Thursday, June 27, 2013

Why Ray's heroes are a breed apart...

On the occasion of legendary filmmaker Satyajit Ray’s 21st death anniversary on April 23rd 2013, Monojit Lahiri pulls back to provide both, a long shot and a close-up of what made his heroes so different, special and unique.

In epics, sagas, legends and folklore, the ‘hero’ is always Mr. Perfect. Brave, bold, truthful, chivalrous and noble. In the Mumbai-manufactured ‘masala’ movies, add sexy handsome and macho (and don’t bother to strain the brain cells too much!). For over three and a half decades the one hero who blazed the screen and scorched the imagination of millions was the towering and charismatic Amitabh Bachchan.  In recent times, the likes of Sunjay Dutt, Sunny Deol, Abhishek Bachchan, Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn, The Khan combine (Saif included) and Hrithik Roshan have clashed swords for that coveted clot.

In serious cinema (parallel cinema that is) the concept of hero and heroism is not quite as bombastic. Here there is no specific agenda to titillate the wish-fulfillment aspect of the turned-on viewer.  He does not spew armpit rhetoric aimed at the front benchers.  He is a flesh and blood character, acting out real feelings with identifiable honesty, sensitivity and feeling. Agreed, he doesn’t always win, but who does?  Not you or me – only the larger than life caricatures in masala land!

The heroes of Satyajit Ray’s films are a breed apart.  They are even more rooted to the soil and milieu of their environment. Observes Chidananda Das Gupta with rare perception in the most definitive book written on the maestro, The Cinema of Satyajit Ray. “The natural character of an actor was important to Ray, not only in the case of the non-professional, but professionals as well. He must, in real life, reflect some of the basic qualities sought in the character to be portrayed. Acting against the grain of the actor’s nature is unacceptable in Ray’s scheme of things. That is precisely why Ray’s actors exude more or less the same impression of themselves in real life as they do on screen.  Soumitra Chatterjee, Dhritiman Chaterjee (Pratidwandi) or Pinaki Mukherjee (Jana Aranya), all have the unmistakable imprint on them of an intellectual pursuit and contemplative nature. The characters they play on screen are very like themselves.”

Let’s start with Apu in Apur Sansar, the third and last chapter of his unforgettable (Pather Panchali, Aparajito) trilogy.  Apu is a young  man who marries, writes his first novel and then loses his wife in childbirth. This tragedy sends him staggering into the wilderness.  His pathos is summed up in one magnificent image as he casts away the sheets of the novel. They flutter down the hillside in the luminous light of dawn, evoking an overwhelming sense of melancholy. Apu is filled with nostalgia, but when at last he is reunited with his on, it gives him a new vitality and joy with which to face the future.  Thus the wheel has turned full circle and the trilogy closes with Apu carrying his child just as it began with his grandmother rocking him in the cradle. Fittingly for the role of the sensitive Apu, Ray introduced Soumitra Chatterjee – an actor whose physical and intellectual parallels bore such striking resemblance to the character he was to portray, that it inspired the prestigious Time magazine to eulogise, ‘His actors act not with the usual combinations of oriental drama, but as though the camera found them alone and simply living; and they live as few characters in pictures do – real lives that swell to the skin with pain and poetry and sudden wit.’

Take Nayak where the great god, Ray, took Bengal’s (late) King of Hearts, Uttam Kumar for the first time, causing many to believe that the maestro had finally lost it!  Nothing of course was further from the truth. The essence of the film concerned itself with the emptiness that plagued the life of a celluloid superstar. The storyline oozes out of the empty confines of an air-conditioned coach carrying him to Delhi, where a State award awaits him. On the trip he meets an intelligent, young, woman journalist (Sharmila Chatterjee) in the dining car.  A rapport develops between them and in a rare moment of human contact, he tells her of his most private frustrations, doubts and weaknesses.  While it is commonly recognized that Ray’s best works are derived from literary sources other than his, his eye for impeccable casting has almost always been universally acknowledged. Uttam Kumar was Bengal’s reining superstar, whose mere name on the marquee set off serpentine queues. What Ray did was to write a script with him in mind, eliminating his popular, cliché-ridden mannerisms and concentrating on his seldom-tapped acting prowess. In this he succeeded magnificently, inspiring the late star to comment, “Manikda was the first director to really teach me what film acting was all about.”  This new insight was reflected in most of his subsequent movie roles.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Splurging on politics

Nitish Kumar’s yatras are proving costly for the state exchequer, reports Sanjay Upadhyay

Unbeknownst to the world outside, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is in the process of carving a new avatar for himself – the avatar of a yatri or a traveller who undertakes visits to further a cause. It may well be true that the credit of popularising political yatras goes to BJP veteran LK Advani, but its most modern incarnation is this rising backward leader with national aspirations.

In the recent past, Nitish Kumar has headed a number of such yatras or travels to mobilize public opinion. There have been Viswas Yatras, Vikas Yatras, Seva Yatras and Adhikar Yatras. Just recently he finished a similar baptising mission  to Valmikinagar and is slated to leave soon for another destination.

