River prayer

'In my village, trees give shade and we take the heat sitting or lying down on a charpoi under them. In this shahar, towers provide shade and there is no space for a charpoy,' mused the temple priest with a wan smile to no one in particular. Ajoba overheard it. The priest should have been a journalist or maybe will, if there is rebirth. In a white dhoti worn the traditional way, a white jibba, a suggestion of a tikka on his forehead, name and village unknown, he soft tunes to the gods and air around, Hanuman Chalisa and a whiff of faith seeps into Ajoba. The Shiva temple is Ajoba new walking corner, bounded by housing societies with a few trees on the borders; a Laburnum is celebrating the summer, copper pods kolam the earth with yellow flowers oozing a fragrance; yes, Ajoba thought, a yellowness all round with peepals and banyans plus a tulsi adding to the company. Resting in a plastic arm chair, as Rama is into Hanuman Chalisa, Ajoba thrills to the sight of a fantail flycatcher with its up and down notes. Early mornings, there are few for blessings of Lord Shiva or is it the other way round. Will Ajoba set out on a vana prastham? At 70 its time going by many ancient rulings. Has no guts. By the way, where are the forests and the few protected forests are zoos going by the logic of that fine man and friend, Varad Giri. If Borivili National Park is turning into a municipal park and Tadoba into a zoo, where is vana prastham? In Sunday Mumbai Mirror, Bikram Grewal writes of Billy Arjun Singh and creation of the Dudhwa National Park. Ajoba has met Billy Arjun Singh at a Sanctuary awards function and his words still thud in pain: Sometime in the future, when you stand on mountains in the north, will be able to sight Kanyakumari and the seas beyond. Yes, nothing in between: No Ganga mayya, no Narmada, no Godavari, no Cauvery, no Pamba, no Brahmaputra, forests and animals. There is a prayer Ajoba likes, a prayer to rivers starting with Ganga dropping down from Lord Shiva's head, Lord Shiva the first green; for washing away one's sins. Prayer taken from google: Gangecha, Yamune chaiva Godavari, Saraswathi, Narmada, Sindhu, Kaveri jalesmin sannidhim kuru ( O Holy rivers Ganga, and Yamuna and also Godavari, Saraswathi, Narmada, Sindhu and Kaveri; Please be present in this water near me,and make it Holy). Perhaps, its time to scrap the river prayer. When the priest wound down the morning with the River prayer....   

A Song 238

Ahead of water wars.
Mumbaikar
will die in car wars.


.........


Bhakti poets
clean one up
for God or nothing.



.....

April
haikus 
cool.


  

Shreya, Chiyu

Four or maybe five years,
Aji and Ajoba
autoed to Dahisar;
baby sat Shreya, Chiyu.
Noons for Ludo,
snakes and ladders,
cards,
Aji Alleppey tales.
Evenings Ajoba,
Chiyu in arms,
Shreya without leash,
wading along
to Dahisar station
and vanishing humans;
tiled Vitho temple, silent;
at kirana shops
Lays for Shreya,
Balaji for Chiyu,
Gems and Amul for both
sharing quarrels;
in blind alleys
throwing dirt,
kicking a ball,
cycling with friends.
Laughs matched cries. 
Evenings,
Dakhi walked in
to baby sits
turning adult sits. 

A Song 237

April suns
reluctant to relent
scorch pebbled palms.
Lady, Old Man
below Karuna banyan
on Karuna Road,
count on frail fingers
time, leaves, cars, bikes.
Taking breaks,
Old Man pulls out letters,
broken, cracked, wounded
alphabets,
in wrinkled smiles,
from hip pockets.
Lady,
yanks out
dried, fragrant sadaphules,
from faded frock,
worn over years.
Old ghosts
unlocking cackles
peep from banyan holes.
Did they trade in letters,
flowers and ghosts?
Birds into knocking nests
for the two to drop
eggs with dreamy yolk,
ahead of rains.
Eggs have no buyers,
dreams hatched no takers.
Deva, the donkey,
parked with two umbrellas
stuck to ears,
on alert,
sheltering rains,
when and if they come. 
They were like that,
They are like that,
They will be like that,
says friend Rose, a nun
lazing on Karuna Road.

