Maharashtra Desha: Uddhav Thackeray Photography

On Diwali eve, we found some new roadside vendors joining the festivities in Pune. We noticed an unusual seller: a woman was selling "books" on a table she had put on the roadside. We found that all the books and magazines on sale were in Marathi language. Then I noticed a book by Uddhav Thackeray. The book "Maharashtra Desha" is a collection of Uddhav's aerial photography across the state. When we asked the lady if the book was also available in Hindi or English, she replied, "the person whose book it is, is a Marathi and hence the book is also in Marathi." I liked her pride and attitude. We bought one book and came back home. When we checked the book out, we were awestruck with the brilliant and wonderful photographs published in the book. We could not resist but went back to the lady and bought 2 more books which we have gifted to our parents. Pieces of beautiful Maharashtra and some reason for the lady's pride have traveled to far places now...

The book महाराष्ट्र देशा is divided into sections: (1) Forts, (2) Temples and places of worship, (3) Rivers and Roads/Highways, (4) Landmarks in Mumbai, (5) General photography. 

A few pictures of forts are can be seen here: 

You can also see a Rediff Slideshow on the same book and Uddhav Thackeray's photography: [Link]

Paperback edition of the book costs only Rs 100 and can be found here: http://www.sahyadribooks.org/books/MHDesha.aspx?bid=508

When I tried to find some photographs on the internet, I could find mostly pictures of forts. But the photographs of other sections of the book including the last general photography titled "Adbhut Desha अद्भुत देशा" is so wonderful that unless you see those, you won't be able to guess the beauty. Our parents viewed the pictures and were mesmerized. The photographs not only show the international level photography talent in Uddhav Thackeray but also his thinking and humility. There is a picture of a man washing his buffaloes in a pond, a family traveling in a boat in a river, a farmer with green turban sitting in his fields with specks of greenery, a variety of crops making a mesmerizing visual delight, a group of womenfolks waiving to the photographers while they were sowing rice in the fields, or four boys resting after having hearty swimming... The width and depth of the images are unseen before... Kudos to Uddhav for this book and for his photography... 

With the exceptional quality of photography and the unparalleled coverage of Maharashtra, the book is actually priceless. If you love Maharashtra or want to know more, it is a must buy. 

- Rahul

Reading List by Amazon on LinkedIn Gone?

I used to use the Application “Reading List by Amazon” on LinkedIn for many years. Whenever I read a book, I went to LinkedIn and listed the book’s title on the Amazon Reading List, including a review about the same. But today, I do not find Amazon Reading List App at all on LinkedIn!

A Q&A search tells that LinkedIn has stopped supporting this App. And perhaps it did not warn users before stopping it. It feels bad to see our years of efforts go in vein, in this manner. 

Read about it here: 

http://www.linkedin.com/answers/using-linkedIn/ULI/1079628-23155484 

After many years of using it, I had listed around 250 books that I had read and also had several "followers" who were following my profile for my reading interests. Though I kept posting larger reviews on my blogger.com blog also, but I had many books in my Reading List for which I had not got time to write reviews. Alas, all is gone now.

I still hope LinkedIn would start supporting the Reading List app and would also retrieve all our data/details which we entered in the app.

- Rahul   

Note: Views are personal and do not represent views of any organization associated with the author. [Detailed disclaimer]

Dabang 2 and Portrayal of Religion in Movies

We watched the recently released flick ‘Dabang-2’ and found it very entertaining. We thoroughly enjoyed it. But as afterthoughts I am left wondering about the trend of negative portrayal of religions in our movies.

