Press Freedom

For the past couple of days I have been watching the American Elections.  When Pennsylvania and Georgia started to swing Biden way, Trump gave a speech at the White House.  As usual he ranted that he had won the election and what was happening in those states was a fraud.  As he ranted, NBC anchor cut in and said that the President is peddling lies. 

And as I listened, I wondered if it was possible in India.  Nehru used to laugh at the cartoons poking fun of him.  But he was a rare one. When Emergency was declared by Indira Gandhi in 25th June 1975, The Times of India carried an obituary.  It was 22 words long and read:

"O'Cracy, D.E.M beloved husband of T. Ruth, Loving father of L.I. Bertie, brother of Faith, Hope and Justicia expired on June 26th."

In today's India it is impossible to imagine any of this happening. No TV channel or anchor will have the courage to do what the NBC anchor did.  The freedom of press along with other freedom (even the ones guaranteed to us by the Constitution of India) and institutions are either dying or are dead.

P.S. Appa said that he  did not know why it took so long to declare the winner.  The Tamil Newspapers and Thulasendrapuram declared Kamala (Harris has been conveniently dropped) the winner right after the elections were over.  Of course, Trump did not have Chittis backing him or breaking 108 coconuts in the temples.

Eta Dom

 Living on Janpath in the 1970s gave us easy access to the British Council Library, the American Center and the Russian (Soviet Union) Center.

Of the three, the British Council library had a very good collection of books.  Appa became a member,  I do not remember whether my brother also had a membership or not.  From my view point, it was a wonderful place for they had a children's section and I was introduced to the books written by Enid Blyton.  Even today, despite the obvious racist overtones, they still remain a favourite, to be dipped into now and then.

The American Center functioned more as an information center.  But they did have a small library. This is where we got to read Life with Father and Life with Mother, both written by Clarence Day.  I also remember that they had a book of American Plays.  That is how I read "The Philadelphia Marriage", Arsenic and Old Lace, and the Man who came to Dinner.

The Russian Center too was an information center.  They did not have a library but they made up for it by deluging the Indian market with affordable books published either by Mir (Peace) Publications or Progress Publishers.  These books were English translation of the Russian books and included both fiction and non-fiction.  That is how Tolstoy, Turgenev, Pushkin, and Gorky (after reading Mother I never got the courage to read any of his other books) came into our lives.

We were introduced to the American Center because the librarian had a problem with the telephone.  Those days telephone was not freely available and even if a person had a telephone, there was no guarantee that it would work.  Kidwai Bhawan Telephone exchange was notorious for its non-functional property and it was Appa's job to soothe the irate customers.  Of course we made many friends this way.  That is how the librarian at the American Center entered our lives.  Under his guidance we became members of the American Center.  He also provided us free subscription to Span, which was American propaganda magazine.

The Russian Center swam into our orbit because my younger athai (Appa's 2nd older sister).  Athai was a writer and she won the Soviet Land Prize.  She came to Delhi to accept the award.  She was learning Russian those days as the prize included a trip to Soviet Union.  Between her and the Russian Center, they managed to convince appa to subscribe to Soviet Land, which was their propaganda magazine, for three years.  We were non-aligned keeping with the fact that India was one of the founding members of the Non-aligned Movement.  According to my brother, Span was readable while Soviet Land was completely unreadable.  Both he and I remember that it used to contain folk/fairy tales which we would read.  I also remember that either that or Soviet Woman used to contain embroidery/knitting/cross stitch patterns for I still have some of the patterns that I saved from the magazine.

The subscription to Soviet Land included linguaphone to learn Russian.  It included a blue coloured 45 rpm gramophone disc and a book.  These arrived every month for 3 years.  Athai and appa were were enthusiastic but amma was skeptical of the project.  And she was right for appa never opened the book or listened to the disc.  It was quietly relegated to a project to be taken up after retirement.

But, my brother and I did open the first one.  Over the course of hot Summer days I learnt the Cyrillic alphabets and was introduced to the Russian family comprising of Mama, Papa, Anton, and Anna.  Then came Eta Dom or This is a house.

That is where I stopped. Eta Dom remains etched in my memory.

Few years back, with my parents becoming older, my brother and I threw away the linguaphone records, unopened and unlearnt.

Re-shaping Delhi

The Central Government has taken the onus to reshape Delhi.  

