Ram Janmasthan is in Ayodhya: A split verdict for national unity

By John Cheeran
Three judge Allahabad bench of Lucknow High Court has given a split verdict for national unity. The Ramajanmabhumi-Babri Masjid disputed land is to be divided into three parts --- Sunni Waqf Board, Nirmohi Akhara and Hindus – in what can be interpreted as an out-of-the-box judgment. Judges Sharma, Sudhir Agarwal and SU Khan delivered three separate judgments on the title dispute.
The bench rejected the claims of Sunni Waqf board and Nirmohi Akhara but in a reconciliatory gesture said that the land will be divided in three.
The most significant decision of the bench is that it affirms the place below the central dome of the disputed stricture is the birthplace of Ram. It also said prior to the construction of Babri Masjid in 1528, there was a temple structure at the site but it cannot be definitively said whether it was a Ram temple. The bench relied on the evidence presented by the Archeological Survey of India for this.
What emerges is that the bench has clearly gone beyond the brief given to it when one considers the fact that it pronounced that the place is Ramjanmasthan. It has apparently arrived at this decision considering the majority community’s faith and available evidence such as the ruins of a temple.
It also upheld the installation of Ram idols into the Babri Masjid on December 22, 23, 1949, arguing that there never was a Masjid to begin with at Ramjanmabhumi. The bench said as per the Islamic tenets a mosque will not have legitimacy if it is built over an existing place of worship by destroying it.
The court may have also taken into consideration the observation made by Justice JS Verma in 1994 that in Islam, Muslims can offers prayers at any place and therefore a mosque is not place that cannot be taken over by the state, claiming sanctity.
Of course, in a nutshell, the judgment of Allahabad Bench is a vindication of the demolition of the Babri Masjid and the stance taken by the Bharatiya Janata Party.
It remains to be seen whether Indian Muslims will fight the legal battle and ensure that the long festering wound does not get any salve at all.

The most famous mikes in Delhi now…

By John Cheeran
Who the hell are Mike Fennell and Mike Hooper?
Are they the new mikes for Commonwealth imperialism?
Are they George VI?
To order, shove and shout against Indians?
The ruckus created around two aspects -- of security and hygiene – by these two as New Delhi races towards hosting the Commonwealth Games is incredible. It has been spearheaded by two bureaucrats from Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF).
At most places, if you had perceived a problem of hospitality, you would not hold press conferences to castigate the hosts. There are many other ways to fix such issues. Why such niceties were not observed by Mikes?
And who are these gentlemen to issue deadlines to the Indian government? IANS reports that Fennell had given India a 24-hour deadline to clean up the Games Village!
The fact of the matter remains that Australian cricketers are currently in India. People do fly down to Delhi all corners of world despite the threats of Dengue, lax security, and floods. And dust.
If Ponting and his men can play in India, what’s the problem with rest of the Australian athletes? Ponting knows all these years he has been given regal hospitality wherever he has gone in India. May be better than Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra, for that matter.
So, again, for whose common cause are Mikes are shouting from rooftop?
And why do we, especially our journalists, fret about national calamity and shame?
It’s time to get out of Commonwealth.

Why is this national breast-beating over Commonwealth Games?

By John Cheeran

Ah! The sound of national breast-beating over the conduct of Commonwealth Games has turned me deaf.
Yes, we have goofed up certain things. Things could have been done better. Rs70,000 crore could have been put to better use.
But what has happened?
There is indignation and outcry from certain quarters. It is quite sad the outcry has been coming from the white supremacist and insular nations such as Australia, New Zealand, Scotland and England. They have been threatening over the last few days to pull out of the Commonwealth Games, citing a long list of reasons which includes inadequate security cover, poor hygiene and living conditions, etc.
Individual athletes have already announced their withdrawals, including Australia’s women’s world discus champion.
Lalit Bhanot, secretary of Amateur Athletic Federation of India and secretary of Commonwealth Games Organising Committee General secretary has a point when he spoke about different standards of cleanliness on Tuesday.
He may be wrong about standards of cleanliness.
But he is spot on when it comes to double standards.
India has a great tradition of hospitality. We also have infuriating approaches to getting things done which can unnerve others.
But the points – security and cleanliness – raised by white nations are merely points of posturing. Please remember, the kind of cleanliness and security these privileged class are quibbling over are 24x7 realities for people like you and me in New Delhi and elsewhere in Indian subcontinent. It also holds true for All the African nations, including South Africa.
Let me say this. This grandstanding of pulling out by a cabal of nations --- Australia, England, Scotland and New Zealand – is only that – grand standing.
Otherwise, it is going to be the end of Commonwealth as we know it.
But the most important guest for India, Pakistan, yes, they haven’t threatened us with a pullout, citing hygiene and security.
If there was any nation in the Commonwealth who should have used the current opportunity to settle political scores, it should have been Pakistan. But they are coming, amply explaining the point made by Bhanot the other day.
Everyone knows that no nation can afford to pull out of Commonwealth Games citing reasons such as security and hygiene. Montreal Olympics witnessed the massacre of Israeli athletes that did not turn Canada a sports pariah. People haven’t stopped flying into New York after 9/11.
But is there an assurance that terror won’t strike again the United States?
Just because of the collapse of a foot over bridge and false ceiling, it is juvenile of news organizations to cry SHAME, SHAME.
Let’s still cling onto to some reserve of self-respect and look at the brighter side. Yes, we will not have a large haul of medals. But let’s thank our political establishment for that. Imagine, following the Chinese model, turning our sports camps into gulags to produce champions to add to national luster.
Journalists are now comparing how China managed to stage Beijing Olympics with India’s amateurish efforts. Tonight I was told that venues for the 2010 Asian Games to be held in Guangzhou from November 12-27 is ready. But, then, in China, journalists will be invited only for the opening ceremony and will be given cues on when and where to clap their hands.
We, instead, have democracy. A third world democracy, that is. India has a different template even when it is going to put the rest of the world in it.
By the way, please understand that the comity of Commonwealth nations is too big than those who are making a hue and cry over the arrangements.
Today I went through the list of nations (as reported by AFP) that are scheduled to take part in the Delhi edition.
It is long. Be calm. The havoc is only on television studios. Cracks are on newspaper columns. Commonwealth Games is happening. Come on India.

