Eid at Mohamad Ali Road, Bombay

Bombay

Behind every great fortune there is a crime – Balzac

 

Delhi with its thousands years of history can be summed up in two words - power and perfidy. Similarly, you cannot de-link two major operative words from Balzac quote – fortune and crime – with Bombay. Foundation of this great city is built on opium money. The current denizen of this city does not realize that it is not wrong to call it an Opium City and should read Amar Farooqui’s seminal work on Victorian Bombay.

Bombay is not an old historic city. Its meteoric rise from an obscure port in West India to its current fairy tale existence happened in 50 years from 1790 to 1840. The city flourished on its opium export to China. There is an oblique reference to the Parsis control over opium trade in Aamir Khan’s Mangal Pandey. For about two decades Jamshetjee Jejeebhoy dominated opium export from this city. He was the first Indian [though idea of India happened much later] to be knighted in 1842, one of the directors on Bank of Bombay and got baronetcy in 1857.

Money flowed during this time allowed the parvenu Bombayites to lay the foundation of industrial Bombay and make some landmark building in South Bombay. Most of the opium came from Malwa region to Bombay. Its a great irony of our time that the poppy fields of Bihar and business acumen of Karachiites built Bombay. And the ignorant politician today, oblivious of the history in his Landcruiser, want to send back the Biharis.

Despite its in-glorious past, Bombay still holds out a great promise. It’s a overcrowded, stinky, dirty, dilapidated city. Its ubiquitous quest for ‘money’ [fortune as Balzac said] helps her transcends all kinds of religion, caste, social background. Bombay offers a great mirage. Here thousands lands everyday to make it big – in films, TV, art, stock market, etc. It’s a city where abject poverty in shanty slums juxtapose

s with opulence of designer apartments. If you want to study the great divide between haves and have-nots, there is no place better than Bombay.

 

Yangon Diary

Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve

Bandhavgarh, May 03, 2009

Its 4.30 in the morning and Bandhavgarh is buzzing with activities. Elephants are getting ready for their morning rounds. They provide first peep to humans to the world of tigers. Mahout’s ride on the elephants, rubbing elephants ears with their legs and giving simple instructions like piche (go back), dhar (stay), leading human entry to the taala region of the tiger reserve sanctuary at Bandhavgarh.

Outside the gate, curious city creatures still rubbing their eyes are making their cameras ready for a possible encounter with the pride of the jungle – the tiger. Scores of foreigners from different parts of the world carrying cameras bigger than bazooka missiles are ready for ‘action’. Scores of gypsy are lined on both sides of the road and the guides are jostling for entry tickets to take the visitors to the tiger area. Bandhavgarh has the highest concentration of tigers and offers an excellent opportunity to see this magnificent predator in its own territory. According to Aseem Srivastava, in the 740 sq km area of Bandhavgarh there are around 65 tigers. As per WWI study for a good tiger conservation program, a sanctuary needs 22 females and coverage area of 1000 sq km to successfully carry forward tiger conservation plan.

 At the peak of summer, heat has washed trees and offers spectacular view of the vast forest full of saal and bamboo trees. Park is closed in the monsoon season and in the winter tiger steps out for a brief period in the thickly vegetated jungle. So, peak summer offers a golden opportunity to the wild life enthusiasts from all over the world to spot tiger in Bandhavgarh reserves.

Bandhavgarh is situated in the Vindhyan mountain ranges. Named after the ancient fort built on 800 m high cliff. Core area of 105  sq km has the highest density of tiger population in the world.You really need to be a wild life enthusiast to spend a sizeable amount of money in the middle of 44 degrees to head out to Bandhavgarh. Even if you are not able to spot a tiger then it’s a trip which will convert your for sure towards wildlife conservation. To say the inane, Tiger is an incredibly beautiful creature. Sheer sight of a tiger in its natural habitat will force you to think of the injustice done to this creature in the circus and zoos around the world. If you cherish freedom in its true meaning then you will abhor the idea of confining this supreme creature to anything but its natural habitat. To spot a tiger, you need a very good driver and a guide. Here anticipation and experience are of utmost importance. Do remember that mobile cameras and other silly auto focus digital cameras are of no use. You will do a world of good if you know how to use a camera without a flash. Its an experience and be an informed visitor rather than an obsessed inane intruder. Its important to be not obsessed with the tiger and enjoy the journey of spotted deer, sambhar, wild pig, and birds like kingfisher, owl, vultures, eagles, bluejays, the green bee eater, the racket tailed etc. Today, not only at Bandhavgarh but also at other sanctuary, save the tiger program offers a unique opportunity to conserve the environment and it provides employment to scores of people around the sanctuary. As per Mr srivastava, last year, Bandhavgarh offered employment to some 400 individuals and thru other forest upkeep programs it generated 3 lakhs mandate of labour work. In its truest sense the tiger is already paying back for all the money spent on wildlife conservation.

