aditya kumar's weblog

The world could do with a few more cab drivers like these…

Update
A whole lot of discussion going on at DC and I am thankful it hasn’t got into personal feuds just yet. But some sentiments for sure. Worth a dekko, the whole thing here.

Something I wrote for desicritics, cross posted here. Your comments, criticism always welcome.

Questions for Raj Thackeray:

1. Are you specifically against UP-wallahs and Biharis because, as you allege, they spread “filth”?

2. Or do North-Indians in general, spread filth?

3. If any of the above is true, can we assume that you have no problems with South-Indians? Does it mean that you are okay with South Indians coming to Mumbai?

4. When you say that outsiders being a menace to Mumbai, what exactly do you mean? If a Maharashtrian living in Nashik comes to Mumbai to earn a living, would he qualify to be called an “outsider” and in effect, spread “filth”?

5. Or could it be that a Maharashtrian living elsewhere in Maharashtra is a lesser “outsider” than a person who has crossed several states to come to Mumbai? Doesn’t it then look like a matter of convenience?

6. And what about a Maharashtrian who has lived all his life in Patna and decides to come to Mumbai for a living? Is he an outsider too? Would he be a problem?

7. Lastly, what about me, Sir? I have lived almost 10 years in Maharashtra. I love eating pooran poli and I understand Marathi. I am not that good when it comes to speaking Marathi but compared to Punjabi, which happens to be my mother tongue, I find Marathi more comfortable. Oh and yes, I was born in New Delhi to a Punjabi family. Can I come back to Mumbai? Or will you throw me out since I do not have a Maharashtrian Surname?

In a fast food chain restaurant, standing in a queue, overheard a couple of 30-something software engineers (or the likes) deciding on the menu. A sentence should suffice —

“yeh le le — this combo has 4 items compared to that one, which has only 3 items, for the same price”.

This sums up, how an Indian mind works once confronted with the menu.

In Patna and Gaya, LLB students go on a rampage because they aren’t allowed to cheat by the authorities. Yes, it is the same Gaya where, in 500 BC, Gautam Buddha attained enlightenment. After 2500 years, surely, this is some kind of enlightenment the students are looking for. It also gives you a picture of how strong this section-in-making, of one of the pillars of our democracy will turn out to be.

I think this is exactly what Shashi Tharoor meant when he mentioned in the first page of his book, “The Great Indian Novel” that “India is a highly developed country in an advanced stage of decay”.

A few days ago, in conversation on the phone with a friend, talk revolved around the games available for playstation 2. Most of the games ported on video game consoles like the PS series are role-play. You are on the either side — The good guys or the bad guys. A terrorist on the run or a black commando killing robbers. Or a good earthling killing Martians. It boils down to one concept, the one of killing.

Honestly I am not in favor of letting a 13 year old use it because of the gore involved in the games. It is much worse than plain television viewing.

The concept of killing people with guns coupled with this modern amenity called a gaming console makes a combo that can be termed as trash of the western world. I got the console for myself when I turned, ahem, 26. Though I am sure I wouldn’t have picked up the gun but I shudder to think how would it be if I had got my hands on this thing 13 years ago.

The effects are for you to see. The School killings in America. Back home, a first incident of its kind, happened in Delhi a few hours ago. I am not suggesting that the people involved in these incidents were directly influenced by video games but I certainly see a pattern of some sort here.

Children carrying guns to school. This is the new face of the society we are living in.

What Modi did, when he made those comments about Sohrabuddin was that he provoked the little devil living in each man, in this case, the hindu front benchers who chanted “Kill him! Kill him!” when he raised up the issue.

Modi has been smart enough to show some state development on his performance report card. It would serve him right and because the Gujarati Hindu voter is always more than willing to give him that benefit of doubt because afterall, he views the CM’s efforts of development as perhaps, ten times of what has actually been done.

Whats disturbing in all this is that Modi saw it coming. He knew that his pro-Hindu (and Anti-Muslim) stance could turn on a backlash if he did not have real development figures to show up. So he had his figures ready.

