Southern Odyssey 1 : Srisailam – Set off from home at about 7 am on the 24th Nov for Srisailam. The workday traffic was already thick on the city roads and the highway opened up only after crossing Pahadi Shareef (famous for the Dargah of Syedna Baba Sharfuddin). The road leading to the Nallamala hills snaked through the picturesque Amrabad Tiger Reserve and passed through quaintly named villages like Domala Penta (Heap of mosquitoes) and Eegala Penta (Heap or pile of flies), which, belying their names, were spotlessly clean. The road then descended into the reservoir area of Srisailam Dam (one of the largest in South India) before climbing up to Srisailam. Among the notice boards indicating various shrines and holy places, was an exhortation to the visitors to refrain from smoking and drinking in the temple city.
Monday, May 15, 2023
Monday, September 5, 2022
The First Grand
Gesture of the First Citizen - President Murmu
President Murmu joins this illustrious company, having worked as a teacher for more than a decade before she entered politics. The First Citizen has already chalked up many notable milestones such as being the first tribal person to be the President of India and being the youngest President ever. She now has an opportunity to match the expansive vision and largesse of Dr Radhakrishnan – by dedicating the Rashtrapati Nilayam at Secunderabad, the official winter retreat of the President, to another nascent institute of national importance, the Indian Defence University (IDU). Spread over 90 acres, the erstwhile Residency (the official residence of the British Resident to the Court of the Nizam of Hyderabad), is located on the north-western periphery of Secunderabad Cantonment, with easy access to both civil and military areas. The size and location are ideal for the nucleus of the IDU.
Rashtrapati Nilayam at Secunderabad - Pic Courtesy : wikipedia.org
Initially conceived in 1967 to address the deficiencies in India’s security management system, and recommended by successive committees set up to deal with defence reforms, the proposal for establishing the Indian Defence University was approved ‘in principle’ by the union cabinet in 2010. The University has been “broadly envisioned as a teaching and affiliating University to
· develop and promote higher education and
research in National Security Studies, Defence Management, Defence Technology
and allied areas;
· serve as think tank contributing to policy
formulation;
· prepare the personnel of the national security
establishments and the academic community from within India and from friendly
foreign countries for high-level leadership, staff and policy responsibilities;
and
· create competencies related to national security issues.”
The foundation stone for the university was laid at Binola in Gurgaon on 23 May 2013. Since then, as per open source information, only the construction of boundary wall, perimeter road, watch towers and guard rooms has been taken up and completed on the 200 acre complex. No significant progress seems to have been made to make the university functional till date. It may, therefore, not be too late to review the choice of location of the Indian Defence University and consider Secunderabad as an option for locating the Indian Defence University.Sunday, September 13, 2015
Have You Been Baader-Meinhoffed Lately?
Not something I'd read normally in my line of work. And certainly not something I would choose to read. But here I was at the barbershop, and the wait list promised a couple of hours of uninterrupted reading. So, I soldiered on. And reached the part containing an account of the extraordinary Mr Phineas Gage. This American railroad construction foreman (how apt! Are you Broad, Metre or Narrow, Mr Gage?) survived an accident in which a large iron rod was driven completely through his head, destroying much of his brain's left frontal lobe and the injury affected his personality and behaviour so profoundly that friends saw him as "no longer Gage".
Tonight, I got around to reading about this uncanny phenomenon of unlikely coincidences. And found that it actually has a name - Baader Meinhof!! Are you kidding me?
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
No Innocents in War
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Jai Ho, JLF
Some meetings take years to happen. And some, decades. Like my meeting with Wole Soyinka. It was in 1987 or 1988 that I travelled to Mysore (a trip sponsored by Vijay, English professor by training and indulgent banker to insolvent friends by inclination). Wole Soyinka, recently awarded the Nobel Prize for literature, was expected to attend a seminar on African Literature at the Mysore University. In the event, He did not. And instead of the prized autograph of a Nobel Laureate, what I ended up with was a middle for the TOI. Two decades later, as we entered Diggi Palace for DSC Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) 2010, almost the very first person one bumped into was Wole Soyinka, in all his resplendent silver-maned glory!
Day 1
So, how did it all begin? The first day festivities, from what one heard, were sabotaged by an unlikely foe – the Delhi fog! Flights got cancelled, writers were stranded, organisers were bemused, schedules went awry. In short, SNAFU!
