The Treasures

The broken video game symbolized many things.

I was ten year old and had gone to Bombay on vacation. The Video game was being sold on a beautiful shop and it became irresistible. After desperate persuasions, blackmailing and many tears I succeeded in getting it bought.

Today I found it. It took me back to a different world. It was the world of a kid whose worries were limited and desires small. And his world began and ended with his family.

To utilise my time at home, I was trying to clean it and the buried treasures kept coming back to me; or rather taking me back along with them. They meant a lot then; today they mean much more.

I found a picture of my parents. They were young and happy, and smiling too. My mother had put make up and my father’s face was serene. For me they would have been the prettiest couple, better than those of any fairy tale.

Why don’t you two look same today!

I found a statue of Buddha. There used to be a Dussehra fate in our town. I haggled with the vendor and bought it for one fourth. For next month or so, it was a must drawing room topic. Jaiswal uncle praised me a lot, Shukla uncle teased me in his familiar manner and my mother kept reassuring me that I had done a good job.

The statue was in good shape…………. but the dust had set in. An effort had to be done to see it properly.

I found a broken transistor too. To me, it was always broken. My father kept teasing my mother that it was the only thing he got as dowry. Enjoying that banter gave me absolute pleasure and I kept changing sides.

I was never allowed to open it and inspect; and my parents always thought they will get it repaired. Perhaps they forgot one cannot go back in time!

Everything that kept coming back had inscribed on it, people and places, and events too. They were happy and sad, dark and bright but they all greeted me with warmth. I told them that I loved them too; and many a times in my dreams, or when I am awake too; I desperately pine for them.

Crossroads

Let the PM wait; let the Bharat Darshan Chronicles wait. And let every agenda on my blog’s list wait. At present I just want to be myself. This is the time when I wish to sit and watch things passing by…… on the lanes of memory.

Before you are more perplexed by my incoherent musings, I must tell you the cause. My stint in Mussoorie is over. It was more that 9 months of LBSNAA, it was more than 9 months of ‘training’; and wasn’t it yesterday that I was preparing to go there.

The life there was good, the life there was life. I never noticed that I liked it, and I never noticed I was attached. But today I miss it all.

I miss you my friends when I loved you. I miss that too when I hated you all. Perhaps I never cared for you; or perhaps I was too shy to admit so. There were lives made, there were lives pined for. And I was honored, every time you shared that small secret with me.

Lest I forget; though I never will; I admit that I loved that coffee machine, I loved that lounge. And lest I forget; though I never will; I loved those two friends too, whom I pierced from my bouts of wise cracks.

There are things that stay there, as we move on in life; the clouds, the cold, the mountains and the ‘exhilarating’ horse riding (pun intended only for one who will get it). And now we will see the heat of the districts.

Coming out from this poetry mode, I must also tell you that I am going to do my district training in Bankura district of West Bengal. So if you see the inactivity on my blog, blame it on poor internet connectivity in interior districts.

Turbulence in life will also increase from the event that’s going to be in July. I know the consequences of using the word turbulence knowing that she will read this sooner or later, but can’t resist my humor though. I am getting married then.

A Visit to Democracy; or the Symbol of it: Part I

The time was 11 AM on the 5th of May. The heat in Delhi was unforgiving but 92 officers got formally dressed up, ladies in their saris and gentlemen in their black Band galas (our ceremonial dress) and started their day in the capital. We were having our attachment with the citadel of Indian democracy, our Parliament.

The parliament has a special bureau that specializes in research and training about parliament and its procedures. It is called Bureau of Parliamentary Studies (BPST). It runs courses for first time MP’s and all others who are stakeholders in our democracy. We were attached with BPST for a five day course.

After an hour’s journey we reached the parliament and entered the BPST after a multilayered security checking. The schedule for the day was to begin our course by watching a live session in the house. So after a small briefing, we proceeded towards the Lok Sabha.

While walking in the corridors of parliament, I was having multitude of thoughts. This was the system I stood for; this was the place where the fate of our nation is given shape. In the Kaleidoscope of time I saw Viceroys walking, our parliamentarians of British India giving speeches and then Nehru delivering his ‘tryst with destiny’.

Lost in these musings, I reached the visitor’s gallery of Lok Sabha. My first reaction was, Lok Sabha is so small! It was smaller than any auditorium and looked like a congested classroom. The press gallery was just above the speakers whereas the Visitor’s gallery was at the remaining periphery. MP’s were entering the house and taking the seats allotted to them. They were cracking jokes, having cross talks and some were making strange salutations to introduce humor in the house.

I spotted Dr. Manmohan Singh, Sharad Pawar, Pranab Mukherjee, Advani, Shahnawaj Hussain, Lalu Prasad and many others. The Speaker’s entry was announced and the house resumed order. First the agenda of the house was announced and then Speaker announced that proceedings against the MP’s for unruly behavior in the house shall be stopped. The decision was applauded by all members. Then on some issue regarding an apology, the house went in a pandemonium.

When silence was restored L. K. Advani referring to Pranab Mukherjee and said to the speaker “Sir, I along with the leader of Opposition, Shri Pranab Mukherjee promise full co operation in running of the house”

Speaker instantly shot back “He is anticipating” and the house burst into laughter. After making some other announcements the house was adjourned sine die. The entire thing happened in not more than 15 minutes and to tell you the truth I was awed by seeing so many great personalities.

Here I must also tell you how visitors sit in the gallery. Absolute silence has to be maintained and there are marshals to ensure that. One cannot cross one’s legs as it amounts to showing disrespect to the house. You even cannot put your hands on your friend’s shoulder. Also, visitors are present there as if they do not exist. So they do not rise when the speaker comes, they also do not rise when MP’s and Press rise for the National Song.

We came back to our BPST classroom. After one or two lectures, Speaker Sri Somnath Chaterjee came to formally welcome us for our course and addressed us. A noticeable thing was that he was very humble and apologized three times for coming 2 minutes late.

Our first day ended and we rushed to our hostels to get rid of our Band Galas. Many more things happened during BPST but they shall be blogged in the second part. Come Back :)

Of A Love, and A Story

“It will go away” Abhishek said as if feeling the pain of Shivangi himself. His expressions were of a scared child; or that of a hesitant liar. Three days back, Shivangi, his wife had fallen from the stairs. There was only a minor injury in the back but the pain had lingered.

Abhishek had known Shivangi for years. Theirs was the kind of relationship that others call ‘made for each other’ types. They fell in love while in school, went ahead to make their careers, and then got married.

Shivangi quickly controlled her tears, listening to Abhishek’s pleading. She was more concerned about his panic than her own pain. He was still a teenager for her; a stubborn teenager who loved her. He could never see her suffer, he could never see her cry. Her tears made him restless; always………. ‘almost all ways’. So much had changed but Abhishek never grew up.

She quickly took bath and got dressed up in her best to show him that she was fine. After a long time she saw him carefree and she felt the same love she felt for him ten years ago. Thoughts wandered taking her to the marriage and then she remembered Abhishek was her husband...... H U S B A N D

Every time the word sounded so strange!

Life after marriage was same. They were more of friends and the stereotyped ‘man and wife’ roles had not yet emerged. They still were Abhishek and Shivangi.

“You are not going to the office today, right?” Abhishek asked. Her thoughts were broken and she came back to the present. Her project’s deadline was coming near she was already behind schedule.

“I have to go today. The pain is subsiding and I think I shall manage” she announced. Abhishek was not too happy with that. He tried to convince her why she needed rest. It began from logic, then turned into an argument and then went on to become ‘cant you do this if I say? ’

But she decided to go. She went ahead not noticing the frown on his face, not choosing to notice the frown on his face. That day he did not give her a call in office. Some feel restless if they do not read the newspaper and some feel restless if they miss their tea. But for anyone in love, nothing creates more restlessness than not receiving a phone call from the lover.

So in the afternoon, she called. In the beginning he refused to speak. In next few calls there were pauses, long cryptic pauses. She now understood that she had miscalculated his anger. She came home worried, and somewhat concerned. She started with apologies and then she tried to cajole.

His outburst came naturally; something he never controlled. It began from her lack of care for herself. Then he screamed how less his words meant for her. And then the flow took its course. Corpses came out from the closet; the ‘once upon a time’ issues emerged. He reminded her of all her flaws, of all the wrong things she had done and of all the things that were not so good between them.

And then he stopped. There were tears in her eyes and they were more than her injury had caused in last three days. She was crying and he could see her suffer.