The main villain of Dabang-2 is a criminal turned politician called Bachcha Singh Thakur (played by Prakash Raj). In the first shot when he appears in front of the audience, he is shown as taking part in a Yagna in a temple. His goons have prevented any other devotees to enter the temple while he is busy offering oblations to the gods. When his brother is killed by ‘Dabang’ Chulbul Pandey, he performs proper last rites and also scolds his other brother for not going to immerse the ashes into river himself (this event turns out to be game changer in the story). In the end, a war happens as the climax between the hero and the villain and it takes place at the remains of an ancient looking Hindu temple. During the fight, when Thakur Bachcha Singh becomes sure that Chulbul Pandey has been subdued and defeated, he tells his goons, “make preparations for his last rites while I come back after thanking the God” and moves towards the temple along with his brother for prayers. All through the movie, the villain’s religious affiliations are clearly shown as a remarkable feature. But if we think about the plot and the story, these religious dimensions were totally unnecessary and irrelevant.

The plot and story would have lost nothing whether the villain was introduced while performing Yagna or while addressing a mass gathering. Or if the climatic fight happened in a ruined fort rather than a Hindu temple. But if the filmmakers had chosen not to highlight religion (in particular Hinduism) in the manner they have done, it would not have resulted in a trend worth getting disturbed about – increasingly the film industry in India is showing religion (in particular Hinduism because it is most tolerant in the lot) in the wrong light. On one hand villains are shown to be practicing religious men, the ‘Heroes’ are shown as irreligious guys who do not practice any rituals or religion. Hero’s religion do not matter, but villain’s religion becomes a point worth being highlighted – why such a double standard? Do the film makers want to make us believe gradually that religion is bad and practicing it is not “cool”? They will never accept it but what they are doing certainly means the same…

I am fully with the creative industry’s rights and freedom to fabricate whatever kind of villains and heroes they want for their creative offerings, but when movie after movie a disturbing pattern emerges, it is worth being made a note of.

I liked Dabang 2 and would always remember it for its nice representation of family values and fun. Sonakshi’s role as a wife, Vinod Khanna’s as a father and Arbaaz Khan as brother in a typical Indian family sharing little joys of day to day life is so wonderfully portrayed. But if they had not chosen to go the run-of-the-mill way of presenting religion as a kind of demonist characteristic to be painted on the villain, it would have been much better and fairer.

- Rahul

Note: Views are personal and do not represent views of any organization associated with the author. [Detailed disclaimer]

The Handicapped Coach

Recently I was in Mumbai after a gap. I observed that they had introduced a compartment reserved for people with disabilities and ailments. I thought it was a good idea and would really help people who needed extra care. But the experience turned out to be very different.

When I reached the platform, a train was already arriving. I confirmed with a boy standing nearby that the train went was slow local for Borivali, and he said “yes”. I observed that he was carrying a bouquet of flowers in his hands and seemed to be a delivery boy. Incidentally, the compartment that stopped in front of us was the one reserved for people with disabilities. When I tried to board it by mistake, I saw a man standing at the door shouting loudly for everyone’s benefit about the status of the compartment. So I boarded the next one.

From inside my compartment, I could oversee the reserved compartment. It was largely unoccupied – with at most 5-6 people inside it. The boy with a bouquet of flowers was sitting at one of the front seats. At the next station, another man boarded the compartment and sat in front of him. This well-dressed apparently gentleman seemed to have his hands and legs affected by Polio. After some time, my attention was diverted towards them because of strong arguments being made which I could easily hear.

The man with Polio was asking the boy with bouquet of flowers if he was disabled. The boy said “yes”. The man asked for proof. “Do you have some document or certificate saying you have disability???” The boy replied that his hand had problem, which he had inserted deep inside his trousers’ pocket. The man demanded to be shown the actual disability and the boy kept insisting that he did not need to show it to the man. I disliked the man for being so adamant. The compartment was anyway vacant, and I did not understand his gesture of doing policing without authority. He kept verbally abusing the boy and it was very sad to watch. Had the man found his same courage to challenge a well-dressed visibly rich man with a strong built; like he was attacking the poor boy? I felt like challenging the man and telling him his fault, but kept mum as I was in a different compartment. Suddenly the man slapped the boy! The boy was agitated and kept saying some things and then brought out his hand from his trousers’ pocket. I think it indeed had some disability, because the man with Polio was taken aback for a moment. But then he started afresh, scolding the boy asking why he did not come clean when he first demanded the hand to be shown!

I am sure that the man would not have behaved with the boy in the same manner had the boy not been poor. He was a delivery boy delivering flowers to people on order – thereby bringing smiles on their faces. The man with Polio on the other hand looked well educated and employed. Perhaps he had got his education and government job due to his disability but it should have made him humble instead of being narcissist. Or may be the man used to face too much trouble in general compartments and hence when this reserved coach was introduced, he felt a need protect it against being occupied by able-bodied people. Whatever be his psychology, in his show of outrage he had slapped a disabled poor boy with no fault to be blamed for. The boy started crying, saying, “how could he hit me?”, but soon he had to stop. He won’t find sympathy from anyone around, not even from others with disability in that compartment, because he was poor and weak.

This experience reminded me that more than disability and any other problem, what is most insulting to people is their poverty. A person can be from any caste, religion or of any ability, but if he has money, he can buy his respectable place in society - at least on first meetings. This is why Balasaheb Thackeray used to say that there were only two castes in this world – rich and poor. Also, the above incident showed how exploitation of people needing care often happens in the hands of others “like them” too! It also proves that simply providing "reservations" on the basis of anything while ignoring "economic status" would always be unfair to some extent. 

With heavy heart and great pain, I saw the boy get down at the next station. In some time, he would walk or reach by bus to his customer and would deliver fresh flowers to him/her. His villain remained in the compartment. Next time an old man with his daughter boarded that compartment, and the villain was again looking at the woman with critical eyes – because she seemed able-bodied. Thank God that he did not choose to attack her. Even if she was able bodied, should she have left her father alone in the compartment while she boarded a next compartment – just because of the rules? I don’t think so. But how to explain this to the well-educated and well awakened men like the man in the above incident? Most difficult thing is to teach the teachers and discipline the discipliners – those who start to discipline others. Our society needs to be sensitive and show lots of empathy. Creating new compartments or a few seats reserved for people needing extra care are only small part of our collective gesture...

- Rahul Tiwary

Note: Views are personal and do not represent views of any organization associated with the author. [Detailed disclaimer]

Balasaheb Thackeray – Hinduhriday Samrat!

The great Maratha warrior king Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj is popularly known amongst the masses as “Janata Raja” (also the name of a famous play based on his life). Literally, it means “The wise king”. Is it ironical in the sense that the King who won so many battles against mighty warriors and established his own kingdom against the might of history, is popularly remembered today more for his knowledge and wisdom rather than for his military valor? For people from outside the state, Shivaji has been identified as the great “Maratha”. But the empire that he established is known as “Hindavi Swarajya” meaning “self-rule of Hindu people”, which has wider connotations. No matter how convenient we find it to “compartmentalize” and “tag” history and great historical figures, over the time the clamor dismantles and the true “image” settles down. Not on the pages of newspapers or on the screens of Television sets, but in the very hearts of people who identify with these great personalities. It is in this background, that I find late Balasaheb Thackeray’s image as not of any aggressive leader of regional influence, but of someone who had a grand vision and a nationalistic thinking. Definitely “Hindu Hridaysamrat” (the one who rules the hearts of Hindus). 

I had a discussion with a group of friends recently on Balasaheb’s contribution towards our nation India. I thought it would be useful to compile and share some of the points made by the group. You are welcome to add to this list, which is neither exclusive nor exhaustive.

Contributions of Balasaheb Thackeray towards National Causes in India:

1. Strong Opponent of Illegal Bangladeshi Muslim Migrants: In Balasaheb, we found a fearless leader who openly opposed illegal migration of Bangladeshi migrants into Mumbai and other places in India. He threatened to send them packing. When in power, his political party did send many such illegal migrants back to where they came from. Such illegal migrants are threat to our national security. They also steal low level skilled/unskilled jobs from very poor Indian nationals, and burden the city’s infrastructure in an unplanned manner. Some political parties use these people as their vote bank and perhaps only Balasaheb was a leader who opposed this politics openly.

