Childhood and Calcutta..memoirs

Ajo ache shei sujji doba nodi



Ajo ache sei nokshi kathar math



Ache chalay chokh rekhe miche swapno dekha



Ache chile kothar ghare kichu ichche rakha



Dure chole geche , bahu dure.. bujhte parini kato dure

Albumer majhe din gulo harie geche

Sei barshay hatujal rastata aaj kothay ache?

Jani na, ami jani na…

Ajo jete chai sei ghum poriri deshe

Ajo choote chai shei chander pahar

Ache chander majhe charka burir chaka

Aache tepantarer mathe kichu swapno rakha

Doore chole geche , bahu doore.. bujhte parini kato doore..

Albumer majhe din gulo hariye geche

Shei grismer dupur gulo keno bodle geche

Jani na, ami jani na…





The song has been composed by, probably, the best-ever Bangla band, Paraspathar. It was composed way back in 1995-96 but the lyrics remain relevant even today.

I received this compilation as a forwarded email. Whoever has compiled this just wanted to tell him/her that it's beautiful and made me extremely nostalgic.

(Personal favourite is the second pic...dunno why...)

Weekend gone Awry!

T - “You are an ass!”
Me – “Umm….err…I know.”
T – “The whole world drinks on Saturdays …. Do you know that?”
M – “Umm...err…I know.”
T – “Oh just Fuck off.”


This is not how the evening or the conversation began, though. It began with a chance meeting with the girlfriend of my closest friend, PJ, who then bored me to death with her “My guy is the best” talks over a cup of coffee.

“Girls do act silly in love.”

I tried pacifying myself.

On my way back home from the coffee shop, I got a call from KS asking me to reach ‘Mezz’ in an hour’s time. And we, but, obviously had SJ, "King of good times", with us that evening who has been assigned a fixed waiter to keep on serving him till the time he can be thrown out of the pub.

KS – “What should I order for you? Beer? Light or strong? Ya fir vodka piyega?

Me – “I would like to have a fresh lime soda.”

“What??!!” (In unison)

Me – “I do not drink on Saturdays, dude. Arey I am a vegetarian on Saturdays, yaar!” (I announced, as naively as possible)

T - “You are an ass!”

Me – “Umm….err…I know that. But what exactly prompted you to say this just now?”

T – “The whole world drinks on Saturdays. Dude, after doing crazy hours in office this is the only day when you can calm down your nerves. And in any case you do not have get-togethers on weekdays, generally, right? Do you know all that?”

M – “Umm...err…I know.”

T – “Oh just f%&k off.”

Sensing the wrath I thought I was either about to be murdered or be asked to leave the pub immediately. But then I was grossly mistaken. They, actually, did something worse...

KS started it first, as he does everytime after a glass of beer, and within a couple of minutes I could hear them all declaring.... "My girl is the best". What followed was a thought provoking interactive session on 'why a certain female(s) is the ideal choice to be his girlfriend...sorry...wife (as referred to by the participants of the session)

"Boys do act silly in love."

As the session grew inexplicably intolerable, I turned my face towards the giant TV screen showing the FA cup final match between ManU and Chelsea. Thank God for football ! Totally engrossed in Lampard, Drogba, Rooney and the gang I barely listened to their crap.

All I could gather from their discussions and my similar past experiences is that:

Love is all about boring your friends with your respective girl/guy's talks

Love is all about talking for hours in the night (I wonder why only at night??!!) and add to that... purchasing a separate Reliance or Tata Indicom connection to facilitate the chatting process.

Love is all about meeting your love atleast thrice in a week(even if you stay 40kms apart) and then lamenting over the reduced number of meetings. (Shit man!She is going to Vaishno Devi for 3days.Now we will be able to meet only after she returns (whimper --> wail --> howl)!)

Love is all about being broke all the time. (even if your dad earns a lakh rupees a month.. that ain't enough)

Interestingly, NFC CC, the place where the pub is located, is known as the ‘Mecca of Non-Veg food’.

Probably T’s statement, which came when I was trying to handle four drunkards at the same time, sums it up the best:

“It was quite ironic to see a Bengali feed on the complimentary peanuts when people all around were gorging on the sumptuous non-veg buffet.”

Yes, difficult it was to resist but then I had no other choice.

Feel the pulse of poverty

"With urban poverty and destitution rising at an alarming rate, there is an urgent need for a well thought-out strategy, which will take health and other services to the people who live at the fringes" --

Having declared health as a major security concern, the World Health Organisation has urged all member-countries to look at the growing interdependence between health and security and invest generously in the heath sector to build a safer future.

