Boat-trekker-trekker-boat: a travelogue

Kaleidoscope by virtue of his continuous and never-ending service to Higher Education often undertakes extensive travels to investigate the progress of pupil in other side of the river - in Nandigram. The ultimate aim is to impose a momentary halt in his non-judgemental self and start judging pupil and their works with a few often stereotypical questions. However, as always happens Kaleidoscope finds these moments as opportunities to experience people and places. 

Therefore, Kaleidoscope must leave his office early and cross the river which has the most amazing sun-set views. 

A few sun-set moments

Kaleidoscope crosses the river in an over crowded machine run boat which constantly speaks monotonous word "bhat bhat bhat bhat" and therefore, these are "bhotbhotis". People can manage to sit on a three inch elevated side wall of the boat and speak with each others. Much like local train co-passengers they start talking from nowhere and continues until the boat reaches its destination. There are issues of health, office politics, state and central politics, cricket, good looking girls and films. As Kaleidoscope almost makes once-in-a-year visit to Nandigram he is often asked by the daily passengers his whereabouts. He is mostly thought of as a newly appointed school teacher or somebody going for the BDO office work. 

This is how you need to cross the river

It takes about 10 - 15 minutes to cross the river and often there are displays of bravery by age old or quite young people who jump from Kaleidoscope's boat to another boat which goes to Nayachar. If Kaleidoscope's boat starts late it meets the Nayachar boat mid river and both the boatmen try hart to bring their bhotbhotis closer in such a way the gap becomes just enough for one brave heart person to jump off, but there must be a distance so that these two do not collide with each other. 

When the boat anchored in the opposite side of the river bank, a race takes place to catch the trekker - sole communication medium in most of the rural West Bengal. A trekker is a metal hooded vehicle with an unlimited carrying capacity. While there are sitting arrangements for about 10 to 12 at least 35 to 38 people boards and travels with a smile. The drivers and helpers are their friends or neighbours and many of them are grown up together. The attachment is such deep seated that several trekkers bear the inscription "bandhutto barite/ byabsa gaarite" - loosely meaning I am a friend of yours' at home but this vehicle means business - an alternative way to say "pay to avail the service." There is a huge concession for school going children, they boards - almost always clings with the vehicle and pays Rs. 2/- against the minimum fare of Rs. 5/-. Everytime Kaleidoscope goes he finds the driver taking personal care of each of his passengers who are dangerously clinging with the vehicle. He constantly reminds passengers to holdfast. At the back side of the trekker where Kaleidoscope most of the times gets to seat has a single sit in between two parallel sits virtually omitting the slightest leg-space. This time a girl sits on that single sit and keep browsing facebook from her touch screen cellular phone. Yes, while these people do not have a 'proper' transport facility, they have mobile phones and many of them do access facebook. 

The trekker with unlimited carrying capacity makes regular stoppages and its carrying capacity increases as the drivers never say no and passengers reciprocate. once in a while it has to stop to check whether the hen or duck which was crossing the road actually have crossed it or is still waiting under the vehicle. The car stops, the helper who happens to be a spider-man to be able to cling throughout the vehicle and collect the fare, asks "what happened?" The driver asks "you must first check with the duck!!" A cheering smile goes across the vehicle and it continues to shuttle. The people of Nandigram having being able to mark a prominence in the social movements related to land acquisition continues to toil happily between "Kendamari to Nandigram bazar" or between "Terepekhya to Nandigram bus stand." As Kaleidoscope is writing this unproductive experience he can still hear the cheering smile by the school going students who were advised by the trekker driver to ask their MP for bicycles... or the moment when the real life spider-man had to check whether the duck was still there!

P.S. Kaleidoscope's boss at one of the best institutes of the world once received a FPM (PhD) application with a Post Script "Sir, I am from Nandigram!"  

“Water water everywhere...” What the fuss does that mean?

Portion of Kangsabati river barrage.

The pictorial Mukutmanipur dam which halts water flow of the river Kumari and Kansabati and irrigates parts of Bankura, Paschim Medinipur, Purba Medinipur and Hooghly provides one of examples of the bitter and unreported experiences of what happens in neighbouring villages of large scale dam constructions. People a couple of generations ago have seen villages submerged under water, large scale evacuation process and irrevocable loss of social and emotional bonding.