PS: Many people have asked me what happened next. The truth is I don’t know but if I have to guess, I will say they they lived (happily/sadly) ever after. But yes, they lived together :)

Do We Lack Brain?

Watched ‘Shourya’ on this weekend featuring Rahul Bose, Minishaa Lamba and KK Menon. There are movies that are bad and there are movies that are more than bad. You are disgusted not only while watching them, but they also disturb your calm for coming few days. Shourya is that kind of movie.

Its biggest crime is that it is a ‘bad copy’ of ‘A Few Good Men’. Copying is not good but making a bad copy is obnoxious. Mr. Moviemaker copied and did not do even that job well. First of all they made a complete mess of the story. The accused maintains a constipated face all the time and rarely speaks to enlighten the audience what has happened. Before you make any sense, the intermission comes and you wonder when the movie shall begin. And as soon as it begins, it ends!

There is no case and it is also not solved. You may say that it is also not a movie. Oh yes there some outpours from Rahul Bose and some from KK. Perhaps the reason is that producers vaguely remembered something similar in A Few Good Men. Now Bollywood walas do not have good English, so you cannot blame them from not copying the content. They brought our most clichéd outpour, religious hatred. And bingo, the case is solved, accused not guilty………… Wait a minute, was the case about a murder or communalism?

Now let us come to the actors. Rahul Bose speaks much more than required. He is a bad imitation of carefree Tom Cruise. Minishaa Lamba is there because of the dictum ‘A bollywood movie must have a female lead’. KK is OK because he comes for a small time, so he does not have time to spoil his role.

I feel that they decided to make a copy, and then add bollywood masala to it. So they added songs, added a beautiful female but forgot to write role for her, and decided to bring comedy by Rahul Bose’s foolish jokes. To help the audience in remembering the name of the movie, the characters repeat word ‘Shourya’ in their each second dialogue.

I am disappointed because movie is actually meant for the niche or the multiplex audiences. There also did the producers feel that viewers will not be able to appreciate a solid case. You can neither close your mind thinking it to be ‘David Dhawan genre’, nor can allow it any work as it will lead to only questions, not answers.

It not only is a bad movie but it also brings a bad name to the army. The blame of communalism scars the biggest reputation of the army, that is secularism. To add to the confusion, in the end they show various news reports of human right violations by the Indian army.

Why can’t Bollywood produce one good flawless movie? I rephrase, Can’t Bollywood produce one good flawless copy?

I seriously wonder that do we lack brain.

Bharat Darshan Chronicles-III

This is third part of the Bharat Darshan series. If you are a new visitor, you may read the first and second parts by clicking the hyperlinks.

We traveled from Dantewada to Vishakhapatnam by road. The landscape of the region is marvelous spreading across Chattisgarh, Orrisa and Andhra Pradesh. The entire road runs along Eastern Ghats.

The path had ideal setting of sceneries we used to draw as a child. There were beautiful mountains and the river running across them. Then there was that colorful sky at the sunset with various shades and the red ball of fire vanishing in the horizon. There also were small scattered hamlets that dissolved in the landscape as twinkling lights along with sunset.

We reached Vishakhapatnam at around nine at night. Our attachment was with the Eastern Naval Command. A submariner had come to receive us. He introduced himself along with his rank and that’s when we realized that we should have known the hierarchy of the armed forces. Our predicament was to continue for next few days. We were taken to a Navy guest house named ‘Kremlin’, signifying our long defense ties with Russia. Our rooms were in no way less than any good hotel. After dumping our luggage, we rushed to the Mess, to have our dinner. A Mess in armed forces is quite different in many ways.

The atmosphere is formal with a proper dress code. You go there and sit with a stern face and the rest of the job shall be done by the waiters. A plate will appear in front of you along with other items. You try hard not make any noise while eating with the fork and knife. After that you close your plate by putting the fork and spoon parallel and the waiter will ensure he picks it from the right direction. Those three days of ‘formal dining’ were the most stressful part of our attachment.

Next day our Navy attachment officially began with a visit to Maritime Warfare center. There sailors are taught, how to control a ship with the help of computer aided simulations. War games are prepared and trainees learn to use the controls of the ship. After this we went to visit a warship INS Ranjit. The captain of the ship was the only serving Mahavir Chakra winner in Navy. He explained us about defense equipments, materials bought from Russia and the difference from their American counterparts.

Here I have a good news for ladies. Any lady who goes on a warship receives a salute from the officer in command. The reason is that they treat ship as a lady, so it is a token of respect. And then came the visit that we can never forget; the visit to submarine INS Sindhudhwaj.

The difficult life that submariners live has to be seen to be believed. A person cannot stand erect in a submarine. When it ventures out in the sea, the submariners get a ration of one mug water a day to do all their activities. They have no contact with the outer world and no one other than the captain knows where they are, how long the operation shall continue and what is happening in the outside world. Also in case of an accident or attack, the chances of survival are slim.

In the evening we had an interaction with the Chief of the command, a Rear Admiral. He briefed us about the importance of Navy in general and operations of Eastern command in particular. He explained us how Navy is a strategic force which has an important role in the present geopolitical scenario. He also told us about the continuous struggle of Navy to get a bigger share in the defense budget. The official schedule had no plan of taking us out into the sea but we requested him for that and he agreed. The day after was going to be in the sea, on a warship INS Kripan.

Our sea journey started early in the morning. We were welcomed by the captain and the entire crew. There we came to know that in the night at two, they had returned from a military exercise. They had been in the sea for last two months and now they were going to have rest. But then they were asked to take us into the sea. I was really impressed by their cheerfulness in entertaining the forced guests, i.e. IAS probationers.

The weather was good and it was amazing to feel the breeze on the deck Even walking was difficult due to wind but we tried to emulate the Titanic pose. We were treated royally on the ship with juices and shakes being served on the deck After sometime the captain gave a go ahead to the exercises that were simultaneously being planned.

A ship called INS Sukanya came along and then both ships exchanged man and material by rope. They sent us ‘Idlis’ while our ship sent a bag of sweets. Then men were exchanged via rope connecting the two ships. After that an IAF chopper landed on the moving ship and then flew back. Firing on a target was also practiced and there I fired the first machine gun of my life. The day spent on the ship was one of the best experiences of Bharat Darshan.

That day we came back late. In the evening some of us went to the beach. Staring the raw form of nature evokes strange feelings and the philosophical questions come gushing back to me, what is life, what is my aim, and what I want to do. Many times the truth of life is equally simple and complex. When I look back, I feel that everything in life just happens and we are only spectators.

Next day we went to see the ‘Satavahanas’ that was training school for submariners. The training there is more difficult than life in the submarine. And after every three years, everyone has to come back and go through the training again. In the afternoon we had a debriefing session with the Chief of Staff, Admin. It was more of a general ‘Gyan session’. He shared his philosophy of life. Interestingly he criticized the hierarchy of civil services, an element that was more pervasive in armed forces. He told us an interesting story.

A young IAS was newly posted as an SDM in a district. The DM called him for a meeting that was for discussing the arrangements of marriage of his daughter. The young officer had no clue so he took his head clerk along with him for this meeting. The DM asked how many sweets should be present in the wedding. The head clerk prompted the SDM to say that five kinds of sweets will be good.

After the marriage, our SDM received a call from the DM thanking him for the arrangements of sweets. When the SDM inquired from his head clerk how arrangements were made and from which fund the money came, he replied “Sir, didn’t you pass an order for spraying insecticides in the villages. The insecticides have been ‘perfectly’ sprayed and that is where the money came from”.

Well, I sincerely pray that we don’t end up spraying insecticides in such a fashion. Our official Navy attachment ended with this. For most of us, this was the first close interaction with armed forces. I was inspired by the great work they are doing for the nation work and I wish that we, as civil servants are able to emulate it.

Next day we had to move for Rajamundry, and then to Sringarei coalfields for our public sector attachment

LBSNAA TIMES

Today I will tell you the secret of successful blogging, if you do not have anything to write, write anything. In other words I want to say that I have nothing specific to write so I will write LBSNAA times….


Disappointment galores:

The report of Pay commission is out and media got it completely wrong, we have no such desire of jumping from the roof. Do you remember bold headlines, 40% hike for babus, of yes a good 40%. But did anyone forget to mention, hike is only in the basic pay. The real hike may not be more than four thousand rupees a month and the recommendations shall stay for next ten years. There is a feeling that in government, honesty is penalized. Previously we were having peanuts, now the honorable pay commission may enable us to eat groundnuts, indeed a qualitative improvement!

