Essaying India's Media (A): India v. Media

Etymology of the word ESSAY: 1597, "short non-fiction literary composition" (first attested in writings of Francis Bacon, probably in imitation of Montaigne), from M.Fr. essai "trial, attempt, essay," from L.L. exagium "a weighing, weight," from L. exigere "test," from ex- "out" + agere apparently meaning here "to weigh." The suggestion is of unpolished writing. Essayist is from 1609. The more literal verb meaning "to put to proof, test the mettle of" is from 1483; this sense has mostly gone with the divergent spelling assay (q.v.).

HOLY COW
Gentler souls have often dissuaded me from writing about the Media: apparently, it is one of the “Three Holy Cows” of Indian society that mustn’t dare be criticized (the other two, if you’re interested, are the Judiciary and Religion- in that order); consequently, the ideal relationship- infact, the only relationship- one can have with the media has got to be one of abject adulation: with one’s lips firmly puckered to its butt even if it decides with all solemnity to shit all over one’s face.

Forgive the scatological imagery but I’ve been there only too often to know what I’m talking about: even before the Central Bureau of Implication (more commonly known as the CBI) charged me with murdering a political-nobody whom I hadn’t heard of before, a news channel, Aaj Tak, had graphically shown me- or atleast an actor who was suppose to look like me- committing the crime in cold blood in its popular primetime program “Hatyara Kaun?” (Who is the Killer?). I suppose it doesn’t make any difference that the Court ultimately acquitted me after I had spent exactly one year locked up in jail. I mean what’s a person’s life compared to TRPs, right?

There are those who see this phenomenon- of a hyperactive media- as Progress: the Fourth Estate, after all, gives Voice to the People. That is indeed true. But the more important question is what kind of ‘people’- and why?

THE NNS SYNDROME
To understand, let’s look back at the last Lok Sabha Election (2004). The mainstream media was unanimous in its prediction that the NDA would return to power with an absolute majority; as a corollary, its rival, the UPA, was slated to be wiped out. When the exact opposite happened, the erudite journalist Rajdeep Sardesai, then political correspondent of NDTV, introspected that ‘it was the duty of the media to disbelieve; and we didn’t’. Disbelieve who?

I suppose he meant politicians. Or more specifically, the propaganda-machinery headed by the late Pramod Mahajan with its hard-selling of the NDA’s “India Shining” campaign. This machinery was cleverly named ‘National News Service’ (NNS) when infact it functioned solely as the ‘NDA’s News Service’. For one thing, it had more professional journalists and reporters on its payrolls than any other news organization in the nation (the Times of India group included). In Chhattisgarh, for instance, it was headed by Ramesh Nayyar, a former editor with the Chandigarh Tribune. Many, like my father, considered him to be the very embodiment of Nehruvian Socialism. After his stint with NNS, he has now become the principal ideologue of Dr. Raman Singh’s government.

NNS had seemingly unlimited resources and a remarkably sophisticated infrastructure at its command to conduct its massive media-blitzkrieg: Feel Good comprised only one part of its operation; a far more lethal side involved making its enemies Feel- and look- Bad. Its CCTV-wired hi-tech headquarters located on the third floor of Delhi’s posh Dhawandeep Apartment building were filled with dossiers containing damaging propaganda on virtually anyone who was considered a threat to the NDA: ‘target-specific’ websites mushroomed in seconds; passwords were hacked and emails intercepted; a virtual cyber war was waged. Even more curiously, millions were raised from the ‘Overseas Friends of the BJP’ and other similar sounding associations of sympathetic NRIs: this extraordinary largesse might well be symptomatic of an émigré’s effort to ‘rationalize’ (again, forgive the Freudian analysis) a deep-rooted sense of guilt- a feeling that springs from having left one’s Motherland for a better life elsewhere- by funneling money into the BJP’s oft-voiced ultra-patriotic agenda of making India ‘Great’ (presumably by annexing Pakistan, Srilanka, Nepal, Myanmar and Afghanistan into an amalgam called ‘Akhand Bharat’).

More conventionally, hundreds of crores of rupees were spent on buying ‘television talktime’, and ‘coverage space’ in the print media. All of this with one very convenient rider: they weren’t suppose to be shown as paid-advertisements; but as neutral, objective ‘news’, ‘surveys’ and ‘exit polls’. Any reference to their being sponsored was reduced to fine print one could barely read; later, many news organizations dispensed with even this fig-leaf.

Under these circumstances, it would be foolish to expect the media- well, most of it anyway- not to simply play along. Unfortunately for the NNS, the People didn’t.

FOIE GRAS, ANYONE?

Now, supposing that the media provides the interface between the People and their politicians, telling the former what to think and the latter what to do, the Lok Sabha results meant that the People were simply not taking this carpet-bombardment of ‘news’, ‘surveys’ and ‘exit polls’ seriously: after all, they didn’t do what the media was telling them to do, i.e., vote back the NDA to power. For a majority of Indians, most of who continue to live outside cities, “India Shining” didn’t make any sense at all: many of them genuinely believed that six years of NDA’s rule had led to their pauperization; to put it differently, the rich had gotten richer while the poor had been, well, forgotten.

It was the media’s job to tell this to Mr. Mahajan. It didn’t. Instead, it believed Mr. Mahajan’s NNS machinery, and parroted word for word what he was saying. Maybe, this was because the media itself had no idea how the people really felt?

