Music: Why it means so much

I was playing the first self-titled album by the band Traffic last night. For those who have not heard it, this album from 1968 is a classic. Alternately sombre and light-hearted, loud and melodic, it is a tour de force by Steve Winwood and the rest of the band. Winwood’s vocals never sounded so urgent. Dave Mason’s understated guitar work is brilliant, Jim Capaldi’s angular drumming is spot-on, and the lyrics are profound, yet self-effacing. It is rock, it is blues, it is folk, it is jazz. Like a lot of great music, it is hard to categorize.

Listening to the album had an entirely unexpected effect on my wife. Ten minutes into the album, I saw her sitting in a corner looking very thoughtful. I asked her whether she was bored by the music, since rock music for her is still an acquired taste (I do not blame her, considering the amount of taste she has had to acquire for it – I play so much of it). She said she wasn’t bored. In fact, she liked the album. She had another question on her mind entirely. What, she said, would the next generation of kids listen to, now that most modern music is so inconsequential and pointless?

I paused, with my glass of rum and coke half-way to my lips. I was floored. I did not expect the music to have that effect on her. I wasn’t prepared for the question, which was a very good one. “Well”, I said, “I am sure there still are some good new bands out there. Maybe we just aren’t aware of them, old fogeys that we are” (or I am anyway). Besides, in terms of my tastes in music and other references to popular culture, I am a throwback to the 1960s. I am hardly representative of my own generation; forget about kids who are much younger than me.

But the question was still a very valid one, and I started thinking of why exactly music has played such a huge influence in my life. I consider myself an expert on rock music – not just the music or lyrics, but what the music represents. For example, I can tell you what the Who classic “Won’t Get Fooled Again” means. Written and released in 1971, it is about the souring of the social revolution of the 1960s. Drugs, idealism and a naïve belief in loving everybody else on the planet isn’t going to work, the singer cautions; don’t get fooled again!

And then I realized that for me, music has always stood for a lot more than just a tune or a lyric. In many cases, it has captured my feelings in ways that I could not. Great rock and classical music reminds me of what my dreams in life once were. It reminds me of how I used to be before (like everyone else) I was forced to compromise and dilute some of my beliefs to get ahead in this world. It reminds me of everything out there that is still pure and free. It reminds me not to take anything at face value; to question everything. Rejecting easy answers to complex questions is the easy part. Sometimes (and a great art form like music tells you this), there just are no answers to the difficult questions life throws at us. Sometimes when life gets hard, there is no redeeming pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. You just have to grin and bear it.

Of course, this was not always the case. In my youth, I thought the best way to deal with the blues was to listen to Led Zeppelin’s “No Quarter” at very high volume, preferably with my choice of intoxicants and stimulants close at hand. It felt great for a little while, but at the end of the song, my problems still didn’t go away. Much later, I realized that the music in itself gave you a high. You really didn’t need anything else to go with it.

The music itself can capture what you feel, your hopes, dreams and apprehensions; in many cases, music captures it better than you can yourself. Music is also that last free, pure, unadulterated place in my soul – that last piece of paradise within me. It is mine! I am very selfish as far as guarding that space is concerned. Dig it, baby.

Of course, music has also been responsible for me meeting and getting to know many of my closest and truest friends. An initial conversation would go something like this: Me - “What do you like to listen to, man?” Friend – “Well, I like Creedence Clearwater Revival and the Clash”. Me – “Really? Well, we should get together sometime and listen to “Guns of Brixton”. Friend – “Yeah, that sounds like a plan”. And that is how many of my most valued friendships have started. Recently, when a close friend of mine saw the Who in concert in Los Angeles and brought back a t-shirt of the band for me, I was ecstatic. Yes, band t-shirts still make me happy, ok?

Coming back to the question my wife raised; Will the next generation of kids have their own representative bands, making music that reflects their hopes and fears? I do not know. What I do know is for me, so many years later, the music I first heard twenty-five years ago as a boy still matters. And I have a feeling that I will still feel this way even if I live to be eighty.

I realise this has been a “heavy” blog. I promise that the next one will be a much lighter one!

