Hri Institute for Southasian Research and Exchange

Diary of a disastrous campaign

21 December 2012

By Thomas Bell
A recently unearthed diary brings a fresh perspective to the lesser-known British foray into what we now call Nepal.

The history of the British East India Company was mostly written by the Company itself. It emphasises military victories, such as the late-eighteenth-century campaigns against the Marathas or the Kingdom of Mysore; and it dwells on episodes of heroism and tragedy which serve to expose the perfidy of the natives (the ‘Black Hole of Calcutta’). Although they are now seen in a different light, such events still mark the way. There is little space in the story for Captain Kinloch’s invasion of Nepal. Yet, in his failure, Kinloch helped to draw the map of contemporary Southasia no less than his luckier colleagues in the Deccan.

Nepali historians have dwelt on the historic destiny of Prithvi Narayan Shah the Great, who in the mid eighteenth century forged the Gorkhali empire in the hills as a bulwark against the firingis in the plains. His patriotism was so great, he defended Nepali independence before it was invented. These historians record that Kinloch’s expedition was routed by the Gorkhali army at Sindhuli – the first of several occasions when Gorkha courage or nationalism kept the overbearing power to the south at bay. His defeat has been treated as inevitable, and significant mainly in entrenching the Gorkhalis’ abiding suspicion of the British.

Kinloch’s own diary of his disastrous campaign was – until recently – scarcely known to exist, and its publication is provocative and fascinating. It demands that earlier analyses of the invasion be substantially revised. And it invites us to reflect how national destiny, or the fortune of an imperial adventurer, rests on such factors as the antics of an unreliable grain merchant during the interminable monsoon of 1767.

Read more at Himalmag.com

Text by Sarita Manu
Images courtesy: Sarita Manu and Zakaria Zainal

Our Gurkhas the exhibition in Kathmandu

Our Gurkhas is an anthology of portraits and anecdotes of the retired Singapore Gurkhas as they reminisce about life in the Lion City — from the 50s till today. The exhibition travelled to Kathmandu, Pokhara and Dharan earlier this month. At the Kathmandu exhibition, I found Zakaria Zainal, the young photographer from Singapore, engaged in an animated conversation with a few women. I could not help but notice that the older woman in the group spoke impeccable English, while the younger one did not. After waiting long for my turn to speak to Zainal, I mentioned this to him. He added, “I was fascinated at how good her English is. When I did this project, I felt that I wish I had known Nepali language, my interviews would have been richer.” He added that the older woman grew up in Singapore, learning and speaking more English than her younger sister who grew up in Nepal.

The Gurkha units, famous for their loyalty, bravery and valour, are well known regiments in the British and Indian armies.  Following the independence of India, a Gurkhas contingent was formed in Singapore in 1949, with the ex-British Army Gurkhas. Very little is known about these Gurkhas, men from Nepal, who serve in the Gurkha Contingent of the Singapore Police Force. Established in 1949, the legacy of the Gurkha Contingent goes beyond the independence of Singapore. In the year preceding Singapore’s independence, the Gurkhas played a very important role in what was known as the 1964 ‘racial riots’, a significant chapter in Singapore’s history. The Gurkha were seen as an impartial force that would not side with the Malay or Chinese ethnic groups who were involved in the riots. Zainal feels that this incident left a permanent mark on official policies. As a community, the Gurkha and their families lead their own lives in a segregated neighbourhood, and deliberately so, – because they are wanted as an impartial force even today, in case of tension between the main ethnic groups. This quarter is the Mount Vernon Camp, a neighbourhood that houses the training and residential facilities for the Gurkha contingent.

The literature on Gurkha and the number of articles written on them are few, given their more than 60 years of history in Singapore.  ‘There is an overwhelming sense of aura alongside a vacuum of information about this community,’ says Zainal. ‘And how we fill up that vacuum is by amusing ourselves with tales of how they can jump off a high wall, rip someone’s head off with their bare hands,’ he adds. Zainal wanted to challenge this, knowing that the Gurkha were regular people like other Singaporeans. He was wondering how to get others to know more about them. Zainal says, ‘I wanted this to resonate with other Singaporeans – that the Gurkha are just like them. I believe photography is a process of commemoration and I photograph to remember. I am very worried that if I don’t photograph these people, they will be forgotten forever.’ Zainal took time to conceptualise this – an anthology of portraits and short stories, which serve as an important visual archive of a visibly invisible community. The stories accompanying the portraits are much understated and this was intentional as Zainal wants people to say, ‘Is that it? I want to know more’.