It’s a difficult and challenging task to work a meaningful ecosystem around tiger reserve. Its important to stop villagers around tiger reserve encroachment to the sanctuary area. Current tiger reservation plan includes simple things like providing pressure cookers and LPG connections to the villagers so that they don’t need to cut trees and stray into the sanctuary. It is still difficult and challenging to get the whole community to work for Tiger conservation when an old or injured tiger kills a cattle. It requires resolve of the entire community to stay focused and keep larger picture in mind. It would come as a revelation to most city dwellers that left undisturbed a tiger will amble past a convoy of jeeps giving a royal ignore. With plentiful food available in its natural habitat a tiger would rarely attack a human.

It is fascinating to see the camouflage of birds and animals with nature. All kinds of birds and animals take advantage in God’s creativity and seamlessly hide in the jungle. An owl merges with the brown trunk of a tree, tiger bird hides in the bamboo trees and a blue jay hovers around saal trees and a blue neck stork merging with the foliage. Its fascinating and awesome if you come from the concrete jungle. Tiger is the top predator on the jungle food chain. Tiger conservation has helped in saving an entire ecosystem. Tiger remains the flagship of our deforestation and wild life conservation plan. Saving the tiger is akin to saving the entire chain. You would recall a line from the movie Schindlers List where Ben Kingsley talks about saving a person is like an entire generation. Our tiger conservation is similar to this. To save our jungle we need to preserve our tigers.

 

Where is the answer?

I wrote this piece on Nov 30th 2008 after terrorist attack on Mumbai . Just happen to read by chance today. My God, nothing has changed...

Where is the answer?

I went to Dungerwadi on saturday evening to attend the funeral of a man whose name I came to know at this solemn place. In some strange way, I came to know a fine man Rohinton Maloo in his death. My friend told me that Parsis are brave, courageous and stoic people even in the face of the death. But this one is different. Yes, this one is different. Un-natural death and where it is difficult to identify the mutilated body can move the most stoic ones also. Rohinton for no fault of his was at the wrong place at the wrong time. This is no comfort for the family members who will struggle with their grief for a very long time.

This may be my way of expressing my solidarity with the bizarre things happened in Mumbai over last few days.

I have been trying to come to terms with my own feelings. Do I feel angry with the elite who are seething with the anger because finally terror has landed at their door-step; or angry with inept politicians who have no clue about the world around them where they stumble for media footage from one studio to another; or angry with the much taut spirit of Mumbai which is simply bull crap; or with the incessant news coverage which dehumanize all feelings. I think there is no need to put a word to these feelings. It’s alright to be confused and allow all emotions to come out.

In India this emotional outpouring is different. Only twice before this, India saw such emotional catharsis – our World Cup Cricket victory in 1983 and Kargil War in 1999. It is sad that only cricket benefited out of that epoch making victory. We squandered all the emotions of Kargil war. We need to do something so that we don’t fall prey to the token sloganeering. This requires change in our behavious and sustained discipline from each one of us.

Terrorism is no longer going to be the same in India. It’s pathetically easy to kill few hundred people in India. Please visit any railway station or local bus depot or any traffic point, you know that it’s horrifyingly easy to kill few hundred commoners in India. Our biggest strength is our biggest disadvantage. There is not much cost to human life in India.

Unfortunately, new terrorism reality comes to us at an exorbitant human cost. Terrorism in India is no longer about killing hundreds of people. Now, it’s a media event. Terrorist understood new media realities as much as our dear politicians. Terrorism is about attracting eye-balls. It’s a global TRP game and it’s all about footage. It’s a media circus that should go on for as long as possible. It is not about the number of killing but who you kill is more important. Terrorist are already done with railway stations, buses and now hotels. One shudder to think what would be the next target – schools, malls, cinema halls or marriage functions.