Here, let’s stop to look at the United States, where Gallup Polls are far a more evolved ‘science’: in 2000, barring Rupert Murdoch’s ‘conservative’ media-empire (including the Fox TV network), everybody had predicted an Al Gore win; likewise, most of the ‘liberal media’ was not in favor of President George W. Bush’s comeback in 2004. The Economist sought to explain this ‘disjunction’- between the Press and the People of the world’s sole superpower- in terms of: ‘exurbias’. A vast majority of those who lined up to vote for ‘W.’ didn’t live in the big cities: they lead self-contented, some might say insular, lives in nice, little, self-contained townships that are coming up all over North America. Sociologists see this phenomenon as part of the larger ‘exodus’ from big, overcrowded, over-polluted, crime-infested, possibly even ‘immoral’ cities, and a yearning to return to the Jeffersonian vision of yore (as opposed to the Hamiltonian one); hence, I guess, the term exurbias. The genius of Mr. Bush’s campaign team- and more specifically, its manager, Karl Rove- lies in identifying and ‘reaching out’ to these extremely significant entities who were in a way fleeing the negative effects of ‘the liberal ethos’ that has come to grip most big cities, and which were largely neglected by the mainstream media.

As it turns out, this explanation provides a rather perceptive insight into the predicament of India’s Press. All that needs to be done is to replace the term ‘exurbia’ with ‘villages’ and ‘townships’. While India may live- or which is more likely, die- in her villages, its media is ensconced in the cool comforts of its blooming cities. Editors who shot to fame telling the world about starvation deaths in remote parts of Assam are now happily pontificating on the virtues of goose liver making the best foie gras. Perhaps, it would be unfair to blame them entirely for this. The fact is that news about what’s happening outside the metros doesn’t sell. It’s simply not profitable for the corporations, who now own most of the media and almost certainly, cough-up all of its advertisement-revenue (next only to Government- which fact led Noam Chomsky to call media ‘bludgeons of democratic governments’): how many villagers, after all, are rushing to buy Coca Cola when they have to worry about getting work to pay for their next meal?

One boy gets himself stuck in a well in a town near Delhi on a Sunday (which is a relatively ‘news-free’ day), and the entire national media goes agog: in minutes, crores of rupees are generated in SMSs and ‘relief funds’. On the other hand, hundreds of tribals are being killed in the Dantewada district of south Bastar since the inception of Salwa Judum in 2005, and the nation’s biggest magazine- India Today- hasn’t had one word to say about it to date.

Truth be told, there are two Indias really; and the one the media now caters to isn’t the one in which most of our fellow citizens live. In other words, the mainstream media is no longer representative of the nation.

And if that is so, then what- or whom- does the media represent?


AJ

End of Part One
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Village Diary Preview: Pictures from Tala

Note: I am grateful to Mr. SNT, Mr. Anuj Sharma and Mr. Ardhendu Mukherjee for the following photographs from their one-day visit to see me at Tala; Dr. Saibel Farishta has written his account of the trip, which can be read on his blog.

L-R: SNT, Saibel, Self, Ardhendu at the entrance to the Garba Grha of the Devrani Temple, 29.07.07
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Rudra Siva as seen by Ardhendu Mukherjee, 29.07.07
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A Room with a View: A Donga on the Maniyari
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Self aboard the Donga (also seen: the MLA Mr. Siyaram Kaushik's back, Gopal Aggrawal and the village sarpanch's back)
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Tour Guide: Self explaining the intricacies of an early Haihaya sculptor to the Chhattisgarhi superhero, Anuj Sharma (seen here in his underpants) and the BAG correspondent, Ardhendu Mukherjee
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Personal: A Letter to the RSS & its Reply

The current edition of the RSS publication, ORGANISER (July 8, 2007), editorialises on the UPA Government's alleged 'bailing out' of its political supporters. Both my father and me are cited as examples of this. As anyone who has been following this blog knows only too well, this is not true.

I, therefore, wrote a letter to the Editor of Organiser, Mr. R. Balashankar, giving him the factual position. He has been gracious enough to reply. Below is the full text of this correspondence.

AJ

(1)
To: editor@organiserweekly.com
Cc: amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com
Sent: Saturday, July 14, 2007 10:54 AM
Subject: ref: This regime is about bailing out swindlers

Dear Sir,

With respect to your editorial (This regime is about bailing out swindlers), there is no truth in the assertion that "Ajit Jogi and his son are other beneficiaries of such mercy". For the record, I was arrested by the CBI on 1st July, 2005- well after the UPA had come to power. As the agency's chargesheet shows, all 'evidence' allegedly recorded against me was also done after the formation of the UPA government. No stone was left unturned by the agency in its prosecution- persecution?- against me: an audio tape recording of the case's Investigating Officer, Mr. AGL Kaul, offering bribes to a person to turn approver against me exemplifies this spirit of witch-hunt. Not only this, I was named in the Judeo case chargesheet by the CBI while I was languishing in jail (needless to mention, the UPA was still in power at the time). Ironically, no action whatsoever was taken against me when the NDA was still in power!

My acquittal, therefore, has nothing to do with 'acts of mercy' by the UPA. It was a decision of the court based on unimpeachable documentary evidence (which the CBI did its best to suppress). On the contrary the CBI under the UPA did everything in- and beyond- its power to see that I was locked up for life.

Regards,
Amit Aishwarya Jogi

Anugrah, Raipur
Chhattisgarh

(2)
From: editor editor@organiserweekly.com
Date: Monday, July 16, 2007 3:44 PM
To: amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com
Subject: ref: This regime is about bailing out swindlers

Dear Amit Jogi,

Thanks for your mail. I stand corrected. There was no intention of malise (sic). I can understand the agony of an (sic) young and upcoming political activist caught up in a legal impasse. And also appreciate the fact that you are a free man after a due process of law. I wish you all the best and I will carry your response in the next issue of our publication.

