Service that touches your soul

I usually take my meals at the TISCO Guest House in Jamshedpur where I am staying – they serve great food and more interestingly, there is a certain panache with which they do so. But this day was a little different – we had been out to Patamda, a remote block in East Singbhum district and it was nearly 3 p.m. by the time we made our way back to civilization. The Dining Hall timings are till 2 p.m. and I thought that I could do with a change from the usual offering of Continental cuisine. My driver assured me that he knew of a few good places near the Guest House itself, which are not too exorbitant, but dish out good food.

Off we went driving along roads and by-lanes, till I sighted this place – ANAND – A HOUSE FOR PURE, VEGETARIAN SOUTH INDIAN MEALS. A sudden bout of nostalgia, induced by my daily ritual of eating at my favourite Udupi joint near Colaba Apollo Bunder, gripped me. “It's time for some Dosa-Chutney” said by taste buds and I decided to oblige them. In we went; myself with my driver in tow.

Tables and chairs stacked in rows and columns – the place resembled my old Engineering hostel mess. The place seemed packed – I managed to catch hold of a passing waiter -

“Bhaiyya, table khali hoga kya?”

He manages a swift, sweeping glance of the full expanse and a wave of incredulity sweeps across his face. A stern rebuke follows -

“Table se kya matlab?? Chair to khali hai na.”

I can't deny that – I think of seeking a 2nd opinion from another waiter, but then decide otherwise – they all look the same and I can visualize the 2nd one speaking with the same conviction about the need to efficiently utilize space.

A set of 5 tables had been arranged in a row to look like a long bench on my left – 3 of the chairs were empty – I decide to sit down. The others who are using that bench-like table, are obviously in a big group and do not seem too pleased with my decision to infringe upon their space. I don't give a damn – I am famished.

No one seems to be appearing – I try to catch the attention of a few of the waiters, darting all around. No success. I almost grab the next guy who comes close –

"'Bhaiyya, Masala Dosa milega?”

I had decided to forgo the right to demand the menu card before I chose a dish.

“Main is table ka nahin hoon sir..'

- curtly said with the shrug of the shoulder. I wait – a menu card is whizzed across the table to me, much like one throws a flying saucer in the fields.

A look at the menu card rejuvenates me – my eyes are peering down on the longest list of assorted dosas that I have come across – all neatly lined up in order of hierarchy.

SADA DOSA Price
MASALA DOSA Price
ONION SADA DOSA Price
ONION MASALA DOSA Price
RAWA SADA DOSA Price
RAWA MASALA DOSA Price
RAWA O.S. DOSA Price

(The abbreviations come in – they make the most mundane sounding name interesting, if you like rolling around the acronyms in your mouth)
RAWA M.S. DOSA Price
................................ ..................
COCONUT R.M.S. DOSA Price

I like this – I decide to go for the ones with the longest acronyms. The waiter - my table's this time – has thankfully appeared -

“Bhaiyya, ek Coconut Rawa Masala Dosa (my rolling tongue comes up with the acronym Cocoramado – I love the Latino twist to a Tam dish) aur ek Idli-Sambhar (for my driver – he would prove to be the more intelligent one)”.

“Sirf Plain Sada Dosa milega saab.”

This guy loves simplicity – and he says so with a no-nonsense tone. I am resigned to my fate –

''Wohi la dijiye aur do Thums Up”.

They serve earlier than I expect. We pounce on it like a pack of hungry wolves. The Thums Up arrives a little later – it is positioned as a substitute for dessert. I catch a few eyes around looking at myself and decide to go a little slow in my consumption. I am down to a respectable pace by the time I start sipping on my Thums Up. My driver chooses not to follow suit – he is through with his meal in a jiffy and decides to wait outside.

“Aur kuchh chahiye kya?”