Like the ancient Magadhan king chalking out his plans to see firsthand the situation in his countryside, Nitish is doing it with gusto. There can scarcely be an eyebrow raised if a politician uses these vote catching measures in a democracy before impending General Elections; it becomes quite another matter if party work is being conducted at the expense of the state exchequer, because that is precisely what is happening in Bihar.

Naturally, if a chief minister travels anywhere in the state, he cannot do so without a jumbo team of bureaucrats who accompany him along with their rather steep expenses. Traditional circuit houses, once the mainstay of travelling officials, have given way to swanky hotels. Add to it a fairly lavish entertainment allowance that the babudom believes it is their birthright.

Some details with TSI obtained through an RTI reveal an interesting picture. In Begusarai district during the CM’s Viswas and Vikas Yatra, the district administration coughed up upwards of Rs 3.33 lakh; the district administration of Khagaria spend Rs 2.82 lakhs while in contrast, the Muzzafarpur district administration put out Rs 31.96 lakhs by way of expenses. In the course of the CM’s Seva Yatra in Banka, the total amount spent was Rs 21.22 lakhs.

According to RTI information, Nitish’s Vikas Yatra in Bhagalpur cost Rs 67, 751; the money spend on his Viswas Yatra in the same district had gone up to Rs 3.33 lakhs but the Seva Yatra to the same place took the cake: Rs 21.69 lakhs!

RTI information reveals the same pattern. In Purnea, for instance, the Vikas Yatra cost Rs 6. 74 lakhs, the Viswas Yatra Rs 2.14 lakhs but on the Seva Yatra, the district administration spent over Rs 10 lakhs.

There are other interesting tit bits that RTI replies reveal. In Muzzafarpur, officials ordered a TV on rent for a whopping Rs 53,000!  In a flat three days there, the official entourage including officials, aides and security detail had gobbled up food worth close to Rs 9.90 lakhs. On an earlier Viswas Yatra to Araria, a modest Rs 90,000 had been spend during the course of a single day.

Presumably, in an effort to restore working order, Rs 1.45 lakh was spent on repairing furniture at a guest house and a new sofa set worth Rs 1.7 lakhs installed for visiting dignitaries’ in Muzaffarpur. Over and above, another Rs 2.6 lakhs was splurged on refreshment and lodging.

The opposition naturally sees in this an opportunity to attack a CM who is generally the toast of Bihar – and even of the country – as his recent anti-Narendra Modi stand has shown. Some activists allege that MNREGS money has been used during such trips. The charges have gathered momentum after a reply in the affirmative was given by the district rural development authority, Muzaffarpur, when asked if MNREGS money had been spent during the CM’s Yatra. Later, the department told this magazine that the reply ``was a clerical error’’ and that it had since then been rectified.

Nonetheless RJD MP, Ram Kripal Yadav has demanded a high-level probe into the alleged use of MNREGA funds. “There should be intensive review of all Yatras done by the CM. This is a case of embezzlement. These are Mewa Yatras (just deserts),” he says.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles
IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

Monday, June 3, 2013

Fighting the Hunger pangs

Scams in ICDS projects can ruin India's human capital

When on the one hand India is adding to its indigenous list of billionaires in Forbes’s list and other journals it is also increasing the count of hungry children that is such an embarrassment for a country of extremes such as ours. Worse, the money allocated to mitigate the malaise is being diverted and misappropriated by the vested interests involved. It’s a worst form of socio-economic malady and a shame for the nation that should have raised the eyebrows of our institutions and administrations – but it didn’t!

India’s Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) has been unable to stem the rot in the system and must be revamped. It must be revamped because it is not armed with the power to monitor the government’s role in fund utilization. The funds released by the Central government are often misused by the states, denying the children the benefits of ICDS schemes. The worst offenders are the governments of Bihar and Jharkhand that through a nexus of politicians and bureaucrats diverted funds meant for nourishment of impoverished children. The mid-day meals are denied to school children and finances for the same are diverted to the fat pockets of the stakeholders! It has been a practise that has plagued not only to the two states mentioned but has been prevalent across the country in varying degrees. There are allegations of audit mismatch in the internal function ICDS too. The audit report notes that Rs.57.82 crore is diverted to the non-permissible schemes of ICDS in five test-checked states. There are further reports of fund diversion to the tune Rs.70.11 crore that have been parked elsewhere. The reports of poor infrastructure to deliver the schemes only add to the problem – 61% of the test-checked anganwadis in operation under the ICDS do not have a proper building of their own and 25% manage it through covered shelters. The unsettling effect continues with the vanishing medical kits in 33-49% of the anganwadis due to failure of the state governments in spending funds released by the Centre. Also 26% of the children’s weighing machines and 58% of the adult weighing machines failed to make it to the centres. The essential utensils required for providing supplementary nutrition to the beneficiaries are also not available in many places. A new survey conducted by Citizen's Alliance against Malnutrition and the Nandi Foundation drives home the shocking reality check that despite India’s economy tripling since the beginning of this century, the level of child malnutrition has not dropped. More than half of all child deaths are associated with malnutrition, which weakens the body's resistance to illness. The Nandi Foundation survey revealed that 42% of Indians under the age of five are underweight – a manifestation of inadequate nutrition.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles
IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

Sunday, June 2, 2013

Proxy war rages in Karachi

Pakistan has become a playground for global players and the main issues affecting common people have been overlooked, reports Shahid Husain

More than 45 innocents, including those hailing from the majority Muslim Sunni sect, were killed and 135 injured when marauders struck again at the thickly-populated entrance of Abbas Town on Abul Hasan Ispahani Road in Karachi at about 6.50 pm on Sunday evening.