Thanks and regards.

R Balashankar,
Editor.
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Politics of Presidency (B): SKELETONS IN THE VICE PRESIDENTIAL CLOSET?

A recently cyclostyled letter, circulated by the Hon’ble Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Mr. Lal Krishna Advani, among members of Parliament and state legislatures (who constitute the electoral college for the presidential election), contains his party’s by-now clichéd recitation of charges against the UPA presidential candidate, Ms. Pratibha Patil, and ends with a plea ‘to exercise a vote of conscience’ in favor of the incumbent Vice President, Mr. Bhairon Singh Shekhawat. He clarifies that any defiance of a party policy-decision does not come under the purview of the Anti-defection Act since, technically speaking, parties cannot issue whips in a presidential election; ergo, if a member of the UPA decides to vote for Mr. Shekhawat, he can do so with impunity.

Poison Pen
Now, this is the same man who only three-and-a-half years ago had condemned my- and my father’s- alleged role in attempting to split the newly-elected BJP legislative party in Chhattisgarh in what is more commonly referred to as ‘the cash-for-MLA exposé’, as “the darkest chapter in India’s democratic history”. Apparently, the abovementioned logic of technicalities didn’t seem to apply in those days. It is worth mentioning that the Anti-defection Act, as it then stood, recognized the legality of a split if the number of defecting MLAs exceeded one-third of the party’s total legislative strength; so, technically speaking, had 17 tribal members of the BJP decided to form their own separate outfit yielding to their conscience-call to elect a tribal chief minister, they could also have done so with impunity.

In this respect, the letter written by my father in his capacity as the then leader of the state Congress legislative party, extending support to this hypothetical breakaway faction of the BJP, cannot be considered any different from Mr. Advani’s own letter inciting UPA members to cross-vote: at the time of their writing, both letters sought to ‘embolden’ elected-representatives to defy their respective party-lines on the basis of ‘conscience’; and neither attracted the punitive provisions of law. Yet, for some peculiar reason, Mr. Advani puts his letter on the pedestal of collective conscience while condemning my father’s.

Something About Living in Glass Houses
While Mr. Advani, and his principal-polemist, Mr. Arun Shourie, are more than happy to launch a comprehensive assault on Ms. Patil’s past, his letter doesn’t tell us one very important thing: why exactly should one vote for Mr. Shekhawat? Perhaps, Mr. Advani believes that by putting Ms. Patil in the dock, his own candidate would, by contrast, come across as ‘holier than thou’. That ofcourse would be the most obvious explanation. But there are two other, far more disturbing, reasons.


kahin pé nigahein, kahin pé nishana?

First, the vitriolic against Ms. Patil is intended to deflect attention from the nation’s biggest political story: the END of the NDA. As things stand today, with the exception of the Akali Dal, the BJP’s coalition partner in the Punjab, all of NDA’s former allies have jumped ship. The UNPA, a new political ‘third front’ comprising most of NDA’s ousted regional allies, has decided to abstain.

Secondly, Mr. Advani’s diatribe is also intended to conjure a diversion from Mr. Shekhawat’s not-so-illustrious past. It would seem that at the time when the young Ms. Patil, and her future husband’s family (also, Shekhawati like the Vice President) were fighting our British suzerains, the equally youthful Mr. Shekhawat, then a hot-blooded policeman in the service of the Raj, was busy raining lathi-blows on them. For this, he was duly rewarded with a promotion. There are those who might be tempted to argue that he was only doing his duty. Alternatively, they could adopt his friend and former Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee’s defense. When confronted with his approver’s testimony, which, as it turned out, landed at least six freedom fighters in jail for a term of 10 years R.I. (rigorous imprisonment), the great man proclaimed: “jawani ka adhkacharapan tha” (it was youth’s folly).


Youth’s Folly might also be used to justify Mr. Shekhawat’s subsequent acts. Not too long after ‘the stroke of the midnight hour when…India awoke to freedom’, he was caught red-handed taking bribe for letting a caravan of local salt-merchants pass through a toll-tax checkpost near Sikar. Needless to say, this act unwittingly transformed him into an avant garde trendsetter for things to come: Mr. Shekhawat is, in all probability, the first policeman to be suspended for corruption in our nation’s post-colonial history. Thereupon, in what appears to be the fulfillment of Oscar Wilde’s prophesy that ‘politics is the last resort of scoundrels’, he entered public life, and climbed his way to eventually become Rajasthan's chief minister.

Rajasthan, as we all know, is an arid state. To this day, its major lifeline continues to be the Indira Gandhi Canal. To build this intricate network of waterways, private land had to be possessed. Needless to say, compensation was also paid. One such person to whom compensation was paid happened to be the nephew of the then chief minister. There was only one problem: he didn’t own the land for which he received payment. The issue was raised in the Vidhan Sabha. In his reply to the House, the chief minister claimed that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had investigated the matter, and found nothing in it. Again, nothing wrong with this answer except that the CBI was never asked by anyone (Government of Rajasthan included) to look into this affair. Not only had the chief minister deliberately misled the Assembly to save his nephew’s skin, he had also perjured himself before the People.

