A Day in the life of METRO

First of all, a disclaimer, this post is in no way related to the Bollywood movie of the same name. This one concentrates on one of the most favorite mode of transportation for millions of "Kolkatans", THE METRO RAILWAYS.... I would say they are an answer to all our transport woes, well not to all, but most certainly to some important ones... but hold on before you move away from the page, I am not about to chronicle Metro Railway's history... this is more about my personal observations about people's behavior, especially the females, since I proudly belong to that community and without any failure, always occupy the seats reserved for our "species".

For a certain gentleman, who is residing in the US at present, and has little idea about the present state of Metro Railways, and for all those respectfully ignorant souls who do not know what a gift and a curse Metro Railways is to the "Kolkatans", you guys first need to know some basic facts about the Kolkata Metro...

No the Kolkata Metro is not the same "patalraail" that Bengalis are so proud of, it's a sky walk now, zooming from one end of the City of Joy to the other... and no it's not Air Conditioned, so we Kolkatans do occasionally suffer tremendous hardship, heat and humidity in our course of the journey, but then again, we had a communist rule for 34 years in the same state, so no one's complaining!!!!! The other important fact worth knowing is that there are two rows of seats reserved for the fairer sex, as much as we would like to talk about equality, this is one of the things we are grateful to the Metro authorities for... I, on the behalf of my species, acknowledge that life would have been much tougher hadn't it been for that "Ladies seat" ....

Let's now begin with a day's journey in the Kolkata Metro as observed yours faithfully...

My tryst with the Metro begins everyday at 8:30 am when I punch in my paper ticket, into a machine, that is generally well known for it's mood swings, when it's in a good mood, people have a wonderful life, everyone is happy sliding their ticket from one end and getting it back from the other, and when our "dear ticket puncher" is in a bad mood, everyone from the commuters to the authorities have a really sad time, no amount of coaxing, caressing or cursing works... so this is the first thing to be noted, a "mood swinging ticket puncher".... then there's the elevator... ok my Metro station boasts of both options, manual and mechanic, meaning there's both an elevator to take you upstairs or one can use the stairs, needless to say most human beings with an ordinary amount of common sense would think, "who wants to take the stairs when there's an elevator????? "

My dear brothers and sisters, this is where you have misjudged the Kolkata Metro, here the speed of the elevator is actually less than your's if u decide o take the stairs... so being the quintessential late comer that I am , I have to run up the flight of stairs.. on some days, when Karma decides to reward me for my good deeds, I am on time, meaning, I am atleast 16 minutes early for the Metro, and on those rare days, I actually use the elevator... it's really a nice experience, being on a machine that's actually slower than you are... it makes one proud of the human race!!!

Oh!! another thing, the Metro stations of Kolkata, after Ravindra Sarovar, believe in natural cooling meaning there are no ACs again, which is a tad problematic considering Kolkata's weather, where there is very little scope for a "cool weather".... so every man, woman or child u meet in these stations, craving to embark on a journey would mostly be heaving and blotting away 'natural moisture' from their faces, arms, necks with a towel or a large handkerchief and often complaining about the city's weather.

I have a set group of 5 friends who I travel with, two of them are my colleagues and our favorite discussion is how The Times of India is making us slave for them. For the past three months, we have been making brilliant plans for our lives away from the TOI office, but sadly till date none of them have come remotely true, and friends, the optimists that we are, we will continue making the same plan in the coming months without any improvement in the status quo.... among the other two, one works for the Indian Oil Corporation and has amazing pair of earrings and the other dislikes us big time... her point of dislike is aimed at our mobiles, which she considers flashy and an utter waste of hard earned money, I have often spotted her discussing in low tones with the other female, and she generally shuts up when encountered by any one of us. I have a general belief that she talks about us, but then again she might not.

We ( the three of us i.e..) generally try taking the 8:33 am train, and the simple reason behind this, is that while getting on and getting off at our respective Metro Stations, we can be less barbaric and more humane, as every Metro commuter, worth his salt knows, THE KOLKATA METRO HAS THE ABILITY TO BRING OUT THE BEAST IN YOU, THE ONE WHO GETS TO SIT, SURVIVES, AND THE ONE WHO SURVIVES, GETS TO LIVE ANOTHER DAY!!!!!!
So while boarding on and boarding off the Metro between the hrs 8:15 am to 10:30 am and between the hrs 5:15 pm to 8:15 pm, the beast in every metro commuter comes out at it's best.

