South Asia Daily

A few observations about Oprah Winfrey in India

Oprah Winfrey (Pic: screen grab from ndtv.com)

I have been looking for a standout gig on the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) for myself. I found one this morning. Not having ever attended it, I think it is a great gig never to attend it in the future. And yet feel no compunctions whatsoever in holding forth on it.That could well be a defense mechanism going up against the fact I never get invited to such events. It is not a case of grapes being sour but grapes being non-existent.

There, with that out of the way let me say a thing or two about Oprah Winfrey’s interview by NDTV’s Barkha Dutt, India’s most high profile television anchor, at the festival. Winfrey has been in India for the past few days on her first visit, partly to shoot a chapter of a new show and partly to see for herself a country frenzied on her surface and tranquil at her core. That’s a great myth about India but it is so compelling that I will let that pass.

Mutual admiration societies have a way of forming effortlessly in the kind of convivial and salubrious setting of festivals in India. The JLF being one such festival it is not surprising that people try and put their best foot forward, unless, of course, if you happen to be Salman Rushdie. Then the foot is on your throat. But I digress.

Dutt introduced Winfrey with somewhat breathless, albeit fully deserved, praise. Winfrey in turn seemed awestruck by the fact that Dutt said all that she did without a teleprompter. My immediate thought at the exchange, admittedly churlish and sophomoric, was that from now on it has to be Barkha Winfrey and Oprah Dutt. The switch has a certain cadence to it. (Check, one more gratuitous comment out of the way).

I can review the whole interview but I think it would be sufficient to make an observation or two about a couple of points. Among the things that Winfrey says she was struck by immediately on her arrival in Mumbai (being reflective and contemplative not to mention ruminant, she noticed more profound things too) was how Indian drivers treat traffic lights.

“What is it with the red lights? I mean does the red light mean stop or not? Or is it just there for your entertainment? What is this? The light is red and everybody just keeps going. You all seem to know what you’re doing,” Winfrey said in her world famous tone of polite and amused incredulity.

I think Winfrey unwittingly raised a deep civilizational question when she wondered like Seinfeld, “What is it with the red lights?” I will tell you what the deal with the red lights is. The red light is to the the average Indian driver, of four wheelers, two wheelers, three wheelers and occasionally uni-wheelers, is what the red rag is to a bull. It is an invitation to charge and not stop. Because it is a rule, not only must it be broken but trampled upon. In laws lies the irresistible possibility and thrill of breaking them. The first instinct in India is to how to get around doing something that is mandated by law. It is a civilization that has for long had gloriously comprehensive laws on its statute books and that’s where they have mostly stayed.

Another point that Dutt touched upon was Winfrey’s visit to the widows of Vrindavan. These women are a profoundly shameful rebuke of the lofty claims of family values. These are the women who have been not just cast aside but castigated simply because their husbands died before them. Although the practice is not as widespread as it seems, it is prevalent enough to have a large number of them living in the ancient town of Vrindavan, the putative of hub of Krishna’s childhood in Uttar Pradesh. A lot has been written and filmed about this revoltingly obscurantist and abhorrent practice.

I am sure Winfrey was struck by the cruel contradiction of a country that still prides herself in her joint family system and yet tolerates the widows of Vrindavan. Answering Dutt’s question what struck her the most about her visit, Winfrey spoke of three things. One of which was the sense of family.

“The sense of family tradition..I now get it. I really get the sense of how glorious it is that this is a country that has no respect for nursing homes because you take care of your families and you don’t put your families in nursing homes,” she said.

Unless of course if you are a widow in northern parts of India, in which case you are likely to be packed off to Vrindavan to be among other widows leading this grotesquely imagined life of loneliness away from your family simply because the husband died. And without a husband what are you if not a wretched shadow of a human being shrouded in a white sari and tonsured head stewing in your own misery?

I am sure Winfrey could not square the “glorious” practice of taking care of one’s family with the widows of Vrindavan. She should not even try it because it would be like trying to understand why drivers do not stop at the red lights. They do either because they can.

 

‘Behind the Beautiful Forevers’

A book that is getting a lot of buzz these days is “Behind the Beautiful Forevers—Life, Death and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity’ by Katherine Boo.