By the way, I just love news channels screaming, Holi bonanza for babus, showing money raining in offices and Newspapers asking SMS’s from their worthy readers if any hike in salary for civil servants justified. For a long time, I was missing a good comedy show.


A Learning Experience:

We are learning horse riding and I must tell you, horse riding is a real learning experience. By just sitting on horseback we learn to worship the person who invented the automobiles. We never even felt before how comfortable it was to enter a car, have a smooth ride and stop it as per our wish. Horses are ‘almost’ the same, just a few probability issues here and there.

And trust me horses are real fun too. It is funny to see, yes see (and not feel) a probationer kissing the ground when horse revolts thinking how can LBSNAA make a donkey ride a horse.


Inservice Jokes:

An auditor from Indian Audit and Accounts Service (IAAS) audits an IAS and tells him that his working style conforms to the full form of his service, IAS= I am Safe. The IAS replies that you too exhibit the traits of your service, IAAS= I am absolutely safe.

What do you call the mess of Intelligence Bureau; An Intelligence Mess.

My Great Discovery:

Serendipity is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate. During Bharat Darshan we were having a lecture by a private organization. While explaining about Corporate Social Resposibilty, they elaborately told us how much they have done for the differently abled kids and they also added that they have opened many 'mentally retarded schools'. Oh I shouted Eureca!

I discovered the truth why I write such stupid blogs and moreover you read it. All of us studied in mentally retarded schools which told us what is right rather than allowing us to discover the truth. By the way, professional academies are not very different!

And this is how it began

Hope is a good thing, and no good thing ever dies. Looking back, he can say that it is true.

It was a perfect case of love at first sight. Angel was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen and this was the reason sufficient to fall in love. Though his previous ‘first sight loves’ proved to be a disaster, he still had hope. With full faith in his abilities, he decided to make a strategy to win over Angel.

The plan of action was to take help of Sandhya. Oh yes, I haven’t told you about Sandhya. She was the bubbliest girl in the class and had a horde of friends. Her laughter could be heard from a mile and everybody liked her. Incidentally she was also the best friend of Angel.

So he befriended Sandhya and soon started talking to her for hours. In a way they became the best of pals and he was awed by her ability to look deep into his heart. She could castigate him severely and still pamper him as a child. Their ease with each other was natural her company was a real bliss. Thus time passed and passed and days went and went.

Our protagonist was living a happy life when murmurings started in his brain “Actually Sandhya is the right girl for you”. Once again he discovered his true love; and this time he decided to tell her all. But loving a girl is one thing, and telling her that another.

That day as usual, she rang him and their long conversations began. They talked about their childhood, they talked about their friends. He again told her about his crushes and then he told her why Angel was not a right choice for him. That is when it happened.

She asked him bluntly, who was the new girl he had started liking. At times, it requires all the effort in the world to utter few words. He was taken aback, found it hard to breathe but he mustered all his courage to utter “YOU”.

Suddenly he saw stars in front of his eyes and before she could give any reply, he banged the receiver down. This was one of the few times in his life when he felt foolish. First he told her about his previous crushes; then he discussed about Angel and after telling all that he said he actually liked her. What a proposal it had been!

Next few days were filled with melancholy. He was too scared to go to school, so he kept bunking it. He started appreciating Ghazals; and felt all of them applicable to his life. Without being formally rejected, he felt being one. In a way, life seemed all right but everything is not that voluntary. Soon his mother forced him to go back to the school.

He did not know how to behave, so he acquired a permanent sad and hurt look. He rarely talked to Sandhya and continued behaving bizarre. When it became quite uncomfortable, she came and said “Can’t we just be friends?”

Well he agreed; actually he had to. The story remained in the same phase for quite some time. The strange thing was that he still had hope!

Bharat Darshan Chronicles-II

This is in continuation to the first article on Bharat Darshan. If you have not read it, you may see it here.

Early in the morning we started for Kirandool block. It is two hours drive from Dantewada. The BDO of the block had come to pick us up and we were going to stay in the government quarter allotted to the BDO. He himself stayed in another town which was good for the education of his kids.

The schedule for the day was to visit some nearby villages. The BDO decided that first he will take us for lunch which was organized on a Waterfall known as 'Phoolpada'. I was amazed by the beauty of the waterfall and its surroundings. Some years back it used to be a favorite picnic spot for the tourists but today hardly anyone went there as the region was badly naxal infested.

The arrangement of our lunch was done by men from a nearby village. They had carried with them utensils, cooking material, vegetables etc inside that dense forest. Lunch arrangements for four of us had required not less than forty people!

There I interacted with the Sarpanch of the village. He was illiterate, naïve and knew nothing about the government schemes. But he told me about the reasons for rise of Naxals, also called as ‘Andarwale’ in the region. I was also not aware that Dantewada has been declared as the capital of the red corridor by the Naxals.

Incidentally I also discovered an interesting fact there. Tribals still hold their arrows with forefinger and middle finger and they never use their thumbs. Does that remind you of Eklavya’s story?

After having our lunch, we went to visit the village. From a long distance we were welcomed by a Gaur dance party which escorted us into the village dancing and our entry became almost like a procession.

Tribal villages are divided into small ‘Padas’. Not more than six seven houses are clustered in a Pada and the next Pada can be half a kilometer away. This causes a big burden on the administration in providing electricity, water supply and roads.

Also, people live in joint families and they never go for division of agricultural land. They still have big plots of lands registered in names of their ancestors deceased long ago. This causes a big problem in providing them the government benefits as majority of them are designed for small and marginal farmers.

We came to our quarter in the late evening. On TV, news was being flashed that a police station in a nearby district has been attacked by the naxals. The peon staying with us consoled that naxals ‘generally’ do not attack civil servants, only police is their target.

We were slightly worried that night and our worries got magnified by the gunshots we heard in the late night. You might like to know that we were in a house whose front doors even could not be bolted due to misalignment. I forced myself to sleep but I remember having restless dreams. Early in the morning we called the SP who told us that everything was all right. The gunshots were fired by the police itself to check their preparedness.

Next day, we went to visit a local ‘Haat’ or the markets organized weekly which were marked by heavy police presence. There are two things that shall always be present in a Haat. One is the traditional cock fight. Blades are tied on the nails of the cock and the winner cock bleeds its opponent to death. A considerable amount of money is gambled on such fights.

Second is the ‘Sulfi drink’ or the ‘Bastar beer’. This is local booze made from the Sulfi tree found in the region. Enjoyment of life is a major component of tribal society and social drinking is also a part of it. Both men and women consume liquor and in the late afternoon many of them can be seen drunk.

They have many customs which we may not be looked favorably in ‘cultured’ society. During spring season, unmarried boys and girls go in the forest to collect forest produce. In the night they sing, dance and booze in the forest and spend the night there itself. It is also a method of finding one’s spouse.

Tribals live a contended life. They are happy with their lives and many times they do not like the externally enforced ‘development’. They also do not want to work hard for improving their lives. I still wonder what is important in life; to be happy or to be ‘developed’.

We also interacted with other government officials posted in the region. They have their own set of problems. A doctor told us that naxals coerce them to treat their wounded members. After that police harasses them for helping the naxals. Police also at times pressurizes them to issue fake postmortem reports when they have not even seen the dead bodies. And then we wonder sitting in cities why no doctor is ready to serve in interior areas.

Two days passed away safely in the block. We had to see the same ‘Gaur dance’ three times, drink ‘Sulfis’ everywhere and take petitions for electricity, hand pumps and government benefits. The initial enthusiasm was waning away and it was becoming difficult to maintain the same zeal. Next day we came back to the NMDC guest house. A major thing in the area that was left till now was to see a ‘Salwa Judum’ camp.

Literally Salwa Judum means meeting for peace. When Naxalism was deeply entrenched, naxals started targeting innocent villagers in order to force them for joining the naxal movement. They also started imposing heavy levies on the traders. This created resentment among the general public.

In one Haat, people decided to march towards interior villages and convince the villagers to quit naxalism. When a big crowd entered the village, naxals were not able to frighten them away. This became a method and it caused a sharp decline in the cadre strength of naxals.

They retaliated by brutally killing innocent villages whom they suspected to be Judum members. Exodus of villagers started from the villages towards the cities.Thousands came abandoning entire villages and Sulwa Judum camps were set up.

So next day we went to visit Dornapal camp. Its population is more than 17000, which is many times the original Dornapal village. It looks like any other city slum with narrow lanes, bad sewage system and dense population. But I must say that administration is taking good care of them considering their scarce resources.