Doesn’t it seem ironical- even unfortunate- that atleast two men who collaborated actively with the British to send their countrymen- freedom fighters, no less- to jail should go on to occupy two of our nation’s highest political offices whereas those who they got imprisoned are conveniently forgotten, erased from history, as if they never existed; that a man who willfully perjured himself to indulge in shameless nepotism now aspires to the Office of President of our Republic?

J’accuse
Even more perplexing, is the now-deafening silence of Ms. Patil’s backers. It would be ridiculous to attribute credence to Mr. Advani’s fictionalized ‘chargesheet’ against her. Apropos her role as chairperson of a district cooperative, the following facts need to be noted: one, she is NOT the founder of the district cooperative society, as has been alleged; two, no loan was sanctioned to any of her relatives during her tenure as chairperson; three, it is true that three of her relatives had defaulted on their loans, but as every agriculturist knows only too well that given the vagaries of monsoons, such things are not only commonplace in our rural hinterland but to construe them as ‘illegal’ is akin to calling all our nation’s farmers robbers; four, all three did repay the full loan-amount with interest, as far back as 1999; five, Ms. Patil’s cooperative was among 181 others in the region that were closed, so surely there were other more universal factors, such as crop-failure, in operation.

Six, the complaint-case now pending before the Bombay High Court regarding Ms. Patil’s husband’s alleged role in the death of a school principal is outrightly bizarre: in his so-called suicide note, the deceased alludes to the fact that he had written several letters to Mr. Shekhawat (Ms. Patil’s husband), who was the chairperson of the school’s Educational Trust, requesting a transfer, but to no avail. Now, while the death itself is unfortunate, surely Mr. Shekhawat receives several correspondences of such nature, and he cannot be prosecuted under section 304(B) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC)- enticement to commit suicide- for not responding favorably to one of these requests. Lastly, another complaint-case has very recently been filed before the Aurangabad Bench of the Bombay High Court seeking institution of proceedings under section 302 (IPC)- murder- by the widow of a rival district-level Congressman. While judgment is awaited, the timing of this complaint is itself suspect: what was the aggrieved party doing all this time; why did she decide to file the complaint only after Ms. Patil’s name came up for President?

Are Umpires always Right?
In all this, the role of the Media has been, for lack of a better word, one-sided. Rather than simply report the allegations against Ms. Patil as they ought to have done, most editorialists (with the notable exception of The Hindu and The Outlook) hastily went on to pronounce verdict against her, thereby becoming parties to the conflict. Now, it is a fundamental principle of civilization that ‘a person is to be presumed innocent until proven guilty’. As things stand, Ms. Patil has not been deemed guilty by any court of law, and as the preceding paragraph shows, there is very little chance of that happening. This reminds me of the pre-poll surveys conducted by the nation’s mainstream media in 2004, when all of them showed the NDA as getting a clear-cut majority in the Lok Sabha election. When the results were out, and it was clear that the UPA will form its government, Mr. Rajdeep Sardesai, then with NDTV, introspected thus: “as the media, our primary duty is to disbelieve; the fact is we didn’t.” Even a newspaper like The Indian Express, which prides itself for its ‘journalism of courage’, failed in this primary duty, dutifully publishing word for word what the BJP fed it.

There could ofcourse be another reason for this pervasive (if not perverse) lack of disbelief. With the old-school ‘Nehruvian’ generation of journalists long gone, and the current crop of editorialists completing their metamorphoses from socialists to socialites, could it just be possible that a significant majority of the new breed secretly sports khaki-shorts under their carefully-creased trousers?

AJ
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On Forgiveness: Reginald Jeremiah

Et Tu...
A certain amount of post-acquittal exuberance, edging perhaps towards a nascent-belligerence, is understandable: the Trial Court’s decision to initiate proceedings under section 194 of the Indian Penal Code- i.e., “giving or fabricating false evidence with intent to procure conviction of capital offence”- against a former college mate, Reginald Jeremiah, must therefore be seen in this context. After dealing at considerable length with his deposition, the hon’ble Court finally arrived at the following surmise in paragraph 452 of its mammoth Judgment:

“[In this way,] the evidence of Reginald Jeremiah (PW-85), who is an approver against a co-accused, is extremely evasive and contradictory. In all important facts, he is not corroborated either by circumstantial or any other evidence. His evidence is suspect, weak and false. After careful scrutiny of this evidence, it cannot be said that the charge against accused Amit Jogi, Chiman Singh, Yahya Dhebar, Abhay Goyal and Firoz Siddiqui that they conspired to kill Ram Avtar Jaggi at the hotel Greenpark on 21st May 2003, is proven relying on the sole testimony of this co-accused approver. [These other co-accused have been convicted of having conspired at another location. It is therefore ironical that they should be sentenced on a charge for which they did not face trial- AJ] The statement of this witness is extremely weak and full or errors. Witness is not reliable. Hence, it will not be judicious to hold the accused liable for conspiracy on the basis of his evidence. Everything that has been stated by Reginald Jeremiah in his evidence, is untrue. Nothing he has said in court is true. There is no doubt he has said all these things against Amit Jogi because of personal enmity, because after being fired from Akash Channel, he expected Amit Jogi to recommend his name for reinstatement to Rohit Prasad [the Director of the said channel], which the latter did not do…Hence, it does not seem proper to rely on any of this witness’s utterances.”

Accordingly, the Court has summoned him to appear tomorrow, the 5th of July, 2007, to face Trial for the aforementioned offence, punishable with life imprisonment.

The Ides of March
I recall, vividly, the catharsis that was Reginald’s testimony. It was the day after the festival of colors, Holi (which Reggie, the self-professed puritan of Scottish descent, deems a heresy). He entered the witness box at 4:30 p.m. sharp, half an hour before closing time. Armed personnel of the state police’s crime squad encircled him. He didn’t once look me in the face; not even when the then learned judge asked him to identify me.

Upon his return to Delhi, he was celebrated as a “hero”- the ideal prosecution witness in the Age of Zaheera Sheikhs- most enthusiastically by the NDTV correspondent, Sunetra Choudhary, who was enticed by her ‘sources’ in the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to do a primetime story on him: “At a time when witnesses in high-profile criminal cases are turning hostile," Ms. Choudhary proclaimed, "one young man has withstood threats to testify in the (Ram) Avtar Jaggi murder case”. Finally, justice had been done to the Mafiosi-son of a high-profile politician: “Jeremiah’s statement is enough to nail Amit.”

Indeed it might well have been so. Fortunately for me, we were able to establish beyond a shadow of doubt that everything he uttered that day in the packed courtroom was nothing but lies, dictated to him by certain officials at the Bureau. For the record, the meticulous demolition of his evidence has very little to do with oral testimonies (or as the popular expression goes, ‘with witnesses turning hostile’); on the contrary, it is based exclusively on unimpeachable “documentary evidence”: Passports- verified by the Indian High Commission at London in pursuance of information received from Her Majesty’s Home Department- proved that atleast three persons who had allegedly played a pivotal role in the conspiracy according to Reginald on the night of 21st May 2003 at the hotel Greenpark in Raipur, weren’t even in India; Telephonic Call Details (obtained unwittingly by the CBI, no less) and Newspaper Reports disproved Reggie’s claims on other material points; even the Bureau’s Case Diary did not come to his aid. With every word that escaped his lips, Reginald willfully perjured himself.

Even now, I cannot say why he did what he did: lying when he knew only too well that his lies might well become the noose around my neck? Was it fear; possibly greed; or a bit of both? I will never really know. One thing is for certain: Reginald’s actions have forced me to question everything I thought I knew- and cherished- about Human Nature: the things that make us ‘human’. However, there have also been extraordinary kindnesses, too many to recount here, that are more than enough to heal this most unkind cut.

Honourable Men
Under the circumstances, what can I do? For me, one of the most difficult things about this Trial has been to come to terms with Reginald's act. As a Christian, I feel myself bound by the following passage, not from the retributive prophesies of his namesake (the Old Testament Book of Jeremiah) but from that most humane of Gospels, Matthew:

Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy times seven.”
(Matthew 18:21-22)

Tonight, when I go to sleep, I want to do so with a clear conscience: having forgiven Reginald, I now leave him to God’s- and the Court’s- Judgment. May the Lord give me the strength to do so.

AJ
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Voices from Tala: Village Diary Preview

Recently, the IANS/Reuters correspondent for Chhattisgarh, Mr. Sujith Kumar, wrote a piece on my stay at Tala, entitled, 'Amit Jogi Toils With Tribals, for Career's Sake', which was carried by a variety of newspapers (22.07.07). On the whole, it offers a somewhat different perspective of things, projecting a motive where none in fact exists.

Note: I am in Raipur tonight to attend Mr. Chaveendra Karma's wedding reception, and will return to Tala tomorrow morning. Presented below are excerpts from my Village Diary. Before I part, I would like to share with the Reader the following hana (folk-saying):

Char godh ké Chappo (Four-footed Chappo)
Tekhar upar Nippo (Above, Nippo)
Aa gayé Gappo (Came Gappo)
Lé gayé Nippo (Took Nippo)
Baacché Chappo Chappo (Remains only Chappo Chappo)

The above hana makes so much more sense once we know that 'Chappo' stands for Mother Earth; 'Nippo' refers to Mankind; and 'Gappo' is Death. Makes one think, doesn't it?

AJ


June 21-22, 2007
Mr. Kuber Yadu, a longtime family associate handpicked by Papa & SNT principally due to his incontrovertible ‘Chhattisgarhi’ credentials, accompanies me to Tala; enroute, we halt at his village, Marrakona on the banks of the river Seonath. At Mr. Yadu’s farm, I am given a crash course in the three kinds of sowing prevalent in the region: khurra (dry-sowing, before rainfall); batar (after rainfall); and ropa (wet-sowing, i.e., transplanting of saplings raised in a nursery, tharra). He insists on my paying obeisance to the local deity, Mawli Mata.


After crossing the river Maniyari, a tributary of the Seonath, we arrive at our destination, Tala (aka Ameri-Kapa). Well, not Tala per sé. My host, Mr. Siyaram Kaushik, who is also the local MLA, has lodged me in one of the rooms of a newly constructed temple-complex adjacent to the historic- and only one of its kind- statue of Rudra-Siva (more about this later; photo above). To my disappointment, he has had a rather noisy water cooler fitted in it. Happily though, for ablutions I must, like the rest of the village folk, rely on the Great Wide Open. Or, as the locals refer to it: bahi-dahar (literally: out of the way, or outskirt). It is well past midnight by the time dinner is cooked: it comprises a simple but fulfilling meal of rice, dal and beans (sémee) with a relish of raw onions.

My desire to sleep outside is summarily dismissed citing snakes: the ghodi-karayat variety, which is small, jet-black and deadly poisonous, is more fearsome than the asadhiya, which is long, fair and has the cumulative effect of a shot of marijuana (weed). Mr. Yadu fondly recollects that this reptilian analogy was used by his late father, the freedom fighter Mr. Parasram Yadu, to compare my father with his rival, Vidya Charan Shukla.

