The Unknown Anna

Both are Gandhians. Both are selfless doers. Both are fighting for causes of colossal magnitude. Both resorted to fasting. Both are ordinary humans. Both are social activists. But one went on to become a National Hero and the other still remains to be just another social activist. Compare them on a couple of pans, put a 12 day fast on one and on the other, an eleven year fast. Of course, the latter is heavier.

Meet Sharmila Chanu, better known as Irom Sharmila Chanu. Born on 14th  March, 1972, none would have imagined it in their wildest of dreams that this lady from the North Eastern belt of India would go on to hold the record for being the World’s longest hunger striker. Her reasons to hold the hunger strike are no meager reasons. It is more than a decade now that she is demanding the Indian Government to repeal the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958. She blames this Act for creating the amount of insurgence it has in the areas of Manipur, Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland. This Act was also imposed in Jammu and Kashmir later. This Act entitles the Armed forces with the ultimate authority to use force or fire upon any person, arrest without a warrant and search any premise without any notice during times of emergency in the disturbed areas.

Hell broke loose in Malom, a small town in the Imphal valley on the 2nd  of November back in the year 2000 when ten commoners were shot down at a bus stop by the Assam Rifles (a part of the Indian Paramilitary Forces). Deeply affected by the ruthless incident which otherwise is known as the Malom Massacre, Chanu began her journey of unimaginable struggle, inexplicable pain and intensive torture. Right from the outset, the killing of people based on mere suspicion sounds farcical and that is what Chanu is fighting against. Her fasting has become an epic struggle now and while the law makers and executors should pay heed to it, they instead have pushed her deep into further trouble. Her act of fasting has been looked upon as an attempt to suicide which is unlawful under Section 309 of the Indian Penal Code. The law has found her guilty on the above grounds and she serves an imprisonment up to one year (with or without fine) every year. Chanu keeps getting released and re-arrested every year which goes to show the indifference of the government towards her. While Chanu hasn’t taken a morsel of food or even a drop of water for more than a decade now, she has been put on nasogastric intubation which force feeds her twice a day with a handful of vitamins and nutrients. There are two sides to this discussion. You may look at it as a method to keep her alive or you may think of it as a cruel way to kill her again and again, every passing moment. But amidst all this, she might just weigh 37 kilos, her body organs might have gone defunct but the fact that she is still fighting on a hospital bed is painfully inspiring enough to create a wave of awakening.

Has her life created a wave of awakening? The answer is a painful NO. When Chanu started off with her fast, she might have never thought that it would take so long. And even after a decade’s fight, her demand longs for fulfillment. Her courage has been awarded with various Global, Bravery and Peace Awards but does that serve her purpose? The answer again is a painful NO. Her struggle got a fresh leash of life in the year 2006 when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh promised to amend the Act to ensure it was humane. And that promise is yet to be fulfilled.

Chanu’s life and struggle have been plots of innumerable documentaries, books, debate and a few audacious ones consider it to be a feat to be registered in the books of World Records. Did Chanu ever ask for all this? All that she still wants is justice. All that she still yearns for is respect for the human life which is violated by the AFSPA Act. Simple things are best answered with simplicity but our complex constitution doesn’t seem to believe in it. While the Ramlila Maidan where Anna sat down fasting was enveloped by special security personnel, Chanu on the other hand, is left seeking support. Anna found support from all across the country, including the media, celebrities, top businessmen, high rank officials etc. While the entire nation woke up to the chants of Anna and demanded justice, one wonders why such a step-motherly treatment has been dished out to Chanu. Does this mean that Chanu’s reasons don’t qualify for a hearing? If that is the story, then our country and its law makers really need to draw a line. And here we are not talking about the much hyped Below Poverty Line. The country now needs to draw a line for what deserves justice, which method is legal enough and who is qualified enough to do it?

In a nation where a kid falling into a pit makes news, celebrity break-ups and patch ups make news, Chanu’s story deserves better treatment. Irom Sharmila Chanu is rightly called the Iron Lady of Manipur, for more reasons than one. Her as-strong-as-iron determination and guts is a lesson to be learnt. But more importantly, the biggest question that we need to find an answer to is:

“Who defends the defender?”