The book is preceded by high praise, some of which calls it the best book of narrative non-fiction in a quarter century. Author and historian Ramchandra Guha says, “Without question the best book yet written on contemporary India. Also, the best work of narrative nonfiction I’ve read in twenty-five years.”

Kirkus Review calls it “The best book yet written on India in the throes of a brutal transition.”

Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen says, “A beautiful account, told through real-life stories, of the sorrows and joys, the anxieties and stamina, in the lives of the precarious and powerless in urban India whom a booming country has failed to absorb and integrate. A brilliant book that simultaneously informs, agitates, angers, inspires, and instigates.”

There is a word for something that “simultaneously informs, agitates, angers, inspires, and instigates” –- it’s called life.

The book’s publishers, Random House, describes it thus:

“In this brilliantly written, fast-paced book, based on three years of uncompromising reporting, a bewildering age of global change and inequality is made human.

Annawadi is a makeshift settlement in the shadow of luxury hotels near the Mumbai airport, and as India starts to prosper, Annawadians are electric with hope. Abdul, a reflective and enterprising Muslim teenager, sees “a fortune beyond counting” in the recyclable garbage that richer people throw away. Asha, a woman of formidable wit and deep scars from a childhood in rural poverty, has identified an alternate route to the middle class: political corruption. With a little luck, her sensitive, beautiful daughter—Annawadi’s “most-everything girl”—will soon become its first female college graduate. And even the poorest Annawadians, like Kalu, a fifteen-year-old scrap-metal thief, believe themselves inching closer to the good lives and good times they call “the full enjoy.”

But then Abdul the garbage sorter is falsely accused in a shocking tragedy; terror and a global recession rock the city; and suppressed tensions over religion, caste, sex, power and economic envy turn brutal. As the tenderest individual hopes intersect with the greatest global truths, the true contours of a competitive age are revealed. And so, too, are the imaginations and courage of the people of Annawadi.”

P.S.: You can see that I have taken the path of least resistance in this post by merely copy-pasting publicity blurbs. There is a reason for that. I woke up with pure ennui this morning. I think it was set off by having to shovel six inches of snow yesterday. And snow, I can assure you, does not take the path of least resistance while being shoveled.

Why bite the bullet?

What woke me up this morning a little earlier than my normal 4.30 a.m. was muffled but distinctly audible exultation. At first I attributed it to the dawn dreamscape that often washes over me. However, as I opened my regular news source of the IANS wire I knew what I heard probably emanated from the direction of Deoband in India.

I found out that author Salman Rushdie has called off his visit to India. Here is how the 64-year-old author explains the reason:

“For the last several days I have made no public comment about my proposed trip to Jaipur at the request of the authorities in Rajasthan, hoping that they would put in place such precautions as might be necessary to allow me to come and address the Festival audience in circumstances that were comfortable and safe for all.

I have now been informed by intelligence sources in Maharashtra and Rajasthan that paid assassins from the Mumbai underworld may be on their way to Jaipur to 'eliminate' me.

While I have some doubts about the accuracy of this intelligence, it would be irresponsible of me to come to the Festival in such circumstances; irresponsible to my family, to the festival audience, and to my fellow writers. I will therefore not travel to Jaipur as planned."

What this means immediately is that while the original fatwa issued against Rushdie’s life on February 14, 1989 by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini of Iran may have lapsed, its mutations are still very much around nearly a quarter century later. The advent of information and knowledge century in the interim, it seems, has done nothing to contain our primal barbarism.

Let’s for the sake of argument take the Indian intelligence reports to be accurate. Does that mean that somewhere along the line the extreme Islamic religious establishment, such as it is, would at the very least take the path of least resistance were paid underworld assassins to carry out the hit? And who paid them? Also, at whose behest? I hope the intelligence reports are not just an expedient device that someone in the bureaucratic establishment is using to get around this ticklish issue. Perhaps that someone reasoned that if Rushdie were to be warned of a “credible” plot to assassinate him, would he still take the chance and visit for the greater glory of the freedom of speech?

It makes the question that I raised the other day—Should Rushdie be in a lifelong battle-ready mode?—particularly relevant. He does speak about his responsibility towards his family, the festival audience and fellow writers while choosing to cancel the visit. It is not worth his while even if the plot to assassinate him may be nothing more than some crafty intelligence bureaucrat’s way of preempting the difficult challenge of protecting him inside a chaotic literary festival.