Mumbai Mirror

Maybe because me friend Tariq Engineer writes, like Mumbai Mirror. Writes all bones, no flesh, like the gentle Parsi he is. MM costs Rs. 3 when a chhota Gold Flake to go with it costs Rs.10. MM cares for Mumbai like The Statesman in Calcutta of yore in Calcutta Notebook. An old news editor said it more human interest stories. Yes, Mumbai Mirror has them. Perhaps they should have a FP cartoon and something of a daily Third Edit on FP, a 300 worder, single column. A Mario and Busybee of 2018. But Editors know better.  Today, it heads of with the news of Mumbaikars touching Alibaug by RoRo. Modern times, computer times, mobile times need RoRO. From Mumbai to Alibaug it will be about an hour. Me thought (as usual wrong) Alibaug is of the rich and they own yachts to swim across to bunglows. They sure will not take RoRo. Maybe, Tariq Engineer will take it to talk up and down a corporate on Alibaug life. A new Chinese toy as the first vessel will come from Confucius land. Realtors and corporates are developing the area (get a stroke every time me bumps into development). Has Mumbaikar, at best a torn, dated newspaper, a chance? From a daily local, crushed to a RoRo to Alibaug sandwiched in plastic. And long times ago they took the sea in dug outs if one goes by J.C. Daniel on Salim Ali in Salim Ali's India. He writes: 'I watched the heaving monsoon seas with a sinking heart. Being tossed about in a narrow dug out canoe was not something I'd bargained for when I joined the Bombay Natural History Society a few months earlier. As one of my legs began to twitch uncontrollably, the tiny bearded man sitting next to me asked, "Can you swim, Daniel?" 'Swim? Y-yes,' I stammered, wondering wildly if Salim Ali, the legendary honorary secretary of the BNHS, was about to give the order to abandon ship. Instead, Salim Ali looked at me for a moment and said quietly, 'I can't.' 

Earth Day

On Earth Day watched a google video on Jane Goodall telling of her life being always with animals, animals, animals. The Earth thanks Goodall. Me thanks Goodall. Me spent an ordinary youth in Calcutta, none talking to me of Earth and me not caring much of Earth. Today, me thanks my stars for having three wildlifers as friends. They taught me what little me knows. They are: Kishor Rithe, Nishibhau and Varad Giri. Rithe looks after Melghat Tiger Reserve, Nishibhau is a fine birder and Varad is the cecilian, snaker and turtler working in the Western Ghats. Today me Thanks them as they put Nature in me. Got me into the habit of hugging trees, stopping on roads to watch a magpie robin call and once watching new borns Oliver Riddley Turtles scampering into the Arabian Sea in Konkan. Still have not got over me Eureka moment when Vivek Bendre and me released two new born turtles into the waves of Arabian Sea on prayers with Varad watching and chatting the turtles. Wonder whether the two are around as they have long lives. We did not name them. Thanked Lord Shiva, the first green creating the Ganges, silently and long at the temple off Yogi Nagar Road. Being Sunday there was a quiet as the priest spread grains for pigeons and squirrels. Tried to mobile click them when the priest noted: Bhag jate hain. Hamse darthe hain. Yes Earth is afraid of Humans. Scared of Man. Waiting for the time moment when a squirrel will have faith in me to take a fine clic. The temple, bounded by housing societies, has a few trees, and me hugs the peepals, banyans and bananas. On Monday mornings, women after bathing Lord Shiva take glasses of water to wet the feet of trees with prayers and bows. And on Earth Day, the Fadnavis government wants to usurp the land given to Bombay Natural History Society for building a Film City, reports Mumbai Mirror. Yes, appropriate. Why be Mumbai green, why set aside Earth for Mumbai?  

Draupadi

Me piece of earth needs
a Lady.
Not Kali, Saraswathi, Meera,
Mary
but a Draupadi
in a salwar kameez,
dark and trim,
a cross of Smita Patil and Shabna Azmi,
refusing Krishna,
daring Krishna,
shooing men and me,
on the run.
Draupadi,
halting the chariot,
demanding Arjuna to turn back
from manufacturing widows
to appease peace, paramatmans;
littering me piece of earth
with still, saltless tears.
Dialling me piece of earth
with heft and compassion,
under banyans,
for grass to grow,
children to frolic,
no blood.
Draupadi thinks its easy;
maybe not;
me does not know.
Draupadi silent as far horizons.
Sets norms.
Dropping the search,
a drooped, fierce head,
Draupadi
mulches me piece of earth
with dry eyes,
births 8 year old Asifa Bano
and many more.
Draupadi
will not be a twelth woman
in any team,
on me piece of earth.
She bests Bhishma
in a wash of disgust.
Her friend is Sita,
but she is not Sita.
She has the charity of Shabari,
is not Shabari.
Is she where Asifa is?
Where is Draupadi?