KN Panikkar exposes fundamentalists in Kerala

By KN Panikkar in The HIndu

A lecturer with Newman College in the town of Thodupuzha in Kerala, T.J. Joseph, was brutally attacked on July 4, 2010, allegedly by members of a fundamentalist group. It was an act of retribution: Mr. Joseph had framed a question for an examination for his students in the college, which offended their religious sentiments. The punishment meted out by the aggrieved group was to chop off his palm: it was reminiscent of medieval practices.

The authorities of the college, apparently endorsing the claim of the fundamentalists, suspended the ‘delinquent' teacher and ordered an enquiry. The enquiry committee concluded that he had deliberately subscribed to an activity that promoted feelings of enmity between different communities/ religions.

The controversial question paper by itself had not lead to any manifest enmity between different religious communities, as the enquiry report had suspected. But the fundamentalists created a law and order situation by resorting to rioting.

Consequently, the lecturer was dismissed from service, and thus debarred from “future employment in any of the institutions maintained by or affiliated to the university.”

Mr. Joseph had had no record of communal bias or instigation during his career in the college. He is reported to have been a conscientious teacher with a rapport with students and cordial relations with colleagues: this is evident from the public testimony of students. To them his dismissal was thoroughly unexpected, and they struck work demanding his reinstatement. But the college authorities did not relent. They took the position that they would reconsider their action only if the Muslim community made an appeal to reinstate him, or the court issued an order to that effect. A highly irrational act was thus sought to be imbued with legal respectability and given a communal character.

This incident is symptomatic of the creeping influence of fundamentalism that has led to violence in the country at large and certain recent outbursts in Kerala. What has happened to Mr. Joseph is also indicative of the vulnerability of academic space and the authoritarian tendencies of certain managements of educational institutions in the State. Mr. Joseph almost lost a limb (it has since been reattached through a difficult surgical procedure) to the brutality of religious fundamentalism, and he has now been deprived of his job by an insensitive and inhumane college management. While the fundamentalists resorted to the act in order to terrorise the ‘deviants' and ensure that their religious fiats are carried out by all, the college management saw it as an opportunity to enforce discipline and to nip in the bud the influence of critical and rational thinking. Both actions are highly deplorable. Unfortunately, these have not led to a sufficiently strong reaction from the public.

It appears that there is ambiguity in the public mind about Mr. Joseph's own role. The reason is that the charge against him involves meddling with religious sentiments. Although new religions and sects emerge out of non-conformism and as a critique of the present, the established religions mostly see their interest to be linked with the status quo. That was perhaps why the Catholic Church was not moved by appeals to their humanitarian and philanthropic credentials. The Church has now issued a pastoral letter supporting and justifying the action of the college management. It is surprising that in a State that is surcharged by protests and a variety of public interest litigation processes, except for teachers' and students' organisations the liberal intelligentsia has not come forward in defence of Mr. Joseph.

The ‘crime' he committed was to frame a question by reproducing a conversation between God and ‘Muhammad' from a text written by film-maker P.T. Kunhi Mohammed, who is a believer. The ‘mistake' he made was to change the name of the character of a lunatic in the original, to ‘Muhammad.' The fundamentalist group was enraged by the use of the name of the Prophet.

Why Mr. Joseph changed the name is unknown. He is reported to have stated that he was not influenced by any religious reason but used a shorter version of Mr. Kunhi Mohammed's work. ‘Muhammad' is a popular name among Muslims, and there is nothing in the text of the question paper to suggest that it was the Prophet who was implied. Nor did it contain any critique of any religion — including Islam, Christianity and Hinduism.

But to a fundamentalist group that resorts to terror tactics as an instrument of coercion, it provided an opportunity to further its cause. Among Hindus, Rama and Krishna are popular names and are worshipped as incarnations of god. Imagine a situation in which a reference to these names, in literature or academic texts or in a question paper, is considered blasphemous! If this happens, soon writers will find it difficult to give a name to their characters.

That fundamentalists indulge in such irrational behaviour is not surprising. They still live in medieval times, and with hardly any respect for human values. But that cannot be expected from those who have taken the responsibility of imparting education to people. The authorities of Newman College where Mr. Joseph has taught for 25 years quickly took the questionable step of first suspending and then dismissing him — all in the name of communal harmony and secularism.

Unfortunately, they did not realise that the greatest threat to secularism and communal harmony is religious fundamentalism. That is why the management's offer to withdraw the dismissal orders if the Muslim community made an appeal for such a withdrawal, becomes self-contradictory. The management seems to have overlooked the fact that by doing so it was reinforcing the communal, and not secular, consciousness. What was done would only help legitimise the fundamentalist forces and not strengthen secularism, as the college authorities claim. In fact, they should have stood by Mr. Joseph and defended his academic freedom as a teacher. Instead, they compromised with fundamentalism and extended to it a helping hand — also sullying the Christian character of the institution.

It is high time that the managements of public-funded private institutions are brought under a democratic structure, so that healthy norms prevail in these institutions and higher education becomes accessible to larger sections of the population, including the poor. It is to be hoped that either through legal intervention or democratic struggles Mr. Joseph would be reinstated, or adequately compensated.

But the brutality of the fundamentalists on the one hand, and the irresponsibility of educational entrepreneurs on the other, have already vitiated the academic atmosphere. In order to overcome this situation, new steps are called for, both from the part of the government and civil society.

It also raises the larger, even if contentious, issue of the management of education in Kerala. Since 1984, the government, through a system of financial aid, meets the entire expenses towards payment of salary and maintenance of private colleges. The share of the management is meagre. What the managements typically do, however, is to milk these institutions through various means. It is common knowledge that most of these colleges indulge in corrupt practices, both in the matter of appointment of teachers and grant of admission to students. Since there is practically no control exercised by the government or the universities over aided institutions, many managements treat colleges as a source of income. Some of them also fatten their purses by conducting self- financing courses, utilising facilities created by public funds. The Central government has introduced in Parliament a Bill to prevent the prevalent unfair practices in the field of education. How far it will succeed in doing so is anybody's guess.

