What Makes Me an IITian?

Dear Readers,

Apologies for this long-long break from the blogosphere. I share with you today an article which I had written in December 2008 for the National Education Day essay competition held at my parent IIT. The essay originally had the title “Twice Born: What Makes Me an IITian”. It had won an award for the best essay. Hope you all enjoy reading it.

Happy blogging!

Anne

I came out on the chariot of the first gleam of light,
and pursued my voyage through the wildernesses of worlds leaving my track on many a star and planet.
It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself,
and that training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.
(“Journey Home”, Gitanjali, R.N.Tagore)

When I started my journey through the “wilderness” of research and practical rigours of training in Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IITB), I hardly knew that my life was poised to change forever. Ruminating on the events of the past three years and ten months, I am confounded by the changes in my personality and life.

I joined IITBombay in July 2005 as a Research Scholar in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. It was an unconventional choice for a humanities researcher to choose a technical institution rather than the University system for intensive research. People whom I meet in conferences and seminars have asked me this question several times: “Why IIT system for a humanities person and that too a researcher in literature?” My answer has been; “Why not?” I wanted to learn at least a little of both humanities and technology. In the 21st century analysts working in any field of humanities have to deal with global terrorism, cyber crime and fragmented individual and cultural systems. It becomes imperative in this context for researchers to be well equipped with a working knowledge of latest technological developments. In IITs, we get ample opportunity to understand the subtleties both of technology and humanities. IITs give flexibility and free-flow of knowledge ecosystems to individuals who have the will and curiosity to learn. After joining IIT, not only did I get deeper insight into the nuances of my own field, but also got a working knowledge of many other disciplines like sociology, economics, philosophy, computer science, electrical engineering and physics. Today if someone queries me about the relation between visual and verbal, a Kantian worldview, Wittgensteinian concepts, a dragon economy, subaltern in Gayathri Spivak and Partha Chatterji, Dhrut and Madhyam in Hindustani classical music, I would probably not sound so lost. Similarly, I do also understand to a certain extent the significance of Wireless networking for rural India, WCDMA phones, biological research in computer sciences, Quark gluons, General and Special Theories of Relativity and particle physics – something that seem absolutely incredible considering my limited understanding of these subjects. Coming from a completely different knowledge system, I must confess that I was not aware of these research modules earlier. IIT gave me a peer group of research scholars who have given invaluable insights into different facets of research. Whether it is a formal seminar of interdisciplinary nature or an informal session in the hostel mess or a chai meet in any of the canteens, we share and enrich our existing knowledge base.

Earlier during post-graduation days, we used to get our dissertations typed by small DTP shops in our town. At school, we were given theoretical computer knowledge in terms of DOS, MS Office and some elementary know-how of C language without ever being allowed to touch the “real computer”. I had not learnt to use a computer on my own. Back home, when I was struggling to go out of the state for research, some mails that I typed and sent to Professors through the only mail id (which a friend had opened for me) in a Cyber Cafe, were either rejected or not replied to. I had not realized until I came to IIT Bombay that I was coming to a world which runs on a virtual web of email communication.

“Someone should give me a chance to prove myself”, I dreamt. Finally, IIT gave me that chance, but when I went into the course-work phases, my Quixotic romanticism vanished. The most painful part of the coursework phase was to come to terms with my own ignorance. Here, I was competing with some of the well-trained people of India, each one coming from unique educational systems. I was slow – in fact very slow in that pace. While I did not know how to type files in MS Word, how to prepare a PPT, IIT confounded me with LINUX, MATLAB, HTML and other computer related programs. Previously I had only one mail id, at IIT we had five major mail ids and all needed to be thoroughly checked at regular intervals for mails from guides and Professors or for assignment discussions. While my typing speed was pathetically slow, we were given fifteen assignments to be typed and submitted within a month’s time. There was the course seminar report additionally and the power point slides which had to be “perfect”! This was the toughest phase of my career where I was learning to unlearn many things that I had learnt in the past. IITs are special because they motivate the researcher to compete with himself/herself first before competing with others.