It is safe to say that at least for the foreseeable future Rushdie will not be able to openly visit the country of his birth because the so-called paid assassins are unlikely to dismantle their weapons and mothball their telescopic sights right away. A doubt about his personal safety has been introduced not just in Rushdie’s mind but that of his family and friends who may advise him that it is simply not worth it.

In a way Rushdie’s decision to cancel can also be attributed to the bizarre calculus by India’s political establishment that they are better off not annoying nearly 20 million Muslims in the election-bound state of Uttar Pradesh, even though those 20 million have said nothing to indicate that they care whether the author came visiting.

Next time when Indian leaders brag about the country’s rising status as a “global superpower” let them remember that a mere a cleric in a grimy town can undermine their grandiosity.

‘Ukraine is not a brothel’

Ukrainian women’s rights group Femen members protest at the residence of Indian ambassador to Kiev. (Pic: femen.livejournal.com)

A group of topless Ukrainian women stormed the balcony of Indian Ambassador Rajiv K. Chander’s residence in capital Kiev. They were protesting because they believe the Indian embassy is denying visas to women between 15 and 40 amid reports that some of them go to India to engage in prostitution.

A newspaper report in India alleged that the issuance of visas to women between 15 and 40 had been made more rigorous because of the allegations of prostitution. The protestors belong to Femen, a women’s group that stages topless protests against various issues.

There are reports that India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had instructed embassies in former Soviet republics such as Ukraine, Georgia, Chechnya, Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan to vet visa applications from young women with greater scrutiny. The Indian embassy in Kiev has denied that it is following any such practice.

The Telegraph newspaper of Kolkata that reported the story said this:

“A senior MEA official said the report was “weird, if not mischievous and misplaced”.

“No such instructions have been issued. Visa officials are continuing to use their judgement in the issuance of visas, but there is no discrimination,” the official said, adding such restrictions would make every man a potential terrorist and every woman a potential sex worker.”

I went to Femen’s blog to get some more details about the protest. Since the blog is in Russian and its Google translation poor, I am not able to say precisely what it asserts. But the general tone is one of anger and rejection. “Ukraine is not a brothel! Ukrainka not prostitutes!” it says. I would not depend on the translation because of a line like this one: “Daily hundreds ukraynok, pыtayuschyhsya get visas, passes vыnuzhdenы pozornuyu procedure opravdanyya, dokazыvaya officials that they are not fucking.”

“Indian prostitution is directly conducted with impunity of the country’s criminal business. Blaming it on women is a shame for the heirs of such a rich and old culture,” The telegraph quotes the blog as saying.

Femen’s outrage is understandable because if the embassy operates under that particular instruction, it does amount to profiling. I am willing to take the Indian foreign ministry’s assertion that it does not practice discrimination at its face value, even though I would not be surprised if there are at least discreet guidelines to the effect.

Notwithstanding Femen’s protest, it is no secret in New Delhi that a number of women from the former Soviet republics, including Ukraine, do come to the Indian capital because “the business here is good”, as one young  politician told me last year. It was a poorly disguised euphemism for prostitution.

The way the business operates is that young women from Central Asian countries visit on tourist visas for short durations and use their time in New Delhi to make tidy sums of money from businessmen and politicians. India’s booming economy has spawned a generation of young and successful businessmen with substantial spare cash to spend on personal entertainment. It is also a well known fact that there is a preference for white women among these businessmen.

On this one I am with Femen in so much as the group says that the embassy would end up perpetuating that unsavory reputation of Ukrainian women if it was indeed profiling those in the age group 15-40. Of course, visa issuance by any country has a built-in bias in the sense that it does eventually boil down to what a particular consular officer thinks at that particular time. Since visas are a privilege and not a right, it is never easy to prove why some get rejected. It could well be that the Indian embassy in Kiev does subject this age group of women to greater scrutiny.

Should Rushdie be in a lifelong battle-ready mode?

Would it be fair to expect author Salman Rushdie to pick one more fight in defense of literary and creative freedom? Whether Rushdie should visit India to attend a literary festival in the face of some Islamic clerics’ demand to prevent him because he offended them a quarter century ago is at the heart of the debate.

