"Maara dil ma dhadke Gujarat!"

As a writer, one spends a lifetime journeying into the heart of language, trying to minimize if not eliminate the distance between language and thought. 'Language is the skin on my thought'.
From the essay Power Politics – Arundhati Roy
 
Ok, so this post has to get me the maximum ire from readers. I am ready.  One of my senior colleagues once labeled me as a left wing ‘terrorist’ because I opposed Modi's politics on a public forum. The senior conveniently lives in a country that has most recently witnessed maximum racial attacks, and neither have I seen him coming out in support of his fellow countrymen nor have I heard his opinion on the barbaric attacks. It’s amazing what kind of double lives we live in this modern (complicated) world. Consistency in shallowness. A Shiv Sena opposes Sachin Tendulkar's statement, so he goes to the MNS' Maharashtra Day function and accepts a golden sword. Take that, from your popular icon! Why are popular figures asked to take a stance. And even if asked, why do they have to take one?. Amitabh Bachchan going to Modi and suddenly giving a new "kahaani mei twist" to the whole political scenario. No one denies in participating for the celebrations for a Gujarat Day or Maharashtra Day. But why associate with MNS or BJP?

On the occassion of celebrating 50 years of the state of Gujarat, A R Rahman has composed a song (like an anthem for the state) "Jai Jai garvi gujarat..." Hear the song here.



The song is so brilliant that for a moment my hard lined-hurting Gujarati heart warmed up to the thought of belonging to this wonderful state Gujarat. Music lingers on long enough to heal from within.
The A R Rahman anthem begins with
 "Dhanya hu thai gayo, ahi janm chhe maaro thayo..."

What an amazing way to put forward a simple thought. After all, this is where I was born. This is where I did my part-schooling and my graduation. This is where I found my calling and this is where I belong ultimately. I am sure any NRI Gujarati hearing this song, will feel as emotional as the soccer players feel while the national anthem plays on the ground on the eve of Finals before the huge crowd. The language of the song: both music and the lyrics are so very Gujarati. It reminds me of how I so love talking in my mother tongue, Gujarati. I always talk in Gujarati whenever I come across a fellow Gujarati. The emotions, the tone, the expression, the words get a new high when I speak in my language. I feel my laughter is more free-flowing, when I laugh in Gujarati. Yeah. even laughter has a language. I even love the abuses that are original gujarati style, invented right there.

My favourite line from the song:
"mane phoolon jetlo parseva thhi pyaar..."
(i love the smell of the sweat like the fragrance of a flower)

Brilliant! never has the enterpreuer inside a Gujarati symbolized in such a perfect manner. Blame it on my lack of reading good Gujarati literature. But this simple line is beautiful. Thats what so many friends of mine whose parents migrated from their states to Gujarat tell me: "you know hardik, If we as a community are told to stand on the street and sell potatoes or sell toys, we wont do it, we would rather take a job of a security guard outside the posh building or a peon in a swanky office, coz thats what we seek in life: stability. whereas a Gujarati wont mind stepping on the street and getting burnt in the scorched heat and manage to make an earning out of it. Forget making money, he/she will double it in a few days. A Gujarati is not in this world to survive but thrive, is how he/she will explain you their philosophy. Thats what makes us different. "dhandha maate koi sharam nai rakhwaani". That is one thing I borrow abundantly from my community.

But deep down, as a poetic Gujarati would put: "yaadon ne jo vaagoliye..the murky history comes floating up. And then being into the 'sane' side of things, the thought of Gujarat and Modi brings with it the ghosts of its gruesome communal background and a reminder that the man in power is probably not meant to be there. Yes. I can hear your counter reactions. Oh have you already closed the page or have started hurling abuses. "these bloggers do not know anything, just because Internet has given them space, they think they can write anything. Narendra bhai has worked very hard to bring glory to the state of Gujarat".

Well, when viewed through the myopic glasses of the urban middle class, Gujarat surely is a state that has done wonders for itself. And what better example can history give: Tata Nano the middle class dream went to Gujarat! An NRI sitting seven seas away and romanticizing about his childhood Gujarat and how it has now changed is bound to give credit to Modi and will be up in arms any moment if someone dares oppose him. Now its very interesting to see the dimension that an NRI Gujarati speaks of. Just because they are away and miss their native land, doesn't mean that the land misses them as much. While drinking beer on the other side of the world they surf government websites, read email forwards about the statistics and the % growth and hear 'only' good things about the state and when they do visit once in two years, they drive along the Expressway and think wow, all is well in my motherland.