What did they get in return is perhaps the most vital question. To understand this question I have been roaming around villages of Dhagora, Peerless para, Ekkaduar, Nadupara, Jambedia and Barghutu. Each of the villages fall under Gorabari Gram Panchayat which is now controlled by the Trinamool Congress. Mostly Tribal people like Santals, Bhumijs and a few families of Mundas occupy these villages. Some Scheduled Caste groups like Teli, Lohar and Bene live in some of the villages in the region.  While the dam is filled with water regulated by the irrigation department to irrigate different parts of the neighbouring districts people in the adjascent villages keep depending on the rainwater to cultivate.  Excepting the village Jambedia the rest of the villages cultivate a single crop and the amount they got is just enough for preparing next year’s seeds and providing their family a couple of rice meals throughout the year.

What makes the difference?

The difference which will be discussed soon is solely an outcome of positional advantage of the Jambedia than the rest of the villages. Jambedia which is about five kilometres south-west from the head regulator of the Kangsabati river barrage, have the closest farmlands from the dam water.  Villagers use suction pump to pull out water to irrigate their farm lands. Interestingly the strategic locational advantage of the village farmland is a result of the evacuation process. The village headman, the Majhi, who is old enough to see and remember the actual process of evacuation reports that people from Jambedia village have lost their land and bought new lands from neighbouring villages like Surigram and Jhanti-Pahari which are now disappeared under water. The irrigation results in production of multiple crops which is otherwise impossible in the region. The Self Help Group (SHG) initiatives taken by the Panchayat have resulted in the availability of loans and the village SHG members have purchased several such pumps to irrigate their farm land in arid seasons. However, similar SHGs of the adjacent villages did not buy simply because they barely have access to the water that they see every day from their village.

The nature of difference:

One crop makes a family to survive two crops ensure educational attainments and three crops makes significant impact on health and well being. I did Participatory Rural Appraisal as well as Focus Group Discussions to find out the nature of educational and occupational attainments of the villagers. It is seen that Jambedia has several college going students and has sons and daughters working as school teachers, government employees and as other white-collar workers. This has been possible because on average they could afford to send their children not only to the schools but also to the colleges and even to universities. Other villages have school going children, perhaps a good result of the Mid-day meal programme but none of the villagers could afford to continue their child’s post-school education. Young boys are sent to cities like Kolkata, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Pune to do construction works. While they stay abroad for a long period of time, it is reported by several villagers that they have high rate of Sexually Transmitted Disease, perhaps a common trend among the migrant labourers.

The possibilities:

While water scarcity is the main factor behind the difference between Jambedia and the rest, the Gorabari Gram Panchayat is constantly trying to improve water retention by constructing hapa, small water reservoir with the help of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Generation Scheme. My two years field visit in the region shows that while the Gram Panchayat has planned innovatively to create hapas and interconnecting them to ensure long-term water retention, it is extremely difficult to convince villagers to provide land where such interconnected hapas can be constructed. There is no initiative from the irrigation department to install possible schemes like River Lift Irrigation, may be because it would reduce actual irrigation potential. However, in consequence villagers apart from Jambedia continue to toil for water which is plenty but inaccessible.  

Aam Aadmi Party: Charisma, Simulacrum and a new myth

While Kaleidoscope remains dormant for sometime several incidents reshape the world in which he strives to live on. One of the striking reshuffling that Kaleidoscope finds hard to overlook is the rise of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). On the one hand the rise shows anti-Congress wave that former CM sheila Dikshit’s popularity and political skill fail manage and on the other hand although Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP+) emerges as largest group with 32 seats it faces a stiff warning. Moreover, clearly the “Modi effect” which supposedly works in Rajastan and Madhyapradesh do not work in a cosmopolitan city. Locational analysis would prove the fact that BJP wins with its traditional voters.

What is new?

AAP and BJP continue to show interest in becoming opposition and the country sees an unprecedented situation where parties fight for becoming opposition in the run on elections. While Congress extends their primarily “unconditional” then “quasi-conditional” support, AAP goes for a SMS poll and accepts the verdict of people and Mr Arvind Kejriwal is becoming the CM of Delhi. A great transformation of a versatile individual from participating in a social movement to an active change agent – now with authority he needs to do something extraordinary with huge expectations.