A very dear friend of mine, has evolved a very noble solution to winning this ongoing war. He carries along with him a really long umbrella, no matter what the weather, it's main purpose is to poke his metro compatriots, so as to enable him to get a seat, a ride in the Metro is just not a ride my friends, it's a WAR!!...

But, despite all the woes chronicled here, my life would have been unbearable had it not been for the Metro Railways. Come winter, summer, autumn or the rains, it is one mode of transport which carries me back and forth, every morning to my work and back to the people I love... It's a life saver for me, nay, for all of us. For all my complaints and sarcasm, this everyday journey will remain one of the most beautiful part of my life.

When All Falls Apart...

The strings of the quartet
falling apart,
the unsung melodies, remain unsung,
staring in her eyes,
thought he,
so this is betrayal?
Their first meeting,
the first kiss under the silver moonlight,
the warm caresses, the dewy morning,
when he held her close and she whispered promises.
Promises that now seem absurdly meaningless.
Love that seem tender yesterday,
looked ugly today,
poisonous, filthy,
promises made, empty.
He scorned at his foolish heart,
his mind,
wavering on the brink of malevolent anger.
A voice somewhere deep inside,
mocked him in derision...
laughing at him in silent mirth...
Anger, pain, scorn, jealousy, confusion
He was drowning...
She stood before him,
a mute silent spectator,
her eyes asking for the forgiveness,
he could not find...
He closed his eyes shut,
forgiveness, probably, would later be...
He turned around...
Now at the moment,
He just wanted to breathe...

Is "SHE " a curse?

Between the hullabaloo of the Cricket World cup and the Men in Blue performing extraordinarily... one news item that would otherwise have made the headlines of every single news channel and print media have got lost in translation. I am talking about the miserable child sex ratio of our nation which has dropped from 927 in the year 2001 to 914 in 2011. What does this mean? From whatever I could gather from the Net and the print media is that... based on the provisional Census data for 2011, there are in the age group of 0-6 yrs, 914 girl child for every 1000 boy child.
This shows a tremendous increase in female infanticide. A nation that boasts itself to be the 3rd most growing economy with a Purchasing Power Parity to be 2nd in the world, such a woeful state of affairs is indeed shocking. India has a Lady President at helm, a lady is the chairperson of our ruling coalition govt, one of the most populous and the largest state of India has a lady Chief Minster... and the most densely populated state in our country is rooting for another lady Chief Minster... so how come in a nation so dominated by the fair sex, does her counterpart in the infancy of their lives face such discrimination? It is indeed a question which, not our policy makers, but we the common people, have to answer.
The provisional Census figures show starkly the north south divide. The three worst performing states are Haryana (830 female child/1000 male child), Punjab (846/1000 machild) and J&K (859/1000 male child). Among the states which have shown an improvement over the the data of 2001 are the states of Punjab which showed a steady increase of over a 48 point while Haryana has an 11 point increase from 2001. But it is J&K which has shown a steady decline in child sex ratio, decreasing by 82 points. It is followed by Maharashtra which shows the next biggest decline in child sex ratio.
The grim story behind gritty numbers are that the girl child is not welcome in the families of the young, prosperous India. The three states that have been mentioned aforesaid are among the three having a high per capita income. Even Maharashtra which is the most industrially advanced state of India does no longer want a girl child. Notice that many "low income " states of the nation like Orrissa, Bihar, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh haven't made it to the list. Also the seven north east states are actually heading the list of states with higher female sex ratio.
The overall Female sex ratio has undergone a change for the better, there are now 940 females per 1000 males in India as compared to 933 females/1000 males a decade ago. But this does not take away the fact that actually more and more girl child are dying a faster death at their birth than the ones who get to live.
Coming to a horrendous fact, some years ago, an Indo Canadian Scientist reported in "the Lancet" that pre natal selection and selective abortion were causing a loss of 500,000 girls in India a year. Scientists say that most economically well off nations have a more than equal sex ratio and a country with higher GDP and a poor sex ratio is an anomaly.
This problem is one of the many which no law can actually solve, the right to give birth to a child actually depends on the parents, no matter if the apex court considers abortion as murder. I just ask one question, are girls so bad that they don't even have a right to see the light of the day. Abortion is a criminal act in out law, but now it has been proved that only the more well off are going for it, paying huge sums of money for the dastardly act. I ask young mothers and fathers, the literacy rate of India, in the new census figures is a lofty 74.6%, how could any of you stand this? A girl child is as good, if not better than her male counterpart, so why this discrimination? Sadly in India, they are not even given a chance to prove their worthiness. The absence of the girl child will definately be felt, if not now then 10 years later, and then the society will pay a hefty price. Maybe we deserve this, for we are all guilty of murder.