Aesop fixing?

Legs seem to have given up. Morning walks a crawl and rest on stone and wooden benches. A year ago did the distance from home to the church on Link Road in 10 minutes. Now its more than 30 minutes. Rama beats me to it. A hare and tortoise Aesop walk. No race here. Eknath Easwaran advises slowing down the pace. A shuffle .... no, that may not suit Eknath Easwaran, no sportsman or sportswoman should read Eknath .... one step after another, not timed to a watch, snatching a stillness, staring and smiling to self if none is there to share laughs, counting the laughers on the road .... a noisy warbler on a copper pod (cant identify the fellow) and a halt.... Jontie the Labbie comes up with a bound ..... and on the last stretch smoking a Gold Flake, wondered whether there was any fixing the Aesop Hare and Tortoise race....the first fixing ever? Where was the race held... a piece of forest cleared for a stadium...When and the timings...Did the hare and tortoise shake legs and hands? Before and after. And which nation they belonged to as Aesop does not talk of flags and anthems, gold and silver medals...who coached them .. and officials bursting with cash and friends. Understand Hare offering a handicap but not snoring away (or is it drugged) for the Tortoise to scramble past the finishing post.... maybe rich farmers in Aesop times were into betting and fixing, an art older than creation.. gods did bet on creative outcomes .....Can the claim be made? ... When Rama beats me home, to be ready with a coffee. 

!!!!!

In Walking Around, Pablo Neruda verses: I happen to be tired of being a man. Yes Pablo me am, very tired. Cant get over the raping and killing of an 8 year old girl, Asifa Bano. She gave us no reason to hate except of course a smile to live. A time to be born, and a time to die, says the Bible. We didnt giver her a time scale; quarter of a chance; she was raped and killed before she was born. Bhakts laugh, contend they dont rape and kill unborns and they are always right, me country of violent hates, cultivated to a fashion statement. Yes, her mistake she was born. But that was not her mistake. Her religion was given her. She, like all of us, had no say in the matter. To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under the heaven, says the Bible. Season she understood. It was winter. But purpose she did not grasp, nor anyone. A blundered mystery. Anyway she is no more. Where is her tomb? Has she any to lay a flower. Earth did not tumble. Nor the sun dim. Yes, Neruda, no excuse in being a man. 

Channel Nine

Channel Nine is no more. Outpriced. Vijay Tagore in Mumbai Mirror reports the RIP of Channel Nine in Australia with talking rights snatched by Seven and Foxtel. Richie Benaud with Morning Everyone to add: Glenn McGrath dismissed for two, just 98 runs short of his century, writes Vijay Tagore. Me has not much eared Channel Nine. Or for that matter any cricket commentator. For me the best was Noob as he never spoke. Sports for me, is watching and appreciating not talking. Talking is later over rums after the game, rewinding the cover drives of Sobers and manslaughter by Viv.  And is there any cricket, any class cricket, any style cricket? Music minus notes. The recent SA-Australia series was all about cheating. Talking fixing. For me cricket started with gentleman Frank Worrell leading West Indies at Brisbane against abrasive Benaud's Australia at Brisbane to a Tie. Worrell, Sobers, Kanhai, Hall... And then followed Lloyd's magic men: Greenidge, Richards, Roberts, Holding ... Sobers, the greatest of them all. Master. Bradmans and Hobbs are not on me memory pads. OK, they are great for you, not me. With that Test cricket for me is over. Not for me gods and gentlemen as the first were the West Indies. T50 and T20 are not cricket ... an insult to decencies.....and nothing to talk and write and click about. Me dhobi told me the other day: Saab, I dont see the entire match. Last five overs or better last over.' Every last over is the same as the previous and future last over. A swipe shot is an abuse of the red ball and willow bat. Bowlers bowling knuckles, not an inswinger or a turner, an off spin or leg spin. And the loutish audience, waving flags and spilling abuses. Today, cricket commentators, all, every one of them, have no poetry in them (perhaps are ill read), zilch imagination and lots of volume. Gavaskar making faces is not Commentary. Channel Nine saw all of me greats, the Calypso symphony. Harry Belafontes all. Today, there is no West Indies cricket, no cricket, no Channel Nine. Astu. 

