2010-01 Sydney (1)

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INDIANLINK

PUBLISHER

Pawan Luthra

EDITOR

Rajni Anand Luthra

Usha Arvind

Sheryl Dixit

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ASSISTANT EDITORS

MELBOURNE

Preeti Jabbal

CONTRIBUTORS

Ritam Mitra, Sam Varghese, Darshak Mehta, Nima Menon, Shivangi Ambani-Gandhi, Chitra Sudarshan, Graham Sims, Noel G deSouza, Sanjiv Dubey, Tom King, Minal Khona, Geeta Khurana, Aparna Jacob, Guneeta Dhingra

ADVERTISING MANAGER

Vivek Trivedi 02 9262 1766

ADVERTISING ASSISTANT

Priti Sharma 02 9279 2004

GRAPHIC DESIGN AND LAYOUT

Darren Monaghan

A tale of two cities S

ydney and Melbourne both have their share of international students.

Youngsters of Indian origin have been arriving by the planeloads in the past few years as the education boom in Australia has fuelled their desire to come to Australia and seek greener pastures. While the ratio is more in favour of the Garden State, both cities have a high visibility of Indian students as they work at 7-11s, fast food outlets and petrol stations. Yet the violence against Indian students is deeply contrasted between Sydney and Melbourne.

By PAWAN LUTHRA

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are elements of racism in Australian society, as has been done by the Victorian Deputy Police Commissioner Ken Jones, would have been a good start by the Federal Government. Then pro-active work with stated objectives in tackling international student violence issues would be a welcome step forward.

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the then leadership of Nathan Rees and able guidance of Community Relations Commision head Stepan Kerkyasherian, the hands-on approach of Consul General Amit Dasgupta along with community leaders have been able to control the problem. Melbourne, it appears, has not been able to do the same.

The reason for this is still not apparent – whether it is the lie of the land where the Indian population is far more spread out or if it’s the general level of low multicultural harmony, it clearly is a case of the police not being able to do their jobs. Be it staffing issues or just pure poor utilisation of police resources – the reasons need to be explored and the Victorian government will be well advised to challenge its existing strategy on dealing with the violence on Indian students.

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Level 24/44 Market St, Sydney 2000 or GPO Box 108, Sydney 2001

Ph: 02 9279-2004 Fax: 02 9279-2005

Email: info@indianlink.com.au

Over the past year, violence against the students has widely been reported in the media. Assault and robbery culminated in the extreme crime of murder as 21-yearold Nitin Garg was brutally knifed as he walked through a Melbourne park on a balmy night in January. For Melbourne this was yet another violent incident in the ongoing saga affecting the Indian community. Within days of this murder two Indian taxi drivers in Melbourne were assaulted by their passengers. Sydney on the other hand has been relatively incident free. One is sure there have been issues of violence and robbery but none which have grabbed the headlines and certainly no stabbing incidents. The burnt body of Ranjot Singh was discovered in Griffith but investigations seem to be heading in the direction of contract labour issues.

New Delhi has not exactly covered itself with glory on these issues either. The politicians need to show more spine against a feral local media who do not wish to let facts get in the way of a good story. Rather than issue travel warnings, perhaps it is worth pointing out that of the 400,000 plus Indians living in Australia, over 99% are safe, happy and enjoying the lifestyle and comforts of their new home.

One has yet to see the flight of hordes of Indians leaving Australia in the wake of these incidents. Politicians and Ministers need to speak up for the masses of Indian Australians also, rather than letting the local Indian media hijack the agenda creating bad blood amongst Indian-origin Australians and local Australians.

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New Delhi needs to work on education as much as Canberra does.

Both cities have faced similar problems. Sydney to date seems to have identified its hot spots for trouble. In Harris Park, Parramatta, Blacktown and Liverpool, the law enforcement officers have done exceedingly well in managing the situation. The State Government under

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Contrasts are also visible between two other cities - New Delhi and Canberra. Canberra and Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gilliard do not seem to have a clue on how to handle the situation. Their statements of accusing India of internal racism or accepting violence as a way of modern city life, are akin to rubbing salt in infested wounds. Giving prominence to a cartoon depicting Victorian police as a member of the Klu Klux Klan to divert attention away from the issues at hand was poor gameplay by Julia Gilliard. Perhaps admitting there

At the dawn of the new decade, it is also upon all of us Indian Australians to educate our friends and families in India - through personal contacts, emails, social networking websites - on our lifestyle options here in Australia and why, on the whole, our experiences have been largely positive.

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After the HSC

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The journey begins now

Thirteen years of education ultimately eventuates into a simple 4 digit number. As thousands of students leave behind the tag of “boys and girls” and join the league of “ladies and gentlemen”, it comes with the realisation that the journey is not by any means finished – it is just beginning.

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HSC results for 2009 were released to a record number of candidates (almost 70,000 students) on the 17th of December, with the new ATAR (Australian Tertiary Admission Rank) sent the following day. Students logged on to the Board of Studies website, or were sent SMS messages on their phones at 6am, along with the more traditional HSC letter summarising their results.

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This year there were some incredible statistics – most students sat six exam papers each, in about 750 exam centres including schools in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. There were 113 different courses, and exams were sat in 111 of them (English Extension 2 and Music extension have no written examinations). Students read from over 13 million printed pages of questions and put their answers into 1.75 million writing booklets. Female dominance in the HSC this year was not surprising. It is a normal occurrence, but even as a guy it is hard for this writer to ignore the level of achievement of our state’s young women – no all-boys institution features in the top 8 schools in NSW.

All these statistics do no justice, however, to the absolutely immense amount of work done by the students. Nights spent dreary-eyed, without food, drink and obviously without sleep were countless. Parents struggled to keep a rein on their child’s sudden desires to study, and topics of conversation would become only too predictable – for the guys, for example, it would be HSC, Katrina Kaif, HSC, Cricket, HSC and so on until every possible sport-related or female distraction had been used up. Even songs became HSC-related songs, because they were released during the examination period – these have since vanished from iPods.

absolutely nothing! However, as the 17th of December loomed closer, the mood started to shift and once again HSC talk begun.

COPING WITH THE NERVES

as my mind resurfaced mistakes made in the examinations. Aside from that, the post HSC relaxed mindset and enjoyment prevented the accumulation of such nerves.”

A common theme among families, especially those in our community, is the strange phenomenon of parents being more concerned about results than the students themselves are!

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Rajan Rehan of Sydney Technical High School passed with an ATAR of 99.1, and says of his parents, “I think they were more stressed out than me as the date of the release for my result drew closer”. This is a positive thing according to him; with the benefit of hindsight, he recalls, “My parents did expect me to do well so there was a bit of pressure in the back of my mind but I believe this positively motivated me to achieve my goal.”

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In any case, November 13th brought relief to every student across the country, whether they studied or not, whether they were going to university or not – and it is this jubilation at completing that last exam, that inexplicable euphoria at realising you’d just written that final word, and that overwhelming sense of calm as the examiner said “Pens down,

Naturally, the wait was a very nervous one for many - however, students like Darshil Shah, who achieved an ATAR of 93.20, felt that “it was actually an exciting wait for the results”. Keeping his mind distracted was easy for him, because he was “involved in so many activities and catching up on things...that at times I totally forgot about the results!”

Srikkumar Ashokkumar from Melbourne, who achieved the maximum possible VCE (Victorian Certificate of Education) score of 99.95, felt otherwise, saying, “I didn’t go to bed the night before, I was just up talking to friends the whole night”. How did he cope with the tension? He believes it is in fact talking to his friends who were in the same predicament which helped him deal with the situation.

Shiva Subramanyam graduated from James Ruse Agricultural High School with an ATAR of 99.85 and was at a sleepover when the results were announced. He says, “At the time the results were coming out, we were all watching Pokémon on TV so it wasn’t a very nervous wait, and we sort of didn’t realise we were getting our results!”

Kedar Mehta graduated from Parramatta Marist High School with an ATAR of 96.7. He says, “The few days prior to the release of HSC results were quite nerve-racking

Pressure, however, is a strange thing – it can come not only from parents, but from the students themselves. Rajan says that “The HSC was a huge deal during Year 12, especially coming from a selective school - most students discussed the topic everyday which further built up the hype”. Indeed, peer pressure is a driving force behind the success of many students, as competition is an inherently human value.

TIPS AND ADVICE

However, there are many ways to avert pressure and stay on top of things. Priyanka Acharya of Hornsby Girls High School attained an ATAR of 99.90, yet still played numerous sports, including Basketball, Water Polo and Soccer. It is often said that extra-curricular activities can hamper a student’s ability in Year 12, however it is important to note that many high achievers have an outlet through which they release pressure –music, sports, dancing, and even computer games all act to distract the mind from the incessant tension during this crucial year. Of course, this is not an excuse to play computer games all day!

RITAM MITRA talks to fellow students about HSC 2009

Use your HSC as a chance to develop your perceptions of the world, get involved in your work and enjoy it

Kamal Prakash Singh ATAR 99.95

Jayraj Singh Bhatti ATAR 99.85

Kedar Mehta ATAR 96.70

Priyanka Acharya ATAR 99.90

Jayraj Singh Bhatti of Baulkham Hills High School, for example, obtained an ATAR of 99.85, while also winning the Silver in Shot Put and a Bronze in Discus in the NSW All Schools Athletics Competition – indeed, his training schedule included twice-a-week weights training, a daily 3km run and once a week throwing training – all during year Year 12 examinations. He also plays Tabla, and holds a purple belt in Karate.

Mihir Ranadive graduated from Fort Street High School this year with an ATAR of 98.65. He says, “The HSC means you get to study exactly what you want where you want (or what your parents want) but there are countless ways

to still do this without it being a “stressful” HSC”. Mihir is pleased he was allowed to choose his own path, saying that his parents were relaxed about his results. “The beauty of doing everything on your own is that when something goes wrong, there is only yourself to blame and you know you have the ability to remedy that mistake”.

Srikkumar says that while he didn’t have a concrete study plan, he just did as much work as he thought he needed to do.

Sunraj Patel of Knox Grammar, who had an ATAR of 96.7, found that the HSC was “not a big deal if you’re motivated and stick to the syllabus.” However, he adds, “Efficiency is a must, and technique is crucial”.

Clearly there are different techniques for different students and they have their own merits – Adnan Chaudhary from Christian Brothers College in Blacktown [ATAR 95.5], along with most other students, felt it was crucial for future students to avoid panic. Adnan assured that “in the end, your

marks will go up heaps. While in the trials I was getting maybe 65-70%, in the end they became 80s and 90s”.

Meanwhile, Shiva found that the holidays were crucial periods. His secret was to study in large amounts during the holidays, and to keep yourself motivated. “At school, you have teachers that will push you, and friends that will always talk to you, but in the holidays people get distracted. It’s okay to go out once or twice a week, but people forget that when they’re at home it’s important to remain focused and motivated”.

Srishti Yadav of Girraween High School [ATAR 99.90] reveals, “The support of your parents is imperative. Although they may not have realised it, without my parents telling me they’d be proud no matter what, I probably would’ve felt a bit more pressure and stress, but knowing I had their support and guidance proved invaluable”. Her advice to future students: “More than anything, it is important to pursue what you truly desire...It’s easy to underestimate the knowledge and

Continued on page 8

Rajan Rehan

ATAR 99.10

power you possess but in the end, just try your best, have faith in yourself and you will almost certainly reap the rewards!”