The Other "YOU"

Are there times when you feel you don't know yourself?
Thoughts and actions chasing your mind surprises you intensely?
When the world becomes a confused haze and you are trying to find a place...
That's the time you meet your "new self"
It angers you, chides you, bullies you and again falls in love with you...
You wonder who the real "you" are?
Is it the one you know or is it the one who peeps in
at times and hides away swiftly?
Till there comes a time when you feel;
you know yourself well enough...
There comes a foreboding security
of knowing oneself too well,
And then you wish
you didn't know yourself at all...

An ordinary Indian's woe!!!!

I was just glancing through the Sunday Times Op Ed page and I came across two very different articles... one by Swapan Dasgupta on how the brave, tech savvy, Gen X of Egypt brought down an autocratic 30 year rule, below it was another article by Chetan Bhagat 'An open letter to Soniaji'... this one was about the unbearable corruption that the Indian democracy has given birth to...
Now the two articles are quite a contradiction at the first glance... the Egypt article shows how people faced innumerable difficulties trying to bring in a democratic system into a country ruled under US whims and the other reflects how a mature democracy and the largest one at that falters under it's own weight... though they seem to be contradicting each other, there is indeed a great connection underlining the two...
Imagine the India 64 years ago... newly independent, brimming with hope and giving rise to a popular democracy with noble ideas... the first article would have fit to the T.... now imagine Egypt 64 years later... the revolution having succeeded has now given rise to a vast democratic system, freedom of expression and association are abound.. and a system filled with corruption... the second article would have fitted perfectly.
Well of course it might not be true, Egypt probably wouldn't succumb to the pressures Indian democracy have been subjected to, it could well be prove to be a more mature democracy that deals with corruption and inefficiency with an iron fist, where babus and corporate czars and politicians and powerful journalists are treated alike with the "aam aaadmi" and where newspapers everyday do not have pages filled with reports of scams, scandals, kickbacks and illegal accounts in Switzerland... yes Egypt's democracy could be all that... and I pray to God that their democracy doesn't become a mockery like ours.
Isn't frustrating, we see (as we've been seeing) other countrymen fighting police lathis and camel soldiers, to get democracy and we, after having all the freedom and the democratic set up that others are fighting for, misusing them so blatantly?
Where did we go wrong?
We, Indians, are a comparatively much more literate people, quite intelligent, tech savvy, having a pretty good idea of what constitutes right and wrong, we even have electronic voting mechanisms ( even US relies on ballot paper) that ensures our precious votes aren't tampered with, we have GDP figures that makes many a country blush and a lot more freedom of expression, association etc.... we are also extremely patriotic (bordering on jingoism) when it comes to international events of any kind and when other nations point out our flaws and so and so forth... so why are we so corrupt, why has "our democracy" given birth to such immense levels of corruption, why does everyone in power from government, to the armed forces, to the corporates and even the judiciary steeped in corruption????
A recent study by the Times of India and Synovate Research points out that the levels of corruption have breached our tolerance levels... India mind you has a history of scams, scandals and kickbacks right from the "Nehruvian" era... but suddenly this has become all pervasive. Earlier politicians were synonymous with the "C" word, now suddenly everyone from every field is out in the light having stashed away crores of rupees for personal use.
Well the answer is perhaps not very difficult to find, it is "we" the people who have given rise to a system that helps breed in corruption, no I m not saying all of us directly give or take bribes on every occasion, but it's our nature of getting our work done 'jaise bhi', our attitude of throwing around influential names, our showing off when we get those VIP seats without payment, our inbred idea that a Police in uniform can "always be bought"... these are the very things that breeds in corruption. If we want to save ourselves, leave alone the nation, then we have to bring changes in these minor attitudes of ours otherwise we plainly cannot survive.
We'll become one of those nation which thrives on US backed Aid (we have an example in our neighborhood), yes Chetan Bhagat is quite correct when he says that corruption is worse than terrorism as terrorism can be fought with planned strategies but corruption can only be overcome through individual will and character.
Long live the Egyptian Revolution... only wish Indians would enumerate it!!!!

