100 years of Indian Cinema

All through 2012-13 there are several programs being organized across the country and world being dedicated to ‘100 years of Indian Cinema’. We have lost several individuals recently, who have been popular or non-conventional, like Bhupen Hazarika, Rajesh Khanna and Pandit Ravi Shankar. In the glamour world we forget several of them. In a country where more than a 1000 films are made every year, in many languages, there is one single thing that dominates the films and these are our villages in India. Most stories and music are rooted from the villages. There is one man who has portrayed some of our Indian villages and the rich Indian heritage in his cinemas, and he is Satyajit Ray.

We the members of ACT, who work with the people of remote villages in East and Northeast India, have taken an initiative to dedicate this ‘100 years of Indian Cinema’ to this great personality of Indian Cinema, Satyajit Ray. Our active member, Tarapada Banerjee, who has followed this Great man from 1958 to his last day has managed to put together some of his best photos into a book in print. As a news photographer, Tarada is known to have made the front page with his extraordinary photographs, mainly on personalities like our previous Prime minister, Late Mrs Indira Gandhi, several Chief Ministers of the different states of India and film personalities. Many of them still know him and address him at the personal level as ‘Tarada’.

Tarada has decided to bring some of his students for a workshop in the Darjeeling Hills in March 2013. He has also agreed to take in a few local students in his workshop to pass on his knowledge to few interested from the remote villages that he would be visiting. Nature and people has always been his favourite subject and he wishes that every Indian youth should have an access to a camera so that he can document the rich heritage of this country before everything is lost. 

East Himalaya Introduction

DHR Society Wins Top Award for Engineering Project in India

The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway Society UK (DHRS) has won a prestigious competition for the best heritage railway project of 2012.

The award was sponsored by Steam Railway Magazine – the UK’s top-selling steam railway title with a circulation of over 32,000.  Voting was by Steam Railway’s readers and the DHRS bid triumphed over 15 other high-quality entries.

The award recognises the Society’s work in improving the reliability and performance of the world-famous ‘B’ Class steam locomotives on the DHR. The request for help was made by Indian Railways in early 2011. Between mid-2011 and early 2012 Engineering Director, David Mead, and steam engineer, Mike Weedon, made three DHRS-funded trips to the DHR’s Tindharia Works. With the willing assistance of local staff they were able to achieve significant improvements in the efficiency of two locomotives, as well as assisting with skills training and a review of workshop procedures.

Indian Railways has expressed its sincere gratitude for the work done and is keen to have a continuing fully-funded engineering relationship with the DHRS. Work is in progress on taking this forward. In the meantime, congratulations on the award have come from many DHRS friends and partners in India including the General Manager, Northeast Frontier Railway (directly responsible for the DHR) Mr R S Virdi and the Executive Director, Heritage (Railway HQ Delhi) Mr Manu Goel.

The award ceremony took place on 9 February 2013 at the Union Jack Club, London at the AGM Dinner of the Heritage Railway Association (HRA) - the professional body for heritage railways in Britain, and in the presence of distinguished guests including Sir Peter Hendy CBE, Commissioner of Transport for London.

Receiving the award trophy were DHRS Vice-Chairman Paul Whittle and Engineering Director David Mead. Said Paul Whittle “ We are delighted to receive such a huge vote of confidence in our efforts to help the DHR keep its British-built steam locomotives in good order for many years to come. With the full support of  Indian Railways we look forward to continuing this vital work.”

One India Spirit

‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’, which means Victory to Motherland India. Every corner of Arunachal Pradesh was echoing with these slogans for 11^th and 12^th of January, 2012. Small children and young men, local intellectuals and a few Government people were seen in the mornings following the local VKV band through the main street. Most of Arunachal Pradesh is isolated and not so much touched with modern development, but you will often meet a local person, highly motivated to serve the grassroots and more enlightened with their thinking, more than many other parts of India.

This is mainly because of the presence of VKV, Vivekananda Kendriya Vidyalaya in every corner of Arunachal Pradesh. Most of the time we portray Swami Vivekanda as a Spiritual Leader, but we often overlook that he was probably the only Indian who not only practiced and preached the ‘Spirit of India’, but convinced the world about ‘the global need for Indianization’. Understanding the global trend and the invasion on India, he had set several guidelines for the Indian Youth, which is beyond any religion or community. With the Chinese claim on Arunachal Pradesh and at the same time several countries recognizing the same as dispute between China and India, it is the foundation of India being laid by the Vivekanda Kendriya Vidyalayas in this most remote part of the country.

It is time that the rest of the country needs this spirit. When most of this country is bitten by consumerism, deafness and division, we need to turn around and say that we believe in one India, one spirit. If many of us will be able to rewind and see Lord Macaulay’s address in the British Parliament on 02.02.1835, we will realize that how difficult it was to westernize the deep rooted Indian spirit, they could only do the same through a completely new education system. It was for the first time that someone invaded India and did not Indianize themselves, but wanted their system to be implemented to serve their country, Great Britain. With Independent India, how much have we changed the system at the micro levels, the education system, the natural resource management system etc, have we really been able to Indianize them, are they really focussed at the main Indian population.

After 150 years of Swami Vivekananda, we enjoy a day off on his Birth Anniversary or at the most pay respect to him at one of the nearby Ramakrishna Missions or Vivekananda Ashrams, but none of us have followed his path to contributing to ‘One India’.  

2013, Happy New Year

Reba Bose, Siliguri, 4th January, 2013:

As I have just returned to Siliguri, all my brothers and sisters asked me to where did I celebrate my year end? 31st December night, I was watching the reflection of the moon in the back waters of Kerala from my house boat. It was quite astonishing to know that there were more than 3000 floating rooms in Kerala. It took me back 20 years when young Babu explained on TV, how he converted the Rice Boat of Kerala into House Boat.

My last visit to South India was almost 50 years ago as the first excursion batch of Siliguri College, and there was always a wish to return, and hence I enjoyed all stories from the south. I did make a short visit to my nephew at Bangalore, but longed to make a longer exploratory trip. For my 02 grand-daughters and 02 daughters joining me, I could not think of anyone else other than ‘The Blue Yonder’ to organize the experience exploratory trip for me.

The temples and beaches of South India have always attracted visitors from across the world, but I wanted to differently and chose to do south, from East to West. Started with Madras (Chennai), followed by Mahabalipuram, where Ind-Eco was a good experience with the world famous Mahabalipuram Temples. Being on the Eastern Ghats, we did not miss the great sunrise. The Temple trails continued till we reached Pondicherry. Going back to Rishi Aurobindo and Mother’s Retreat was renewing the emotional energies to live life in full. A visit to South India would remain incomplete without staying at the Chettinad, the present global brand of South India. Though promoted as a village, yet it was hard to accept this fact as there is no agriculture, but this was more ‘Peace in Heritage’, the real feeling of Shantiniketan, and was nothing to be a village or a town.

A good break was at the Spice Village at Periyar. The SV was a nature reserve on its own with the Nilgiri Langur and the Malabar Giant Squirrel making this their retreat for the night. The hundreds of bats in the morning and late afternoon over the Spice Village is an experience. Not to mention about the bird life almost everywhere. The best at Periyar was the Spice Safari organized by Girish. Periyar and Chettinad were the first time experiences for me. I mostly enjoyed the elaborate local food at all places, the shakes of Savarna and the numerous hand woven saris. Enjoy the photos below.    

To Luku with Love

It was in the month of December 1990, early at dawn we got down at Jharsugordha Rail Station and crossed over the railway track sat in front of the GSI camp, mainly to collect tents etc for children camp being organized by YHA of South Calcutta. We started our journey with 02 full loaded trucks and a jeep to our destination, Sonaridungri. This was the outskirts of a small village, beside the pond area of Mahanadi Barrage. Sonaridungri means the golden rocky hill in Oriya language. We reached at about 04 pm in the evening and while unloading the trucks, suddenly a man and a child of about 06 years of age ran towards us, and in their local language they enquired about our arrival at that site. While my friends were erecting the tents for our night stay, I Ranajit Mitra started talking with the kid and his father who said that he was a daily labour. I assured him a job from the next day morning @Rs.25/- per day plus food with us. He was overwhelmed with this and I could see his tear filled eyes. This was an unexpected reward for him.

He cautioned us about ourselves about 02 dangers in the area, lakra (wolf according to him, which we discovered to be the striped Hyna) and Bhhoot (ghost), which we could not find at all. The next day morning the kid joined us, and as we had language barrier, we could not communicate properly with him, but I found that his name was LUKU. Somehow I realised that Luku was my friend and we shared biscuits and other snacks with him. While we continued the survey, Luku helped us by folding the ropes and tapes, while his father started working under the instruction of Chorda (Bidyut Sarkar) and Raja Paul.

I returned to the tent to prepare lunch for all and found that Luku has followed me. I confirmed his that he should also have lunch with us. Suddenly, he disappeared in the forests and returned after half an hour with handful of wild spinach and he insisted that we have this for lunch. At lunch we discovered that this was one of the most tasteful of food that we have ever had. Luku now was a friend of everyone in the team and would disappear in the forests and would come back with wild berries. The days passed by and on 25^th Dec ember morning the children participants and instructors joined the camp and we became busy with the camp.

We the advance team always looked forward to Luku, who shy fully, somewhat afraid of the city children with good clothing, stayed at the corner of our tent. We tried our best to involve Luku with the children of the camp, but after a long effort he found a few friends among the participating children. Many of the senior girl participants organized some good clothes from the little boy participants for Luku, which he refused. Luku and his father never stayed in the camp at night as they believed they would be attacked by Lakra and Bhoot. Inspite of the children insisting Luku to have food with them, he would always eat at the end with us, the advance team.

Finally on 31^st December, when we were winding up and the campers were boarding their bus, the advance team were to leave the camp in the last vehicle. Luku was around us and we found out an almost new and very colourful woollen sweater left by a camper which we handed over to Luku. He put it on and ran to the forests. He came back with handful of berries and eyes full of tears for us. As our vehicle started, we waved to Luku, he was too sad even to wave back and stood weeping, the small boy in the colourful sweater with forests & the setting sun in the backdrop.

The next few days, I could not be a part of any of my friend or family programs. Every year, towards the beginning the memories of Luku return as waves of the sea. Luku, I still remember you.

This article has been contributed by Ranajit Mitra. He has recently been felicitated by Government of West Bengal for his contribution to Children Nature Camps

The Sunday Village Markets

Back to the HAATs, one of the most important days of the week is Sunday, mainly for the ones which is among the Tea Garden clusters. Sunday, being the day off for the Tea Garden labourers, this is a very important day, an opportunity for the ladies to dress up well and the men to finish their weekly salaries in gambling and drinking. Some of the HAATs which include revenue villages, forest villages and tea villages become so big that one has to travel more than a kilometre through the HAAT.

A major part of the big HAAT is dominated by the buying and selling of cows and bullocks. One such big Sunday HAAT is held at Itakhola, a major village which is situated on a 22km by-road from NH-52 from Balipara, originating from Naharbari (Bakola), also called Seubari (6^th mile point) connecting Seijosa in East Kameng District in Arunachal Pradesh. The next place is Balijhora, few kilometres after Itakhola, which also hosts a small HAAT on Sunday. If by any chance the Sunday Itakhola HAAT is missed, the next day, i.e.Monday, the nearby big HAAT with a different character is on NH-52, at Towbhanga, next to the picturesque Jiabharali River and also much close to Balipara.

This is a very interesting area considering the History, Diversity in people, Biodiversity and International borders. As a continuation of the Mahabharata, Bana Ashura, the King of Central Assam with capital at Sonitpur (Tezpur) had war with Lord Krishna based on the his daughter Usha getting married to Krishna’s grandson, Aniruddha. According to recorded history, Harjjar Varma of Salastambar dynasty ruled from the capital called Harrupeswara (Tezpur), followed by the rule of Brahmapal from Pal dynasty and finally by the Barabhuyans before being a part of the Ahom kingdom.

Many at Tezpur and Siliguri will be remembering the ‘maroon trains’ at Tezpur and Siliguri Junctions in 1959. After the Tibet Uprising, His Holiness, the 14^th Dalai Lama fled Tibet and through Tawang finally reached Misamari and then Tezpur Railway Station, where he was greeted by thousands of people, of which there were more than 100 journalists from across the world. There were more than 80000 Tibetans who followed HH and made India their home, trains loaded with maroon Lama Dresses were hung out of the train windows to be dried.

The Railways in this region started by 1895 with the establishing of the very interesting Tezpore-Balipara Light Railway with 2’6” Narrow Gauge to carry mainly tea to the ghats (river ports) at Tezpur, but this also became more popular as passenger route also. The records of 1934 railway time-table shows that there were 03 daily services on return basis, but on Sundays there were 02 extra trains allotted as ‘HAAT specials”.

Around the Jia Bhareli River or Kameng River, as it is known in Arunachal Pradesh, the river network gives birth to rich forested valleys, which include some of the best Protected Areas of India, Nameri Tiger Reserve, Pakke Tiger Reserve etc. Pakke Tiger Reserve, which is dominated by the Nyishi community have successfully launched the first ‘community conservation and tourism initiative’ in the Indian subcontinent. The tourism infrastructure, Pakke Jungle Camp is situated in the nesting hill of hornbills, the oriental pied, great pied and wreathered hornbills are common, also the rufous necked has been photographed here.

12 Gaon Burhas (village heads) and community leaders decided to undertake this initiative and finally managed to conserve this rich Hornbill habitat in Pakke Tiger Reserve is also one of the best butterfly habitats and also frequented by the wild elephants, leopards and several other wild animals. The trek to the Naksha Pahar or elephant ride across the river is some of the lifetime activities in the area. A leisurely day at the camp in the Nyishi huts with some Gaoburhas is also a lifetime experience.

   

The Monday HAAT (market) on NH52 at Towbhanga near Jia Bhareli River