Religious fundamentalists are on the rise among Muslims and Hindus. Permitting them to influence the practices of education has long-term implications. The most dangerous possibility is the state of social and political consciousness such compromises would produce. Compromising with religious fundamentalism, as the authorities of Newman College have done, is likely to lead the country to Talibanism.

Why values should matter…

The New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman writes..
“China and India have been catching up to America not only via cheap labor and currencies. They are catching us because they now have free markets like we do, education like we do, access to capital and technology like we do, but, most importantly, values like our Greatest Generation had. That is, a willingness to postpone gratification, invest for the future, work harder than the next guy and hold their kids to the highest expectations.
In a flat world where everyone has access to everything, values matter more than ever. Right now the Hindus and Confucians have more Protestant ethics than we do, and as long as that is the case we’ll be No. 11!

The Vagrants by Yiyun Li: A Review

By John Cheeran
People are the most dangerous animals in the world, says teacher Gu while recalling how his only daughter Shan was betrayed as a counter revolutionary by her boyfriend in the Chinese immigrant author Yiyun Li’s debut novel The Vagrants.
Living in a totalitarian state Gu cannot be blamed for losing faith in himself and those around him. Betrayals often come from the most intimate and beloved people in one’s life as the teacher realises. Gu, at the end of his tether, is still left guessing whether his first wife used him as an anticipatory bail if the revolution did not take off.
Between two executions Li tries to portray a picture of China coming to terms with the immediate aftermath of the end of Cultural Revolution in 1978.
The Vagrants, which won the Guardian’s First Book Award, promises a lot but fails to deliver in the end. The lack of a central character to build her story saps the energy from Li’s narrative.
You expect a certain kind of stories from a writer who has left behind a totalitarian state. It’s almost a habit now. In that context, much of what the US-based Li, 38, writes fits in with readers’ idea of a stifling atmosphere.
In Li’s China, God is Communist party. In Red Star school, young Tong is reminded of how much the Party cares for its children. “Everybody’s equally loved by the party, but when someone makes a mistake, just as when a child makes a mistake, the party will not let a single wrongdoer slip by.”
Not much of that situation has been changed, if you recall the kind of elaborate arrangements the Party made to prevent the Chinese converging on Tiananmen Square on the 20th anniversary of the suppression of the student protest last year. Till now, there has been no recrudescence of Tiananmen Square.
The Vagrants starts on a somber note. Li evocatively portrays the emotional trauma teacher Gu and his wife faces, preparing for the day of public denunciation and execution of their only daughter, Shan, condemned to death after being branded as a counter-revolutionary by the Party.
It is teacher Gu who shines through this bleak novel, despite his doubts and disappointments, putting counter revolutionaries such as Shan and Kai into the shade. Despite being a teacher revered by villagers, Gu, however, could not determine his daughter’s fortunes.
Shan, revolutionary-turned-counter-revolutionary, we watch only from a distance and get to know through the reminiscences of her parents.
The angst, in the aftermath of Shan’s execution, comes home to roost with Kai, the voice of the revolution. The big change and support that Kai and Jialin expected from Beijing never arrive and the protest fizzles out with another bullet.
In the end you agree with teacher Gu. The only way to live on, he had known most of his adulthood, was to focus on the small patch of life in front of one’s eyes.

Title: The Vagrants
Author: Yiyun Li
Publisher: Fourth Estate
Price: 7.99 pounds
Pages: 338

No-ball troika from Pakistan: Presumed Innocent?

By John Cheeran
This is the month of Ramadan. Three Pakistani cricketers ---captain Salman Butt, fast bowlers Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamir -- on Thursday said they were innocent and the rest of the world, I mean, The News of The World is torturing them. May be, they are not lying.
Pakistan is a colourful nation and often that colour is blood red. I remember that during the last cricket World Cup in 2007, held in the West Indies, Pakistan’s coach Bob Woolmer was found murdered. The team manager, then faced with a moral crisis, said while facing the global media that he asked his players to swear on Koran, by placing their hands on the book, that they had no role to play in the most foul murder. There was no incriminating video footage in the West Indies.
Here in London, nailed by the video footage, no such exercises are coming forth. Now the tagline is Presumed Innocent. Till yesterday Butt, Aamir and Asif were seen smiling but now they have said they are not in a mental frame to play cricket.
They are not suspended by the Pakistan Cricket Board. They are not dropped. They have simply walked away from the centre.
To argue that a brilliant bowler such as Aamer was not the cause but the consequence of circumstances and should not be banned for life from the game, as former England captain Mike Atherton has argued, is nothing but sophistry.
When you stray from the line, batsmen punish you. When you err, you get punished. Till now cricketers accused of colluding with bookies could wriggle out since there was no evidence of having taken money for falling in line with the bookies.
Here, for the first time, players are caught on camera along with the bookie, of accepting money. But Imran Khan, that opportunist par excellence, now wants the brilliance of young Aamir to be protected. Match-fixing and spot-fixing, too, need martyrs, Imran. Aamir, if he is found to be guilty, deserves no place on a cricket field in any form of game. Ditto for Butt and Asif.
Cricket’s problems stem from the fact that its administrators lack the will to take impartial and tough decisions. They need to serve the game, not the petty power and personal equations with in the respective national boards.
The spirit of forgiving should take a back seat this Ramadan.

Freedom of choice comes with an emotional tax: Interview with Sheena Iyengar

By John Cheeran
No one asks better questions, or comes up with more intriguing answers, that’s how Malcolm Gladwell describes Sheena Iyengar, 40, a professor at the Columbia Business School, who has written the highly acclaimed book The Art of Choosing.
As a daughter of Indian immigrants, Iyengar had to make tough choices while growing up in United States.
When Iyengar was three years old, she was diagnosed with a rare form of retinitis pigmentos, an inherited disease of retinal degeneration. By 6th grade, Iyengar had lost the ability to read, and by 11th grade, she had lost her sight entirely and could only perceive light. When she was 13, her father died of a heart attack.
Despite such trying circumstances, Iyengar says she has chosen the big things in her life. During a visit to Bangalore, she speaks about the emotional tax that each one of us has to pay for the freedom of choice.

