I clicked these pictures at Chawri Bazar. Hats-off to these guys. They were propagating the information about TB and DOTS by distributing brochures. It was a small road show. We should learn the spirit from them.

DOTS - Sure cure for TB

For more information on TB visit http://www.tbcindia.org.

Much has been said, and much has been claimed and in the midst of this chaos, the simple truths were forgotten and overlooked. Every year, as the monsoon arrives, life is plagued by multiple woes; starting from water logging to various other issues. And as the monsoon clouds disappear, so is the common man’s angst against the MCD. However, one that is perennial, unlike the monsoon is the smelling garbage truck that you often end up following on your way to work, shards of decomposed stink flying from its coverless garbage. Several years ago, the Chief Minister of Delhi had made it mandatory for all garbage trucks to cover the waste with a canvas or a tarpaulin and to have more number of covered garbage trucks. But sadly enough, this isn’t the only promise that vanished into thin air. We can still see the trucks full of awful smelling garbage plying either uncovered or covered with a tattered polythene sheet or few sacks.

Uncovered garbage truck

The problem doesn’t end here only. Walk down the roads of any colony and one common sight is either the overflowed garbage bin or huge area of spilled rags, attracting the stray dogs, pigs, scavengers, mosquitoes.etc.

Spilled garbage on the road

It was said that there will be a pair of dustbin of different colors so that the garbage can be segregated into bio-degradable & non-degradable stuff and dumped accordingly. We can see these dustbins at some places but it remains questionable about the rate of their success. The lack of awareness is one of the major reasons for this.

The problem is that the civic body creates rules but hardly does anything to follow those rules or they make sure they are followed. The Kuda wala’s who come to our doorstep they also do not segregate the degradable and non-degradable stuff. In fact even if we keep them separate, they mix those and dump at the same place. Nobody is there to get hold of these people creating mess like overcharging, not collecting garbage from houses on regular basis and so on.

When we do not like litters inside our house then we should also make sure the surrounding of our house is clean. It is our civic and moral responsibility to maintain cleanliness both inside and outside the house. In fact if we can be conscientious to stop others from making our surrounding dirty, it will be easier for us to maintain cleanliness.

Charity begins at home. So if we the readers of this article start the practice and encourage other, which I am sure most of us will, then many others will also join us. Why not live in a beautiful and clean city & be proud of it, rather than regretting upon the fact that the city is dirty and we have to live with it. Let’s own this city for once.

Click to enlarge

“We have evidence, we have the culprit, and we have the witnesses………..but what we don’t have is the justice.”

Pragnya P Mohanty

Every time we suffer at the hands of terrorist, our suffering is instant and continues forever, because we are the public. What follows after such attacks is en-cashing of such incidents. Starting from politicians who use such incidents as a medium for votes and earning through the aids coming from various sources. In this the NGO’s also benefit quite a lot. Then it’s the media. They make sure to get each and every profit out of it, not only immediately but also a year after. They use the sentiments of general public to gain the huge revenue that flows in.

After every attack it’s said Delhi’s Spirit, Mumbai’s spirit etc. etc. But what choice the general public has other than moving on. We are bound to move on since we don’t have the choice. We know we are not going to get any protection and nothing concrete is going to be done. All the security and alertness is for a few days. Once the things start cooling down, all the security and checking in the public places are done just for the sake of formality only, traffic police officer talking on mobile phone while managing traffic at signals, security officer sipping tea & police officer dozing off at the check post are some of the common sights.

Taj Hotel under fire after terrorist attack

Photo by: Priyam Dhar

Government spending some crores per year which comes to around some lakhs per day to protect the terrorists like Ajmal Kasab, 26/11 terrorist attack captured in Mumbai attack, is a shame. Why so much farce of justice when we know what was the truth. He killed people mercilessly, openly and we are giving him more than a VIP’s treatment. For his medical treatment expensive Doctors are called in. What about those who suffered because of him? How much is government spending for those people? What have the victims like some of those kids who either lost a limb or gravely injured in some or the other form due to these terrorist attacks, got from government? We need justice in this as well. Don’t be unjust to the innocents and just to those merciless killers.

