Saint Xavier's Jaipur - Time Travel

Just travelled back in time,
Lush green lower field on the outskirts of Thar,
Saint Xavier’s it was, great legends in blue, dribbling their way to glory,
How we ran to get their attention, slices of lime along with Gopal,
Anand Singh Junia blowing his might into that whistle,
Ashraf’s sprint across that wing, daulat’s boom to that soccer,
It all came back with that one look into his face,
Though the calendar showed 2011 across that table at club,
I could have sworn, I was eight and the year was 1978

On the morning of Christmas,
Searching that turn for Brij Nikunj,
I was twelve and the year was 1982
It was auntie’s Birthday,
And we were five of those 28,
Biju, Ripu, Vineet and Tonu, with the perfect hosting from that little that Shivani was
Every second was a reminiscence and the child within the adults were just giggling to silly,
We missed the others and the lady much

Later that evening,
Among the batch of 86 at john’s house
My seniors were as young as me,
As it was then it was now,
Nothing had changed,
Not Jai or Prashant,
Neither Anuj nor Nitin,
Wives and kids had gladly let the men be boys one more day

A day later,
Holding my kids, spouse on side,
A walk into that hall,
Time had no meaning now,
There stood twelve years of my life,
Every face that I knew and all those who feigned to know me,
Their age, their memories had just left them with a glowing smile,
And I stood with droplets in my eyes,
For it didn’t matter if Junia recognized me or Maya David would know me!
As long as I had seen them once more,
I remembered my father that moment the most,
Wish he could see these tears,
I had earned them well

That night later,
The year was 1990
And all of them must be forty now,
As they were all drunk and didn’t matter what,
Wives were smiling or smirking, it didn’t matter either,
Hugs and swears, promises and apologies,
It was definitely not the end,
How the crowd thinned and no one asked how we earn our bread,
This is school and it is just emotion, commotion and pure, not an iota of greed

For all of us,
I just hope that there is a tomorrow.

Nirmala Singh – a legend in making

Never have I felt before, what I have just experienced. Spending a day with someone, who is about to be a legend, a story waiting to be written.

I hope to be the first one to acknowledge it.

Six years back, when I first met Aunty, Nirmala Singh, Wife of late Dr. Surjan Singh, a leading scientist with the Indian govt. she seemed to be an ordinary middle age, Delhi women, well to do, who in the memory of her late husband wished to do something useful for the village he belonged to and with her life.

Over dinner we discussed her vision, to which, then, frankly I was a little skeptic of its long term survival. In my own enthusiasm of free thinking and belief in complexity of things suggested many a things, that surely would have taken her initiative another way, more towards doom.

And, thus with this skeptic attitude, though, I was around the initiative, it was more for the socialite cause than the social cause.

Adharshila, a school for children, who otherwise, would never enroll in a school, In a remote village called Kohra, near Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. This “remote” comes from a person, himself, living in a dusty village of Bihar. Kohra is seriously remote.

A sixty km. journey takes 2 hrs. Roads that would put craters to shame, undulating fields, no irrigation facility, one crop a year, perhaps cattle fodder or sugarcane, of course no electricity or clean drinking water, govt. run schools, which runs only on the rolls. People still cook food on wood fire, and you can see the tiniest of stars on a dark night and perhaps the whole village would know who snores, it’s so silent, you can still get a sumptuous meal for Rupees ten, I am ashamed; my village can’t boast such niceties.
Aunty, waited late at midnight, in that very silence for her chief guest to be by default, that’s me, she was disappointed, to have me alone, as others were unable to come due to cancellation of trains. But then she had an important day ahead, as long as she had a decoy, the enthusiasm of the staff and kids would not dampen all that bad.
She was busy right from day break to midnight the next day, it was the sixth annual function of Adharshila, on the birthday of her late husband who had envisioned such a dream, which aunty set out to accomplish.