Excerpts from an interview:

Has this book far exceeded your expectations?

I didn’t really know what expectations to have. Yes, exceeded. It changed my life, actually. It really depends on your definition of exceed and expectations. Everything that has happened since the book has come out is positive. I’m generally a positive person.

Has life chosen you or you have chosen life?

I would say that the big things in life, to some extent, I have chosen. So much of our life is determined by what happens to us. The only choice we have is how we react.


Have you ever felt that your choices have been limited by your circumstances?

I think that’s true for everyone that our choices are based on our circumstances. When I applied for my PhD programme, I actually was thinking of becoming a clinical psychologist. And I went to my advisor when I was an undergrad. My professor wanted a list of schools I was applying to so that he would write a letter of recommendation. I gave him the list and he said he cannot write this letter until I put Stanford University on the list. Stanford didn’t have a clinical programme but since my professor insisted I put Stanford on the list. I wanted to go to Yale. I was told my some other professors that I have made it to Yale and they congratulated me. But I didn’t get the offer and kept waiting. And when I went to see my professor, the one who insisted on me adding Stanford to the list, said ‘Yale called me but I told them you don’t belong there.’ You need to go to Stanford, he told me. Then Stanford called and I went. That effectively changed my life.

Had you been living in India, would you have written this book?

Oh. I don’t know how to answer that question. Who knows what I would have been had I grown up in India. I don’t think I’m capable of figuring that out.

Do you believe in free will? In India, many believe that everything in life is pre-ordained. So do choices matter?

I do think choices matter. I don’t think you have free will about everything. I think from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to bed, or the moment you born till the moment you die, you are constantly being manipulated by circumstances, your family, friends, your government, no matter what it is, they are manipulating you, influencing you.

To go to the other side, and say you have no free will is also incorrect. If you consciously decide that something is important then you have the ability to veto the negative influence. I can say that, to a certain degree, I can exercise some degree of free will. I have the power to exercise my free will and say no or yes or do something different in certain situations.

Can beggars be choosers?

Yes. Why not? They make choices. They may have fewer choices. Certainly beggars have more constraints but everybody has the ability to make choices in the midst of constraints.


What’s more important -- having multiple choices or having information on whatever choices you have?

It is much more important to be able to understand how your choices differ. I could it put another way. The value of choice depends on your ability to perceive differences between the options.


Do you think Indians are ‘super thinkers’ when confronted with multiple choices in daily life?

No. I wouldn’t call them super thinkers. I do think that they have certain decision making methods. Indian women are more likely to, when picking out a sari, jewellery, do it in a group and get multiple opinions and reach a consensus.
That is probably how they better cope with the rise in a range of options. It seems consensus is the driving criteria for determining which is the choice you make.


For a society such as India what’s true—the more is less or the less is more?

I think if there is one thing the Indians can benefit from, in terms of thinking about choice, is how to create choice.
There is a lot more emphasis here on difficulties and limitations in Indian society. And sometimes, I think, that thwarts the ability to be creative. The less can be more if you are able to use those constraints to generate new and useful options.

Do you have any tips for Sophie as in Sophie’s Choice.

Aaaah. That’s what so terrible about that choice, right? Can you advise her anything? If you tell her not to choose the outcome is terrible. If you tell her to choose, the outcome is terrible.


What would you tell her?

I don’t think you can tell anybody what to do in that case.


Is choice a science or art?

It ultimately is an art. Science can help you become more skillful but in the end your ability to choose depends on your ability to balance the pros and cons, the possibilities and the limitations, the uncertainties, the contradictions. And so much of what makes the choice work out in the end is what you do with the choice you make.

Do you think your book will help one make better choices?

I hope so. That, certainly, is the intention behind the book.

What’s next for you?

It will take a few years for me to write another book. I may write about globalisation, something I teach about and research about. Or I might write about the psychology of money.

You write that freedom of choice comes with an emotional tax. Who pays it more, man or woman?

It does. In different ways in different domains. I don’t think one pays more tax than the other.

Is there anything else I should have asked you, which I haven’t?

No, I think that’s fine.

When players are fixers

By John Cheeran
So what’s new? Match-fixing in cricket is old hat especially after Hansie Cronje was fixed by Delhi Police and all of us know cricketers, irrespective of nationalities and racial background, are willing to take the bait if you can up the stakes.
Yes, it’s a total disaster for Pakistan cricket and Pakistan the nation state. The News of The World expose has done more damage to Pakistan than the recent floods and possibly what an Indian nuclear attack could have done. It would take a long, long time for the credibility of Pakistani cricketers to be restored.
India, too, had dealt with the monster of match-fixing and who can tell how clean Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his band of men are? But, then, unless exposed and established otherwise we should believe in their integrity.
With video footage clearly showing some of the Pakistan players currently touring England accepting cash from a bookie, things are looking bleak for Salman Butt and guys.
Arguments that spot fixing is a bit of harmless fun and the result of the match is not influenced or determined by such transgressions will not hold much water since it’s question of integrity of the players involved. You can either be bought or cannot.
Will this recent spate of allegations drive fans away from cricket? Today, cricket is many things for many people. More than a sport, it’s a commercial circus and all those involved, television channels, sponsors, players, International Cricket Council, national cricket boards will do their level best to convince us that what’s being offered is genuine, unadulterated stuff.
And you watch at your own peril.
Long live cricket.