The year 2002 - the very year that took away my state from me. A year if only I could erase from the annals of history. But no it cant be undone so easily. I was 19 then, in my most prime youth. Modi returned back with a thumping victory, even after all that he did. But the world moved on...Neither of us had lost any near or dear ones so who cares, those were 'the lives of others'. ***Estimates say: 2000 citizens systematically killed and 1,50,000 driven out of their homes (should i be afraid to say that most of them happened to be Muslims) 288 people were booked by the police under POTA (now the irony that one feels like laughing - 287 muslims and 1 sikh! ) 240 dargahs and 180 masjids were brought down. Women were gang-raped and parents were massacred in front of their kids. With all due respects to the 57 people that got charred in the Sabarmati Train, but the incident still remains a mystery. Only if I could edit this paragraph out of my write up?

Maybe I would have never felt as worthless if the genocide would have happened in an another era, like my counterparts in Delhi, I haven't heard them ever or seen them as ashamed for the anti-sikh carnage (maybe), coz she/he was hardly born or was a toddler and has only grown up on the stories of 1984, but this 2002 was before our eyes., during our prime youth, during the time minds change and beliefs are formed and maybe thats why it has affected my imagination and how. It has painted a picture of a country that is very very volatile! A country so fragile that you would fret your kids to grow up. Where should I go from here. Maybe earn enough, get out of this rat-race and see my kids growing up in a very small town that is hardly visible on the map. But then the claws of a dreaded animal called globalization will surely catch us. And Internet is its biggest example.

Epilogue: In the 'intellectual' Delhi circuit of post 2002, I was so afraid to speak out that I am from Gujarat. All due to you Mr. Modi and your recent history. The thought that everyone will give me a second look, I was so afraid. Not for that, but for the simple reason that I cannot see my motherland in my dreams as pure as it would have been - FOR THAT I will always blame you. Its only for that one reason I would never ever be able to forgive you.

"manne garv chhe ke hun gujarati chhu, pan haqeekat ni upar paato maari ne besi nai shakun jindagi bhar." (Don't feel like translating!)

Please don't mind the random structure and language of this post. Couldn't proofread given the topic!

*** if anyone has a doubt over the reference and the numbers written here, they are free to contact. will produce the required documents.

P.S: have written this hearing this. One of the most haunting themes I have come across. Can do wonders to writing at night. Needless to say comes from Coen Brothers.

© Copyrights 2009 www.bhaandgroup.blogspot.com. All Rights Reserved. Hardik Mehta

Tackling the language and how I made friends in class 6

People almost always have an affinity towards their own language. Not many can detach themselves from their own mother tongue and carry on with their cosmopolitan existence. Somewhere down the line, the “apanapan” in them “jaag he jaata hai...”!! Even, when students leave their home, one of the first things that come to their parents’ mind is that it would be better if their daughter/son finds a roommate/classmate/friend/colleague that belongs to the same region or speaks the same language.

“Ideas ka exchange aasani se ho jata hai, you see”
And / Or
“woh tumhe zyada behtar samajh sakenge..”

I remember how I used to make it a point to speak in the same language to my fellow ‘same-language’ classmates in Delhi. Sometimes it was forced but I carried on, maybe the language had a wonderful “sugar-syrup” quality attached to it. Remember, that interesting episode in the Akbar-Birbal story, about a man knowing every language, so well that nobody could decipher his mother tongue. But then, Birbal always had different ideas.

Ok, so cut to July, 1993 -

Our family was transferred from Mumbai to Baroda. I had just completed my class 5 then. Marathi was a part of my course in Mumbai and I was just getting a hang of it, when the transfer order came, my tryst with the Marathi language came to an abrupt end.

(Flash forward to July, 2008, the forgotten language came back like a long-lost boomerang in the Australian desert carrying Pandit Nehru’s famous words “tryst with destiny”. Enter the local train. Anyways that’s for later.)

Back to July, 1993.

So, when I reached Baroda, and entered my new class 6 - I saw this guy with a lanky frame, long face, and trying to be the hero of the class types (a few months forward again: I too would become of the same type - cutting out the lanky part, of course).

Enter class 6 classroom. Watching this “trying-to-be-hero” guy and his tall structure near the blackboard, I instantly started to have a dislike for him. Maybe it’s with the tall guys or maybe it’s with the idea of intimidating the class with your overbearing persona and ya maybe coz I m “not-so-tall”. To add to my “new-classroom blues” - the teacher hadn’t come and as a result it was time for monitors to mind the class. So, you see this lanky guy is a “monitor” aah...