Mountain Stories: When the Beatles Came to Town

My wife and I recently returned from a lovely Himalayan vacation. The base I use for all my Himalayan sojourns is the town of Almora, tucked away at 5,500 feet in the Kumaon Himalayas. Apart from the spectacular natural beauty on offer in this part of the world, I have a deep emotional connection to this place. My grandfather was so taken in by the beauty and splendour of the Indian Himalayas, he decided to retire there in 1969. As a child, I made annual pilgrimages to Almora every October to meet my grandfather and soak up the atmosphere of the Himalayas. Most of my most vivid, important childhood memories are from the mountains, where as a child, I spent hours tinkering in my grandfather’s beautiful garden and watching the play of light and shade, cloud and sunshine on the deep, dark forests and snow-covered mountains.

Over the years, the town of Almora has grown exponentially. Like most Indian towns, the growth has been largely unplanned and haphazard. As a result, most of the town has become dirty and crowded. However, my grandfather’s neighbourhood has remained largely unchanged.

But this blog is not about Almora or even the Himalayas. It is about the legend of the Beatles coming to a little village above Almora back in 1968. That the Beatles visited the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s ashram in Rishikesh in 1968 is a documented fact. That they stayed in Rishikesh for three months is also well-documented. However, reliable sources tell me that three of the four Beatles (John, Paul and George) visited a little village above Almora now called “Crank’s Ridge” back in 1968.

Before I get into details, I need to tell you where Crank’s Ridge is. It is located about six kilometres above the town of Almora, at about 6,500 feet. The forested ridge is on the sunny side of the mountain, which means that it does not get too cold, even in the depths of winter. It has a truly spectacular view of the Himalayas, with the 25,600 foot high Nanda Devi peak dominating the horizon. It also has a reputation for being a place with a spiritual aura around it. Famous Indian mystic Swami Vivekananda lived and meditated here in the 1890s. Ever since then, it has seen a steady stream of famous artists, musicians, mystics and cranks (hence the name “Crank’s Ridge” – check it out on wikipedia).

American beat generation poet Allan Ginsberg visited here in 1962, and felt it was a “little like the Catskills in upstate New York, only more spiritual”. Sixties guru and University of California Berkeley professor Timothy Leary lived here for extended periods of time in the 1950s and 1960s. Singers Bob Dylan and Cat Stevens also visited here, as did noted Buddhist scholar Robert Thurman, father of the delectable Uma Thurman. In fact, the young Uma Thurman also probably lived here for a little while. Indian dance maestro Uday Shankar (brother of sitar player Ravi Shankar) set up a school for Indian classical dance here in the 1930s. Indian film-maker Guru Dutt also lived here for sometime in the 1950s. These are all documented facts.

Wikipedia also says that Crank’s Ridge is “a cult destination, it now has a small community of backpackers and ex-hippies settled there ever since the place gained the reputation of being a Power Centre during the hippie hey-days. This reputation is due to the alleged gap in the Van Allen Belt above the ridge, a perception arguably strengthened by the free and easy availability of hemp on the slopes. There is also a Buddhist meditation center on the ridge”.

All in all, Crank’s Ridge is a place worth visiting, and I go there every time I am in the mountains. And now, patient reader, I will come back to the question I raised a few paragraphs ago. Did three of the four Beatles visit here in 1968, or is this just another shaggy-dog story? An individual I know and respect has irrefutable proof that Timothy Leary was indeed a frequent visitor to Crank’s Ridge and the town of Almora. Leary was a very close friend of the Beatles. The Beatles were in Rishikesh in 1968. Rishikesh is also a town in the Himalayan foothills, about 250 kilometers away from Almora and Crank’s Ridge. I also have it from reliable sources that George Harrison made several trips to Almora and Crank’s Ridge in the 1970s. This is not surprising, since of all the Beatles, Harrison was the one most attached to India and was also a keen student of Indian music and Hinduism.

If indeed the Beatles made the long and winding journey to Almora and Crank’s Ridge from Rishikesh back in 1968, they would have followed much the same route we did this year. They would have traveled via Deoprayag, Rudgraprayag, Gwaldam and Kausani. Like us, they would probably have had a night-halt at the town of Rudraprayag, the confluence (“sangam”) of the Alakananda and Mandakini rivers, which together form the mighty Ganges. Here one road leads up to that holiest of Hindu pilgrimage towns – Badrinath. Another road leads towards Gwaldam and Almora.