Absolute Khushwant By Khushwant Singh: A Review

By John Cheeran
These days readers are more familiar with Chetan Bhagat than Kushwant Singh. It’s a pity. Singh, at a venerable 95, can no longer shock or prick Indian society’s egos. We, of course, have come a long way since the sardar wrote that his pen has no condom.
Very few would have read Singh’s Train to Pakistan that tried to capture the emotional vivisection of partition, published in 1956. Singh still retains the candour that endeared him to readers of his newspaper columns in the past and his fresh take on various topics, Absolute Khushwant, is a delightful read thanks to his brutal honesty.
Singh, a former editor of Hindustan Times and The Illustrated Weekly of India, never cared for political correctness and has no qualms to recall that by turning bullshitting into an art form he changed Indian journalism irrevocably. As an editor he never hesitated to titillate, if there was an occasion for it.
Singh still sings the praise of Sanjay Gandhi, despite Emergency and all that. He not only finds Sanjay dynamic but confesses that it was the man in a hurry who got him the editor’s job at The Hindustan Times. Not many editors would have been honest enough to say this when the dead cannot come back to scratch your back.
Many associate Singh’s prolific writings with ribaldry but the novelist, historian, lawyer and editor has many shades that quarrel against easy classifications.
Singh takes pride in continuing his war against fundoos despite advancing age. BJP, he says, has poisoned the country with its right wing agenda.
At the height of Emergency, Singh supported Sanjay and Indira Gandhi unabashedly. Today, Singh says, India is in safe hands—in the hands of Manmohan Singh, Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. Well, not much has changed in his world.

The curious case of Vishwanathan Anand’s Indian passport

By John Cheeran
Who is an Indian?
If Vishwanathan Anand, who has been living in Spain for many years in order to pursue his passion, chess in this case, ceases to be an Indian merely because of the number of days he has spent in India in recent times, it is an incredibly ludicrous moment thanks to a babu in New Delhi.
Anand, of course, holds a valid Indian passport. Despite that it now has emerged that the human resource department in New Delhi raised doubts about Anand’s citizenship status when Hyderabad University decided to honour him with a doctorate.
Unlike most of us resident Indians, Anand has brought India glory. He has been the most unassuming of champions that India has produced and loves his Tamil, idli and sambhar in that order.
Anand is the finest brand ambassador India could ever attain. It’s true that he had to shift his base to Spain. He finds it more convenient to compete and keep abreast of the game from there. May be tax regime there is a bit more considerate. But he is not living in Pakistan. He has married a Chennai girl. His parents live in Chennai. His friends are in India. His heart is in India. Whenever he has won a world title – right from when he won the world junior chess title in 1987—the country has made him its own.
Let’s not forget that the desperation with which we try to appropriate individual who excel on global stage, especially science. Remember Venkataraman Ramakrishnan? When he won the Nobel prize for chemistry in 2009, we were quick to find reference points to India so that we could bask in reflected glory. And he had utter contempt for all of us when he blurted out that congratulatory emails from India only go to waste his time and energy.
Unlike many such worthies, Anand has been modest to a fault and never forgot the fact that in outlook and approach he remains an Indian, though he does not require the state’s patronage to ply his trade.
If Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, LK Advani and I are Indians, Anand, too, is an Indian, though king on the chessboard does not have any nationality.

Serious Men By Manu Joseph: A Review

By John Cheeran
Every English language journalist in India has a novel project. Manu Joseph has completed it in a remarkable manner and Serious Men is the result.
It’s smart novel, one that you dream of producing at a writers’ workshop. It’s about a daring con job that a Dalit pulls off on scientific society with stealth and a large dose of insouciance.
A lot of thought has gone into the making of Serious Men.
Just as Ayyan Mani had a project to turn his son Adi into a genius, at least for a short span of time, making use of paid news and other tricks, Joseph too had his grand design of vowing readers. Please note that both Mani and Joseph chuckle at the end of the story.
Joseph does not need a certificate from me on how well he writes. Of course, he writes well.
Familiarity with journalism has helped Joseph hone his writing skills and it is a pleasure to read his measured, clear sentences and sardonic wit.
But one cannot ignore the artifice and intellectual pretension that inform and, in the process, harm Serious Men. In the end it is a deflating experience to realize that Joseph’s Serious Men derives its strength from Mani’s stealth and voice recorder as well as the ire of a spurned woman to sustain the narrative and engineer the denouement.
In a recent column in Open magazine Joseph has explained how he seized upon the idea for his novel project while reacting to a newspaper story on a childhood prodigy. His skepticism shows through the novel and results in smart aleck moments such as when Arvind Acharya notes how human beings can live without water, citing Tamilians as living proof. Well, I loved Acharya’s speech where he observes that how every mediocre fellow rails about mediocrity without realizing his own shortcomings. Such wry observations sit well in a column but a great novel requires insights and inspirational writing.
Joseph, however, has brilliantly captured the social tension in the post-Mandal India, and racial and class divisions that alarm and frighten the Brahmins. The big stories in a liberalized India are the rise of Dalits and Naxals. Again there can be opinions on whether the journalist has triumphed over the novelist or vice versa.
When markets crashed in India in 1998, Joseph had written a piece in Times of India that began with the lines “every time a friend of mine succeeds a little part of me dies.”
It’s a line made famous by Gore Vidal and though Jospeh chose not to acknowledge the American, the success that Serious Men has attracted will leave you no choice but to say it aloud.

Delhi Calm By Vishwajyoti Ghosh: A Review

By John Cheeran
Delhi Calm is a graphic novel with a difference. It tackles contemporary Indian history about which our understanding, still, is nebulous. As a recent newspaper report suggests, 35 years later, no one in the Indian establishment knows where the documents that record the correspondence between then President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed and the government are.
Vishwajyoti Ghosh deserves praise for choosing the dark days of Emergency (1975 June 25-1977 January 18) for his debut graphic novel.
Ghosh, however, could not weave a gripping tale out of the exciting and exasperating times when there was change, and Total Revolution, as coined by that wooly idealist Jayaprakash Narayan, were in the air.
What instead Delhi Calm provides is political commentary in patches. It’s a long and laborious affair and at the end of it, the reader is not left with any single graphic image that captures the bathos of those extra-ordinary times.
It is important to recall in this context the cartoon by the late Abu Abraham which depicted President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed supine in his bathtub and signing yet another constitutional amendment as desired by prime minister Indira Gandhi and asking a flunkey if there are any more ordinances he has to sign. It calls for an astute understanding of the political theatre, and may be in good time Ghosh would grow to acquire it.
Having said that one must admit Ghosh has succeeded in conveying a fair share of the complexity that dogged JP’s call for Total Revolution.
Not only the Prophet even his movement was undergoing dialysis with a motley crew almost hijacking it. By slipping Jogi, the right winger, into Naya Savera Band constituted by Vibuti Prasad, Parvez Alam and Masterji in the name of ‘inclusion’, Ghosh shows how cracks began to develop in the identity of the righteous movement. Masks were worn by not just Indira Gandhi and her son Sanjay but those who were ranged against them too.
Ghosh has gone on record that he did not intend Delhi Calm as a dummy’s guide to Emergency. That’s fine. One can look elsewhere for that. Delhi Calm’s fatal flaw lies in the fact that its author lacks a story, a bigger picture to share with readers. Even after all these years.