Day 2
After a short rest and a gargantuan breakfast of the most delectable parathas, we reached Diggi Palace as Soyinka was heading for his session in the sun-washed front lawns. We thought we’d give the other venues a quick dekko before getting back to Soyinka and trooped into the bright-hued Baithak (despite the grandeur of the Durbar Hall and the wide openness of the front lawns, it is the Baithak with its pinks and greens, oranges and yellows, settees and bolsters, modas and charpoys, which truly dazzles). The discussion that soon began – Pavan Varma, Om Thanvi and Gulzar on ‘Language and Identity’- had us hooked. Pavan was at his eloquent best, espousing the cause of other Indian languages, not as substitutes for English, but as essential tools to realise one’s innate Indianness. Om Tanvi lovingly spoke of the ‘choli-dhaman’ relationship between Hindi and Urdu, a sentiment passionately echoed by Gulzar Saab. As the vibrant discussion drew to a close, one wondered if there indeed is a need and opportunity for an Indian Esperanto. Or, given the animosity that Hindi engenders in some parts of the country, is there scope for any other Indian language (Sanskrit?) to be lingua franca? Sadly, in all this excitement, we missed Wole Soyinka’s session completely. Will there be a third chance, maybe after another decade or two?
Treat of another kind awaited us immediately post-lunch - Shabana Azmi, Rahul Bose, Alka Pande, Catherine Cle’ment (she’s French, so be careful how you pronounce Cle’ment) discussing ‘Social Activism in the Arts’. Rahul Bose’s candid admission that film actors are not known so much for their intellectual acuity as for their emotional acuity, was itself a reflection of this ‘activist’ actor’s thinking mind. Shabana warmed the cockles of many bleeding hearts when she said that a sensitive actor would invariably get involved with the lives (s)he portrays.
In a free-wheeling discussion on ‘Can the Internet Save Books’, Vikram Chandra (his Sacred Games has, for long, substituted the missing leg of my desk – maybe I’ll even read it one day) made an interesting point about how the printed book is nothing but a business model. His prognosis was that ‘books’ will survive the internet onslaught but may morph in their appearance. While Vikram re-‘Kindle’d interest in e-books and Tina Brown highlighted the immense reach of The Daily Beast (http://www.thedailybeast.com/), fondness for the book as we know it was apparent among many.
Queen’s Hinglish, which had Mark Tully, Ira Pande and Prasoon Joshi on the panel, reframed the language debate held earlier in the day. As somebody in the audience remarked, Hinglish may soon give way to Indlish, given the myriad forms that English takes in different parts of the country. The discussion, although animated, lacked the intellectual vigour of a Om Thanvi - Pavan Varma - Gulzar debate. Young and articulate, Prasoon plumbed the depths of human emotion with great finesse during ‘Chalte Chalte’, the poetry reading session that ensued, along with veteran Javed Akhtar.
As the lucent moon began his languid ascent over the velvet sky, the glitterati of Jaipur descended on Diggi Palace. It was time for the weightier matters of the mind to give way to the lighter affairs of the heart. Animesh, friend and former colleague, had joined us in the afternoon. Ashok and Mita, friends from another era and now settled in Jaipur, also came by in the evening. We retired to the poolside with an appropriately eudemonic measure of (good) spirits from The Flow, the charming alfresco restaurant on the premises. Gulabo and Titi Robin took the stage. The amber liquid cruising through weary limbs and the hypnotic rhythm of Gulabo’s gyrations spread a warm glow of contentment. After a sparse dinner of exquisitely camouflaged and outrageously priced chapatis, we headed home.
Day 3
What’s a good time to begin your day on a holiday? We figured anytime before 11 am would be obscene. Which meant we’d miss the first session of the day that began at 10 am. Well, you win some, you lose some.
When we walked in that Monday morning, after another gastronomic overindulgence, Basharat Peer was moderating ‘Bin Laden after Bush’. I don’t know what the organisers had in mind but one middlingly successful book (albeit, a finely crafted one) cannot automatically make its author an authority on terrorism. True enough, Basharat was not. But his panellists – Lawrence Wright, Steve Coll et al - knew their Laden. And Basharat was happy letting them speak. The panel, after sharing some truly fascinating vignettes about the Bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and al-Qaeda, reached the conclusion that, even as the civilised world fashions mechanisms to thwart its designs, al-Qaeda will work around the impediments and continue to explore new ways of propagating its terror message. That indeed was a chilling prospect.
