Reflections

For the developed world the car was the ultimate symbol of the last century. For the developing world it has been the ultimate aspiration which, many thought would come to fruition in this one. However just as Indians were thinking of the Nano as the model T Ford for India, albeit one century late, comes the economic downturn and many of these dreams seem to be turning to dust. The pioneers of the automobile industry in Detroit are in dire straits. The mighty three automobile makers of the USA, all based in Detroit, are on the verge of closure To many , Detroit is the home of the automobile, and home to three of Americas biggest car makers: General Motors, Ford and Chrysler. In the heady post World War II days they made as many as 80% of all the world’s cars. The Chief Executive of General Motors Charlie Wilson famously said “What is good for General Motors is good for America”. These automakers spent the last two decades fighting all regulatory measures that were proposed by...

What is it about the water and air of Hindusthan that makes even incorrigible critics like me and many of my ilk feel an aching emptiness as soon as we are removed from its soil? For the past two weeks I am abroad, living in a much advanced society. The creature comforts are far removed from the bustle and untidiness of Siliguri. The roads are like Hema Malini’s cheeks and the electricity is always on. There is no noise on the streets and you don’t trip over garbage over every corner. Driving is a breeze, everybody follows rules and there is no pollution. And yet!! It is not India. There is something about the land of my birth that is inside my skin. It itches and aches and leaves a something that can never be satisfied in a foreign land. I sometimes try to analyse what it is. What is it that made Pritish Nandy say “ if you exile me, please put out my eyes before I go” ( I quote from memory, so that I may be wrong in the actual words though not in the sentiment) I was reading Sunil Ga...

The Teesta is now the focus of builders of dams. Sikkim and the hills of North Bengal are the proposed sites of a large number of dams which will, if all goes well generate a large amount of electricity. Several of these dams are already in the process of being built and the hillsides are already being torn apart to accommodate these leviatans. This had already proved to be controversial as the Llepchas in Sikkim are vigorously opposing the project and have been on hunger strike to prevent the project from drowning their ancestral lands and desecrating their sacred forests. These issues are very important. It has been estimated that since independence, at least 5 million people have been displaced by the large dam projects. Most of them were tribals who have traditionally been voiceless in the power dispensation. It is not a coincidence that these areas where the tribals have been deprived of their land and even more important, their identity that are racked with Naxalite violence toda...

There is a tradition in an old Muslim text that Bhaktiar Khilji, who famously conquered Bengal with 18 soldiers, later planned and executed an invasion of Tibet. The source for this tradition is most likely to be the The Tabaqat-i-Nasiri of Minhaj-ud-din . The same story has been repeated by the Riyazu-S-Salatin by Ghulam Husain Salim. This book was written at about the end of the eighteenth century and was used as a sourcebook for various Histories of Bengal written by the early British administrators. The book became available in English in 1902 when the Asiatic Society of Calcutta published a translation by Maulavi Abdus Salam who was a civil servant then posted in Cuttack. The story is interesting and bears repetition. Bhaktiar, fresh from his conquests in Bihar where he dealt the deathblow to the Nalanda University, decided in 1205 to invade Tibet. He led a force of cavalry 12000 strong to the mountains of North Bengal. The story goes that he was guided by a Koch warrior who ...

When we recently visited the Jaldapara wildlife sanctuary, we noted the large number of Simul trees that dot the forest. The simul is my favourite tree. For most of the year it arises majestically full of leaves and gives plenty of shade. Anybody who has walked in the forests of Purulia will remember how welcome its shade can be after a long walk. Come spring, however, it loses its leaves and becomes full of a mass of crimson coloured flowers. The transition is sudden and the flowers bloom lighting up the forest or the garden. These trees tend to grow in clusters all of whom bloom together so that a patch of forest may turn red when they flower. The flowers also fall below the tree and turn a patch of grass into a red carpet that is a sight that is ethereal. The trees are tall and majestic and the trunk is studded with spike like projections. There is a story current in Oriya tribal lore about how the tree got these projections. A tribal king chased a demon onto the tree. As he climbed...

When I stopped eating the salt of the West Bengal Government (or, to put it less dramatically, when I resigned from Government service,) I had hoped that I would never have to enter a West Bengal Government office again. This was wishful thinking, because when I came back to West Bengal in 2004 to live in Siliguri, and bought an apartment here, it was imperative to visit several offices, those of the Registrar, the State Electricity board and so on. Let me tell you of my experience a couple of days ago when I visited the offices of the State Electricity Board at Matigara, an outlying suburb of Siliguri. The work I had there should have taken all of three minutes. I had to pay a sum of money at the cash office and then get a form endorsed by the clerk in charge of the Office. The office is supposed to start functioning from 10 AM, so I went at 11. The person who was supposed to accept the money had not yet arrived. The cashier assured me that he would be there by 11 AM. When I looked pu...

So, what seemed inevitable over the past few weeks has happened, Bark Obama has won the elections and will be USA’s first (half) Black President. The newspapers and the websites are full of the historical significance of the victory. It is significant, no doubt, in many ways. He had to defeat the Democratic Party machine which was all for Hillary Clinton, and then the Republicans. What with the popularity (or otherwise) of George Bush and the economic crisis, this was the easier battle. If we read today’s newspapers, it would appear that we are at the dawn of a new era where Aslan will rule and all will be well in the Kingdom of Narnia. However before being carried away by the euphoria, let us draw some lessons from history. The last time that a US Presidential election caused such a hullabaloo was when a peanut farmer from Georgia won the elections. No matter what sort of person he may have been, Jimmy Carter was a lousy president. He also presided over a decline of the liberals that...

The city of Siliguri has no bus service. To go from Point A to Point B you have to use either smoke belching auto rickshaws or the cycle rickshaws. While the latter are an environment friendly and poor friendly option, it is not a convenient option if you are in a hurry or have to travel long distances. (Incidentally when I say poor friendly, I am talking about the rickshaw pullers, not of the passengers as the fare structures are much higher than in Autos.) You can, of course walk; Siliguri is, after all, not a city of huge distances, but at acute risk to life and limb. The footpaths on Sevoke Road and Hill Cart road are occupied by the business of commerce, and there are no footpaths anywhere else. You can cycle, but again cycling in Siliguri with the crazy autorickshaws and even madder Shaktimans is an adventure sport. I for one prefer to adventure at Himalayan heights, rather than on the streets of Siliguri. The only thing that can make a Siligurian (somebody suggest a better name,...

William Ruddiman is a paleoclimatologist, that is somebody who studies the climate of long ago and how it influenced and even now influences the world today. He recently retired as the Professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia and is now the Professor Emeritus in the same department. He has long been known for a series of bold hypotheses about climate change. He was the man who in the 1980s postulated that the rising of the Tibetan plateau created the highly seasonal Monsoonal circulation which dominates the climate of South Asia today. However today he is best known for his controversial Ruddiman hypothesis. According to this hypothesis Human activity has been a basic and important factor in causing climate change not for the past two hundred years after the Industrial revolution released large amounts of fossil fuels and their byproducts into the atmosphere, but for the last 8000 years during which mankind has changed the face of many regions of the world. He ...

The Jalpaiguri district links the body of West Bengal to the North East. It lies north of Bangladesh, stretching from the foothills of the Bhutan Hills to the former princely state of Cooch Behar and then to Assam. The district town, Jalpaiguri lies on the East bank of the Teesta. Crossing the Teesta, the scenery is typically that of Bengal. Green paddy fields, ponds and large trees. Just to the north of the road to Cooch Behar lie the jungles of the Terai, home to the one horned Indian Rhinoceros. But here all is bucolic Bengal. The road to the Bangladesh border goes of at right angles from the Jalpaiguri Cooch Behar road and about 7 kilometers distant is the Jalpesh temple. The story of this temple begins in mythology. The Rangpur district, now in Bangladesh, was part of the kingdom of Kamrup in the days of the Mahabharata. The king of these parts, Baghadatta one of the Barman kings, sided with the losers in the battle of Kurukshetra and lost his life to the third Pandava, Arjun .Ho...

The global economic crisis has struck and sob sob, all those poor flight crew who used to earn Rs 35000 a month are out of a job. The Times Of India informs me that they can now barely earn Rs 10000 a month in any other job. How will the poor souls make ends meet? And guess who are agitating for them? The CITU no less, in Kolkata and their twin, Raj Thackeray in Mumbai. And there is no reason the believe that Amar Singh or Jayalalithaaaaaa( Or however many a s she is using nowadays) will leap into the fray in no time. Please forgive me if I am not too sympathetic for these kids who were being paid at a level that even a doctor or a scientist with the highest qualifications are sometimes unable to earn. I know many many students of mine who would be glad to earn Rs 10000 a month and they are qualified doctors. The total lack of any sort of relationship between the type of work that a person does and the remuneration is something that shocks me. I am not surprised that the f...

The Pujas are here, and so , unexpectedly are we! In Siliguri I mean. For various reasons, mostly personal we are staying put in Siliguri this year instead of joining the usual Bengali emigration to other states and countries. Last year the Pujas were slightly later than this year and we visited Western Arunachal Pradesh, including the Tawang area. On the way back we turned away from the Bhalukpong Guwahati road to enter the wonderland of Namieri. We stayed at the Eco camp. This a is a collection of tents and some bungalows placed around a green. Run by Ronen Sen, a wildlife enthusiast and avid angler, this pace is really worth visiting. The Forest department has its camp just adjacent. Close to the camp is the entry to the Namieri tiger reserve and if you walk about a kilometer you come upon the Bhoreli river. The river reminded me of the Ramganga river at Corbet except that there was little evidence of human movement, though I am told, there is extensive poaching in this area. If y...

It is commonly felt that hospitalization is the biggest financial burden that can befall a household. In many cases, poor people are financially crippled by a single hospitalization episode with the costs involved, loss of time at work and other costs( transportation, bribes and so on ) that they have to bear. However a new study suggests that so called minor illness episodes are more likely to cause an unacceptable burden to poor households in India. The study in question was published in the Indian Journal of Medical Research in April this year.The study has provided information in what is a very poorly researched field.I will summarize some of the principal conclusions. It is often claimed that the poorer parts of our population are sustained by indigenous medical practitioners. If this study is to be believed nothing is further from the truth. Just 3.2 % of the expenditure was made for these systems of medicine. While this may be due to the lower costs of indigenous therapy, t...

The Dooars are one of the most beautiful parts of India. As the tourist brochures say, it is full of lush forests, the second largest concentration of the one horned rhino, rippling streams, mountains and tea gardens. The tea gardens have been part of the landscape for about a hundred years. When you drive down towards Hashimara over the Coronation Bridge, they lie on both sides, lush green, full of shade trees and the workers with colourful baskets picking tea leaves- it is really a dream destination. Unfortunately it is also one of the killing fields of West Bengal. Until I came to live in Siliguri I had no idea of the poverty and disease that is rampant in these gardens. I first got an inkling of the state of affairs when some newspapers highlighted the starvation deaths that had taken place in the Tea Gardens of the Dooars. Unfortunately the attention span of the newspapers nowadays does not extend to two consecutive daily editions and the story was lost when we began to discu...

When we were children, snake charmers were a popular mode of entertainment. Together with bandarwalas and bhaloowalas, they entertained us hugely in those days when TVs did not exist and movies were a rare treat. Even in cities like Kolkata where we grew up, once in a while a snake charmer or a bandarwala would turn up and perform to huge popular acclaim. We were not aware, or did not care to see the cruelty involved in trapping and training these animals, nor did we ever think of the consequences of trapping snakes from the wild. We fully believed that the snakes we saw were poisonous and likely to bite at the least provocation. We were also convinced that the Sapura charmed the snakes by the music of the flute that he played. As we grew up we learnt that the animals were ill treated, the snakes were defanged and there was in fact no danger from these reptiles who only swayed to the movement of the flutes and could not in fact hear the music. I was reminded of all this when I read a...

Buxa Fort is now known as a tourist attraction and is in the dense forests of North Bengal. We spent some time there a couple of years ago and took some pictures of the fort and the post office which is one of the remotest in the country. There was a hue and cry sometime back as the Postal department wanted to close it down. However the move has been stalled for the moment. However the story starts long before the British period when the fort was used to incarcerate political prisoners, including, famously , Netaji Subhash Bose. The Buxa Dooar (Dooar meaning a door) was one of the several entry points into Bhutan from the plains of Bengal and Assam. This particular port was used in the medieval and early modern times as a conduit for trade between Bengal and Bhutan and via Bhutan with Tibet. This trade lasted till the early nineteenth century when the British took over the administration of Cooch Behar and a adversarial relationship developed between the two powers which culminated in...