This article was written during Anna Hazare's longest hunger strike to move the government to frame the Jan Lokpal Bill.

Monsoon Health Hazards

All that we hope for, after a never ending sultry spell of summer is the dashing rains. While one is totally sapped out by the exhausting heat, one still doesn’t lack the enthusiasm of welcoming the rain with open arms. For a school kid, monsoon is the splash of mud that he enjoys after school gets over whereas for a college goer it is the inexplicable joy of sipping a hot coffee and watching the rain drops create a mist on the glass panes. While an employee hates the rain interrupting his work schedule, a housewife loathes the weather for not allowing her to dry the washed clothes. These are the multiple contradictory remarks that people make about the rain. In a way, it wouldn’t be wrong to comment that the woman, who prays for the relieving rains during summer, actually hates it when she is confined to her living room during the incessant rains.

While monsoon brings with it a bundle of joy, it is also accompanied by a horde of diseases that the human body is immensely susceptible to. The ideal way of celebrating monsoon is by taking good care of our ownselves because they say, “Prevention is always better than cure.”

Monsoon poses a lot of threat in the form of innumerable water borne diseases and gastro-intestinal infections. Some of the common diseases that do the rounds are diarrhea, typhoid, jaundice, dengue, malaria, etc. Influenza is perhaps the commonest of all while gastric disturbances and high blood pressure are also encountered in this season.

So, we at P3, thought of helping our readers with a few health tips and precautions that one should follow in order to enjoy the monsoon in its full glory.

• Since most of the diseases encountered during monsoon are waterborne, one should take extra care of the water that is used, be it for drinking or any other purpose. The doctors advise us to boil water before using it, round the year and more so during this season. Contaminated water leads to several infections, especially diarrhea, which can aggravate many other diseases. It is also advised that one should drink boiled water since it helps digestion.

• Besides taking extreme care of the water we use, we should also be equally vigilant about the kind of food we consume. Eating out is a “Strict NO, NO!” The idea of having a quick snack at a roadside food stall sounds very tempting but it comes with a lot of germs. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to compromise a bit on the taste buds and actually look to have homemade food as far as possible. Eat food which is well cooked and served hot. Fried, spicy food must be avoided too.

• Fruits and vegetables should we washed carefully before cooking. Leafy vegetables are the ones which contain germs more than the other, hence special care should be taken about it. Vegetables and fruits which are cut long back and kept in the open should be avoided.

• Insects like flies are the most common carriers of germs and hence precaution should be taken in order to keep them away from causing contamination. Food should be covered at all times, vegetables and fruits should be kept away too.

• Mosquito breeds the most during this season and causes the most dangerous disease of the season in the form of malaria and dengue. Care should be taken to drive out any puddles. Phenyl or kerosene must be poured in the drainage areas to stop the breeding of mosquitoes. While malaria is the most common monsoon disease, dengue is suspected to engulf about two- fifth of the world population as per one of the latest reports released by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Besides all these infections, Cholera is a dreaded bacterial infection which has caused a lot of deaths in the past and continues to be a danger even now. Typhoid, which again is a common name during the monsoons, is caused by contaminated food and water. Typhoid if not attended at the right time can cause a lot of complications.

The epidemic which took the world by storm, H1N1 otherwise known as Swine Flu, is also reported to see a rise during the monsoons. Till mid 2009, 34,000 cases of Swine Flu were reported, resulting in 1500 odd deaths.

The high humidity which is prevalent during the monsoons runs people into risks of getting several fungal infections. Doctors advise to wear cotton clothes and loose clothes to avoid fungal infections. Hair care problems are also on the rise during this time therefore proper conditioning and shampooing is advised.

Doctors strongly believe that dealing with monsoon diseases doesn’t require efforts which would force people to go out of their way. It in fact involves a lot of common sense and the basic knowledge that we had acquired during our primary school days. Habits like washing hands, using good detergent for washing, use of antiseptic soaps, etc. is a must.

Remember in this monsoon, cleanliness is the secret of healthiness and happiness!

This article was published in the health section of P3.. Not Just Page 3.

A Foodie's Day Out!