Book Cover (left) , Photographer Zakaria Zainal (right)

Talking about his experience of connecting with the community through these three exhibitions, Zainal says, ‘In this photographic exhibition, sometimes, the main draw was not the photographs but the community itself — as they took this opportunity to bond and reminisce their shared experiences in a country vastly different from theirs. And this connection ranged from old retired Gurkhas from the 1950s and 1950s mingling with just retired Gurkhas from the 2000s, the wives and children too from various generations. At the same time, they also invited the Nepali public and gave them a glimpse of what life was like during their time of service — not through photographs, but the stories that they told. I am humbled by the overwhelming support shown by the retired Singapore Gurkhas and their immediate community — as well as the Nepali public in attending and giving support and feedback to this photographic project and exhibition.’

Corporal Nar Bahadur Gurung, 73, 1953 – 1973 (4518). Retired Singapore Gurkha Nar Bahadur Gurung holds a framed photograph of himself when he first arrived in Singapore as a young recruit in 1953.

Zainal also wants to do another project of archiving old photos from inside the Mount Vernon Camp. He strongly feels that in putting too many words alongside the pictures, the message often gets lost. One can do things like this (the exhibition), where the community gathers, fuelling a sense of ownership. Through his photographs, Zainal has brought forth many old memories and also archived them in a way. Zainal humbly maintains that he knows nothing about the quality of photographs, but he believes very strongly in creating work that is accessible to all. He wrote down their stories in his little notebook, and took pictures. First it was only a few and then Zainal realised over time that nearly all Gurkha have really large frames of photographs from their time in Singapore. They say that they are proud of their time in Singapore, and want to frame the pictures. ‘The beauty is – the more I look at it, I realise that these photographs are also a tension between space and time. The Gurkha are younger, in their photographs of Singapore, and now they are old and in Nepal – it creates a visual tension. It is something I could not look at – at first, but I kept looking at it and I discovered something new every time – this perplexes me till today’, adds Zainal.

 

By: Daljit Ami

Sadayat Hasan Manto

Revisiting Sadayat Hasan Manto (1912-1955) on his birth centenary turned out to be an experience which cannot be described by a single adjective. It was not just a return to Manto but also a home-coming to my associations with him. I was introduced to Manto in the 1980s during my graduation in A S College Khanna, in Ludhiana district of Punjab. There, I could immediately relate Manto’s Toba Tek Singh, as the prevalent vicious communal atmosphere and brutal state response was nothing short of insanity. After graduation I came to Chandigarh which, despite being the capital of Punjab was aloof from the madness reigning in the countryside. Here, Manto again helped me to understand how the same situation could have different impacts. The massacre of April 1919 of Jalianwala Bagh, Amritsar had changed the life of Udham Singh and Sadayat Hasan Manto in different directions. Udham Singh became part of history as Ram Mohammad Singh Azad when he avenged the massacre of Jalianwala Bagh and was hung by the British. In another but equally powerful trajectory, Manto wrote his first short story, Tamasha, using the backdrop of the Jalianwala Bagh massacre, and went on to become one of the most acclaimed story tellers of the Subcontinent, with prolific writing until his untimely death at forty two.

In Chandigarh I learnt that Manto belonged to Papraudi, a village near Samrala in Ludhiana district. We Punjabis have a fluid definition of the term ‘village’. Whenever a Bihari labourer received a visitor, we used to say that someone had come to meet him from his village. It did not matter that one was from Gopalganj at the western end of Bihar and the other from Kotihar in the east. Similarly, when we move out of our villages the concept of village expanded along with the distance from native place. Living in Europe or North America, someone from Bahawalpur (West Punjab) and other one from Patiala (East Punjab) can comfortably claim that they belong to same village. Manto’s village is just 15 km from my village, Daudpur — in the same district and tehsil. This piece of information made me feel closer to Sadayat Hasan Manto. From a mere reader I became his garain or someone from the same village.

In the 1990s Lal Singh Dil, a revolutionary Punjabi poet was running a roadside tea stall in Samrala, from where I used to change my bus while commuting between Chandigarh and Daudpur.  Mostly, I used to stop at his tea stall to talk about poetry, politics and literature or sometimes just to chat. It was a great feeling that Manto, Dil and I are garain.

