Come, walk with me

I had written about my friend Rahul’s memoirs of his activist struggles. Thanks to the wonders of blog-communication, Prof Swarup, an elderly Indian now settled in Australia, offered to extend financial assistance towards publication of Rahul’s memoirs. And now his manuscript is being actively prepared for publication by some very fine and distinguished people in the BlogBharti team. Rahul’s manuscript is a fascinating account of the India that his – and my – generation inherited and tried to engage with.

In his account, Rahul has referred to the inspiration he derived from the song “Chal mere saath hi chal”. I was remembering this song today morning. This is a ghazal, by the Urdu poet, Hasrat Jaipuri (who was also a renowned lyricist of Hindi cinema). The song has been evocatively rendered by the brothers’ duo Ahmed Hussain and Mohd Hussain. I first heard this at a concert of the Hussain brothers in Hyderabad, exactly 10 years ago. A few months later, I found a cassette-album of theirs (titled "Guldasta") in a shop in Ahmedabad, which included the song.

Anyone who has walked a difficult path, alone, along a "road less travelled", and shared with another an unconventional intimacy – would appreciate this song. Its also a favourite of my colleague Amina (who mistakenly thought I had composed it after hearing me sing it!).

Listen to the ghazal here (link provided by Bhupinder).

chal mere saath hi chal, ae meri jaan-e-ghazal
in samajon ke baneye huey bandhan se nikal
chal…

hum vahan jayen jahan pyar pe pehere na lagey
dil ki daulat pe jahan koi lutere na lagey
kab hai badla ye zamana, tu zamane ko badal
chal…

pyar sachcha ho to rahen bhi nikal ati hain
bijliyan arsh se khud rasta dikhlati hai
tu bhi bijli ki tarah gam ke andheron se nikal
chal

apne milne pe jahan koi bhi ungli na utthey
apni chahat pe jahan koi bhi dushman na hanse
chhed de pyar se tu sazey, mohabbat pey ghazal
chal...

peechey mat dekh na shamil ho gunahgaron mein
samne dekhke, manzil hai teri taaron mein
baat banti hai agar dil mey, iradey ho atal
chal…

Let me attempt a translation:

Come walk with me alone, O my life-inspiration,
Break out of these socially constructed bonds
Come...

We shall go where there’s no surveillance on love
Where no thieves set upon hearts’ wealth
When has this world ever changed, you must change the world
Come...

When love’s true, the ways also emerge
The bolts of lightening from the heavens verily show the road
Do emerge too like lightening from the darknesses of grief
Come...

Where no fingers are pointed about our union
Where no enemy scoffs at our desires
Do tease out melodies with love, a poem on love
Come...

Don’t look back, don’t join the wrong-doers
Look ahead, your destination is in the stars
If your heart speaks, may your intentions be unshakable
Come...

Voices from the soil

Yesterday evening, after a long time I had a reunion with my old friend and comrade, Dr Pasupati Prasad Mahato. Pasupati-da is a distinguished anthropologist and social and cultural activist.

We met again today afternoon. He gave me a copy of his recently published book of poems (in Bengali) Manbhum Ma Hamar (Manbhum, My Mother: A Collection of Adivasi Bengali Poetry). The book has been published by Shobar Ganyer Khobor (Calcutta, 2007).

Pasupati-da selected and read out to me two of his poems from this volume, written in his native Purulia dialect. I present them below, together with my translation.





shombuk aajo

ramchandra uakey sidhailo tumi ke hey?
uttar ailo, hami shombhuk, jatitey shudro.
ramchandra sidhailo, tumi ki koirchho?
uttar ailo, hami baed path korchhi.

proja botshol ram, gota desher raja
ragey gur-gurayn, tolwar tainey
ghochang korey dilo shombhuker gola kaitey
shurdrer baed path cholbek nain.

manusanghitar ain, ramchandra rokhok,
ain omainnyo korlaey rashtrodrohi
shasti to patei hobek.
mrityudondo mrityudondo mrityudondo.
shombhuker gola kathchhey ainer rokhokra,
rashter biruddhey judhyo ghoshona,
eeta shoibhek nain,
hamra gonotontrer raja, shoibo nain.
shombuk-ke khujte ramayan ghantley pabi
ekhon jey ramayan choilchhey
otha domey samajsebider dolkhani,
shombhukra ekhon jailey, Bina bicharey.
bichhinotabadi, prithokotabadi,
rashtrodrohi shombhuk,
e’der gharey kota matha!!
shombhukra moirlo 14 march 2007 ey
nandigramey, nandigram tomakey selam.

Shambuk today too

Lord Rama asked him: Who are you?
He replied: I am Shambuk, Shudra by caste.
Lord Rama asked: What are you doing?
He replied: I am reciting the Vedas.