Every nitty gritty was personally attended to, with grace and composure, which would put the best organizer to shame. Of some 250 students, at least half of them would have participated in the programs; an eight year old master of ceremonies in somewhat impeccable English went on introducing the programs, skits and plays with morals woven around, songs and anthems, speeches and jokes. There wasn’t a moment when the audience was lost.
Aunty had known each one of them, all the programs must have been rehearsed many a times, as I could see her lisping with the kids. As the day ended, and till the last kid did reach home, she was attending the parents.
In that pitch dark night as we sat by the fire of the kitchen having dinner, the warmth around the family was more than that fire. I couldn’t help noticing her swelled feet, the day had taken its toll on her health, she must be in her seventies and 90 kg plus, all that walking and flights of stairs was not something one can pursue as career for long.
“This was winters, how do you manage the summers?” I couldn’t help asking, this kitchen fire would be a bane then, and the dusty open roads in this barren field would be too much, the rains still would bring in slush and mud! Wondering, if she had some backup, from this, too much of reality. Even a villager like me, could not accept the fact that someone would do this out of sheer choice.
“Hah! Been there, done that” that’s all she had to say! The smile on her face said everything, “you guys have responsibilities, and do it well!” I didn’t know what to make of it! Here was a women, who has traveled the world, owned houses in the metro’s , have a very well settled lineage, a big family and she chooses to come and spend rest of her life in the village of late husband. Where basic necessities of life need to be struggled for everyday, when health and security should be a normal human beings priority, she goes on wiping the noses of toddlers.

While serving hot rotis’s right from the fire, she says “wish I could serve you some good Chinese food here, but then you guys always get that opportunity, try some of this today” after a pause, she goes on in a soft voice, “kids, even us, used to spend so much of money over frivolous things, a Chinese dinner would cost you five thousand or something, how I wish, people could spare that money for Adharshila”

Well Aunty, here’s a promise I make to myself, every time, I would have Chinese, I would save the bill, and write a cheque of a similar amount to Adharshila!
let me call it, "chopsticks for adharshila"

Don’t know if that could be a little contribution, I could do to change the lives of those you have devoted your life to, but it sure is meant to provide a whiff of fresh air to your spirit, a small initiative, tiny in comparison to your purpose, but perhaps, we could find a few similar and many addicts to ajinomoto!

You are an inspiration, I am proud to have known, how I hope I could dare to walk a few similar steps.

Aunty –Rest in Peace

Aunty, passed away two weeks back.
Mrs. Chitra Singh, perhaps around 60 years old, breathed her last in a hospital in Bombay, suffering from leukemia.
She leaves behind a very loving husband and caring daughter and a son, all well settled.
She also left behind many of us who have forgotten her care in the years when our loved ones were far.

It was in 1981 or 82, that the hostel at St. Xavier’s school, Jaipur, decided to close the hostel part. We were around 200 of us in the hostel. I must have been eleven then.
We had all come to study at Jaipur from far off places all over the country, with diverse backgrounds; closure of the hostel would have meant a very difficult time reallocating, for all of us.
Her son, Nirlipt was a junior and living in the hostel with us and perhaps empathizing with the anguish of the parents, his parents decided to open their Jaipur residence for a accommodation for the really needy boys. Later, I was told, this was auntie’s personal decision which her husband whole heartedly supported. Though, in those days me like others thought it was a business decision, only realizing now, it could only be a women who would justify passion with rationale.

We had all called her aunty. We were 28 of us. 10 year old to 18 year olds, in an unprofessional run hostel but with the personal care and caress that only a deep hearted family could provide, with many a emotional events that concurred during the period of 9 years when the hostel closed, till everyone of us passed out of school, me being the last of the inmates of Brij Nikunj, had a ring side view of those years.

As we all left to find our own pastures and destiny in a pre cell phone and Facebook era, many of us can hardly relate to this gap of so many years and era’s. Like me, I am sure, many of us would have been postponing the day, till at some point we must have been wanting to thank aunty and the family enough. Perhaps waiting for that right moment when we could showcase, how the sapling had grown, which they had nurtured in those difficult years.
I am not sure how many of us had the opportunity and a chance to meet aunty in last few years. I did, meet her with my family a few years back, thank god for that, or else I would have had to repent all my life.
If where ever she is, does have an internet connection and manages to be one of the few who do occasionally read this space. I would like you to know, that, there hasn’t been a day or night that I have not thought of your face ever since I heard of your demise. I needed to thank you enough, for whatever, I am today, I am happy for the fact that you were a part of my life then and will be a cause of my nature and destiny. No human is perfect, and it is in these imperfections that I find peace and strength.

You will always remain an inspiration, a symbol of care to me.
Love you Aunty!

P.S - Though, I do find solace in the possibility that my father might be in good company up there!

REST IN PEACE PAPA

It’s exactly been two dark moons since papa passed away.
Sri Ram Kumar Singh, fondly called Lapetu Singh, born 6th of July 1948 at village Maniyarpur, District Vaishali, Bihar passed away on the 3rd of May, 2011 at around 1 A.M, inside the sanctum sanctorum of the age old Shiva temple the family deity, in a rather dramatic way, like his life had been lately.
Ever since, the episodes of last year, his perhaps only goal in life now appeared to be the resurrection of the dilapidated temple, in a record time of 10 months he had managed to construct a 81 feet, 3000 sq ft structure and was about to do the final rituals a few days later.
None of us were pleased with this single agenda program of his and had hardly cooperated. We didn’t see this coming, except for a lesser dangerous ailments like epilepsy, atrophy of the right brain and high blood pressure, he was a normal physically and a normal death would have been at least 20 years later.
But of course, rationality is subjective and in the most suited manner the man with the utmost pride walked out of his house in the middle of the dark night, prayed to his ancestors and worshiped his deity, seeked forgiveness from the souls he was leaving and slept the deepest slumber ever in the foot of his god with an absolute calm and peace on his glowing dead face.

Born to a 53 year old father Sri Nagina Singh and his second wife Uma Devi an 18 year mother, he was the only son and hope for the seven families of brothers and cousins who had no issues or hope left of continuation of their lineage, the family together owned 1200 acres of Zamindari then.
Father Nagina Singh had no interest in the property and lived with the British in Patna, running a motor company, in his early days he had lost his wife and kids in an epidemic and it was only in his last days of his life that he came back to the village, denouncing everything he had earned.
Papa lived his early life in Patna, but would travel often to the village and was pained to see his cousin grandfather the then “Malik” blowing wealth and the inhuman treatment he meted out the lower strata of society.
Papa turned a communist and would often boast to us later the big names he was associated with while running the communist party elections in Patna. After the death of the then Malik, Shree Panchu Singh, who ruled with an iron fist and, his father had no choice but to return to Zamindari.
Papa dropped out of his college pursuing the science degree, much to the annoyance of his father and engaged himself into the matters of property.
Soon the communist had turned into a Zamindar himself fighting the Government against land ceiling and the “parcha’s” distributed of his property to the poor he stood for against his grandfather a few years back.
He made his father stand for the elections of “Mukhiya” and had him uncontested take that post for next 20 years till his time of death. The government till date has not been able to acquire a single inch of land from the property he inherited, though my father must have sold at least 800 acres of land in his life.
Married at an early age of 20, he was broken the news of his wedding two days before his wedding, my mother Asha Singh, was 19 then, daughter of a Doctor and also came from a family of zamindar. Just that the priorities were different there and here. Back in their family, they would go for shikaar, have partridges and wild boar for dinner almost every day and sold land to have a feast.
While here, there were widows of seven families to be taken care, their sisters and some two dozen rustic managers. Husband had turned into a full time farmer, ploughing land as he could not sell due to the land ceiling cases. There would be an army standing every second day to violently settle the border issues of landed property.
But life was good for them as everyday was an adventure.
Father to two sons and three daughters, all been provided good opportunity for education, in different corners of the country, in a situation in those days, with hardly any civil society around, guns were one thing, we have seen in our early days, people walking with spears and other improvised arms walking around in their daily routines, bullock cart and horses and boats for travel as far as 20 kms to Hajipur the nearest Kasbah, all of this was till the late eighties. Father had the vision to send us all out in those days, when he was still grappling with a double barrel gun and an army of spear men to perform his farming.

