bound wat and the panchayat was inclusion under written reply addressing Deprivation and denial the BPL category. However, neither the panthe problem and its solu- Their lives are a constant struggle for survival. chayat nor the SDM provided them with the tion. On submitting a request, Either they have no access to water tanks or pink receipts. Shekhawat, who accepted the the complainant is given a pink the existing water pumps and connections lie application but made no written commitreceipt stating the day of the hearing. defunct. Pushpa Bhil of Sukhpura village says, ment, said, “We will try to deal with these isThis receipt is the only proof that can hold the “We walk two-three kilometres to get drinking sues, although we are not certain if we can local officials accountable to the fact that the water.” Caste discrimination adds to their wa- hold special camps to redress their problems.” government has registered the complaint and ter woes. Bhils from Jaawda district said, “Our The new State government has now anthat action will be taken. water-filled vessels are often thrown away by nounced a Good Governance Act. While policyBhils form almost 38 per cent of the adivasi upper caste people.” makers and politicians tweak and replace population of Rajasthan and are classified as A survey conducted by the Rajasthan Adiva- important legislations like the Right to Hearscheduled tribes under the Constitution. Al- si Adhikar Manch in Maangarh (with 96 Bhil ing, poor governance makes day-to-day survivthough the word ‘bhilwara’ means abode of families) indicated that in the last 28 years on- al an endless struggle for the Bhils. the Bhils, there is little that the Bhils can call ly three literate people have emerged from the their own. Most of them hold no registered village. But Maangarh is considered luckier digvijay singh is a member of School for Democracy, land holdings to claim their land, most of than other villages because it has access to a Rajasthan

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Not poor Renough

A 10-day yatra through Bhil villages in Rajasthan reveals that a community with no access to water, schooling or shelter isn’t considered Below Poverty Line

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An ongoing rally (right) Roger Federer lifts the men’s singles Wimbledon trophy in 2012 after beating Andy Murray ap/anja niedringhaus; and defending champion Murray practises at the same venue to take on a back-in-form Federer this year ap/john walton

Listen to us Villagers gather in Bijoliya to share their grievances digvijay singh

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saturday, june 28,28, 2014 saturday, june 2014

Good evening, I’m Kodomoroid

Return of the super-thief? afp/yoshikazu tsuno

Code green: operation jackfruit

form a special The first android newscaster goes Why live an audacious car theft in the Capital earlier this month Police made the city’s policeteam forcetosit nab thieves who stole fruits upyetand gasp odomoroid can’t do a back flip or a cartwheel but boy, can in disbelief she read the news — and in several languages. She can even from an MP’s house

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switch to a raspy male voice for the Twitter feed. Unveiled at ‘Anthe evening of June 2, a man droid: What is a Human?’ an exhibition in Japan (wheren else!), walked into a house in south Delshe is the world’s first android newscaster. Named Kodomo or hi’s posh Vasant Kunj neighbourchild in Japanese, she is otherworldly in countenance and hood. With the owners away, he simple in speech. And occasionally, she’s funny too. In conasked the domestic help for the keys to the versation with her creator Hiroshi Ishiguro, for instance, family Kodomo ribs him by saying, “You are starting to look car, like a Volkswagen Polo, claiming it was blocking his way and he needed to move it. a robot!” Kodomo’s ‘adult’ counterpart and Ishiguro’s The keys were handed over and the stranger second android is called Otonaroid. coollyof drove away with the car.

Even as more of their friends breach the barriers A week science fiction, Kodomoroid’s news telecasts appear to later, the same car drove up to a petrol pump in nearby Vasant Vihar, got its tank be heading the J-horror way. filled and sped away without paying a paisa.

The scene was re-enacted a few days later.

While these might, at first glance, seem like minor misdemeanours in a city that is habitually reeling from the shock of violent crimes, their modus operandi has left the Capital’s police force jittery.

these last two incidents. Even though this is and Bhojpuri superstar Manoj Tiwari. He not strictly Bunty’s style, the thieves do seem didn’t last long though; the organisers sent to be inspired by him.” him out on the second day of filming because News reports have breathlessly claimed he was “constantly hurling abuses, trying to that he has committed anywhere from 400 to cover cameras with socks and (had) complete 700 burglaries, mostly in the National Capital disrespect for the house rules”. The super-thief Region and surrounding States, but also in was also approached to host crime shows on other places such as Bhopal, Pune, Chennai Hindi channels, but nothing came of it. and Thiruvananthapuram. “The property he Last year, a Malayalam film called Bunty Chor stole from Delhi alone is valued at more than was released, but unlike its Hindi counterpart ₹7 crore,” says Inspector Rajender Singh, Spe- it was not a hit. cial Task Force, Delhi Police. Singh is a ‘Bunty expert’ of sorts, having tracked him down and A strange kind of thief taken him into custody twice in the last 12 “In oneDelhi of hisPolice heists, Bunty the hen got a callstole froma photo Janata of Dal years. “I don’t think there are homeowner’s and daughter, (United) MP Mahendra wife Prasad’s house, many other criminals who furniture,” recalls they — as they arealong wontwith to dothe when netas call — achieved this kind of notoriety Singh.

“We were worried team, he may acted immediately.

Forming a special singlehandedly. Bunty is defibe planning to kidnap them… which included a fingerprint expert and a person The police assisted nitely one of a kind.”

When we arrested him though, from the CID, the police arrived all prepared at Bunty in setting up a Someone like Bunty we found that he had placed the Prasad’s Tughlaq Road bungalow. detective agency in he last news circulated (remember the For close to two decades, a super-thief hadtime Del- such Matinee idol photo frame in his living room Onhe arrival, Delhi when askedthey were promptly directed to the Singapore guy who wanted to divorce his wifeafor hi equally horrified and fascinated with simiBunty’s antics even inspired along withthat the stolen furniture, garden and duly informed two jackfruits them to help him beinginugly?), out to be hoax. Alas, this lar capers. A resident of Vikaspuri west it turned successful Bollywood film, not Dibaand was pretending to be an NRIhad gone MIA. A senior official was later quoted as “lead a positive life” A Punekar resident recently for Lucky divorce Delhi, Devinder Singh, better knowntime. as Bunty, Banerjee’s Oyefiled Lucky! businessman based saying, “The MP’s personal assistant calledin theSingastabecause wife was the bulge.

Apparpulled off his crimes with an insouciance that hisOye! The battling lead character, Lucky, pore.

He we was really the unusual tion to report a theft.

When reached spot itin breastDeol, surgery had releft the police embarrassed and fuming.ently, a pre-wedding played by Abhay is based that sense.” were missing from was found that two jackfruits fewthe extra depriving thesupoor The audacious car theft this monthsulted madein aon lifekilos, and crimes of the Afterhad hisnine arrest in We 2007 and the tree, which allegedly fruits. have the many ‘pleasures’ ofthe marital them sit up — it had all the markings ofhusband Bunty, ofperchor.

Released in 2008, film shows Deol eventual release in 2010, the investigating police assisted registered a case of theft and are he except the man himself was supposed life to be— declining stealing a to car, do andhousework, for good measure a TV as Bunty in setting up a detective agency in Delhi the matter.” claimed theusing wife awas also technique. adamant and behind bars in Kerala. On checking and conwell, similar forexamination their help to “lead positive Onwhen close he andasked careful of thea‘crime also sheabout modfirming that the super-thief was still behindquarrelsome.

BanerjeeHe sees thealleged film as that a “fable life”.

Detective and Security scene’, the Krishna investigators concluded that theExperts theft failed to mention the surgery bars, the Delhi police now had a new worry —had ern India”.

“On the surface it is aninoften funny stay in business for long though, not coulddidn’t have been the handiwork of children.

Andafthe form that the Solapur bu- it is about was a copycat super-thief on the prowl? and thrilling ride. Butmarriage at its core, Bunty was in 2013. had sinceter breaching thearrested walls of again the MP’s houseHe and (through which they met)India had is,” he had “With Bunty in a Kerala jail, we are afraidreauwhat the new and ‘liberated’ stolen an SUV from a businessman’s house stealing his precious organic goods is clearlyin them fillthe out.release His now-estranged there might be ‘Bunty imitators’ on the loose,”made said, after of the film, which went Thiruvananthapuram andfurther the police tracked child’s play, the police are now investigathowever, denies theclassic. charge.

She says a senior po-wife,on to become a cult The film and furhim down in Pune. ing the matter. says ther thereacts wasofnoinfamy medical history sec- not only a lice official. gained Bunty When we contacted K Padmakumar, ADGP, in the and that her parents “Investiga-tion slot in form the “most wanted” lists across States Kerala Police, he confirmed that Bunty was all their cards on the table, anytions arehad laid but also in Mumbai’s TV studios. still in their custody. Now all that the Delhi poit happens, thisfourth curious case of on, and weway. As Roped in for the season of the reality lice can hope for is that the latest superchor inhusband was first himself in spired crimes were nothing more than a flash are trying the TV ‘aggrieved’ show Bigg Boss, Bunty found by a Pune family to get to thrown rather out exceptionalcourt, company — Ab- in the pan. “The theft in Vasant Kunj is just a High the bot- and bas then, Kazmi,byonethe Bombay of the lawyers who one-off incident. If we see more such cases, The bench found it “very diffi- Ajmal Ka- then we will have to consider them as copycat tom of Court. represented 26/11 terrorist cultsab, to believe theprotestimony of the ap- wrestler crimes, based on Bunty’s style,” says a senior former fessional pellant” andformer summarily Khali, ban- dismisseddittheand Samaj- officer. “For Bunty though, it was never about case.wadi Order.

Order.

Party member Seema Parihar the stolen property he amassed, it was always about how he got away with it. He was definitely a stylish kind of thief.” dding to the tally of 97 elephants poached sibi arasu this year, is Kenya’s and probably the world’s largest tusker, Satao. A “pinnacle of his species”, Satao’s tusks, each a good 6.5 feet in length, alountaineers from Norway and Swemost reached the ground. den who went on an expedition from Even though conservationists and the Tsavo Pokhara, Nepal, could have hardly known Trust, who maintain the Tsavo East National what the Himalayas had in store for them.

Park where Satao lived, had provided the pachyOn their trek, the group reportedly found a derm with security, it was in vain. “In March we complex of 65 caves, including one that is a had discovered two arrow wounds. We had repository of the oldest human remains evthought that he was healing from his er found. wounds. But when we found this huge eleThe skeleton, which is considered to be phant carcass, we knew it was him,” said an that of a humanoid male from the Palaeoofficial from the Trust. lithic era, is expected to be between 2.33 and Satao now joins the more than 30,000 1.44 million years old. Apart from the skeleelephants that are poached annually for ton, the climbers also found a crude stone their ivory. spear and a few badly damaged leather objects. And while carbon-dating tests are on to find out more accurate information about the remains, this discovery could force scientists to question established theories of human migration and return to the drawing board.

The other, shallow half Till death and cellulite do us apart

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Kenya’s biggie breathes his last

shutterstock

The country’s biggest elephant, Satao, was hunted by poachers earlier this month

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The caveman cometh In Nepal, climbers may have possibly found the remains of the oldest man ever

dipankar

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saturday, june 28, 2014

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cornerstone in-faq by joy bhattacharjya Treaties and agreements

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t’s the 95th anniversary of the Treaty of Versailles, which was so one-sided that it practically guaranteed another World War! This week’s quiz is about treaties and agreements.

1 2

The Charter of Liberties, issued by Norman ruler Henry I, is considered the inspiration of which famous agreement?

On a complete tangent. After a big hit in the early ’70s, this director was offered a new agreement and a huge raise for his next film by 20th Century Fox. Instead of taking it, he negotiated a deal for all merchandising rights, which were considered next to useless by the studio. He made hundreds of millions of dollars and his movie changed the rules of film merchandising. Identify the director and film.

3 4 5 6 7

What is described as a morganatic or ‘lefthanded marriage’?

Which two famous authors decided on the ‘Park Avenue Pact’ during a shared cab ride in New York in the ’70s? And what was the pact?

What did David Packard and William Hewlett decide on the basis of a simple coin toss back in 1947?

Which independent State came into being as a result of the Lateran treaty signed in 1929?

the new york times crossword-1006

overheard in new england

Miguel Cabrera recently signed the most lucrative agreement in the history of sport — a 10-year $292 million agreement. Can you name the sport, and the team that has showered him with this largesse?

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This agreement was drafted and pushed through by US Secretary of State William Seward in 1867. In its time it was regarded by many newspapers and political commentators as a complete folly and waste of public money.

Subsequent discoveries made it one of the best deals in US history. Name the deal.

9

Rock bands often have strange backstage requests during concerts. Which legendary band would insist in the performing agreement that M&M candies be available in their dressing room, but with all the brown ones removed?

10

In 2000, which couple famously signed a prenuptial agreement which had a $5 million penalty if the husband was unfaithful?

ANSWERS

1. The Magna Carta, signed by King John in 1215, the first document in British history limiting the powers of a king and safeguarding his subjects’ rights.

2. George Lucas, Star Wars 3. A morganatic marriage is a marriage agreement between people of unequal social rank, which prevents the passage of the husband’s titles and privileges to the wife and children. It is common among royalty.

4. Authors Isaac Asimov and Arthur C Clarke. The pact was that Asimov would insist Clarke was the best science fiction writer in the world, leaving second best for himself, while Clarke would refer to Asimov as the best sci-fi writer in the world, with himself in second place.

5. Whether the company they formed would be Packard Hewlett or Hewlett Packard. William Hewlett won the toss.

6. Vatican City, creating an independent entity within the state of Italy.

7. Baseball, Detroit Tigers.

8. US buying Alaska from Russia for just $7.2 million.

9. Van Halen. But rock journalists claim it was to check if the promoter actually read the contract — and many bands would have similar demands hidden in the fine print.

10. Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones. A bit rocky but apparently still together.

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joy bhattacharjya is a quizmaster, director Kolkata Knight Riders and author of Junior Premier League — The First XI . t@joybhattacharj

ACROSS

1 Boxes up 8 Hidden 14 Astronomer Halley 20 Sheer, informally 21 Individually 22 Not get gratis 23 Clan garb 24 A “Star Trek” officer and a physician are going to board a plane?

26 Attack, as ramparts 27 Cracker topper 29 German Dadaist Hannah 30 Makes stronger?

31 Kind of court 34 Without ___ in the world 36 Atlantic fishery auditors?

39 “Galatea of the Spheres” and others 41 Comcast media holding 44 Ones giving their addresses 45 Hedge shrub 47 Dog command 48 Non-Eur. U.S. ally 49 Baseball features 53 French article 54 To boot 56 Minute 59 Work agreeably in a greenhouse?

62 It’s opposite julio on a calendario 63 “No challenge at all” 64 “Dat ___” (classic jazz song) 65 Called the shots 67 Dead¬-doornail connection 68 Delicate first-date topic 72 Moon feature 7 3Aristocratic practice 75 Bacteriologist Julius 76 “Happy Birthday” on a cake, e.g.?

80 Naysayer 81 Reproductive parts of flowers 82 Folk rocker DiFranco 83 Ball game 85 Québec place name starter 86 Buster Brown’s dog, in old comics 87 Verizon competitor 90 Positions oneself to hear better, say 93 Wood-shaping tool 94 Reagan attorney general 95 Sexy operators?

99 Cell part 101 Femmes fatales 102 Bank heist, e.g.

Cotton Bowl 16 Reflective material 17 Unbalanced 18 Florida State player, casually 19 Prohibitionists 25 Oil source 28 Model Carol 32 Clutch, e.g.

33 Recipe amt.

35 Stronghold 36 Tortile 37 Italian princely family name 38 Sand ___ (perchlike fish) 39 Drab-looking DOWN 40 Bygone Chevrolet 1 They’re probably close: 42 Salve Abbr.

43 Engine specification: Abbr.

2 Undiluted 46 Drinks now, pays later 3 Large sport fish 47 Make more enticing 4 Draw 50 Footless creature 5 Hotel amenity 51 Barnyard sound 6 Directional suffix 52 Enters furtively 7 Hitchcock genre 55 Chevron 8 Common aquarium feature 57 Exhibit fear, in a way 9 Show up 58 Quarter 10 Grp. in a 1955 merger 60 Green spot 11 “Wag the Dog” actress 61 1960s-’70s pitcher Blue 12 Fashion designer Marc Moon 13 Family tree listing: Abbr.

63 Ticked (off) 14 Prefix with dermis 66 Locked?

15 Longtime home of the 68 One 60-trillionth of a min.

104 Lion portrayer 107 Word with sea or seasoned 108 Bar, legally 112 Where frogs shop?

115 Religious recluse 117 Consternation 118 O.K. to serve 119 Medication for a narcoleptic 120 Cabernet Sauvignon alternative 121 Ran out 122 Immediately

69 “True” 70 Dimwit 71 Charmers 73 Start of a choosing rhyme 74 “Can ___ now?”

76 “___ light?”

77 “Metamorphoses” poet 78 Sight at many a barbecue 79 Setting of the 2012 film “John Carter” 80 Combine name 84 Hoarders’ problems 88 Rinds 89 Fourth Arabic letter 91 Go along with 92 “WKRP in Cincinnati” news director Les ___ 94 To a greater extent 96 Reduced

97 Got emotional, with “up” 98 Baseball’s Bando 100 Mountainous land 101 Postal symbol, once 102 Bud 103 Super-duper 105 Uncle of Enoch 106 “I ___ thought” 109 Part of a space shuttle’s exterior 110 ___ & Carla (1960s duo) 111 Cooped (up) 113 No longer playing: Abbr.

114 They may improve in crunch time 116 Birthplace of the bossa nova

By Norm Guggenbiller / Edited by Will Shortz

Corrigendum: In the article ‘200, Not Out’ (BLink June 21), an image of The Oval was wrongly captioned as the Lord’s Cricket Ground. The error is regretted.

Reach us at blink@thehindu.co.in. Follow us on t@Ink_BL and facebook.com/ hbl.blink or log on to our website thehindubusinessline.com/blink