Police Excesses in India

I cannot stop myself from writing about this. Here are 3 incidents:

1) 3 guys throw acid on 2 girls who died but police shot the three people down. Here is a link of the story in ToI.

2) A guy wrongly speed races on his bike at 1 am n Bangalore, police stops him. He runs away towards a house which turns out to be a brigadiers, makes a call from the roof top, in Urdu, and police shoots him down. Link.

3) The fracas began at 2.30pm in Kolkata, when 37-year-old Yadav was about to park his vehicle on the wrong side of Kiron Shankar Roy Road. Policeman Banerjee, who was on duty in front of the high court, spotted the taxi and signalled to the driver to stop. When he didn’t, the constable sprinted towards the taxi, witnesses said. “He was holding an iron clamp, which he tried to attach to one of the wheels to prevent the driver from fleeing. The driver alighted and asked Banerjee why he was using the clamp instead of filing a case of parking violation,” a bystander said. Banerjee allegedly replied with a slap. Link.

The three incidents are of varying intensity and if decided to judge individually, probably you may differ on the sides to choose on each. However, one thing is clear, on all the three incidents; the people who suffered from police violence were not clean. They all had committed some offense. But is this the way a responsible police should react?

However, I am surprised at people’s reaction. Yes there are people who think these are bad acts by the police but I thought that would be a unanimous decision. However, surprisingly people differed. One of the people I asked felt that Police did the right thing. That is why terrorism is on the rise. Nobody is afraid of the police anymore.

Here is what I beg to differ. The job of the police is to maintain law and order. It is not their job to convict people and make people afraid of them. If you see a police on the road, you should feel positive that aah, here is a man maintaining law and order. But the truth is different. We see police with either disgust or fear.

However slow the process of law may be, somebody else cannot take over it. Ideally in all these cases, police should have caught the convict and produced him in the court, but instead they chose to be the judges. When discussing with someone about the first case, I said, police should have shot him on the leg or put tear gas. The other person said may be the police wanted to do that but the shot got misplaced. Come on, why do you pay the police for if they do not even know how to shoot.

And this is precisely why I hate when people talk highly of the so called “encounters”. Yes, those people may be convicts, or may be we can even kill the dreaded terrorists in encounters, but that’s not the way things should happen. It should be for the law to decide these things. If the law process needs to be revived, let’s do it. But police taking over law is definitely not the way to go.

And this is what I think is the difference between first world and third world country. Till now, whenever people used to tell me that India is a third world country, I used to feel sad. But now I know why it is so. Police takes law in its hand because lawmakers take infinite amount of time. Digging deeper, somewhere it boils down to the fact that we do not have the money and resources to have a police which should have the decency to talk like a gentleman even to the most dreaded terrorist in the world. Wasn’t even Saddam tried in the court before being hanged?

Sandipan Bollywood Awards 2008

After the very successful blogs of Sandipan Bollywood Awards from 2006, and 2007, here we go for 2008. I say popular, because if you search Sandipan Mitra on google, the first result is the 07 awards.

This year has been tough. Not lot of good films rather mostly dismal. A few decent ones though. But I have to continue with the tradition. Here we go:

Best Story: Neeraj Pandey for ‘A Wednesday’ and Shyam Benegal for ‘Welcome to Sajjanpur’.

Best Song: ‘Jashn-e-bahara’. Melodious as well as fresh

Best Music Director: A.R. Rahman , “Jodha- Akbar”. (and borrowing from previous year’s blog ---- who else?

Best Singer(Male) : Javed Ali for ‘Jashn-e-bahara’

Best Singer (Female): I guess this award goes empty this year. Not a single memorable solo. What’s wrong with Shreya, Sunidhi or even alka and kavita madam?

Best television interview: Of course Arundhati Roy in ‘Devil’s Advocate’. I know that may be she is not at all right and her logic fails at time but she is so convincing with her words. By the way, this time I found one person so irritating that she better not give any interviews and that’s Deepika Padukone. Why does she have to speak in English when her accent is like a Gaon Khede wali of Maharashtra?
Best Item Song: Krazzy4 Hrithik Roshan

And now the main awards:

Best Comedian: Abhishek Bachchan in Dostana
Best Supporting Actor: John Abraham in Dostana. He was so hilarious and did what he can do the best. Reminds me that once during the wedding of my friend I asked him that when is his wife going to do the chawal fenko rasam like John?