Government has given support to many for building houses. Ration is provided to every family free of cost. There are Aanganwadis, primary schools and ration shops. And these families keep waiting for the time when they will be able to go back again to their homes.

The strategy of Sulwa Judum has always been controversial. But one thing is certain. The tribal way of life is completely changed in the camps. Many houses have got electricity connection, TV’s and their clothing now is similar to the urbanized people. I doubt if anyone in camps shall ever go back. The question remains that, is changing the way of life of tribals an affordable price in fight against naxalism.

Our official assignments were over and the plan for the day after was to visit the Kanger Valley National Park. The park is famous for the ‘Gandak’ limestone caves. Dripping water causes formation of protruding limestone structures. It is completely dark inside and we had to carry many torches and a horde of guides with us. Then we went to the Tirathgarh waterfalls where steps have been made by the falling water. Chattisgarh has good potential for tourism and this part had considerable presence of tourists as effect of naxalism was less in the region.

In the evening we met the collector, briefed him about our observations and thanked him for making our stay comfortable there. Next day early in the morning we went to the famous ‘Danteshwari Devi’ temple. From there we started our journey to Vishakhapatnam, where we were going to have our Navy Attachment. In the evening when we were reaching Vishakhapatnam, we got the news that Jail has been broken in Dantewada and more than 300 naxals have escaped!

Bharat Darshan Chronicles-I

As promised earlier, I shall share with you all my experiences of Bharat Darshan. They will be long, they may be boring….. but trust me they will tell you about ‘Bharat’; which may be different from your perception of India. To minimise the boredom, I shall keep the chronicles in small episodes.

With the beginning of December, the cold was getting worse in Mussoorrie. Foundation course had just ended and those not into IAS had gone to their respective academies. LBSNAA wore a deserted look and we all who remained here wanted a desperate change. So we were happy to pack our bags and move on to Bharat Darshan.

Bharat Darshan Tour, alternatively known as the Winter Study Tour is an integral part of IAS training. It is an eight week tour of almost entire India starting from first week of December. The course handbook describes its purpose as “to expose officer trainees to a wide range of organizations and situations they are going to run into during their careers and also give them a glimpse of the diversity of our cultural heritage.”

Our journey began on 8rth Dec. The group had 11 members with one lady officer. Our first destination was Dantewada, the heartland of Naxalism where we had our tribal attachment. We started by a bus from the academy to Ambala and from there we took Chattisgrah Express to Raipur.

The entire journey was more than 48 hours long. I chatted with the group, started reading ‘A Suitable Boy’ by Vikram Seth, sat idle, walked in the train and tried to kill the long idle hours. I sat at the window for hours looking outside. Civilizations came and went; lone lights twinkled at the far ends and fields made way for the cities. At times the monotony was broken by the rivers; and also by the the sound of train passing over a steel bridge. Looking outside the window was a serene bliss and when I look back, the path was more beautiful than the destination. Perhaps the same holds for life too.

We reached Raipur station on 10th morning. And that was the place where realization came that we are into a premier service. Five Boleros had come to pick us up, there was a horde of local officials present and a meticulous arrangement was in place to welcome us. From the station we proceeded to the newly built State Transit House.

Raipur is a mid sized city, still very much different from the densely populated cities of north India. Roads do not qualify for being of the capital of a state. Big construction works are visible and the State Guest house was also recently made. A small surprise was waiting for us. Dantewada was still eight hours away and these Boleros were meant to carry us there.

We started within an hour as it was not advisable to get late in reaching Dantewada. The countryside of Chattisgarh is full of forest cover. Teakwood is abundantly present along with other dense vegetation. After half the journey when we passed a district called Jagdalpur, there was a noticeable difference in infrastructure. Roads became narrower, they were in bad shape and the signals of my Reliance mobile went away. There was unfinished work going on at many places and the number of police pickets increased. Incidentally, the naxals heartland had just begun.

It was quite late when we reached Dantewada and we were taken to an NMDC guest house. I was surprised to see a public sector maintaining such a good guest house. The rooms had all the modern facilities and the staff was very cordial. Most of them were Malayalis and the guest house had the entire staff from Indian Coffee House. Next day our tribal attachment had to formally begin by a presentation by the DM and SP.

On the way to collectorate, a small program was arranged for us in a village. We were traditionally welcomed by flowers and garlands and the local villagers presented the traditional ‘Gaur dance’ for us. The dance was performed by more than thirty men and women with all the paraphernalia like big drums and head-gears having Bison horns. We also met some orphan physically handicapped children who were looked after in a nearby ‘Ashram’. The Ashram system in Chattisgarh is a kind of boarding school. Books, dresses and food are provided there and children go to their houses once in a fortnight.

We were touched by the elaborate arrangements done and the respect shown to us. We could not understand why they are taking so much pain for entertaining us. We were just probationers and we could have done nothing for them even if we wanted to. But then we realized, they did not want anything from us. It was due to the respect that IAS still commands. The dancers were elated when we took their drums and headgears and had a photograph with them. Our appreciation of the work that Ashram was doing for the orphans was good enough to bring a smile on their face. There are times when one feels good to be in service, and this was certainly one of them.

The meeting with the DM and SP turned out to be an eye opener. We came to know about the gravity of situation in Dantewada. DM and SP were not using government vehicles due to the frequent landmines. Most of the policemen were in civil dress. The entire district is in a complete war like situation and battle lines are clearly drawn. And the administration is fighting a real war when the region is not even declared as ‘disturbed’.

The big deal about declaring a region as ‘disturbed’ is that special schemes can be adopted there. For e.g. there is 50% lack of administrative staff but no incentives can be provided to those working in the interior areas as it would be against general financial rules. If shoes have to be procured for the policemen, it will take the normal hierarchical chain where a file may have to pass through twenty tables, and a small query at any level may send it downwards tracing the same path.

Before visiting there we all knew that Naxalism is a socio economic problem. The simple solution is, develop the region and Naxalism will vanish. But we were wrong. Reasons of emergence of Naxalism are socio economic, but once it finds its roots, it becomes a law and order problem. Why will Naxals allow development if it can threaten their own existence. Hence in the interior villages, there are no schools, no connectivity, no electricity and in short no government. In case you want to know what is ‘interior’; today also there are police stations where it takes 72 hours for any outside help to reach!

Next day we had to move to interior areas, live there for three days and understand the ground situation. No security cover was given to us as it could have invited trouble. Our drivers told us that naxals must have by now come to know by now that we were going to visit their terrain. To tell you the truth, we were all little scared!

The chronicle shall continue. I have many more things to tell, so keep coming back.

Why I became a Civil Servant?

This article by cosmic voices has prompted me to write my answer to “Why I became a civil servant?” The reasons are very much the same as mentioned there but I could not resist imparting my wisdom on this vital subject.

There are questions like what is truth, what is morality, what is right. And then there is Dholpur House’s (UPSC Office) variant of these, “Why you want to become a civil servant?” Somehow I could escape/fool/convince board members about my reason there and now I can calmly blog the truth.

My answer is, I had nothing else to do.

Not convinced, OK, I shall elaborate. I come from middle, middle class and my parents are in government service. I knew what they knew, what the township in which we lived knew. My license to success in this world was education. And what is the biggest success one can achieve through education. You got it right, civil services. I wanted the biggest TV, smartest car, largest house, the most beautiful girl in the town, and along with all of them, the best job.

Some of you might not be very happy about my platonic reasons. Till now I have given reasons that came in my adolescence. Where was the zeal to do something for the country, where was the motivation from inside to do what I really wanted to do, where were the ‘more mature’ reasons. I shall give them too.

I hated the slow way in which the clerk in a government office did his work. I could never forget the nurse in the government hospital that misbehaved with the patients. I turned my eyes from the horde of beggars on the traffic signal as if they do not even exist. And then, adrenalin gushed in me too when I watched Rang De Basanti.

After all such incidents, I heard a voice inside me, do something about it. The answer available was, become a civil servant. In fact as I grew, I could satisfy all my ambitions by dreaming to become a civil servant. I wanted to have a social status, a secure future and a challenging work. I also wanted to make my parents feel proud. Whenever I had an ambition, I asked myself, “Will it be satisfied if I became a civil servant?” The answer was always yes.

As I grew, it became an obsession and I had to achieve it. No other service could have offered me even half of these. The bug of becoming an IAS entered in the childhood and I had no escape.