Of course, Almora was a much smaller, more picturesque town back in 1968. Crank’s Ridge today boasts of several high-class resorts, an excellent multi-cuisine Continental restaurant and lovely cottages where old ex-hippies from all over the world live. The place has a real multi-cultural, laid-back feel to it. But back in 1968, it would have been just a collection of stone and slate mountain houses where villagers lived and eked out a living in the terraced fields below.

But could John, Paul and George have come here in 1968? It is not only possible, it is likely. John and George would definitely have been interested. I am not so sure about Paul. George was already sold on India, Indian mythology and music. At the time, John was sold on the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. It is very, very possible that they came to Crank’s Ridge in 1968. If that is indeed the case, it is also possible that some of the songs on the landmark 1968 Beatles “White Album” were written here. The Beatles themselves have said that most of the “White Album” was written in India.

I find this whole hypothesis fascinating. Could “Across the Universe” or “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” have been written above Almora, Uttarakhand? It is possible.
Did the three Beatles visit Almora and Crank’s Ridge in 1968? What do you think?

Indian Heroes: The Mangal Deep School for the Mentally Handicapped

The last few weeks, and indeed months, have brought us nothing but bad news in India. The economic slowdown was the first bit of bad news we heard about. Then the spate of terror bombings across the country, culminating in the mowing down of innocents in Mumbai two weeks ago. Our politicians seem too weak-kneed, incompetent and corrupt to deal with the situation.

Heroes seem hard to find in this day and age. But they still exist, as I found to my pleasant surprise. It is just that they are hidden and not easy to find. They quietly go about their business, saving lives one by one, against all odds.

This is the story of the Mangal Deep School for Mentally Handicapped Children in the mountain town of Almora, deep in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand. On our recent trip to the Himalayas, my wife and I were taken to meet the founder, students and staff of this school. I was wary. Many Indian NGOs (non-governmental agencies) that are ostensibly set up to provide social welfare and justice are just as corrupt and inefficient as their governmental counterparts. Many of them use monies received from well-meaning donors to feather their own nests, instead of using the funds to benefit their intended audience. I am personally aware of two or three such NGOs that have duped me in the past.

So the Mangal Deep School for Mentally Handicapped Children came as a very pleasant surprise. Set on a picturesque ridge in a village below the town of Almora, the school premises commands a very impressive view of the Central Himalayan Ranges.

The school was started ten years ago, with a student population of only five children. Today, it has grown to cater to fifty children with special needs. The founder and staff of the school are extraordinarily dedicated. Over the years, they have learnt to cater to students with many different needs (the latest student to enrol is autistic). They have learnt this on their own, with little or no support from state and central governmental agencies (more on this later). The school was set up by a retired college teacher who used her entire pension and retirement funds to start the school. She must be nearly seventy years old, but she is indefatigable and always cheerful. I have not seen such positive energy in people half her age. She is also self-effacing to a fault. Over the years, this extraordinary lady and her staff have learnt to deal with students with varying kinds of special needs, indifferent, occasionally hostile parents, a sceptical and conservative society, and apathetic and often corrupt governmental agencies. And they do all this with a smile on their face.

But the real stars of the school are the students themselves. Each student is taught a vocation based on their talents, so that they become financially independent and help support their families, who are often poor. We were astonished to find the high levels of artistic ability that these children possessed. They make high-quality dinner and place mats, greetings cards, hand-woven carpets and gift bags, among other things. You and I would pay big bucks for these items in any big-city mall. The school has succeeded in making the students financially independent and gone a long way in helping many of them enhance their worth in the eyes of their families. The students are also taught to read and write And all of this is done with smiles and good cheer.

The less said about assistance the government is supposed to provide, the better. The number of approvals required to receive allocated financial assistance from the government are many, and frankly, quite ridiculous. Every governmental agency in the chain wants its own cut or bribe. It is truly shocking. I knew corruption in Indian government agencies was endemic, but the extent and the brazenness of it left me speechless, when I found out details. I know who these corrupt governmental agencies are, but I will not name them in this blog, because it may get the school into trouble. Suffice to say, the school authorities have squarely refused to pay bribes to obtain the financial assistance promised to them. Like in most other facets of Indian life, the government is an obstacle to overcome, and not a facilitator.