In other words, this has been Modi’s stance — There has been development in Gujarat, I hate Muslims and I am the Extremist Hindu that you perceive me to be. Its all a part of the deal.

So, a large section of would-be-Modi voters need not worry about his remarks on Sohrabuddin. Why after all, there has been some work done and they need to vote for him. The real, unsaid reason is simple — His antics as Gujarat’s CM, the reasons we all know him for. The speeches ofcourse provoke that little devil in each one of them and the development figures are enough to devoid the voter of the guilt that he may have after voting for the man.

Congress’s comments on the issue have not helped the party; The muddy hands they have got now after all this mudslinging could put the busiest potter to shame. Perhaps it was wrong that Congress started the whole thing but then again, do two wrongs make a right? And don’t our leaders fear the law anymore — that they openly justify and advocate for the killing of a man who, though was accused by law of a crime, had not yet been convicted of it?

The third pillar of democracy, our courts are rotting. Our judiciary has become ineffective for the common man. Our politicians advocate killing people in election speeches. Democracy is being abused in India; we are bending it, breaking it to suit ourselves.

And here we are, hailing to our world of our Democracy. Politics has become such a crying shame.

All this, for the moment, happening in Gujarat — once known as the land of one Mr. Mohandas K Gandhi. I see him turning in his grave.

There was a recent story on CNN-IBN about a murder in broad daylight in East Delhi. What was peculiar about it, from the journalism angle, is that they showed scenes of the dead body lying on the street. There was no panic situation (as there is, in times like a bomb blast) while the camera focussed on the dead body, as if it was a commodity to be screened long enough for prime time. As reported, the police had failed to turn up before the press found out about it and there was no one to take control of the happenings at that point of time.

I think this is where journalism crosses the line. It is this line that electronic journalism needs to honor but fails to do so. It’s disappointing and perhaps alarming that the news channels find it so difficult to respect the dead. In a bid to fill the prime time slots, these channels go overboard. There have been enough voices raised by bloggers and by a few journalists of the “old school” kinds but clearly no one is listening.

All this while, the print media is dipping to lows of a different kind. Print media houses are essentially organizations that intend to make profit and they need to target a particular audience if they are to be in the market. In a bid to capture this audience, newspapers tend to disassociate with values they earlier stood for. The writers and articles that once formed the elite of the newspaper are compressed and done with in two pages.

So what we have, in the end, is basically something like those 10 pages that come as a “supplement” to the main newspaper. The first and the last pages usually have photos of skimpily clad women and news of their (not so) private affairs. I was in Delhi and I think it was in the mid-90s, initiated by The Times of India, that the “supplement” started to come 7 days a week with the main newspaper. A few months later TOI had eaten into Hindustan Time’s share. HT couldn’t bear it for long and what soon followed was a total overhaul (thats what they call it) of the look and feel of Delhi’s most popular Newspaper. Changes didn’t restrict themselves to the supplement. The whole newspaper, soon, had hardly any relevant news.

I know some people who start their morning reading the supplement first. I know some who read just the supplement. Now, many would say that this is what the people want. People asked for it and thats what they are getting. I think that argument is crap. People never asked for it.

It is not the people who have been calling the shots. It is the publication itself. You take up an aggressive marketing stance. Then, you feed people with the most irrelevant news that you can find on the planet and you continue feeding them that. You go to schools and you distribute the newspapers with supplements, free, to kids in the name of education. The kids grow up and by that time they are so used to your newspaper that…well, they start reading only the supplement. Then you claim that this is what people want. And, this, is just one way of doing it.

Even then, my problem is not with how a newspaper looks. My problem is that the quality of writing that makes up the newspaper is not of the standard an editor can look up to. I don’t have any problem with the photos that take up most of the space but I am concerned with the quality of the text that lies in the space that remains.

Another point: Blogs are serious competition to newspapers. Blogs vis-a-vis Newspapers; Not as sources of authentic information but for something as basic as quality of prose. The difference between the reader that you were 10 years ago and the reader that you are now is that you have less time to read. And if you spend most of that time reading blogs, shouldn’t Mr. Newspaper editor be concerned?