Title: Delhi Calm
Author: Vishwajyoti Ghosh
Publisher: HarperCollins
Pages: 246
Price: Rs499

Delhi On The Road by Supriya Sahai: A Review

By John Cheeran

Flipping through these black and white sketches by Supriya Sahai you suddenly realise that Delhi, essentially, is a city of tombs. Ghosts of emperors walk its streets and Sahai’s attention for detail produces stunning visuals, even for someone who has spent the best part of his youth in the city.
Humayun, the only Mughal emperor to have been buried in Delhi, and a slew of others have their private spaces to rest in peace. She, however, has no time for Rajghat.
Sahai’s Delhi is steeped in history. Most of the sketches make you aware of the deep scars in the cityscape and of rulers and empires that quietly slumped out of our sights.
Delhi On The Road is a collection of richly evocative sketches that offers insights to the historic city. You also realise that in spite of the appellation of new to the city, there is a distinct lack of modern monuments in New Delhi. May be the Metro and flyovers along with suffocating and chaotic traffic should be enough for New Delhi. But, then, again these are sketches from a curiosity angle to satisfy the needs of travellers. Sahai, it seems, has no pretensions of laying bare the soul of the city through her drawings.
Title: Delhi On The Road
Author: Supriya Sahai
Publisher: Collins
Pages:156
Price: Rs 299

Randiv’s no-ball: All is fair in love and cricket

By John Cheeran
Virender Sehwag missed his century. Is that such a big deal? India played Sri Lanka in a inconsequential triangular one-day match in Dambulla on Monday and won comfortably. It should have ended there. But when you are looking for a story, such circumstances are not missed easily. With Sehwag unbeaten on 99, India only needed a single to overcome the Lankan total of 170.
So in a losing situation Sri Lankan bowler (off-spinner) Suraj Randiv did the smartest thing to do – sent down a no-ball by overstepping the bowler’s crease to deny Sehwag his 13th ODI century.
No rules were broken.
I don’t think Randiv or Sri Lankan captain Kumar Sangakkara or Tillakaratne Dilshan besmirched the spirit of the game by that smart piece of strategy.
Yes, they were not magnanimous to allow Sehwag complete a statistical milestone. Cricket, after all, is a sport and sport tends to be combative and competitive.
I’m baffled at the attempt of some commentators to draw parallel with Australian Trevor Chappell’s underarm ball to New Zealand striker Brian McKechnie in the final of Benson and Hedges Cup in 1981. That was well within the rule book but not in the spirit of the game.
In Sri Lanka, the other day, had Sehwag showed some more urgency the century would have been his. There was no attempt to subvert the spirit of the game; and India won. Had the non-striker been an enterprising guy, there would not have been enough opportunity for Sehwag to complete his milestone. So these are mere storm in tea cups.
The fact that Sri Lankan cricket board took the matter seriously and conducted an internal inquiry is a welcome step indeed. Now that Randiv has been suspended for one-match and Dilshan docked his match-fee, Sri Lankan board can retain its veneer of moral superiority.
But let’s not forget that all is fair in love and cricket.

Tiger Hills by Sarita Mandanna: A Review

By John Cheeran

“No matter how far I tried to go from you. No matter how I have tried to forget, or how much I deny it, I carry you within me like a hook in a fish. Like a bullet, Devi, a bullet that has worked its way permanently into my flesh.”

Push a pin anywhere on earth, it may hit upon letters of love.
In Tiger Hills, Sarita Mandanna tells an epic love story set in Coorg. It’s her debut novel but you can immediately sense the masterly control she wields on the narrative. In itself, a love triangle is not the ideal subject to make a gripping read. We have had enough of love.
To the credit of Mandanna, it must be said that she keeps the reader engaged almost till the end and the restraint with which she handles the all-consuming love of Devi is laudable.
The obvious fault line is the epilogue that reveals the desperation of Mandanna, clueless on how and where to apply the brakes to the wheels of fiction.
Mandanna, a private equity professional with a PGDM from the Indian Institute of Management and MBA from Wharton Business School, has stuck to a terrain that she is familiar with in Tiger Hills. That’s her strength. Being a Coorgi has helped Mandanna to easily evoke the mysterious charm of hills in the pages of Tiger Hills.
With butter yellow laburnums twisting in the breeze, Mandanna’s heroine Devi Nachimanda is determined to set right the one calamitous event in her life, her marriage to Devanna. Later Devi realises that one has to fight for happiness and for one’s dues. May be we, too, should agree with her.
It’s not Kambeymadas – Devanna, her meek but intelligent childhood friend with gold in his brain, and tiger killer Machaiah – who play crucial roles in Devi’s life. It’s Devi who woos Machu the hero, forcing him to break his vow. It’s Devi who pushes her husband Devanna and later Machu’s wife into suicides. Alas, as in love, Devanna fails in ending his life too.
Devi is the child of destiny. The flock of herons that sent her avvaiah Muthavva the message, reappears in Devi’s life quite often.
Devi’s grit is remarkable when confronted with love—her love for Machu and Devanna’s love for her. Even when Machu finally retreats from their illicit rendezvous and gets married, Devi is unwavering in her devotion and attention to the one who was meant for.
She, in fact, turns the death of Machu, far away in the battlefield of Afghan mountains, to further her own agenda. She fills the absence of Machu by bringing home Machu’s son Appu and bringing up the kid as her own.
It’s Devi’s way of wreaking revenge on tayi and appaiah who left her with little choice other than marrying Devanna when the latter fled the medical college in Bangalore and sought refuge in the body of his beloved. Addled by ragging and the death of his pet squirrel Nancy, Devanna had lost control of himself. He wanted love, an anchor in his life. On his return, he could not resist and forced himself upon Devi and in the process set in motion betrayals that went on to devastate the lives of his and Machaiah’s sons.
At the end one realises that Tiger Hills is more about suffering than love. The suffering of missionary Hermann Gundert, who pinned all his hopes on Mission Devanna but found to his bitterness that all the signs were misplaced, the suffering of husband (Coorg) Devanna who lives on regardless the insults of his Devi, the suffering of Nanjappa, a son whom his mother calls a curse, and the suffering of Nancy the squirrel. And most of all, the suffering of Devi herself, who finally has to accept fate as it is, despite all her fighting spirit.