Terrorism has not only put a foot in the door of our life but it has entered our drawing room. It’s a part of our conversation. It is about anecdotes - juicy survivor story or tragic death story? At Dungerwadi, one woman chillingly recalled the numbing down of her children. From the three windows of  the different rooms of her house in Colaba, her entire family could see the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, The Oberoi/ Trident and Nariman House. Three days of gun noise reduced it to fire-cracker sound for her children.

Regretfully, we are wired differently. We are hard coded to believe in paying for our karma. We follow chalta hain culture  from the core of our being. Despite all chest thumping jingoism and declaration of   this time is different on all kinds of TV channels, we will lapse into our day to day existence. Soon we will be talking of the next cricket match or the grand release of SRK and Aamir in Decemeber.

As a society, we will not stand up and do our basic duty of casting our vote. We will not go out and demand answers from politicians. We will give Rs.100 for next traffic violation. We will make every possible effort to ghettoize our building, our offices and schools of our children. Unfortunately, our only contribution is to watch news television and discuss ‘stories’ over drinks. Lets not look at others for answers to what happened in Mumbai in last week. All of us need to look within and for a change let’s be HONEST.

Would we be HONEST? It is ‘DIFFERENT’ this time. That’s what I am hearing from everybody. I apologize for being cynical. Nothing is going to change. And unfortunately, I am still betting that I would be right this time too.

Nanda Devi

Nanda Devi Beckons

What do you do when the only skyline you familiar with is of concrete? What do you do when you actually get space to walk? What do you when your food plate unwaveringly full of only potato? What do you when flowers can only be seen at bouquet shop? What do you when your mobile is not incessantly ringing and you can’t text? And what do you do when the only activity for the day is WALKING?

Well, please don’t blame for confusing you on such inane existential issues. Like a moron, I left my beautiful city Bombay [I still prefer this]- where even skyline is crowded, where people don’t travel but crawl, where life is lived more on the roads then in your respective humble abode, where even the air you breathe is shared with few million people and where you have bhel, sandwich, vada pav, etc apart from potato for your meal- to travel to the North India for a trek to Nanda Devi base camp.

I stood out like a sore thumb among my friends when I decided to trek 120 kms for base camp to Nanda Devi at a height of 4100m. Everybody was planning to go to Rome, Greece, Scotland, Egypt [Singapore, Malyasia, London and even US are passé] and I decided to trek for 9 days, living in tents and for ablutions preferring an open environment. Yes, there was something wrong with me. I wanted to spend time with myself and I wanted to walk. You really need to be in love with yourself to think something like this.

To say the inane – India is a BEAUTIFUL country. Nanda Devi is not a peak full of myths, mystic and beauty. Nanda Devi, as the name suggests, is a bliss. It is ethereal beauty. It is moody. It is alluring. It is capricious. And yes, you need to make an effort to reach there.  I share Bill Aitken idea of love with Nanda Devi than reverence. And when you are face to face with the Nanda Devi, I was speechless. 

I came to know this fascinating story of Willi Unsoeld. He was the first mountaineer to climb Everest from West Ridge side. He lost his nine toes in that expedition. Despite his Everest success, he was enchanted by the beauty of Nanda Devi. He decided to get married to name his daughter Nanda Devi.

In late seventies, Willi made an unsuccessful attempt to summit Nanda Devi with his daughter Nanda Devi Unsoeld. Unfortunately, she died during the expedition. She was buried there and the epitaph quotes from her diary - 'I stand upon a wind-swept ridge at night with the stars bright alive and I am no longer alone but I waver and merge with all the shadows that surround me. I am part of the whole and am content.'

 Climbing mountain makes you humble. It makes you feel human. It connects you with fellow humans. You can’t do it on your own. You need friends, porters, guide, etc with you. Not only does it open up your lungs, increase your RBC count, tones your body, strengthens your glut, good for your knees, tests your ankles, etc but most importantly, it invigorates your soul. It connects you with nature. You can almost touch the milkyway at night and in morning you can feel the unadulterated warmth and energy of the sun.