It was not all that easy, especially after one comes from a different work place to reinvent oneself. Many researchers come here mostly in their mid-twenties or even later and have to start from scratch. Sometimes our learning, ideologies and age inhibits us from easily accepting a system or jelling ourselves with a new system. However, the grueling process taught to me to be faster and clearer not only in my written work but also in my thoughts and in goal seeking. From lengthy confusing statements, that was a part of my writing style, I was taught to be curt and analytical. I was taught to question even if it were my own course instructors and my own work. Today when we present our paper in international conferences and seminars, this experience gives our presentation an edge over many others. I learnt to have confidence on my work, to defend it as and when required and to be patient, the last one being the most difficult part of my learning process.

Academically, there are a lot of things which if described can very well become a “self-help” treatise. I was being educated on the personal front too – starting from hostel manners to email etiquettes, from research intricacies to changing nature of personal friendships and equations. My association with Research Scholars’ Forum (RSF) and hostel life played an important role in giving insight into the psychology of people and fellow researchers. Single rooms in hostels give us that personal space where we can work and think. In the mess, it is a social gathering where people meet, talk and discuss. However, there is one aspect of researchers residing in the hostel that is slightly disturbing — the level of competition at least until the Presynopsis phase. As researchers, we need to understand that research is not just a degree which can be competed for. Of course, competition gives an incentive to work but “unhealthy comparison” is different from healthy competition. Research is a process and an individual endeavour where we cannot survive if we continue to compare ourselves with peers who seem to be “doing better”.

As a female researcher after coming to IIT many things changed. IITians take a pride in their casual style and an unkempt easy aura. When I had read the IIT lingo in the set of documents distributed to us during the Orientation program of the institute, I was amused by the definition given to girls’ hostels H-10 and H-11 as the “endangered species of IIT”. I often chuckle at the thought of being “endangered” and take a certain amount of honest pride — only an endangered species has something special in itself that demands attention.

As far as my experience of Mumbai is concerned, it has changed in these years from a culture shock to a fond liking of the campus and the city. 26th July 2005 – my first day in Mumbai and also the day of the flash floods. Our batch was a victim of the floods and some of us spent three days in the TV room of Hostel-11 while others chose to live in their labs until the flood subsided. I have sadly witnessed three major disasters that affected Mumbai in the past years – flash floods of 2005, Mumbai local train blasts in 2006 and the recent hostage crisis in CST, Taj, Oberoi and Nariman House in November 2008. The need to be accountable towards our own people acquires foremost significance. Though IITians have succeeded in career goals, we have a long way to go learning to be responsible citizens of a country that puts so much hope on IIT products. I still wonder as IITians when will we learn to pay back our people, not just in terms of money but in terms of services and intellect (which we are so proud of).

IITs are respected so much because they contribute in the overall making of an individual. Each individual has his/her own experiences, work styles and stories to narrate on the theme “how my days in IIT have helped me develop as a person”. If I were to summarize my days in IIT and all that I learnt here in three statements, it would be as follows: (a) I learnt to be humble; (b) I learnt to love my world; and (c) I learnt to forgive others and forgive myself.

Mumbai 26/11: No Words for a Tribute

I will not write too many words or too long a post.

We have already had multiple blogs and posts and news items cropping up on TV and Internet on this subject. Naseeruddin Shah made a powerful statement in the movie A Wednesday, while telling the reporter: “There are a lot of news hungry people out there” and what better or worse news than terror. No amount of coverage, no amount of tributes can take away the pain of those thousands of families who are struggling to psychologically come in terms with the shock of 26/11 and many such attacks on India. However, I have one severe reservation against media — their body language when they are reporting sensitive events. Their excitement seems to overtake their objectivity. Today there is a news on NDTV regarding Mumbaikars missing a parade of strength. The callous body language of people who are being interviewed as well as the interviewer is visible at times. It has to be also noted that there are many who are not celebrating today the “victory” march of a new found Mumbai, but rather mourning the 1st anniversary of people who were massacred ruthlessly and another huge mass of people who lost their fathers, brothers, sisters, mothers, daughters, sons, fiances and friends…. May be  no amount of blogs or news reports or marches might cover up the sorrow and loss of these individuals struggling to come to terms with senseless and mindless killings.