The Teesta River is one of the important geographical features of Siliguri. It enters the plains at Sevoke where the narrow mountain torrent opens up to form a wide river. It has been dammed at the Teesta Barrage a little lower on the course. However I bring up the Teesta because I was reminded of it by the recent change in course of the Kosi River in Bihar. The recent floods caused it to shift to a course that it had not followed for two hundred years. This has caused unprecedented havoc in North Bihar. I do not know if you are aware, but the Teesta did a similar thing similar in 1787, following a devastating earthquake and a major flood. This earthquake took place on the 12th of June that year. It was probably the same quake that also destroyed one of the towers of St Paul’s Cathedral in Calcutta. Previous to this the Teesta , when it entered the plains divided into three streams, the Karatoya to the east, the Punarbhaba in the west and the Atrai in the centre. This led to its name ...

Siliguri badly needs an image makeover. It is today known as the place you pass through in order to reach the tourist destinations of Darjeeling, Gangtok and the Dooars. You cannot fly to Siliguri though it has an airport (it is named Bagdogra), nor can you take a major Mail or express train to Siliguri (its main station is called New Jalpaiguri). Somewhat like Kolkata which never had a station to its name until very recently, Siliguri has a couple of stations but they cater only to the less important trains. It is imperative that two transport centres are renamed at the earliest. Siliguri however lies at the crossroads of South Asia. Within a radius of 50 kilometres as the crow flies there are four countries and four states of India. It is the gateway through which the Indian heartland communicates with the North Eastern states of the Indian Union. No wonder then it is the fastest growing small town in India. The superficial trappings of modernity have all arrived. It has large shopp...

Another update on GREEN. One of the projects we had taken up was the Siliguri Dumping ground near Don Bosco School. One of our members, Pratap Kedia first drew our attention this scandal. We discovered the road adjacent to the dumping ground was being used to drop waste including clinical waste. The road which was like a drain was taken by students of 5 schools in the area.All the children were passing through the area with their noses buried in their handkerchiefs! The entire place is permeated by a stink that penetrates the school premises as well. We took this matter up as a priority and we shot a video showing the place and its effect on the local residents and the school kids. We also met the Urban Develoment Minister who is from Siliguri and insisted that something be done. He gave us a patient hearing but we did not expect anything and were drawings up plans for a more militant movement. However we were pleasantly surprised to find that the Municipal Corporation has announced it...

Normally I hate eating my words. But this time I will do it with great pleasure. I am glad that the three musketeers of Beijing have proved me wrong in all counts. In my opinion it shows that changes are taking place at a rapid pace in small cities across the country. Bhindra’s case is different; he had the backing of his millionaire father. However the point is that infrastructure should be available for sportsmen so that they do not have to depend on individual largesse. It is now clear that even if the state fails, young men and women will make their way. If only the state helped, their life would have been so much easier. Perhaps it is the necessity for small town men to prove themselves that have made them more determined and capable of doing well. The table tennis players of Siliguri come to mind in this context. It amazes me that while the security apparatus for politicians are the best in the world, there is no third world excuse then, the excuse of lack of money is trotted out...

Its that time!The newspapers are full of the new champions who are very likely to win medals in the Olympics. In spite of the fact that no athlete has timings anywhere near the Olympic or world bests, the officials, parts of the media and of course crazy sport administrators keep insisting that so and so is bound to get a medal this year.I remember Anju Baby George. She came fourth in one World Athletics Meet, never came close to her timings after that, and everybody kept saying that she would win a medal. Not surprisingly she did not. The only medals that have come our way, one apiece in each recent Olympics, have been sort of flukes, nobody expected it and it just happened. In this Olympics if we do get our one medal it will be like that, some sportsman who was not thought of at all might win a bronze and become the next great Hope of Indian sport. It is ridiculous how puny achievements are played up as if they were world shaking achievements. Sania Mirza. She won a couple of matches...

Coming back to the doings of GREEN, our organization let me remind you, that works on environmental issues. Last Sunday was the beginning of one of our most ambitious ventures. We plan to plant 10,000 trees this year while the monsoon lasts. The land for this project was lent to us by The Army authorities. The programme kicked off on the 3rd August when we all went to the Army Cantonment at Sukna. The plantation this Sunday was at the banks of the Dakdakia rivulet, a tributary of the Balason. The opposite bank was thickly wooded; it is part of the Mahananda Sanctuary. We planted about 200 trees, our members and officers of the Army unit all pitched in. In this phase 2000 saplings will be planted. Subsequently we plan to plant the rest in phases. The saplings were obtained from the Forest Division of the Jalpaiguri District. The great advantage of having the Army with us is that we can be sure that the trees will be looked after well. We hope that with their active cooperation we will b...