Best Supporting Actress: Hands down Kangana Ranaut. She was the core of Fashion. The way she changed expressions for drug addict to supermodel in no time was top of the world.

Best Villain: Bipasha Basu in Race. In Race, everybody is a villain and not many villainy movies in 08 except Ghajini. And Bipasha has to get some prize.

Best Newcomer (male): Farhan Akhtar for Rock On. He was really impressive and a fresh and unconventional face.

Best Newcomer (Female) : Asin. Though I did not like her ‘Jab We Met’ish acting much bt she is definitely the best looking amongst the new faces.

Best Director: Shyam Benegal and Neeraj Pandey for Welcome to Sajjanpur and A Wednesday resp.

Best Film: Combining the fact that it should have story (Jodhaa Akbar, Ghajini, Singh is Kiing and Rab ne ruled out), Good looking and famous star cast ( A Wednesday, Welcome to Sajjanpur, Rock On, Jaane tu are gone), decent songs (A Wednesday, Ghajini, Rab ne, Fashion all out) and ofcourse a decent budget, the award points to only one movie which may not be best amongst any of the above factors individually but has a good combo of above all, and the movie is RACE…

Best Actress: Like last year, I again want to give it to Soha Ali Khan or Mumbai Meri Jaan but I guess that would be too much bias. A Kareenaish Asin does not impress me, Genelia is too kiddish and Fashion is all about Kangana, mugdha and Kitu and not about Priyanka. Aishwarya as Jodhaa looks more south Indian and can never look rajputani. However, I think the best actress award should still go to her but for Sarkar Raj. She really stole the show and she DID some acting apart form looking good and/or crying.

Best Actor: Shahrukh Khan for Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi. The lesser the mentioned of Ghajini is better, and Singh is Kiing is really not worth that much. Hrithik as Akbar was good but with nonsense scenes like Sword fights and dismissing court listening to Man Mohana, he has lost it. The reason it is Shahrukh Khan is not only because people really liked Surinder Sahni but because Shahrukh made people hate Raj. It is probably easy for a Superstar to make you love him but it is really difficult to hate ur favorite star and he was successfully able to achieve it.

Last blog for 2008

I am sorry folks, for all who were waiting for the famous “Sandipan Bollywood Awards 2008” (if any) but it has to wait because of Ghajini which I am going to watch only in the New Year.

Here, I will just try to recap the year for me. The year has been a year of Travel. On first Jan 2008, I was in San Diego. During Labor Day, I went to Miami. 4th of July, I was in NC and Atlanta and 22nd of July I was in New Hampshire. Thanksgiving time I was again in California, but the Bay Area this time. Apart from this, I have been thrice to Rhode Island and twice to the wonderful Cape Cod which is hours away but truly they are amazing. And finally and hopefully, I am flying to Kolkata tomorrow.

I was really new to Boston last year but now I know a lot about in and around places and I love it more and more. Yes, mid December to mid February is bad, but after that it is really wonderful spring summer and fall.

Blogically, I have maintained my stats, 26 blogs are more like a one a fortnight which is cool. I have stayed away from Bollywood but I cannot control myself in saying this now: “If reports are true that Bipasha is acting pricey and does not want Juhi Chawla on the sow, then to hell with Bipasha”

Apart form movies and the musings and ‘News that I follow’, my past few blogs have been a bit to sensitive. But I think I am going to continue that and keep nurturing the impossible dream of boundary less world with no war or crimes or criminal punishments.

As for social networking goes, I managed approximately 500 scarps on orkut which is on the lower side. I keep calling chacha chachi, mama, mami, nani, bua, bhabhi, bhatija, bhanja and all possible relations and do keep in touch with my friends too. What’s new this year is the emergence of their fiancés/fiancées. Being the good guy that I am, I have got these new friends now. It was kind of embarrassing early on, but now it looks fine.