Continuing to bask in the golden sunshine of the front lawns, we waited for the high-octane discussion ‘In a Tough Neighbourhood’. As I looked around, two things were immediately clear. One, black is the new black. Black to my right, black to my left, black of a blouse, black of a bra, black in a tee, black in a tie. Black, black, black. And this was all before noon. What would these beautiful people do for evening wear? More black, as I learnt later! That was observation number one. Observation number two, not all people feel cold on a chilly winter morning. The abandon with which skin was being displayed made one wonder if cold is just a state of mind!
Ali Sethi, Asma Jehangir, Romesh Gunasekera, Shazia Omar, Shyam Saran and Siddharth Varadarajan soon took their places and began discussing the depressing prospect of living in a neighbourhood such as ours. Ali Sethi, all of 25 years old, spoke with unusual gravitas and insight. Asma Jehangir preened, full of self-importance and been-there-done-that indifference. Romesh made some mild remarks and let others tread through the minefield. Shazia Omar, she of that elfin smile, waif-like figure and almond eyes, appeared to be in the same amphetamine-induced trance that her characters of ‘Like A Diamond in the Sky’ floated in. Shyam Saran highlighted the need for India, with its huge footprint over South Asia, to be wary of taking prematurely pro-active interest in the affairs of its neighbours. Siddharth Varadarajan proved to be an able moderator, skilfully steering the focus towards areas of convergence and avoiding acrimony.
Post lunch, we scurried to Baithak to hear Tony Wheeler recount the fascinating ‘Lonely Planet Story’ – how Tony and his wife Maureen hit the hippy trail soon after their marriage, how a book came out of these travels and how Lonely Planet is where it is today. Interestingly, Tony claims that Lonely Planet is the only book that is available on all the continents, including Antarctica!
The JLF takes pride in being a completely democratic affair. The seating at every venue is strictly on ‘first-come-first-seated’ basis. No VIP seats, no reserved slots. As a result, a Deepti Naval or an Om Puri or a Navtej Sarna may just have to stand right through a session. More often than not, William Dalrymple, one of the festival directors, could be seen seated on the floor, along with school children and sundry late-comers. The only time I saw an exception being made was for Ms Vasundhara Raje. Even then, a chair was brought from inside the house and placed unobtrusively, without either interrupting the session or disturbing the audience. This complete absence of protocol was truly liberating, especially for one so bound by it in professional life.
We were caught in a dilemma. Should we go into the Durbar Hall and hear Niall Ferguson speak on ‘The Ascent of Money’ or should we make our way to the Moghul Tent for the discussion ‘Of Women, Rebels and Peasants’ by Dilip Simeon and Nandini Sundar? Niall Ferguson, the Harvard Don, had formidable credentials. On the other hand, I had heard Dilip Simeon earlier at LSR and was impressed by his well-reasoned arguments. We decided that the dimensions of social unrest in India deserve our attention more than the ascent of filthy lucre. A decision which was not regretted but certainly reviewed since we heard glowing accounts of the Ferguson session. As for Women, Rebels and Peasants, we had the pleasure of hearing a Delhi University professor, a charming one at that, use the F word with great aplomb, while rendering a moving account of how a success story for the state spells devastation for its people. And hearing Dilip Simeon’s semi-fictional account of a Naxal’s encounter with two French leftists and his telling commentary on the futility of violence. It was all getting too much for me. I was choking under the weight of terrorism, regional disputes and social unrest thrown at me with unrelenting earnestness. Gimme a break for chrissake!
Day 4
Lawrence Wright, Pulitzer Prize winner, opened the day in the front lawns, with ‘The Looming Tower’. Introduced by Shazia Omar (yes, the one with waif-like figure), once part of the post-undergrad elite of Manhattan, now writer, who was actually there at Ground Zero when 9/11 happened, and had a ‘life-changing’ experience (http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/true-life/last-train-from-wtc). Wright generously emptied his haversack and displayed his tools of the trade – legal paper, spare batteries, spare recorders, water bottle, list of contacts, reference cards etc etc. He bemoaned the fact that the FBI is staffed with Italians and the Irish, a throwback to the times when America’s greatest threats were the Mafia and the IRA, whereas what it urgently requires are native Arabic speakers who understand the language and culture of potential al-Qaeda recruits.
