Reflections

For the past year, Siliguri has had a haat (periodic village market). Called the Sunday Haat, this takes place on Church Road every week. In collaboration with COFAM   (Centre for Floriculture & Agro-business Management) – NBU (North Bengal University), the Mango tree Village Haat holds a market that enables the producers of organic produce as well as makers of handicrafts to display and sell their products. The Haat runs from 10 Am to 2 PM every Sunday. I had visited the Haat the last time I was in Siliguri in October. One of the chief organizers and an inspiration for this haat is my friend Raj Basu. ( You can read an interview with him here ) He had asked me to come and have a look at what was being done and I was very impressed. On the particular day that I had attended it, there was. in addition to all the fresh vegetables and fruit, jam, condiments and what not, a group of itinerant singers from Nepal. They added a cultural dimension to the Haat and to tell the

2020 has arrived. It was to be the year when India became a developed country. It was to be the year when we arrived as a major player in the world and when India became a beacon of hope for countries with religious and regional divisions to look up to and feel confident that this was the model that should be used in order to have a democratic, tolerant and vibrantly diverse path to prosperity. Alas, the year dawned a few days ago and it has been heralded by a gasping economy, deep divisions exacerbated by those in power and unrest and violence everywhere. The sellers of dreams are still promising jam tomorrow. The state of the republic leaves much to be desired to put it mildly. Is everything lost? That is what I would have thought until the country fought back over the past month or so. It warms the cockles of my heart to see that students and young people are standing up to be heard and saying no to the narrative that appeared to be unchallenged over the past few years. The

I was reading Umberto Eco’s novel The Prague Cemetery. This very cleverly constructed novel uses actual historical characters who interact with the fictional narrator of the book. It is a riot of intrigue and what would today be called fake news. The manner in which Jews, communists and other rebels were demonized by the creation of false documents is eye opening. That such tactics are still in use goes without saying. What struck me was how old and well tested the tactics are and how well they work. Verily, there is nothing new under the sun. In one passage, a Russian agent advises the narrator about how one can deflect discontent from the authorities to other “enemies of the people”. The tactics described so perfectly described those of the present ruling dispensation in India, Russia, Turkey and of course the US and UK, that I think it bears quoting at length. If you just substituted some words, mainly “Muslims” for Jews, it would be a blueprint for the right wing nation