But let me come back to the school and its founder and staff. They work hard, against all odds, to cater to a forgotten and neglected section of our society. They ask for very little in return. They do this only because this is the right thing to do. They soldier on and prevail in the face of daunting adversity that would deter most other people (it would certainly deter me). In my book, this makes them true heroes. Forget our self-obsessed celluloid stars in Bollywood and our overpaid, over-hyped cricketers. What this school is doing is noble, it is real, it is right.

For many years, I have felt guilty of not even attempting to return a little bit to the country that made me – India. Now I have the opportunity to do so, in a small way. My wife and I intend contributing what we can to help the Mangal Deep School grow and flourish. At this point in time, modest financial assistance is all we can offer. If we choose to settle down and live in that part of the country some years from now (this is very much part of the grand plan), we will find other ways we can contribute.

If you are interested in finding out more about the Mangal Deep School, please contact me. Do something good, feel something real. Thanks.

Politics: In Defence of George Bush Jr.

I expect this to be a deeply unpopular blog with plenty of adverse comments. How can you defend George Bush Jr, people will ask? Look at the mess he has made, especially in Iraq. Look at his approval ratings – barely 25% of Americans approve of his presidency at the moment. He is dyslexic, clueless about foreign affairs and policy and knows very little about macro-economics. His prior experience as a businessman and owner of a baseball team show him to be a failure. So how can you defend him?

To begin my defence, let us first list the facts. All of what I have mentioned in the previous paragraph is true. George Bush made a huge mistake going into Iraq, a country that under Saddam Hussein was a tyranny. However, it was a secular, reasonably moderate country in the Middle East. Crucially, Iraq under Saddam Hussein was an important counterweight to the other key player in the region – Iran. As long as you had these two countries balancing each other out, the world was a safer place. Now that Iraq is no longer a rival, Iran has aspirations of becoming a regional superpower and there is nothing the US can do to stop them.

There were no Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) in Iraq either. I agree that Iraq was Bush’s one big mistake. Because of that expensive error of judgment, the US became deeply unpopular throughout much of the Islamic world. Dubya’s father, the far more capable and intelligent George Bush Sr., did the right thing during the first Gulf War in 1991. He bombed the hell out of Saddam Hussein, destroyed the Iraqi Army and left, having taught Saddam a lesson for invading Kuwait. That war was won in days, it was inexpensive and the body count was low.

But if you take the Iraq War out of the equation, how would George Bush Jr. fare as a president? Would his legacy be viewed more favourably? Here again, it depends on your perspective. Bush did nothing to help in managing the two big domestic economic crises that an aging America faces – Social Security and Medicare. He refused to tackle the key problem of prohibitively priced healthcare insurance - a problem that deprives tens of millions of Americans from getting access to affordable healthcare. At the beginning of his presidency, he laughed off concerns about global warming, saying these fears were exaggerated. He did not encourage American automakers to develop alternative fuels.

But George Bush Jr. also did quite a few good things. The most important among these (for countries such as India and China) was that he encouraged and supported free trade. As a result, China became the manufacturing hub of the world. Its economy grew by leaps and bounds, and millions of Chinese were pulled out of poverty. India became the services and information technology hub of the world. The explosive growth of India’s services sector in the last decade owes a lot to George Bush Jr. He made it easier for qualified foreigners to live and work in the United States, by liberalising immigration policies. During his presidency, the U economy remained robust and grew faster than it had in decades, which created jobs for Americans, Indians and Chinese alike.

George Bush Jr went out of his way to work with India on the Indo-US civil nuclear deal. I do not claim to be an expert on this deal, but when people like former Indian President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and Indian National Security Adviser K. Narayanan support the deal, I assume that it is in India’s best interests. He stayed out of the Kashmir issue, and said it was a bilateral matter that needed to be resolved between India and Pakistan.

It is easy (and completely wrong) to blame George Bush Jr. for the current economic recession in the US. The fact is that he had nothing to do with it. The legislation to provide supposedly “affordable housing” to those who could not afford it was one that was passed many years ago, by his opponents the Democratic Party. This legislation was a populist one designed to garner votes. Dubya in reality, tried hard to nullify this legislation. The fact is that Dubya presided over the largest global economic expansion in history – one spanning six years from 2001 to 2007. Thanks to the economic policies of his government, the U.S, China, India and many other countries prospered.