There is no legal way to stop Rushdie from visiting other than someone challenging in a court of law his Person of Indian Origin (PIO) status that guarantees him unlimited multiple visits to the country of his birth whenever he wishes to. I seriously doubt whether any judge of reasonable merit would oblige any such petitioner. I am not even sure if the PIO status is vulnerable to individual litigation.

As some of you might know Rushdie is scheduled to visit the annual Jaipur Literature Festival (January 20-24). That visit has run into politically expedient resistance from a bunch of Islamic clerics who believe that the author should be prevented because he wrote a book, namely ‘The Satanic Verses’, in 1988 that they insist blasphemed Islam and the Prophet Mohammad. Rushdie has visited India in recent years, the latest being in 2007, without any serious opposition.

One reason for this objection may have something to with the fact that Uttar Pradesh, India’s largest and politically the most influential state, is up for state legislature elections. It is a season of political expediency and posturing at its worst in a state where everything is political until proven otherwise. I do not mean to minimize the clerics’ ability to hold long grudges by saying that their objection is purely political but it helps that elections are imminent. There is no better time than elections to exhibit old wounds and demand that they be nursed.

One can make the case that without the obliging media, particularly the broadcast media, the marginal demand from the clerics may not have gained the traction and visibility that it now enjoys. It has risen to a point where it is seriously forcing the Indian government to dither over whether Rushdie should visit. Left to them the government would be mighty pleased if Rushdie cancels the visit of his own volition. Literary and creative freedom is not an issue any political dispensation would be too eager to stand up for. They would rather that such lofty ideals simply disappeared.

An element of uncertainty has been introduced by Ashok Gehlot, the chief minister of the state of Rajasthan in whose capital Jaipur the festival is being organized. Gehlot has implied that he is aware of the security concerns surrounding the Rushdie visit. What he really means to say is, “Salman Rushdie, can you please not mess up my happiness by actually visiting?”

That brings me back to my original question. Those, including I, who regard free speech as a fundamental human right, should be conscious that no one has paid a greater price to uphold it than Rushdie. It is entirely up to him whether he thinks it is worth his while to engage in one more battle. No one should think any less of him simply because he concludes that it is not worth it. Even Rushdie cannot be in a lifelong battle-ready mode. The idea that if he chooses not to visit would hand a victory to the extremist fringe is a powerful one, but why should it be Rushdie’s personal responsibility to take on them again and again?

So far in this ridiculous affair the only people who seem to winning are the clerics because they have forced the government on the defensive because of the media. Having been a journalist for 30 years, albeit on the less glamorous print side, I am willing to be sympathetic to those who raise the question whether they could have willfully disregarded the clerics’ demand. It is a question of treatment and perspective and not whether the media should disregard such stories which have a way of quickly degenerating into shrill television debates fueled by their ratings potential.

The clerics have also succeeded in grabbing political space disproportionate to their actual standing and influence as a voice of Muslims in the country. If there is a moderate, reasonable counter to their demand it is not getting the media representation it deserves. One heard Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah saying, "We underestimate the intelligence of Indian Muslims when we try to raise issues like this which have no bearing on day to day concerns of Muslims. I don't believe that there are many Muslims in India for whom visa to Salman Rushdie will be an election issue."

Despite those spirited words, there is a real possibility that Rushdie may not yet make it. The Jaipur Literature Festival organizers insist that there is no change in his visit but there is ambiguity about when he might come. From where I am sitting(a freezing basement) it is beginning to seem that even the festival organizers would be secretly relieved if Rushdie did not show up. I doubt very much if they would cancel the festival unless Rushdie attends. Even they are not so wedded to principles. Of course, it is possible that there is a lot going on discreetly, behind the scene to ensure that Rushdie attends and attends with the respect he deserves.

It is a sorry spectacle that a handful of outdated clerics can still sway the world’s largest democracy in the direction they want.

Mumbai’s celebrity world is convulsing in multiple Oprahsms

Mumbai’s celebrity world is convulsing in multiple Oprahsms. It is hardly surprising that anyone who is anyone at all came in Oprah Winfrey’s honor. I meant to the biggest party of 2012 in India, in Mumbai, hosted in her honor yesterday.

Winfrey was visiting Mumbai as part of something so profound that it would change the course of human history. As usual I am not privy to exactly what. But as I was saying anyone who is anyone at all, even Sikander Kher, showed up wearing their most beatific smiles in case benediction came their way from her.