The charm of India lies in the fact that its unity shines amidst a plethora of diversities. Be it a thousand religions or a million Gods, be it a bountiful of beliefs and practices or a billion dreams, India has always come up with a lot of surprises. Not much different is its food habits as well.

“Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.” – Socrates.

That saying doesn’t hold true anymore with the taste buds craving for more and hence it wouldn’t be wrong to claim, that many of us, including many of you – our readers, want to wear the best, possess the best and eat the best too, so much so that we at times can actually “Live to Eat.” The obsession is so much so that when matrimonial offers come across, the first question that the son’s mom asks is, “Does she know how to cook?” When the man returns exhausted from his workplace, the first question he asks is, “What’s there for dinner, tonight?” The finicky Gen Next kids can just ignore food that they don’t like and go on a fast. We’re pretty particular about what we eat, aren’t we? So, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to actually look at how India looks from the Foodie’s eyes.

If one keenly looks at India, every piece of land would spring up a different culture, a different lifestyle and a different food habit too. Variety is the spice of life and India, the land of spices, adds that spice to life too. The tourists from abroad have more often than not expressed their appreciation for the Indian food, despite succumbing to a Delhi Belly. The Indian Food Map is such that it urges one to dive into a fantasy of travelling throughout India and possibly enjoy the best meal at specific places for specific time of the day.

Statutory Warning: Travelling to all the mentioned parts of India for specific meals in a single day is completely fictitious. Any resemblance to the characters like Mr.India, Krrish, Ra.One is co-incidental.

Disclaimer: We’re not responsible for Delhi Belly (Diarrhea experienced by travellers in a foreign land for not being accustomed to local food and water.)

We start off the day with a hope to gobble up the best food in our breakfast and the Southern belt of India (especially Tamil Nadu and Karnataka) doesn’t disappoint us. Wake up with the special coffee made from the plantations in Chikmagalur and expect to have the same aroma in life too. You can order for a sumptuous plate of Masala Dosai with the perfect blend of taste and appetite. For those who don’t quite favour the Dosai can go for a plate of Idlis with Sambar.

A fresh morning now makes way for some strenuous work at office and after all the hard work, one looks to have a heavy meal for lunch. The East is believed to have a heavy lunch and what more would one ask for if he is served with a spicy, yes a little oily bowl of fish (Ilish maach, better known as the King of fish) with a plate of steamed rice. You can choose your favourite dish of fish though, be it Bhaapa Ilish or Doi Maach. After satiating your hunger, the perfect thing that can light up your mood and sweeten your talks for the next few hours would be Rossogolla.

Rossogolla and West Bengal are synonymous, so much so that it is often called the Land of Rossogollas. The Bengalis have mastered the art of preparing this special dessert and keeping in mind that the diabetics can’t have it, they have this Sugar Free Rossogollas too.

Third on our list is the evening snacks and after having covered the Southern and Eastern India, it is time to move to the West. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to amalgamate the best of Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra on our thali. The Gujarati snack bread known as Thepla and the tea time snack in the form of Khandvi make for luscious snacks. One can opt for the Vada Paos as well which is the most popular dish from Maharashtra or order for a plate of Batata Vada and Kandi Bhaaji. The list doesn’t end here with the Royal Rajasthanis dishing out the ever so tasty Pyaaz Kachoris. Wow! Food is like.. heaven, isn’t it ?

Now, last but no way is the least, our supper. All is well that ends well and here too, we have prepared for the best to round off a day which has been a “A Foodie’s Day Out!”  We now move towards North for what promises to be a mouthwatering dinner. While the veggies can enjoy the Delhi special Chhole Bhature/Masala Kulcha (which often is found on the To-do-list), the non-vegetarians have a lot to choose from. They can go for an out and out Punjabi meal like a Makke di Roti, Sarson da Saag or have the authentic Tandoori Chicken with Paranthe. Butter Chicken is among the other specialties here and still sells out the most in any restaurant located in any area of the nation. If it was Rossogollas in West Bengal, it is the ever so famous Chaach-Lassi served in a towering glass which rounds off a highly sumptuous meal.