As far as citizens are concerned, they are paying their tribute by being on their job and going to schools, colleges and offices. What to do the luxury of lamentation only belongs to the top brass of the media and the parliamentarians — who have enough scope to engage in  debates and discussions. The average taxpayer (or even the labour class) has to be on his/her toes for a day’s salary, terror or no terror.

I am reminded today of a very provocative piece by one of the leading philosophers of the 20th century Jean Baudrillard named “The Gulf War Did not Take Place” where he emphatically states  that: “the war, the victory and the defeat are all equally unreal, equally non existent” (p.82).  Something that is considered as a victory for “India”, might be a major defeat from others eyes.  How and in what ways we perceive this simulacra of terror is debatable still. As common human beings who die in these mindless battles of ideologies, fixations, politics and religion — we can only have anger not terror.

I had thought of restraining myself and not to post another post on the Internet during this phase. However, when I opened my dashboard today, the number of search terms baffled me. People have searched: “slogans for 26/11…emergency”, “sms messages for 26/11″, “ideas for essays on 26/11″ , etc.  Well, if we do not have 15 words of original tributes for the “martyrs” as we call them, then who can stop us from being killed again and again. The problem is extremely deep rooted and not violence but awareness is the only solution to such a menace. The problem with citizens is we have become followers rather than leaders –  we ape and copy whatever is “available” in the market or whatever the media feeds us with.

We have many “martyrs” killed in Batla House, Bus and train bomb blasts, Delhi and Bangalore attacks and 26/11  attacks as well. Moreover, it was not only 26/11, it was also 27/11 and 28/11. The rampage lasted for three days not one ….

For the time being it can only be said that there are not enough words for a tribute…

“Lest we forget” (deliberately chose this quotation from a news channel) ….

Jai Hind!

Who is a Human?

For the last few weeks, I was absorbed reading Arvind Adiga’s novel The White Tiger which had borrowed from Eddie’s Kitchen . My interest in the novel was based on the  Booker Award that it received last year. Frankly, I was not aware of Adiga’s writings before I came across the piece of news that he had beat Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of Poppies in the race for Booker. The blurb claims that this novel is a “page turner” and can be read at one go. But I took longer to complete it than my usual pace since I found the “realities” described in that text very difficult to digest. Not that the “realities” described are “unrealistic”, but rather are too “harshly-realistic”, sometimes at the cost of language, style and aesthetic sensibilities. Probably, the author had deliberately chosen a style that is anti-aesthetic or “anti-literary-ness”. However, Adiga is not the first author to have presented “India” in this fashion, there are many known and unknown authors who have headed the brigade. In fact, Adiga seems to be directly influenced by none other than Sir Vidya, i.e., V.S. Naipaul and his India writings, especially An Area of Darkness. Adiga keeps invoking the term “darkness” in his novel reminding us of Sir Vidya’s experiences of India as a mind-boggling, problematic “area of darkness” in the first of his India trilogy.

Keeping aside the literary jargon that we usually get entangled with, Adiga’s novel brought some of my own real life experiences fresh into memory. I have been asking the question, “who is a human?” from the past few experiences that I have had. About a month ago, while I was waiting for a friend to arrive at the Ghatkopar station had a strange experience. Mumbai starts sweltering by mid-March and noons are especially hot. It was around 1 pm and the station was apparently less crowded than usual. I stood at the magazine vendor, peeping into some of the new titles that are on stand this year. Each local train that arrived at the platform dumped hordes of unknown, unnamed faces, each face seeming no different than the other and then another departing local would come and scoop away half the population like mushrooms scooped with a soup spoon from the soup bowl. The heat made people angrier and more restless than possibly they would be. Each one seemed to be in a hurry to reach some mysterious destination. With perfect nonchalance, I kept my eyes fixed on the new numbers displayed at the magazine stall and muttered under my breath a distorted version of T.S.Eliot’s Wasteland: “March is the cruelest month that mixes sweat with anger” (original: “April is the cruelest month mixing memory with desire”) .