I went to Lahore in 2003 to attend the Punjabi World Conference. In a parallel program on the Seraiki language someone told me that Hamid Akhtar was also in the gathering. Hamid Akhtar is an old friend of Manto and Sahir Ludhianvi and his ancestral village is also in Ludhiana district. They all migrated to Pakistan after Partition but Sahir eventually returned to India. Hamid Akhtar was looking very frail, as he had just recovered from throat cancer. I was told that his hearing was very weak so he would not be able to understand many things and, furthermore, he could not speak very easily. However, I was sure that he could listen to his garain. I touched his feet and greeted him with folded hands, “Sat Sri Akal.” He looked at me and I introduced myself, “Mein Samrale toh ayan.” (I have come from Samrala.) In a trice, Hamid was on his feet. He hugged me and announced, without the help of a loudspeaker, “Eh mere pindo aya. Manto de pindon. (He has come from my village, from Manto’s village.)” He made me sit next to him, all the while holding my hand. His first question: “Samrale vich kithon ayan.” (From where in Samrala do you come?) I replied, “Daudpur.” With a few explanations, he could understand the geography as well as roads from Daudpur to Papraudi and to his native village near Jagraon. Hamid subsequently recovered from cancer and has visited Chandigarh twice, thereafter. He would call and ask, “Mein aa gayan, sham nu tun meinu sharab pilauni aa.” (I am here. In the evening you will take me for a drink.) We would end up discussing Manto, Sahir, India and Pakistan. This is Sadda Gran, our village.

Recently, I visited Papraudi to make a special program for the news channel Day and Night News, on Sadayat Hasan Manto’s birth centenary. One of Manto’s contemporaries, Ujjagar Singh, remembers having played with him when they were children. At the age of ninety plus Ujjagar Singh has memories of Manto and his family. He identified Manto’s house, which was auctioned after Partition by government as ‘evacuee property’. I asked him if he had read Manto’s writing. He replied, “I have not read him as I can’t read Urdu. I have heard that he is a renowned writer. He has made our village proud.” I talked to at least half a dozen people but none of them was familiar with Manto’s writings.

Then we went to the village Gurudwara where the Punjabi Sahit Sabha, Delhi, opened the Manto Memorial Library two years ago. The caretaker of the Gurudwara, Lakhwinder Singh, looks after the library as it is housed in his one room accommodation. The bookshelf carrying 200 books has two translated volumes of Manto’s stories. The library attracts not more then a couple of readers a month so Lakhwinder Singh has not felt the need to unbundle books. Now Punjabi Sahit Sabha Delhi is planning to shift this collection to Samrala. Hopefully Manto’s writings will have more readers in his home village.

Continuing my quest for Manto the person, I went to Amritsar to film the places he is supposed to have frequented. One such place is Katra Sher Singh where he lived. The demography of this area has changed, as it was a Muslim dominated locality before Partition, and witnessed remorseless killings and brutality of untold magnitude. Katra Sher Singh now has a Hindu-Sikh population. No trace of its bloody past or its displaced populace is visible to an observer.

Manto might have got his characters of Khol Do and Thanda Ghosht straight out of these environs, I imagine as I walk the streets. Since I had been steeped in Manto for many days, I could feel the traumatized young Sakina’s presence. As in Khol do, she is not confined only to being Sirajudin’s daughter, but symbolizes the vulnerability of women subjected to sexual violence during Partition. Even after 65 years, it is scary. I do not want to dwell on what Manto had gone through while witnessing and then recording these details. He took refuge in Toba Tek Singh’s Bishan Singh, who says, “Aupar di, gargar di, bedhiyana di, annex di, mungi di daal of the lantern of the Hindustan of the Pakistan government, dur fiteh munh.” All the words of this sentence are familiar but still it is an enigma inviting silence.  Manto too, is such an enigma who may have grown out of words so he chose silence at the age of forty two. As a garain of Manto I am unnerved by his silence, Sakina’s predicament and Bishan Singh’s gibberish. Oh, when Manto is not confined to any one village, why should I think that I am the only one who is scared while revisiting him? It leaves me with a final question: can scared people celebrate birth centenaries?
For more, watch Part 1 and Part 2 of Daljit Ami’s special programme on Manto.