After having gorged on a never ending variety of food, any foodie would be filled to the heart as well as stomach. Sometimes, diversities are welcome, especially when they offer such a wide array of dishes. Amidst all these diversities, the Indian food has managed to be a source of unity and hence, sends out a statement to all the tourists (who complain about the rich and high on cholesterol food) that, “Love me or hate me but you simply can’t resist me.”

Here’s wishing all our readers, Happy Munching.

This article was written in the month of May and was first published in P3.. Not Just Page 3 before being published on different other websites.

Snore Machaaye Shor!!

Not too long back, there was an attempt to forge an alliance between two families by a matrimonial agent. Like the usual customs of a Hindu family, the ladke-waale ventured out to meet the ladki-waale with their huge band wagon of friends and family. I strongly believe that even the IIM-A selections don’t follow such fine screening processes like we do for marriages here.

First the boy’s family meets the girl’s family, while the boy’s eyes keep scouring for the girl and the boy’s friends look for the girl’s friends and sisters. The boy’s family speaks to the girl who more often than not, gives an impression of cooking for the entire household and the colony as well. The boy’s family now makes way for the boy and his friends to meet the lady who comes along with her cousins and friends.

Like a film-maker would say, cut to the lawn, the evening is slowly slipping into the darkness with the lamps being switched on.

Boy and his friends: What’s your hobby?

Girl: Listening to music, cooking, umm...

Girl’s friends: What do you guys do on Sundays? You people drink, right?

Boy’s friends: Not just drink, in fact drink like a fish, sleep till noon, laze around and go pubbing the entire evening.

Girls’ friends: Sleep till noon ?? Gawd!

Boy’s friends: Yeah only if Raj (the prospective groom) doesn’t snore to death.

Breaking of glass! Lightning! Thunder!

Cut to the main-gate; The boy’s friends and family are seen walking out, the alliance broke.

Snoring can break marriages! That is how hazardous it can be! 

As per the dictionary, ‘snore’ means to breathe during sleep with hoarse or harsh sounds caused by the vibration of the soft palate. Wonder how a harsh and intolerable sound is produced by something called a soft palate, what’s so soft if it comes out with such a hard hitting noise? But sometimes, words fail to  describe the actual meaning of something; such is the case with snoring.

On being asked how snoring has affected him, a school-goer replied that every time he heard the sound of snoring coming through from the other room, he felt confident enough to surf through TV channels he wasn’t allowed to watch. To this a college goer replied that he made it a point to slowly sneak out a fag from his dad’s packet to enjoy the joys of doing something which he is restricted to.

We shall decide later whether snoring is a crime or not, but that it promotes crime is something we are sure of, after knowing the above mentioned reactions.

For a few wives, snoring of her husband confirms that it’s not yet time to rise from the bed to get going with her daily household chores in the morning. If this is how things would pan out to be, snoring might just go on to remove alarm clocks out of our lives forever.

Snoring is the Loot Lo offer that comes during the Puja vacations for the thieves in the town. While a thief goes patrolling across the households, he keeps a keen ear on the snoring that comes through the windows. Snoring confirms the existence of sleepaholics, hence easy shop- lifting, err.. house lifting!

“Where there is a snore, there’s certainly a confident chor!”

Meandering away from all the humor now, we take a look at a more serious incident. Not too long back, in fact only back in 2009, a man living in south-west Russia had been put behind the bars for murdering a woman who had this habit of snoring. Victor Rudakov had been invited over to the woman’s house for a drink along with his friends. By the time, the guys finished their drink and were about to go to sleep, this woman made terrible noise with her act of snoring. After failing to wake her up, Victor hit her with a plank of wood on the head for close to 30 times before she succumbed to death due to the injuries. Now that’s one serious offence. Isn’t it? Seven years of imprisonment for a snore-murder case, that’s something one wouldn’t imagine in the wildest of dreams.

Snoring and divorces aren’t surprising anymore. There have been many such occurrences in the past and there’s no stopping it seems. In some foreign countries, snoring is considered to be a crime as much as spitting on the roadside is. However, it doesn’t apply to India though, i.e both the crimes.

Snoring is certainly not a petty matter anymore, especially after having known the repercussions. Although there are a lot of exercises that can be adopted to get rid of snoring and hence divorces and murders, it seems people have started to live with it. If you have a snorer around, make sure you don’t use a wooden plank to avoid it.

