Impressions: Kashmir November 2017

Impressions : Kashmir November 2017

Mere mention of Kashmir evokes such mixed impressions, of charming romantic Hindi films of yester years and the contemporary dark films on conflict, juxtaposed in the backdrop of breath taking scenic beauty. Of ethnic cleansing, media reports of militancy, of stone pelting and valour of Defence forces.

When Vinita and Pramod offered us to accompany them to Srinagar on a timeshare holiday in November, I was hesitant. No, not because of security concerns, but because I am sceptic of very cold climates and the increased possibility of being stranded by natural disasters due to rains and snow. But I had never been to Kashmir, the temptation and a little persuasion finally won.
So off we went. The arrangement was to stay at a houseboat in Dal Lake for a day and then shift to a hotel for rest of the stay.

The houseboat Zamzam was opulent, with intricately curved walnut furniture, artefacts on display, fully carpeted floors. It had a sitting room, dining room and bedrooms with attached bathrooms. All rooms had heating arrangements with ‘bukhari', where wood logs were burnt, and we were provided with hot water bags in bed, absolutely life saving, the latter. But more than one night stay at houseboat could be claustrophobic, after the novelty wears off.

The houseboats in Kashmir have a disadvantage, they are stationary in the middle of the lake, and one is totally dependent on ‘shikara', the small boats for mobility, on payment per trip. Worse, the shikara are not available after 6:30 pm, so one can not go out to town to have dinner. Choice of food is limited, need to be ordered in advance, and charges are very expensive when compared to similar food available in restaurants in town. But a great photo opportunity to show off, must say.

Our first brush with Kashmiri hospitality was at the houseboat. When we asked if we should not remove outdoor shoes at the deck itself as inside was carpeted, the manager was genuinely aghast at our asking..”this is YOUR home, please do whatever you like, do not embarrass me, I am a nobody”. The streams of vendors that came to sell wares at the houseboat, shawls, wood work, trinkets, were all very polite and persuasive, and even when we did not buy, the smile on their face did not wane.

We set off for Gulmarg immediately after checking in the houseboat. It had snowed at Gulmarg the previous day as well, and we had the first hand taste of fresh snowfall soon, just when we finished a quick lunch after reaching Gulmarg. There was a Shiva temple at a height in Gulmarg which we had planned to climb to, famous for picturisation of Rajesh Khanna-Mumtaz song Jai Jai Shiv Shakar, but soon the temple which was visible just then, gradually vanished from sight, as it started snowing. We decided to return to Srinagar, the car was cautiously moving in slow motion...as we clicked photos and video clips of snowfall en route. We reached the houseboat just in the nick of the curfew time of shikara service. Whew!!Weather forecast was clouds, rain and snow for the next day, so we dropped the idea of going to Sonmarg. We had already experienced fresh snowfall, more of the same did not seem too attractive.

So it was to be local sightseeing and shopping. We checked out from houseboat and checked in at hotel Sarobar in town. It rained intermittently, sky remained overcast, saw a couple of Moghul gardens while it drizzled off and on, had chai pakora inside J&K tourist cafe when it started raining hard, and when rain refused to stop, decided to go to the Hazratbal shrine and the city museum.
Women are allowed up to a point inside the Hazratbal shrine, and not beyond. Nothing much to see either, at least for women.

Very few visitors to Kashmir would really want to spend time indoors, we did it due to lack of choice, but I am so glad that we visited the museum. How else would I have seen such rich inheritance from close quarters, photography is not allowed in museums, but we were about the only visitors, and the guards were indulgent when we clicked pictures of exhibits and legends on our cell phones. I must remember to include some of the pictures in the album.

The positivity of Kashmiris is palpable. The shop from which we bought walnuts encouraged us “don’t let rains keep you, you have come to see Kashmir,grab an umbrella, just do it”. Most places offer Kahwa as a welcome gesture, and a shop even made us sit on ‘magic sofa',electrically heated and also covered our legs with an electric blanket.

That night a militant was killed in Srinagar.