Oprah being Oprah did not disappoint as evident in the gushing stream of tweets that the attendees put out. Here is a sample from someone called Farah Khan Ali: “"Wth my inspiration @Oprah 2night.I just died. She is d eternal "Rock Star"&this is 1 day I will always remember.” I can go into a detailed analysis of the tweet in all its subtleties but what would be the point of that?

News reports say that Winfrey was chaperoned by personages no less than the Bachchans, Amitabh, wife Jaya, son Abhishek, daughter-in-law Aishwarya. She was visiting India’s first showbiz family, partly because Abhishek and Aishwarya were once guests on her show.

Winfrey was hosted-- in a manner of speaking because you don’t really host her-- by Mumbai’s pioneering socialite Parmeshwar Godrej of the famous Godrej family. Once that happens in the city, everything else happens. Superstars and superwealthies then reflexively show up in their Bentleys, Rollses and Mercs at the Godrej do.

These days when I see the photographs and videos of such high-powered celebrity events I look at the others such as security guards and hangers-on for any hint of resentment at having been left out. I must say I find it rather easily these days. It is not so much resentment as resigned bafflement at what it is they did not do to be among the guarded and gawked at rather than be among those doing the guarding and gawking.

It is easy to begrudge and slam the successful but the fact also remains that many of them came up the hard way. Winfrey herself is a powerful example of that. She has paid her dues and probably deserves every ounce of honor, deference, flattery, respect, admiration and sycophancy that she gets.

Once you are canonized by the Church of Pop Culture, the way Winfrey most certainly is, everything that you do is seen from that special canonical prism. You wear a sari and a gorgeously sequined blouse and you seem divine. There are no wrong moves for a saint, only intriguing ones.

Note to self: When you step out of your basement, remember to get a life.

A captive audience of people under their own spell

Ricky Gervais

I got to the Golden Globes last night exactly at the halfway mark at 8.30 p.m. and did not miss anything. That should tell you how unnecessary they are.

The host, Ricky Gervais, said, "The Golden Globes are just like the Oscars without all that esteem. The Golden Globes are to the Oscars what Kim Kardashian is to Kate Middleton. Bit louder, bit trashier, bit drunker, and more easily bought. Allegedly. Nothing's been proved." For some inexplicable reason the high-powered Hollywood audience laughed, perhaps mistaking his observation to be a joke. I do not think Gervais meant it as one. Gervais seems to have understood that the best jokes are often a pure factual statement without bothering to inject any more humor.

I suspect Gervais had made no preparation for the show but had merely decided to show up and simply state the obvious. If some suckers are willing to pay him for not breaking a sweat, he would be foolish to turn it down. It is an easy gig for someone like him. It is a captive audience of people who can rarely be broken out of their own spell. And I am talking about the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA). Movie stars did not even show up. They all sent their reputations dressed up in expensive clothes.

The formula of having a caustic Englishman hurling gratuitous insults at people is by now well established on American television. Simon Cowell pioneered it and Gervais is perpetuating it. Insult sells even more than sex and who better to sell it than the middle-aged Englishman who can’t do much sex? (See, that is an example of gratuitous insult).

I replayed Gervais’ opening monologue since I missed it live. I thought it had a couple of good cracks like this one: “Who needs the Oscars? Not me, and not Eddie Murphy. He walked out on em, and good for him. But when the man who said yes to Norbit, says no, you know you're in trouble.”

Even by the seemingly lackadaisical standards of the Globes, last night’s show came across as particularly lackadaisical. Don’t let anyone tell you, “But it had humor.” Well, that’s the least one would expect in a room full of Hollywood pantheon.

Waiting at the ocean’s edge

Consider today’s post a sort of director’s cut. It is self-indulgent and not particularly well structured, but I suspect it is still fairly readable. If it is not, so be it because no one pays to read this blog. The tip jar on the left has not attracted a penny since it was shamelessly installed there by me some three years ago. So if you don’t pay, you get no say.

The following three literary constructs happened in quick succession within a span of about 20 minutes early this morning around 1.30 a.m. They just wrote themselves.The scrap of paper above is where I wrote it.

1.