Rather, remember this, “Two cotton balls a day keeps the snoring away!”

This article was written in the month of May, 2011 for the English monthly, P3.. Not Just Page 3.

Puppy Love

“The magic of first love is our ignorance that it can never end.” Love knows no bounds, no limits and most importantly in this piece, knows no age either. For a teen from school, the few threads of hair over his lips are believed to be a sign of growing; but if he is anxious to trim them off to look clean, this for many is a sign of love. Genetically it is understood that a girl spends more than half her age standing in front of a mirror but when a guy starts doing so, that is love. Teen love is being stupid for each other; teen love is being stupid together but under all this stupidity, lies a divine truth - that it’s the first step towards growing up. Yes folks you need to love in order to grow up. We would be lying to each other if we say that we haven’t fallen into this beautiful net of emotions early in life. So it wouldn’t be a bad idea to walk down memory lane and actually see how stupid we were for a sweet girl/how stupid we were for a cute guy.

School is the cradle of all love stories and the center of all heart breaks too; but the courage of happily overcoming the latter to experience the former is the quintessential element of our lives. Perhaps being a  notorious fellow in the class is the birthright of every guy and that often leads us to share a bench with one of the most studious and shy girls in the classroom. Whether or not, it mends us to be as studious as our partner, is a thing to be decided later. Those who are notorious will always seek the attention of one and all but when they don’t get it from the person sitting right next to them, it starts concerning them. Is that the beginning of our sweet little puppy love story? Your guess is as good as mine.

Then the attempt to know her favourites began and putting our ownselves in her colours was evident. The blush that shows up on our faces while filling up the slambooks, especially the section that reads “Your latest crush” speaks more than what we actually end up writing. Although we complain, yet somewhere deep inside our heart, we love the fact that some friends have mischievously written our names together. The joys of writing love notes and hiding it inside our pockets, the nervous excitement while playing a round of “Dare or Truth”, the stupid calculation games like “FLAMES” to find out the percentage of our love are all a proof of the cuteness we have been through.

Her favourites were my favourites now. Right from using the same color pencils to watching her favourite movie over  and over again; humming her most loved song to bringing her favourite dish in the lunch bag were the crazy things we did. All this, just to convey her a simple message that we were made for each other. Soon the route to her home was the route that I took up too because the end of the day at school seemed to be the end of the world for me. She meant the world to me!

If she had a flat tyre I didn’t have any qualms in pushing my bicycle along just to give her company till her destination. The times spent with  her seemed to be  the best  time of  the day. The anxiety revolving around, ahead of her birthday kept me awake night after night. The grit behind every single pie saved to buy her a gift, the brain racking involved in planning a gift, were all a special part of life. The calls we made, hiding from everyone’s sight; the entire roll we spent on clicking her pictures during picnics, were the blushing moments of those beautiful days.

Love and songs seem to share an inseparable relationship. Our parents of course have passed through our age way back and hence when the likes of Enrique Iglesias and George Michael are on a never ending loop on the music systems it certainly pings them to ask us “Beta jawaan ho gaya hai chakkar kya hai?”. How many times youngsters might have seen them lean on the tea gardens and jump off the hills singing the cult song “Pehla Nasha Pehla Khumaar”? Suddenly, I developed this knack of watching romantic movies and relating to it was obvious. The urge of converting the reel life to real life was tempting and all those songs which showed love birds singing on screen seemed fascinating to me.

Whether this fairytale lasts a lifetime or not, is a matter of fate but the fact that it happened, is a thing to be cherished forever. The simplest things are often the truest. Love marks the beginning of the moment when we start thinking ourselves as adults, whether we actually are or not, is a different case altogether. And to add to it whether it was love or not we don’t know. But a few years down the line when someone looks at it at the hindsight, one’s face will be lit up by smiles and mind filled with sumptuous, enriching memories. Name it puppy love or nostalgia; it is indeed a defining moment in life.

So remember the next time you come across your old friends don’t forget to relive those moments because there are a few moments which are worth dying for and a few which tell you that you’ve indeed lived a life!

This article was written during the Valentines' week and was published in P3.. Not Just Page 3 and a few other periodicals including college magazines.