Kaleidoscope’s tiny little books and AAP’s rise:

Kaleidoscope has long been admirer of bearded sociologists (of course new addition is non bearded and even bald thinkers), one of them who is particularly linked to Congress, BJP and AAP’s present condition is Max Weber and his tool kit of explaining authority. More recent condition which links Congress and AAP is of course the not bearded Jean Baudrillard’s cup of tea.

CONGRESS’s case: Congress is at its best to be explained as a party that uses nostalgia, or to be precise “tale of origin”. Congress claims the right to rule because its members in the past victoriously fought a common enemy, i.e. the Britishers and developed common resources to found a kingdom. The tales often becomes poetic-mythical, full of factual errors but nevertheless remains a powerful mechanism of maintaining legitimacy.

BJP’s Case: BJP too is a nostalgic team. It projects although now with a softer tone the glorious version of Hinduism and their fight or restorative effort. The tale of origin with factual errors are with formidable power as Kaleidoscope find’s while Sardar Vallabhbhai Jhaverbhai Patel is being projected as the maker of India, BJP ignores the fact that forming India by forcibly incorporating several princely states seeps in today’s regional movements. Even the divisive approach of Sardar Patel’s in creating Hindu Swimming Bath and Boat Club Trust in Mumbai must have been celebrated inside and ignored outside.  Meanwhile, they also use the charismatic transformation of Gujrat under the leadership of Mr. Narendra Modi – the declared Prime Ministerial candidate of the party.

AAP’s Case: AAP is a charismatic new avenue. It effectively blends the future fight against corruption- which has all the potentials of becoming poetic-mythical, quite similar to the Shri Krishna’s avatars using their charismatic power to restore humanity with future India. AAP says quite clearly “vote me because I can transform your life” (including reducing the Electricity bills and distributing at least 700 liters of water).

The irony is that today’s AAP is nothing more and nothing less than what Congress was during 1940s and what BJP was throughout Post Colonial India’s history. The alleged issue shifts from Colonial masters to rescue of Hinduism to corruption. Social scientists at least people who seriously think for the society and not people like Kaleidoscope who sleeps off are finding a new evolution in the nature of social movements. Many believe that rise of AAP is an alternative model of organising social movement. Although this approach is quite parallel to the people who once thought to come to power by violence and form people’s country. Only they fail to appreciate non-violence and democracy.

Tomorrow’s AAP with Kejriwal as CM of Delhi is ultimately a coalition government that is expected to rule Kaleidoscope’s country capital with “legal rational authority.” AAP will use a permanent machine of Bureaucracy loaded with much nuanced power dynamics and corruption than what they did encounter in their social movements.

Congress support and simulacra of AAP's origins:  

Kaleidoscope along with the entire country witnesses Congress support to AAP. Congress which holds 43 seats in 2008 and now holds only 8 seats supports one of its fiercest enemies that claim their identity from anti-corruption movement allegedly against Congress. AAP had no choice than to form the government to avoid being labelled as irresponsible. This condition at the very outset of AAP mounting on a legal-rational authority, making a transformation from their charismatic power is based on a notion that happens to be a simulacrum-like image under endless succession of depthless presents. AAP fought against something that is in the process of becoming contemporary myth, a well designed, strategically planned myth which soon would be a simulacra whenever AAP will seek its power with “tale of origin” and non-rational sources.

Kaleidoscope wonders five years from now he might be asking “did the anti-corruption movement take place at all?”

Right to right

Kaleidoscope finds this girl fighting in a no-man’s land in the factory where she like many others strives to produce resources that can potentially change this country. She aspires to go out of her comfort zone and makes contacts for things that she finds right, fights with people who otherwise go away with saying and doing anything as they are in the no-man’s land, does things with passion and sincerity that is increasing a scarce resource, and finally she demands what she is entitled to get.

She finds procrastination, has to pursue the powerful, and finally gets absurd remarks from the least expected corners. However, she is going to get her rights, delayed but in a sound way.