The reasons may sound selfish, but in my philosophy of life, everything has to be done in one’s own self interest. I help somebody not because of my kindness, but because I feel good after that. I would like to work for my country not because one should work for his country, but because ‘I’ shall feel happy after doing that. I never believed or unfortunately could not have any 'benevolent' reasons.

I do not know if what I was able to state the truth, or if I even know the truth. That is why I said, this question is a variant of all those philosophical questions which do have ‘right’ answers. Everyone has to seek his/her own definitions. I even doubt if UPSC members are really serious when they ask “Why you want to become a civil servant?”

When all my ‘selfish’ goals are satisfied in this service, and I knew no other alternatives, tell me am I not correct when I say, I had nothing else to do!

The Proposal

He never was the 'romantic types'. Love was something that just happened, like most other things in his life. But the problem being in love is, there is another party and that too may have expectations.

So his girlfriend had some expectations that were imported from foreign lands. She kept on saying “You have not proposed me yet”. This is what happens when there are number of diamond advertisements with men putting the ring in the drink on a candlelight dinner. I bet in real life girl would have gulped the ring and then both would have proceeded to see a doctor.

Long years ago he had somehow uttered “I love you” and that was pretty traumatic in itself. But then this is how life is. One cannot keep on hearing the taunts for whole life. So he decided that he shall propose her, formally.

After Herculean efforts in shopping he managed to buy the ring. The plan was that he will get a lot of flowers, some chocolates and candles. The decided venue was the roof of her house on which he shall propose her with candles and chocolates among the red roses. He also wrote a sentimental poem (which she still claims was a speech) for the event.

The fateful day came and his preparations were perfect. He rang her and told that he will come to meet her in the late evening so that she too returns late from her office, those being her busy days. This would have given him time for preparations.

He reached her house along with fall the paraphernalia. The big items were promptly hidden on the stairs. Then he rang to reconfirm when she was coming.

And then it all began. He could hear the ring tone very loudly. He realized it was ringing from just down the stairs. When he turned back he saw her coming back with her big smile. He almost panicked and rushed outside citing an excuse to hide the flowers and candles on the roof. When he went there, the roof was locked !

He took a deep breadth and came down. There he found her jumping and eating the bunch of chocolates which he forgot to hide. She was so happy discovering the chocolates.

He decided now to do away with candles too and salvage whatever was left of his plan. He brought the bouquet of roses and called her in the balcony. She was surprised by his nervousness. And then he began his poem/speech. It took her time to realize that he was ‘formally’ proposing her.

After one paragraph he forgot his lines, thought for a while and anyhow completed it. And then he came on his knees to present the ring. She was so shocked that she also sat on the floor. Under great confusion he gave her the ring, difficultly uttered “Will you marry me?” and completed the proceedings. She promptly accepted and hugged him. Then she cried for a second and laughed for an hour.

And after that he decided he will never propose anyone again.

Back to Blogger

Lest I cause any delay in writing a blog (having alibi of completing report backlogs), I should tell you all that I am back from my Bharat Darshan, and back same as I was………….almost.

I am safely back from the Naxal battlefield of Dantewada, from the machine gun firings on INS Kulish at Vishakhapatnam and back mesmerised from the SHG’s magic of Rajamundry.

I also happen to be back from the blasting mines of Singareni coalfields and the hitech city and changing face of India, Hyderabad.

Then I roamed in Bangalore, in Chitradurga and missed Hampi by a whisker. From there I touched the sand of Mariana beach in Chennai and got amazed by the beauty of Mahabalipuram.

Not to leave islands of India, I went to Andamans and floated on the absolutely clear waters of Havelock beach.

To match the distances of Andamans, I went to Assam and then to Arunanchal Pradesh, with the 2nd mountain Division of Army. Having almost completed my trip, I went to the Kaziranga National Park and spotted wildlife before returning to Delhi.

After all this I am back and back with a lot of stories…. or tales to tell, and that I shall tell in detail. So keep reading.

Are you still thinking why I wrote “I am back ‘almost’ same”?
Forgot to tell, got engaged on 10th feb :)

Civil Services: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

The charm of civil services has always been an enigma. It is struggling hard to maintain its shine especially after the waves of LPG but still it attract lakhs who ferociously compete for a handful of seats. People predict its doom yet surveys rate it as the most preferred choice of youngsters.

In order to understand why all this happens let us make a balance sheet, outlining its pros and cons. Keeping the pros for the later part, the bad news first.

The foremost disadvantage of civil services is the low salary salary, both in absolute and relative terms. A civil servant may be drawing one fourth salary compared to his peers in the private sector. It may be difficult for an honest civil servant to send his/her kids in a public school, buy a car in the initial years, spend holidays abroad or construct a home. After some years of idealism, reality sets in and then the lack of money pinches hard.

Another thing is the cadre than can be allotted. Suppose one worked hard, invested years, resources; got selected and then got a ‘bad cadre’. There are cadres which may be thousands miles away from his/her home, where a parallel government is running and due to lack of manpower a civil servant will have to work at all levels of hierarchy. Remember, this shall be his/her cadre for life.

Now about tenures, 90% IAS officers spend less than a year on any post. They are shuffled like cards at the slightest of whims of the politicians. This is also an instrument of ‘disciplining’ the civil servants. A DM who is looking after a population of half a crore may be shunted to Archives department having not even an office; and the person may not even know the reason for same.

Then there is the issue of utility of merit. Everyone wants his good work to be appreciated. But Government is like lord Shiva; jo kare uska bhi bhala, jo na kare uska bhi bhala. So irrespective of whether you work or not, system will throw you up.

Adding to all this, a person has to invest a lot to clear the exam. It is highly unpredictable exam with a degree of arbitrariness. A person will never get selected without studying, but even if you study, chances are that you may fail. What is left for a failed thirty year old guy who has wasted four five years in the preparations.

Last but not the least, the powers of civil servants are declining. The commanding heights of the economy are now in the hands of private sector. Bureaucrats no longer enjoy the glory of License Permit Raj. So what shall be the future of services? Will they only a weak image of their former self in the coming times? Is it really worth it to enter the bureaucracy.

Picture is gloomy. But there is a brighter side too, and aspects that make civil services what it is.


It is a career of diversity. Once a CA was asked why he entered IAS when he could have worked for any major company. His answer was he could have worked for ICICI, then could have moved to Deutche Bank, then perhaps to World Bank at much higher pay scales. But till he retires, he would be doing the same work. What if the challenge left in such a job? In civil services every day and every post is a new challenge and a new learning opportunity.

And love it or hate it, stability in civil services is a big plus point. Let me take my own example. I wanted to live life on my own terms, do what I want to do and not because it will increase my ‘market value’. I want to be relaxed from any undue pressure of continuously competing throughout my life in the rat race. I now have an assured career. Competition is good but its excess may take a heavy toll on life.

Any post in civil services may be of much greater value than in private sector. Only a handful may rise to become a CEO in private sector but nearly all IAS will manage a public sector unit in their thirties. In terms of importance of work too, civil services score fairly well. A person may sell the sixth brand of toothpaste much more than his fourth brand, but the satisfaction he gets may not compete with that of a civil servant who has successfully managed relief work during a cyclone.

Another intangible but still a very important thing is the social respect a civil servant commands. In India this may not be matched by any other service. I do not know what future in services have in store for me. But whenever my parents tell anyone that their son is an IAS, they have a glow in their eyes. Leaving other things apart, this alone is a reason sufficient for me to choose civil services as a career.

And then the biggest thing, here one can really work for the people. Most civil servants, at least when they come in service, have the passion of creating a difference; and many succeed in doing that. I once heard an election commissioner who ensured free and fair UP elections. There was a village which had never voted before because of terror of dominant groups and when he ensured that they fearlessly vote in elections, he got all the satisfaction of his life. Hearing him, I realized I had made a right choice.

Anyways emotions apart, both pros and cons are pretty strong. Before deciding to enter civil services, one should be very clear in his/her mind what is he/she going to get. The reality may be pretty different from the perceptions. For seeing more, have a look at this .

It’s a path that demands big sacrifices; and has its own way of giving rewards too!

PS: My Bharat Darshan starts on 8th Dec and will last till mid Feb. So I will be almost offline during the period and my blog may hibernate. But, I will be back :)

In Which I Played the Host

Education teaches you many laws of life and one is the great Murphy’s law; if a thing can go wrong, it certainly will. So in the penultimate week at LBSNAA, the thing dreaded by officer trainees happened to me. I was made the escort officer of a visiting guest faculty.