The first thought was about a fictional poet called Mazoori Sana of Africa. Incidentally, Mazoori Sana means ‘I am fine’ in Swahili in response to the question “Habari gani” (How are you or what's’ up?). I have used it as the name of a fictional poet standing at the edge of the Indian Ocean on the shores of Zanzibar. Here is what Mazoori Sana wrote via me:

From the shores of Zanzibar

I trade in cloves afar

Then I wait at the ocean’s edge

For fragrances to wash ashore

By the way, Zanzibar is one of my all time favorite words and always conjures up the fragrance of cloves, something this semiautonomous part of Tanzania in Africa was once known for.

 

2.

That little limerick was followed by one in Hindustani. It says:

Woh le gaye gulaab merey,

Yeh kehke ke hisaab

Khushbuon mein chukayenge

Fir ek roz meri dehleez par

Itr ki do bottle chhod gaya koi

(She took my roses

Saying she will pay me in fragrances

Then one day

Someone left two perfume bottles at my doorstep)

 

3.

The third construct is not necessarily poetic but tries to tell an ancient story my way. It is in Hindustani with translation below.

Brij pahuncha to pata chala

Ki woh to Dwarka mein baithen hein

Dwarka mein khabar mili

Woh Kurukshetra ko nikal gaye

Kurukshetra ki seema par ek yoddha ne mujhe roka aur kaha

‘Yehan se aagey jana pratibandh hai,

Aagey ghamasan yuddh chal raha hai

Woh aayenge, avashya aayenge

Parantu is yuddh ke pashchyat

Sab vyarth hi hoga’

(I reached Brij only to find that

He was in Dwarka

In Dwarka, I heard the news that

He was on way to Kurukshetra

On the outskirts of Kurukshetra

A warrior stopped me and said,

‘Thus far and no further

There is a fierce war on

He will return, will surely return

But after the war

It will all be futile’)

After writing these three unconnected bits I went to sleep around 2 a.m.

The kite fliers of Ahmedabad redux

The kite by Mayank Chhaya

(I wrote the following post on January 14, 2011. I am republishing it by popular demand…. Well, that’s a lie. For one, there is no popular demand for it. More importantly, nothing has to be republished on the Internet. It is always there for the world to see and read when it wants to. I am recycling it because I do not feel like writing this morning.To be fair to me, there are some rare new insights added to the redux version.)

I don’t do nostalgia that well. Coming from me, it sounds bogus. But I am going to indulge myself anyway considering that today happens to be Uttarayan, the D-Day for the kite fliers of Gujarat in general and Ahmedabad in particular.

While residents of many other cities wannbe kite fliers in the league of those in Ahmedabad, there is really no comparison. Kite flying in Ahmedabad is an experience of near nirvanic bliss. When I was growing up learning to fly kites was a defining rite of passage. I got defined when I was nine.

In my extended family, the ultimate test of one’s kite flying skills was to be able to fly a kite even while holding a firki (a string spool) and finally cutting a rival’s kite. I did all that without much fuss. So yes, I have been a bloody good kite flier. But then Ahmedabad is teeming with bloody good kite fliers.

Kite flying in Ahmedabad was and remains today an aerial war where victims are almost invariably anonymous. You never really know whose kite you are cutting because there are thousands in the sky.

There are two broad ways to wage this war. One is to attack your adversary from below and the other is to swoop down from top. Once your kite gains a certain altitude because of the Uttarayan wind, the taut string becomes a potentially lethal weapon. It is laced with what is called the manjo or manja. In fact, making the manja is quite a process and there are manja makers who have become legends because of the sheer abrasiveness of their product. When I was growing up some of them in the walled city guarded their formula as zealously as the makers of Coca Cola.

The manja is a mixture of flour, industrial adhesive, aluminum oxide, zirconia alumina, powdered glass and various types of colors. The raw string is laced with the manja and allowed to dry for several hours, sometimes overnight. My mamas, maternal uncles, who grew up in the walled city had “undisclosed” sources of specially made string spools which would be delivered in the dark of the nigh away from the prying eyes of neighboring spies. A dozen or so firkis would be brought wrapped in newspapers as if they were some rare contraband. And for that one day on January 14, the firkis were indeed rare contraband.