Text and images: Sarita Manu, in Dhaka

Emotions have been running high in Bangladesh since the country’s ecstatic win over India and Sri Lanka in the Asia Cup and the tearful loss for the home team in the finals against Pakistan. With the finals played out only a few days away from Bangladesh’s 40^th Independence Day on 26 March, writer and journalist Shahriar Kabir, Executive President of Nirmul Committee, had only one pre-match message for the Tigers of the Bangladesh Cricket team: to remember the brutal genocide of Bangladeshis that began 41 years ago.

At 8:00 pm yesterday evening, the Ekatturer Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee (Forum for Secular Bangladesh and Trial of War Criminals of 1971) lit mashaals (torches) and walked in a candlelight procession in memory of those killed in 25 March, 1971. Forty mashaals were lit and people marched from the Central Shaheed Minar to the Jagannath Hall premises at Dhaka University. At midnight of 25 March 1971, 41 years ago, the Pakistani occupying forces in then East Pakistan began killing unarmed Bengalis. A nine-month long war followed, ending with the independence of Bangladesh. A prime target was also the Dhaka University: several teachers, students and staffs of Dhaka University were killed by the Pakistani army and buried at the courtyard of students’ hostel named Jagannath Hall. The Shaheed Minar was built to in remembrance of the martyrs of the historic Language Movement of 1952. Numerous students and political activists started a process on 21 February, 1952 demanding that Bengali be given the status of a national language. The protestors were fired upon and many were killed. To commemorate this movement, Shaheed Minar was built at the place of the massacre.

The evening was attended by freedom fighters, politicians, socio-cultural activists, and Bangladeshi citizens in numbers. Addressing the gather in a public speech before the march, the committee demanded the observance of 25 March as ‘International Genocide Day’ and also urged Parliamentarians to move the initiative ahead.

Please click on the thumbnail for the full picture from the evening:

Last week’s news media featured a lot of talk about being, or making, someone ‘human’. Roger Cohen of the International Herald Tribune – among various others – wrote about Anthony Shadid, foreign correspondent for The New York Times based in Baghdad and Beirut, whose death on February 16 is being mourned by many. He was so important, they all said, and his work so respected, because of his ability to “humanize” a conflict. Of Shadid, Cohen wrote, “His explorations of Arab societies not static or dehumanized — freed from the distorting lens of the West — offered portraits of places and people adapting with difficulty to modernity. To reductive cradles of Islamic fanaticism, images that satisfied a Western thirst, his counterpoint was portraits of civilizations whose wounds did not efface their poetry. He relished contradiction. He abhorred the bellicosity of simplification in the angry post-9/11 age.”

Seldom, in my memory, have tributes to a journalist been so marked by that idea — their ability to understand and filter through the history and political complexity of a crisis situation to tell a more full picture of the impact on human life. In the Jakarta Globe Kamila Shamsie wrote about showing “the softer side of Pakistan“. As a counter to the “one-dimensional view” of Pakistan created largely by foreign correspondents, Shamsie called attention to cultural production — the music, art, history, and literature of a place. Highlighting such works isn’t just about showing the “softer” side of a country, she said. It is important because it draws attention to people, and to a society as more than just a site of violent destruction. It is the human – or humane – side of Pakistan that is absent from much of the current conversation.

These writings got me thinking about journalism as a medium of representation, as a tool of aggression, and as an active participant in the waging of war. As a very simple and recent example, one could look at the way the New York Times has been reporting on the so-called “nuclear crisis” in Iran. It all seems a bit like the all-too-fast escalation of emotions that led to the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

And then I was reminded of a David Brookes piece from the end of September, also in the New York Times (“The Limits of Empathy“). Admittedly, Brookes had little research to prove his thesis, but I read it in a time of questioning, and it sent me into a little tailspin of despair. Brookes asserted that while it was all very well to try and “promote empathy”, empathy was not linked to moral action. He cited as examples “Nazi prison guards [who] sometimes wept as they moved down Jewish women and children, but they still did it. Subjects in the famous Milgram experiments [who] felt anguish as they appeared to administer electric shocks to other research subjects, but they pressed on because some guy in a lab coat told them to.”  His argument that empathy is largely overblown was a terribly depressing, if somehow still seductive, assertion.