Excerpts:
It had been the nape of her neck. The first, fatal hook. The smooth skinned grace of it, all but obscured by the plait that swung to her hips. She had thrust past him at the Kaveri tank, the very picture of determination and his spurt of irritation was swiftly replaced by amusement. And then, as she had wedged herself before him, he had found himself unable to tear his eyes away. Following every dip of light and shadow, the interplay of muscle beneath the translucent skin, as he craned her neck this way and that. He had shut his eyes for only a brief moment in prayer; when they opened, she was tilting slowly towards the water. The compactness of her waist, fitting neatly into the span of his hands.

Title: Tiger Hills
Author: Sarita Mandanna
Publisher: Penguin Viking
Pages: 452
Price: 599

Adoor Gopalakrishnan: A Life In Cinema: A Review

By John Cheeran
There is cinema in India outside of Bollywood and Adoor Gopalakrishnan, a classicist in the mould of Satyajit Ray, has made significant contributions to sustain such alternative ways of light and shade. Adoor, an auteur celebrated internationally, but in India and, especially in his native Kerala, is regarded as an aloof man and, as happens mostly, is branded arrogant.
Film critic Gautaman Bhaskaran’s authorised biography of the director, Adoor Gopalakrishnan: A Life In Cinema, disappointingly does not offer enough insights and inputs that will help one understand the auteur better.
Adoor who has made films such as Swayamvaram, Kodiyettam, Elipathayam, Mukhamukham and Vidheyan deserves a biography that should read more than the reviews of his eleven features he has made in a long career.
Adoor is not an easy man or a film-maker to understand. As Shyam Benegal reminds us Adoor’s movies are meditations on the human condition. Bhaskaran, who has closely watched Adoor’s career from the vantage point of a journalist, has a written biography largely based on conversations that he had with the filmmaker. It’s challenge for any biographer to make Adoor confess about his life and movies. Bhaskaran, however, is unpretentious and writes lucidly and has succeeded to a great extent to give the reader an overall view about Adoor’s world. Adoor says: “Cinema is actually one’s experience. One’s vision of life. The filmmaker’s. That is his cinema.”
Adoor’s first movie (Swayamvaram) was released in 1972. Except for Nalu Pennungal and Oru Pennum Randaanum, the interval between his movies has been an excruciating four years, most of the times. The interval only reflects the time and thought that Adoor puts into his movies. He is a careful filmmaker. There is not a single frame in his oeuvre that is inessential. And he is a careful and cagey talker too which rules out a brutal self-portrait.
Adoor is not a stranger to controversies and, in Kerala, fellow filmmakers in art film circuit has had many bones to pick with him. It’s quite disappointing that Bhaskaran could not persuade Adoor to explain why he did not work with Kodiyettam Gopi after the successful 1977 effort (Kodiyettam) that gave the actor the national award. The lack of critical observations on the filmmaker from his contemporaries will, of course, invite the charge of the biography being a hagiography. Had Bhaskaran talked to Adoor’s heroes (Mammooty, Madhu, MR Gopakumar) and heroines (Sobhana, Mini Nair) the portrait would have been fuller.
And if you want to understand Adoor as a friend, lover, husband and father, you will have to wait longer.

Title: Adoor Gopalakrishnan: A Life In Cinema
Author: Gautaman Bhaskaran
Publisher: Penguin Viking

Why do they want to Islamise Kerala?

By John Cheeran
Comrade VS Achuthanandan has finally blurted out the truth. He said in New Delhi the other day that the Muslim fundamentalist organization Popular Front of India has plans to convert Kerala into a Muslim-majority state in 20 years and is using money and love to achieve its aim.
Now, obviously, truth has few takers.
And Muslims in Kerala are mighty upset at the statement of VS Achuthanandan.
But why should they?
Shouldn’t they be happy at the thought that in the next 20 years Kerala will truly become Allah’s Own Country with rest of the Kerala converting into Islam?
Crescent will replace hammer and sickle. Paradise, Period.
Can any devout, God-fearing Muslim be unhappy about such a scenario?
Think of it, Kerala will be a Saudi Arabia without desert! The variety of mind-boggling burqas that one can lech at gives me goose bumps.
E Ahmed, minister of state for railways in Union cabinet and a Muslim League MP, says Achuthandan’s statement is meant to create communal divide in the state. In an edit-page article written for Mathrubhumi, Muslim League leader P Kunhalikutty has called Achuthanandan a communalist.
Muslim leaders, especially that of Indian Union Muslim League (think of it, can there be any more fundamentalist party name in Indian democracy than the IUML?), are saying that as the chief minister of the state VS should not have said what he said.
What has VS said?
He has only shared the information the Kerala Police have ferreted out especially after the Taliban attack on Professor TJ Joseph. Literature seized during raids at the offices and homes of Popular Front members clearly show the Islamisation agenda at work in the state. Muslim youth are encouraged to take the path of Love Jihad to marry girls from other religions and produce as many kids as possible.
The Times of India report quotes VS: “The outfit (Popular Front) was attempting to do this by influencing youth of other religion and converting them by giving money, marrying them to Muslim women and thus producing kids of the community.”
A chief minister is duty bound to speak out against such a divisive agenda.
Kerala’s Muslim community should introspect what is happening within its fold. Popular Front is not a right wing Hindu organization. All its members swear by Koran. They have turned some of the mosques in the state, if not all, into magazines. When police seize weapons from masjids and madrasas, shouldn’t the Muslim community be alarmed?
And this has been happening for the last many years.
LeT South India commander and Bangalore blasts accused Tadiyantavide Nazeer had told his interrogators that the plan was to Islamize the state by 2050. Also in August 2009, the Kerala High Court had asked the police to investigate charges that there was a racket operating in the state which aimed at luring youth to Islam by feigning love.
From North Kerala, Muslim youth went to Kashmir to be part of the Jihad against the government of India. IUML workers, a few years ago, hoisted the Muslim League flag at the Kozhikode international airport. These are facts, not cooked-up charges.
Every time a Muslim youth get caught in terrorism related charges, the propaganda is that the state is on a witch hunt against the community. If there were sensible leaders within the community, they would have urged its members not to pursue the narrow, divisive and destructive agenda in the name of Koran and Islam.
In Kerala, Muslims are a powerful community. It has access to everything that that state provides as much as other communities in the state. So what’s the Muslim community’s grouse? Why do they want to chop off kafir hands? Why are they involved in havala deals? Why do they want to Talibanise Kerala?
It is an utterly lame response to say that Popular Front is a fringe group and one should ignore them. In fact, it is not. Is Jamat Islami a fringe group? No. In fact, even among Muslims, there is utter confusion about which is the lunatic fringe, and which is not.
Is Abdul Nasar Madani’s People’s Democratic Party a fringe group? Is he a fundamentalist? There have to be answers for such questions.
Every time investigations expose terrorist and other nefarious links among Muslim members in the state, the community leadership shies away from confronting the truth. It’s time it engaged with reality.
If anyone harbours fantasies of altering Kerala’s cultural and demographic map, if not today, there will be a backlash tomorrow. And it would be worse than Gujarat. I hope better sense will prevail among those who swear by the fantasies of Shariath.