Suddenly, I spotted a tattered old man, more clarification, a tattered blind old-man, trying to alight from the footbridge connecting the platforms. He was desperately seeking help from commuters requesting them to guide him down the stairs of the steep footbridge. No one listened to the  old man and none stopped to help him either. I was in the other end of the platform and far away from the old man, could only helplessly observe him faltering in his steps, trying to balance himself as he got down the stairs of the bridge. Somehow he did manage to get to the platform, but his ordeal did not end there. The man intended to board a local train bound for Ambernath and evidently he was unable to board it himself . He badly needed help and went on requesting people to help, but to no use. Finally, in utter desperation the man put one hand on the shoulder of a passerby and requested him to just make him board the train. The passerby who probably was also one of those innumerable faces who had to hurry for some destination, rudely and angrily jerked away the blind man’s hand. He was so rude  that the poor old man just lost his balance, lost his stick, tumbled and fell down badly on the platform. He was bruised, hurt and the dark glasses he had was broken into pieces. Except a young student who came running from the farthest end of the platform to assist the man to get up, no one else bothered to even stop for a second. The  gentleman had tears in his eyes — tears of frustration and tears of blindness. I had come running from the another end of the platform to see if he was ok, and could make out that he was just very shaken and hurt. He just said to me in Marathi that he wanted to go to Ambernath to meet his daughter and son-in-law, but people thought he was a beggar and was just creating nuisance. Hmmm! What difference does it make to have or not to have eyes? We are also blind….

My friend reached on time and we came out of the station. Outside Ghatkopar station there was a queue for the BEST buses. It did not contain 5, 10 or 15 people; there were thousands waiting for one bus. The queue snaked down to the streets and almost covered a kilometer distance. Frustrating! In the heat, in the full summer noon, thousands standing in queue to board a bus. My friend sighed and said; “thank god! we have auto rickshaws here! It would be a torture to wait in queue for these buses!” We had to pay just 40 rupees to reach IIT by an auto, quiet simple and affordable. But for some of those who were standing in that queue for a bus, that 40 rupees was half-a-day’s salary.

These days I wonder what happens to the “super-power” nation that India is prophesied to be. With elections just round the corner and each political party bragging of its greatness, the question of “who is a human?” becomes even more pertinent. “Murk” is the only word that defines the situation here. Maybe we will have a “super-power” consumer nation down the years, all that we have now is easy money, minority politics and post-election alliances. The rest are indifferent people like us who get an easy ride through auto and taxis, a comfortable room, malls to shop, air conditioned labs, air conditioned airplanes to gain a safe passage out of the country and lead rest of the life in some “cool” place, sighing over the deteriorating human situation of India. People like me, Adiga, Arundhati Roy, Danny Boyle, etc. have one aspect that is similar — we all live in safe ghettos while talking or writing about the “inhuman”. I bet I will never stand in a long queue to get to board a bus and so will Danny Boyle who can never substitute real “shit” for his “peanut butter” to shoot another Slumdog and so will Adiga who may not choose to visit the “darkness” that won him a Booker. The question of who is a human applies to us as well.

If being “human” has certain values, “virtues” or “expectations” attached to it, then the term has got really problematic dimensions. But, if being human means just being a higher-ape, a biological being, I have no issues. In fact the term “human” has of late come to substitute “man”, as the latter was considered to be gender insensitive by some thoughtful critics. Terms like “physically challenged”, “mentally challenged”, etc. also came into vogue as terms which carry “sensitivity” towards the “lesser capable” and to give a more “humanitarian” angle to certain physical disorders. But, that day in Ghatkopar when I saw the gentleman struggling and being insulted in the platform in front of thousands, my idea of these “sensitive” terms completely changed. They are mere terms in critical jargon having hollow meaning, because there are millions out there who will not sympathize or empathize with a man as “physically challenged”, but might just identify a person as a “blind man” or a “leper” or a “deaf” person. The physical attribute goes as an identification mark, because all these jargon of gender-sensitive, physical attribute-sensitive, are limited to bookish, snobbish, aristocrats like us who hardly venture out into the platform to help a “blind man” cope with his “blindness”.