Mumbai terrorist attack accused Ajmal Amir Kasab

We are no more ready to forget and forgive such inhuman acts.

Amitabh Bachchan’s comment on Kasab

The Ring Road is hardly a circle and the Capital’s civic reputation, seldom exemplary. Yet, no matter how you abuse and where you curse, this city is perfectly livable and enjoyable. We enjoy the Blue Lines on laid back Sunday mornings and curse the smelly passengers standing alongside on another working day. The gubbaras hit our face and get us into a rage while the next hour we aim gubbaras at others to celebrate Holi. And long before you realize you have become a part of the city. This realization knocked me on a warm summer day in Kolkata in 2002. I exited from the Howrah station and looked around for an auto. To my surprise, I could spot none. It came to me in a flash that autos in Kolkata are not the ‘yellow and green’ of Delhi. I found swarms of black autos around me.

Yellow-Black Autorickshaw

The bone rattling experience inside the yellow-green autos is the Dilliwallah’s unique nouveau culture. While one would fleece you to the bone, another will be the guardian of morality calling you to return your lost cellphone. Pimped to the teeth with streamers, distorted images of Bollywood’s queens, stereo and a dysfunctional fare-meter, auto-rickshaws in Delhi are a class apart. My experience with auto rides in the city has been vivid and extreme, much like my confrontation and assimilation with the rest of its cultures. I narrate here the most bizarre of them all.

A decade removed from the hustle bustle of the city is a sleepy locality called Gandhi Vihar. Local auto wallahs ply on the dusty route between Kingsway Camp and Gandhi Vihar on ‘fixed, fare and share’ system. I had gone to meet an old friend at Gandhi Vihar and I boarded this shared-fared auto on my way back home. Three sit at the back and two on the driver’s flanks; left and right.

With some reluctance, I occupied the last remaining seat on the driver’s left flank. We were soon speeding down the deserted street that connects Gandhi Vihar to the rest of Delhi. It overtook a cyclist and something curious buzzed around us. Within a few seconds it erupted again trying to overtake a pedestrian, “hat ja tao panache ne, naachan de jee bharke”.

‘Is that the horn?’ I asked hesitatingly and the driver beamed, ‘Ha. yeh haran hai’. We soon landed on the concrete road towards Batra Cinema and the street lights greeted us back to the city. The horn buzzed incessantly, snaking its way through the flood of people. I wonder if they realized what this was. Everything made way for our green and yellow war horse. The war horse advanced with its war cry and its soldiers poking their heads from the flanks.

Public transportation has its own drawbacks (read charms). The list of drawbacks hitherto included is over charging, bargaining and time consumption. I added ‘muscial horns’ to the list.

Delhi Metro in no time has become lifeline of Delhi. It not only provides easy & clean mode of transport but also safe for the commuters late at night also. Delhi Metro not only helps to avoid heavy traffic jam but also helps in reducing the pollution.

Apart from the countless advantages of Delhi Metro one of the advantageous features of it is escalator. But its really sad that people really don’t value the escalator given for convenience. A few days back while commuting by Metro at the escalator of Rajeev Chowk metro stations I noticed people block the entire escalator. It gets difficult for people who are in hurry. Even the Metro Guide suggest that while using escalators stand on the left side of the escalators and while moving keep to the right. People who want to stand should do so by keeping to the left side, so that others willing to move can do so without any hindrances. The fault has also been on the part of DMRC since they have not advertised it properly. The Tube used in London & the escalators there have proper guidelines so that people adhere to them & commute conveniently.

Escalators - Delhi Metro

Escalators - London Tube

If we stand on the left of escalator and move on the right side it will help us to get through fast and easy when we are in hurry. Someone might be late for an interview, to go to a hospital or somewhere else which is time bound. We should also not transport bulky or heavy loads on escalators to ensure their smooth functioning. Escalator is for the convenience of people & not for any particular individual.

“Marriages are made in heaven”, but settled on Earth via matrimonial service providers – well, not always – sometimes the experience is to the contrary. Recalling from my experiences ranging from downright hilarious to hair-raising, I relate an event to throw some light on the efficacy of finding a match through matrimonials.