2. Politics of fast development and growth: Today, Narendra Modi is identified with development politics, but when Shiv Sena had come to power, it did very rapid development in the state:

i) Slum Rehabilitation Scheme: Economic Times article [Link] mentions, “One of the key initiatives of the Shiv Sena was the slum rehabilitation scheme. As the ruling party of the state, it expanded the scheme in 1995. The scheme continues to gain momentum as this remains a key route for land acquisition in land-starved Mumbai, be it for infrastructure, urban development or housing construction. The scheme was essentially a cross-subsidization scheme under which developers could access land for development at market rates in exchange for providing housing for slum-dwellers.”

ii) Construction of 55 flyovers in Mumbai: Shiv Sena-led government in 1995 announced the construction of 55 flyovers in Mumbai in order to provide adequate infrastructure in Mumbai. The entire project was pegged at Rs 1,500-1,600 crore and was the largest urban infrastructure project undertaken in the city until then.

iii) Mumbai-Pune Expressway: Built by the state's Road Development Corporation, it was a result of Bal Thackeray’s wish. If you ever travel between Mumbai and Pune and are impressed with the world class E-Way, you should thank Balasaheb for it.

iv) Sea Link in Mumbai (Bandra Worli Sea Link): Even the Bandra Worli Sea Link was Balasaheb’s dream project, but Cong. renamed it after Rajiv Gandhi for political reasons.

3. Protecting Hindu Temple (ISKCON, Mumbai) from demolition: You can read it on ISKCON’s website [Link]. It mentions, “But very few people know how he intervened when Sri Sri Radha-Rasabihari’s temple in Juhu was being violently attacked.... While we were all rushing forward to meet the municipal workers and police — and were being taken into custody —a Gujarati devotee named Manasvi dasa was crouching in the bushes and watching. And he got the idea to phone Balasaheb Thackeray, who was known for supporting Hindu causes. Manasvi phoned and gave the report. Bal Thackeray called the Municipal Commissioner, informed him of what was happening, and told him to stop the demolition of the temple. The Municipal Commissioner, being part of the clique that had conspired against the temple, objected. Then Bal Thackeray said, “Just remember who this city belongs to.” “Okay, Balasaheb. Okay.” Then the Municipal Commissioner phoned the K-Ward Officer in Andheri, who was in charge of the Juhu area. And the Ward Officer came personally, running to the site to stop the demolition...

Remembering Balasaheb Thackeray’s service to Srila Prabhupada and Sri Sri Radha-Rasabihari, ISKCON devotees from Juhu and Chowpatty joined the funeral procession and later chanted on the stage at Shivaji Park: Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna, Krishna, Hare Hare/ Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare.... Bal Thackeray came forward and helped at a most critical moment.

4. Saving Hindus during 1993 Riots: Though Shivsena’s role during the riots is controversial to speak about, most of the locals mention that Shivsena had protected Hindus during the riots.

5. Protecting Sikhs during 1984 anti-Sikh genocide: Though the role would be controversial to talk about, locals recall how Shiv Sena under Balasaheb Thackeray protected Sikhs from the riots. It is no surprise that Sikhs mourned his demise and Gurudwaras were open and langar (community kitchen) organized for the mourners taking part in funeral. [Link]

In 2008, after an incident Balasaheb Thackeray had written [Link] in Saamna that if the anti-Sikhs riots did not spread to Mumbai in 1984, it was largely because of the Shiv Sena. He said the then President, Giani Zail Singh, had thanked him for protecting members of his community in Mumbai while those in Delhi had suffered.