Next day the shutters were down in most shops and restaurants in Srinagar. Five more militants were killed in district Bandipura, we made enquiries if travelling to Pahalgam in Anantnag district would be safe. “Nobody harms civilian tourists”, that was the general confident statement of everybody we spoke to. It was a partly Sunny day, we found most commercial places shut en route, but were rewarded by an unscheduled visit to Avantipur, saw the apples on trees from close, passed by the cricket bat cottage industry village and the saffron mandi village, and reached Pahalgam. We missed seeing the Martand Sun temple due to lack of time, it involved taking a diversion. The locals call it “Mutton” temple, hahaha.

The (Muslim) guide at Avantipur knew the history and legends in the Vishnu mandir so well, it was awe inspiring. He did not get his salary for a couple of months, which was kind of ‘normal ‘. According to him, people like him are able to get by only as most have farmland for basic necessities. I was thinking, if, like in other States, land indeed became transferable, would that help or harm the locals at the margin?

The scenic places to see in Pahalgam are accessible only on pony, had not bargained for it at my age and ahem...weight. But we decided to give it a shot after bargaining on lines advised by our driver. Whatever the owner asks for, just offer half and stick to it. We were four, with two pony attendants. It had rained and snowed the previous day, slushy rocky narrow terrain, steep ups and downs, with ponies choosing softer ground precariously close to edge- it was so adventurous!!

The young pony attendant kept boosting my morale with gems , “ who says you are old, old are those who have no teeth left”, “ You think you are fat, arey so many Amarnath Yatris have such paunches that they can not even see the handle in front to hold on to”, and made me laugh and lose fear. It was a backbreaking task for the attendants, walking on slippery slopes, holding on to us to maintain proper balance, the works.The attendant of my 9 year old pony, Mastana, was Ishfaq. He was a little younger than my son, and had a disarming smile.

We reached Baisaran -mini Switzerland after stopping to see from atop the pony, Dabian, the place with a quaint legend about hunting of a tiger and a deer by a single arrow shot. Baisaran was a lush green expanse, set against backdrop of the snowy mountains and pine trees, with patches of snow on the ground...out of the world. Bowl of hot Maggi was soul food at Baisaran for us. On way back,we stopped at a couple more view points, seen from the pony.

While we were in Srinagar, we talked to ordinary Kashmiris, like our driver, shop keepers etc about their perception of the situation in Kashmir. They are disdainful of politicians of all hues, past and present. According to all people that we spoke to, “media exaggerates”, and then with a smile “seeing for yourself is believing, isn’t it”? They are guardedly resentful about armed forces continuing to be deployed in the state, but are nevertheless cheerful with inherent positivity.

An incident will be etched in memory as a final takeaway for me. I have never seen a security person who smiles while doing his job anywhere. While returning, the security drill at Srinagar airport is very strict, with luggage loaded and screened at multiple points. At one such point the handle of my trolley suitcase had got dislodged. The security person at the next checking point saw it, and himself put it back in the slot from which it had come off, tied the security rope very securely so that the contraption stays together, and smiled “I would have fixed it permanently if I had the right glue and time”.

This was an unknown facet of Kashmiriyat for me. The blessed land and its gracious people.

Middle Finger, literally

Middle Finger, literally

My virtual and real life friends already know that I have been very skeptic and resentful about the trigger happy policy of linking of Aadhar to all activities of an average citizen of India. The irony is that while having Aadhar is not a proof of citizenship, every citizen nevertheless needs to possess an Aadhar registration for leading her humdrum life. For those who do not  take any benefit from Government welfare programme
s, and have documents to establish identity, insistence on Aadhar to operate a bank account or use a mobile phone does look like a State surveillance mechanism to monitor all individuals, on the principle of 'everybody suspected as likely to commit crime, till proved innocent'.

Anyway, hopefully Supreme Court would shortly rule in these areas. I was disappointed that pending a decision, the Hon'ble court did not stay operation of the linking of Aadhar to bank accounts and mobile phones. After all, law abiding risk averting average citizens would grudgingly do the linking before the indicated last date to avoid inconvenience, and any Court decision after that date will be just for academic interest.