The lethality of the manja would be tested with the same meticulousness that a seasoned drug dealer would establish his contraband’s purity. Two firkis would be randomly picked from about a dozen or so surreptitiously peeping out of the newspaper packaging. One mama would unspool a firki as if he was initiating a virgin bride into the joys of sex without frightening her. Another mama would gently tap at the side of another spool to see if the string unraveled easily. They would then clip two short pieces of thread from the firkis. The two would rub the pieces in one swift action in opposite directions to see who cut first. That would complete the test of the manja’s purity.

Coming back to the two main ways to cut your rival’s kite, one of my uncles specialized in attacking from below. What it meant was that he would circle his kite around the rival’s, and at a precise point start pulling the string back with considerable hand coordination. That would rapidly raise his kite’s height again and the resultant contact of his string with the rival’s string would create a cutting edge. That’s where the quality of the manja would come into play. I do not remember a single occasion when this particular kite flier lost his. There were times when after cutting a dozen or so kites, he would cut his own string and let his kite go. Mahesh Mama, that was his name, was a kite flier whose prowess was discussed by us boys in whispered tones.

The other strategy is to swoop down and rapidly release the string as one makes contact with the rival. That rapid release causes friction and eventually cuts either your string or the rival’s. The second way of attacking was preferred by those not blessed with swift arms.

Kite flying began as early as 4 a.m. and went on till 1 p.m. when we would break for lunch. Even though we had protection on (that does not sound right), our fingers would have been slashed at several spots in the first ten minutes. That made eating an excruciatingly painful affair. It was literally rubbing salt and other spices in one’s wounds. At one point my throat was virtually slit because I came in the middle of Mahesh Mama’s ambush of a kite being flown by someone several streets away.

Mahesh Mama’s signature gig was to cut kites rising from nearby terraces even before they had gone up ten feet. That’s how good he was. Let’s just say he was a top gun among kite fliers. For some men in the neighborhood being cut down in early flight was nothing short of public emasculation. And we would rub it in by banging on steel platters in a tribal ritual proclaiming triumph.

It was only fitting that such triumphs were celebrated with deliciously rich food. It was a tradition in my maternal grandparents’ family to hide money, coins really, in food. So one had to watch out for a pawali (a quarter) in the daal or 50 paise in the pooris. There was no FDA to enforce rules about choking hazards. Since it was expected that money would be hidden as an Uttarayan gift, we would eat carefully. It never exceeded 50 paise.

At its core flying kite is as much about liberation, as signified by a soaring kite, as it is about being tethered, as signified by the string. It is a great thrill.

Pissed off

Here is what the viral video showing four U.S. Marines urinating on three dead Taliban men tells me. It tells me that for these four men killing someone is not enough.

For them somehow their brutal death is incomplete without the kind of humiliation that these Marines believe they must be subjected to. And not just that, that humiliation must be recorded for posterity. Humiliation must not only be done but must also be seen (literally) to have been done. In that humiliation is like justice, I suppose.

I seriously wonder whether when these Marines were doing this, they would have told each other, “Hey, let’s urinate on them.” The term sounds too clinical and, under the circumstances, too dignified. They might have said something like, “Let’s piss on the bastards.” More seriously though one of the Marines reportedly says, “Have a great day, buddy.”

As I survey the broad global revulsion at the video, it is striking that death here has become secondary to urination. That has something to do with the rationale that in a war death is often inevitable but not being pissed on posthumously. That is a matter of choice, a despicable one but a choice nevertheless.

One can argue that in an ecosystem of brutality, misanthropy and vileness prevailing in Afghanistan, the Marines’ behavior, however revolting, is not that remarkably out of character. Those who are engaged in daily gun battles, from either side and irrespective of whose cause is more just, do develop a different set of standards of acceptable human conduct. No one should be surprised by that.

In a region where even a donkey is strapped with explosives and let loose in a crowded bazaar, one is hard-pressed to say with certitude what the standards of correct human conduct should be. (That happened in Kandahar in 2008).

To some my circumlocution might suggest that I am somehow trying to explain or rationalize an inherently vile act rather than unambiguously denouncing it. Far from it. In fact, I am trying to make a larger philosophical point about a situation where we have no major problem accepting wars as a way to resolve civilizational conflicts but feel such revulsion about acts which are consequences of that acceptance.

I am sure the US government will hand down whatever punishment that is due to these Marines but that will neither solve the larger question of how wars grotesquely mangle what we consider decent human behavior nor bring the kind of peace the US says it wants to in that part of the world.