Given the situation, he excelled in his work, he was one of the active forces of the green and white revolution, the way he used the laws to save his property, in fact to an extent to reclaim what the family had lost over the years, is nothing short of brilliance.
Somehow, his lateral approach to life, though led to excellence in the projects he overtook, he lost out on a few essential things in life.
Passion, love and happiness.
He was a simpleton who still wore a lungi at home and a polyester shirt he must have bought in seventies. All the Arrows and Marks and Spencer’s still have the collar pins intact, the ones he was being gifted by friends and family.
Neither was he able to spend time with family nor did he make many friends and thus turned a loner till late. Living a solitary life in Maniyarpur,happy with his quintessential marijuana and bhang trying to make a heaven here, he forgot that home is where heart is. It’s made of humans and not of bricks and mortar. He was a friend of the latter, built a 20 inch thick 20 ft tall wall around his 2 acre campus, a three floored house with some 12 rooms and as many toilets and large halls and balconies for two people to live.
Various small and big halls and stores were continuously being made every year.
It was this affinity of his and that I had used to get my factory constructed without me spending a penny.
He must have spent a very handsome amount of money in his lifetime and the reason he had a few thousand rupees in his savings. He was just a spender.

Over the years he has left a very well organized and a consolidated empire of real estate, which could be taken to a next stage, but he has left a long list of people who kept waiting for his hugs and kisses and some good words.
He was an intense human being, extreme and unpredictive. But then who says all has to be well.
We have formed a trust yesterday, “SRI RAM KUMAR SINGH MEMORIAL MANIYARPUR SHIVALAY SAMITI TRUST” and wish to continue a little of his wishes of maintaining the temple that he was committed to and much more like building schools and hospitals and meeting out other human needs good in nature.
Many people will have many words for him; there were thousands to walk barefoot to the Ganga for his last rites, women who brought their children to touch his feet, mostly people he had never met, poor who could get sweets and feast only when someone like him dies. It is these people whom the trust will address to.
You had a right brain atrophy, which restricted you to think right.
The least we can do is think for your deeds.
REST IN PEACE PAPA.

Nawang Gombu - R.I.P

For me, when I first met him, Nawang Gombu was just an old time mountaineer who happened to climb the Everest twice, sat comfortably in the wooden office at the Himalayan mountaineering institute, Darjeeling and had a welcoming smile.

Then, to me like any other layman, Mountain meant Everest and mountaineer meant Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay.

On my next meet, this perception has changed drastically, as I shook hands, receiving my certificate from the man, I could well understand every freckle on his face and what would have gone into making of those hard lines, as had just about managed to complete my adventure course in mountaineering. “Ah! I see you have some much required talent for a budding mountaineer” Gombu had remarked, with a slight grin. My citation read, “Excelled in hat speech, debate and elocution”.

The two week course and the climb up from Jorthang to Darjeeling, nonstop in 6 hours had surely left a remarkable impression on my life and an amazing admiration for this mountaineer.

Nawang Gombu, the first man to scale Mt. Everest twice, died at his home in Darjeeling early on Sunday, 24th of April 2011, after a brief illness. He was 79.
He was not an attention seeker and thus went quietly into the night, when Sri Satya Sai Baba coincided to leave his body on the same very day; Satya Sai Baba hogged the limelight, which should have been equally if not more, due to the great soul of Nawang Gombu.