I am a risk averter by temperament. So with a heavy heart, I visited the Airtel store in the neighbourhood for biometrically linking Aadhar to my post paid number of almost 20 years now. Even the machine could read my mood. It refused to recognise my thumb print. Once, twice, thrice.The person at the store theorised that as I had taken Aadhar more than 8 years ago, the biometric details perhaps need updation!

I came away, dejected. My husband suggested that perhaps we should try at a different store. On two visits to Delhi thereafter, I tried at two different stores, surprisingly none of them agreed to deal with post paid number linking, they were supposedly equipped only for pre paid linking.

Then there was this press release about facility of linking SIM number to Aadhar by individuals without need of biometric  authentication, from December. Some relief!! But wait!! What is my SIM number? How to know? Google search. Initial elation, then despair. The indicated procedure   does not work for SIM cards that have been cut smaller to fit in smartphones. So,  a visit to the Airtel store again.😞

This time there was a different person at the desk. A pleasant helpful youngman. He heard my woes patiently. He checked and wrote out the formidably long array of digits of the SIM, and asked me to try at the machine once more and with another finger.

Wonder of wonders. I am a polite prim and propah person by default,  but yes, the finger print that the savvy omniscient  machine recognised was that of the middle finger!!😃

Twinkle Twinkle Little (Red) Star

Twinkle Twinkle Little (Red) star

The Central Government has recently taken a decision that Red Beacon VIP culture in India should go- it is a very welcome move, citizens have welcomed it wholeheartedly, politicians have also publicly welcomed it, whether or not they are happy about the loss of public symbol of power. 

I was waiting for the gazette notification amending the Central Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989, as till the changes are known, it is premature to celebrate. Now the draft  GSR 397(E) __ has been published and uploaded on E Gazette portal on 20th April 2017. So what is proposed?

Basically, the changes proposed have three components:

(a) Use of the amber light, if displayed by any direction indicator or top light or as top light used on vehicle for operating within the premises like airports and  ports without going outside the said premises on to public roads, which was permitted till now, has been extended to also mines and project sites.

(b) Clauses relating to use of red light for vehicles carrying high dignitaries to be prescribed by either the Central Government or the State Governments, blanket permission for use of blue lights ( with or without flasher) for pilot vehicles accompanying the vehicles carrying high dignitaries, with use of blue lights with flasher being at the sole discretion of the State Governments have been deleted. 

(c) The power enjoyed henceforth solely by the State Governments for permitting use of multi coloured red, blue and white light only on vehicles specifically designated for emergency duties as 'specifically specified' by State Governments, has been withdrawn. Now instead, the Central Government will exercise these powers for such emergency and disaster management duties as may be specified by the Central Government. 

What the changes at (b) and (c) essentially imply is that cooperative federalism is diluted in so far as the States' power to permit use of multi coloured lights in vehicles is concerned.State Governments will have no powers in the matter whatsoever, not even in case of emergencies.

It also implies that while there will no longer be vehicles fitted with  lights with the objective of "carrying high dignitaries" or their pilot cars ,the Central Government can still use its powers to ferry anybody, including a dignitary citing  'emergency',  in vehicle(s) fitted with external beacons.

Even in times of emergency affecting a State, the State will henceforth need to seek permission of the Central Government for using vehicles fitted with beacons. 

There appears to be a trust deficit on part of the Central Government vis a vis State Governments regarding the latter acting in a responsible manner, which is not very healthy in a federal structure. After all cooperative federalism is just not semantics.

Illegal abattoirs and action

Out of resigned curiosity, I checked out THE election manifesto, what it actually said about abattoirs. At bullet point 2 related to animal husbandry, it says all illegal abattoirs will be shut down with utmost strictness and the Government will 'impose restrictions' on all mechanical abattoirs.

Now election manifestos are documents of intent, presented as a bouquet. Whether or not voters vote for a party specifically because of what it states in the manifesto, when voted to power, parties cherry-pick whatever suits them and calls it 'people's mandate'.

Presumably, the manual abattoirs are illegal. They had been thriving without pollution control measures and posing environmental hazards,  with connivance of law enforcers.  They should be shut down. Fair enough. But then any reasonable Government needs to give a show cause notice to the prima facie offenders, that they should close business by a given date if they do not comply with legal requirements. In fact, in a just system, the offenders also need to be given an opportunity to  take appropriate licenses, by paying penalty. But no, the new State Government's agenda is striking at the meat industry itself, so there is no natural justice for anybody in the industry at all, not even the licensed mechanical abattoirs.