The guy is not pleased at all that his afternoon snooze is being delayed and he makes it evident that he won't relish serving you, if you decide to be brazen enough to order something else now. I am not thinking of it anyway – I love this place so much that I can't think of robbing it of any more of its stocks. I nod my head to say 'no' – he scampers off and comes back with the bill with an alarming efficiency. I am only halfway through my Thums Up. He waits for a few seconds before announcing :

“51 Rs huya hai sir..”

He doesn't seem to be too pleased with my speed and is standing besides the table, staring down at me. I implore for some more time -

“Bhaiyya, khatam karke deta hoon paise.”

He decides to take pity -

“Haan, haan thik hai”.

I take out a crisp Rs 100 note and place it in the small bowl – my man is now happy that the saga is about to end -

“You like the food, sir?”

He blurts out in English. A little part of the training that he got, seems to be still floating around in his head. I nod my head. I am being honest – the food was ok.

He is back with my change.

“Have a good day, sir. Do come back”.

English again - He seems to have shifted gears completely – this guy still expects me to come back to this place after all this?? I take an instant liking to this innocent invitation and leave a decent tip.

As I step out, I notice a small banner to my right -

“OTHER RESTAURANTS SATISFY YOUR HUNGER, WE SATISFY YOUR SOUL”.

I can't help having a good laugh.

India - A modern, progressive nation..???

Bant Singh is a poor Dalit villager from the Punjab – a nameless face in the vast multitude that live in the rural belts of the country. Unknown and unwanted in a country which has shifted its focus to cities, to the more successful faces of “India Shining”. A country which is in a frantic race to join the league of developed nations and which chooses to push the obvious lacunae, that point otherwise; under curtains.

Bant Singh's daughter Baljeet Kaur was raped by upper caste Jats three years back, when she was a mere minor, a Class-IX student, returning from school. Bant Singh comes from a family of agricultural labourers, a breed that is synonymous with bonded labour and slavery in the Punjab. In these parts of the country, as in many other parts indeed, the Dalits have no rights – violation of their daughters, is seen as inconsequential, as acts of daily mundaneness. Mere arithmetical additions to statistics that shock no one any more. The families are usually offered lucrative monetary compensations and are expected to keep quiet and move on with their lives. The physical and mental depredations are to be seen as mere blips in the journey of time.

It is sad that these things happen in Punjab – a state where 31% of the population is Dalit – the largest proportion in any state in India. And it is all the more ironic that the protagonists of our stories are all Sikhs – a religious cult founded on the very principle of anti-casteism, which was so very rampant in the Hindu hierarchy. Unfortunately, with time, old regressive customs have an uncanny ability to override the laudable ethos of equality and morality that give rise to new socio-religious orders.

But Bant Singh was not one to keep mum. He fought back – filed a court case against the culprits and had them incarcerated. An act of defiance which would cost him dearly. A fortnight back, some of the relatives of the accused, beat him up mercilessly on a lonely stretch of road and left him to die for good. He survived, but his limbs didn't – Bant Singh has lost both his arms and a leg and as I write this, doctors are still at work, frantically trying to save his sole remaining leg.
The political establishment in Punjab, dominated by the upper castes, chose to conveniently close their eyes ...... and the media followed suit. Fashions shows in Chandigarh and the social peccadilloes of Bollywood starlets were deemed to be more worthy of occupying newsprint. The attack went unreported and it was only when the limbs were amputated, that the local media found the story salacious enough to report.

And yet, Bant Singh would not have been able to tide over these times had it not been for the grass-roots activism and support of the CPI, CPI-M and CPI-ML in his area. A CPI-ML activist from his youth, it was the sense of empowerment that the movement had imbibed in him, that helped Bant Singh stand up to the perpetrators of such heinous crimes. He was promised support and his case brought to the fore, thanks to the activism of the communist leaders from Punjab. In fact, it was only after Harkishen Singh Surjeet took up cudgels on behalf of Bant Singh, that the case was taken up in earnest in the media.

In these enlightened days of a resurgent India, it has become fashionable to criticize the leftist parties at the drop of a hat and to blame them for every roadblock that pops up on the path of economic liberalization. We conveniently choose to forget the less fortunate across India. We are interested only in the output and we do not care about the conditions of the labour force, the vital input for our dreams of economic prosperity. The labour force in states like Punjab are treated as pariahs by those with money and the caste problem is but another angle of the same problem. For many of these nameless, faceless people, the communists and the leftist social activists are the only hope for salvation, for social survival, for that little dose of dignity that would help them keep their heads high.

No nation has truly progressed with only an elitist minority bearing the fruits of such success. The sooner we realize this, the better for all of us.

“Now, that I have lost my limbs and can't do anything anymore, I have all the more time for my activism and to spread the message of solidarity and equality amongst all my brethren.”

May the force be with people like Bant Singh.

Of musical lamas and wounded bodybuilders

I have been paying a lot of attention to all sorts of news items that appear in newspapers and the electronic media ever since I have landed in Jamshedpur. There is not much to do once I come back from office in the evening and the news never fails to provide enough snippets to ensure that all sorts of emotions come rushing through.

Here's a random collection of some stories that aroused my curiosity:

A minister in Rajasthan has been censured by the media and her party colleagues for glorifying the practice of Sati. I am amazed at the resilience of Indian beliefs or worse, at the shameless pandering to local sentiments to garner votes. It is a pity that nearly 60 years after independence, we still have to grapple with issues that would make the Dark Ages seem like a supernova in comparison. And to think that the minister in question is a lady herself.

Parochial sentiments too refuse to ever die out. And Bongs with their infinite fondness for Sourav Ganguly are not the only ones to blame. At the recently concluded Mr. India contest in Mumbai, the favourite was a son of the soil – Shyam Rawathe. He was however, upstaged by Bijit Gogoi of Assam, who went on to win the coveted title. The Shiv Sainiks however, were in no mood to raise a toast to him. Instead, they rode up to the dais in droves, brandished knives in front of the judges, announced that a person from North East does not deserve to win any pan-Indian award as they are all terrorists, kicked Gogoi out of the stage and forced the judges to reverse the decision and announce Rawathe as the winner. When the media finally caught up with a shaken Gogoi in Guwahati, he brushed off the incident as an act of immature people and in an admirable gesture, appealed to his Assamese brethren to ensure that this sort of treatment is not meted out to athletes and spectators from across the country who would soon arrive in Assam for the National Games. My salute to this brave man – he deserves to be Mr. India.

The North East has traditionally been given the cold shoulder by the media, by other Indians and the Government in most areas of national life. Somehow, we have never been able to accommodate them in the national mainstream; a fact, borne out by the above snippet. And yet, this part of the country has made us proud on a number of occasions. Dingko Singh gave us a boxing gold in the Asian Games, half of the indigenous talent that we are still able to produce in football come from Manipur, it was in Imphal that the Azad Hind Fauj waged a valiant guard against the British, with considerable help from the local populace, Tripura gave the Hindi film industry its finest composer duo of S.D. and R.D. Burman etc. And yet again, a simple, unheralded Buddhist monk from Arunachal Pradesh has made us sit up and take notice of the region. Lama Tashi has been nominated for the Grammys in the world fusion music category for his album on Tibetan chants. Lama Tashi is multi-phonic singer which means that when he sings, it seems that a whole lot of people are singing together. A rare musical genius and doctors from around the world are conducting studies to figure out the secret behind his unique gift. Unperturbed, he promises to continue enchanting us with his soulful music.

And to wind up, an illuminative piece of wisdom from Carl Jung:

All the greatest and most important problems of life are fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved, but only outgrown. This "outgrowing" proves on further investigation to require a new level of consciousness. Some higher or wider interest appeared on the horizon and through this broadening of outlook the insoluble problem lost its urgency. It was not solved logically in its own terms but faded when confronted with a new and stronger life urge.

Most of the Indian politicians won't know Carl Jung from Carl Lewis, but they seem to be faithful adherents of the above maxim :))