Popular Front wants Islamic Kerala: VS (The Times of India Report)

Editor's note: The Sunday Times of India carried this report in all its editions across India on July 25, 2010

TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala chief minister VS Achutanandan dropped a bombshell on Saturday alleging that the Popular Front of India had plans to convert the state into a Muslim-majority one in 20 years and was using money and love to achieve its aim.
Speaking to reporters in New Delhi, VS slammed the PFI, which is alleged to have masterminded the attack on Kerala college lecturer T J Joseph accused of hurting Muslim sentiments.
The PFI, VS stated, was trying to multiply Muslim numbers in the state and believed that Kerala would be a Muslim-majority state after 20 years. “The outfit was attempting to do this by influencing youth of other religion and converting them by giving money, marrying them to Muslim women and thus producing kids of the community,” the chief minister claimed.
The statement of the chief minister has i nv i t e d sharp reaction from the PFI. Its state-unit p re s i d e n t N a s a r u d - deen Elam a r a m said, “The charges are baseless and not suited to the CM’s office. It will only aid communal polarisation in Kerala. This is to get Hindu votes. The CPM leadership should clarify if this is the official view of the party.”
Achutanandan’s comments gain significance given that LeT South India commander and Bangalore blasts accused Tadiyantavide Nazeer had told his interrogators that the plan was to Islamize the state by 2050. Also in August 2009, the Kerala High Court had asked the police to investigate charges that there was a racket operating in the state which aimed at luring youth to Islam by feigning love.

Now who will go beyond Muralitharan’s 800?

By John Cheeran
When I began to pay attention to cricket, Dennis Lillee was the ultimate bowler. The Australian fast bowler had 355 wickets when he bowed out of Test cricket. At that time, it appeared such an impossible task for anyone to overcome those numbers. Or in any case, the man would have been bloody tired to do that, as the English fast bowler Fred Trueman said when he became the first bowler to cross the 300 threshold in Tests.
On July 22, 2010, Muttiah Muralitharan, the Sri Lankan wrist-spinning off-spinner retired from Test cricket in Galle, completing 800 Test wickets, with the last ball of his illustrious career. 800 wickets in 133 Tests!
But in Galle, on Friday, there were no traces of Muralitharan being bloody tired. He still sported his winsome smile as Mahela Jayawardene completed the catch to dismiss Indian rabbit Pragyan Ojha.
Even Lillee, the unabashedly aggressive Aussie, would not have dreamed about such a fantastic figure during his playing days. For a cricket fan, 800 wickets, anyway, was a mind boggling thought in the early 1980s.
Now the question is that will anyone in the future of the game go beyond the mark of 800? Shane Warne, may be the complete spin bowler, the one with prodigious turn and classical action and aggression, in the history of the game, left his pursuit with an awe-inspiring tally of 708 wickets. India’s own Anil Kumble finished, far too away, with 619 wickets in 132 Tests.
Before Lillee rushed through international batting line-ups, the bowling record for the maximum number of wickets was with the West Indian off-spinner Lance Gibbs (309). I wonder whether anyone remembers Gibbs in the glut of wickets now?
Yes, Sharad Pawar is determined to spread cricket into Russia, USA and many other European countries. There could come a time when India would be playing Tests against Latvia, Serbia and Ghana. When Lillee was playing Sri Lanka was taking baby steps in Test cricket. There was no opposition called Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.
You cannot say with certainty that no bowler will overcome Muralitharan’s 800. Yes, Muralitharan had some unfair advantage thanks to his freakish action. He was the only wrist-spinning off-spinner in the history of the game. The Sri Lankan was a bowler with a freak action much to the chagrin of not only the irascible Australian umpire Darrell Hair, who no-balled him repeatedly during a Test Down Under, but India’s pristine practitioner of the craft, Bishan Singh Bedi too. Bedi who called Muralitharan a thief, however, saluted Muralitharan as a man of great qualities when the Sri Lankan Tamil retired after inflicting an embarrassing 10-wicket defeat on Indians and ruined captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s honey moon trip.
But to argue that Muralitharan’s success sprang from his action would be a denial of reality. Remember, Shane Warne, too, had taken an astonishing tally of 708 wickets without the benevolence of nature’s freakish side. But make no mistake, if anyone would scale the Mount of 800, it has to be a slow bowler with an appetite huge enough to scare away batsmen from the crease.