It is possible that history will be a little kinder to George Bush Jr. From an American viewpoint, Bush started the Iraq War, and did nothing to combat global warming, resolve the healthcare crisis or reduce that country’s dependence on foreign oil. But he also ensured seven years of unprecedented economic growth. From an Indian viewpoint, he was a friend of India and his policies were consistently pro-India. Therefore, his legacy for Americans will be a mixed one. His legacy for India however, will be uniformly positive.

This does not mean that I have anything against Barack Obama. I wish him well. But there are a couple of areas of concern. The first is his view on outsourcing. He has said that he will find ways to penalise American companies that are “shipping jobs overseas”. This is like the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena saying that jobs in Maharashtra should be reserved for only Marathi speaking people. The fact is that all employers around the world will always find ways to reduce their costs of production. Lower costs of production means that consumers like you and me pay lower prices for goods and services. I sincerely do hope that Obama does not try and curb US outsourcing work to other countries, because this is something that is mutually beneficial.

The other warning sign is that Obama plans to appoint Bill Clinton as “envoy” to help “resolve” the Kashmir issue between India and Pakistan. This is being done in the mistaken belief that Pakistan will fight terrorism better if they had all their troops stationed on the Afghanistan border. Also of course, now that Hillary Clinton is no longer a candidate for US President, Bill needs something to do to keep him gainfully occupied. This desire to appoint an “envoy” to “solve” the Kashmir problem is worrisome. Kashmir is a bilateral problem between India and Pakistan.

But it is still early days. Obama is intelligent, charismatic and seems to be a unifier. He has overcome formidable obstacles to become the President-elect. He appears to be very serious about combating global warming. He has publicly stated that he will encourage research into alternative fuels and reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil. He appears serious about resolving America’s healthcare and social security crises.

But will he be a good friend to India? Only time will tell.

Observations: In Praise of Hybrids

Barack Obama has won the U.S. Presidential election. Plenty has already been said about his historic victory, so I am not going to give you my take on it. Suffice to say, the challenges facing him are daunting. The most important and immediate challenge he faces is finding ways to resuscitate the U.S. economy. A normal remedy would include a massive increase in public spending, which is what Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) did during the Great Depression, seventy years ago. However, Obama will find this difficult to do since the U.S. federal deficit is already at an all-time high. Besides, any additional public spending would probably mean an increase in taxes as well as the potential threat of higher inflation. In a time where people are losing jobs, this will be an extremely unpopular thing to do. It will be interesting to see how he deals with the global economic crisis. A silver lining will be the fact that the Democrats have gained substantially in the races for the Senate as well as the House of Representatives. This should make it easier for him to introduce any legislation he has in mind to improve the world’s economic situation. Yes, it is the world’s economic situation that will be determined by Obama’s policies, and not just America’s.

But I digress. This blog is not about Obama’s victory. Instead, it is about something that many people do not know or consider important. The media all over the world has been waxing eloquent about Obama being the first “black/African-American” person to become the U.S. President. Actually, Obama is not black. He is of mixed race. His father was an African-American, while his mother was white. The media always needs to categorise whatever they report, so it is convenient to slot Obama as a black man. Like I said a little earlier, this is not a fact.

Obama (like Yours Truly) is a hybrid. He is a racial hybrid; while I am an ethnic hybrid (my father is a Bengali, while my mother is a Kannadiga). In my own small way, I have faced similar problems. Indians I meet always ask me my ethnic background. There is no simple way to answer this question. I either say “Bengali” if I want to give them a short answer. If I am in a chatty mood, I give them the long answer, which is: “My father is a Bengali who grew up in Mumbai. My mother is a Konkani-speaking Kannadiga who grew up in Karnataka. I was born and raised in a Roman Catholic neighbourhood in Bombay, so I frequently went to church. In the impressionable years of my youth, I spent six years living and studying in America, which made me very independent-minded and shaped my identity”.

This last encyclopaedic answer effectively shuts people up. It is also the correct answer. There are many people who find it difficult to categorise me. In their minds, I am a “Bengali”. This is incorrect, but I guess it works for them. Understanding the truth sometimes requires patience, the ability to listen and the realization that every question in the world does not have a neat answer which can be put into a box. Many people aren’t interested in the truth; they only need an answer that can be easily categorised.