When mechanical abattoirs operate with a license, they need to abide by the conditions of the license. But to state in the manifesto that 'restrictions will be put on all mechanical abattoirs', is pushing an agenda of economically impoverishing sections of the citizentry and their food choices, as per certain calculated profiling, very unfortunate.

Though ostensibly,  'sab ka saath, sab ka vikas' is the motto, by deliberately attacking certain legitimate vocations and food habits,  immediately within a week of change of Government, action is speaking louder than the words.

The Evil Eye

How do certain superstitions take a hold of our lives, I often wonder. Coincidences one too many and the association of one event with the other gets established subconsciously, and despite claiming to be ‘rational’ , irrationality seeps in subsequent actions. I remember I had a certain green batik printed sari which I wore every single day for important examinations. Till that sari just tore on a very rainy Calcutta day when I tried to walk fast, just off the bus, on my way to the examination hall. Now I don’t remember any more if I did well or not that day, but the memory of the embarrassment I felt as a young girl sporting a torn sari publicly has stayed till these late years.

 

In North India, people do not buy mustard oil and metallic things on Saturdays, apparently all powerful dreaded Shanidev enters a household through these means.I did not know this superstition when I initially came to Delhi. A few coincidences, and I fell irrevocably for this superstition. It started with my buying an innocuous steel utensil rack on a Saturday, and immediately falling ill. Then another Saturday I bought a few steel clothes hangers and my husband had a minor accident the following week, you get the drift. So when I was buying my car this year, I was very reluctant to take delivery on a Saturday. But the ‘rational’ and ‘practical’ ‘worse’ half would have none of my idiotic superstitions and he scheduled delivery on a Saturday, his argument being it was an ‘auspicious’ day, the day of Shri Jagannath Rath Yatra. Very reluctantly I agreed, with the condition that though new, it will not be kept in the garage, as the garage was part of the house itself. So far so good. We did not use the new car much, I was still in service and had the officially provided transport. 

 

Then came the day when I was to pick up my Central Govt Health Scheme (CGHS) cards as a retired Central Govt employee from a designated CGHS building. That particular CGHS building has ample parking space inside, I got off and made my way to the designated window to join the queue, and my husband was trying to park. Suddenly I heard a heartbeat chilling breaking sound... I turned and found that the car was damaged, there was a broken half constructed structure right in the middle of the parking area, not visible from a driver seat, and the car had dashed against it. The repair of the total damage cost 38 thousand rupees, of which we had to bear almost half, as the fine print in the insurance papers did not cover cost of certain items. Call it an accident, mishap, coincidence, what have you, yes, may be no lives were lost (by Lord Jagannath’s grace?), but we lost peace of mind, money and were so harassed(usually ascribed to Shanidev’s influence) ... but will I ever buy ANY metallic item on a Saturday, anymore? You have guessed right, no surprises. I prefer to stay superstitious. So there!!

 

In one of my postings, with the change of the Secretary of the Ministry, the working atmosphere suddenly got very tense for me. I kind of felt trapped and sensed a very vicious and negative working environment. Can not really explain it, but I felt chronically depressed, demotivated, even humiliated. Though I have always tried to maintain a clear distinction between office and personal domestic life, I was unable to do so, and it affected me deeply. At that time, a friend suggested that I keep a Turkish ‘Evil Eye” at office facing the door. Now there is a catch, for such a talisman to take effect, it needs to be a ‘gift’. Well there was one lying at home somewhere, it was a paperweight bought by my husband that he had picked up from an earlier trip to Turkey. Strictly speaking “I” did not buy it myself!!. I took it to office and kept it as advised. 

 

Next morning I found the paperweight was broken, my office peon had accidentally dropped it while dusting!!My heart sank. I felt the atmosphere now was too vicious for me to continue. Even the ‘Evil Eye’ lost to the malevolent forces, hahahaha. At the earliest opportunity of a transfer, I gratefully left that Ministry. 