As soon as he was near the blackboard (green board in our case) he selected a chalk-piece from the lifeless chalk box and started drawing something. No, it was not the drawing, but what he used to draw that irritated me. The drawing would consist of just one face - the side-view of a macho guy with a cigar on his lips and long hair that would extend till his shoulders. (Oh the other day I saw Nirmal Pandey at Lokhandwala market buying Naturals ice-cream. Same pinch. Even I love Naturals)

So now you know what that chalky figure on the board looked like. But Nirmal Pandey hadn’t graced our screen then. So, classmates felt that the lanky guy was trying to sketch someone like Sanjay Dutt in Khalnayak. Back in 1993, it was one of the super hit films, combining Dutt's real and reel life. Remember the 1993 Bomb Blasts case.

But wait, after the drawing came the most irritating part. Mr. Lanky would stand back and admire his sketch and would turn to the class and shout the most absurd thing that you would have heard.

"Ye waqt hamara hai.."!!!

Reference: even "Waqt Hamara hai" - a Akshay Kumar, Sunil Shetty film (then he was Sunil and not Suniel) was released in 1993. Thus getting clearly inspired from the movie, he used to do this stupid act. Oh, so maybe that chalky figure was of Akshay Kumar!

"ye waqt hamara hai,
ye waqt hamara hai"

Day 2 - Class 6.

The teacher enters the classroom and announces that since this is a free lecture, she will take Gujarati subject. She asked us to open our Gujarati textbooks. Now having studied in Mumbai, I never had Gujarati as a subject - but the irony is that my mother tongue happens to be Gujarati. But I was never taught to write.

I could speak, yes, very well.
Read: well, very slowly.
Write: A big No.

Although once my mother came to know that we are going to get transferred to Gujarat, she instantly told me that you will have to learn Gujarati now. She taught me for two or three days before I lost patience. Writing Marathi is much simpler due to its proximity to Hindi. But Gujarati, well I was never ready for it.

But here I was, the teacher had asked now to take out our notebooks and she started dictating. Mr. Lanky was sitting besides me. The class started writing. I was clueless. Words from her mouth came like the arrows in a Zhang Yimou film. They shot my head like a rocket. I could only match her speed of dictation for one or two sentences. Eventually, in the web of familiar words but unfamiliar territory of writing, I lost her. I thought I will look into Mr. Lanky’s book and start copying, but as soon as I tried to do this - Mr. Lanky turned the page. Now I was helpless. I choked. I couldn’t comply.

To everyone's amazement in the class, the 12-year old inside me started crying. The teacher stopped dictating and came to me. On knowing the reason she smiled. She told me to take Mr. Lanky’s notebook for copying at home. She said "practice". In a few days I would catch up - she promised.

The guy gave me his notebook. His mother tongue happened to be Hindi. Amazing irony!

Since that day onwards I started taking his notebook to home. During all the exchanges, I started seeing Mr. Lanky in a different light. I came to know his name: Shailesh Gupta.

The moment I made friends with him - school was never school. From then on, I so enjoyed coming to school. Sitting on last benches, we always had our comments reserved for every classmate, teacher, and peon of the school. We used to cycle together to the railway tracks to watch the brand new Shatabdi Express pass at 3 45pm in afternoon. We made sure that we go as far as possible from the station, so that we see the train in its maximum speed. One fine day, oh sorry, one fine night we were also caught by a police constable. Memories, I tell you.


Post-script:
In class 8, the Gujarati teacher was so impressed with my essay in the exam that not only she gave me the maximum numbers, but she brought my answer sheet from the junk and handed it to me saying: “please read this essay for the class”

The essay was called “shaak-bhaaji na market ma ek kalak” (An hour at the Vegetable Market) I remember describing the vegetable market (Kadak Bazaar near Baroda station) as a melting pot for people, vegetables, voices, noises, cows, cowdung, cow horns, car horns. (in Gujarati - it read - “Jo aam chaale bai, ne vach ma chaale gai... toh kya jaai aapda bhai...?)

Quite an achievement that was from the guy who once cried for not knowing how to write the language. Sorry for this last self-appraisal post script. But I loved that few seconds of celebrityhood.



© Copyrights 2009 www.bhaandgroup.blogspot.com. All Rights Reserved. Hardik Mehta