I can vouch for the fact that there are plenty of positives about being a hybrid. For Obama, it is being able to reach out to people across races and classes, Democrats and Republicans, to develop consensus. He can relate to blacks as well as whites. He has enough of a perspective to understand the unique challenges and advantages faced by both races. In my own small way, I can relate. I can understand the Bengali language as well as its customs, traditions and rituals. I can also understand my mother’s language and heritage. Add to that the fact that I grew up in cosmopolitan Bombay, and lived and worked across cultures and countries, and this puts me in a pretty unique position.

There are narrow-minded Indians who feel that the ethnic group they belong to is somehow superior to other ethnic groups in the country. There have been enough instances of this in the national news lately. Frankly, I find this laughable. Obviously, these individuals and groups have their heads buried in the sand.

My advice to them is simple – pull your head out of your ass and take a look around you. The world is large and diverse. India is only a small part of what the world has to offer. Take the time out to learn and understand the various cultures and ethnic groups in India. You may be astonished to learn that many of your deep-rooted beliefs are inaccurate and just plain wrong. You may be surprised to find that some of the traditions and histories of other ethnic groups are actually richer and more interesting than your own.

For my outlook on life, I have my parents to thank. They brought me up to be an Indian and a citizen of the world. They taught me to be independent minded, to search for the truth, and to refuse to settle for easy, incorrect answers. Sometimes, the search for the truth can be a frustrating and unsettling experience. It can also be lonely. It requires the searcher to constantly learn new things, and to frequently challenge cherished long-standing beliefs. Each person’s search for the truth is his or her own, and there are no prefabricated paths for you to walk on. To quote the lines of an old song by Van Morrison; “No Guru, No Method, No Teacher”.

So I wish Barack Obama all the best in his quest to rejuvenate America, the greatest country in the world. He is faced with some formidable problems – an ailing economy, an unpopular war and an empty treasury. But he also has a unique set of qualities and a diverse background. He is neither black nor white; he grew up in the American heartland of Chicago, but also in Indonesia and Kenya, he understands the problems of poor inner cities in America, but also studied at Harvard. He is a hybrid, and like all hybrids, he can understand issues that many others cannot. He may or may not succeed in his quest. But as a hybrid, I am rooting for him.

Thanks for listening!!

India: The Bombay I Knew and Loved

The Bombay I knew had clean, quiet, tree-lined suburban streets where on public holidays, we played hockey, football and cricket. If the ball went out in the middle of the street, you ran out to pick it up without a second thought. Today you would get run over in less than a nano-second by some brat driving around in his daddy’s luxury SUV.

In the Bombay I knew, there was no cable TV. Kids were encouraged to come out and play after school. If you didn’t play sports, your peers called you a wimp. There were no fancy gyms. If you wanted to exercise, you sweated it out in your building compound or on the street, just like all the other kids. On afternoons when you had time to spare, you went to “town” to watch Kanga League cricket matches at the Oval Maidan. Today, I do not see kids playing anymore. They are too caught up with computer games and homework, no doubt.

In the Bombay I knew, there was only black and white television, on which you watched “Chhayageet” and Sunil Gavaskar making one of his interminably long test match centuries. “Another innings of dedication, determination and application”, the commentators used to intone. On the way back from school, you stopped by the local paan-waala to listen to the latest cricket score on his handy, nifty transistor radio. You don’t see too many of those anymore either.

In the Bombay I knew, you tuned into Radio Ceylon at night to listen to all the latest American pop hits.

In the Bombay I knew, there were rows and rows of lovely cottages facing the sea. You wondered what it would be like to live in one of them. They are all gone now, replaced by matchbox style high-rise buildings, where you pay the equivalent of a lifetime’s income for a quality of life that is non-existent.

In the Bombay I knew, Bandra Reclamation was one huge field, where kids played all day long in the summertime. Today the place is one giant slum.

On lazy, hot summer days, you went to Bandra Fort to sneak a cigarette or satiate your raging teenage hormones by making out with a girlfriend. In those days, Bandra Fort was almost off-limits. There were rumours of smugglers landing there on dark nights with gold biscuits and counterfeit electronic goods. People said that jackals lurked in the ruins of the fort and howled at night. Today, it is home to a five-star hotel. The smugglers and jackals (if they really existed) are long gone.

In the Bombay I knew, you went to Jude’s Bakery in Bandra early in the morning to buy kadak-pav and ate it with maska, and a cup of hot steaming tea.