To brief you a little about that, most of the lectures at LBSNAA are taken by specialist guest faculties who come from all over. One (unfortunate) officer trainee is made his escort officer who has to be his ‘direct host’ for his entire stay.

Apart from general duties of an escort like entertaining the kids of the guest and arranging the flavor of ice cream liked by his wife, a specific one is introduce him to the students and ensure that his lecture goes well. Introduction is a euphemism for eulogizing the guest, and going to the extent of proving that he is the most talented man born on the earth.

As a responsible man, I decided to take the challenge head on. The biggest hurdle for me was to save my guest from apathetic (read hostile) audience in an auditorium that has more than three hundred (yawning, sleeping, murmuring) students, and a challenge greater than that was to give a good impression of the academy to the guest after all this.

All this did not stop there. My guest was a young professor, enthusiastic about his field and was on his first visit to the academy. This meant that he had high hopes from the academic brilliance of civil servants and a desire to have an intellectual discussion with them.

The guest was friendly and during our informal chat before the lecture, I quietly mentioned the hectic schedule of the academy, hard physical training that we had to undergo and general lack of sleep amongst the officer trainees. With a smile I mentioned that he should not be surprised in he finds ‘some’ ( a gross misrepresentation) students sleeping.

The lecture began. Slowly ‘some’ started growing and soon I could hear soft snoring sounds. Before things grew out of hand, I requested my guest to allow switching off some lights so that his presentation becomes visible to the students sitting at the back. This proved fairly successful and after that there was no major issue. People anonymously slept and my guest went on.

When the lecture got finished, my guest invited questions. That is the rarest thing to get from a sleeping, uninterested audience but I had anticipated this. On promise of a treat, some of friends had agreed to ask questions. The guest was fairly happy by the level of their intellect and the interest his lecture had generated.

I gave a brief thanks speech and the session ended. I could not have asked for more. The mission was complete. As a courtesy, I requested my guest to join us for lunch.

I sat on a table having already two officer trainees.

“Sir this is Vaneet, and he is Venkat” : I said
“ Hello Vaneet, hello Venkat” : my guest was very courteous to them

Hellos got exchanged and then it all started. Venkat who was sitting quiet till now started talking.

“AS, is he your friend?”: I prayed that he shuts up his mouth soon.

“Is he your relative?” He enquired again.

I was completely taken aback but my guest replied “I was the one who took your two hour lecture in the morning”. I had nothing much to say.

After that I deliberately avoided discussing interest of officer trainees in lectures. My guest was a nice human being and as far as I know, he carried a 'almost' good impression of the academy.

Moral of the story is Murpy's law is indeed true.

PS: As in all other posts, this one too has a good content of my imagination. So please do not consider it to be literally true.

And she still smiles

He met Aarti for the first time during trek, both of them somehow forced into trekking. She was a simple, soft spoken girl who had only few friends. The thing that brought them close as friends was that they were partners in misery. I will tell you what their misery was.

They had never imagined that there are places with absolutely no communication with the outside world. But when they marched a little on their trek, they realized that they were completely cut off. The only thing left for them was to wait.

So they became friends in such a situation. He could never know whether she really liked him or it was just lack of other familiar faces but he became her confidante. They talked a lot, tried to keep each other happy and distracted from the fact that they were missing someone. While sharing their lives, he had come to know that Aarti was into a relationship.

The boy was from the same college and they had known each other for quite sometime. Initially they worked together in a firm and then both decided to enter the civil services. She succeeded but he failed.

There were other complications too. When Aarti told her parents about this, they were completely against it. The emotional blackmailing began and she was given the option of choosing either of them.

He discussed with Aarti for hours what she will do then and how they can still get their way. As an interested audience, he also discussed how they fell in love, how their relation was and how restless the boy must be now when she could not talk to him. In a weak moment, she confessed that she could not imagine her life without him.

He prayed for them and sincerely wished that their relation has a happy ending. Days passed and their trek became over. Their ‘Trek Friendship’ did not continue with the same enthusiasm and they went back to their original friends.

After nearly a month, he decided meet Aarti again. The truth was he missed a friend with whom he could share his life. He called her for a cup of coffee. She agreed but somehow he did not sense the same enthusiasm in her. They met and he eagerly told her everything that had happened in his life in last one month. And after that, she began.

She said that her relationship was over. Now she felt that theirs was an unequal relation which was destined to fail. When she herself had such doubts, she could not sacrifice the happiness of her parents. She gave a kind of philosophical talk. Among the vague words he could listen, there were that about how with time, many things change and people get mature.

He was completely lost and the only thing he remembered was that her face did not show even slight signs of strain while saying this.

She may be right, she may be wrong, but he only knew a girl who was madly in love. He thought about that boy, whose image he had formed after hearing so much about him and tried to feel his pain. That day he realized he was friends not with her, but with her relationship, and now when that was gone, he had one friend less.

After that whenever he saw her smiling, he wondered how just some time ago it was impossible for her to live without that boy!

All (Good) Things Come to an End

So what is coming to an end? My foundation course (FC) at LBSNAA.

The truth is even if I crib, I enjoyed it and FC became a part of my life. I will miss seeing 300 faces, getting up at 5 AM, working late till night, enjoying the batch gossips and making new friends. I do not know what the reason of my nostalgia is when there are still 20 days to go. Perhaps if on a Deepawali morning, you are alone and you know that in coming days this loneliness will increase, you can only feel sad.

Today I will tell you the heights of the FC. If you have been a regular reader of my blog, you may know about many of them. But I have never written a comprehensive blog devoted exclusively to entire LBSNAA activities, so here it is.

TREK: It all begins with the trek, a nine day affair, when you are left on mountains in a group of around twenty. It is a nerve testing experience. There you discover and rediscover your limits, make some really good friends or rather ever lasting relationship and see the difficult side of life. Mountains reveal many truths and make you humble; one realizes that his life, egos, ambitions etc are too small in this game of nature.

VILLAGE VISIT: The first place where you are treated as an officer; where you get to know what real India is. In a group of around six, we are sent to distant backward villages. Probationers live in the village itself and there they discover that rays of India’s shining are yet to reach many places. They realize that task ahead for a civil servant is really demanding; but yes if they work with empathy, they can make a difference.

FETE: In a team of nearly ten, we manage a shop, just like the school kids do in school fete. The shop that earns the maximum profit becomes the winner. There is this jail where you can send anyone by paying a token money, there is that music on demand, there are usual pani puris, fancy dresses and what not. And this time we also got the real Bond, Ruskin Bond. Welcome back to the school days.

INDIA DAY: The batch is divided into four zones, region wise. Each zone presents its culture, its cuisines, its dances for an entire day. Everyone gets dressed in his traditional attire. That is the time when you know how much you have missed by not learning classical music, by not knowing any dance form etc. And that is also the time one discovers why India has unity in diversity.

There are many other things a FC too. There are cultural nights by professionals. You listen to the classical Ghazals and realize that they are beautiful; you see your first Odissi performance and cannot help appreciating the dance. There are also regular physical exercises and I am told this becomes a habit and reason of good health of many civil servants.

To avoid giving you a skewed picture, the highs of the FC are evenly balanced by over demanding discipline, lullabying lectures, loaded academics, occasional show cause notices, memos, castigations etc.

But everyone tells me, FC remains the best (or the most nostalgic) part of a civil servant’s career.

To end it on a positive note, see the most popular joke here.

There is a queue of dead people and god is sending them to heaven and hell by seeing their life records. An officer trainee from LBSNAA comes there is his suit, tie, and lapel card etc. The god without even seeing any of his records sends him to heaven. People protest. They shout how only being from the academy qualifies him for heaven.

God replies: But he has already been through hell at LBSNAA!

Reality Bytes: India Revisited

What is your caste?

Within minutes of landing in the village, I faced this question and I was almost shocked. This was my first interaction with real India. So I am back from my village tour, somewhat wiser about India, little more curious about Bharat.

The village we went to was Mehandwas, in Tonk district of Rajasthan. In a way it was somewhat a developed village. It was on the national highway, so definite signs of development were present. There was eight hour electricity supply, a primary health center, four schools, many motor cycles and innumerable mobiles present in the village.

We received a royal welcome there. In fact their hospitability touched our hearts. Everyone wanted to meet us. I do not know if they trusted us but they liked that someone from government was hearing their woes. There was that old lady who took us to her house to show how bad road to her house was. Then there was that SC sarpanch who was so happy because we ate at his house against the wishes of elites of the village.