Kaleidoscope, seriously, Kaleidoscope does not know when this cosy circle of friendship and other ties would be hammered? The cosy circle which exercises centralised power, makes uncalled for intervention, and uses personalised covetousness that become the rights and rituals. Yes Kaleidoscope's world needs a strong Heresy! 

State, temple and corporates: constructs and micro identities in postmodern India

Kaleidoscope and queen were amazed and shocked to find Mr P in Levi-Strauss jean and denim shirt in Varanasi as being part of the family which owns all but four temples of the old city. Mr P is a Brahmin and a saint who does not need to 'sacrifice' any of the earthy comforts to attain Moksha. Mr. P belongs to a considerably large group of many other such saints and leads a life which is quite contradictory to the common constructs associated with saints.

God man and not so godly pursuits:

Quite obvious, this section devotes itself in discussing Asaram's alleged rape of a 16-year-old girl. It appears that the girl and her parents are made to believe that she is possessed by some evil spirit and Asaram being a guru is with the power to drive it off. Asaram's ideology is anti-western, anti-non vegetarian, anti-sexuality as he says if one removes these 'antis' s/he perpetuates evil side of human beings such as aggression, wrath, etc. He advises not to fall in love before marriage, abstain sexual intercourse for pleasure as it is for the continuation of life cycle. He further advises to stop celebrating valentine's day, and also talks in favour of rapists who raped and killed the medical student in New Delhi. 

For Asaram the saint Kaleidoscope and the Queen meet at Varanasi is perpetuating evil side of their personalities.

The constructs: 

Asaram and people like Asaram projects the image of saint that is well nurtured by the mainstream media. Socialisation and social constructs are intermixed for the perpetuating their hegemony. Throughout life people tend to identify themselves with their parents, teachers and heroes. Therefore when Asaram and the like shares dais with leaders of such height as L K Advani, Narendra Modi or Uma Bharati it leaves significant effect on people's mind. When Bollywood superstars vow their respects towards these godmen the  powerful constructs embodied by them are formidable. Despite of many cases of murder, sexual assault and land grab Asaram has considerable power in BJP ruled states such as MP, Gujarat and Chhattisgarh. Asaram's arrest has been projected by VHP as an attack to weaken Hindu culture and Hindu ideology. These acts often go unnoticed but smoothly blends faith, politics and money. 

Interestingly all these happen in a time when Science and Technology dominates much like the Pharaohs of Egypt and Zamindar's of Bengal. While Science and Technology bring new barbarism, religious pursuits are even more powerful. One instance would show the nature of constructivism in neo-liberal India. The solar eclipse of 1980 was a phenomenon that people were advised by the televisions to avoid, people avoided. The 1995 eclipse was promoted by television as a spectacle and people watched the spectacle. Interestingly in the same year the country was moved by the miraculous milk drinking Ganesh. Constructs, stereotypes and myths are created, recreated and killed everyday.

Liberalisation and India's own special ways:

Godmen like Asaram project their agendas against west and aspects of 'other' culture that comes with post liberal era of the country. However, strategically Asaram and others like Ramdev uses political clout which surrounds them, encash Hindu sentiments promoted by several political parties and voluntary organisations, build their empire on leased and discounted lands from states, collect donations from sections of rich Indians in India and in Abroad, collect money from temples that tend to grow like mushrooms. They are successful in attracting corporate fundings from organisations which seek to encash from religious tourism, healthcare and education industries. Neo-liberal India sees free flow capital along with a blend of states, temples and corporates effectively. Under Neo-liberal regime India attract private capitals from both global and indigenous players. It has become relatively easy to club up money from people and corporates to form religious-cum-business empires. Saints whom Kaleidoscope and the Queen meet in the Varanasi, with whom they dine together, talk over hours and share a special friendship are therefore sidelined, although Mr. P cannot overthrow the political clout which surrounds him just because he is part of the family which owns numerous temples in the holy city. 

The rest, the dominant discourse of sainthood run patanjali, get funding for Art of Life (AOL) form Infosys, get land from the state, spread Hinduttava among the tribals of MP, Chhatisgarh and then they allegedly rape girls, kill people, and encroach lands all for sake of faith and value of a age old tradition collectively called the Hinduism.