In the Bombay I knew, you learnt how to drive in your dad’s old stick-shift 1974 Ambassador car. You had never heard of air-conditioning, automatic transmission, power steering or power windows.

The Bombay I knew was the most diverse, tolerant and cosmopolitan city in India. Nobody asked you where you were from. Nobody called you an “outsider”. At school, nobody asked you your religion, your caste or your ethnic background. Nobody felt superior to you if they belonged to a different community. Nobody laughed at your community’s festivals and customs. All of us were from Bombay, and that was enough.

In the Bombay I knew, you went to Parsi weddings at Khusro Baug, where old Parsi men drank Sosyo raspberry juice, ate caramel custard made in Ratan Tata Institute and quarrelled with waiters about how small the chicken legs on their plate were. Everybody had a great time.

In the Bombay I knew, you spoke either English or “Bambaiyaa Hindi” with your friends. The language, like the city of Bombay, was a melting pot of several different Indian languages. You used words like “raapchik” and “pochaaoed” (the latter was an obscene Bandra special and possibly not in use in the rest of the city). When you saw your friend coming down the street, you yelled “Aey, yer bugger” (another Bandra special).

In the Bombay I knew, you celebrated Diwali with your Hindu friends. During Durga Puja, you pretended to be a good Bengali and went to the Pujo-Baadi in Shivaji Park, mainly to eat the delicious singhadaas and sandesh. On Christmas and New Years’ you went for midnight mass with your Catholic friends (my neighbourhood at the time was predominantly Catholic), partly to check out the pretty young women who attended in hordes. On occasions such as baptisms and funerals of neighbours you knew, you dressed up and went to church. On Christmas Eve, groups of young kids would come and sing Christmas carols below your window. In return, you gave them some money to enjoy themselves.

In the Bombay I knew, there were no expensive nightclubs and discos. Setting up a party was a project. There were no cell phones, and landline phones worked only sometimes. You partied on your friend’s terrace. You hired a stereo and listened to Eddie Grant singing “Electric Avenue” at full volume. You cringed when your friend with poor taste in music suddenly played “Funky Town”.

In the Bombay I knew, you went and bought alcohol from “Aunty’s” on “dry” days. Aunty was a woman who lived in Shirley Rajan village in Bandra, and sold liquor at exorbitant prices to desperate teenagers on “dry days”. She lived on the second floor. You whistled when you got to her building, and her assistant, a little boy, came running up to you. You told him what brand of whisky you wanted and gave him the money. He ran up the stairs and handed over the money to “Aunty” who then proceeded to lower the bottle containing the beverage of your choice in a basket attached to a rope. It was a very smooth operation.

On weekends, you went out for drives with your family and dog to places like Aarey Milk Colony in Goregaon (with the traffic, slums and pollution today, this must seem unimaginable). You ate vada-pav outside Churchgate Station, had a few beers with the freaks at Café Mondegar and ate huge lunches at George’s Restaurant in Fort. If you were in the mood for a steak, you walked down to Wayside Inn on Rampart Row, where doddering elderly waiters with bad attitudes served you the best steaks in Bombay. Wayside Inn is gone and in its place is a fancy, glitzy restaurant with no character or personality.

Yes, I remember that Bombay well, the beautiful city with the sea on one side and the rolling Western Ghats on the other, easily the most important and enlightened city in India.

In light of recent events, that Bombay is gone forever. Bombay represented the mess that was India, but also all that was good and great. It was a grand experiment which showed us what we could achieve as a nation if we put all our regional and religious divisions behind us. It taught me what being Indian really meant. It taught me to judge people based on who they were as individuals, and not on what language they spoke at home or which part of the country they came from. I miss that Bombay, I miss that India.

Politics: Will the Real Rahul Baba Please Stand Up?

Imagine that you work for an old family-run firm. The firm has been owned and managed for generations by the same dynasty. Imagine also, that the firm is currently run by a matriarch. The matriarch is a very savvy, egotistical woman who projects the firm as being democratic, modern and progressive, whereas in reality, it is the opposite - traditional, autocratic and conservative. The firm has many faithful retainers like you. To keep herself in power, the matriarch brooks no opposition and often plays the faithful retainers off against each other.