Who is a human? Still the questions lurks in my mind…

Slum Who Millionaire?: a Critique of Slum Dog Millionaire

I seriously have been resisting getting into the debate over Slumdog Millionaire (2008 ) and thought like every busy-for-nothing “type” let film critics, media and editorials battle it out. I was happy with the “Golden Globes” and “BAFTAs” pouring in for A.R .Rehman (one of my favourite music Directors). Moreover, who cares what the rear view of a mirror is as long as it clearly reflects my image on its surface! Then, I watched the movie… re-watched with some friends…then re-watched it alone, this time to understand what comes in the way of my appreciating it and the already famous awards and acclaim that have come for it. I read the reviews, the debates and counter-debates raging over the movie. Decided to forget it — but strangely couldn’t! So, had to plunge into…better than being “sleepless in Mumbai” .

Well, let me try to piece together my confusion…

The movie is brilliantly packaged, technically sound with a contemporary story-line and significantly “cleverly marketed” as a “rags-to-riches” and a “feel-good story of the decade”. The movie lives in its strongly strewn “moments” — of love, of anger, of orphaned existence, of communal riots, of beggary, of brother seducing a brother’s love, of betrayal, of honesty versus crime, and finally the feel-good factor of “love winning it all” and “virtuous-victorious” kind of ending, which of course makes you sit up in the theatre. “And they lived happily ever after…” thus ends the movie on an optimistic note. But, considering the deaths of Salim (the brother of Jamal Malik) and the Don, if we know the underworld well, then Jamal and Latika will hardly be left in peace, they were after-all the reasons for these deaths and also they have 2 crores in hand. If the cops can be after Jamal, so can be the underworld. However, we are not supposed to question while watching a movie–suspension of disbelief. We all love “happy endings”. But, then why did some of us not smile as we came out of the theatre? Two reasons: (a) We have seen something of this movie in many other Bollywood movies, maybe better versions; (b) The cultural part: I mean the “dog” part…

The first point is the crux of my blog: (a) We have seen something of this movie in many other Bollywood movies, maybe better versions. Let me take you back to a series of movies of late 1980s and 1990s, which had similar subject lines: of course not a “Kaun Banega Crorepati?” kind of story, but stories which you identify as “Mumbaichi Katha” with love stories set in the backdrop of “problems”. They were vibrant, pulsating and often “true” pictures of Mumbai, may not be clinically and technically as evolved as Slum Dog , but had in my opinion superior content narrated in a casual matter-of-fact style. Movies that immediately come to mind are: Salim Langde Pe Mat Ro (1989), Parinda (1989), Baaghi (1990), Sadak(1991), Bombay (1995), Satya (1998 ). No I don’t mean to compare and critique Slum Dog in the lines of these stories, my comparison rests on the fact that they belong to the same genre and to the fact that Slum Dog wins a “Golden Globe”, while some of these movies are not even known in the home audience. When you watch Salim Langde pe Mat Ro… you tend to realize how far the tentacles of the underworld seeped into the chawls of Mumbai. There is no glossing over, no overboard styles and no Mr. Bachhan prototypes in the movie. Of course one of the best examples of parallel cinema that I have ever viewed. The plot is set in the chawls of Mumbai, even the restaurants that Neelima Azim and Pavan Malhotra (in title role) frequent can be imagined as any second restaurant near railway stations like Kanjurmarg or Ghatkopar. The Hindu-Muslim equations which Slum Dog tried to portray for our western and diaspora viewers in 2008, has actually already seen its consummation in Salim Langde pe back in 1989.

When you watch Parinda, the aspect that hits right on your face is the innocent love story of Karan (ironically played by Anil Kapoor) and Paro (Madhuri Dixit) and the way they were killed by the underworld Don Anna (Nana Patekar) on their wedding bed. As far as my understanding, Parinda defines the grammar of movies in this genre. Amazing cinematography (watch the pigeons flocking and un-flocking along with gun shots near Gateway of India in the movie) and extremely touching love-hate relationship between the brothers Anil Kapoor and Jackie Shroff.