Yesterday I attended function held to inaugurate a new Hospital in Jalpaiguri, the district town of the eponymous district, about 40 kilometres from Siliguri. The road is execrable, many parts resembling ploughed fields rather than the State Highway it is supposed to be. And the government wants investment in North Bengal! Anyway let’s not chase that rabbit but come back to what I was saying. The function started about 40 minutes late, inevitably as the organizers had invited the local MP and one nondescript minister of the West Bengal Government. There were the inevitable speeches; I noticed with some amusement that a Ramakrishna Mission monk who inaugurated the function could talk effortlessly for ten minutes saying nothing in particular as well as any politician! The local MP stood up to speak. She informed us, without batting an eyelid that the Government run health service is the best in West Bengal among all the states of India. Apparently 73% people avail the services and “most...

This a account of our visit to Sigiruya in Sri Lanka in 2004 Traveling to Serendip was a long nurtured dream. Working as we were then at the Manipal College of Medical Sciences in Pokhara, Nepal, we had a large number of Sri Lankan students, many of whom had often invited us to visit their country. Once, returning from a vacation, a group of them brought a huge collection of travel literature for us. As a seasoned traveler knows, reading about a place and planning the trip is half the fun and we spent many happy hours in the Emerald Isle, albeit that of our imagination. But when the opportunity came it was unexpected. Susmita was going to Sri Lanka: she had been invited to address the Annual Conference of the College of Anesthesiologists. Would I also like to come? You bet I would! The trip however would last only three days, so Colombo, Kandy, Sigiriya and Dambulla would be our destinations this time. The beaches of the Deep South and the National Parks of the East Coast, not to speak...

I have recently become a founder member of an organisation that plans to highlight environmental issues in Siliguri. Rather unoriginally we have named it GREEN. We are about 40 strong and in the two months or so of our existence we have scored one minor success. We have managed to persuade all the residents of Green Valley, the apartment complex where we live to stop using plastic bags.We also talked to the management of the Cosmos Mall, the largest and the most hip hangout in Siliguri to stop plastic usage in the Mall. This made it to the newspapers, Check it out at http://www.telegraphindia.com/1080603/jsp/siliguri/story_9356033.jsp We will be planting10,000 trees in a space provided to us by the Army Authorities near Sukna, This function is scheduled for the 3rd August and is likely to be attended by the Corps Commander( a bigwig, i am told). We have a website, rather basic, though we have plans. Visit us at http://greenslg.com/

Recently I had the misfortune of being involved in the management of a young boy. He was the only child of his parents, a bright young man who was studying for a Master’s degree in Microbiology in the North Bengal University . Exams were scheduled and he was crossing the road to catch an auto on Hill Cart Road . A fast moving SUV crashed into him. The fault was probably the boy’s, he had been talking to his father while he crossed the road and did not notice the SUV. The driver of the vehicle , to his credit, did not zoom away but stopped, took the boy to the Siliguri hospital, where he was told that he should be shifted to a place where better facilities were available. He was shifted to this facility, admitted to the ICU, ventilated and finally died at 9 pm on the same day. The point is that the death was totally unnecessary. He was ignorant, or ignored the basic rules of the road. Possibly the driver of the vehicle was also speeding.. Basically he was only the latest victim of ...

There may have been a lot of irregularities. It is not possible to believe that all those BJP and other opposition MPs voted against their own side out of sheer conviction that th Nuclear deal will benefit India. However i can vouch for the fact that around 70% of all people that I polled ( In an entirely unscientific manner) were pleased that our great revolutionary from the Kremlin on the Jamuna, Mr Prakash ( Fathead) Karat got his comeuppance. We can only hope that the Bengal comrades now put their foot down and tell him where to get off. It is incredible that he should ignore the needs of his own party to massage his own ego. It is also amusing that the opposition which was so eagerly crowing about the defection from the Samajwadi party ( all of whom defected because of their conviction that the government was selling out to the Americans of course, ) became so het up when Amar Singh got into action from the other side. One thing however, Manmohan Singh may be principled and all t...