2009 looks to be a promising year already which economy booming towards the middle of the year and my fist month beginning with a holiday and a cruise from Miami in the second month. As for movies, ofcourse waiting for Harry Potter the most. Apart from that looking forward to “My Name is Khan” and the ‘Sushmita-Shahrukh’ movie. The annual Disney-Pixar also has been something that I am looking forward to every year now.

Merry Christmas and a Happy new year

Impact of Mumbai blasts on me

In my vain attempts to be a neutral citizen and not form and opinion about the incidents have failed. But what surprises me the most is that I have mixed emotions for both for or against.

Let’s go to the bad part first. Not blaming the terrorists. There can be many shades of positive arguments about this. First which I think is more important is not to give them a death sentence. I am strictly against death sentence. What if they land up in heaven by accident? Then the whole purpose of death sentence will be lost. We can rather give life long imprisonment making their life like hell. I think that’s what should be done to all the criminals who are sentenced to death.

Second is, these are just brainwashed youngsters made to do all this because they have nothing better to do in life. Let us create fair job opportunities on both sides of the border rather the sub-continent as a whole. Killing these people either by encounter or by conviction is not a solution. I specially hate the media hyped and liked by many – the so called encounter specialists. I always get the feeling that by accident, they are may be not killing absolute offenders but also some people just at the wrong place. I always get reminded of some incidents which happened to me and I bet every one of us at some point. Here are 2 examples:

1) Did it ever happen to you that you are with a bunch of “friends” who suddenly get into eve teasing? So they are passing comments at a certain girl on the road. The girl looks back. Is there any reason that she will believe you are not amongst them? Same may happen to a guy killed in an encounter. I agree that you should avoid such company, but you know, it’s not always avoidable.

2) You typecast just because of your geographic origin. For me, though jokingly, people call me Commi, Bangladeshi infiltrator and in one case was a part of a convicted group for just being from “Maharashtra”. I do not say that I should be separated from the rest. After all, yes, I am from the Commi state, my great grand parents did live in Bangladesh way back in 1905 and I am a proud Maharashtrian born. I would not like to be separated from these groups and revered in isolation.

3) You are doing the right thing in the wrong time. Once I took my very dear school friend for a walk. He is physically challenged so we took some time for the walk. And I was beaten by the teacher for being late and my nice deed was entirely unappreciated.

So, might be many of the terrorists fall in one of the above 3 categories and put friendship/loyalty first? Do they deserve to be killed?

Another ting I liked about this entire last few days of event was failure of BJP’s terror campaign. Deep down, I think I still prefer this party over others. But it is high time they learn that national issues do not and should not concern common people who do not have even access to basic amenities like drinking water. How is getting killed by a bullet worse than dying of thirst. It should get into the root cause campaigning mode and not this “India shining” or “Anti terror” campaigns. Terrorists most likely will never target small villages.

Having said so many things against the common people, I don’t know why, deep inside me, a small hatred has started against Pakistan. I would not justify these acts as enough has already been said and done by politicians, media and intelligentsia. But as a consequence of that, I could not make myself buy the 1000 times better Pakistani biryani masala and the Basmati rice and instead chose the inferior Priya and Swad brands. Still not able to fathom why and how to get rid of this emotion.

Happily grazing cow in New Zealand

A very strange thing happened today. Like the last few days, I was awake since 4:30 am. Today at 5:30, I get a call from my School friend Shubhajit. He always calls in odd hours but though I will never talk in those odd hours even from my parents, I can never hang up on Shubhajit or Bhaji. The reason is that he calls from the borders of Jammu and Kashmir, where one rarely gets signals. I always feel a strange guilt attending his calls. He did something which I never had the courage to do and instead, to public and to myself I always spoke of joining army as joining a band of fools. But deep inside, I do know that it is more because I am not capable of so much sacrifice.

I asked him abut what’s happening as it was Election Day and he said that it was very hectic but he was happy that I remember. Yes, and I had just read it in rediff some 10 minutes back. There is a lot going on in that part of the country. We can just speculate, the locals can just suffer, the army people might just be the pawns but whatever is happening in the power corridors on either side of the border, we do not know, rather we may not wish to know.