Shruti Jagdale of St Marks College finished with an ATAR of 92.50, and her piece of advice is simple yet very effective: “The more past papers you do, the higher your results will be. Even if you do nothing else the entire year, make sure you do lots of past papers”. She adds, “As long as you’re consistent, you won’t have to pull all-nighters all the time and you will be fine”

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Kamal Parkash Singh went to Girraween High School, and achieved the maximum possible ATAR of 99.95. He has some philosophical advice for future students: “During my HSC I stumbled upon a quote by Malcolm Forbes, ‘Education’s role is to replace an empty mind with an open one’. I believe this is of utmost importance; use your HSC as a chance to develop your perceptions of the world, get involved in your work and enjoy it. If you can maintain such a holistic approach to you education then the marks will follow you!”

All students interviewed agreed that the HSC is definitely overhyped – Srishti sums up aptly, that the HSC is definitely not the be all and end all of a student’s tertiary aspirations. “It really is only as stressful as you make it, so I think that if you work hard and are determined to do well then why should anything stop you?”

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SO WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD?

So, after all the scaling is done and dusted, and ATARs start becoming meaningless numbers, it is time to consider the future. There are many thoughts flowing through a student’s mind at this stageclearly, the stand-out question is, what course do I choose?

Darshil chose to do a Bachelor of Commerce combined with a Bachelor of Information Systems at UNSW. He says that while it was a tough choice, “Parents and relatives provided me with invaluable advice on choosing what I wanted to do through their experiences.”

Shiva found his choice fairly easy – although he did economics in school, he preferred to choose to study medicine because “it’s a good job to do for me, as I like talking to people, and medicine is a profession where you meet new people every day”. His parents did influence him, but he says there was no pressure and they assured him they’d be happy with whatever he chose to do. After attaining a UMAT percentile of 99, he is very excited about the future – and plans to be an Ophthalmologist one day.

Medicine and Economics degree at the University of Sydney. He says that “Making the decision regarding which university to attend is never easy. Many of my friends advised me to go to UNSW for their undergraduate Medicine program rather than waste my time in economics. However to me the added bonus of economics makes the experience of Medicine at the University of Sydney even more worthwhile.”

Kedar aspires to study Commerce at UNSW. “It was a rather tedious decision for me as I frequently weighted issues such as future job security against personal interests whilst contemplating a career. My parents had strong input into my choice however yet again it was more constructive guidance as opposed to pressure. Ultimately, I believe their input enabled me to make the right decision”.

parents weren’t expecting me to get it, but they were really supportive”. She is very excited about university, however she feels that while teachers at high school would show her the way to a Band 6, the lecturers at university will have the attitude, “Do the work, or we don’t care!”

Mihir sees himself either working in the Department of Public Prosecutions or establishing his own law firm in ten years’ time. While he is a bit uncertain as to what path to follow in his first year as a result of narrowly missing out on his first preference of Law/Criminology at UNSW, he says “Ultimately I would like to transfer into my course after first year. It wasn’t a tough choice for me, I had chosen law as my field as early as Year 10 possibly.”

Srikkumar aspires to do medicine at Monash University in Melbourne. He says, “Science is an area which interests me and I look forward to the practical application of science which medicine offers me”. In ten years’ time, he hopes, “I will have my M.B.B.S., and be a general surgeon or cardiologist”.

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Similarly, Rajan also says, “Following the Indian stereotype, I plan to further pursue my studies in medicine.” It was a tough choice for him and he wasn’t 100% sure about his future aspirations during the year, but he soon developed a genuine interest in medicine with the guidance of his parents.

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Srishti also wishes to pursue medicine – although if this does not work out, she would like to go into psychology. Although she was “thoroughly against the idea of medicine once upon a time”,

Priyanka intends to study a combined degree of Law and Commerce at the University of Sydney, where she has been awarded a Merit Scholarship – in fact, Priyanka was also awarded two other scholarships, at the Australian National University and the University of New South Wales. After being named Dux of Hornsby Girls High School, the future definitely looks bright.

Adnan plans to do a Bachelor of Actuarial Studies degree at Macquarie University, saying that while initially his mum wanted him to do medicine, he “wasn’t really into it - in the end she said she was happy with my marks and would be okay with whatever I wanted to do”.

Sunraj aims to undertake the new Bachelor of Applied Finance with Bachelor of Commerce-Professional Accounting degree at Macquarie University. He says, “It was not a tough choice, as this course,

So now that one part of the journey is over, it is time to look forward to the future – it is up to us to take hold of the extra independence, the new-found confidence and the renewed ability to believe in ourselves. An exciting chapter of our lives is about to begin – and the story is in our hands...

Ritam Mitra finished his HSC at the Sydney Boys High School with an ATAR of 95.7. Having played state level volleyball, his ATAR effectively became 99.7. He has gained entrance into UNSW under the Elite Athletes and Performers Scheme. He will work towards a Bachelors’ degree in Commerce/ Law.

More than anything, it is important to pursue what you truly desire... just try your best, have faith in yourself and you will almost certainly reap the rewards!”

Srishti Yadav ATAR 99.90

Adnan Chaudhary ATAR 95.5

Shruti Jagdale ATAR 92.50

Darshil Shah ATAR 93.20

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Racist radio comment

I am writing to inform you of a nasty bit of radio work on Power FM on January 4. I think they deserve to be held to account for their “entertainment”.

Below is the email I sent them immediately and I urge you to complain also, to them and to broadcast authorities. I am an ordinary Anglo Aussie, but I see the racism in the more ignorant sections of my society and it makes me angry.

Dear Power FM,

I want to complain in the strongest terms possible about a sickening attempt at humour by your male breakfast presenter on Power FM in Ballarat at about 8:50 am on January 4, 2010.

Referencing the fatal stabbing of an Indian student in Footscray your presenter said, “It’s not racist because EVERYBODY in Footscray gets stabbed!” (Ha, ha, it was said as a joke!)

I am sure the man’s friends and family would find that comment hilarious.

I don’t see humour potential in the tragic murder of a reportedly, good and decent man on his way to work. I waited for the presenter to apologise after the break, perhaps it was a mistaken attempt at humour that he thought better of after a minute or two. Or perhaps his producer would see it and correct the blunder. But no, it seems that brain cells are few and far between at Power FM.

I will be lodging a formal complaint with the Broadcast Authority and your main sponsor. I hope your sponsor Booth and Lee can appreciate how their name will be associated with such a low and callous variety of humour, but I doubt it.

Steve Rhodes Ballarat, VIC

Pathetic justice

I have been campaigning for more police presence now for five years, to no avail. The Police Association has a large petition circulating for more police and so far we have over 60,000 signatures, and are aiming for 70,000.

The law and order situation in this state is pathetic. It is not only Indians being assaulted; two of my friends have had sons bashed - one of them twice! We have had many people murdered on our streets and the justice handed out when these people ever get caught is pathetic. You can kill someone, get a sentence of a couple of years, then get out and do it again.

We need stronger sentencing and longer sentences. Many of the offenders come to this country from overseas, but it is not politically correct to say this. I want to see these offenders deported, instead of sitting in our motel-style prison while we residents pay for their keep. I feel very angry about Mr Garg death and pray that the killer is

Letters to the editor

brought to justice. And is given the life sentence, not just a couple of years. They have obviously gone out with the intention of taking a life, so we should take theirs. I tell people not to go out alone on the street or in public transport as these cowards are looking for easy targets. No matter what their nationality.

Believe me, on the whole we are not a racist country. We do have a problem with people who come here for a better life and still want to maintain the lifestyle of their country of origin. They come here for a better life, but then they criticize our way of life and start dictating to us. We have always accepted people from other countries and when they integrate with us, there have been no problems. I have friends who have come here from many different countries and they have taught me many new things. It has also expanded our world and made other countries seem not so far away.

The whole problem in Victoria is that our Police command is making our police too soft. And our politicians are not making strong laws to fit the crimes.

We are a very proud country and have fought in two World Wars to protect our democracy, and we treasure these men for what they have given us. We have never had a war fought on our own land, and never want it to happen here. This is a beautiful country but now I sometimes fear for it, the way things are going. I am afraid that until we get politicians with guts and a strong opposition, we may be doomed.

Lori Mclean VIC

Crime is crime

I agree (Time to call a spade a spade, by Preeti Jabbal on www.indianlink.com. au). Crime is crime. Violence is violence. If you dress up barbarity or callousness in culture or race or ‘us and them’, it can shield the underlying ugliness and truth of unacceptable criminal violence. In my mind there is no doubt that Australia has strong racist tendencies - but what country and culture doesn’t? Scratch the surface and discrimination is bubbling. The White Australia policy was the seed of South Africa’s Apartheid, and the racism in South Africa was a strong influence on Gandhiji. He wasn’t just interested in British injustice but also the injustice of the caste system, and everything else.

It is very easy to feel anger when the victim of violence, yet anger always looks for something to blame. More often than not anger drives an attitude that generalises - ie ‘they are all to blame’, whether that race, that culture, that family etc. A feeling of being discriminated against creates fertile ground for retaliatory discrimination.

So I agree with Preeti Jabbal – let’s not get distracted by the hype and lets concentrate on the unequivocal - crime should be prevented, and violence should be punished. And individually, we should examine ourselves and our own attitudes to others to determine whether we are practicing what we preach. India is home to some of the world’s greatest peace activists and most peaceful spiritual traditions, and it would be a shame to share only the blame and anger, and not the compassion and wisdom.

Phil

Leadership should condemn racist elements

Re your report (Time to call a spade a spade, Preeti Jabbal on www.indianlink. com.au), the pointers emerging from detective work, as also eyewitness testimonies, cumulatively, are enough to prove the case conclusively. Whatever the genesis of the problem as it prevails now, to remedy the latest ill afflicting the social fabric in Victoria, the first thing for them to do is to openly admit that there is a growing number of xenophobic crimes on the streets! For, unless the doctor/patient acknowledges or identifies the virus, how will they begin to find cures? No amount of empty statements and condemnation as these being only “opportunistic crimes” will actually ease the situation. Only after that can they launch an open diatribe and strong condemnation of racist elements from public platforms to isolate and shame them, and such a campaign must be backed by immediate suitable legislation and implementation of relevant law to preserve Melbourne as a truly multinational/ multiracial, model city. Unless this happens, you can be pretty sure that xenophobia will grow rapidly. Leadership within a society must visibly stand up and lead. All doesn’t seem to be well with Melbourne.

Where is the leadership? Has the recession left them so famished that they’ve even lost voice?

Saying things like ‘India should not preach because it is a casteist society’ etc. doesn’t help because it only serves to demonstrate prevalence of an attitude of impunity and stubbornness which are hallmarks of a society caught in a downward spiral and certainly not of one that may be categorized as evolved and forward looking.. Whereas the infamous caste system in India is slowly being nibbled away by development, creeping prosperity and spreading education, Australia seems to be on its own path of a new discovery! I think it is just a crisis of leadership. It seems like a place where voices of regression and a new apartheid

seem to be coming out much stronger on the net; in blogs and comments!

Inder Mohan Singh Malhotra Nagpur, INDIA

Living up to our reputation

In 1973 my parents migrated from India to Australia. They came in the hope that they could bequeath to their children a future of promise and opportunity. They came with an idyllic vision of an egalitarian country, a welcoming country. And they came without fear for their safety. These are the very reasons why every year thousands of Indian students make that same trip to Australia. It is why they make that difficult decision to leave behind their friends and families and embrace the uncertainties of a foreign country. Yet today they are confronted with a very different Australia to that which welcomed my parents.

Today Indian students are two and a half times more at risk of attack than other Melbournians. Today Indian students are told that they are ‘soft targets’; that when they are assaulted, it is their failure to take adequate precautions for their safety that is to blame. Today Indian students are told that before they raise their voice in outrage they should first look at the problems that plague their own country. Where once Indian students were welcomed warmly, today they are reminded every day that they are no more than guests.

And so it is not the attacks on Indian students which are most disappointing. It is the absence of a human response. I do not believe for a minute that Australia is a racist country; a small minority of bigots should not be allowed to blacken the names of an entire nation. Nor do I welcome the overblown coverage provided by the Indian media. What I find disappointing and disturbing is the defensive mindset of the Australian community. Are we that arrogant that when a minority voices concerns about their safety we respond with the glib line that at least our country is not as bad as theirs? Are we so consumed with a false vision of perfection that we are not willing to even entertain the suggestion that the attacks may be racially motivated? And have we become so sapped of humanity that our economic interest in Indian students trumps basic empathy for their plight?

What the Indian students seek is genuine understanding and recognition, not patronising advice. What the Indian students seek is an acknowledgement that they are being unfairly targeted, that they are over-represented in crime statistics; not politically correct statements that dismiss the problem. And what Indian students seek above all is an Australia that lives up to its reputation as a welcoming country, a safe country. After all, that’s why they came here in the first place.

Bibhu Aggarwal Ryde NSW

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PREETI JABBAL talks to Trevor Carter, head of the PIWF on its role and the existing policing and law enforcing measures in Victoria

‘Passenger jailed for racist taxi attack’. Indian community, please put your hands together for this unfamiliar bit of news that hit the headlines on January 15, both in The Age and Herald Sun online. Justice did indeed move swiftly in Ballarat when a 48-year-old man was jailed hours after he racially abused and threatened to kill an Indian taxi driver.

Paul John Brogden couldn’t have picked a worse time to unleash his drug and alcohol infused ranting. The Australian Government is trying frantically to diffuse hostility, law enforcers are under enormous pressure to prove that they are ‘doing something’ and the media is having a mud-slinging ball. Brogden now has three months to regret his timing.

still be looking after the safety of Indian students .We are gathering a whole range of people together who are responsible for safety of international students. Collectively we can work on getting the message of safety and awareness across to everyone, we can help new students to integrate within the Australian society and provide advice or support to victims of crime.

claims to have thousands of members and is growing by the minute with anti-Indian sentiments?

This is effectively the first zero tolerance message we have seen since the media went ballistic on the spate of violent attacks on Indian students in Australia. It is not to say that nothing was done before we never heard of it certainly not in any of the ‘power’ press in Australia. Pardon me in case I missed a paragraph that was tucked away in some obscure page.

PJ: In your meeting held last year you provided us with data and statistics that indicated that the incidents of violence against Indians in the Western region had actually reduced, not increased. Is this still the case?

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TC: This is the first time I have heard of such a thing in existence. I would like to get more details and investigate this further.

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It took political intervention, public protests, travel warning, plummeting enrolments, economic loss, media hysteria and appalling statistics collectively to reach here. Australia has finally realised that it is time not to be defensive, but to launch an offensive against perpetrators of these criminal acts of violence against people of Indian appearance.

One hopes that this does not end up as a solitary case of redress and that the law enforcers are consistent in meting out justice to the victims of crime, while ensuring the momentum in terms of speedy investigations, arrests and summary trials.

While a premature conclusion of racism in any case is inappropriate, the apparent disproportionate number of attacks on Indians relative to other overseas students does suggest racism is a factor. There is a lot of angst in the community at the moment and innumerable questions are being raised about the effectiveness of policing measures and law enforcement especially in the Western suburbs. Here is what Trevor Carter, Commander, Footscray Police Complex and head of the Police Indian Western Reference (PIWR) group had to say.

TC: Yes, this is correct. The geographical area of Western Suburbs has experienced a downward trend in the incidents of violence against people of Indian appearance as a result of the measures we have put in place. You have to understand that there is not one solution to this problem - many aspects need to be looked at. We are working with the State and Federal Government on various operations like safe stations project, weapons search and undercover operations. We are being proactive by sending police out in plainclothes to educate the community about safety. We are not just confined to the Western region as we are targeting problem spots around Melbourne.

PJ: Do you have statistics on the number of incidents of violence against Indian students in Melbourne or at least in your Western area?

TC: I cannot give you the numbers because they have to be released corporately. The concern with releasing such figures is how they will be interpreted. Statistics needs to be looked at in context, unfortunately that is not always the case.

PJ: Do you know how many more police were recruited after the last spate of attacks on Indian students?

PJ: People have complained about instances where they tried to report an incident at the Police Station but were told to come back later, because there weren’t enough police to attend or assist them.

TC: That is not acceptable at all. It is the clear responsibility of the Police that if someone contacts them to report an incident, they should provide assistance. I suggest if anyone comes across a case where they are not being assisted, they should ask to speak to someone in authority at the stations.

PJ: In the Nitin Garg case, the Jaspreet Singh case and the Lynbrook Gurudwara incident, the Police and the Government were quick to dismiss the possibility of racism being involved. This has created an impression of a nation in denial. Have you been given a directive to make such statements?

TC: No there is no such directive to the Police. My interpretation of this is that the statements are not being put in context. It depends on how the question is put by journalists or reporting media and how it is perceived by the people. If they ask about racism being involved in an incident but there is no evidence to suggest that it is a racially motivated attack, at that point of time, that is what they will be told. We can only confirm otherwise once the investigation is complete and evidence of racial motivation is found.

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The reference group was created to address the violence against Indian students, in consultation with representatives from the community, media, academics, education providers and students. The group held several meetings to develop strategies for tackling crime on the streets. It launched a student helpline with the support of Federation of Indian Associations of Australia (FIAV) and dealt primarily with sending out a message of safety and awareness to international students. After the initial meetings last year, a long silence followed.

Preeti Jabbal: What is happening with the Police Indian-Western Reference Group? Is it still operating?

Trevor Carter: It is still operating; however we are in the process of changing the composition and direction of the group. Our focus from now on will be on ‘International students’ rather than only Indian students. There was recognition within the group that some of the issues were common to all International students, so we are developing a broader representation from the community. A large focus of our work will

TC: The Government this year is putting out 150 extra police. These will go to all metropolitan areas of Melbourne. We have had injections of police in our region - for example, we had 20 more police in the Wyndham area and another injection in the Werribee area. Our operation ‘safe stations’ has been underway since June last year and we have transit police who ride on trains and go to railway stations that are identified as trouble spots

PJ: What happens once you do find that the attacks were racially motivated? There have been several cases in the past few months where Indians were victims of race crime; has anyone been convicted yet?

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PJ: With the weapon search operation launched recently you are required to give prior notice about where it will be conducted. Does that reduce its effectiveness?

TC: Providing prior notice is a legal requirement. When we conducted the last search it was highly publicised in the media, but despite that we found weapons on several people in that area. The weapons were confiscated and the offenders were charged accordingly. The operation will prove to be a deterrent, as well as a means to detect potential problem areas.

PJ: Does that indicate that violence has increased in Victoria?

TC: Yes, there is an increase in weapons of crime and incidents of violence in Melbourne. It is a disturbing trend and it is a concern for us, which is why we have operations targeted at hot spots especially in the CBD area of Melbourne. We are working very hard to reduce crime.

PJ: Are you aware of the Facebook chain that

TC: Some cases are still under trial or yet to go to the courts; however we arrested 4 young students within ten days of an incident in our region. We have made more arrests and charged many people. You can obtain the figures of specific cases by contacting Police media. I can assure you we are putting in every effort to apprehend the culprits.

PJ: What do you suggest we can do as a community to support the Victorian Police?

TC: There are a couple of things that would help us. We need to know what is happening within the community from a criminal perspective, to help combat crime. The Western Indian Reference task force saw lots of views from lots of people and sometimes we could not reach a consensus or a definitive outcome; however we value working and talking to the community and getting a wide range of perspectives. Secondly, each of us is responsible for our own safety and we need to promote that awareness. The Indian community can help us to create that awareness. We are only as effective as the community will allow us to be.

The Western Indian Reference task force saw lots of views from lots of people and sometimes we could not reach a consensus or a definitive outcome; however we value working and talking to the community and getting a wide range of perspectives

Trevor Carter

Trevor

Carter feels that Melbourne’s western suburbs have experienced

a downward trend in the incidents of violence against people of Indian appearance as a result of the measures

the police have put in place

Changing the mindset

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SAM VARGHESE takes an indepth look into the racial element behind attacks on Indians, still being vociferously denied by those in power

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Indians living in the state of Victoria are 2 1/2 times more likely to be assaulted than non-Indians, as far as figures for the period July 1 2006 to June 30 2007, go.

The assault rate for Indians was 1700 for every 100,000 while for non-Indians it was 700 for every 100,000. In the 2007-‘08 financial year, there were 1447 assaults on Indians.

These figures - from The Age newspaper - illustrate how ridiculous it is for the police and politicians to keep insisting that there is no racial angle to the ongoing violence against Indians.

The attempt to divert attention from this fact has become so ludicrous that, following the tragic death of young Nitin Garg in Melbourne recently, acting prime minister Julia Gillard blasted an unknown Indian tabloid for running a cartoon that depicted a Victorian police officer in Ku Klux Klan garb.

ablaze after a dinner party. It happens all the time!

One should not be surprised at this stubborn refusal to acknowledge that a racial problem exists. A few years back, when Jewish community members had foul racial epithets hurled at them, the Victorian police issued similar denials. There are a number of factors, all of which I think are contributing to the violence.

The federal opposition has now resorted to playing the race card and indulging in dog-whistle politics on immigration in a desperate bid to try and raise its poll numbers. Whether one likes it or not, the tone of the national debate does influence the rest of the country.

This will, definitely, embolden those who are involved in racial attacks.

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can influence public policy - politicians, religious leaders, social leaders, academics, the media, police, the army and so on.

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Had The Times of India, Hindustan Times, Indian Express, The Hindu or even regional bigwigs like Deccan Herald or Deccan Chronicle done so, it would have been worth shouting about. Even if the nonEnglish biggies like Malayalam Manorama or Amrita Bazar Patrika had done so, it would have been worthy of notice.

What the Mail Today, a rag that is not even three years old, thinks about anything is really irrelevant - both in India and abroad.

But it provided a diversion from the real issue - the racial angle - so Ms Gillard grabbed it.

Victoria’s police tried it too: when an attempt was made to set alight another Indian, the police actually had the gall to hint that he may have done it himself! Sure, it is very logical for a 29-year-old man who has a young child to try and set himself

Both the federal government and Victoria’s state Labor government go to the polls later this year - neither would like to contribute to a debate on race which can be about the most damaging thing for any political party.

Hence the spin, which continues to emanate from both Canberra and Melbourne.

Some may ask why it is necessary for the police and politicians to admit the nature of the problem in order to try and prevent further occurrences.

The answer is obvious. More and more countries’ populations are becoming heterogeneous; as more and more people join a population, it is obvious that everyone will not like everything which the others do. Hence, a sense of restraint develops, a sense of being willing to let the other do his thing, as long as he lets you do yours.

If it were not for this pattern of behaviour, there would be pitched battles on the streets of every major city every single

The federal opposition has now resorted to playing the race card and indulging in dog-whistle politics on immigration in a desperate bid to try and raise its poll numbers

day. We would all be out there fighting like dogs over scraps of meat.

Much as each of us claims to be his own man or woman, the things which we learn to abhor, the things which we come to acknowledge as being harmful to social cohesion, are defined solely by our leaders, those in authority and those who

A simple example: two decades ago, it was dangerous for gays or lesbians to even hold hands in public. Gay-bashing was not frowned upon and homosexuals were treated as though they were social pariahs. That kind of sentiment has more or less completely gone away - due to public utterances by those in authority and a constant driving home of the message that they should be accepted as people with an alternate lifestyle.

Those who cling to such archaic beliefs, do not dare to articulate them in public or act in support of their beliefs anymore. Similarly with the violence against Indians, those in authority should stand up and condemn the racism that is, in part, fuelling these incidents. Instead, those who should speak out are in denial. How does one expect the situation to improve?

Sam Varghese is a sub-editor with The Age Online

Sydney Indian community sends a message to Victoria

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In the wake of the attack and murder of Nitin Garg, a 21-year-old Indian student in Melbourne, theUnited Indian Associations Inc (UIA) and All International Student Association (AISA) organised a meeting of community leaders in the UIA offices in Parramatta. The purpose was for the community in NSW to get together to take a position and ‘send a message to Victoria’, presumably Victorian government authorities. The meeting was led by Stepan Kerkyasharian, (chairman of Community Relations Commission CRC), Amit Dasgupta (Consul General of India), Navjot Singh (President of AISA) and Aruna Chandrala (President of UIA).

Aruna Chandrala as the chairperson gave an introduction to the situation. The CRC Chairman followed with an overview. The Consul General, while making it clear that his jurisdiction was limited to NSW and SA, expressed anguish and stressed the need to remain on alert in NSW. He said that the community must not focus on who is to blame but rather work with NSW Police to make their area safe. He commended the work that Cdr Robert Bradford did to make the Harris Park area safe where international students have worked with the

local communities. He stressed that we don’t need to be vigilantes, as that’s not our job. To the Australian Indian community members, his message was to ensure that this country has all the values that brought them here to call Australia home.

The forum was then thrown open to members of the community and most delegates made their presence felt with their useful comments and suggestions.

Hemchandra Rao said that Police visibility does a lot to prevent crimes, relating the case of New York, a hotbed of crime, which was succesfully cleaned up. Vish Vishwanathan said that 1400-1500 attacks were one too many and the government must accept it as a problem and take stern action against offenders so that others take a lesson. Padmanabha and Abbas Alvi stressed the need to take a realistic view of the situation because we cannot form a strategy unless we know the causes. Gautam Sharma, Amit Pal, Rajwant Singh, Amarinder Singh, Dr. Navin Patel and many other community members also participated.

Several members related their own stories of racial abuse on the street, even in shopping centres. It was

stressed that if a member suffers a racial abuse, they must make a complaint. Crime in any form must not be tolerated.

Other suggestions also came up.

* There should be policy intervention on: a. security; and b. communication. To illustrate, each university must have designated faculty members who form a committee to help international students, teach them the rules around living here etc.

* There was a detailed discussion on media’s role and the need to engage with it, especially in India. The CRC and the CG stressed the reality that press is free in both countries and cannot be controlled.

* There should be targeted crime squads that focus on particular trouble spots and trouble-maker groups.

* The community was unanimous that protest marches were not an effective tool. Rather diplomacy must be pursued which is known to have resulted in good outcomes. The consensus was that a crime be treated as a crime and dealt as one rather than attribute motives to it.

Hasnain Zaheer

Time to call a spade a spade

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There is only way in which the attack on Indian students can be described, says PREETI JABBAL

Let’s stop calling these attacks on Indian students ‘antisocial- behavior ‘, ‘opportunistic attacks’, ‘racial element’ as there is only one word for these unacceptable acts of violence and that is ‘ crime’. This mindless, senseless criminal activity needs to be addressed immediately not by the glib talking politicians, nor by the divisive Indian community leaders, not even by student representatives; the only force that can curb this appalling violence are the Australian Police.

Six months ago promises were made to increase the force by another 40-50 Police officers: were they enough? Three months ago many media outlets showed pictures of cops on beat at railway stations: are they still around? Whatever happened to the people who were accused or charged over various incidents that happened last year? Are they all behind bars? How many were convicted? How many assaults were not opportunistic by nature? There are many

questions but very few answers. You and I are not privy to this important information. ‘Privacy laws, Police processes, legal ramifications’ are the reasons cited. Having a largely Anglo centric media is not helping either.

who has sent her only child to a ‘safe’ country for a better future; to the father who is working double shifts to pay his child’s fees; to the siblings and friends who are waiting for an opportunity to join the ‘better life’.

undoubtedly good albeit mistimed. The sole focus, earlier, and at this point of time, needs to be zero tolerance.

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There were 1447 assaults on Indian students in the year to July 2008 confirmed by Victoria Police according to the Sydney Morning Herald. Manpreet Singh from SBS Punjabi Radio also obtained controversial statistics from the Department Of Immigration and Citizenship under the Freedom of Information Act (FOA). According to that document 183 overseas students died in Australia during 2003-2009, while studying here. DIAC also added that in no way do they suggest that this is an official, comprehensive tally and as such the data cannot be presented as a complete, official record. The nationalities and cause of deaths is not yet known. DIAC also maintains that there are no definitive statistics on this since they do not maintain comprehensive data regarding details of the deaths of student visa holders.

Alarming? Yes, especially to the mother

How often have I heard people say they have come to Australia because here, ‘life has value?’ I am not so confident of that anymore. The Nitin Garg case has shaken my faith. In the last few months the Australian Government seemed more concerned with tightening immigration laws, cleaning up the education industry, closing unscrupulous colleges, than enforcing some concrete law and order solutions. Their intentions were

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A strong message needs to be sent out to the perpetrators that what they are doing is unacceptable. And I am sorry to say but a ‘harmony walk’ does not really do much. Multiculturalism is the fabric of Australian society - we don’t need to spend time and effort to reiterate that further. We need to target ‘crime’. We need tougher sentences on perpetrators of these hate crimes. We need to target that Facebook chain that is getting stronger and stronger with anti Indian sentiments. We need more police out after dark. We need less political spin. We need, and demand, safer streets.

Gurudwara fire deliberately lit

A fire that broke out in a partially-built Gurudwara in the south eastern suburb of Lynbrook in Melbourne, is believed to have been deliberately lit.

Surinder Singh of the Nanaksar Thath Isher Darbar gurudwara, claims that some people were spotted entering the Gurudwara site around midnight on the night of Tuesday 12/10/01. Mr. Singh had just finished his turn in offering prayers as part of a Sikh ritual called the Akhand Path which involves reading the holy book Granth Sahib from beginning to end without any break. He went to change his clothes and heard some noises coming from the empty site.

department and the Police. It took the Fire department nearly three hours to control the fire, according to Gurudwara officials.

The Lynbrook Gurudwara in Evans Road has been under construction for quite some time now and is about 8-9 months from completion. The fire caused considerable damage to the shrine, mainly the insulation on the walls and the foam panels that were being used in the building process. The structure of the building is still sound as it is built of poured concrete; however, it will take a few weeks to fix the damage to the interior.

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According to Surinder he saw two people inside the fence that was set up to secure the building site. As it was very dark he couldn’t see their faces or identify who they were. He called out to them and when they ran in his direction, he ran towards the makeshift premises next to the building site to avoid any trouble. He saw what looked like torch lights inside the partially built gurudwara building and decided to contact the manager of the gurudwara.

By this time people who reside in the temporary gurudwara saw flames coming out of the building and they called the fire

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Police are investigating the cause of fire. Initially they were quick to rule out the possibility that the Gurudwara was targeted by arsonists. They suspected that a bonfire, on the site, may have started the blaze. However, on further investigation it was confirmed that this was a case of arson.

“The arsonists managed to lever a section of the fence, at the rear of the site, and used that to enter and exit the gurudwara site,” said Detective Senior Constable Paul Stowe, who is in charge of the investigation.

“Evidence suggests that the fire was lit at three separate areas of the temple with crudely put together glass bottles/ containers filled with petrol.” he added.

A piece of red plastic that appears to be part of a

jerry can could also have been used to light the fire. A cigarette lighter was also found at the building site, confirmed Detective Stowe.

Joey Herrech, multicultural liaison officer who is handling this case, said the fire is suspicious and not a bonfire as outlined earlier.

“We cannot elaborate where the investigation is at, however this case is being taken very seriously by the Police and they are making every effort to find those responsible,” he said.

When asked if security has been stepped up in that area, both Detective Stowe and Joey Herrech replied that the Gurudwara officials have appointed their own security measures and Police have also stepped up their patrol in that area.

The Gurudwara officials are understandably very upset with this incident and very vocal in their condemnation of the arsonists who indulged in this senseless crime against a sacred site. The total value of the damage done is yet to be established.

Preeti Jabbal

Friends and colleagues at a vigil organized outside the Hungry Jack’s outlet where slain Melbourne man Nitin Garg (inset) worked. (Photo: Ravinder Singh Jabbal)

Surinder Singh outside the partially burnt Nanaksar Thath Ishar Darbar Gurudwara in Lynbrook

Damages to the inside of the building

In December, India’s National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) visited Sydney and Melbourne to meet with the Federal and State Government, ICT industry associations and attend the 2009 Asia Pacific Digital Innovation Summit held in Melbourne.

Each year, the Asia Pacific Digital Innovation Summit is held in different cities across the region and organised by respective members of the AsianOceanian Computing Industry Organization (ASOCIO). This year Australia hosted the event, organised by the peak industry body Australian Information Industries Association (AIIA) with the support of the Australian and Victorian Governments.

NASSCOM brought a delegation of companies to Australia including: Mr Srinivas Rao, Chief Executive Officer, Aujas Networks Pvt Ltd; Mr Sanjay Balrama, Country Head, Espire Infolabs; Mr Pushkar Misra, President & CEO, Philippines Operations, Hinduja Global Solutions Ltd. (HGSL); Mr Sadasivan Narayanan, AVP Sales, Icreon Communications; Mr Gulab Sharma, President US Operations, Pratham Software; Mr Nitin Shimpi, Director, Talentica Software (India); Mr Sachin Samson, Manager- Australia and New

Zealand, Zenith Software.

The visit by the NASSCOM delegation, led by its Vice President–Global Trade Development Mr Ameet Nivsarkar, offered an opportunity to take stock of the fast developing ICT relationship between Australia and India.

At a panel discussion organised by

Indian IT delegation visits down under Admin Assistant

the Australia India Business Council and chaired by Consul-General of India Mr Amit Dasgupta, Mr Sudhir Mathur Chairman of NASSCOM Australia reflected on the fast growth of India-headquartered IT companies.

“NASSCOM Australia members now have 13 software centres across

Australia, servicing companies in telecommunications, banks, airlines and other sectors,” Mr Mathur said.

“NASSCOM members are interested to partner with innovative Australian companies to jointly deliver services both in Australia and overseas,” he added.

The Australian Trade Commission (Austrade), in partnership with NSW Industry and Investment, co-ordinated presentations on a range of topics for the delegation. These included policy settings around investment and innovation in NSW and Australia, innovative ICT research projects of Australia’s ICT Centre of Excellence ‘National ICT Australia’, and Australia’s business visa framework. The delegation also met with AIIA and Australian Computer Society.

According to Ms Janelle Casey, Austrade’s Global Leader – ICT, “Australia has traditionally attracted investment from IT multinationals headquartered in the US, Europe and North East Asia. Over the last decade, investment in Australia by Indiaheadquartered IT multinationals has grown rapidly and is reflected in their expanded presence across Australian states. Their large local employment, commitment to local training and scholarships, and interest in partnering with innovative Australian companies are long-term benefits for the Australian ICT industry.”

Austrade has also appointed dedicated Investment Specialists in India to help Indian companies find the right partners, provide practical advice and market intelligence when looking to invest in Australia.

The delegation also met with the Victorian Minister for Information and Communications Technology Mr John Lenders MP.

Worth living through the Art of Living

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Early in December I made a trip to Phillip Island, and the journey I experienced will stay with me for a lifetime. One year comes by and rolls away, making way for yet another one and life goes on as it did before. New Year resolutions were a thing of the past and I didn’t think much except that the grains of sand have flitted down rather too quickly. But after my recent trip, things seemed to have changed in a very subtle way. I have started seeing myself in a different light; have started recognising the “me” within me, and my search for everything good and noble has raced into a different dimension. I am beginning to grasp the ‘Art of Living’.

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I was introduced to the Art of Living concept way back in 2001, but I was probably not ready for it and so I didn’t make a deal of it. It was not until November 2008 that the mystery of this life started unfolding. It went a step further when I met Sri Sri in April 2009, and had the honour of doing an advanced course in his presence. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar or Guruji as he is fondly called, needs no

introduction for he is known the world over for his simplicity and the joy that he infuses into the lives of people who go to him. Guruji has spoken extensively about various Hindu scriptures and has always drawn a parallel between them and the scriptures from other religions, propagating the fact that God is One. His dialogues open new gateways of understanding for the stories are not just stories; each one has a tale to tell and a meaning to convey. Life seems so simple and easy to live, and all the knots that we have created start opening up, generating a freshness that is absolutely addictive.

Guruji was in Melbourne for the Parliament of World’s Religions and all those who had the opportunity to listen to him would have got a taste of what he has to offer. Spirituality is separate from religion and it has to be treated that way. The Melbourne branch of Art of Living did not want to let go of this great opportunity and decided to plan different

(Phillip Island) was great and the purpose was even greater! Another advanced course with Guruji in the same calendar year, well, that was for the privileged and I was determined to be one of them! I have heard from people that every advanced course, though the course contents are the same, offers different experiences. I found it hard to understand. How can

you feel different when there is no surprise element and you know what is coming? Well, I got a whiff of that in this course. The teacher, the course participants and their energy contribute to your feelings and experiences. This time we had the privilege of having two teachers, one from India and the other from Switzerland. Course participants came from all over the world, while some had travelled all the way from India, others were from South Africa, Malaysia, Fiji, Singapore, New Zealand and Hong Kong. I would like to live life the simple way, for according to Guruji that is how God intended it for us. We have filled it with confusions and complications and have made it so difficult, that we have stopped enjoying it. We are so busy planning our future and rectifying our past that the present gets lost in the rigmarole. How can we enjoy every moment of our lives if we do not experience those moments? And this time I have decided to make a New Year resolution, something I haven’t done in a long time. I have started the ground work and I am on the path to becoming the best student possible in the Art of Living. I would recommend this to all those who have decided to read this article, for believe me, there is a purpose behind everything. Give yourself this gift this New Year, learn and know the Art of Living. There is nothing better than that… Experience it! Happy 2010!

Nima Menon

If

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POWR seeks a global ethic

pluralism and focus on global concerns.

In 1893, in the Chicago Parliament of World Religions, Swami Vivekananda received a standing ovation from a crowd of seven thousand for his opening remark “Brothers and Sisters of America” as he introduced Hinduism to the West. A century and a bit later in the 2009 Parliament of World Religions (POWR), the Dalai Lama received similar, if not equal, adulation when he said that the world faced a moral crisis that only inner values such as compassion could solve. Both the speakers discussed peace and diversity in the context of interreligious understanding, cooperation and universality that constitutes the main spirit of POWR.

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The 2009 POWR was held in Melbourne recently, bringing together the world’s religious and spiritual communities, leaders and followers to discuss and find answers to various issues such as global poverty, indigenous reconciliation, climate change and environmental care. The week–long convention, co hosted by the Melbourne City Government, gathered the world’s faiths like Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Sikhs, Jains, Zorastrians, Bahai’s, Native Americans and

The theme for the fifth POWR event was “Make a World of Difference: Hearing each other, Healing the earth” — an essential focus for our times. With multiple panels, workshops, lectures, worship and music events taking place simultaneously, it was hard to comprehensively cover the entire event; however selected sampling of the spiritual fare compelled many, including me, to expand our theological horizons. The spiritual perspectives were diverse, but a common realization bound all the participants and attendees that it is going to take all collective prayers, collective consciousness, and spiritual resources to move the world forward.

In what can be termed as the broadest possible range of spirituality and religious experience, the POWR offered some moving oratory, involving rituals, soothing music and interesting

discussions. Besides running from room to room listening to the speakers, I spent some time admiring the ornate Buddhist pray area, taking a stress test at the Scientology section and getting a healing session at the Shinji Shumeikai booth. I photographed young Sikh kids from a village in Punjab as they walked past, resplendent in traditional clothing. I browsed for hours through the rich treasure of books, pamphlets and displays at the exhibition. As I threaded my way through the mind boggling variety of enriching experiences on offer, I felt for the hundreds and thousands who did not or could not attend this event for several reasons, including the prohibitive cost. If nothing else, the event, if absorbed in its true spirit, had the potential to guide individuals towards the ultimate religious value - creation of a decent human being. There was a strong presence of Hindu and Sikh speakers at the Convention. Renowned speakers like Sri Sri Ravi Shankar from Art of Living Foundation, Dadi Janki Raja Yogini from Bramha Kumaris, Dada J P Waswani head of Sadhu Waswani mission,

Amma Sri Karunamayi from Penusila Ashram, His Holiness Sri Chinna Jeeyar Swamiji were some of the Hindu spiritual leaders who spoke at the POWR. The Sikh Diaspora was represented by Kuldeep Singh President of the Sikh Youth of America, Bhai Mohinder Singh from Guru Nanak Nishkam Seva jatha, UK, Jagdeep Singh Shergill from Victorian Multicultural Association, Dr Balwant Singh Hansra, Dr Sangat Singh Syalee, Dr Balwant Singh Dhillon, Dr Devinder Singh Chahal and many more.

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The 2009 POWR was attended by approximately 5000 people with the maximum numbers attending the closing ceremony to hear the Dalai Lama’s address. It was ironic to see that metal detectors were installed for the first and only time to ensure the safety of a man who embodies peace and global unity. It also reflected on the fact that the world sees religions as the main cause for pain, strife and war, and if the world’s religions can get out of their fear and work together and help each other in promoting the same ideals, ideas and value systems, religion can be a major force in helping people. “The problems of this world are spiritual problems,” declared the Dalai Lama, “and can never be solved by material means.” He challenged the council of POWR to ensure that the Parliament would not simply be a social gathering, but that it would provide the impetus and inspiration to implement acts of love and compassion worldwide.

The Parliament of World Religions held in Melbourne last month, brought the world’s spiritual communities together. PREETI JABBAL reports

Indian folk music’s sweet seduction

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One of the most successful acts as part of the Sydney Festival 2010 so far is a show by the Manganiyars, a caste of Muslim musicians from Rajasthan. Their free 30-minute preview at Hyde Park on Festival First Night was jam packed, and the shows at the Seymour Centre were sold out - even standing room tickets. You may be surprised, but director Roysten Abel is not - even when, after viewing Manganiyar Seduction, members of the audience often walk up to thank him for showing them God.

drawn into a world which is beyond theirs or even of the Manganiyars,” says Abel.

Besides theatre and music, Abel has also worked in film. “While film is quite different and has its own technique, I do want there to be a synergy in all my art forms. I was hoping that there is a space where they can all go together,” he reveals.

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“I am not surprised by the response, because that is how I felt when I first saw the Manganiyars,” confides Abel.

Breaking out of conventions is nothing new to Abel, beginning from when he dropped out of commerce class, discarded the family business and joined drama school - informing his parents only after he had taken admission.

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About 10 years ago, Abel saw a traditional concert by the Manganiyars and the experience lingered; in 2006 he included two musicians in one of his theatre performances in Spain. But he had to leave the show midway to be in Germany for another performance.

“However, I felt myself wanting to hear more of their music. I called them up and made them play to me over the phone,” recollects Abel. “I knew then that I had been totally seduced by the music and wanted to translate it into a more physical form.” So rather than use music in theatre, Abel reversed the process by using theatre to create theatre in music.

In this production, 43 Manganiyars perform seated in 36 boxes, inspired by the windows of the famous red light district of Amsterdam - one he describes as being extremely theatrical and burlesque. “I loved the theatricality of it. The soul is seduced through the body and so I wanted to marry the two,” he says.

Each box is curtained and framed by carnival lights. A single voice emerges, as the curtains on one cubicle are drawn. Soon the other cubicles light up, as a range of musical instruments including the Khamacha (string instrument), Kartal (percussion instrument similar to the Spanish castanas)

“Theatre was not, and still is not a career in India,” says Abel. “I did not think about how I would sustain myself or a family, I just did it because I loved theatre. That is how my productions are as well – I have an idea, and I pursue it not quite knowing how the logistics will work out, but things just seem to fall into place.”

He does, of course, have a couple of big ideas up his sleeve at the moment. The first, a major production with Manganiyar musicians, titled The Manganiyar War that will interpret the 10 days of war from the Mahabharata through music. “I hope to interpret the atmosphere and mood of the war through the quality of singing,” says Abel.

The musicians you hear singing soulful ballads and Sufi poems hardly seem like the voices of rage or violence, I comment. “They have aggression between the musicians,” explains Abel. “Just as there is jugalbandi, there is also jangbandi where a musician tries to outdo the other.”

Abel’s second big idea is to create an international folk music centre in Jaisalmer, that he hopes to have ready by 2012. “I envision it as a residency for composers, designers, performers, where they can create new works with traditional resources,” says Abel.

He is passionate about India’s traditional resources and has worked with various folk and street artists including magicians, jugglers, impersonators, snake charmers, and puppeteers. “I grew up listening to the usual rock music. It was just 10 years ago that I was exposed to folk music and discovered a different side of India, and it was absolutely fantastic,” he says. “I delved deeper into the various cultures of India and knew I had to work in this world.”

The Manganiyars are not the only folk artists that have been successfully received by audiences the world over. Tim Supple’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream was performed with folk musicians and acrobats from across India. Meanwhile, Underscore Records, established by Shubha Mudgal and Aneesh Pradhan, gives Indian musicians access to the global market through an online store. Once celebrated in Kings’ courts, Indian folk music is now making inroads into the global music scene.

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Sindhi Sarangi and Murli (snake charmer’s flute, also called been) and the voices of men, women, children and the elderly of the Manganiyar community, build up a spectacle of rhythm and song.

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Adding to the theatricality of the performance is an animated conductor.

“Traditional Indian musical performances don’t have a conductor. I found the conductor of western classical performances very theatrical and wanted to incorporate that aspect. The conductor is a rehearsed act. Besides, there is also the practical aspect that he has the entire crew of musicians to pull through the show,” says Abel.

Manganiyar Seduction has had a popular run across India and Europe, and will later travel to New Zealand. So what is the cross cultural appeal of this otherwise little known traditional folk form, the lyrics of which are in Indian languages? “The show is structured and presented in a way that compels you to keep your intellect at bay and immerse yourself in the experience. The audience is

Once seduced by the Manganiyars, Roysten Abel is now taking them to audiences around the world, writes SHIVANGI AMBANI-GANDHI

The show is structured and presented in a way that compels you to keep your intellect at bay and immerse yourself in the experience

Photos: Wolfgang Krichner

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Rahman for

By DARSHAK MEHTA

Waugh told me that he was stunned at the sheer size of the crowd (“mate, it stretches for a mile”) when he gave Rahman a rousing introduction, prior to the concert. His speech was certainly one of the highlights of the evening. He called Rahman the “Sachin Tendulkar” of music, regretted the recent attacks in Melbourne on Indian students, reiterated that Indian students were welcome in our country and asked that they be treated with the same respect and friendliness that Australian cricketers experience in India.

About five years ago, the laudable Melbourne based organisation CHARINDAA had organised a couple of A.R. Rahman concerts in Australia and donated $ 120,000 to the Steve Waugh Foundation. Waugh, along with wife Lynette, attended that concert, as well.

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Indian Consul General to Sydney, Amit Dasgupta was of course in attendance and played a pivotal role in briefing A.R. Rahman on the student attacks issue. The result was a polished performance by Rahman in his press conference.

Rahman’s songs from Roja, Dil Se and Taal were well received as were his renditions of Khwaja mere Khwaja, Vande Matram (Maa Tuuje Salaam), Mustafa amongst others.

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He said it at the Oscars but he could have well meant this memorable line for us, here in Sydney.

A.R. Rahman, Indian music’s first truly international superstar rocked Sydney at the Sydney Festival’s free concert at Parramatta Park on Sunday, 17 January 2010.

Waugh was at the Parramatta Park concert with daughter Rosie and sat with Indian High Commissioner Mrs Sujatha Singh. The HC thought it significant that Rahman considered it as “the most important concert of my life”.

Chhaiyan, Chhaiyan was sung by Rahman’s elder sister Reyhana. Incidentally, his younger sister Ishrat was a part of the troupe as well. One of the highlights of the evening was Jai Ho – of course. The crowd, who had been anticipating the hit song from Slumdog Millionaire, were on their feet, instantly. The synchronised fireworks display accompanying it, had an electrifying effect, though sadly, marking the end of the evening.

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It is thought that around 70,000 people attended the concert – though, how one accurately estimates large crowds is an enduring mystery!

Australian cricket legend and notorious India lover Steve

Amongst other high profile attendees was NSW Premier Kristina Kenneally who was there with husband, Ben. Ex NSW Premier Nathan Rees was there throughout the evening as was Minister David Borger. Minister for the Arts Virginia Judge, attended later on in the evening.

It is refreshing to see Australian politicians with a human touch and without any airs, whatsoever. True egalitarianism. No trappings of power such as oppressive security etc. When

I might also mention the flawless performance of the background instrumental score of Mausam and Escape from the soundtrack of Slumdog Millionaire – in which the sarod was played with dynamic crescendo and particular verve. The dancing was high voltage with well orchestrated (though, brief!) forays into the crowd by both the dancers and singers.

Hariharan, with his dulcet tones, was particularly impressive in his signature song, Tu Hi Re from Bombay

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“All my life, I had a choice between hate and love and I chose love and that is why I am here”

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And, Blaze, was his usual live-wire act - whether rapping, dancing or singing. He was like the Energiser bunny

The jarring note of the evening was not the light rain, but the poor quality of the sound.

And one of the disappointments for me personally was the lack of adequate opportunity for dynamic percussionist Sivamani to display his skill. He would have brought the house down (and, rocked the next few suburbs!)

However, all in all, it was a sensational spectacle, a great concert and full marks to the Sydney Festival and the NSW Government for enticing Rahman to perform. Rahman was undoubtedly motivated by altruistic factors.

Though all parties concerned have mouthed the usual pious stuff about how this concert was about “bringing Australia and India together, promoting cultural harmony, solidarity, friendship, goodwill” etc. etc. it is difficult not to be cynical whether any of this can be achieved, yet? At best, this is a good beginning. There certainly need to be many more of these cultural exchanges which can only help in promoting greater understanding and appreciation amongst the local populace which obviously is hostile and feeling threatened at the sudden change in the demographic mix.

anything constructive out of the incidents of violence against Indian students (mainly in Melbourne). Some of the lessons of the Rahman concert might provide pointers.

For a start, the overwhelming number of people who attended the show were of Indian extraction. There could not have been more than 10 % Caucasian-Australians in the crowd - which must disappoint advocates of Indo-Australian friendship. The Sydney Festival and all concerned must do some soul searching – how come white Australians were largely missing even though the other Indian act of the Sydney Festival “The Manganiyar Seduction” was so overwhelmingly patronised by white Australians?

against people of Indian origin in Australia as racist. The Australian authorities need to admit this, even if it embarrasses them. A simple statement such as this will go a long way to soothe community fears: “Yes, regrettably, there is racism around and we find it reprehensible in any form. We are trying to deal with it, change community attitudes whilst coming down hard on those who attack this very core value of civilised society”

The absence of any untoward incident reported by the police at the A R Rahman concert should give all governments food for thought. It might be mentioned that the police presence was highly visible and yet, unobtrusive. Simple lesson: visible police presence equals trouble-free events and safer suburbs.

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In any case, it is also well known that Indians are amongst the most law abiding minorities everywhere in the world, so the lack of untoward incidents should not come much of a surprise!

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Ultimately, respect for culture will hopefully flow on to respect for the individual – obviously missing, currently.

Governments in Australia are going to have to act simultaneously on several fronts if they have to salvage

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Bringing alcohol into the venue was banned though limited service was available from licensed areas in the park. Alcohol has become a serious, alarming societal issue throughout Australia and must have a deleterious bearing on the violent, abusive occurrences towards Indian students. The fact that most of the behaviour manifests itself at night is another pointer to its pernicious influence. Was it a mere co-incidence that little or no alcohol = no incidents?

The Police, State Governments and the Federal Government are in full denial mode about racism existing in any substantial form in Australia but this is as flawed an argument (and, one which flies in the face of facts) as the claim by the feral Indian media which labels every incident

All in all, a fantastic night for the 70,000 odd at Parramatta Park, hundreds of thousands who watched it on ABC 2, a night of harmony and high class entertainment for lovers of music and those thrilled by big spectacles and a night when the music of the “Mozart of Madras” resonated with the souls of thousands of Sydneysiders, a night when the prestigious Sydney Festival embraced the Indian Australian community in its fold.

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Photos: Muneet Duggal/PV Productions; Prudence Upton/Sydney Festival

Photos: Muneet Duggal/PV Productions; Prudence Upton/Sydney Festival

Walking through the crowds

Vande Mataram

NSW Premier Kristina Kenneally

Steve Waugh with niece Julia and daughter Rosie

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Mere paas maa hai: ARR’s mum (right) and aunt Steve Waugh

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Don’t go for LESS, but settle for the best!

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Art Gallery of NSW

Garden and cosmos: The royal paintings of Jodhpur (Until 26 Jan 2010)

Tours Daily 1pm, Wednesdays 7.15pm

Art After Hours 20 Jan 5.30pm Exhibition talk Analiese

Treacy, paper conservator AGNSW

Rangoli Demonstration

What’s On

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WHERE: Darcy Road Public School Hall, Wentworthville COST: FREE

MATERIALS: All materials will be provided. Classes will be in English.

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23 -24 Jan 12 noon-4 pm Café Circulation Area

Soul to soul: Healing music and nada yoga

22 and 23 Jan 9-10am

Indian music and chant to lift the spirit led by Nirmal Jena and friends. Join exercises in breathing and sound vibrations with vocal and instrumental accompaniment.

Garden Walk: Royal Botanic Garden Divine Landscape self-guided tour

Experience the sensuality, tranquility and beauty of the gardens, stopping at locations reminiscent of the maharaja’s palace. Download the self-guided tour from www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/gardenswalk

Joint Republic Day and Australia Day celebration

24 Jan The Australia India Medical association [AIMA], in partnership with 25+ Indian Australian associations/groups, has organised a combined celebration to mark Australia Day and India’s Republic Day. Ryde Civic Centre, 1 Devlin Street, Ryde NSW, 6pm-11pm. Details call Yadu Singh 0413 375 669 or Rahul Jethi 0402 883 225

UIA’s Republic Day – Australia Day celebration

25 Jan UIA organises a joint celebration of Australia and India’s national days at Parravilla Function Centre, 42 Campbell St, Parramatta. Details call Aruna Chandrala 0410 338 900.

Republic Day

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Amit Dasgupta, Consul General of India (Sydney) will then read out the message of the President of India to the nation. This will be followed by light refreshments. All members of the Indian community are cordially invited to attend the function.

Raja Yoga Weekend Retreat

5 Feb All are invited for a Raja Yoga weekend Hindi Retreat on Experiencing Inner Power & Protection starting 7:00pm at Brahma Kumaris Centre for Spiritual learning, Leura. Details contact www.bkwsu.org/au/retreats then click Blue Mountains or phone 02 47842500, mobile 0431 446 056.

Harbour Cruise

6 Feb NSW Indian Welfare Association is organising a Harbour Cruise from 6.30pm to 10.30pm by the Three Tier “MV Blue Moon Majestic”. Boarding at Birkinhead Point. Prizes for the best dressed; dance to the music of DJ. Licenced Bar on board. Details contact N Sampath 9893 7729 or Saraswathi Venugopalan 9838 0654.

Upanishads short course

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Details contact Kumar 0407 108 372 or Shobana 0422 732 907

Dancing to spirituality

28 Mar Natyadharshan Dance School presents a charity dance program, at Casula Power House Theatre, (Casula Road - near Jolly Knight Motel) 6pm. Details call Sashi Bala on 9607 2916 / 0434 233 115 or visit www. natyadharshan.com

Volunteers needed for 2010 Sydney Royal Easter Show

The Royal Agricultural Society of NSW (RAS) is inviting people over the age of 17 to become volunteers at the 2010 Sydney Royal Easter Show, which runs from 1 – 14 April. Volunteers can apply to work in areas such as administration, information and ushering, or with the animals.

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Each volunteer is asked to take on a minimum of eight shifts over the 14 days of the Show, with at least four of the shifts on high traffic days. For this, each volunteer will receive access to the Show for its duration, meal vouchers, an official volunteer uniform and exclusive entry to the Volunteer Green Room. All volunteers will be provided with job specific coaching and training, and must also complete an Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) induction which can be completed online.

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26 Jan India’s Republic Day will be marked in Sydney at the residence of the Consul General at 2 Pleasant Ave, East Lindfield NSW 2070 at 9.00am sharp. The function will begin with the Flag Hoisting at 9.00am. Mr.

Starting March SVT Vidyalaya presents Upanishatsarasangraha a rare and free opportunity to learn the essence of all Upanishads. Sri Vasudevacharya, Senior Disciple of Swami Dayananda Saraswathi will teach the course. In eighteen classes, he will systematically explain the meaning of the most outstanding mantras from all the principal Upanishads. This is a unique course that will prove of great benefit to spiritual seekers. All are welcome. No prior knowledge necessary.

WHEN: First 3 Sundays of each month, Start: SUN, March 7, 2010 (3pm-5pm). Finish SUN August 15, 2010 (3pm-5pm)

People interested in becoming a volunteer can visit www. eastershow.com.au/volunteers for additional details and to download an application form.

Volunteer interviews will be conducted by appointment on Saturday 6 February. Please register by contacting Rosemary Ferrari, Sydney Royal Easter Show Volunteers Coordinator, on (02) 9704 1297 or email volunteers@ rasnsw.com.au

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We give protection from all magic

Tamleni Indian Supermarket 103, Rawson Street, Auburn, NSW 2144

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large balcony off lounge and bedroom, video security system + security parking, great tenant for the investor or ideal first home.

Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

Contact Alan Fowler

GUILDFORD $439,000

WENTWORTHVILLE $529,950

LOCATION, LOCATION

Set in an ultra quiet cul-de-sac, within walking distance to shops & station this spotless 3 bedroom brick veneer home features large air conditioned separate lounge, modern kitchen, family + sunrooms, 2nd toilet, garage and more. A MUST TO INSPECT!

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WOW -WHAT A HOME

This home sits on the high side with a wonderful northerly aspect featuring 4 bedrooms polished floor boards throughout, modern kitchen with granite bench tops and new stove + dishwasher, large separate lounge & dining area with reverse cycle air con, large sun drenched verandah at the front and huge entertaining area out the back, remote tandem lock up garage, extra features such as alarm, storage, shutters & walk to all amenities. This home will be gone before you know it so don’t miss this opportunity!

Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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TOONGABBIE $349,950

FEATURES GALOURE

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Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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OLD TOONGABBIE

GREAT STARTER Modern 2 bedroom townhouse, spacious bedrooms, modern kitchen & bathroom, separate lounge & dining, alarm system, large paved courtyard & a drive thru lock up garage. Set in a small complex within walking distance to station & shops.

Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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WENTWORTHVILLE $289,950

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This two bedroom apartment situated on the middle floor is very spacious, featuring large lounge and dining area, main bedroom with air conditioning, huge north facing balcony, security intercom and large lock up garage (enough room for extra storage) This unit is in easy walking distance to Woolworths, local schools, shops & trains. BE SURE TO INSPECT!

Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000 Contact Leanne Ollerenshaw

Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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$429,950

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Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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Situated in quiet residential street you find this clad and tile home with separate lounge, large eat in kitchen, 3 spacious bedrooms, garage which has been converted to a sleep out, private rear yard & close to transport. A MUST TO INSPECT!

Laing & Simmons Wentworthville 9688 4000

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West Bengal mourns Jyoti Basu

WEST BENGAL mourned the death of one of its most accomplished leaders Jyoti Basu on January 17, who ruled the state for a record 23 years. Communists wept inconsolably and thousands gathered before the hospital where the 95-year-old Marxist breathed his last.

front governments.

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As news of his death after a 16-day battle in hospital was announced by state Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) secretary Biman Bose, people broke down. Bose himself was sobbing as he said, his voice shaking: “I have come to give you sad news. Jyoti Basu is now no more with us. He has left us. I can’t say anything more now...”

In no time, the state was plunged into grief, and the red flag was flown at half mast in all the hundreds of party offices across the state. Senior CPI-M leaders, Basu’s relatives and party activists wept inconsolably as party cadres periodically chanted the slogan: “Jyoti Basu, Lal Salaam, Lal Salaam (red salute)”.

The West Bengal government declared a two-day state mourning and announced a holiday in all state government offices and establishments on January 18.

Local television channels cancelled all other programmes and started broadcasting images of Jyoti Basu at various stages of his life, his old interviews and recollections of people who knew him closely. Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee described Basu as the guardian of the state’s Left Front government, and said: “In his death the country has lost a great leader and the left and democratic movement in the country has received a severe blow.”

Former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, who called Basu his ‘political guru’, said: “I have lost somebody like my father. He had immense love and feelings for the people. He always asked us to stay by the side of the common people. He always said politics is for the common people”.

“A chapter of history ended today. He was never a chief minister, he was an uncle to me and he also loved me in the similar way,” said Bollywood hero Mithun Chakraborty, who visited the hospital after the veteran passed away.

Eminent filmmaker Mrinal Sen said there was no other political leader of Basu’s stature in the country now. “Aamar Bhuvan (My World, 2002) is the last movie he had seen. It was directed by me. He was very happy after watching it and appreciated the movie. An era ended with his death.”

State assembly Speaker Hasim Abdul Halim said: “He was a fighter and he fought for his life till the end. His demise is a big loss for the workers and labourers of the country.”

Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee, Basu’s bitter political foe when he was chief minister, called for a 72-hour mourning in the state.

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Basu had been chief minister for a record 23 years, leading five consecutive Left

“He was the first and last chapter of the Communist movement in India. He will be remembered for his political achievements because of his pioneering role in the country’s Left movement.”

Former West Bengal chief minister Siddhartha Shankar Ray remembered the economic hurdles Basu endured during his long years of struggle as communist leader before becoming chief minister. “At the beginning of his career as a communist, he had faced lots of economic hurdles. I have seen how simple a life he led whenever

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Jyoti Basu (1914-2010)

I visited his house. I have seen his wife cooking simple food... seldom I found them cooking fish or meat,” Ray, a close friend of Basu, said.

The mass leader’s death triggered gloom among his countless admirers. “I can’t express my feelings now. All I can say, I grew up watching him and following his Communist ideals throughout my life,” said Arnab Mondal, a 50-year-old resident of Kolkata’s Nagerbazar area.

Winning elections then became a habit for Basu. After independence, he was repeatedly elected to the West Bengal legislature, starting in 1952.

When the CPI split in 1964 parallel to the Sino-Soviet break-up, Basu became one of the nine founding politburo members of the more radical CPI-M.

Even after relinquishing office as chief minister in 2000, Basu continued to play a big role in the CPI-M and Indian politics till repeated bouts of illness finally took their toll. He passed away on January 17, aged 95, after a 16-day battle in hospital.

in economics, Shah is the highest-ranking Indian American in any presidential administration.

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Shiva Prasad Yadav, who hails from neighbouring Bihar, also mourned the death of the CPI-M veteran. “I am completely shattered to hear the news... my leader is no more with me,” he said while crying profusely near the hospital.

Basu will not be cremated but his body will be handed over to a state-run hospital as he had donated his body, the CPI-M announced later. His eyes have been removed as per his wishes. He had pledged to donate his eyes.

Jyoti Basu: Marxist who almost became India’s PM HE WAS A MARXIST to the core who was equally at home with bourgeois democracy and capitalist ideas. If destiny had been on his side, Jyoti Basu would have become India’s prime minister in 1996.

West Bengal was in turmoil in the late 1960s, with a section of the CPI-M revolting in a small West Bengal village known as Naxalbari and igniting a bloody Maoist movement.

Two shaky and shortlived governments took office in West Bengal in 1967 and 1969, and Basu was the deputy chief minister - his first stint as an administrator.

It was in June 1977 that Basu became the West Bengal chief minister heading a multi-party Left Front government, a post he himself decided to give up almost a quarter century later.

Under Basu’s leadership, the CPI-M expanded its social base in villages. His government brought about sweeping agrarian reforms, devolved power to rural bodies or panchayats and undertook rapid agricultural development.

Rajiv Shah takes helm of Haiti disaster LESS THAN a week after being sworn in as the head of the USAID, Indian American Rajiv Shah, 36, has been named coordinator of the US response to the Haiti earthquake, one of the worst natural disasters in the western hemisphere in recent history.

Shah’s boss, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, was halfway around the world in Hawaii en route to Australia when the earthquake struck. President Barack Obama quickly promised “a swift, coordinated and aggressive effort to save lives.” Shah, the president said, would lead it.

“We are committed to a significant effort,” Shah later told reporters at the State Department, standing alongside Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, head of US Southern Command, and Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s chief of staff.

Over the next 72 hours, he said, his job is to help save as many people as he can in Haiti. Countless numbers are buried under collapsed buildings, and many others are without food, clean water and shelter. USAID deployed two urban search teams that specialize in digging people out of rubble, and the agency is working to deploy more, he said. It is also setting up mobile health clinics and coordinating food and water relief. “We are very focused on saving lives,” he said.

But that was not to be, thanks to his dogmatic Communist Party of IndiaMarxist (CPI-M) which ruled that no one from its ranks could head a multi-party regime that would not be able to implement Marxist programmes.

Basu swallowed the diktat silently. But within months he questioned the wisdom of fellow Stalinists and described the party’s decision not to form the centre-Left United Front government as a “historic blunder”.

That perhaps was the only time the very ‘bhadralok’, or gentleman, Basu broke the CPI-M’s strict rules of discipline. He got away with it because he was the prima donna of Indian Communism, a product of aristocracy who embraced Marx in London and became the longest serving chief minister in the country.

By the time he gave up the reins of West Bengal in 2000 citing health grounds, Basu had been the chief minister for an incredible 23 uninterrupted years. He was widely respected across the political spectrum. Many a prime minister consulted him on matters of national importance.

Of course he had his critics. But for someone married to an ideology that has had few takers in India, he was one of the most successful politicians in the world’s largest democracy.

The Marxists soon developed a welloiled election machinery that ensured victory in one election after another, stunning friends and foes alike and becoming a rarity of sorts in democratic politics around the world.

Basu led the Marxists to power five times in a row in West Bengal.

Along with his scholarly finance minister Ashok Mitra, he vigorously sought more powers for the states. He also played a key role in bringing together non-Congress state governments and parties in the 1980s.

He took an active part in the confabulations in the run up to the formation of non-Congress governments in 1989, 1996, 1997 and 2004, in the process becoming a national figure.

His tenure as chief minister was not without allegations of corruption, especially against his industrialist son. But these remained just allegations.

While the agrarian reforms in West Bengal were hailed as a model across the country, Basu was widely faulted for his poor showing in various other sectors including industry, education and health.

“To ensure that we coordinate our effort, going forward, I have designated the Administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) Rajiv Shah, to be our government’s unified disaster coordinator,” he said. A medical doctor who also holds a degree

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“The mission of USAID is my passion,” Shah told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at his confirmation hearing last month. “As a young child, my parents - both immigrants from India - took me to visit their homeland,” where he saw “vast slums that were home to millions and continue to be. This early experience opened my eyes to a type of human suffering I had not previously witnessed

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Born July 8, 1914, in Kolkata, the son of a doctor was schooled in Loreto and St. Xavier’s. He graduated from the Presidency College of Kolkata with an honours in English in 1935.

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He then studied law in London where he came in contact with the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), the alma mater of many an Indian Communist.

Basu’s early associates included the veteran British Communists Harry Pollitt, Rajani Palme Dutt and Ben Bradley. In London, he joined the India League and the Federation of Indian Students in Great Britain.

On returning to India, Basu joined the then undivided Communist Party of India (CPI) and in 1944, three years before the British Raj ended, started working among railway workers. He got into electoral politics in 1946, getting elected to the Bengal Legislative Assembly.

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and have not since forgotten.” ***

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IGNOU world’s largest university: UNESCO

THE INDIRA GANDHi National Open University (IGNOU) is the world’s largest, with its student base extending to three million, Unesco has said.

“IGNOU is the largest University in the world. Almost three million students in India and 33 other countries study at IGNOU, which is also India’s National Resource Center for Open and Distance Learning and a world leader in distance education,” UNESCO said in a positng on its website.

“Enrollments of nearly three million students and networks across the country making the best use of Information Communication Technology (ICT)IGNOU’s accomplishments are recognized worldwide,” UNESCO director general Irina Bokova said.

“With the launch of EduSat (a satellite dedicated to education) in 2004, and the establishment of the Inter-University Consortium, IGNOU has ushered in a new era of technology-enabled education,” the website said.

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Through its 21 schools of study, 59 regional centres, 2,300 learner support centres and some 52 overseas centres, the university offers certificate, diploma, degree and doctoral programmes, comprising around 1,500 courses, it said. It said that the university provides access to sustainable and learner-centred education and training to all through quality, innovative and needs-based programmes at affordable costs, thus reaching out to

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Hindu devotees take the holy dip during the solar eclipse at the bathing ghats (steps) at the bank of river Ganges, India, on 15 January 2010. The temples of Ganga Maiya, Lord Shiva and Lakshmi-Narayan at Har-ki-Pauri in this Uttarakhand town, which is hosting the three-month Mahakumbh Mela January 14 - April 28, remained closed during the solar eclipse to ward off the negative energy generated by the eclipsed sun. Bathers congregated on the bank around 3 p.m. to resume the ‘new moon dip’ on the occasion of Mauni Amavasya.