You must have guessed by now that caste was the most dominant factor in the village. And I found the caste system exactly in the way I felt was extinct in India. The village habitations were divided in caste clusters, one of Yadavas, one of Brahmins, another of Bairavas etc. And if you feel that this is it, you are mistaken.

Untouchables lived outside the village and they were treated different from schedule castes. In fact schedule castes treated themselves to be much higher than untouchables. The untouchable still had to go to the city for haircut as the village barber refused to touch them. In roadside hotels they were served tea in disposable cups!

A heartening thing to discover was that there was complete communal harmony in the village. There was no history of any communal clash. The authorities said that this is the case in nearly all villages in India. This is a big thing that urban India has to learn from its villages.

Now being a government servant, I should also talk about the government schemes. There was a great enthusiasm for National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS). In fact that has made Panchayats all the more meaningful. The second scheme doing wonders is Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan. Now a lot of money is being pumped in mid day meal, school infrastructure and that is showing. In case you have no idea, 65000 teachers have been recruited in Rajasthan alone in last one year!

So what did we do? We tried to convince the villages that they have to be an agent in their developments. Other people can come and help them but they ultimately have to be the primary drivers. People looked to panchayat and government even for simple things. And you know what; most of the villagers were convinced.

If you want to know our concrete achievement, a lady member of our group shook the entire district administration to get a Below Poverty Line card of a widow made. Then there was this overseeing committee for education of panchayat which was meant to check teachers absenteeism, quality of educations etc. We tried to give a new birth to it as most villages complained about the quality of education in schools.

I do not say that we changed the face of that village; neither have we learned a lot. But yes, we felt that being in our jobs; we can really make difference. And trust me, even the feeling of getting just 1 BPL card made for a deserving widow is beyond words!

PS: I will write in detail about this and what I feel can be done about village development. I also have to tell what was my score in perceptions about village in last post. But in many devious ways, LBSNAA is keeping me too busy these days.

Off to Bharat

My next blog shall come after ten days. The reason is that we are going to see the real India, that is its villages. I shall be going to a village in Tonk district, Rajasthan.

It is not that I have never seen a village. My grandparents lived in a village and I used to go there every year. But this time it shall be different. We will try to understand functioning of development programs, caste dynamics, delivery of services etc.

Before going there I wish to put what I expect a village to be like. It would be fun to see after coming back if all this is true.

1. The caste will be a dominant factor in village.
2. Since the village is in Rajasthan, there will be problem of water.
3. Women will be in Purdah and more backward than males.
4. The school teacher must not be coming regularly.
5. The actual functioning and statistics on paper of development programs will be different.

Well these are only my naive perceptions. I will be happy if the village has mobile signals. Not because my mobile will be functioning, but that shall be a sign of perculation of development. Anyways I have to rush now.

Wait for the details of ‘Bharat’ till I come back

The Tip

The noises were too loud to be ignored. Though he had slept hardly for an hour, Raju could no longer continue his sleep. His landlord had come again, demanding the rent. This was becoming the routine from last seven months, when his father passed away. He was frustrated by the naggings of his landlord, milkman and the person who had given them a small debt.

His father was a taxi driver, and when he was alive they had a comfortable life. If you are thinking what comforts a driver can give, you come from a different piece of land. Isn’t having an assured meal without any worries a big comfort. No one knew it better than Raju.

But one accident changed his life. His father died on the spot and his family was given one thousand rupees in all to forget about the case. Raju whose life till now revolved around cards and friends became the sole bread earner of the family.

He adapted well with the change. Raju’s father had taught him driving long ago, after seeing his disasters in studies. So Raju got a job as a driver, by the 'generosity' of his father’s employer, albeit at half the salary. He worked really hard and no one could have imagined Raju like this when his father was alive.

Now he had to save money, save the family from continuous naggings of everyone and also put together some money for his sister who was already fourteen. Adding to this, even the health of his mother was deteriorating.

So Raju was saving in all the ways he could. He ate with half the money that his employer gave him, stopped having his ‘pan masala’ and took any additional job that came in the way.

One day he was sent to get a carwash. There was a carwash market, which had tens of shops bustling with activity. The fixed rate was forty rupees and that was what his master gave him. But Raju decided to bargain. He tried in many shops, hassled with shopkeepers, argued with them and then found one who agreed to do it in thirty. That shall enable him to save complete ten rupees.

This was going to be the way in which all his dreams will get fulfilled. Why is it not possible that he will own a fleet of taxis on day? Even if a fleet is not there, he may be able to drive his own taxi. His father always said that fortunes are built by meager savings.

Lost in his dreams, he was watching the ten year old boy washing the car. Thin as a kite, the boy had to apply all his strength to remove the car stains. He was wearing torn clothes and a big talisman on his arm. He must have been from the fleet of young boys who came to the cities from villages to get some work. There must be a family back home that was waiting for the wages of this boy.

When the work was done, Raju came and sat in his car, his dreams somewhat disturbed. He started the car but then he noticed the hollows around the eyes of this young boy. He could not move on.

He called the boy and gave him ten rupees tip.

PS: This story is almost based on a real incident. Humanity keeps on amazing me!

News for you all, my raft got toppled while River rafting. I drank at least 2 lts of Ganges water, had many up and downs in river rapids and was finally rescued after three minutes which seemed like a lifetime. Now I think I should put adventure sports to the backseat for sometime.

Snippets

I cannot resist this anymore, so here is this blog.

There are things that I want to share but they will not fit into anything specific. Why always look for order when chaos can be equally beautiful. So I decided to dedicate one blog to my unspecific, yet according to me interesting thoughts.

The first thing is about Catch-22. Not exactly the novel, but the phrase. Look around and nearly all the time we are in Catch-22 situations. I will give you examples.

One of my close friends said that each one in our friend circle is simple and good at heart. So they will be perfect for their girlfriends. But since all of us are simple and good at heart; almost no one has a girlfriend. A perfect Catch-22 situation.

Another one is about the LBS academy. The faculty here wants us to be frank and open in discussions. But they also want our behavior to be officer like. So anything that is ‘frank and open’ can be dubbed as unofficerlike and vice versa. I bet bureaucracy will have maximum Catch-22 situations.

Now I want to share something else. I know I look ‘almost’ alright or I like to believe this. The truth is I do not see mirror quite often. But when I have to get my haircut, I am made to stare in the mirror for complete 15 minutes. I keep on saying to myself ‘Gosh! you are not good’. The image in the mirror looks to be a stranger and those 15 minutes look like a lifetime.

I feel like this ghazal ‘Mere desh me, mere bhes me, koi aur tha, koi aur hai’ (In my land, in my dress up, there was someone else, there is someone else).

And to end this something that amazed me, a sort of discourse on God. Let us assume that God exists and since he is God he is omnipotent. As he is omnipotent, he should be able to do everything in this world.

Now can he create a stone which he cannot lift? If no, then he is not omnipotent hence not God. If yes, then since he cannot lift the stone he is not omnipotent hence not God. Well no conclusions from my side……..

In case you now want a statement from me now about my religious beliefs, I am somewhat between an agnostic and a theist.

PS: The ‘adventure’ at LBSNAA continues. After having rock climbing this weekend, we are going for River rafting and Para-sailing on the coming sat-sun, though I reserve my take on my interest in adventure :)

Prisoners of the Past

She had really loved Abhay. It was just a three week affair. They had met in a party and things clicked as they normally do in fairy tales. He was the perfect sort of guy she had imagined. When a lifetime also turns out to be less to know a person, they decided that there is no reason why they should not get married.

That was the beginning of problems . Her parents were against it, his parents were against it, adding to it even Abhay looked indecisive. When she got an accusing call from Abhay’s parents, having all that stuff about fooling their son; and he was still not ready to come in her support, she called it quit.

Never again, she would do such a thing to herself; she would never fall in love; it was a promise she made to herself. She decided to spend all her time in work, so as to forget the past, so as to forget herself. Being a workaholic was fun. Somehow she loved lines of a song ‘Ye Shehar Bhoola Mujhe, main bhi ise bhool gaya.’

While working she was assigned a project with another colleague of her, Dhruva. He was a different kind of person. By different she meant the kinds whose heart remain pure and unadulterated by this world. He was….what she should say….simple. The beauty of simplicity can be appreciated only if you find one.