Is it justified? Fighting for the country? After all, if we do believe in some sort of superpower, it might have just been a split second decision of the god to pass the next life on earth as a human being of a particular country. Next second, we could have been a cow happily grazing grass in New Zealand. Well, with my present, I am happy. I am paying back to the world in whatever form I came in. I am paying tax so that we walk on better streets, I have sent money to Indian charitable organizations also and if that is not enough, I did buy the Unicef greeting cards to have the proceedings sent to Africa. I will also buy ‘Tales of Beedle The Bard’ and the proceedings will go for betterment of the world. And so is the cow from New Zealand paying back to the society. It is making more cows, it is giving lot of milk and it is also maintaining the balance of nature.

But what is a man in military doing? Isn’t he being brainwashed to fight for SOME country on the whims of certain people? For example, India and Pakistan are fighting for ages now on may be some stupid decision of the then Viceroy and queen Victoria’s ‘Let’s have some fun, let’s split the Hindus and Muslims’.

Same with the World Wars, the present Iraq war or any other wars. It is a few people who decide the fate of so many others, who simply decide to die for the country, when if one instant late they would have been happily grazing cows in New Zealand.

I am so happy that I was born a few seconds late, so now I am a happily sitting on a couch and frantically pressing keys on the laptop keyboard, not much different from the grazing cows of New Zealand!!!

It is probably inevitable to have wars, or it might be really important to go to space when children are dying of hunger on the streets, or it is really important to spend millions of dollars to go deep down into the sea and find some stop watch in the titanic, it is just that I do not know why.

Titbits

It has been long since I wrote something. I had consciously tried to write a blog every other week. So ideally the total would have been 26. I think I will manage it, now that this is the 24^th one, and the usual annual 2008 bollywood awards will come towards the year end.

However, after being quoted in Mumbai Mirror in an abridged way which gives a wrong picture of me but on the whole carries the point, I did not know whether I should be happy or sad. When I saw that I did not receive any comments (forget angry ones) I realized that even if people would have read it, they would have done it on the newspaper, and nobody was crazy enough to type out the link on a computer and read it for themselves.

Hence, I will be talking about myself a bit, though I know not for whom. I have moved to a new apartment and the net connection hasn’t come yet. This brought 2 nice things with it. One, I started reading agan and secondly, I stopped watching bigg boss season 2. The show was very addictive. Watching a bunch of brain dead people over and over again fight over lost tomatoes and less sugar in the tea left me brain dead too. Not that I was following a lot of quality news before bigg boss started, but I was not even watching the hindi movies which I always made sure I watch. I was out of touch with the blogs I read, the google news searches that I do. Atleast now the little time I spend surfing in the office, I spend it on reading some news keeping me up-to-date with the current affairs.

However, watching any news or reading any news website had become so boring in the past few days. It was just Obama everywhere. Beaten to death. It was so difficult to get any other news other than which country head congratulated hi and how he out smarted McCain or how the fall was all due to Sarah Palin. I had had enough. However in my desperate attempt to find more news on the day after the elections, I found 4 events that I found non Obama.

• Pt. Bhimsen Joshi being awarded the Bharat Ratna. He The last Bharat Ratna was awarded was in 2002. It has been a long time. On thinking who would be the right choice for the next one, three people came to my mind. The first one surely deserving and the other two should be atleast considered. They are: Sachin Tendulkar, Narayan Murthy and Al Gore.

• Uma Bharti slapped her party worker, kissed him again, he was still angry after the kiss and then she was on a strike till he forgives. Really crazy.

• B. R. Chopra died. This news though supposedly important, it just to be read as a headline and moved on to the next.

• Abhishek Bachchan suffering from high fever in Kerala. This news did not come from any news site but from Amitabh Bachchan’s own site. And sure enough, next day it appears in the news websites. I don’t know whether I should like or hate these easy journalisms: getting news from celebrity bloggers. But then it’s absolutely legal to do so.

Anyway, the second good thing that happned with no internet is that I started reading books again. I read ‘White Tiger’ by Arvind Adiga. It is a fast and good read. Does give you a picture of how India is shining in fools gold. And then ofcourse, I am re-reading Harry Potter 7. I have re-read selective chapters but for the first time re-reading the entire book. Some parts are just amazing. The two shifting minds when Harry runs out of Bathilda’s house. The tussle between Hermione and Ron after he returns and how he keeps agreeing to everything she says for truce. And many more things here and there.

Anyways, turned out to be a long post. Will be back soon.

Endorsing Arundhati Roy

I just saw an interview of Arundhati Roy in Devil’s advocate by Karan Thapar and needless to say I am impressed by the lady. I have always been awed by her and am still continuing to be.

Generally, when Karan Thapar grills anybody, either they go backfoot or they counter his evidences convincingly and we feel that the person has done so well. But this lady, not only accepted whatever Karan Thapar quoted from various texts, but also provided enough evidences why she thinks that way and why it is the right way.

But the best part is not that. The best part is she knows what she is doing. She knows that she will only get the wrath of politicians and even the common people for this. She will be compared with the terrorists (if not already) but still she carries on her job. She knows she is fighting a lost battle. But we need people like her. What if Narmada Bachao is actually required, what if Afzal is actually not guilty, what if Kashmiris really want an independent Kashmir and are denied of that. What if the Indian Mujahideen is a media creation and the police are actually just cooking up stories and fooling the people with collaboration from media.

Let’s hope this is all not true. What the government is doing is actually right. We will feel immensely happy and I am pretty sure Arundhati will be happy too. But what if the above is actually true? We are turning into a fascist nation and soon will become another Germany? At least we will have something to say: “But one amongst us stood up against it. One amongst us fought for it. And that is Arundhati”.

I am very sure Arundhati knows all this. She is doing all this knowingly that how much wrath this will invite for her. After all she is an author and which other does not like popularity? But the fact that she is going against all this shows that she is a big humanitarian. She has her own principle and not relenting to even the public pressure is a big courageous act. She is doing all this, just to make sure that we are all right in our decisions and not hurriedly doing anything wrong. This is my principle too, I can stand convicts moving freely in the societly, but I cannot stand a single innocent person to be punished.

Let’s briefly talk about Singur. Yes, there would not be any industries after this in West Bengal, yes Mamata Banerjee is a Mahishasur in a female form. But do you think everything was alright in the way CPIM allotted the land? Do you not think there was some underhand money involved between Tata and the government? Most importantly, do you really believe that there was no other way possible that would have convinced the entire concerned group? I believe there would have been ways out. I already read somewhere that the initial land for the tatas was allotted somewhere near Kharagpur, but it is just that the Tats said can’t you offer anything better and they gave away more important land. Can’t a compromise be arrived with the Kharagpur land as well. Why will a government have to act like a Ramu servant to a business powerhouse.

Arundhati, I am not as courageous as you are. But like you, I do really hope that the correct convicts are punished and the correct thing in Kashmir might be a way that brings peace to the actual people of Kashmir. In many other cases, I would hope that you are really wrong and the media/ common man opinion is right. Because if it is not, we are really heading towards doom. But for all your endeavors, I really respect you a lot! It is not easy to go against the people for the people.

I wish

It’s my one year in Boston today. As a recap, this is after 17 years in Nagpur, 4 in Surathkal, 0.5 in mysore, 0.5 in bhubaneswar, and 2 years in College Station TX.

Boston is different from all the other places I have been before. This place has 4 distinct seasons. You really need 4 distinct set of clothes for the four seasons. The trees are four different colors. And now coming to think of it, I do like the fact that we do not like the winter. It’s so good to have not liking a season over the other unlike say California where people have no choice as it is sunshine year round.

Aah, enough of false praising. I really would love a warmer place, a place like Miami or Houston or Austin, or say a place like Bangalore.

Bangalore, it is my favorite place. As you might have noticed above, I have never stayed in Bangalore but I still love it and I think that is my final destination ten years down the line. Ask the people of Bangalore, and they will say “Oh, so much traffic, things are so unnecessarily priced” etc. But the simple fact that I am still interested in hearing these people out who say so shows my concern. The reason may be because I have never felt any place as my own. Though I love Nagpur a lot, there is nothing in Nagpur to hold me. Though there is enough to hold me in Kolkata, I really don’t feel any connection with that place. I do feel sad about the issues like Singur because of being a Bengali and I also secretly do not like when non Kolkata people bash Kolkata, but when it comes to me being a part of the people and the city, I feel like an outsider.

On the other hand, Bangalore has always been a pampering place for me, thanks to my brother. When I went there the first time, bro was new in his job and he spent a lot and we were always eating in good restaurants, going to the fancy malls, buying expensive clothes etc. Then, during my stay in Surathkal, this became the place where I used to come when I needed breaks from the college life. I ran there once for Holi. In first year, when I was really afraid of my seniors, Bangalore was a soothing comfort. I will come by an early bus in the morning, and then always get cheated by the Autowallas on my way to Dada’s place but all to be reimbursed by him. His roommates also ensured I have a nice time. Overall it was always a fun place. Then, the one year after college, Bangalore became the place of dreams because it had all my “college friends” and it was a place where you had all the good paying companies. I yearned for Bangalore even in my first few months in College Station when I was still making friends and I was always jealous that my college friends are having so much fun together.

Thinking on practical terms, may be staying anywhere else will be no different than what I have been imagining about Bangalore, because few years down the line, when I will eventually think about coming back to India, none of my friends will be single and may be not even me. Things might be totally different. But there still be the Forum mall with it’s characteristic smell (if not already blasted by the terrorists) and there will always be newer and better eating places, either my brothers favorites like Parivar, Nagarjuna, Amravati and Sues kitchen or the one with the get ups like “Chandni chowk” or fancy names like “Rumali with a view” (As if the rumali rotis have a hole in the middle to peep out while eating). And of course those out of the world Bangalore Times articles talking about trends which nobody follows and finding terms like Gastrosexual ( Just heard this term from Umesh, apparently it means “women of Bangalore” nowadays like men who will cook food for them). I am very sure this is also a BT finding.

But then, I may meet my brother again by surprise on the stairs of PVR cinemas, introduce our friends and move on.

Scary thoughts on the blasts

Lot is happening around the world, especially those which bother me like Ike, Georgia, Singur and to a bit even the US presidential elections. But this post, I would like to discuss the blasts happening in the Indian cities.

Yes, enough has been written about it, and various views. There are many topics to discuss on. They are:

1) What is government doing?

2) Is it justified to have an anti terrorism law like POTA

3) Is what was earlier known as the “Mumbai spirit” actually “Mumbai cowardice” or “Mumbai apathy”?

4) Should we begin to suspect all Muslims?

5) What do the terrorists really want?

Let us begin with the last question. I wish and I can just wish that they would tell me “We want azad Kashmir and nothing else.” If I had power, I would have immediately said “Yeh lo, and take this extra 1 square meter from ladakh too, and please stop this”. I wish it was as simple, and if it is, I urge the politicians please do this right away. But we all know that is not the case. I think the reason for the blasts has to be something else, and it might not be entirely based on reason, region or religion. It very well might be, they had nothing else to do. These big terrorist organizations, once found that everything is already ok in this world but they have these huge infrastructure established and they will go jobless if they do not do anything, started brainwashing people. And where else will they get such a large population to influence and to attack. Yes, Indonesia has the biggest Islamic population, but then they can’t create havoc there, because it is all Islam. India becomes a natural choice.

No I am not typecasting the religion, I am just typecasting terrorism. To sound more secular, let me bring out a Hindu example. What would VHP and Bajrang dal do if India was a Hindu nation?

Now this drives me to the next point. See how in he above explanation, I had to do Hindu bashing for the sake of sounding secular. This is what I am so concerned about and this is what Rajdeep has also discussed in his blog. Why do we have to do our own religion bashing just to sound secular? Even in common life, we consider a Muslim good if he is clean shaven, he takes part in festivals like diwali and holi alongwith Eid and he even goes to temple. We the Hindus say “See, that is how a Muslim should be, and see, how we accept such good Muslims to our society and we think we are tolerant hindus”. But that is not right. We should also respect a Muslim who does not want to participate in Holi or Diwali. Frankly speaking, Holi diwali are not even Hindu festivals, they are Indian festivals. How many Muslims do take part in the “Sathyanarayan katha”?