First comes the tough task of reducing one’s identity to a word limit that suits one’s budget, and make no mistake, for the fair gender the vital statistics stretch beyond the right curves – the girl should have the right complexion, the right height, the right width, the right attitude, the right academic degree, the right religious inclinations, the right time of birth, the right culinary skills, and the right set of teeth to the right height of heels.

After short-listing a prospective groom on the basis of factors ranging from the size of his paunch to the receding hairline, from the droop of his moustache to his height (this is relevant for the girl) and the bank balance he sports (the parents’ concern) and an archaeological survey of his family’s history, the matter proceeds further.

The two parties assemble, each assessing the other minutely and with complete absence of – discretion! The guy in question is a Captain in the army – so far so good.

Then the ordeal begins – the boy’s father starts hurtling a series of questions about studies, career, ethics, and morals – all hypothetical in the extreme. For instance, in one breath I was asked if I would mind keeping my head covered and occasionally observe “purdah”? And do I speak fluent English? To my increasing amusement he asked if I knew how to trace henna patterns on hand? And to put to my ease I was informed that the “boy” in question did it extremely well (eeks!). Meanwhile the boy asked if I could sing. I immediately denied, however, it was not acceptable with him insisting persistently that my voice revealed otherwise. Finally I couldn’t control myself and let the truth out – I said of course I sing but there is a slight problem with those who hear me plead that I should stop traumatizing others. This saved the day for me for upon hearing this they were shocked – not because I could not sing but at my audacity for cracking jokes.

The party immediately dispersed, and I thanked God for sparing me from being married to a dunce whose family never even thought of letting me know and question the boy.

The process of fixing an “arranged marriage” through newspaper columns has been a very heady mixture of pain in the neck as well as downright ridiculous. One is completely unaware of the people one is going to meet and it’s only a matter of chance that things click and a “deal” is made for the convenience of getting married. Certain existential questions always remain unanswered, and they forever are, because after marriage one has no choice left but live a life of compromise if one’s spouse’s behavior doesn’t meet expectations.

But a coin has two sides to it. Matrimonials can be a good medium to get married at the right time, at the right age and with most of the conditions being met – from the point of view of the marrying couple and that of the parents. And if the partners are happy with each other, there’s nothing like it. India has had a tradition of arranged marriages ever since ancient times. Then, it used to be old uncles and aunts as instruments for finding a suitable match. The newspapers have taken over today. We don’t have sweeping statistics of how well the papers are doing, or how effective the ads are for people in finding a partner because different people have different experiences. But what we hear most is that the boys’ side are ever the more demanding (cash or kind? They think they are the Kings of Convenience); indecent ways of getting out of the first meeting (how to say yes or no?); and the discomfort on the part of boy and girl to come to terms with each other.

All said and done, one should use the matrimonial columns at one’s own risk. God doesn’t keep a score of the hits and misses here on Earth, for He must be busy with the next version of Adam and Eve (and their protégé) taking care that there should be no bug left behind.

I was recently reading a small article about the Aarushi murder case by a lesser known columnist from New York. The article moved from the murder story towards Arvind Adiga’s novel, The White Tiger.

Aarushi murder case throws new light into the clichéd stories (read fear) of the capital city of India. The fear of domestic helps being one such. It doesn’t need much effort to understand why the cops zeroed in on Hemraj as the killer of the fourteen year old Aarushi; he was the domestic help; a Nepali and was missing. The cops blatantly overlooked all known basic drills of investigation, like following the blood stains that led to the terrace (a retired cop discovered the partially decomposed body of Hemraj days later) and for that matter, taking photographs of the murder scene. The TV screens have changed with time and it speaks no more about Aarushi.