Rama, the ruler of the masses, is the king of the nation
Trembling with rage, drawing his sword,
Decapitated Shambuk with a single stroke.
A Shudra must never recite the Vedas.

The Law of Manusamhita, Lord Rama is its protector
Violation of the law is anti-national.
He must be punished!
Capital Punishment! Capital Punishment! Capital Punishment!
The protectors of the law are decapitating Shambuks
Declaration of war against the state?
This cannot be tolerated,
We are the kings of democracy, we won’t tolerate it.
To find Shambuk search through the Ramayana,
But the Ramayana of today -
Is brimming with the arrogance of social liberators,
Shambuks are in gaol, without trial.
Separatist, secessionist
Treacherous Shambuks,
Who, pray, are these fellows?
Shambuks were killed on 14 March 2007
In Nandigram, Nandigram we salute you!

(Translator's note: Shambuk is a Shudra character in the Ramayana. In the epic, after Rama has assumed the throne of Ayodhya following his return from exile, a Brahmin accuses him of causing the death of his son by his toleration of the Shudra, Shambuk, who has violated the caste hierarchy by engaging in extreme penances. In order to redress the situation, Rama searches for, finds and kills Shambuk. And the Brahmin boy comes back to life.)





Toutor

gota puruliay toutor toutor
domey liyai ke bodo toutor, babur?

court kachariye toutor,
jomi registri-ye toutor
thanay toutor, party office-ey toutor,
panchayat-ey toutor.
uara anchla paitey ghurchhey,
somajsebi-ke bishisto samajsebi boley
shwor ta chaikhey dhekrichhey
bolchhey hami puruliar toutor

chho nachey programme patey,
bidesh jaitey toutor dhor
suratey lebar legbi taw
mota taka niye toutor dhor.

hashpataley bhorti kortey
toutor dhor -
oxygen cylinder patey
toutor dhor
na holey anjona mahato’r
lekhen morbi.
chaila bhorti korbi schooley, toutor dhor,
B.Ed-ey bhorti hobi toutor dhor -
gota puruliyai toutorer desh.
toutor dhorei to legechhilo
koilkata patal railey
ghurli jokhon, tokhon TB,
ley ibar toutor dhor.

Touts

The whole of Purulia is full of touts!
A great competition over who’s the greatest tout of the babus!

Touts in the courts
Touts in the land registration offices
Touts in the police stations, touts in the party offices
Touts in the village government.
They go around with their collection cloth held out
The social liberators are termed as “distinguished social liberators”
Burping after swallowing the cream,
They declare, “We are the touts of Purulia!”

Want to get a chance to go abroad for the Chho dance programme?
Catch the touts.
Want to be a labour supplier to Surat?
Catch touts, with a big pile of money.

Want to get hospital admission?
Catch touts.
Need an oxygen cylinder?
Catch touts.
Or else, you will die, like Anjana Mahato.
Want to admit your child to school? Catch the touts.
Want to be admitted to the Bachelor of Education course? Catch the touts.
The whole of Purulia is tout country .
‘Twas through touts that I got to work
In Calcutta’s metro rail.
When I returned, I had tuberculosis.
There, now to go and catch the touts!

[Translator's note: In colloquial parlance, "tout" refers to fixers or middlemen, an entity with which Bengal society, and especially the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPI(M), is brimming. Anjana Mahato is the poet's mother.]

Learning Poetry

I was pleasantly surprised yesterday to stumble upon (on the net) a publication by the UNESCO, gathering the views of poets from across the world on the subject of the teaching of poetry to school students.

Reading and Writing Poetry: The Recommendations of Noted Poets from Many Lands on the Teaching of Poetry in Secondary Schools. Editor Richard W. Halperin, UNESCO, Paris, 2005, in English, French and Spanish. The English version is accessible here (1.3 MB).

44 important poets, from 25 countries, in 5 continents, were asked about the best ways to present poetry to secondary school students. The poets were asked 5 questions:

How would you like to see the purpose of poetry presented to adolescents?

How would you want teachers to differentiate poetic language from prosaic language? Are there teaching methods to stimulate the use of poetry by adolescents to express or understand thematically or emotionally difficult subjects?

How might teachers help motivate young people to visualise images created by poetic texts and cultivate attention to the use of imagery in poetic expression?

How can teachers help students at the secondary school level use poetry to sharpen the understanding of the difference between subjective and objective perception?

Are there any methods used in your country of birth or residence which you personally find effective for the teaching of poetry to secondary school learners which could be used equally well in other parts of the world?

This has ramifications that go beyond “poetry”. How can one help to bring out, like a gardener, all kinds of faculties and sensibilities in a child?

There was no one from Bangladesh, or from Bengal in India, in the UNESCO report’s list of poets – I think Bengali-speaking people must have the largest ppm (poets per million) in the world. But there was Ishfaque Ahmad of Pakistan, who are also a people quite in the sway of poetry, in Urdu and Punjabi, and with towering poet-sage giants from the distant to recent past.