A visit to the site by TSI presented an unbearable and grotesque picture. The powerful bomb had ripped two apartment buildings namely Iqra City and Rabia Flowers situated on opposite sides of the road. The target obviously was Abbas Town but religious extremists could not reach there and preferred to bomb the entrance of Shia-dominated Abbas Town.

Tragically, even by Monday morning, when the TSI reporter was present there, there were no security personnel in sight.Maulana Talib Jauhiri, a Shia scholar and Senator Faisal Raza Abidi, of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) visited the crime scene but top political leaders preferred to give statements from the safety of their offices.

The City District Government Karachi (CDGK) led by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) did a commendable job in removing the debris. Similarly, Edhi Ambulance Service and Chippa Ambulance Service played their usual dynamic role in shifting the dead and the wounded to public and private sector hospitals. Doctors, nurses and para medical staff too did their best and salvaged the situation under great odds and stress.    

By all counts, this latest outrage is part of the deadly proxy war which has been going on in the sprawling port city of Karachi with an estimated 20 million population. The Americans and NATO forces after having lost the so called “War on Terror” in Afghanistan are too eager that the deadly weapons they used there do not fall into the wrong hands.

The previous Afghan War against Soviet Union was fought with the help of drug money. In turn it has brought misery to the people of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Pakistan happens to be the transit point of drugs and arms smuggling and that was why President Barack Obama asked the Chief of the Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani to “do more.” The armed forces of Pakistan fully aware that they will have to bear the brunt of the fall out of the Afghan War, are moving cautiously and dictating their terms.

A senior American journalist wrote a couple of years ago that the US itself creates a monster - and then it fights it. This is how its war and arms industry has flourished and unprecedented employment created there. But this war expenditure has almost crippled the US economy; recession is at its peak and millions are surviving on food stamps.

A former US national security advisor wrote some time ago that it was easy to deal with President Asif Ali Zardari because he has no hang-ups. Unlike twice Prime Minister and chairperson PPP Benazir Bhutto, her husband, and the party's Founding Chairman Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Zardari does not suffer from delusions of grandeur. Eleven years in prison and exile have transformed him into a shrewd politician.

With millions in search of jobs, including highly qualified Pakistani youth and inflation at its peak, why would the army stage a coup? General Kayani, a former ADC to Benazir, has shown remarakble restraint.

The flooding in Sindh and Balochistan in 2010 and 2011 uprooted millions of rural households, hit the tribal and feudal structure in these impoverished provinces and also induced demographic changes. For the first time, these uprooted people lived the lives of their more urbane brethren, sent their children to schools and enjoyed healthcare despite being condemned to live in make-shift camps provided by international NGOs. Their standing crops were destroyed and a large number of flood victims were not ready to go to their ancestral homes. Hence demographic changes have taken place in cities such as Karachi and Hyderabad.

Since the creation of “New Pakistan” in 1972 when President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto took over the reins of power and the kick started the “Dubai Syndrome”, millions of plumbers, technicians, labourers, doctors, nurses and engineers opted for the Middle East.

Their remittances brought rich dividends to their families back home but along with remittances came a conservative culture and a brand of religion that was radically different than the tolerant religion in the 1950s and 1960s when Muslims, Christians, Hindus, Parsees and other minorities lived in peace and harmony.

In sharp contrast to migrants who have moved to the US, Canada, Germany, France, Australia, New Zealand, Britain, Sweden, Norway and other advanced western countries, overseas Pakistanis who toiled hard in the Middle East brought with them money - along with big doses of conservatism.

Little wonder that the Pakistani society was Talibanised. The conservative mindset not only asserted itself in the Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA) and the northern areas of Pakistan, but even in the country's financial hub Karachi that happens to be amongst the 10 largest cities of the world.

This mindset came to dominate the middle classes - lawyers, judiciary, doctors, journalists, teachers and even the armed forces. Little wonder that former Chief of the Army Staff and President General Pervez Musharraf failed miserably to undo the religious extremism promoted by Pakistan’s worst military dictator, General Zia ul Haq. The poisonous seeds sown by the general have now become a full-fledged, vast tree which is threatening the very fabric of the Pakistani society.

Ethnicity, sectarianism, intolerance and chaos prevalent in the country today are essentially remnants of the Zia era. It has manifested itself in many ways: there has been resistance to the anti-polio campaign and conspiracy theories dominate the thinking pattern in Pakistan today. The media, social media and civil society too have played a role. Greed has become the domin


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles
IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA