Jaipur, March 13, 2010
WEEKEND VIEWS Need for a better mix ashion shows in Europe and America are tied to seasonal offerings. Hence autumn and winter, spring and summer collections are de rigueur. Along with the cat-walks and show-stoppers, Indian fashion too seems to unthinkingly follow the European pattern. One wonders why Indian fashion designers and show managers do not want to infuse some indigenous ideas to make fashion a little more vibrant and give it the much-needed desi branding. After all, fashion cannot mean Italian and French design patterns being adapted through Indian fabrics and to Indian preferences. The general lament that what you see on the ramp cannot be worn on the sidewalk is slightly impertinent because haute couture is essentially a statement of passion, imagination, extravagance and opulence. While making high street fashion accessible at the downtown market is a business proposition, what is more relevant is whether India’s fabulous resources, not just in terms of fabrics, but in terms of climate, can be made into a leitmotif of design as well. It is surprising that the rainy season, Fashion shows which is such an should be an inalienable part of the Indian exercise in calendar, does giving Indian not inspire a fashion its own monsoon collection among our resonance and designers. It making it an could and attractive player should inspire designers to think of ways of getting drenched in a downpour without looking downright bedraggled. Then there is the famous, or infamous, scorching Indian summer which should prove as much of a challenge to the fashion designers’ imagination as the rainy season. The renowned gauze-like Dhaka muslin is an example of what the fabric can be made to do to meet the demands of weather. A similar raiment response is the Lucknowi chikan. If one digs a little more into the Indian mode beyond rains and summer, the designers should be able to discover the traditional six seasons celebrated in Sanskrit and other Indian language literatures, the most wellknown being Kalidasa’s Ritusamhara, which is a description of grishma (summer), varsha (monsoon), hemanta (early winter), shishir (late winter) and vasanta (spring). Each season should lead to a collection, and there could be six instead of four European collections. This is not exactly a case for going native or striking a note of cultural nationalism. This should be an exercise in giving Indian fashion its own resonance, which will make it an attractive player on the world stage as well. The saree, the wrap-around of all seasons, is getting much attention from designers and the gliterrati all over the world. To add seasonal motifs to Indian fabrics will not only make Indian fashion exotic, but also give it that niche value which is the hallmark of sound business.
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By Manjul
I don’t deserve this award, but I have arthritis and I don't deserve that either. —Jack Benny
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Tigers are being killed well within the Ranthambhore reserve et again, Ranthambhore is in the news for all the wrong reasons. Two sub-adult tigers were found dead last Sunday and the forest authorities accepted that the big cats died due to poisoning. This was the latest in a series of mishaps that have cost Ranthambhore at least seven tigers in the past three years. As the news spread, officials within and outside the forest department quickly swung into action. First, they told the media that Ranthambhore’s tiger population had reached saturation mark and that the surplus tigers would always be at risk when they moved out. They also claimed that the only way to avoid such tragedies would be to shift these tigers to Sariska and blamed the Centre for putting the tiger translocation process on hold. Next, they pointed fingers at a few local hoteliers who did not want tigers to be moved to Sariska as fewer tigers in Ranthambhore would hurt their business interests. To be fair, a lot has changed for the good in Ranthambhore over the past five years. The tiger population has bounced back in Ranthambhore since 2005 when the reserve recorded just 26 tigers. Today, the number stands above 40. But Ranthambhore tiger reserve is spread over 1,300 sq km — too large an area to become crowded with 40 tigers. Corbett National Park, for example, has more than 150 tigers in as much area. So how did the state forest bosses claim that Ranthambhore was
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over-populated? Obviously, by Ranthambhore, they meant Ranthambhore National Park which is just a small part of the Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve. Most of Ranthambhore’s tigers are inside the prey-rich, well-protected 300 sq km national park area. The rest of the tiger reserve — about 1,000 sq km of Sawai Man Singh sanctuary, Kela Devi sanctuary and reserve forests — is not protected at all and, therefore, has no natural prey left. Tigers have little option here but to feed on cattle and, in turn, invite retribution. When the forest authorities say that tigers are moving out of Ranthambhore to die, tigers are only moving from one part of the reserve to another. The latest poisoning deaths were reported from Taldakhet, a small village in Kela Devi sanctuary and very much inside the tiger reserve. It is indeed shocking how a 1,000 sq km tiger forest has been surrendered to grazing and encroachment and accepted by the forest authorities as death zones. After the Sariska lesson, authorities should have tried to restore the entire reserve as prime tiger habitat. Next, they should have gone ahead to reclaim the corridors to Kuno in Madhya Pradesh to Ramgarh Bisdhari sanctuary near Bundi for natural dispersal of tigers. Unfortunately, they have just given up on these areas and are now seeking to save tigers by airlifting them to Sariska. And therein lies another example of conservation myopia. The tiger translocation pro-
gramme has been put on hold in Rajasthan after three siblings were arbitrarily picked up from Ranthambhore to repopulate Sariska. Recently, the Centre ordered DNA tests to ascertain the breeding compatibility of Ranthambhore tigers before translocating them. This embargo has further irked the state forest bosses who were already at loggerheads with the Centre in 2008 when National Tiger Conservation Authority made it mandatory to pick up only floating sub-adults for translocation. Tigers seek out individual territories by the time they are three and a settled tiger, if moved, only tries to return. The catch is that identifying and tracking a floater takes much longer than picking up a resident tiger. On top of that, the order for DNA tests has only made state forest officials more impatient. Good science is a must for the success of the world’s first wild tiger repopulation drive in Sariska. But good science is often laborious and time-consuming. So many in Jaipur seem keen to exploit Ranthambhore’s fatalities to fast-track airlifting of tigers to Sariska. They have even offered an imaginative twist to this Centre-state tussle by involving “a section of Ranthambhore’s hoteliers”. Indeed, the Ranthambhore tourism lobby may have the clout to engage conservationists who can influence the policies of the Union government, but the hoteliers have little reason for trying to plot such an ambitious conspiracy. Even if the Centre decides not to wait for the DNA test results and allows the state to resume shifting tigers to Sariska, the 2008 directives necessitate that only floaters be picked up. Ranthambhore’s tourism zone is inside the national park area occupied by resident tigers. How can removal of tigers from non-tourism areas affect the chances of tiger sighting and tourism in Ranthambhore? It is time to get real. The forest authorities need to focus on hard ground management instead of taking short cuts. For starters, they could set a deadline for reclaiming the entire Ranthambhore reserve area for the tiger. If protected, Ranthambhore’s 1,000 sq km death zone will make for a bigger tiger habitat than all of Sariska (681 sq km). Guess what, tigers do not need airlifting if they can walk free, and safe. The author is an independent journalist and filmmaker
Night out in Berlin — and how Suparna Thombare believe that a city’s nightlife speaks a lot about the spirit of the people and the place. I had heard a lot about Berlin as an emerging nightlife destination in Europe from friends, in online reviews and travelogues. So I signed up to take the pub crawl to check it out for myself when I got there. We reached the square in front of the designated cafe to start the pub crawl. It was close to two degrees and the wind chills weren’t helping either. My friend and I were wrapped in layers from head to toe but still couldn’t beat the chilly weather. Beer was the last thing on our mind. But in keeping with German tradition, our welcome drink at the crawl was a pint of Berliner. Shivering with cold, we gulped it down. Germans drink beer— come rain, come snow, they just drink beer! Our guide was a young Australian girl who had fallen in love with Berlin and stayed back. During my visit I heard many stories of people who had stayed back in this city. Not because they got good money or good jobs, but because they fell in love with Berlin. Most of the city’s buildings and facades of monuments were rebuilt in heritage style and it was hard to tell that all this was just 20 years old. Rents were low and life was comfortable. Berlin’s unpleasant past with Hitler and World War II seemed to have made the locals more helpful towards and acceptable of outsiders. Our crawl group was a complete mix, just like the local population. First, I noticed a bunch of loud Irish men who had come to the city for a bachelor party. Second was a group of Dutch men, relatively quiet and soft spoken. Our guide told us that Berlin pubs are open all night, smoking is allowed inside and you can easily take one for the road if you don’t finish your drink when you leave the pub. That’s as
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free as it can get for a partygoer, I thought. So we hit the first pub. It was a dimly lit, tiny watering hole. Everyone ordered another beer and got a free round of two shots. I noticed a guy from Israel. He had had a fight with his friend and decided to join the crawl alone. Well, from the way he was sulking I thought he was gay and had had a tiff with his boyfriend. Anyway, we got to hear a lot about his views on the Palestine problem, and how nightlife rocked in Tel Aviv too. The only German in the group was a 20year-old boy named Victor (he could drink legally at that age) and in typical German style he had taken it upon himself to make the visitors feel comfortable. Two more rounds of shots and we were set for the next destination. We got out and as we walked across the road, I felt warm enough to get rid of my jacket. I guess it was all the alcohol but I wasn’t complaining. After we left our next pub, we realised how alive the streets were. The city seemed transformed in the night. There was no obvious distinction between East and West Berlin. But in daytime, dark history was everywhere — in
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museums, on roads, in the last existing stretch of the Berlin Wall and in the holocaust memorials. But at night, everything changed. The city was modern and futuristic. In the next pub, two Irish guys introduced themselves as Sara and Michelle and that’s what we called them all night. We danced, took pictures, shared stories and Victor got us drinks. The Israeli guy was no longer gay because he danced like a man! We left the last club wearing only T-shirt and jeans. And we walked the empty streets of the city with the joy of going sans layers of clothing after freezing in the first two days of our Berlin visit. That’s when we understood why Germans drank so much beer! And when we woke up the next morning, we were confused as to exactly how many pubs we had gone to. We didn’t remember the name of a single one. It was all a haze. Apart from the momentary loss of perception, the tough German names had a lot to do with it too! But what we did remember were Sara, Michelle, Victor, Tel Aviv and the Berliner. I guess Berlin nightlife does rock after all. Email: t_suparna@dnaindia.net
Let me join the chorus of congratulations that are being showered on Congress president Sonia Gandhi for getting the women’s quota bill passed in the Rajya Sabha and paving the way for “...articulate/upper-caste/upper-class women to grab the levers of power ...” (‘Change in the air’, DNA, March 11) and contribute their mite to the progress of the nation. But as I think of rising prices and my daily battle for survival, I find my sense of elation reduced in no time. I see nothing on the horizon to warrant hope of any relief from the spiralling cost of living, not even the hollow assurances of our politicians. Let it be said that our top priority for the moment should be to arrest the prices of at least the basics and make life liveable. —Arundhati Wajge, Pune
The weaker sex? In the historic Rajya Sabha vote providing for 33 per cent reservation for women in Parliament and state assemblies, what was amazing was the incredible camaraderie among the Left and the Right parties (‘It’s done: Women’s bill over the hump’, DNA, March 10). What I don’t
Court-appointed special investigation team (SIT; ‘Eight years after Godhra, the law calls on Modi’, DNA, March 12). In the process, it appears to have overlooked the snail’s pace at which the wheels of the legal machinery move in the country. First, the SIT is not the judiciary. Second, even if the SIT finds incriminating evidence against Modi, would that deprive him of his constitutional right to appeal? —Arun Malankar, via email
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The ‘secular’ media seems to be euphoric over the summons being issued to Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi by the Supreme
aking off from where I left the last time then here are a few quick ways how you can become a sommelier. Start a Wine Club: Nothing can announce you as a veritable vino faster than this. Gather some friends, get a gaudy business card proclaiming yourself king of all things wine this side of Alpha Centauri, fool some unsuspecting wine supplier into handing you a few bottles, serve some, sell the rest, click lots of pictures, put it on a website or Facebook or both, and wait for the invites to turn up. Organise a Wine-something: Dinner, tasting, soirée, gala, fest — let’s just collectively call them ‘shindig’. So what if you started out being an event management outfit; all is acceptable, unless it is unacceptable, in which case reword it. Buy a Pin/Badge: I am sure that pet shops sell sommelier pins. If Counterfeit not yet, then they soon will and it would lie sommeliers right next to the warn- are a dime a ing signs: “Warning, sommelier on the loose dozen — but in this restaurant”. even they are The social animals doing their bit wouldn’t mind getting themselves a nifty little for the wine wine badgeroo while world getting some Fido-feed. In fact, they have a great deal in the offing where in exchange for your soul and integrity they give you a shiny pin shaped like a corkscrew, an euphemism for what verb-action you are meting out to the real sommeliers. Print a Certificate: The fake passport/driver’s licence/ration card racket will soon be found to be less lucrative than this one because the agents stand to make far more money for much lesser work. Aim for gothic fonts; they always look more convincing. Claim titles that make it seem as if you don’t just taste wine but create the grape itself. Travel Abroad: I think it is accepted in India that if, during your foreign travels, you cross a wine shop or transit through a wine-making country or just somehow manage to touch the in-flight drinks service trolley which had some wine stocked in it, then you are, for all purposes, a sommelier. If you have worked on a cruise then you are a grand sommelier. And, if you studied abroad, then you are definitely good enough to teach others back here. Cross-mesh References: This is a neat trick. Once you have anything that could remotely connect you to wine, join a modest set-up. A small winery, an importer, whatever. From there, the rise is easy. As long as you come from something that resembles a wine outfit, people will hire you. Why? Because there aren’t many qualified wine professionals around, so anything half resembling a sommelier will do. If you ask me, the only thing in greater shortage than such self-baked sommeliers are prostitutes and drug-peddlers with a sense for honest business practices. Oh wait, you never asked. Now you know, nevertheless. But you know what folks, I laud each and every one of these “counterfeit catadors” (Spanish for ‘taster’ and I had to use it for reasons of alliteration). Consider this the epiphany of one of the dying species, but if they managed to turn even one non-vino to wine, no matter how much they cheated the system or true sommeliers, they still unknowingly rendered a service to the wine world. But I just thought that you, dear reader, should know the difference. Next time you attend a lousy session, don’t be too quick to blame wine. Instead, just know that you have been served a tasting portion of un-sommellerie! Email: s_magandeep@dnaindia.net
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rez-er-vey-shuh n The Women's Reservation Bill being passed in the Rajya Sabha ■ The act of keeping back or setting apart ■ A limiting condition or exception. Eg: He has reservations about the proposal ■ A tract of public land set apart for a special purpose ■ An arrangement to get accommodations at a restaurant or hotel, on a boat or plane. ■ The record of such an arrangement
understand is what prevented our womenfolk from equipping themselves to compete with men in the electoral process during the last 60 years of India’s existence as a vibrant republic where there were absolutely no restrictions for them to excel? When women are in the top echelons of all spheres of life, do they need reservation in government? —KP Rajan, Mumbai
Modi matter
Magandeep Singh
reservation
—Ravi Jadhav
It is unfortunate that the policy of reservation has taken deep roots in independent India. The intention behind reservations was to right social wrongs. The policy, instead of promoting the right to equality, has become a gesture of benevolence. The time has come to take stock of the situation and decide whether to abolish quotas and give legitimate rights to worth and talent and thereby bring equality in society, or hang on to the benevolence of the state. —RM Deshpande, Navi Mumbai
best CELLARS
buzz WORD
INBOX Not a word about prices
Separating fake from real
Conning conservation Jay Mazoomdaar
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Climate review Short public memory With the passage of the Women’s Reservation Bill in the Rajya Sabha, sycophancy in India has touched a new low with all and sundry falling over themselves to compliment Sonia Gandhi for her “skillful handling” of the matter (‘Sonia steels party to counter Yadav trio’, DNA, March 10). Public memory is indeed very short for it was the very same Congress under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi that had stalled the NDA government’s repeated attempts to pass this bill. —MR Hosangady, Mumbai
In reference to ‘UN orders review of IPCC’s work’ (DNA, March 12), it is heartening to note that the independent scientific body includes a scientist from the Indian Institute of Science. The problem with the IPCC is that it has been functioning more as a one-man panel. The Inter-Academy Council that has been entrusted with this job will do well to look critically at the IPCC’s methods of data collection, analysis and interpretation, and the soundness of its recommendations. There is also need for an international body comprising geographers and glacial geologists with a brief to study climate change and glacial-retreat. —V Subramanyan, Thane Letters: lettersjpr@dnaindia.net
another TAKE Acceptable limits The first page of The Los Angeles Times on Friday was a garishly multicolored image of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland, superimposed over what looks like the usual front page. Above him is the Los Angeles Times banner, and bracketing his face are recent articles. It was an ad that looked in part like the front page of The Los Angeles Times, as the newspaper once again tested the accepted limits of where ads can blur the boundary with news. Broadsheets have generally shunned ads that are made to look like part of a publication’s front page. But traditional limits on advertising have relaxed as newspapers struggle to cope with steep ad decline. “This isn't newspapering as it used to be,” says Geneva Overholser of the University of Southern California’s journalism school. Richard Pérez-Peña, New York Times Vol. 2 Issue No.238 ■ Executive Editor: R Jagannathan ■ Editor: Dwaipayan Bose Printer & Publishers: Kamal Kant Sharma ■ Printed at Jaipur Printers, Shivdaspura Railway crossing, Tonk Road, Jaipur and published at 10 JLN Marg, Malviya Nagar, Jaipur (Rajasthan) ■ Phone 0141-3988888, Fax 0141-2712216 ■ R.N.I. No.-RAJENG/2008/24805 ■