I wake up at 5:30 a.m. Bravely, I venture out into the unknown for my morning ablutions; with a little help from Mr. Yadu, I find a nice little spot to defecate. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts, I remain constipated for the rest of the day. After a quick bath at the local bored-well, right in the front of the historic Siva statue, we head off to the nearby fields: here, I try my hand at the Nagar, the neolithic plough still in vogue. It is pulled by two bullocks: to make a right-turn, shout Arra to the bull on the right; for left, it’s Tatta to the bull on the left; and to stop, Ho-ho. If they don’t obey, simply use the stick (tutari). For a first-timer, I do OK.


I also learn a little bit about how farmland is divided. Apparently, the revenue department has got it all wrong. Instead of the patwari’s maps (khasra), villagers prefer to follow the rule of the incline (slope): water flows downwards from the pakhar to the ghansa; accordingly, the field on the side of pakhar (upland) is called pakhar-bhata; likewise for ghansa. The problem, really, pertains to ownership of the raised piece of land that separates the fields, called med. According to the law, all owners have equitable rights over the med. This is easier said than done, and quite naturally, becomes a major cause of disputes: who, for instance, owns the mango tree growing on the med? Now, according to the custom of chanda-munara, each farmer has rights to two of the four meds, one of pakhar and the other of ghansa. This example illustrates the precedence custom- or common law- has over formalistic (land revenue) regulations.

In the evening, we take a bullockcart (bailagadi) ride to the village to participate in the evening ritual called ‘gudi ke goth’ (literally, talks of the village square). The commands Arr-Tatta-Hoho apply equally to the Nagar as well as the bailagadi. At the gudi, where I sit cross-legged on the ground with the rest of the village folk, the entire atmosphere is marked by a refreshing frankness: more than the men, it’s the women who do the talking. The politest way of starting a conversation is to ask: “ka saag rangath has?” (what’s cooking?) Soon, I am in the midst of a culinary class. The staple, basi, or left-over rice from last night soaked in water, is also the favorite: it tastes absolutely marvelous with a jojo (fried-chutney) of tomato, red-chillies or (as Papa likes it) garlic, a bhaaji (sautéed green leafy vegetable) and some curd. As a rule, womenfolk are expected to carry a batki of basi on their heads along with these condiments to the menfolk, who are working hard at their fields, at precisely twelve ’o clock. This hour of midday rest is called thad ki béra (ironically, thad means to stand upright, no doubt an allusion to the sun's perpendicular position).

The womenfolk, comprising all castes, gather around the choura (sacred platform), to dance to the Sua. From the lyrics, it appears that Suas are intensely religious songs, not very different in content from the monastic evensong:

Ayodhya mein Ram khélé hori (Ram plays holi in Ayodhya)
Mati mangalé, Choura bandhalé (Get the mud, Build the Choura)
Ayodhya mein Ram...
Chaanti bechara dohara mati (Even the poor ants bring mud)
Ayodhya mein Ram...
Jahan bajé nagada dason jodi (Where drums resound is ten-pairs)
Ayodhya mein Ram...

As we walk back to the temple-complex, a distance of a kilometer and a half, we stop at a house. Here, we are given a demonstration of three household implements found in almost every village home, by the family’s venerable ‘mayaru bhouji’ (beloved eldest sister-in-law): the jata (used for grinding flour); the déki with its iron-pounder called musar (used to dehusk paddy); and the konéta jata (mud grinder used for dehusking the relatively softer kodo, an excellent diabetic-substitute for rice). There is also the gorsi, an earthen vessel in which cowdung cakes are burnt, to roast rotis, or simply to keep warm during winters. All these implements are made at home by the ladies. On the road, we are crossed by the dreaded ghodi-karat. As with every other omen, this is interpreted as a sign of good luck.

Tomorrow, we intend going fishing with the Kevats & Dhevars. The prospective catch, comprising of Tengna and Kokhiya, promises to be appetizing. Naturally, I am rather looking forward to it.

June 23, 2007
It’s almost four p.m., and there’s no sign of the boatman: the geriatric sarpanch, it appears, has bungled gloriously and wishes to makeup with extra-doses of ‘Chhattisgarhi’ lessons, which I am understandably in no mood for.

Consequently, I spent much of the forenoon with the daily-wage laborers, beneficiaries of the REGS, constructing the embankment. The female laborers are called reja. It is their job to carry an iron-basket called dhamela filled with the mortar on their heads; the headrest- a piece of rolled-up cotton scarf- is called gurri. They are paid Rs. 60 per day. Hardly adequate compensation, I should think, for them to afford the anthi (a silver bracelet, less thick than the harayya), the Rupayya (a necklace of silver coins) and the four-beaded (ladi) kardhani (silver waistband), with which they are all adorned. Indeed, I am in no doubt that they are better economists than the chaps sitting in the Finance Ministry.

The rains prompt a group of young girls to play Fugri. The game begins with a song that ends with one of them asking the question: tor beti ké ka naav hé? (what is the name of your daughter?). The answer- Shree Kajar Mati- initiates the next phase, where the squatting girls quickly start to move their legs, one by one, in a fast kicking motion; and the one who does this the longest wins. Mr. Kaushik very wisely informs me that games such as these help prepare pubescent women for natural child-births.

