We shall overcome...

As usual woke up in the early morning. Morning means running time. Today  is 15th August.I took my phone and checked the FB updates. Everyone was wishing  "Happy Independence Day" but most of them were dissatisfied! The same old question, "What we've achieved in 67 years?" All the drawbacks of the Government  and  the political leaders.Black money, unemployment, inflation, corruption  etc etc. Every year I also do the same. This year am too tired of this.

Things are getting worse or we  are  actually  gonna be the Super power who'll answer? One thing I've realized that in a country like India where the population is more than 112crs, there we can't expect that all the problems  or inequalities  will altogether be abolished.

I am a teacher and I'm worried about something else. In my school  children from the rich family background usually come to take admission. They are all very nice and sophisticated! We teach them manners and etiquette. At the end of the day when I step out the door of the school, I find few children not more than  6/7 years of age, collect garbage from the dustbin and the street. They don't go to the school.

The owner of a sweetshop nearby invited me to have some sweets for Independence day. He was reading the newspaper and  talked about the news of submarine  explosion and then the same old thing he said, "Everything is  so hopeless  about this country, Madam!" Then he shouted, "Chhotu, bring sweets and cold drinks for Madam!" A little boy  came  to me holding a  plate of sweets and a bottle cold drink. He was 7/8 years old, wearing a dirty shirt, seemed to be hungry. I smiled and got up from my chair  and gave him the chocolate which I got in the school. I turned to the owner and said, "Why everything  is so hopeless  just  ask yourself!"

One of my students says, "Constitution is the rule book of this country though nobody follows the rule!" There is an article based on "Right to Education"! Right to "education" is only for the people who have money? Then what about Chootu and the millions of children like him?

67 years  have passed  and what we've done for these children? Being a teacher, feel so helpless!
Then  I remember in the morning  school function children were singing,

"We Shall Overcome ,
We shall overcome,
We shall overcome
Someday!
Deep in my heart,
I do believe-
We Shall Overcome Someday!" 

Happy Republic Day!

           Couple of days back, suddenly I remember something... I went to the Book fair to cheer my students on  their success. After the award ceremony, my bosses said, "Teachers, you may enjoy now!"
So, along with my colleagues, went to check out what's new!  Everyone was in a  very good mood because we were going to get three days holiday before the hectic Sports event. I had a great time and enjoyed coffee along with my colleagues.

Suddenly saw a  banner of a news paper! That reminded me something...
"Hey girl, you used to write!" I used to write for that news paper ... Oh yes! Coming back, I asked my dad,
"Can you please suggest me something for the Republic day?" He was busy in watching Premier league matches. He said,
"Hmmm. Have to think!"
Well ,still I don't know what to write? Whether I should evaluate the system or postmortem the democracy or draw the same old cartoons based on corruption, exploitation, human rights  etc? 
Before that I remember couple of years a ago when I was jobless, that time I wrote so many things and asked a question to everyone,
"Is 26th jan, just a holiday to you?"
Most of the people said , "Yes!"
Now I can understand why they said that.

In fact I have also started thinking like them only.
When I ask people,"Why do we celebrate Republic day?"
Most of them can't answer, There are so many people who doesn't even know, what Republic day exactly is?  Last year my effort was to make children understand the worth of democracy. My cartoons helped me a lot in that case.
But after coming out of the school, when I saw the children picking garbage from the dust bin to earn money or the little tea stall boy, feel so helpless... Despite of being a teacher, can not do anything for them. In fact this is meaningless to teach them the worth of democracy.

  Political parties are busy in pulling legs of the ruling party. Ruling party is busy in defending themselves. I know I know They are busy, indeed. Before 26th, they have to prepare some good speech to address the nation. I don't know how many of us take those words seriously.

We won't  even question them,"What about our "democratic" rights?" "When the rape victims will get justice?" "When our brave soldiers who were brutally killed by Pak army will get justice?" "When the country will be corruption free?" "When we will get rid of inflation?"The same old boring questions..

I thought a lot... What to write.. What to write... A six years old kid  gave me the answer of every single question.
He came to me, gave me a picture of our tricolour .and said,
"Ma'am, you said, people usually remember their country on 26th Jan and 15th August only. see? I remember my country everyday because my India is in my heart!"
I am speechless....

Yes, my country is in my heart! Wishing you  Happy Republic day.

The evening of life!

By sitting  in front of the picture of her late husband, Mrs. Pratibha Sen cherishes those old memories-those happy memories of the time they shared together.Her husband Mr. Shyamaprashad Sen was a retired Govt Clerk. He passed away just a few weeks ago. Her son Rohit, who is  an employee in a big IT company is in London right now.
  The house is so small.. They didn't even know about luxury or anything else but they were happy despite of all the adversities.
She remembers the day when their son Rohit was born. He filled their small world with happiness. He was their only hope. Mr. Shyamaparashad Sen's  only dream was to make his son well established. He wanted his son to be so successful that one day he would proud-fully say-"Yes ,Rohit is my son!"
But that was not a piece of cake for his kind of ordinary clerk. That was not easy enough to send his son to an expensive engineering college. But however he managed to do that. And one day his dream came true. Rohit came to him and said that he got a job and moving to London.
And then? Everything changed. Rohit was so busy that he forgot his parents.One day Mr.Sen had an accident. Mrs. Sen tried to call Rohit but he was on his holidays.
After couple of days Mr. Sen died. He had been waiting for his son till his last breath  but ...........

A common story but a very bitter truth!

What a CHANGE 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was a child when I first saw Sanyukta in my new school. She was my senior. A very smart, talented , sober and decent girl. I was impressed by her leadership quality. She was the class monitor. She was like any other senior but something which was exceptional about her-the truthfulness..

So many years have passed.We left those good old days of childhood behind. Now its the time to face the cruel ruthless world. In the journey from childhood to adulthood, I came across to so many people. So it was quite natural that the time abolished the name "Sanyukta " from my memory.

A couple of days ago, in the evening when I was watching the local news . The breaking news was,
"Sexual harassment in school."And shockingly the victim was none other than my senior Sanyukta. She was working in the leading boys' high school of the town. After the divorce she was coping with her lonely life and her colleagues tried to take advantage of her disaster.They gave her indecent proposals. When she didn't agree, they threatened her. Even her colleagues didn't help her. She told the press, "I'm not scared because I'm telling the truth."Its good to see that she still believes in truth.

"Truth" the word sounds so ridiculous nowadays.  "Sexual harassment" in the working place is so common & nothing new about it.Equality in employment is impaired when women are subjected to gender specific violence, such as sexual harassment in the working places.


Unlike the 18th/19th century women today's women are not confined within the four walls of the home.We are in the 21st century.  And the time has changed! But something never changes.-Just like a woman's life. In 18th /19 th century, they used to struggle for their freedom and today they are struggling for their dignity.

And undoubtedly its a shame to the so called "Civilized society".

The new beginning!

I wasn't born before 15th August 1947.  The day when  India won freedom from the colonization of the British rule! I always wanted to know how  people of that time cherished the moment? How did they celebrate? I always had a regret!  My grandpa used to tell me the stories of those days! Those were more interesting than those which we usually read in the boring history books. 

How a bird feels when you set him free? The feeling was not different than that I guess! The pleasure of breaking the cage! The pleasure of flying high in the sky! Yeah I witnessed something like that on 13th of May 2011.

The day when the people of West Bengal got rid of 34 years old Left Government!

   There eyes were full of dreams & hope. Most of all the light of freedom!

I have no regret anymore!

From an "unknown" ordinary party worker to the Chief Minster of The State

June,1982, an evening, INTUC's(Indian National Trade Union Congress) office-about twenty women were listening to a girl. They were all spell bound by the magic of her dynamic speech. She was a party worker of INTUC's women brunch that day.That's it. There were very few people who knew her full name. Today's Mamta Banerjee was just an unknown party worker.

During the formation of the new brunch of State Congress, a woman candidate required. Mamta's name was recommended- as the general secretory of mahila Congress.. But something was really funny that time everyone used to mistake her surname. Because most of them didn't even know her.

In the year 1983, on the issue of Non-cooperation, Dharmatala become a war field-Lathi charge, Police firing killed about 3 people. The tear gas was in the air. Meanwhile from Bhawanipur sqard, a number of women came out with "Bandemataram" slogan. The leader was "Mamta' herself. Tricolor was in her hand. Some one came to her and said, "Don't go there!You can be killed." She didn't give him a damn. Without caring the tear gas or guns or lathis, she walked forward. That day, the guts and stamina of that woman even stunned the police as well.

She became the youngest parliamentarian  and giantkiller of the party after defeating the veteran Communist leader  Somnath Chatterjee from the Jadavpur Constituency in the year 1984. A very interesting story was behind this. Pranab Mukhejee was distributing election tickets to the candidates in Nizam palace. Suddenly they felt that a woman candidate was needed for the Jadavpur constituency. No one could suggest any name. There was an aged journalist .He suggested her name but he wasn't sure about her surname. So the "surname" section Pranab babu left blank.

 In the year 1989, Lok Sabha elections- She was defeated by CPM (By their weapons-Rigging , booth capturing and other familiar ways). Usually other leaders loose their confidence after such disaster.But she went to the press and bravely said, "Defeat me if you can in a fair way! If you dare! I challenge you!".