   

Ethnocentric bias, starvation deaths and vanishing natives

People can die because of malnutrition, tuberculosis, fever and pneumonia, but they can never die of starvation. A recent report of starvation deaths in Birbhum triggers controversy that government and other key players have found hard to dodge. At least 19 tribal people have died because of starvation. There are several sporadic incidents of such deaths that go unnoticed. The question that becomes important is a historical one. The large scale starvation deaths occurred during 1942-43 do not report much death of tribal population of the state. The starvation death among tribal population while seen historically is a much recent phenomenon. What changes have taken place in last 70 years? More crucially it is important to explore what changes have taken place in last 20 years that have radically altered the tribal ways of life?

Post neo-liberal India sees lands being classified as barren, one to multi crop land, land having mining potentials and so on. Similarly forest policies kept displacing tribal access to the forest. Forest trees are replaced by eucalyptus and others adding noting to daily life of the people who depend heavily on the forest. Furthermore large scale displacements, often induced by development  have continued.

While a land which is seen as barren is actually used for cattle grazing, cultivating wild and high calorie cereals for local consumption, collection of tribal medicines. These lands are then taken for either developing connectivity or stone mining or much recently for industrialisation. The land grab under which tribal people are going through for last three decades are unprecedented.  

Case - I: dam construction and a close call 

The place is known as Mukutmanipur where thousands of families were displaced because of the construction of a river dam which is supposed to irrigate parts of Bardhaman, Bankura and Paschim Medinipur. My two seasons of fieldwork reveals that the impact of the dam construction is still quite detrimental. Apart from the loss of their homes and families who are now resettled far off, the neighboring villages have lost their grazing land and valuable forest resources on which they used to depend. Now the alternative economic pursuit is to work as a hotel boy in several hotels developed surrounding the mukutmanipur lake. Furthermore, the nature of the jungle is transformed and people can no longer depend on the forest resources which used to provide vital nutrients. The result is large-scale migration of men folk to neighbouring urban centres. If the neighbouring urban centres would have been far off many of the existing family members would have died.

Derivations:

Displacement leaves long term effects and undermines local and micro value orientations.

Policies of development usually underestimates existing man and other resource relationships

Case - II: piggery project and child malnutrition

 What happens when government decides to do something for the people. It usually happens like this.

step - I something clicks in the mind of a minister or IAS or the like in one fine morning

Step - II S/he prepares the plan over cups of high-tea sessions

Step - III An expert committee is formed and the project is implemented with the help of local agencies including NGOs.

No one even asks or seeks to explore the feasibility of the project. Once in  one of my fieldworks in Manipur it is seen that after the implementation of piggery development project child malnutrition become extremely high. The assessment team populated by anthropologists finds that because of high cash value of the piggery project people have stopped cultivating wild maize and other cereals. In consequence because of the lack of fodder which used to come from the stems of those wild cereals people have sold off their goats and cows. As a result children started to suffer from mal-nutrition triggered by low milk intake. 

Derivations:

Long-term effects are often undermined

Possible consequences of any initiatives are not properly addressed.  

Case - III: barren land and a halted industrialisation  

As already discussed barren land with good connectivity is an indistralist's gold mine. Therefore, Jindal Steel Works with the help of GoWB started their JSW project in Salboni on a barren land. It completely undermined the nature of existing attachments of the neighbouring tribal people with the land. With the construction of Jindal walls they do not have a place to collect fuel wood, roots and tubers that used to be an integral part of their daily food intake. There is no land for grazing of animals. They have even  lost the place to do open defecation. 

Derivations: 

Understanding of the natural resources are never done from the persepctives of the people who depend on these resources.

Value judgement of any resource depends on perspectives and policies lack the perspectives of the people who tend to depend on those resources

Case - IV: Maoists and armed forces

In another long term fieldwork which continued for three consecutive seasons in several regions of Paschim Medinipur I have seen that people are systematically being denied from the resources on which they have historically depended. While in pre 2011 election Maoist violence have occupied the news headlines people's everyday lives have largely been unseen. The most severely affected people were the tribal. They could not go into the forest because of the fear of maoists who would see them as police linkmen and they could not come out of the jungle because of the fear that police would see them as a maoist sympathasier. The consequence have been devastating. Because of frequent bullet exchanges cultivation was virtually stopped people have starved, if not have died.  