So now that we see that it is all about a change in mindset for all the people is needed, we look at what is the government doing for this? And the answer is obvious, not only nothing, but just the opposite. Ideally the government should have made conducive atmosphere for the peaceful co-existence of the two communities (which I think occurs more by naturally than by the government) and change the mindset of the young people through education. Considering that it is the government who designed the CBSE syllabus, I would say it was a job well done. So you see the government would have been actually helping the problem if it just stopped what it was doing but no, they just did the opposite. They started appeasing one community and thus actually creating differences between those who would have become an ally over time.

And now the most difficult question, so what can be done now? And I am afraid the answer is : I have no idea..

Ganesh Chaturthi

Yes, after a long long time, I am back to my old blogging style. Musings. This times that year kinds. And this one is about Ganesh Chaturthi.

Lord Ganesha has been in my life since I had senses, but in a very peculiar way. The Lord has never been my primary point of inspiration. But he has always brought joy. All hindus tend to have one primary god, though Hinduism believes in polytheism. It can be a good study in itself to see how this is across India as well as classes and subclasses amongst people. But that is not the point of discussion. Anyway, so that way, if I have to choose my primary god, it has to be goddess Saraswati and I would like to believe that it came naturally to me. As a student, it is goddess Saraswati who gives you knowledge and you should pray to her to score good marks in exams. Being a student till last year, you can imagine that she has to be THE goddess for me. And now that I started work, logically speaking I should change to Goddess Laxmi, the goddess of wealth, but I do not like to change. And here comes lord Ganesha. People say, he is the god of knowledge and god of wealth. I think he is also the god of sane thoughts. In short, he is highly capable of being THE god. But, for some reason, he never features that prominently in Bengali culture.

For me, Lord Ganesha has other significance. I was born and brought up in Maharashtra. The land of “Ganapati Bappa Morya”. So every year, Ganpati puja was a big festival in my colony. This also coincided with the “Durga Puja Shopping” commencement. This process involved going to Nagpur city 14 km away and buying new clothes, going to the various ganesh pandals across the city and finally a good dinner at some restaurant. So you see, Ganesha commences the happy season.

Later, when I moved to Karnataka, I realized, it is equally big here and in my college it was a regular event. Infact, this was my first day at Surathkal. I was sitting in the auditorium where the idol was established. It is here, I sat with the people of my state “mattha party” and were introduced and thus made friends who not only made the following four years enjoyable, but even became the most trustworthy friends for life.

Then I came to Texas A&M. Who would have believed that out of the zillions of Hindu festivals celebrated across India, this will be the one that is celebrated in A&M? Yes, diwali, holi rakhi all are celebrated, and I believe even Durga puja and Saraswati puja, but none at the same level as Ganesha utsav. I know the reason too and that is the timing. This coincides with start of fall semester and what better way to start a semester than prayers. I could have ignored this celebration as I do with nearly 95% of the traditions followed in the Aggieland, but as luck would have it, I stayed with Marathi roommates here and hence never missed this occasion. And as luck would have it, this was not only the place where I met many of the friends for first time in college station, but also the place where I met my advisor, the person who shaped my career.

This is the first year; I will have nothing special to do, but now comes the best part: The reason which made me write this blog. It is not me who realized this connection, this subtle realization that knowingly or unknowingly, I have been following this tradition since I was born. And no prize for guessing who made me realize this. Of course, it has to be Maa. And yes Maa, I will definitely do something this time too.

Any good writer, Jane, Jhumpa or JKR, would have stopped here, but no, I want to write more. This may not even be a strong point, but I cannot not mention about it.

The prep of durga puja is described by a poem as follows:

Shiuli phool-er gondhe momo,

Pujar thane dhaker baari

Bhorer aalo fotar aagei

Pounche Gechi taratari.

Somehow I always associate durgapuja with this poem. The poem is pretty meaningless so I won’t dare to do a mundane translation, but it is the first line: Shiuli phool which is a tiny white flower with orange stalk, the frangrance of that flower is the mark of start of the puja season, and the first time we use this flower, is ofcourse for ganesh chaturthi.