 Defeat couldn't break her kind of woman-she proved that. After leaving MP quarter and Delhi, someone asked her-"What next?" She smiled and said, "Lets go to Agra!" Saw Taj Mahal! Enjoyed panipuri and the other street foods. That's the sign of tremendous confidence.  She said, "The war is not over."

In the Rao Government formed in 1991,she was made the Union Minister of the State for Human resource and development, Youth affairs and sports, and Women and children development .As the sports minister, she announced that she would resign, and protested in a rally at the Brigade Parade Ground in Kolkata against Government's indifference towards her proposal to improve sports in the country. Only she could do that! She was discharged of her portfolios in 1993. In April 1996, she alleged that Congress was behaving as a stooge of the CPI-M in West Bengal. She claimed that she was the lone voice of reason and wanted a "clean Congress". In July 1996, she squatted at the well of  Lok Sabha  to protest against the hike in petroleum price, though she was a part of the Government. In that very time she clasped the collar of Amar singh, MP of Samajwadi Party, in the well of the parliament. In February 1997, on the day of railway budget presentation in Lok Sabha, Mamata Banerjee threw her shawl at the railway minister Ram Vilas Paswan for ignoring West Bengal and announced her resignation.

After 2006 Assembly elections Buddhya Dev Bhattacharya said, "We are 235, they are 30. What you can do?"
I hope he has got his answer!

Justice denied!

December 2 1984 people of Bhopal were sleeping peacefully in their houses at night! The wintry night! They didn't imagine-that was gonna be the last sleep of their lives!People started dying in the most hideous ways after a toxic gas leak! Some vomited uncontrollably went into convulsions and fell dead.Others chocked to death , drowning in their own body fluids after the Union Carbide's pesticide factory, whose safety system were reportedly not functioning; exploded filling the streets of Bhopal with toxic clouds of Methyl isocyanate  gas(MIC). More than 15,000 people was killed and affected many more. 

During the intervening night of December 2, a large amount of water entered 'Tank 610' which contained 42 tonnes of MIC , much more than the safety rules permitted! The reaction generated a major increase in the temperature inside the tank to over 240 degree Celsius. This forced the emergency venting of pressure from the tank, releasing the large volume of toxic gases! The reaction was speeded up  by the presence of iron from corroding pipelines.

It is known that the workers cleaned the pipelines . It is known that workers cleaned the pipelines with water but they are not told by the supervisor to add a slip blind water isolation plate. Because of this and of the bad maintenance , the workers considered it possible for water to have accidentally entered the tank.


Legal History:  A few months after the tragedy the Indian Govt had failed a claim of $3.3 b in US courts against Union Carbide. After a US district court transferred all the litigation to India , the Govt in 1989 settled for a measly compensation of of $470 m in an out of court deal which which worked out to under Rs.75,000each for death victims and Rs. 25,000 for the injured.

The main accused Warren Anderson , the Union Carbide chairman declared a fugitive in 1992 and never appeared in an Indian court. Furthermore , in 1996 , the SC reduced the charges against the accused from culpable homicide from not amounting to murder , punishable by a maximum 10 years jail term to causing death by negligible , which invites a sentence of only 2 years.

The true Bhopal verdict was delivered within four days of the tragedy , in December 1984, when Anderson was smuggled out of Bhopal on a state Govt aircraft and then put on a plane to America .Since the people have witnessed a pretend justice farce played out by Govt, police and the judiciary.

Union carbide and its collaborators including Indians of course , have sustained themselves with a lie, that it was an Indian disaster since the plant was built and run by Indians! The design is an exact replica of an American Plant and an American who was terrified of being tried in India was in charge of management.   

11th May , 2011:The Supreme Court turned down on Wednesday a government demand to re-open the case into the 1984 Bhopal Gas tragedy and hand harsher sentences to seven men convicted of negligence.

The court dismissed CBI's curative petition seeking restoration of stringent charges against Bhopal tragedy accused saying it was filed 14 years after the 1996 judgment, which was only a prima facie view of evidence that had come on record till that time.

A five-judge constitutional bench, headed by Chief Justice S H Kapadia, however, left a window of opportunity open saying the pending proceedings before the sessions court against the Chief Judicial Magistrate's judgement awarding two years sentence to the accused.

This is a familiar story of the Indian state ans it's Law enforcement agencies failing to deliver justice. Be it Bhopal Gas tragedy or  1984 Anti Sikh riots or the 1992 Ayodhya demolition , the state has been unable to either punish the perpetrators or adequately compensate victims. This is the failure of the legal system of a country like India.