After all, the (implicit!) mission of Hri is to do the sort of work that leads to a better understanding of the plurality that comprises Southasia, in an effort to promote pluralism as essential to sustainable peace. (A tall order, and some pretty big ideas.) But at the heart of all this is the belief that too much conflict is the result of misinformation. A recognition and understanding of diversity – in its contentious complexity – is a necessary basis for individuals to reach out to those they deem ‘different’. And at the end of the day, the actions of a society – a group, a community, a government – are determined by individuals. Isn’t this ultimately the idea behind groups such as Seeds of Peace, organizations that are usually considered successful in their ability to promote peace in conflict-ridden environments? Perhaps the security studies strategists and classical economists have it right after all – people act to promote their self-interest. Empathy cannot serve as a basis for consistent moral action, especially in times of conflicting needs.

Brooks never showed, though that active attempts to teach and promote empathy failed to reduce future incidence of conflict, whether interpersonal or group. So I decided to undertake my own casual and unscientific investigation, using the internet. It seemed that Brooks’ analysis really fell apart when one looked at the solution – or the alternative – to promoting empathy as a means of producing moral action. Brooks proposed a moral code as the way of making sure individuals were given the combination of discipline and pre-packaged thoughts that would guide them down a particular path. But then Jason Marsh, from Greater Good – a science and society research centre at Berkeley – came to my assistance. Marsh pointed out various studies that refute the idea of empathy as “useless”, particularly in guiding an individual or group’s course of action. Marsh’s most helpful take-away point is the reminder that empathy is a necessary first step, not an end.  Judging by the comments on this and other sites, however, many other readers shared my reaction to Brooks’ piece. Why was this? Why were we so willing to think that this cold rejection of empathy was somehow more valid than our belief in its power?

This brings me back, then, to Southasia. By understanding the context of another person’s beliefs and assertions, we may be less likely to react with immediate anger or defensiveness.  What would it mean to have more reporters like Shadid reporting on Southasian conflicts and political tension, within the region? Who recognize contradictions and contrasts, and can convey complexity – simply? If we can appreciate the value of pluralism, we move away from imposing a singular version of history on others.  Organizations like Seeds of Peace, and programmes like the “Teaching Tolerance” initiative of the Southern Poverty Law Centre,  work institutionally to promote empathy and understanding, especially among young people. On the other hand, the mainstream media has often functioned to incite jingoistic fervour and disparage communities and entire nations. So what is the basis – especially in Southasia – for believing in a sense of common, or shared humanity, one that could be picked up on by media, for example? And if the main work of journalism is to expose, and the task of non-governmental or community organizations to then follow up, what are some initiatives that have focussed on promoting empathy – group or individual – in the region?

-Kabita Parajuli

From the outset, Rajashri Dasgupta and Laxmi Murthy’s Our Pictures, Our Words is an untraditional work. Vibrantly coloured, full of illustrations (in addition to the posters that comprise the heart of this book), and featuring pull-out boxes and timelines, this first seems like more of a textbook or introductory guide than your typical, academic, women’s studies operation. Given that I work with one of the authors (Laxmi Murthy is the director of Hri, and Rajashri Dasgupta is an editorial contributor to Himal), this is in no way a review – although I am encouraging everyone I know who would be interested to buy it. Rather, I’d like to focus on what this book does: its use of archival material to paint a truly vivid portrait of the women’s rights movement in India. I find the visual aspect of this book so compelling for a number of reasons, many of which may reveal only gaps in my own knowledge. Until relatively recently, I was unaware the women’s movement in India had this history, as a movement. There’s quite a difference between isolated campaigns by disconnected groups, and the sense of shared politics and will for change that a movement embodies. These posters also demonstrate the commitment and creativity of its members, and reveal a desire to communicate across levels of class and education. The posters also underline an emphasis on accessibility – this work on the women’s movement is not your Marxist-post-structuralist essay collection! It contains in its pages political, social and intellectual history and analysis, but in language and style that many, reading in English, will find relatable. Both authors are journalists who have been involved with the women’s movement over the past three decades.

I also find this book – the particular use of posters – significant for another reason. As archival documents, the pictures and slogans provide a historical context for understanding the contemporary situation of women’s rights in India, as well as a map of how changes came to pass. It can be very easy to be overwhelmed by injustice. Books like this one may be able to explain the ideas, decisions, and processes that enable social change.