A Skeptic's Truth

Two years ago in a sudden fit of enthusiasm for voluntary social work, I enrolled myself into this NGO. The inspiration came from the certificate that I received for volunteering for the Times of India's "Teach India Program". This one entailed taking communicative English classes for women inmates at a prominent Kolkata Correctional Home (another sophisticated term for Women's Jail). As I have had some experience at teaching communicative English at College, I jumped at the offer.
The day I reached the NGO, I was informed that I have to undergo training of some sort at how to communicate with the women and I was to be mentored by a senior who worked at a nearby Correctional Home, doing the same job for which I had signed up.
The first day I met my senior-cum-trainer-cum-mentor, I knew she was the classic "textbook feminist case"... these types are found frequenting Indian University campuses, wearing "kurtas" of a dark hue, jeans, specs with heavy frames, carrying jute "jholas", heavy silver jewelry... and never lipstick!!! till date I haven't met a single one who wore a lipstick... oh! and dark "kohl" in their eyes...
This one (my mentor-cum-trainer) had all the trademark qualities. She took one look at me and dismissed me as the "non sustainable ones", probably because I was wearing a shocking pink salwar... along with pink lipstick... (what a blasphemy!!!)... however she was pretty cordial and explained all I was supposed to do. This week I was to accompany her to the Correctional Home she taught in and observe her at work. I was also given the liberty to talk to the women so as to familiarize myself with them. After this ten minute intro she shut up. For the duration of the journey that we undertook in the NGO's White Ambassador, I peppered her with enthusiastic questions none of which were answered in complete, meaningful sentence.
After reaching our preferred destination where my mentor was greeted with reverent smiles, she seem to have quite an effect on the inmates, I thought, she took pain to introduce me to everybody present and by their looks I could sense that they also put me into the "non sustainable category".
Undeterred I ploughed further and approached a group nearby. As soon as I started introducing myself, my mentor's voice was heard instructing the ladies to gather where she had set up her black board. The group I had approached left in a huff. Slightly demoralized I wandered further to find a shade from where I was to "observe" my mentor at work.
That was when I spotted her. She was seated on one of the stone seats beneath the shade of a giant tree, in the inmates' uniform, her head covered with a black 'dupatta', her back turned to me. I was slightly taken aback.

'Hello!' I called out, she didn't turn around.

'Why aren't you in the class?', my next obvious question. No response elicited.

'May I sit next to you?' my third plea.

All this while she had studiously refused to even acknowledge my existence. With timid steps I went and sat next to her.

"Hello!" I again repeated, this time my greeting was accompanied by an outstretched palm, to let her know, that she was recipient of the greeting. Slowly she turned around and I gasped, my mouth fell open, shocked...