The late Ishfaque Ahmad, authored several plays, novels and short stories in Urdu. I have felt that poetry is a mass phenomenon in the Urdu language, that is unmatched even in Bengali. So it was indeed edifying to read what he had to say. He begins his response by noting:

“For centuries, the poetry in my part of the world (Pakistan) has been a teacher of basic human values and a source of inspiration.”

I am looking forward to studying this report. Though quite a voracious reader, I had never been interested in poetry. But I could not help being susceptible to quite a few phrases, lines or verses, resounding or poignant, entering and staying in my consciousness. And then with the opening of my inner life I found myself subject to poetic imagination and expression. If I remember correctly, Ramana Maharishi had said that the mystic is one who dwells in mythic poetry.

The same inner life that awakened my poetic consciousness also led me to working in Priya Manna Basti, a slum in Howrah, among poor, Urdu-speaking Muslims. I felt that the community here proved that Urdu poetry and literature is not an elite pastime, it is part of the life and thinking of large numbers of people from very humble, labouring backgrounds. And this is not something involving merely passive appreciation, but rather connotes a process of nurturing of certain superior sensibilities, values and attitudes - a bent of spirit, a bearing - on the part of the genuine lover of Urdu poetry and language. Poetry is not a specialised, exotic fancy of some, but part of the mental universe of many.

Through the poetic imagination are the fundamental questions of life, society and the universe sought to be understood. For today’s world, mired in unending conflict and despair, and throwing up fundamental questions, about survival, peace, dignity and justice, it is only through the imagination, i.e. poetry, that the answers can be found.

Itinerant vendors' calls

As a child living in the city, I had as companions the calls and cries of the itinerant sellers of all kinds of wares and services. Like the automatic routines of nature, each day also consisted of the appearance of these itinerant vendors at one’s location, at specific times, to the accompaniment of their distinctive call and /or associate sounds (the creaking of a wheel of a cart, the hissing swish of a key-maker swinging his ring of keys, the twanging of the bow of the cotton-carding mattress maker...).

These calls had a persona of their own, and formed part of one’s universe of awareness. Each time of the day, for a child, has its own character and pace. The egg-seller going along hurriedly in the morning hurried one to leave for school. Some periods are languid and drag, with an undertone of unease and sadness. The street-seller’s call at that time would simply be part of that, made better known by that. Some periods beckon and are impatiently awaited, so particular calls buoyed up the spirit as heralds of that approaching time.

Scores of calls and sounds. One implicitly liked some calls. And the rest were all simply known, accepted as being part of the order of things. A distinctive sing-song of an old-newspaper buyer would be compelling, automatically making one sing along, silently, or quite loudly sometimes, with exaggerated flourish. Some made one rush to the veranda or gate, to have a look at the passing dancing-bear man, or snake-charmer. The piercing melody of some melancholy popular song from the one-string-violin-man; the occasional baul, with his belt of song pregnant with resonant words; the old violin-player, who just walked by slowly at night, playing a haunting tune, stopping at a junction and playing a while, and moving on; or the kirtan singers, single or in group, with just a pair of small cymbals, or quite elaborately equipped, with a harmonium and a dholok drum; or the pilgrims to Tarakeshwar announcing service at the holy feet of Lord Siva …; all these nourished one's sensory apparatus in so many ways.

During summer holidays spent at my grandparents' in Madras, though we lived in an apartment in a high-rise building, one was awakened in the morning by the cry of the vegetable seller on the road below, elaborately describing all the varieties of spinach he was purveying.

In one’s consciousness, each call was an entity, with a personality, that was often more real than the real person associated with that sound. Like a face, a temperament. If one – or one’s folks – had any interaction with a vendor, it was like getting acquainted with someone one knew about, from his call.

The writer RP Gupta had memorialised the itinerant vendors of Calcutta in his Kolkaatar Pheriwalar Daak (Calcutta’s Sellers’ Calls). One’s heart goes out to the man for paying this loving tribute to the companions of one’s childhood.

There are almost no more such itinerant vendors now. All kinds of changes have taken place. One is assailed by the blasting horns and roars of cars, motorcycles and buses racing by. Some vendors have adopted carts and have a cassette player and loudspeaker playing at an oppressive loudness, with an ugly electric syntheticity. But interestingly, some of these also do have a distinctive narration. And the same narration, for a magical balm brought out by a particular babu, promising instant freedom from chronic, torturous pains, is heard in another part of the city as well. And thus one realises that some disembodied voice now has attained wide electric outreach, beyond earlier possibility, through the efforts of other voiceless itinerants.


Photo: Itinerant Vegetable Seller, Kimbei Kusakabe,Yokohama, 1880.