Born in 1936 in Minzu, Tibet, he was the son of Tenzing Norgay’s oldest sister, besides holding many records in mountaineering, scaling many peaks for the first and receiving many accolades globally, was a perfect human being, humble and inspiring to the core.
He was the youngest Sherpa in tenzing’s team which conquered the world’s highest peak and then went on to climb the Everest on different peak twice and many other peaks, no one had treaded before, he even took his grand children along on one of his achievements.
In the present day of mountaineering with most of the true essence gone and mountaineers fighting it out for money and fame, Gombu's message to all had been, "Mountains cannot be conquered, and mountaineering is like a pilgrimage. We have been paying our respects to the mountains for generations. For mountaineering to sustain as an adventure sport team spirit and love for the sport is the need of the day. Mountaineering can never be commercialized."
He has been an inspiration to me as a simpleton, an achiever and an outstanding human being. I am proud to have known him.

May his soul rest in peace.

Anna Hazare, JP, Mahatma, Corruption and Public Money

Anna Hazare’s fight against corruption is getting trendier on the net. Facebook status, tweets and rejoinders from active netizens seem to be hogging the limelight just after the cricket mania. Well, like cricket, fight against corruption is also getting to be a trend and a peer pressure agenda.

I had a chance to meet the man in the temple that he lived in Ralegan Siddhi, a village in Ahmednagar district, Maharashtra, India and his efforts for establishing it as a model village, for which he was awarded the Padma Bhushan by Govt. of India. It was summer of 1991 and I along with a friend had gone to do some recce work in Ahmednagar, when we decided to see what this man was up to,
Taking on the most powerful Sharad Pawar by his horns in those times could make anyone feel inquisitive about his nerdness. But with little intellect that I had in those days, I could figure out, that this man was not afraid and was pure.

Anna sure did not do this for a few days of glory on the virtual world; he is like Jaiprakash Narain, who is a simpleton, focused to his cause and very down to earth. Unlike the mahatma, who had a global perspective and a flair to identify with smallest of local issues, Anna has always fought for local issues without a larger picture. All these men have one thing in common, credibility and integrity.

Though, this could be different, fight against corruption is no fight, it’s like fighting a shadow, everyone will join you, even the most corrupt. Jaiprakash fought against corruption of the congress party, his army men included, Laloo and Paswan and Mulyam and many more third front socialist. We all know what happened to them.

In this fight, if it reaches somewhere, of which it has the potential, will emerge a new class of pure citizens, who will be lured to rule from the front, maybe, the lokpal bill be amended and a few clean leaders from the dormant political front be a part of the punishing crew. In time the white khadi wearing new clan would put up statues of Anna and decide the fate of billions of rupees to be spent.
This has been the history forever. Anna might be the catalyst this time, like mahatma was to Nehru and Jinnah and JP were to laloo’s and Mulayam’s.

Along with this crusade what one needs is rational principled approach with a plan and a strategy. Gimmicks like indefinite fast is good to grab headlines and will also be forgotten when the IPL arrives.

The root cause of corruption is allowing public servants and legislators to disposal of public money and power, which in turn happen in the name of social good and equality and to eradicate poverty with social schemes like, free education, free health, free food, agro subsidy, MNREGA and other umpteen programs.

It is these social goods and goodies that Anna and JP and mahatma supported that lays a foundation for higher taxes, fiat money printing, government borrowings and all this in the hands of the corrupt and powerful.

Social good happens, it happens if you leave the society alone, if you let law and order prevail and contracts validate.

If corruption happens, it happens because your sheer basics are wrong. If a service is in short supply and there is a back door, is it not common sense and animal instinct to queue on the back door and fight on the front window?

Anna you are a nice man, and so are those 150 fasting with you, but don’t try to perfect a system which is wrong in the first place.
Mahatma fought against taxes, no tax on salt, as small an item as salt every common man could relate to, corruption I can’t relate to, in fact it helps me get my job done.
Taxes I hate! I will sit next to you if you take up a cause against taxes....Hungry till i Die!!