Derivations:

Policies and sometimes armed ideological conflicts tends to undermine people for whom the fight take place.

The accumulations:  

One of the anthropological cornerstones have been the idea of cultural relativism. Although hotly debated, whether or not we should observe cultural relativist stance there is a need to make policies free of ethnocentric bias to the extent possible. Often we find people saying tribal and natives eat rats, snakes, insects and ant larvae because of the paucity of food. There should be policies to feed them for which we need their resources. This is an utter lie. Tribal people eat those items because they consider those as their foods and not alternatives to chicken/mutton or rice and wheat. We have continually damaged their resources. We have transformed their grazing lands to mining grounds, stone crushing factories and water reserviors. We have transformed their forests into bunch of eucalyptus trees which do not yield anything but fuel woods. We never try to explore the systematic relationship between tribal and their habitat. Sadly, anthropologists and other social scientists including activists who do understand the process are either sidelined by the policy makers or are too romantically involved in so called "going native". Instead we see site for industrialisation in their barren lands, we tend to calculate profit and loss from the land yield according to our mode of calculations. 

Now the question is how long are we going to prepare policies that has nothing to do with the natives? The answer however, is known, it is INDEFINITELY. 

A fake coin and the postmodern depthless presents in everyday life

Kaleidoscope and the queen rushes to the expressway connector in order to reach their destinations. It is a hurried moment and as always happens both of them are in no mood to waste a moment. Meanwhile a person approaches "could you please spell out what is written on it?"
Kaleidoscope and the queen become speechless to find out an East India Company 1818 coin in his hand. He convincingly says that he has found it underground while working in a place close to airport. 

The impression that the coin bears is also available in internt: http://kalyan.olx.in/east-india-company-1818-shri-ram-darbar-5-headed-shri-hanuman-rare-temple-token-coin-iid-153375084

Sell it:

Kaleidoscope with his pea sized intellect reads out the inscription and he fails to understand the hidden strategy. The person keeps on saying that he intends to sell it if someone pays him 'a-man-day'. Kaleidoscope asks "which is?" "Yes, it is Rs. 300/-" the man replies. Kaleidoscope (still thinks!) does not show any interest in the coin but reluctantly offers Rs. 50/-. 

The religious issues:

Since the coin numismatically Hinduised. It includes Lord Ram, his brother Laxman, his wife Sita and Hanuman. The man promptly says "I am a Muslim and my contractor says I should not keep it." 

Sold!

Not because of any attempt to save Lord Rama from a Muslim possession, but just because Queen is from archaeology, and Kaleidoscope is magically inclined to old things they make the purchase. 

Fake or Real:

Now comes the real test. Should Kaleidoscope feel the pride of possessing a coin nearly 200 years old, or he has just been cheated. The queen's father and many others (excepting Kaleidoscope, perhaps) have experiences of such encounters with fake coin sellers. Furthermore, one of Kaleidoscope's neighborhood sister from archaeology also says as the queen feels too that the coin, most probably is a fake copy. Kaleidoscope comes back and asks google, as google knows everything. While Kaleidoscope finds out, the design that the coin carries indeed resembles 1818 East India Company Coin.
Meanwhile a thought passes Kaleidoscope's mind, are not we living in an era where restorative efforts, such as Kaleidoscope's inclination towards old stuffs in postmodern condition, reflects the loss of an active relation to past as we have lost a sense of historical location and are locked into an endless succession of depthless presents (Jameson 1991). Hence, Kaleidoscope finds the answer. Whether or not the coin is true or a true copy of the original does not really matter. He is in the world with a whole historically original consumers' appetite for a world [that] transformed into sheer images of itself and for pseudoevents and "spectacles" (the term of the situationists). It is for such objects that we may reserve Plato's conception of the "simulacrum," - the identical copy for which no original has ever existed.

Kaleidoscope is amazed to find out:

1. His consumer-centrist attitudes towards the endless successions of depthless presents
2. His and queen's crave for a restorative efforts in their nostalgic (/colonial) hangover in a postmodern condition.
3. A juxtaposition of religion, consumerism and images in which Kaleidoscope finds the world in which he chooses to live.