It is true that India is progressing but there is another reality that we can’t deny: malnutrition deaths and destitution even in metropolises like Mumbai and Delhi. Demographers predict that while our urban population would double in the next 10 years, urban poverty will, in fact, double in five years.

Each Indian city has two parts: one half lives in relatively clean and healthy environs while the other lives in congested and overcrowded slums sans basic amenities. This lack of proper infrastructure makes people vulnerable to disease and health risks. In fact, development indices (infant and maternal mortality , immunisation and hospital deliveries) in cities are not different from rural areas. The infant mortality rate among the urban poor is 101.3 per thousand as compared to the urban average of 63.1 and the rural average of 103.7.

Moreover, with limited access to health services, 56.1 per cent of childbirths take place at home in poor urban families without trained attendants. This only pushes up the number of neonatal and maternal deaths.In the current context of increasing threats to people’s health, urban poverty and the quality of life of the urban poor assumes increasing significance. While India’s population is growing at 2 per cent, the annual growth of the urban population is 3 per cent. Meanwhile, metropolises are growing at 4 per cent, while growth rate of urban slums is 5 per cent. This imbalanced growth is forcing stakeholders, including healthcare providers, government and non-government agencies, to re-examine the issue of urban poverty .
Poverty is no longer a rural phenomenon. In 2001, 28 per cent of the population (90 million) was living in urban areas and of them, as much as 32 per cent were extremely poor.
Though people move to cities from rural areas in search of a better life, there is very little that changes. Most migrants can’t access medical care due to financial constraints and lack of awareness. They are hardly aware of immunisation or hospital deliveries. When the Urban Health Resource Centre (UHRC) Team, a non-profit organisation working with the urban poor in Delhi and Indore, conducted a survey in Indore’s slums in 2003, it found midwives were using stone or glass to cut umbilical cords. And, infants were given black tea and honey for three days after birth because breast milk was considered impure.

Given this scenario, there is urgent need for a well thought-out strategy that will take health and other services to the urban poor. This is the fastestgrowing segment of the population and their numbers are expected to touch 605-618 million between 2021-25. More important, they cannot be wished away Cities need them: they remove the garbage, . clean the streets, pull the rickshaws and do all kinds of not-so-pleasant jobs that makes life so much better for us. What is also little known is that they contribute 40 per cent of the urban GDP! In fact, health care providers and urban planners have suggested an agency on the lines of the National Rural Health Mission to deal with the various challenges that they face for providing services to this segment. For starters, there is need for a comprehensive mapping of slum areas in cities because accurate planning is possible only if numbers and locations of slums are known.
We also need to identify who actually needs support. There are scores of hidden and temporary slums and these never find a place on the government lists because they are located on the fringes of cities or on private lands.

Different slums have different vulnerabilities based on their location, employment patterns, literacy levels and gender status. For example, slums located near waste disposal sites and open drains are clearly disadvantaged in terms of health and hygiene Gender equity is critical as it enables the mother to use information she receives and take decisions regarding her own health and that of the family .

Moreover, it has also been found and established that empowered slum communities can ensure better accessibility and supply of services. Women from slums can trained to support others in pregnancy assist in providing neonatal care and create , a demand for services through individual and group counselling. They can also facilitate the holding of immunisation and antenatal care camps and the community to attend these camps and use the available services properly.

Written by Siddharth Agarwal, Executive Director , Urban Health Resources Centre
(Hindustan Times 03/05/2K7)

Prescription for disaster

The next time you pop a pill, chances are that it will do little to help you get better. This is because at least 30 per cent of all medication sold in India is fake, though the government disputes this figure.

The trade in such drugs is worth a staggering Rs 4,000 crore, not surprising since 38 per cent of the international fake drug market is sourced from India. One of the major hubs of the trade is a popular market in the middle of New Delhi. We must assume from this that the authorities are turning a blind eye to this racket. Our public health system is in a shambles. The fact that many drugs don't work can only add to our problems. There is no guarantee today that if you buy drugs from a reputed pharmaceutical, you are getting the real thing. The spurious drug trade has become so lucrative and sophisticated that it is very difficult to tell fake medication from a genuine one. To make matters worse, many drugs sold in India are of a lower potency than the one sold in the West. This could result in patients here becoming drug resistant.

The Indian pharma industry is worth Rs 20,000 crore and growing. India's reputation as a haven for spurious drugs and as an exporter of substandard medication will affect this growth adversely The US has put India on a watch list of several other countries for the export of spurious drugs. When it comes to health, India, which has the world's highest percentage of diseases like tuberculosis and cancers, not to mention other communicable ailments, is extremely apathetic.