-?-?-?-?-?

Nirbhaya to 
8 year old Asifa Bano:
You are now safe.
Rama hates,
Tricoloured hates,
Trishuled hates,
Overflowing with hates,
there is no drought
in me country.
We hates,
Ask for more hates,
Our anthems hates,
Our prayers hates,
How many hates enough
for an 8 year old
Asifa.
Not enough,
says Old Man
wiping hates. 

Innocence lost

Other night, Shreya, 13 year old grand-daughter called Ajoba on the mobile: IPL mein fixing hota hai? she asked. A minute silence. Ajoba, she yelled. Ajoba alive. 'Yes', he said. 'Why didnt you tell me,' she asked. 'Bala, you will lose all interest in cricket,' Ajoba replied. 'Paisa deke na?' she asked. Yes, Ajoba outlined fixing. Bare facts, no details, no names taken. Shreya: 'Ajoba, football mein nahin hota hai na?' Shreya is a hollering Messi fan. Ajoba: 'Bala, sab sports fixed hai.' 'Tho kya karun,' came back Shreya, refusing to break off. 'Sports khelo, maja karo, aur dekho,' said Ajoba disappointed an Innocence has snapped. Did not want to tell her corporates have made all sports sick. Fast cash is sports and the best way to touch fast cash is fix with the aid of sports associations and sports commentators. They are all in it together for their good. Soup it with flag waving for ATMs to spew cash. Not for sports. Is there anything called sports with alphabets of sportsman spirit. A big word for being just decent or fair. Winning and losing make any sports. Sure. But not when its all done before a game starts or an athlete takes the blocs. Cricket, football, athletics, tennis, weight lifting....Sad Shreya will be a cynic like venal Ajoba. Asifa Bano was not even quarter that lucky. Perhaps, she might have played with horses while grazing. Or felt the wind in her hair, bird songs in her ears, mountains in her eyes and laughs, a few, somewhere. She may not have known IPL or a mobile, being too poor. A dry roti and dal would have been her seven course meal. Today we have denied her that. Simple. Rape, kill, misplace her tomb, tomb for an 8 year old. Her innocence knifed. Is India worth it. Its boasts worth it. Its humans worth it. Bye, Asifa Bano.   

Asifa Bano

Koyals wailing.
Strays silent.
At the Church,
friend Sebastian,
head down soft toned,
I have a 8 year old grand-daughter,
Daisy;
Me has two: Shreya and Chiyu.
Why hate so much?'
Head down, silent.
Sorry.
Lady Asifa Bano, poor,
went to graze horses.
Lady Asifa Bano,
8-year old,
none tried to
say a Sorry.
Never carried a Sorry
to a memory
you have been reduced to;
didnt pray at your
absent tomb. 
Amen, said Sebastian.
We didnt.
Sebastian, on his knees,
crying
before his Lord
for a gone Asifa Bano.
Amen?

A Song 235

Kishor Rai -
a pull of breath on legs -
is not us.
From village Kathmandu,
allowed parking space
in Borivili.
Manning gates on unsure smileys,
sprints to honks of cars, bikes,
opening, shutting creaky gates;
proffers a Saheb! namaskar,
none cares for.
Nights in a plastic chair,
no parting gates
as memsahebs, sahebs
are in bed;
moons, mosquitos
offer company.
  

A Song 234

Morning,
Vithoo munching a
double vada pav,
licking fingers
dipped in theeka chutney -
prasad from a girl
pleading a topper at SSC.
Rakku: Desire okayed?
Into a corporate smiley,
Vithoo: That's fated. 

A press note

April warms the third floor newsroom of the Times in 1970s. A few chuckles, a few smokes. Journalists listless in chairs with and without arms and legs. Between the Sports and Business Desks, a lone one-legged rotating fan shares hot air. Phones never rang as land lines were always dead. On long tables, typewriters frogged. Smooth for some fingers, hard for others. A chaiwala places glasses of tea ahead of newsmen and newswomen. Dear old biblical Joseph Kurien, talked of times earlier to the 1970s and me, a journalist trainee heard. A Congressman in Travancore-Cochin exiled for shouting for Independence; landed in Goa and on to Bombay. When a young gentleman, suited in smiles, stood ahead of me, bent low and handed a press note. Me first press note, setting me on the way to press note journalism. 'Sir, a few lines in City Notes. We are working hard,' said the gentleman. Never again did a corporate stand in front of me; me always stood in front of them all my life. Me took it, read it, did not understand it. 'Sure,' said Kurien and the gentleman left. Me took the press note to the cabined, Financial Editor. He asked me to sit. Sat, edgy. Stared at the press note upside down, downside up, ran his fingers, shook it before applying his eyes to it. Associated Capsules is into production, read the press note or something equivalent to it. The Financial Editor trimmed a page of press note to two lines for an In brief item in City Notes. Me  typed it as if it was an international scoop. Passed it on to Kurien. No byline, he said. About 60 words became some 30 words. Forgot it as evenings were meant for hooch with friends. Next day, the gentleman surfaced at the same time, looking as if he had just stepped out of a holy dip in the Ganges. Those days the river was surely cleaner than today. 'Thank you, Sir,' he said and me the Sir, fell off the chair. Did not know the In brief item had been carried, making many readers wiser. Today sitting under the peepal on Yogi Nagar Road, a medical van donated by Associated Capsules drove by with horns agog. Associated Capsules is still around. Claims to be a leading producer of empty, hard capsules. 

A Song 233

April noons,
across siestas,
a house sparrow
on the window sill
chirps:
siestas for sleepless;
silences for sore throats. 

Moong over Microchips

Microchips are a must. Moong also a must. IBMer Venkat Iyer, House Number 752, Peth Village, Dahanu taluk, Palghar district, Maharashtra, tills farms organically, grows moong, sells moong, quits comupter keys. After 14 years with the Earth he writes: ' For us, it is different. The open sky, the beautiful scenery, our pets, the crisp vegetables, the fresh fruits and eating what we grow gives us happiness. The joy of seeing the seed you planted push out of soil and in a few weeks turn into a huge plant is something that can never be experienced in a city mall. No Nat Geo Specials you saw would come even remotely close to seeing a buff striped keelback catch a toad and eat it in front of you, a hissing cobra just a couple of feet away or the swaying mating dance of two rate snakes or the Russell's vipers.' Venkat Iyer and Meena (Meena Menon, journalist, who worked with The Hindu?)  make a firm case for moong. 'We have lost out on love and sensitivity,' Venkat Iyer writes. Agreed. Early on, they decide against bribes. Bribes or prasads to the rural bureaucracy are a must in India Interior, no farmer, none can escape it. A must like dance numbers in Indian films. It keeps the rural bureaucracy dancing. Venkat Iyer and Meena break it. But farmers are unsure as protests will ruin them. Who will listen to them? Who will back them? Yet Iyer and Meena plod. To get farmers off chemicals is hard. For governments and the rural bureaucracy, there is money in pushing chemicals, ruining farms over the long term. Farmers are squeezed of cash and when weather and marketing fails, they had it. Every government scheme, reaches a farmer, shrunk; rural officials ram into them, loot. Marketing is impossible and today no farmer can get a price plus profit to keep farming. Venkat Iyer admits to not reaching the city kids. Young in rural areas are quitting farming leaving their olds in farms. The book is the best reason for farm protests across Mahararashtra and India. Time to gherao cities. Lock the rural bureaucracy. The book is better than the many, many prosaic rural inquiry reports by experts. The book lives, hurts. Me friends, Madhavi and Ajit,  confirm there is no money in farming. They live in slums. Madhavi is a house maid, Ajit sells vegetables. Both have land in villages. Venkat Iyer keeps down the disappointments; he hints and moves on. But it is there for the reader: Farming is not worth it in India. He writes: 'I cannot bring myself to think of what will happen to the agricultural land that the next generation will own. Most of the young generation are working in companies or studying in schools and have no intention of farming at all. They are already migrating to the city to find a job and settle there. They will be part of the GenNext of the country. ......Is this where we are headed? A scary thought.' Venkat Iyer will not leave. It could be argued his arm chair has a strong back. Farmers do not have it. Yet, can India do without moong? For Venkat Iyer and Meena it is Moong over Microchips. Thanks be.