The face that looked at me was burnt on the right, there were no eyebrow or eyelashes to speak of, infact no eye at all, just a black unblinking iris, it was gruesome... her left eyebrow and eyelashes also seem to be partially burnt. The right of her nose and lips didn't exist. It was the most macabre human face I have ever set my eyes upon. Infact it didn't even look remotely humane. I don't remember how much time had lapsed. All I do remember are those eyes, a black iris on one side and a partial eye on the other looking unblinking at me. I must have looked abysmally foolish with that open mouthed expression and my palms still stretched out. After sometime, she turned away. I withdrew my hand and stood up. There was nothing to ask, really, my mind was still blank.
As I started walking back, I heard a soft voice- " ai je aapni aar ekhane aashben na, eshob aapnar jonno noy"... (please do not come back here again, this isn't your calling). There was no contempt in that voice, no sarcasm, no regret, no nothing, just a mere stating of a fact. I turned and gingerly walked away.
While on the return journey, I narrated my amazing meeting to my mentor.

"Oh! so then you met Sumati, she doesn't attend the classes", my mentor stated.

"Why, what happened to her face... why is she here? why doesn't she attend your classes?" my volley of questions.

"She's quite educated already; she used to teach English at a primary school".

"Why is she here?"

"For murder. She bound her husband and her in-laws to a chair and set them ablaze".

"Why?" I almost yelled out.

My mentor shrugged, "oh! the usual Indian bride's story, you know, cruel torture, daily beatings, bickering over dowry... the usual sort. She got partially burnt by default".

I never went back to teach communicative English. Sumati was correct. I don't think I have the guts to teach countless Sumatis' adverb, adjectives, prepositions...

Just Another Love Story???

This post is about this movie I saw yesterday... "Arekti Premer Golpo" (Another Love Story)... First of all let me make it very clear that this is the first time I m trying to write a film review of sorts... come to it... its not even a review... this is just how I felt after seeing this particular movie.
To begin with this is the first time acclaimed Bengali director Rituporno Ghosh has tried his hand at acting and he has done a tremendous job of it. The film deals with a very sensitive issue and raises certain uncomfortable questions about our perception of what's "accepted" and what's "normal"... there aren't too many comic timings in the movie, so for those looking for the "fun" element, u can give this film a miss...
I think this is the first time something like this has been tried in Bengali cinema... nay, I would say In Indian Cinema.
The basic story line is very simple... A director and his crew comes from Delhi to make a documentory on a "jatra" artist ("jatra" is a rudimentary theater form of Bengal), Chapal Bhaduri. Now the catch is when Chapal Bhaduri acted on stage, no women were allowed to act, so men used to dress up like women and play their parts. This could also be seen in the 16th century Shakespearean plays where women could not act on stage.
So Chapal Bhaduri, our protagonist, thinks of himself as a woman in a man's body, mind u this Chapal Bhaduri character is real, now our director played by Rituporno Ghosh aka Abhiroop (in the film) likes to term himself as the "third sex" he isn't ashamed of his feminity or his love for his co director played by Indraenil Sengupta aka Basu. Abhiroop is sensitive, cranky, arrogant, and incredibly intelligent. Mind u he's also sensitive towards Basu's needs because Basu is married and is keeping his love for Abhiroop a secret from his wife.
The film progresses showcasing Chapal Bhaduri's life and particularly his intense passion for his lover and simultaneously superimposes it on Abhiroop's life which is quite similar to Bhaduri's except that the later belongs to a past decade when homosexuality was a curse.
The film though tries to showcase the fact the Indian society had tremendously progressed and almost all the characters accept Abhiroop's dalliances with Basu, but the question remains has Indian society progressed far enough, have we really become that broad minded and open in our acceptance?
The music is incredible and the cinematography brilliant. Some of the characters, I felt could have been worked upon such as that of Jishu Sengupta's and Raima Sen's. Jishu plays an important chracter in the movie though his character remains a bit of mystery, Basu's wife is another mysterious character (played exceptionally by Churni Ganguly), which had chances of being portrayed in a different light. The conclusion is somewhat predictable and cliched.
It is an intense film and the purpose of the makers isn't merely entertainment. They have a very serious message that they are trying to send out... but as I pondered earlier have we become flexible enough to accept that message?
I would like to advise a thing or two to the "would be viewers" if u want to watch the movie, please leave your inhibitions behind. There are certain scenes that could make u queasy or make u squirm in ur seat. But if u want to watch a movie for the movie's sake, please do so. It's a beautifully crafted film and forces u to stop and think for a while. If u miss this movie you could be missing something really exceptional.