As of now, there are no plans to beef up inspection mechanisms - the Drugs Control Officers Confederation needs at least 4,500 more inspectors. It currently has 35 personnel, monitoring 15,000 manufacturing units and over 5 lakh retail outlets. Only 23 states have testing facilities for drugs. Amendments to the drug policy rarely get off the ground. And when was the last time you heard of anyone getting convicted for dealing in spurious drugs? The quantum growth in economic indices will amount to little if the health of the country is compromised.

(Hindustan Times 02/05/2K7)

Karan Thapar's Article(HT) - 08/04/2007

ARE WE hypocrites or ignoramuses?" Even for Pertie it was an odd way to start a conversation. He likes to shock but this was simply perplexing.
"What do you mean?" I asked. Although my tone may have betrayed my utter incredulity I hope my words sounded no more than curious.
"The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has banned Fashion TV for showing semi-nude or skimpily-clad women sashaying on ramps. What did they expect them to wear? Overcoats and gum boots!" "Why are you so het-up?" I tried to sound calming. "Surely you don't watch the channel?" "That's not the point." I could tell I had failed. Pertie was ready for a scrap. "Do you know the reason they've given? That it's against good taste and decency! Tell me, what makes our dhoti-kurtawallahs believe they can identify taste and decency even if it slaps them in the face? For most of us they're living proof of bad taste and indecent behaviour."
"Come on Pertie!" It was my last attempt. "The point the Ministry is making is that in India we find it hard to accept such displays of female flesh. You know that's true. So why are you quarrelling?"
"Because it's not true, that's why" But this time Pertie spoke so softly albeit confidently, I was silenced by his deliberate control. Clearly he knew what he was about to say and I didn't dare stop him. "Look at the temples of Khajuraho. Buy a copy of the Kamasutra and flick through its pages. Just go to the Delhi Museum and see our erotic miniatures. We've given the world some of its most graphic, its most striking, representations of the naked female form. Of sex. Of multiple intercourse. And you're telling me that semi-nude and skimpily-clad women are offensive to Indian taste and decency?"
"That's cold, inanimate art. Stone sculptures, oil paintings, pictures in a book. Not warm, living human beings." I thought mine was a good riposte but Pertie clearly disagreed.
"There's nothing cold and inanimate about Khajuraho or our miniatures," he shot back. "But I'm making a wider point. Look at the sari and how it's worn. No other dress so deliberately and so alluringly reveals the female midriff. In fact, it doesn't cover the stomach at all."
"What's the point you're making?" Actually I suspected I knew but I wanted to hear it from him. "That the traditional Indian dress for women is designed to accentuate and focus attention on the female form. On the very centre of her body On that part of it men dream about." Pertie paused so I could absorb what he had said. "Are you telling me this is an accident? That it's not part of our wider culture and our way of appreciating female beauty?" Until then I had never seen the sari as Pertie had spoken of it. Now I couldn't deny that what he said made sense.
But I was flabbergasted that Pertie - Pertie of all people! - should have understood this. Of course, he still had more to say and was anxious to get on with it. "Why do you believe everyone thinks the sari is so beautiful? Surely not just because of its colours or patterns? The answer is that it frames the female form to perfection. And why do you think foreigners look so awkward in one? Because they're not used to the amount it reveals. The dress covers and hides. The sari is a window to what lies beneath."
I can only say I was overwhelmed. I have seen the sari often but I have never seen beyond it. Pertie, to coin a phrase, had seen through it. In fact, it seemed as if he'd seen it not simply as it is but as it's meant to be. "But how does this make us hypocrites and ignoramuses?" Pertie smiled.
It was a slow deliberate stretching of the lips as he silently but proudly acknowledged his triumph and simultaneously signaled I was even dumber than he'd assumed. "Look," he said, "either the Ministry is denying the truth about India's cultural fascination with the female form, in which case its hypocrisy, or it's ignorant of it and that makes them ignoramuses. It's really as simple as that." I was silent with admiration. "I don't care about all this tosh regarding democracy and freedom of expression. All governments censor That India does too is no big deal. But to end up censoring your own values is bizarre! It's madness."

The last day of 2006... and am glad that finally it's going to be over.Phew!

2005 was probably the best year I have had during my six year stay in Delhi.,though I did not achieve anything outstanding that year but still just about everything went about as smoothly as possible.So,had reasons to expect that the next year i.e. 2006 is going to be another good one for me.But then as they say....always expect the unexpected.

2006 really began on a sour note.For the first time I drank on the New Year's eve.And drank quite heavily actually only to puke and embarass not only myself but also the gathering.