 

As I key in this note now, my heart feels heavy, very heavy. With my mother being in an irreversible vegetative state post a cerebral stroke for the last six months, I have been under resigned mental stress, which some of the colleagues knew. A junior colleague in the Ministry was an occasional visitor to my room. When she could manage time, she dropped in for a cup of tea, she said that she felt ‘comforted’ in the informal and welcoming vibes in my room, despite my seniority. We discussed about general things, small personal things like bringing up children, etc, the least being office politics. During one such tea session, I happened to mention about the evil eye incident conversationally as to how it needed to be a gift for it to have any effect and how it broke and how superstitious I was about it. A month or so before my retirement, she came to my room and presented me with a small evil eye hanging which she had got during her official trip to Turkey. I was so touched. That was the last time I met her. She was not in office during my last week in office, it was a festival week in general, and most of the colleagues were either on leave or on tour. 

 

Ten days ago, she committed suicide.The personal demons she was fighting with I had no inkling about. 

 

The evil eye hanging she presented me with, stares hard at the door at home.

Parliament and I

Parliament and I

As I watched the Lok Sabha TV today bringing the Monsoon Session of the Parliament at a close sine die, I had a very peculiar inexplicable lump in my throat.

 Every Ministry has a Parliament Section which is supervised by an officer, among other duties. This responsibility relating to Parliamentary work is considered an ‘absolutely-no-perks-all-nuisance’ responsibility among officers, and generally there is a game of passing the parcel to the most vulnerable/docile/ un-networked officer with that responsibility. So not too unexpectedly, in one of the Ministries, immediately on joining on transfer, I was assigned Parliamentary work.

When Parliament is in Session, the Parliament Section normally works the whole night before the Question day,  that is to say, twice in a week. More often than not, the Minister clears the last Question file only around 8 pm on the day preceding the Question day. After the Minister approves, work of the graveyard shift begins. The Hindi Section translates the responses and provides the Hindi Version, the Parliament Section gets the English Version typed in prescribed format, make umpteen bilingual copies and sets. The task of Parliament Section gets over after they deliver the sets to the respective House Secretariat, which might well happen in the morning of the Question Day, depending on the volume of Questions.

No, as the supervisory officer, I was not required to stay the night, but had the total responsibility. I usually  left office after the last file was approved by the Minister, and reached office next day an hour before office hours, just in case…. I was answerable for all errors and omissions and commissions. It was an uneasy cross to bear, as human errors do happen under pressure…like I remember the time it was detected at 8 am in the morning of the Question Day that the Hindi version of an answer had a mistake, and nobody in the Hindi Section was available so early in the morning.  I had to think on my feet. I located and sent Hindi knowing staff from another section under my charge to Parliament to make corrections in the copies in hand, to be readied before the Question Hour at 11. 

In my limited way, as the supervisory officer of Parliament Section, I did try to make the task of my team a little easier. Earlier, every Division in the Ministry got the basic draft response to Parliament Questions prepared as they found convenient and submitted files to Minister for approval. It was considered the sole responsibility of the Parliament Section to get the approved replies typed in the standard prescribed format. One of the first things I did was to streamline procedures. I took approval of the Secretary of the Ministry that henceforth every Divisional Head should get the draft response typed only in the Parliament prescribed format, and send hard and soft copy of the draft response to Parliament Section and Hindi Section in advance. In 95% cases, the Minister approved the draft reply as it is, and so this way, re-typing the English version in the Parliament Section could be avoided, minimizing chance of typo and saving time, and Hindi Section also got lead time to translate the draft reply.

I did find my ‘perks’ in the dry ‘‘absolutely-no-perks-all-nuisance’’ responsibility too.

One, the Minister became directly aware of who I was   and my work, which, in hindsight, helped me in a convoluted way in my annual performance assessment. I happened to work under an opinionated Secretary for some time who invariably graded all non-IAS officers tad below the IAS officers of the same level. It was such a humbling feeling to get a photocopy of what the Minister had written about me later from Administration for my record. As the Reviewing authority, The Minister had disagreed with the Secretary’s assessment about me and significantly upped my grading.