6. Standing for and helping Rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandits: Ashoke Pandit writes on Tahelka Blog [Link] in the article titled “Thackeray stood by the Kashmiri Pandits”: It was Balasaheb Thackeray who immediately ordered a reservation to be fixed for the refugee Kashmiri youths in all the colleges of Maharashtra. The reservation included Muslims, Ladakhi, Pandit and the children of security forces serving in the valley. This way, he secured the future of 50,000 youths who had the choice of picking up guns in the absence of education. For me, this was Balasaheb Thackeray who did not shy away from taking a stand while those in Delhi were taking refuge behind the diplomacy of terrorism.”

Very often Bal Thackeray mentioned the plight of Kashmiri Pandits in his statements, thereby highlighting it in front of those who forget them. Like he made this statement when flaying SRK for his ‘love’ for Pakistan [Link]: "Why did Shah Rukh never feel that he should do a charity show for flood victims in India, for the 26/11 terror victims or for rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandits who have been ousted from their homeland?”.

Kashmiri Pandit organizations and leaders said with Balasaheb's death the community has become an orphan. Balasaheb had wholeheartedly supported the idea of creating the Union Territory of Panun Kashmir in Jammu and Kashmir as a solution to Kashmir problem. [Link]

7. Not believing in Castes and Opposing Caste Based Reservations: Balasaheb Thackeray was against Caste Based Reservations. He was perhaps the only fearless and patriot politician who was brave enough to speak his mind and say clearly that he was against caste based reservations and caste based discrimination. I watched Balasaheb's interview on TV where he spoke against caste based reservations and said that he believed there were only two castes in this world - rich and poor. He added that we should make poor rich but not rich poor. The next question that the interviewer asked him after his opposition to caste quota was: “How far do you think Bal Thackeray will go in politics.” He was so brave and courageous that people did not believe a straight forward person like would ever succeed in politics. It is also said that Balasaheb Thackeray lost colleagues like Bhujbal who believed and wanted to indulge in caste-politics due to differences in opinion on this matter.

He had got this anti-caste legacy from his father Late Keshav Sitaram Thackeray who was a social reformer who worked to eradicate the evils of caste system.

8. Selfless service to the poor and common people: In the article titled "Bal Thackeray, the people magnet", Rajendra Aklekar, DNA, Nov 28, 2012 writes: "Till the mid-1980s, Thackeray used to answer all phone calls himself and went out of his way to help those who sought help, irrespective of class or religion. He used to go through the "letters" columns of most newspapers and set his men to work... It was, I remember, during the last state elections that the Sena set up a call centre and helpline to solve citizens' grievances. People could call the helpline and young men and women, attired in smart black uniforms, would answer the call, note down the problem, get it solved by their elected representatives and get back to the citizen."

I have personally seen Shiv Sena’s ambulances running on the streets of Mumbai. There are reading centers etc for the people run by the party. Even on internet you can find yellow pages telling about Shiv Sena Ambulance Service. Here is the website of Shiv Sena’s Kerala unit which tells about its social work [Link] http://www.shivsena-kerala.org/service.htm. It talks about its free services, blood donation, educational support, free food, self-employment support, orphanage and old age homes, etc. You can see a slogan at the bottom of the page which mentions “Jai Hindustan Jai Kerala”. For those who thought Shiv Sena as only a regional party, should note its national presence. Most recently, Shiv Sena started “Saffron Guards” to protect morning walkers [Link]. Locals say that they feel safe in the city because there of Shiv Sena and its members. There is also a Yuva Sena doing lot of work under leadership of Aditya Thackeray [Link].

9. Opinion Maker on Issues of National Interest: He was an opinion maker on most of the national issues impacting the common man. He did not confine his area of interest to the state of Maharashtra only, but most of the time we heard him speak his mind on all issues of national interests. In the weeks just before his demise, we heard him oppose Pakistan Cricket team’s visit to India in the name of furthering diplomatic ties between the nations. On the occasion of Dessara, the festival representing victory of good over evil, his message was to throw out darkness out of our lives by throwing out corrupt party leading the government. Most of the time, his opinions represented the feelings of the common man.

- Rahul Tiwary

Note: Views are personal and do not represent views of any organization associated with the author. [Detailed disclaimer]