Baaghi and Sadak make you fall in love with the young, angry Salman Khan and Sanjay Dutt as they battle it out for girls stuck in the red-light area of Mumbai. Sadak especially brings out amazingly well the horror of attempting to tinker with the “business” of these people. Sadashiv Amrapurkar roaring and maneuvering against Sanjay Dutt as Maharani makes you literally shiver. The “murk” of the profession is menacingly narrated with a “shrug-off” kind of narration.

Bombay of Mani Ratnam and Satya of Ram Gopal Verma are cult movies. The first, set in the backdrop of Hindu-Muslim riots of 1991 featured Arvind Swami and Manisha Koirala — a Hindu-Muslim couple strangled in the riots, are looking for their lost twin kids Kabir Narayan and Kamal Basheer in the gullies of riot-ridden Mumbai. The pain of parents who have lost their kids, the pain of two frightened siblings torn-apart by violence and the dangerous communally instigating speeches of the Hindu and Muslim leaders, Bombay is truly a Golden Globe material. I love the A.R.Rahman of “humma-humma” or “Tu Hi Re…” unabashedly more than the A.R.Rahman of “Jai Ho!” The second, Satya of RGV, marked some of the all time highs of Bollywood art.The “cool-suave” Chakravarthy playing the title role gave a new-look to new-generation underworld-operating Mumbai. Urmila Matondkar in the role of “Vidya” makes you fall in love with “innocent love” all over again.

Watch these movies if you have already forgotten them! Mr. Boyle — India has seen it all! But thanks for showing it to the “West”. Slum Dog is a cock-tail of some of these movies, combined with the cultural dimension. That brings us to the second point: (b) The cultural part: I mean the “dog” part…. Unless we learn to love ourselves for whatever we are and whatever we have, we will be kept calling “dogs” . Mr. Sekhar Kapur says in his blog that even Bandit Queen was funded by the West and so was Elizabeth, what’s wrong if Boyle makes a movie on India? Of course, nothing wrong. Except for the “Millionaire” part. Danny Boyle has chosen to make a movie on the slums of Mumbai — he has lived, shot the movie in slums and even appointed slum children as his protagonists. That’s philanthropic! But that is also forms of capitalism and neo-colonialism. Mr. Kapur doesn’t visualize the future where instead of him being a film entrepreneur, he might end up being “employed” by the huge number of Hollywood production houses investing in Indian cinema. I don’t want to see small-time Indian production houses being engulfed by the large MNCs of Hollywood. We will then have cinema made only for people living in the West. The “dog” isn’t actually slums of Mumbai. In fact, “slum dog” can be seen as a metaphor for Indian cinema, for Bollywood especially, and for India which is visualized by the “West” as a gigantic mind-boggling slum. Considering the huge success of Bollywood worldwide, “slum-dog” seems to pun on the fact that Bollywood (the slum of Hollywood) is making it big in the world film circles. However, what seems unfortunate is not the West seeing India as a “slum” but Indians perceiving themselves “through the lens of Slum Dog Millionaire” . Yes! we have slums, we have underworld, we have poverty we have communal tension! Face it! But which country in the world doesn’t have it! Racism in US or England is a different form of communalism. Look at Southern United States, the situation is extremely difficult there. There is poverty in US too — and the poverty there is worse because of its psychological dimensions. In India people who live in chawls, many of them wouldn’t want to leave those chawls for their entire lives. Some of them choose to live there. For example, look at Tehelka’s recent report on Chawls in their website.

If you intend to watch Slumdog Millionaire, watch it for its clever concoction of “Indian” stories and for its cinematography. I have high regards for Mr.Boyle, because he could actually “sell” a Bollywood masala to the West, and showed that India also has its unique story-telling capacity. But my point was that Indian cinema is also capable enough to sustain on its own. The yardstick for Oscars, Golden Globe and such awards should not define our cinema-making capabilities. The movies that I cited above in my article are some examples drawn from both parallel cinema and main-stream commercial cinema. We are capable of matured movie making even without international acclaim.

Maybe that’s what they call — “art for art’s sake” …