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For more information on the poster archives project, visit: http://posterwomen.org/Posterwomen/

And for more on the book from Zubaan, the publishers, go to http://www.zubaanbooks.com/zubaan_books_details.asp?BookID=182

Terence Bech, photo credit: Amar Gurung/MPP

A recent piece by Amar Gurung, chief archivist at Nepal’s Madan Puraskar Pustakalaya, highlights the recent return of a rich collection of Nepali music (“Songs of our times”, Nepali Times, 9 December). The recordings, transcriptions, and instruments — all gathered by Terence Bech, a Peace Corps volunteer to Nepal from 1964 to 1966 — was housed at Indiana University. Bech, an explorer, mountaineer, and sailor, gave Madan Puraskar Pustakalaya (an archival center in Patan,  and a partner in Hri’s Archives project) permission to take copies of the collection. This will be an invaluable resource for ethnomusicologists, anthropologists, and ordinary citizens alike. (Visit the article for links to two songs recorded by Terence Bech.)

It was with Bech’s sense of curiousity that last year, Hri set out on the Music on the Move project. We wanted to document Gandharva musical traditions, as well as to understand the socioeconomic and cultural events that have led to changes in musical style and community structures. Some of our recordings and videos may be found here. We hope this documentation, too, will be a resource for musicians – Gandharva and otherwise – and that it will contribute to an enriched understanding of social life and cultural production in Nepal.

Image 4: Installation by Ashmina Ranjit

By: Sarita Manu

The workshop in early November 2011, “South Asia: Histories, Visual and Literary Texts” (jointly organized by Krantijyoti Savitribai Phule Women’s Studies Centre, University of Pune and Zubaan, New Delhi) introduced many new and interesting areas of studies to me, who is from a non- women’s studies or a social sciences setting. Given my background in art and architecture, the presentation, ‘Feminine Representations and Themes of Resistance in Nepali Art’ by Archana Thapa from Kathmandu, Nepal offered a very refreshing view of contemporary art from Nepal.

Image 1: Om Khattri

Archana’s selection of images from Nepal strongly focused on the theme of menstruation and the colour ‘red’ that occupies a significant place in Nepali culture and tradition.  Looking at the images, the themes seem to emerge so strongly due to two reasons. The first reason: ‘red’ is an auspicious colour adorned by Nepali women in every form, from clothes to accessories, especially among married women. And second: the same ‘red’ as menstrual blood, sees the women being ostracized during and on menstruation every month.

In many parts of Nepal, during menstruation, women tend to be kept in seclusion, with no access to proper food. They are considered “impure” and are forbidden from touching anything or, in some cases, even speaking to anyone on those days.  This is aptly represented in the installation by Om Khattri in Image 1 of a woman sitting alone in a makeshift hut / cowshed. The woman sits isolated and looks uncared-for. Another contemporary artist from Nepal is Asha Dangol, who has participated in exhibitions on similar themes. In Image 2, he shows the mannequin of a menstruating woman. Red threads representing the ‘impure’ menstrual blood flow out of her vagina and end up as the beautiful lotuses on the floor.  His installation attempts to shun the association of ‘impurity’ with menstruation, by using lotuses, which are considered very pious in Hindu religion.

Image 2: Asha Dangol

Menstruation also presents itself as a stark interruption in the life of the ‘Kumari Devi’, the Living Goddess of Nepal. The Kumari Devi is a deified young (pre-pubescent) girl who is worshipped in the Hindu-Buddhist tradition in Nepal.  A girl from the Newar Shakya community of Nepal is selected to be the ‘living goddess’, upon passing all the eligibility requirements. She is highly revered and worshipped as a goddess. When the Kumari starts menstruating – or sheds blood in any form – she ceases to be the ‘living goddess’, as menstruation is considered ‘impure’. Following the end of her life as the Kumari, she starts living the life of a normal girl, but is considered unlucky for marriage.