The matriarch has invited you to her home for dinner. As someone who has spent his whole career with the firm, you definitely make it a point to attend. It is a signal honour, to be recognised and invited to her home for dinner. However, somewhere deep inside, you feel a sense of resentment. You view yourself as an intelligent and capable employee, who if given half a chance, would do a really great job of running the firm.

Once at the party, you mill around and talk to the other family retainers who have also been invited. You also deferentially greet the matriarch’s precocious young son. It is very clear to everyone present at the party that the son is being groomed for a leadership role, though his skills have never really been tested. On the rare occasions that the son has been given any real responsibilities within the firm, he has failed to perform. This fact is kept under wraps as the matriarch invariably finds a scapegoat when things go wrong.

The matriarch’s philosophy is simple – take credit for herself and her son when things go well, pin responsibility on others when they go badly. This deepens your sense of resentment and insecurity, but you are helpless. After all, many family retainers like you have been sidelined by the matriarch when things have not gone well for the firm. You have no choice but to bow in deference to the matriarch and her son. After all, who else can run this family firm? All your life you have been conditioned to believe that only the family the matriarch belongs to is capable of doing so.

This scenario pretty much captures the way things are run within India’s Congress Party. Sonia Gandhi rules with an iron hand. Manmohan Singh is the regent, keeping the Prime Minister’s chair warm for Rahul Gandhi or Rahul “baba” as he is still known. Rahul “baba” is now forty years old, and it is time for him to grow up.

He has been hovering on the fringes of India’s political scene for years now. The problem with him is that he appears to be well-intentioned, but has yet to demonstrate any leadership or administrative skills. He does not have any ministerial portfolio. The Congress Party carefully stage-manages his few public appearances. I can think of two or three such instances recently. The first was last year, when he went to meet the Prime Minister about the implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS). The NREGS was already being implemented nation-wide without Rahul baba’s help. But the Congress Party made it a point to send out several detailed press releases on Rahul baba’s meeting with Manmohan Singh. This stage-managed event was designed to show how much Rahul baba cared for the rural poor.

Another such event took place recently, where Rahul baba was photographed helping low-caste Dalit farmers build earthen dams. Here again, the press release and photographs focused on how Rahul baba’s heart bled for the poor, not what was being done to alleviate the miseries of the Dalit farmers in question. He is being projected as being well-intentioned and articulate. Unfortunately, that is not enough to govern a country. Every politician (including and especially the villainous ones), claim to have the country’s best interests at heart, and all of them say that all they want to do is “serve” the country.

There is nothing wrong with Mama (Sonia Gandhi) trying to project Rahul Gandhi as India’s next Prime Minister. This is the way “democracy” works in the Congress Party. But what the rest of the country needs to know is whether Rahul baba has the actual skills, intelligence and gumption to run the nation. His past record is not inspiring. He graduated from St. Stephen’s College in Delhi about twenty years ago. There were vague reports that he “studied” at Harvard University in the US. This means nothing, because anyone who is rich and well-connected can take a few summer classes for fun at Harvard University. The point is, he did not graduate or complete any degree at Harvard (or anywhere else).

He has never really worked or held a regular job in the last twenty years. Even within the Congress Party, he has never ever been directly responsible for conceiving or implementing any of the various public-works schemes the government has come up with. In terms of garnering votes for the Congress, his record is disastrous. He pulls in the crowds everywhere he goes, but these people never seem to vote for him. To date, every time he has campaigned for the Congress, the party has lost elections. This pattern has been repeated – in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat and many other places. Rahul Gandhi’s presence at campaign rallies are the kiss of death (at least so far).

Before I am accused of being a supporter of the BJP or any opposition political party, let me say here that I have nothing against Rahul baba in person. The point is – I have nothing positive to say about him either, because nobody seems to know exactly what he stands for. Being blandly polite is not enough. What are his views on the economy, and reducing poverty in India? How does he propose to deal with terrorism? How does he propose to handle India’s huge environmental problems? How does he plan to tackle an overstaffed corrupt bureaucracy that feels it is not accountable to the people of India?

It is possible that Rahul Gandhi is extremely intelligent, well-intentioned and capable. If so, this is India’s best kept secret. But for the rest of us to know what he is really made of, he needs to be plain-spoken and take up a position of real responsibility within the government. To paraphrase an old rap song – “Will the real Rahul Gandhi please stand up, please stand up, please stand up?”