The boatman arrives at 5; his oar- kirwar- is located by 5:30. The boat called Donga, part of the state government’s Nava Anjor doleout, is large; it is also extremely leaky. “The wood,” the dongahar or boatman explains, “dried up in the summer.” At considerable risk, then, we ride upstream to the old dolomite overbridge below the national highway. Unlike the donga, this relic of the Raj is in excellent shape. All of us are quite wet, not because of the rain (which has momentarily stopped) but because of the copious amount of water in the boat. Under the circumstances, it is only natural that our conversation turns to Alhan, or mishaps. An alhan, if not stopped, turns to Karlai, or tragedy. In a karlai, the appropriate lingo is: “jeev kalla gé” (soul is shaken). By the time we set anchor (after a nearly-missed alhan with an unseen rock), I am thankful that this truly soul-shaking excursion has finally ended.

June 28, 2007
I have been truant, dillydallying confiding my sojourns to the Diary. Given the rigors, mostly physical, of rural life, it’s no wonder that most villagers don’t bother keeping one. There are times, like when we made an excursion to see the ancient Chaturbhuja Vishnu statue excavated on the banks of the Arpa at Mangala-Matiyari, when I wish they did: the keeper of that temple professes to be 122 years old (I couldn’t help wondering that he was born in the same year as when that Mandarin, Alan Octavian Hume founded the Congress); he lives all by himself, and complains of having been abandoned by all but his deity, whom he serves relentlessly. I must mention that the banks of the rivers Arpa, Seonath and Manihari, all of which crisscross this constituency, are a hidden repository of untold treasures- entire archaeologies of long lost civilizations, now buried under the sands of time- that demand to be excavated, restored and preserved for posterity; if nothing is done, then we- those who live in this Age- are alone to blame.

But I am getting ahead of myself: the narrative must recommence from where I left it: a visit to Matku Deep, a riverine island on the Seonath with an area of about 40 hectares. For reasons I haven’t been able to decipher, it is now the site of an annual Christian Méla (fete). To get to it, we have to ride a dongi (a two-seater donga). The ride itself is somewhat precarious, as the hon’ble MLA discovered much to his chagrin, when the dongi overturned and he very nearly drowned: the correct expression is, he got choro-boro. Thankfully, the water was only waist-deep (kaniya-bhar); and yet another alhan was avoided. Later, after lunch comprising of bankukuri (jungle-hen), we explored the ruins of the haveli of the local zamindar, Akbar Khan, at his capital at Sargaon. As it happened, we scared a bunch of village-alvain (miscreants) busy gambling in one of its several rooms. It was to one of Akbar Khan’s descendants that the Congress turned to, to defeat the formidable Barrister Chedilal, who (if the memoirs of DP Mishra are to be believed) was tricked-out of the state’s chief ministership by Pandit Ravi Shankar Shukla. The other piece of trivia that is worth reporting concerns the christening of the sole railway station of this area: Dagori. The story goes that Akbar Khan challenged the British that his horse, Gauri, was faster than any rail-engine. Our British overlords accepted his challenge, and lost. However, true to form they did name the station after Akbar Khan’s legendary equerry, and in time, “The Gauri” became “Dagori”.

Pradeep (Choubey) Uncle took charge from Mr. Yadu on the 24th. Unlike the latter, Pradeep Uncle insisted that my rural-education must be caste-blind. I am thus instructed to ignore all Hanas (village sayings) with casteistic undertones. Here, I beg to dissent. Hanas, after all, provide an invaluable insight into the dynamics of village-life: how people see, and interact, with each other; what divides and unites them? Also, unlike Mr. Yadu, Pradeep Uncle’s primary language is Hindi and it was not uncommon for him to ‘slip’ into Hindi at the slightest instance. However, his knowledge of Hindu culture made him an informed guide during our visit to two temples (on the 25th), one of which- the Chaturbhuja alluded to above- is of vast historical importance. The other is a rock that has jettisoned out of a field at Belbhata, which the villagers worship as a Shivlinga.

On the 26th, we journeyed to the village of Bamu, some seven kilometers downstream from the dam at Kutaghat (Mummy’s constituency). Although this wasn’t exactly part of our initial itinerary, the fact that Mr. Ramesh Kaushik, the newly-elected chairman of the district Cooperative Bank, is possibly the only farmer in this region to have already begun ropa plantation (transplanting of saplings, alluded to before) on his fifty-acre farm made his invitation irresistible. Most others will do so only later next month, with the onset of Sawan (when the monsoon peaks). His reasons, I believe, are twofold: first, unlike others, he doesn’t believe in the efficacy of consulting the deva-panchanga (the traditional Hindu calendar)- with its not always arbitrary emphasis on the Anjoriya (bright) and Andhiyar (dark) paksha (side) of everything- on matters of agriculture; two, his farms proximity to the dam and the more than ten tube-wells he has dug here ensure a constant supply of standing-water, necessary for this sort of cultivation. I use this opportunity to plant tharras (grown saplings from the nursery) with my feet knee-deep (madhi-bhar) in the slushy water; and also learn to plow and level (jotai-matai) the field using a tractor. Compared to the nagar, which has only one nasa, the contemporary tractor comes with nine. It took me less than half an hour to plow the field with the tractor; I could manage only two kuds with a nagar in that time. But it is a lot trickier to plow the tractor in a slushy, water-filled field- indeed, there are instances when tractors have overturned, fatally wounding its driver. (see below)



However, the greatest danger facing the farmers here is the monkey-plague. The rumor whose veracity I cannot verify is that monkeys (bendra) from all over the nation are being packed off to Chhattisgarh by the trainloads. Apparently, there isn’t much one can do although my advice to domesticate (pausayya) a red-faced monkey to drive off a pack of black-faced ones- something I learnt at Delhi, where a similar plague threatens the workings of North and South Blocks, the twin-epicenters of India’s Government- went down rather well with the villagers. For their sake and mine, I hope it works.