The front lawns quickly filled up for Tina Brown’s Diana Chronicles. Tina, former editor of Tatler and Vanity Fair, now the editor of the Daily Beast (http://www.thedailybeast.com/), threw light on some of the most controversial moments of Late Princess Diana’s troubled life. Her interlocutor, the suave Vir Sanghvi, managed to ferret out salacious details of royal romps, such as Prince Charles’ desire to be addressed as ‘Arthur’ during the act and for Camilla Parker Bowles to be his ‘rocking-horse’. The trouble between Charles and Diana, as Tina put it, was that Charles did not know Diana’s geography!
Having learnt ‘all that we always wanted to know about the sex life of Princess Diana but were afraid to ask’, we set off in search of a light meal. Hotel Meru Palace, on Sawai Ram Singh Road, barely 500 m from Diggi Palace, appeared promising. We ordered some noodles and veg Manchurian. By my reckoning, that must’ve been the first time someone ventured to order Chinese food in that restaurant (which may be approximately 15 years old). After much discussion and frenetic scurrying of waiters, some unrecognisably gooey stuff, floating in oodles of orange-yellow oil, made its appearance on the table. ‘Veg Manchurian’, the waiter announced with visible pride. ‘Where are the noodles?’, I asked. ‘They’ll be coming’ he assured, possibly muttering ‘as soon as the chef figures out how to cook them’ under his breath. When they did arrive, a full twenty minutes later, the noodles looked like noodles and tasted like nothing I’d ever eaten before. Thankfully, not much damage could be done to the Kingfisher Lager I’d ordered.
When we returned to the Mughal Tent, Maya Jasanoff was narrating the tale of American refugees loyal to the British Crown and their dispersal among various colonies of the Empire (including India), after the American War of Independence. Intrigued by this hitherto unknown bit of history and charmed by Maya’s account, I hurried off soon after to Full Circle to pick up a copy of Edge of Empire. But, before I could actually pay for it, an old friend, who now reads books for a living, sauntered up and advised against it saying the book was rather patchy. I’m not sure but I think I’ll buy it one of these days, anyway!
Back to the front lawns for ‘Scotland Presents Under the Kilt’, a delightful conversation among four amazing Scots – William Dalrymple, Alexander McCall Smith, Niall Ferguson and Andrew O’ Hagan. The discussion about all things Scotch was, quite simply, superb. Lacing their racy arguments with ready humour, witticisms, puns and one-liners, they did convince the audience that it is the Scots who ran the British Empire for the English!
As soon as the Scots were done with the laying bare their kilts, the audience rushed to the Durbar Hall for ‘The Directors Cut’, with Hanif Kureishi, Roddy Doyle and Stephen Frears. The folly of following the hype! The two of us had to squirm into one chair and suffer an hour of unintelligible remarks from Roddy Doyle, condescending comments from Hanif Kureishi (which mostly began or ended with ‘I don’t give a damn’) and brief, way too brief, one word responses from Stephen Frears. All this while, as we learnt later, Reba Som and Malashri Lal were enthralling the more discerning audience in Baithak with exquisite insights into Rabindra Sangeet. This surely was an expensive miss.
The evening extravaganza, being the last in the series, somewhat helped us overcome our sense of deprivation. Sufi Qawalls from Sindh and Biddu of ‘Aap Jaisa Koi Mere Zindagi Mein Aaye’ fame, in entirely different ways, enchanted the hugely appreciative crowd. We met up with the charming Rathores, friends from Kalimpong days. More bubbly, more conviviality, a growing feeling that God’s in His heaven and all’s well with the world.
Day 5
Lunch with the Manns – makki ki roti, saag and chilled beer. And hurtled back to a debate on Publishing in the Next Decade. VK Karthika of Harper Collins made a telling observation – why is it that the retailer, the one with the highest margins in the book business, does precious little to promote books? Well okay, an Oxford Book Store here, a Crossword there and an Odyssey thence do make the effort but, is that enough? Shoma Chaudhury revealed what Tehelka painstakingly surveyed and found out – something I thought was obvious even to a layperson – among all the metros, Delhi spends the least on books!
Books discussed, ideas debated, viewpoints exchanged, friendships renewed, music enjoyed, booze imbibed. JLF 2010 lived up to and beyond every expectation. For me, it was a different experience from JLF 2009. The last year, there was this ersatz fame to deal with, thanks to a fortuitous likeness to a then celebrated writer (http://keep-your-powder-dry.blogspot.com/2009/02/accidental-impostor-dr-sarwari-personal.html). The likeness issue having been fixed with some chemical engineering, the fame (both real and bogus) having evaporated, watchful wife having accompanied, I was left to my devices, to revel in my rightful anonymity.
Jai ho, JLF!!