2006 has been an year of losses.So much so that I finally lost count.Considering only academics and relationships with all loved ones -- I find that the situation is so fuckin bad that I do not see anything getting better at least in this lifetime.
The only thing I learnt in 2006 was to live alone.Everybody said that I'll go insane.Initially,I agree, I really went insane but then by now I have kind of settled down.And yes,I have become a cleanliness freak.I can proudly say that my flat would classify as one of the most well arranged bachelors' flats n without a speck of dust as well.
I also have come to the conclusion that in today's context the word "friends" is often misused.Everybody is governed by selfish motives only.I also concur that the bond between hostellers is much more stronger than that between say two day-scholars...say two people going to the same school or the same college irrespective of the fact that you have been going to the school or college together for any number of years.

2006 is going to get over in a few hours time.Let me rewind and see what all news and events do I remember....

Starting with sports.... the most memorable thing of 2006 has to be the head-butting incident involving Zinedine Zidane in the World Cup Finals.What a splendid way to end your career,no,Mr.Zidane?Federer still rules but it was really unfortunate to see Agassi bow out.
Coming to Indian sports,the year definitely belongs to Jeev Milkha Singh.He has comeback so strongly to win six majors this year and not to say he is ranked amongst the top-35 golfers in the world.Well..talking of comebacks...Sourav Ganguly might just have surprised himself as well with his.But one should admire his resillience.

The most defining moment of 2006 came at the fag end of the year...precisely on 30th December... The Hanging Of Saddam Hussain.And yes,Mr. Bush was fast asleep at the time of the hanging as he's holidaying in his ranch in Texas.

The minister of the year is Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav,without a doubt.Railways has netted a profit of Rs.16000 crores after suffering losses for ages.Obviously Lalu must not have taken all the decisions himself but the turnaround has come about in his tenure so he deserves all the applause.And one should not forget that he went on to deliver lectures about the same to the students of IIM-A and Harvard and Wharton Business Schools(Barton as he referred during the speech).

And yes it has been proved beyond doubt that Miss Mamata Bannerjee is a "despo" !
Okay...okay...I mean she is desperate only for publicity.And let me tell you that nobody in Bengal(including urs truly) believes that she actually went hungry for 25 days at a stretch.

But yes,it' not that she is creating such a huge ruckus for nothing.One should have seen the way the local police alongwith the CPI(M) cadres beat the farmers of Singur to evict them out of their land and to sign the papers for the same.

Coming to movies....undoubtedly the year belongs to Rang De Basanti despite the fact that movies like Lage raho Munnabhai,Dhoom2,Krissh etc are acknowledged to be bigger hits.The stiff resistance of the Mandal Commission 2 by the students fraternity,the justice brought about in the Jessica,Mattoo and other cases are ample proof of the movie's impact in awakenig a whole new generation,literally.

Last but not the least,the curious case of 4 IIM-A students who are going to graduate next summer.They rejected Rs.1 crore offers from Deutshe Bank to... hold your breath... start retailing and production of women's lingerie.(yes u heard it rite)
Sarath Babu,the chap who graduated from the same institute this summer and the one who comes from a very poor background,also chucked a plum offer to open his own catering business.Then IIM-A came forward and he was given the charge of the institute's mess.I wonder how the institute is going to help those 4 entrepreneurs this time around.Any guesses,eh?? ;) But then these people are graduating from the best institute so they must be having much greater knowledge than you and me and I leave it at that.

Finally as the new year is about 2 begin....
I salute HR n pray that all goes well.Mentally I am at a much stronger position to face adversities now.Let's see what's in store.

Remember....

" You are not as good as or as bad as people think you to be."


P.S. Cancelled all plans tonight to be on "my own" and celebrating it just the way I celebrated my last birthday. PEACE OUT !!

There is a song by Oasis... " The importance of being idle.. " and dat line actually explains why,actually, am writing this post.Yes,the whole world's busy and ONLY I am sitting idle.

You have this 'Black Forest' cake made by the finest bakery in the country kept on your dining table.You are extremely hungry.But your hands are tied and the body so bruised that you can do absolutely nothing to get up from your chair and reach to the other side of the table,where the cake's kept.

A spectator... Yes!! That's what you are...

In a few hours time you are going to watch 1.91 lac people from different parts of the country come and eat it all leaving not even a trace of the cake behind,while you just wait and watch. You have been nurturing this dream (eating the cake) for years now.Infact you have been even sleeping with it.For years now, you have had a reminder running in your cell which wakes you up in the morning.... "The cake's on it's way.... the 'cake' beckons u." But alas!That was never supposed to take place...


People who absolutely love me and also those who do not love me have been telling me the same thing "So,what's the brouhaha about it?Why don't you just move on with life and everything else??"

Well... I guess only if 'moving on' was so fucking easy...

" I want to run

I want to hide

......................

Where the streets have no name !! "
--- U2.