But what is it like to live in this city? With the risk of being labeled as an achluophobic person or of being agoraphobic, I have drawn a list of Delhite’s most common fears:

1. Domestic Servants: Anyone in Delhi can afford a domestic servant as long as one can provide the servant a space to sleep and food to eat. A spate of murders by domestic servants and disappearing with cash and jewelry – has blotted the recent history of this city. Many new laws have come up to reign in the indispensable domestic helps. One such is to fill the ‘verification form’ of the domestic helps.
2. Taking lift: From the deserted routes of outer Delhi to the soulless expressways, waving down a car for a lift is not a frequent phenomenon on Delhi’s roads. Newspapers are littered with stories of robberies on infamous bus routes, to looting passengers after giving lifts. And quite fascinatingly, it works the other way around where people take lift and loot the driver. Replace the word ‘loot’ with abuse, murder and rape and the statement still stands true. Google ‘Billa Ranga’ to know where it all started.
3. Being a woman: One needs no orientation to know what it means being a woman in Delhi. Some call it the CRIME CAPITAL OF INDIA and others have their own words to describe Delhi. But essentially a woman in Delhi is considered fortunate if she gets away being groped and pinched on public spaces. And unless nothing more happens, the cops won’t be eager enough to entertain your complaints. Around a year ago a TV journalist was shot dead when she was driving back home at night from work. The Chief Minister, who happened (happens) to be a woman then commented how the deceased was being adventurous.
4. The three wheelers: I know many, who bought cars only to avoid haggling with the immoral, foul mouthed auto rickshaw drivers on Delhi’s roads. The Delhi Government introduced tamper proof electronic meters to make life easier for the commuters. They even introduced help lines. But nothing changed when it came to fares and the haggling. If he responds by scratching his head when you ask for his fare – beware he is going to come up with a three digit number! And don’t get shell shocked when he audaciously tells you, “Say we are going by the meter, if the cops ask,” resetting the meter.
5. Bluelines: I would leave this one unexplained and urge my readers to take a ride in one of the privately owned city buses, before they are completely phased out.
   
   Note: If you see the driver smoking a bidi under the hand painted sign, “no smoking,” just poke your head through the window for some fresh air.

Time and again it’s we who have paid the price for the terrorist attacks. Value of life has reduced to the value of rubble. We cry, we mourn, we brood but ultimately we are forced to forget & move on and they think that’s the spirit. No it’s not our spirit but we are bound to move on, because we know we are no IMPORTANT people with the Z class security & ample amount of money behind us to support us. WE the general PUBLIC of INDIA paying tax so that they can get the comforts & the Z-Class security at the cost of our lives. Our JAWAN’S are there to give away their lives for these high class people.

It’s really terrible to know that those who are fighting the terrorists & risking their lives are given 303 guns to face the AK47 & AK56. They are given cheap quality Bullet proof (the so called) jackets. The families of the “Martyr’s” are humiliated. It’s a sad state of affairs where no one has any value except those who are in power. Politics has become a rodent & is eating out our foundation. Some political group is talking about the make-up of a woman protesting, someone else is humiliating our heroes, and somebody else is asking the ministers to resign. Also there are some who consider their region above the democracy & the country. How shameless can these people be? I really hope these people get some senses in them & understand the fact that you are there because of the country & the tax paying citizens of INDIA. If we are dying you will not be spared for long. You are no BHISMA PITAMAH with the blessing to live as long as you want to.

We all need to fight back terrorism unitedly. Some sense of responsibility & awareness on our part can also make a lot of difference. Lets all keep a vigilant eye around. In case anyone comes across any suspicious activity, any suspicious movement or have any information to tell to the Anti-Terror Squad, please take a note of the new ALL INDIA TOLL-FREE Terror Help-line “1090″. Your city’s Police or Anti-Terror squad will take action as quickly as possible. Remember that this single number 1090 is valid all over India. This is a toll free number and can be dialed from mobile phones. Moreover, the identity of the caller will be kept a secret.

Paying homage to all the MARTYRS lets all come together and fight back terrorism. Let’s not forget the terrorism attack. I will request the media to make sure that no one forgets these heinous acts of terrorists. Only when we will remember the pain then only we will be able to fight back. Let this time no politicization of the monstrous act is allowed. Enough is enough. Value our lives……& not the votes.

What purpose does a terrorist attack solves, is something that people of no religion, caste, creed or status can ever support? Or can they? A bomb does not recognize any individual before blowing apart the lives. The one who died belongs to which community is something that bomber might not know, but at least he knew that’s a life worth for somebody at his/her home.

We conscious condoles the sad demise of those people who loose & lost their lives in such tragic incident(s). I hope the law is revised & updated for such terrorists so that the innocents are not victimized.