Time to fly

Getting a confirmation from able souls, on what you wanted to do in the first place, is a very reassuring feeling.
I have been wanting to write a lot on the events of past few months, but have been holding back, for it might be averse and jeopardizing my already dwindling career.
Writing not only clears my clogged thoughts but also correlates the events of past into a lateral motion.
It is easy for self and others, especially in this virtual world to make sense out of irrationality of the place called “our world”.
Doesn’t make much sense! Does it? That’s the point! This world does not make much sense, we are just trying to act intelligent, which is just a way of survival and quest for an improved and a unique DNA.
So let’s see, what happened here!
Like an annual event, as it has started happening these years, the assets of the company that I have built over past decade were up for public auction, and the hammer went down on the 9th of February 2011.
Besides the fact, there were no bids for the unit, which might take a new enterprise to incur a couple of million to set up, the mortgaged property belonging to my mom and dad, did get auctioned for half the market rate. I had surely not expected anyone to bid for a property belonging to my father, who is well known to be shooting around for no reason, but then even dawood’s property had bidders.
The new SARFESI act has given the banks claws and teeth that would shame the third Reich, it’s the beginning and if they don’t do much about it, it would turn draconian soon.
We had gone to the courts with a writ, the hammer had fallen by the time the list got shorter, and we are up for hearing soon, there is a good possibility that banks might want to settle with allowing me to sell my property myself to settle all dues.
Banks want their money back and we are in no situation to return all of it.
In the dark alley that night outside the lawyer’s house, I did break down profusely, like I did same time last year and the year before last, so it was after all an annual event!
To correlate things, returning after a refreshing forced medical break and some good company, I am quite convinced that my bread earning exercise needs a little less adventure.
I would settle my dues soon as possible, with the property already sold, it sure is an agony to live with the blotch, but I am sure in a picture of larger things, a property in Hajipur was no penthouse in Gurgaon.
The good part is there are no buyers for the factory; reason obviously being, and the location in one interior village of Bihar. So, the unit survives debt free and with zero capital.
We have stocks, which could eventually help in accumulating capital, but the scale would be so low that it would not be able to survive me.
This is a time, when I can share a little secret. When we started a decade back, we had zero capital and went on to have a balance sheet of 2 crores on either side. Hundreds of people survived on the industry, including me. It does have a brand and a small network, a patent for a promising product and goodwill.
If we did dispossess an idle plot of land, we had not lost much, if at the end; this was not really an end! Picture abhi baki hai merey dost!
Entrepreneur and the enterprise both need a break from each other.

This was the crux of gita, which I should have known from day one!
I should have only been a trustee, a manager of this venture, never burdened the business with my load.
All enterprise is for profit, which could be monetary or otherwise, profit is pure and only motive for survival and improvement, confusing it with greed is a big mistake.
Only if I had understood this, even when I was running it an NGO style, I would keep my motives pure and unattached; I perhaps would have been in a lesser pain, in these years.
I understand this now, it’s like letting a child go, and marrying your daughter or similar experiences, the enterprise has fully grown if it’s not attached to your identity or your ego attached to the enterprise.
I must have done my duty well, for the child to be taking its own decisions.

A decade back, when I decided to come back, there was no phone or electricity had mud filled roads and any hope was a distant dream.
It took me 3 years of Public interest litigation to get telephone, and when it did, cell phones made them outdated.
2 years to get a transformer in the village, when electricity never came through and captive power lit the villages.
First we parleyed to get access to weapons for self security and eventually surrendered them for the security of others.
Integrated farms and Set up a unit to rid of traders and industry fleecing the farmers and sooner was fleecing the farmers ourselves.
The village which welcomed the first smokes of the chimney as a growth sign, soon complained of pollution, opportunity to labor turned to hue and cry on minimum wages.
The incubator became a burden.
Guess, life has come a full circle and the caterpillar has wings and it’s time to fly!