In a sharp contrast to Asha Dangol’s installation that sets about to erase the ‘impure’ and embrace the ‘pure’, artist Ashmina Ranjit’s installations and performance are very blatant and ‘in-your-face’. The image (see Image 3) of Ashmina performing in a dress made of sanitary pads, from March 2010, made some of us gasp and most, guffaw. Ashmina Ranjit successfully draws attention to the act of menstruation in an attempt to eradicate the taboo associated with menstruation and menstruating women. A thin tube spews blood on the napkins one at a time, as Ashmina carefully folds and discards them in the trash bin. In a similar effort as seen in Image 4, Ashmina also creates an installation of a woman’s toilet by covering it entirely with sanitary napkins. It was interesting to note a woman from the participating audience comment on how the modern sanitary napkins not only reflect menstruation successfully but also the face of capitalism. The ultra-thin sanitary pads seen here are a modern replacement of the traditional cloth or cloth pads used by many.

Image 3: Performance art, Ashmina Ranjit

As I ran over the images from Archana’s presentation in my mind, I could not help but wonder about how menstruation as a subject remains largely unexplored with contemporary artists in India, despite the fact that menstruation is taboo with many Indian Hindu communities, as in Nepal. Amongst many South Indians, the first menstrual cycle in a girl often calls for much joy and celebration as it indicates that the girl is now a ‘grown up woman’, with her womb ready to ‘receive’. At the same time and in a seemingly contradictory manner, it is customary for the women to be barred from entering the kitchen to cook during menstruation. Although some view this as the period when a woman is allowed to rest and be relieved of her domestic duties, she is not allowed to touch anyone or enter the temple or perform any religious rituals.

Today, in many families of the present generation, women are no longer barred from the kitchen during menstruation or treated as untouchables. But for menstruating women to enter the sanctum sanctorum of the temple or to stop considering menstruation as an ‘impure’ process is going to take more than just education and awareness.

Images 1 and 2 are from Archana Thapa; Images 3 and 4 were obtained from http://sanitationupdates.wordpress.com

- Sarita Manu

Why ‘Dhanush’ di? Honestly, it was more like, ‘Who, Dhanush di?” With my limited access (as a Tamilian) to Tamil movies in Mumbai, I had been running this question in my mind for the last few years. I could never figure out Dhanush as an actor, but when I heard about him lending his voice to a song that had gone viral, I had to (I repeat, ‘had to’) check it out. The official video had around 1.8 million hits a week ago and now it has gone up to more than 10 million hits on YouTube.

The catchy, “why this kolaveri kolaveri kolaveri di”, translates to “why this killer rage / murderous rage” in English. ‘Kolaveri’ could also roughly translate to “qaatilana” in Hindustani. In sounding more like a poetic narration of Tanglish (Tamil + English) lyrics, ‘Kolaveri di’ has made the critics cringe and even reject that this is a ‘true’ song.

So what really worked for Dhanush, the singer and Anirudh, the music director, with ‘Kolaveri di’?

• One –marketing;
• Two – more marketing;
  and
• Three – brilliantly executed marketing by Sony Music. With an official release on YouTube on Nov16th, this song went on to become a nearly instant viral – a sock in the face to all those who underestimated or wrote away the influencing reach of online social networking.

The catchy, ‘down-market’ (as some may call it) lyrics that even a non-native speaker of English can understand very obviously worked in its favour. How difficult can it be for someone who speaks broken English to understand what this means: distance la moon-u moon-u /  moon-u  colour-u  white-u /  white background night-u night-u / night-u color-u black-u

or even this: white skin-u girl-u girl-u /  girl-u heart-u black-u /  eyes-u eyes-u meet-u meet-u /  my future dark

and for the icing on the cake: god i m dying now-u / she is happy how-u

The target audience, boys who have failed in love, and have broken hearts, lapped up the song. The ‘soup song’ – a song about failure in love, ends with a dedication to ‘soup boys’ – boys who have failed in love. “Yo boys I am singing song / soup song … ”, starts crooning Dhanush and closes with, “…this song for soup boys-u / we don’t have choice-u”.

‘Soup’ is a Tamil slang for failed love or failure in love. It also strikes a chord with the slang, ‘Sappai’ – which means a simpleton. I was reminded of the dialogue in the climax of the brilliantly executed film, Aaranya Kandam, where Yasmin Ponnappa, the lead actress says, “Sappai is also a man, but all men are sappai”.

And when I walked into the class this week, one of my 10 year old student ran up to me, only to ask, “Have you heard the song, ‘Why this Kolaveri Kolaveri Kolaveri di’”? I was more than glad that I could reply in the positive and save myself the embarrassment of saying, “No, I haven’t. What is it all about?”