Delhi is an ancient city.  There have been seven cities.  The oldest is the area around Qutub Minar (quite close to JNU and in fact, we can see the tall building from my colleague's office).  The remnants of the Qila (Fort) Rai Pithora can be seen around Qutub.   The second city was Mehrauli, again near Qutub Minar.  Then came the city of Siri.  There is the old crumbling Siri Fort still standing.  This area was developed during Asian Games, 1982 and thus, ruined Delhi forever.  The fourth city was that of Tughlaqabad.  The Tughlaqabad fort still stands, though in very bad shape.  These four cities were far away from the flood plains of Yamuna River.  The fifth city was built on the flood plains by Firoz Tughlaq and is known is Firozabad.  The fort is now a cricket stadium.  The sixth city was built by Sher Shah Suri around Purana Qila or Old Fort.  The seventh city was built by Shah Jahan, the fourth Mughal Emperor.  He built the Red Fort on the banks of Yamuna and developed the area that is known as Shahjahanabad.  Incidentally, Shah Jahan also built Taj Mahal in Agra. 

When the Britishers decided to shift the capital from Calcutta (Kolkata) to Delhi, the eight city called New Delhi was built on the Raisina Hill.  This is still as Delhi Imperial Zone or Lutyens' Delhi as it was designed and built by Edwin Lutyens.  The two major roads were the King's way (known as Rajpath after Independence) and the Queen's way (known as Janpath after Independence).  When we moved to Delhi in 1972, we lived on Janpath within the telephone exchange complex called Kidwai Bhawan,

Those days Delhi was a small ra ra town filled with government offices, government officers' residences, and refugee families.  Being right in the center of the town had its advantages.  We would walk down to Rajpath to watch the Republic Day parade on 26th January.  At one end of Rajpath is the Rashtrapathi Bhawan (it was known as Viceroy's Residence during British Era).  At the other end is the India Gate which was built as a war memorial.  The space in between is covered with lawn and man-made ponds.  This is where, even today, people gather to enjoy a bit of greenery.

We would walk down to catch concerts  at Rafi Hall, Mavalankar Auditorium, and Kamani Auditorium.  Appa tells of the days in 1960s when he would walk through Parliament House and how one day he saw Nehru get down from his car and walk into the Parliament house. 

 On Rajpath, came up, I will admit, soulless buildings that housed the government offices.  But Appa for some time worked in Dak Tar Bhawan which I thought was a very nice building.  Opposite it was the All India Radio.  I remember my Athai (father's 2nd older sister) going for recording an interview.

Further away from the Central Part, we would cross the flyover across Safdarjung Airport and come into  residential areas where appa's colleagues lived.  We ourselves moved across the city once appa was transferred to a new office.

These are memories.

Delhi has changed over the years.  The first major change came in 1982 when major construction activity took place as Delhi host Asian Games.  Delhi expanded into and beyond Qutub.  It also expanded across Yamuna.  But the buildings remained.  I left Delhi in 1991 and came back in 2004.  However, I could still go to Janpath and retrace the paths and the roads where we once walked. The shops were still there- the book store where we would browse, the dry fruit shop where amma used to buy cashew nuts and raisins, Keventers'  the iconic milk booth where we used to eat ice cream once a month... So things had changed and yet not changed. 

But now the Government has decided to reshape the Lutyen's Delhi.  Specifically the Rajpath.  All the buildings are to be razed, the green space decimated and converted into buildings and it breaks my heart.  It will no longer be the Rajpath that I recognize and loved.

But the unkindest of all cuts is the building of the new Parliament House.  The current Parliament House is a circular building built by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker.  This is where on 15th August 1947 India gained Independence.  It is where Nehru gave the speech "Tryst with Destiny" It is where the Constitution of India was adopted  (26th November1949) and came into force on 26th January 1950.  Of course the building is old and CPWD excels only in ensuring seepages but that does not mean that it should be abandoned or converted into museum. It is the soul of the country.  

But such things are beyond comprehension.   PIL filed in the Courts have been dismissed.  And so the eighth city is to be razed to build a ninth city.

Three Hundred Ramayana- Essay by A.K. Ramanujan

 I started re-reading this essay after the Nepal Prime Minister declared that Rama was born in Nepal.

Ramayana, one of the two epics, shorn of all the adornments, tells the story of Rama, the son of Dasharatha, King of Ayodhya.  Rama is the ideal man.  Thygaraja sings rAma Ni samAnamevaru or who is equal to you, O Rama.  He was a man, who, as Vishaka Hari tells in her discourse, lives by Dharma.  I do not know how to explain Dharma in English.  Appa once told me that it is not duty.  May be it is Principles? Morals?  I do not know how to say it in English.

To continue:

The people of Ayodhya adore him and want to see him as their King.  However, he is exiled to the forest for 14 years.  Obeying his father's command, Rama goes to the forest with his wife, Sita, and his brother Lakshmana.  In the forest, Sita is abducted by Ravana, the King of Lanka.  Rama wages war to get his wife back.  Ravana is killed.  Rama and Sita are reunited.  This coincides with the end of the exile period. Rama comes back to Ayodhya and is crowned the King.  The happiness does not last long.  Hearing slanderous statements about Sita, Rama orders his brother to kill his wife.  Lakshmana takes pity on Sita and leaves her in the forest where she gives birth to twin sons.  Later, his sons come to his court, and without knowing he is their father, sing the Ramayana before them. 

Ramayana is both a story and a religious text for Rama is seventh incarnation of Vishnu, the Hindu God.

The earliest written version is the Valmiki's Ramayana.  But as, A.K. Ramanujan, expounds in his essay, there are many versions (we cannot call it mere re-telling or translation) for each version is different in how it presents the story.  Each part of the country has its own version of Ramayana, incorporating in the local legends, motifs, and folk tales. In Tamil, we have Kamban's Ramayanam.  Amma used to say that her father would have tears streaming when he read the Sundara Kandam (the fifth book) of Kamban's Ramayanam.  My friend reads Tulsidas' Rama charitmanas.  In addition, there is also Jain version of Ramayana. As there is a Buddhist version.  Ramayana traveled to South Asia.  So the story is told in Bali, Java, Malaysia, Thailand, and Cambodia.   The Thai Kings have written their own version of Ramayana.  Incidentally, there is a Ayuthya in Thailand and the King is styled as King Rama.

The essay, however, was an eye opener for it opened me to a world of different versions of the story.  Each one engaging, each one providing a different perspective, each one making me think.

Reading the essay, I asked myself, how did I hear the story first?  I have no recollection.  What I do recollect is that we had to read the entire Ramayana as part of course work in school. It was a prescribed text book, taught to us as such.  This story was based on Valmiki's Ramayana and I read it in Hindi.  Later, I read C. Rajagopalachari's Ramayana which was based Kamban Ramayana.  Many of my generation would have read the story as told in comic form- Amar Chitra Katha.  Though to be fair, I recollect only The Story of Krishna (the eighth incarnation of Vishnu) and Krishna and Rukmani.  In fact the images of  Krishna and Rukmani story printed in Amar Chitra Katha is still imprinted in my mind.  But I think Amar Chitra Katha printed the story of Ahalya and Sabari (both stories within Ramayana).

I also remember by Bharatanatyam dance master taught couple of pieces based on Ramayana.  I also remember my master teaching a senior student Bhavayami raghuramam, a song composed by Swati Tirunal telling the story of Ramayana.  And there was of course M.S. Subbalakshmi's rendering of Namaramayanam.  Appa used to put this recording in the morning.

During the enforced Covid break, I watched Sita Kalayanam, a dance drama choreographed by Rukmini Devi Arundale and performed Kalakshetra dancers. It was available on You Tube.

The Ramayana, therefore, that I know is a mishmash of all these sources. It is my own version. 

The essay, unfortunately, was banned by Delhi University in 2012 because of protest by a vociferous group.  They said the examples that A.K. Ramanujan chose to explain in his essay hurt their sentiment.

I did not understand and still do not understand the protest.  In a country where multiple languages exist, where cuisine changes every few hundred miles, where the same 6-yard long cloth called saree can be tied in many different ways, where the same festival can be celebrated for different reasons (classic example being Deepavali which North India celebrates because Rama comes back to Ayodhya after 14 years exile while Tamilnadu, Karnataka, Andhra, and Telengana celebrate it because Krishna killed the demon Narakasura, and Kerala along with most of the North East States do not celebrate), I wonder why only one  Ramayana is or should be deemed to be correct.

 

New Education Policy

The Government of India (GoI) has accepted the New Education Policy (NEP).  The policy document reminds me of tender specification that we make for any thing that we wish to purchase.  Tender specifications are mandatory as per  GoI rules. We have to make them and put them up in public portal so that we get bids in a fair manner.  The problem, as Appa says, is that Tender document are made such that it can never be fulfilled.  This is exactly what NEP document is.  It is a lofty, aspirational document completely cut-off from the reality.  If GoI can deliver the aspirations of this document, I would be ecstatic.  However, I am not too hopeful.

I will highlight only two issues in this blog.

The first issue is that of caste.  It is conspicuous by its absence as KumKum Roy has pointed out in her column.  How much ever we would like to wish it away, it exists.  It exists solely to make life miserable for those who belong to the marginalized sections, the dalits, and the adivasis (Tribes).  As an upper caste and upper class person who had a privileged upbringing, I got a rude awakening when I attended the annual Asha India conference in a small UP village some years ago.  In the morning, a child handed me the breakfast.  I accepted it from the child and started eating.  Immediately, a man who taught at an NGO came up to me and asked me to follow him.  I was startled but went with him.  He took the plate away from me and asked me to wash my hands.  I was really puzzled.  Seeing me puzzled look, he explained.  That child, he said, is a Dalit and you are an upper caste.  You cannot accept food from him. Wash your hands.

I was aghast.  I took the plate away from him and walked off.

It was then I realized that despite all that our Constitution says, all the protection that is granted through various laws, caste as a brute reality exists. And Dalit and Adivasi children are going to be discriminated and denied education unless we actively try to change the scenario.  So it is very disappointing that the NEP does not even address this concern.

The second point is about the medium of instruction.  It is commendable that NEP acknowledges that children should be taught in their mother tongue. However, the problem is that we have many different languages.  The Constitution acknowledges only 22 languages.  Missing are many adivasi languages.  This issue was brought out very poignantly in the movie Newton starring Rajkummar Rao and Anjali Patil.  The school teacher, an Adivasi, laments that the children do not understand the textbook because it is in Hindi and the contents are so disconnected from their day to day life.  She says that she tries to explain the content in Gondi, their language, but it is difficult. 

Is NCERT, who are responsible for the textbooks, going to design and write textbooks that will cater to these children?

The next level of complication arises with migrant labour population as they move across states.  What happens when a child born to Bihari parents, who speak Maithili, move to Tamilnadu, where Tamil is spoken.  The two languages are not even remotely similar.  So how will we teach this child.  Of course, states like Kerala take special care.  The teachers make effort to teach Malayalam to non-Malayalam children. But how many states will make this effort?

Already Kendriya Vidyalaya (Central Schools) have said that the medium of instruction will be English and Hindi because these schools cater to children whose parents are in transferable jobs. 

So how is GoI and more importantly the State governments (for Education is on the concurrent list and thus, becomes the responsibility of the State) going to ensure that children are taught in their mother tongue?

Policy making is one aspect.  It is the delivery which is important.

Haldi (Turmeric) milk

When I went to purchase milk at the Mother Diary Booth today, I was surprised to find Turmeric milk.  It is priced at Rupees 25 and on an impulse, for I was little amused, I purchased it.  The milk has no flavour of Turmeric (Haldi in Hindi); it was too sweet and to add insult to injury it was butterscotch flavoured.  Exactly what Haldi milk is not.

Amma used to make us drink hot milk with haldi powder (or Manjapodi in Tamil) and pepper. whenever we had sore throat.  Sugar was never added.  The milk was given to us last thing in the night before we went to sleep.  Couple of days of it and the sore throat would disappear.  Growing up my brother and I never took cough syrups or antibiotics for cold.  Even now whenever we tell her that we have sore throat, she will instruct us to drink milk with manjapodi and pepper.

Nowadays, Sumitra, my maid, who is well-versed in latest trends, exhorts me to drink haldi milk everyday.  In winters we get fresh turmeric root in the market.  So instead of using the powder, she ensures that I grate the root, boil milk with that, and drink it every night.  This summer she got fresh roots for me from her native state, Uttarakhand.  But hot milk during summer is something I cannot do.  So I will wait for the temperature to cool down before satisfying Sumitra.

Amaltas (Laburnum)-The harbinger of Summer

Every year, around the last week of April or the first week of May, the campus lights up with yellow flowers.  And with the flowering of the Laburnum (Amaltas in Hindi), the harsh days of Summer starts.  I always watch for the Amaltas to bloom for it is a fascinating sight.  Through the winter and much of March/April, the tree is just bare branches.  It is just there, easy to miss.  And then the yellow blooms appear and the tree lights up.  It is so beautiful to see the tree covered in yellow. The green leaves appear later.

As the South-West monsoon sets in Kerala around last week of May and starts moving upwards, the yellow blooms fade and fall.  By June, when it is hot and sweltering, the tree covered only with the green leaves. By October/November, the green leaves fall off leaving behind the bare tree.  So the cycle continues.

This year, May was mild with lots of rainy days.  The Amaltas blooms lasted well into June, which is when I captured the following images on the campus:

The mild days of May has meant that we have not had any decent monsoon showers in Delhi.  Of course, Delhi never gets the kind of rains that Mumbai does but usually we have couple of days of pre-monsoon showers followed by monsoon showers towards end of June/beginning of July.  It is mid-July and we have not had any rains.

My brother and I were remembering my Periappa (Appa's eldest brother) who was a meteorologist.  He would always watch the temperatures and wind direction. Harsh temperatures followed by dust storms (aandhi in Hindi) meant that monsoon would be normal and we could expect good rains.  He would also say that the wind direction has to be from east for Delhi to get rains.

Climate change has of course changed everything.  For the past couple of years, monsoon season has extended up to end of September to early October. Delhi now gets rains only towards end of July.

Meantime, it is raining in Chennai when it should not.  Chennai (pretty much of entire Tamilnadu) should get rains due to the North-East monsoon. The monsoon season for Chennai is essential for filling up the reservoirs.

But then everything is topsy turvy this year!