She liked talking with him. He never asked probing questions, he never gave suggestions. She could just be herself with him. Things started turning out good. She started sharing all her thoughts with him, even the darkest corners of her mind about Abhay. She was scared of that, but Dhruva surprisingly made it all easier for her. He made her believe all that happened was none of her fault.

They liked spending time together. She tried everything she wanted to do, but had never done. One day they drank together. After that they chatted, laughed, cried, watched stars and were awake till dawn. That day she sat calmly, feeling a sense of serenity she missed for years, keeping her head on his shoulders.

Next day, for some reason she was confused. Something inside her was seeking answers. She explained to herself, Dhruva was just a friend, he would never have those feelings for her.

That day again Abhay called. Though it was just a friendly call, he did not forget to mention his plans of marriage and how good his fiancé was. In a way he blamed her for everything that went wrong. She did not say anything to him, just tried to be composed.

But after an hour it became unbearable. She was no longer able to remain alone. She wanted to scream, to smash her head on the wall. Then she called Dhruva. When he was there, she did not say anything to him. She just said I want to hug you. She hugged him and remained like that for more than an hour. No, not a word was whispered. They just went out on a long drive that day.

After that, it became difficult for her to remain without meeting Dhruva for a day. They were together most of the time. Yes, she repeated to herself he was just a friend, he must never have thought anything about her.

And then it happened. Dhruva’s eyes were saying something from many days which she chose to ignore, or never wanted to believe. But one day when she asked him, his reply was simple. He smiled and said; I love you.

But, she did not accept, she did not refuse. She was angry that he did this when he knew that she wanted never to fall in love again. She was happy because she never thought that she was worth him. But then she did not want things to change.

After that day she did not ask him anything again, she dared not to. She just pretended that nothing has happened and things continued.

As far as I know, the status is still the same.

PS: Please do tell me what you think will happen in future. And do I need to tell that I was nowhere involved in this story :)

A Journey worth Lifetime

The weather was bad from some days. But we had to start at 6 in the morning. The previous night was cold, and if you slept in a tent in your sleeping bags, you can actually feel how painful cold can be.

After walking for an hour, heavy rains came. The wind made sure that none of us could escape being wet or having a taste of the low temperature that may have been just above zero. When you are in such a situation and the destination is still ten hours away you realize what difficulties in life can be.

It was tough and we walked for ten hours in continuous rains in a steep uphill terrain. That day we realized that human endurance is much more than we believe it to be and one has to go out of his comfort zones to discover his limits. It’s the mental strength that matters more than physical.

So friends I am back from the trek, again alive and well, albeit 2 Kg. less and somewhat darker by sunburns. How do I describe my trek; …………well I can find no words for it. Let me take help of pictures.

In a village midway


Inside the Tent

Just a pose

Trying hands at meditation

We walked for nearly 140 Km in 7 days. Everyday the team started early in the morning and kept walking for entire day. It was demanding, it was tiring but yes it was enjoyable. Many things happened for the first time in my life. I saw ice on mountains and I felt the chilling water of stream coming direct from glacier. For the first time in my life, I was above a rainbow.

A Rainbow below us

Crossed many streams like this


Swargarohini Peak

The valleys we walked in


The entire team

Landslide area

And what did we learn during trek. That nothing should be taken for granted in life, even bathrooms, in literal sense. I made many records and one was how to keep going without taking a bath for 4 days in a row, actually there was no option to.

For nine days, we craved for good food, electricity, beds, and leave mobile phones we craved for just one PCO to send message back home. But we enjoyed a lot too. The first night began with cards and a game of bluff. It gave way to ghost stories and plank chit, the effect of which was intense courtesy the lone forest guest house in a dense jungle. After that we had rounds of palmistry. In the end it went on to match making and ensuring that all team members get a bride or groom.

You tend to become philosophical in difficulties. Trek looked very promising in the beginning but it was full of obstacles. The same is with life. We are enthusiastic when we begin but during the journey, life becomes difficult and far from the dreams. But when you look back with hindsight, you say both look good.

I realized once again that I loved my family, I loved my friends. I missed making just one call to them to say that I am well, to hear the same from them.

So the experience cannot be termed being good or bad,its beyond words. I have more memories of last nine days than I have of last nine months. I enjoyed it but if you ask if I want to go for it again, my reply is no, at least for now. It was a kind of experience that one may want only once.

To put in simpler terms, it was a journey worth lifetime.

Faces after nine days of trek

The Everlasting Enigma

Life has become different. But I am not going to tell you that.

I have been criticized that civil service is taking over AS and I will soon get an identity crisis. As this comment is from someone who knows me better than myself, I think I should write something else.

So today, I will tell you a family fable, one that has been a longtime favorite of my mom. It has been recited by her every time my childhood is mentioned. I remember this incident more by her narrations, than in my real memory.

It happened when I was in class second. There was this girl who sat next to me. We were friends and we played a lot together. I remember two things about her, one that her name was written on her Tiffin box and second that she could pinch really hard. So we had a lot of fun those days; leaving the times she pinched me.

Once while playing a stupid game, she mentioned that she liked bangles. After that when I went to the market with my mom, I insisted that I have to buy bangles. Though somewhat confused, my mom agreed as she was used to my weird demands. I bought golden bangles, the one with stars on it.

Next day I went happily to school and gifted them to her. She was happy too and entire day we played with those golden bangles. But there had to come a twist.

After one day, she came back and returned me those bangles. She said with a flat face that her mom has asked her to return those. I do not remember if I was embarrassed to take them back, though I get embarassed everytime my mom recites this story.

In retrospect, I feel that was this was the beginning of my 'mis' encounters with the fairer sex. It has been an unending enigma. But whenever a girl throws a surprise at me, I can feel the tinge of taking those bangles back.

PS: Since you are reading this, I assume that you are a regular reader of my blog :). So I should tell you that that I am going on a long trek this time, courtesy LBSNAA and my next blog will come nearly after a fortnight. And yes, cadres have come and mine is West Bengal.

We Will Make a Difference

Ravi had done his B.Tech from IIT Kharagpur. He had topped in all his classes and now he had the option of going abroad or taking a job with a fat pay package. But then he had other plans. He was fascinated by freedom fighters. He dreamt of Gandhi calling for Dandi march, Bhagat Singh leading the revolutionaries and Nehru promising life and freedom for India at independence. Like them, he also wanted to do something for his country. He chose to be a civil servant.

Dharma belonged to a backward community. He was poor and had suffered caste discrimination throughout his childhood. But he refused to submit. He wanted this to change, not only for himself, not only for his village but for the entire nation. For this he saw a clear path, civil services.

Shirin was a physically challenged girl. Most of her life she had heard sympathetic talks. But she wanted dignity, and she also wanted the society to change its perception about her. She wanted to prove that she was equally capable and can contribute equally in the development of nation. She cracked the civil services.

All these are imaginary names. But there are many Ravi’s, Dharma’s and Shirin’s in the 81st foundation course at LBSNAA, Mussorie. About 300 probationers have gathered in the academy here from all over India. They belong to different regions, religions, castes, sects etc. They have different educational backgrounds and different exposures. They have many other stories too. But they have one common dream, to work for India.

Many wonder that why lakhs are attracted for this job which offers the toughest competition in the world and still offers a meager salary compared to the private sector. In the era of globalization many people thought civil services will lose its sheen. They gave it derogatory names like Babudom, or the big fat clerks whose only aim is to put red tapes. But to their utter surprise, a recent survey rated civil service to be the most coveted job in the country. It still attracts the youth who want to work directly for the country.

And no one can agree to it more than we probationers at the institute. All of us suffered the shortage of electricity, bad roads and inadequate infrastructure. We stood in queues in government departments and at times felt harassed by the slow system. But then, instead of cribbing about it, we decided to change it. We believed in what Kennedy said “Ask not what your country has done for you - ask what you can do for your country”. And we chose to do our bit by becoming civil servants.

We, in the 81st foundation course believe that we are the steel frame of India. We agree that civil services need a lot of changes. It has to be lean and thin, responsive, corruption free, efficient and effective. It has to deliver to the common man. But we also believe that it has the most important role in the emergence of developed India.

In the first issue of our journal, we take a pledge that we will make a difference. Things will change in India and we will transform the image of the Government. We do not predict a revolution but we will devote our lives in making our motherland a developed nation. That is a solemn promise of all Ravi, Dharma, Shirin and others like them present in the 81st foundation course.

PS: This is an article sent by me for LBSNAA magazine. The benefit of a blog is that even if it is not published in the magazine, I can have the solace of getting readers for this in my blog :)