The second ‘perk’ was in deciding which Division in the Ministry should handle a particular Parliament Question. It is a fact that nobody really likes to handle a Parliament Question directly, and at the flimsiest of opportunity, dodges it horizontally to a colleague. As the supervisory officer of Parliament Section, I was able to pre-empt many such moves of my colleagues by taking orders of the Secretary beforehand. They grumbled, but had to comply with orders, and ahem , I was able to excuse myself successfully too sometimes…hahahaha. After all , charity should begin at home.

Though I was supervisory officer for Parliament Section only in one Ministry, in my more than three decade long working life serving the Central Government, ever since my first posting, I have been exposed to Parliamentary work, be it Parliament Questions, Parliamentary Committees, or legislative business relating to the Ministries that I was posted in.  I have lost count of the number of times I had been to Parliament, to the Official Gallery, to brief Ministers in their allotted rooms in Parliament, attending meetings of Parliamentary Committees as official witness......

 So many memories… …some unnerving in hindsight… I was in Parliament to brief my Minister the day Parliament attack had happened… just half an hour earlier I had come out , …, some very satisfying… the elation one feels sitting in the Official Gallery to see the House pass a Bill one has spent midnight oil on…..   

This was my last Parliament Session as a Central Government Officer. I will hang up my boots before the Winter Session commences.

I silently lipped the National Song Vande Mataram along with the Parliamentarians as I stood and watched the Lok Sabha TV in the privacy of my office room. Yes, I had a lump in my throat.

Entitled Mediocrity and all that

 

I first came across this eloquent expression when I read a 2008 essay by William Deresiewicz on disadvantages of an elite education. According to the essayist, the elite schools both nurture excellence as well as ‘entitled mediocrity’.

 

Somewhere during the course of the essay, Deresiewicz stated that the elite like to think of themselves as belonging to meritocracy, but that is true up a point. He argued that for the students who manage to get into elite institutions, the education system itself ensures that the majority henceforth  get decent enough grades, even if all do not get the highest grades which the more hardworking and truly deserving  among them no doubt do.

 

As Deresiewicz said, it is the pressure on the elite institution as well to keep up its reputation of exclusivity, which ensures that once students come in, most of them also leave the institution with decent enough grades, and practically nobody gets thrown out mid-course for not being up to mark. The students also feel entitled that they deserve more than ‘others’ the hoi polloi, because their scores in the common eligibility tests were much higher. The old-boy network ensures that such elite institution educated students get to reap disproportionate benefits throughout their working career. Even a mediocre graduate of an elite institution gets to reap her fair share of entitlement in the job market.

 

Agreed that Deresiewicz wrote in the context of the American system, but what he wrote is somewhat universal. I was thinking of the mad rush to get into the IITs and the IIMs, the mind-boggling cut-offs for getting into elite colleges like St Stephens or SRCC in Delhi.

 

In campus interviews held recently for the graduation class of 2011 in Delhi University, highest packages were offered to Economics Honours and Commerce students of St Stephens and SRCC respectively. My son’s classmate from school, a very bright commerce student who could not get into an ‘elite’ college just by a whisker, point 05%, to be exact, got an offer of just half of what the SRCC student got. A fresh graduate is a fresh graduate, what difference in knowledge the recruiting companies expected when they offered such disparate packages, I wonder. All students interviewed and selected during campus interview held in their respective colleges wrote identical University examinations, and would all get degrees from Delhi University. This head-start for a would-be graduate from SRCC was a classic case of rent reaped by just studying in an elite college.    

 

Then my thinking gravitated to civil services. Once a person gets inducted into an elite civil service, she is on a conveyer belt up in career progression, if she does not try too hard to get into the bad books of the bosses, including political bosses. The system protects both the delinquent and the non-performer, and of course mediocrity, and more often than not, even rewards these qualities in ample measure. The old-boy networks that include girls these days ensure that clearing that one examination to get in ensures a lifetime of entitlement.

 

Irony, but such is life!!

 

 

P.S. Reference to the essay, if interested :

http://www.theamericanscholar.org/the-disadvantages-of-an-elite-education