27th being the date of (a friend) Sanju Thakur's wedding, I debunk to Bilaspur; Pradeep Uncle, after three days of chaperoning me, returned to his farmland at Saja. His observation that it is becoming increasingly difficult to hire daily-wage farm laborers (banihars) even at increased wages is both good and bad: good because banihars now get higher remuneration for their labor; bad because they have to leave the state, go to the metros and work in the construction sector under mostly inhuman conditions in order to do so. A lot of the rural educated youth that I’ve come across don’t care to work the fields, not even their own, because education, like the Biblical forbidden fruit, has apparently taught them that plowing the nagar is beneath them. At every village I visit, groups of young men can be seen flocking around the local paan and booze shops, in various stages of drunkenness. Infact, the plight of the contemporary rural youth is an issue that I intend returning to later. Curiously, booze itself is referred to as ‘Amolak Singh’, after the notorious liquor contractor who controls the country liquor shops in this region, and indeed all of Chhattisgarh.

This afternoon, I went fishing. I am told that until they open the gates of the dam at Gangrel, our chances of catching fish in the Maniyari- or the Seonath- aren’t very good; so we head with our fishing gear, comprising garis (fishing rods made of bamboo sticks) and gangarvas (earthworms used as bait), to the fishing-tarayyas (ponds) of Kapa, a neighboring village. Putting the squishy-gangarvas into the hook is considered ‘dirty’, and so most castes, apart from the Kevats and the Dhevars, avoid ‘playing’ gari (apparently, this caste-restriction doesn’t seem to apply to the kids, who seem to love it). Akhil, who has accompanied me from Bilaspur, catches a rather juicy tengna (the tastier but smaller kotari, beloved of Papa, are harder to catch). As for me, while I manage to bait 13 times, I don’t catch even one tiny fish. The villagers console me that feeding fish (which is precisely what I did although I had rather hoped that it would be vice-versa) augurs a significant blessing from the lake deity, who is worshipped in the form of a wooden pillar at the centre of the pond.

Armed with such a blessing, we head to Chunchuniya, to see the do-mohan or the confluence of the Seonath with its tributary, Maniyari, on the opposite bank of our temple-complex. The majhis (fishermen-boatmen) here have much better luck with their soukhis (fishing nets); ergo, we won’t starve for dinner.

The tribal headman of Chunchuniya regales us with Karma- or Gond devotional- music, and a song he has composed to commemorate my stay. His repertoire of musical instruments comprises a Mandar and a pair of Tabla-dubki, made exclusively of goat-skin and baked clay. An almost primordial sound is produced by beating the goat-skin (chavni) on either sides of the instrument. The number of gotis (circles) in the kharvan- a blackened circle at the centre of the chavni- determine the tonality and range of the instrument’s acoustics. A quartet that impressed me particularly goes something like this:

Kan kan ma sabké tain rahité (You dwell in every grain of everyone)
Sabké ghat-ghat chhayé (You give shade to everyone's heart)
Gondiyan ké purkha kahilayé (You are called the Ancestor of all Gonds)
Sada kal lé aayé (You come from time immemorial)

On our way back, we witness a burial: a rather somber affair sans ceremony of any sort. It’s a lot cheaper than lighting a funeral-pyre.

June 29, 2007
It’s been raining cats and dogs all day; consequently we while away time listening to a Satnami gentleman called Mr. Indal from the village Darua-Kapa, who had previously floored us with his vast treasure trove of folksongs during our visit to Matku Deep. His songs- both their content and rendition- deserve a separate commentary, which I shall undertake once I’ve been able to decipher my quickly-scribbled notes.

In the evening, we visited the village Godhi, where I dined on angakar, a local delicacy of flattened rice-flour dough wrapped between parsa leaves and gently baked over cowdung fire in an earthen gorsi: it tastes best with patal (tomato) chutney. For now, it’s late and thanks to Dr. Raman Singh, there is no sign of electricity; best then to sleep.
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NOTICE: A Village is My World

Anyone who hopes to do any good for this nation, and has not lived in- I mean, really lived as opposed to merely visited- villages, is a hypocrite: I too am one. How dare could I presume to speak of things I have not myself experienced; for a people whose pain I have not myself felt? All my notions of rural empowerment are, therefore, hollow: in the end, they amount to nothing. Indeed, not having lived in a village is my single biggest handicap.

The Mahatma is right even today: India does live in her villages; but more to the point, she also dies in them. Everyday. The reason, in my opinion, is this: the world occupied by India’s decision-makers isn’t quite the same as the one in which those they decide for live. Even worse, there is absolutely no 'dialogue' between these two worlds; it seems the one doesn't know of- or atleast, is quite content to ignore- the other's existence.

I saw this other world- the world that lies beyond conference halls and powerpoint presentations- during the one year I was jailed; I lived in it, and witnessed life, naked and raw, bereft of color, in black & white. But that is not enough. It can never be.

For the next thirty days, I intend, therefore, to live in a village. Not as an Observer, mind you, but as a full and active Participant of village-life: much like my forefathers. Hopefully, I will begin to learn something about who I am; about the lifeblood that runs in my veins and connects me- binds me- not only to my venerable ancestors but also to the more than twenty-million people who dwell in Chhattisgarh.

It’s sowing season now. A time, aptly, for new beginnings.



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