Photo: AP

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the disadvantaged and also promotes, coordinates and regulates the standards of education offered through open and distance learning in India.

The website further said that IGNOU’s staff consist of 380 faculty members and academic staff in headquarters and regional centres while some 36,000 counsellors from conventional institutions of higher learning and professionals from different spheres.

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Temples reopen as solar eclipse ends in India

AS THE MILLENNIUM’s longest annular solar eclipse ended on the noon of January 15, hundreds and thousands of Hindu temples across the country re-opened after being shut during the four hours of the celestial spectacle.

In Delhi, the Radha-Krishna temple, better known as the Birla Mandir, which was closed at 11 a.m. around the same time as the eclipse started in the city, opened its doors at around 3.30 p.m.

“The temple was closed in the morning and no puja was performed because of the eclipse. But a special havan was performed. When the eclipse got over, the temple reopened but not before a cleansing process,” a priest at the temple told IANS.

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Narayan Kothari, a priest at another temple in east Delhi, said the temple was closed to “ward off bad energy of the eclipsed sun”. The story was the same for most temples across the country, from Haridwar on the banks of the Ganges in Uttarakhand to the southern most tip of India.

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during the solar eclipse is that when the sun is covered by the moon and is not seen, it is said that asuras or demons are worshipped. Therefore, deities should not be worshipped during this time.

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Vedic scholar A.S. Arvamudan told IANS:

“The main reason why temples are closed

“Similarly, after the eclipse gets over, there is a cleansing process. Priests take a bath and mantras are chanted before the temple doors are opened,” he added.

A number of people in the capital, like elsewhere, offered special prayers in their homes during the eclipse and refrained from cooking or eating food until after the event. Said homemaker Usha Kaushal: “No food was cooked or eaten during the period. I have grown up seeing my parents perform these rituals. It is a deeply ingrained

belief.”

Added Rakesh Sharma, an advertising professional: “I am not superstitious but my mother gave me strict instructions not to eat during the eclipse, so I had brunch at 10.30 a.m. before the eclipse began.” While the eclipse started at 11.06 a.m. in

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Mumbai Marathon participants run through the newly-built sea bridge linking Mumbai’s far-flung suburbs, Jan. 17, 2010.

Photo: AP

want

India, the partial phase of it in the capital began at 11.53 a.m. and ended at 3.11 p.m. The maximum eclipse of 53 percent was at 1.39 p.m.

average of 54.72 with 43 centuries. In 440 ODIs, Tendulkar has amassed 17,394 runs with 45 tons and 93 half-centuries.

time,” 38-year-old Roy told IANS over telephone from Port-au-Prince.

Indian personnel were also crucial in getting power and water supply restored to the premises of Minustah within hours.

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An annular solar eclipse occurs when the sun and the moon are exactly in line as seen from the earth, but the apparent size of the moon’s shadow is smaller than that of the visible disc of the sun. The covered sun, therefore, appears as a ‘Ring of Fire’, with its rays appearing spread out from the outline of the dark moon.

Amid death, destruction, Indians help tirelessly in Haiti

The logistics base was located at the foot of a hill on which the MINUSTAH headquarters, operating from a hotel, collapsed, killing its chief, Hedi Annabi, a Tunisian, and over 100 UN personnel.

“The water pipes had burst and the plumbing had clogged. Bhupinder Singh, a water treatment plant specialist, reported to me at 3 a.m., walking on foot from his collapsed house,” he said.

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The last time India saw this ‘Ring of Fire’ was Nov 22, 1965.

Tendulkar surpasses 13,000 Test runs

Sachin Tendulkar reached another milestone, surpassing 13,000 Test runs during India’s first innings against Bangladesh in the first Test at Chittagong on January 17.

Tendulkar needed 30 runs to achieve the feat when he came to bat. He reached the milestone with a pull shot for four off Mahmudullah in the 36th over, becoming the first batsman in the world to cross the 13,000-run mark.

Escorting relief teams, giving medical treatment and providing logistics support to the UN - India’s Lt. Col. Pronob K. Roy and over 150 fellow Indians of the UN mission in Haiti have been working tirelessly and without sleep since a devastating earthquake hit the country.

It was on Jan 12, at 4.53 p.m., that the earth shook violently with a magnitude of 7.0 in the Caribbean nation, flattening whole swathes of the country, with conservative estimates saying that over 50,000 people have perished.

The Indian contingent deployed with UN’s Haiti mission, called MINUSTAH, consists of a 140-member Formed Police Unit (FPU), mainly from the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), as well as 11 UN police officers. There are also 51 Indians working with Trigyn Technologies Ltd, a Mumbai-based company that provides IT support for UN missions.

The next miracle was when Roy survived the quake in his office at the logistics base, the computer, air-conditioner and almirahs falling around him. Cracks bloomed on his office walls.

Unshaken, Roy returned after the tremor into the damaged office to see if he could salvage anything.

“Bang came the first aftershock in 15 minutes. This time the windows cracked on my back. Still I managed to survive,” he recalled.

While the FPU members are safe, the building developed several cracks. “All the personnel are now sleeping in the open and not using the concrete structure for their stay.”

With collapsed buildings, strewn bodies and roads clogged, the Indians working with the UN rallied immediately to start giving relief work after the killer quake.

Singh used his ingenuity to connect the water lines and operate the pump station by 6 in the morning.

Indians used to working with lesser materials have been inventive in managing with the broken-down infrastructure, dealing with unimaginable destruction and death on a regular manner.

“When you see a corpse you don’t panic, you call another guy and lift it and put the body in an orderly manner. When you do not have refrigeration container to put it in, you empty a container which has food and keep the body in it and use the food to feed the people.”

The Indian FPUs have been put in charge of escorting the rescue and relief teams that are rushing to Haiti from around the world.

But the Indians have been going beyond their call of duty.

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Tendulkar, while batting on 16, got a life when Imrul Kayes dropped his catch in the slip off Shafiul Islam.

The batting maestro stood alone even as wickets around him kept falling and India were left struggling at 213 for eight at stumps. Tendulkar scored his 55th Test fifty remaining unbeaten after a 140-ball 76 with the help of six fours and one six. Tendulkar is the highest scorer in both Tests and ODIs.

In 162 Tests, Tendulkar has scored at an

India has sent $1 million in cash for emergency relief, and topped it with another $5 million. But what Col. Roy and other Indians are doing for the quake victims is an untold story.

“I got the first communication from a local who came rushing saying that the headquarter building had crumbled. The whole city was in a jam. Petrol pumps were burning. There was utter chaos,” said Roy, whose family is from Kolkata.

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For Roy, who landed in Haiti 24 days ago on deputation from the Indian Army to the UN logistics unit, his own survival is a miracle - three times over.

“I was supposed to be in the UN headquarters but due to my presence in another conference I was lucky the first

With all the UN senior officials untraceable at the collapsed MINUSTAH headquarters, Roy, deputy chief of the integrated support services, Minustah’s Logistic Base Crisis Centre, was given powers to take charge till his next superior was found alive.

“Within 45 minutes, I went on my aerial sortie to see the situation,” Roy said.

With all hospitals collapsed, urgent medical attention has been given by the FPU, who set up a medical camp within the premises. There are also another 35 Indian nuns working with the Missionaries of Charity, who are also engaged in humanitarian work.

“We have been working for six days without sleep. I don’t know how I have been going on. I really, really want to put on record how amazing our boys have been,” Roy said.

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A saga of sisters

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Tania James was a guest at the Brisbane Writers’ Festival in September 2009 (together with Padma Viswanathan, whose book The Toss of a Lemon, we reviewed in this column a couple of months ago). Her debut novel Atlas of Unknowns is published by Scribe, an independent publishing house in Australia. Like Padma Viswanathan, Tania James too was inspired by her family’s history to write this novel.

Atlas of Unknowns is an unforgettable tale of two sisters, whose bonds are powerfully tested, and is filled with secret histories and hilarious eccentricities of their family – as families everywhere. In this context, two previous novels by Anglo-Indian writers about sisters separated by distance come to mind: Monica Ali’s Brick Lane, and Chitra Banerji Divakaruni’s Sister of My Heart. In James’ novel, the two sisters Linno and Anju Vallara, are raised in Kerala by their father and grandmother in the wake of their mother’s mysterious death. Linno is the elder who loses a hand in a childhood accident and does not do well in school, but develops a skill for drawing; while Anju is academically precocious and ambitious. When seventeen-year-old Anju wins a scholarship to study in New York,

she jumps at the chance to embrace all that America has to offer, but in doing so she commits an act of betrayal that severs her relationship with her sister. When Anju’s lies catch up with her she runs away, helped by a kindly stranger who somehow knows things about Anju’s past. Meanwhile, Linno begins a journey of her own: towards her sister, towards the memory of their mother and towards a future she could never have imagined.

Tania James, who was born and brought up in Kentucky in the US, evokes a Kerala and a traditional Syrian Catholic household with such attention to detail that it is truly

remarkable. The chapters located in Kerala are often reminiscent of Arundhati Roy’s (almost autobiographical) family of similar background in God of Small Things - in style, brilliance of expression, wry humour and genius of story-telling.

Tania James’ language is like a polished gem that shines no matter from which angle it is viewed. Her literary talents are simply far superior to most contemporary IWE, and it will be very surprising indeed if she does not win a Literary Award this year. She is a truly gifted writer whose elegant and polished prose, keenly observed family idiosyncrasies, eye for the minutiae of everyday life, powerful story-telling abilities, all make this book a delight to read. She paints the sisters’ worlds in India and the US beautifully – moving seamlessly from one to the other as she describes their lives unfolding and fills them with colourful characters that will stay in our minds long after we put the book down.

Besides being a wonderful story teller and a gifted writer, James’ novel is also a nuanced examination of the immigrant experience: about those who leave – and those that are left behind. Her keenly observed descriptions are powerful and incisive, and proof of a preternatural mind and superior training. Here is a passage where she describes Anju working in a salon in New York:

“…She squats like only a Third Worlder can, froglike, for minutes on end, brushing tumbleweeds of black and hennaed hair into a dustpan…”

James has published in One Story and New York Times, and lives in New York City.

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WE PROVIDE PROTECTION FROM ALL MAGIC

CHITRA SUDARSHAN reviews a debut gem from novelist Tania James

Besides being a wonderful story teller and a gifted writer, James’ novel is also a nuanced examination of the immigrant experience: about those who leave – and those that are left behind

You be the Judge

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Having been appointed a Justice of the Peace at the young age of twenty-three, I have had a lifelong interest in the law and its administration and, throughout my career in education, had somewhat lamented the fact that teachers were, in those days, exempted from jury service. The reason, presumably, was that our profession was then valued because of our on-going responsibilities for the children in our daily care.

Interestingly, teachers are no longer exempt from jury duty, while for some reason, dentists, pharmacists, medical practitioners, mining managers and “undermanagers of mines” are exempt! But that’s another story.

message was repeated on the next day. However, “third time proves it”, so they say, and, on the third day, the message said to report to the Downing Centre courts the following day.

So, with a mixture of anticipation and frustration, I dusted off a suitable coat, slacks, business shirt and tie, (rarely worn since my retirement and “overdressed” as things emerged), and headed off into the city... a trip I’d done daily for some 20 years, but now endured, rather than enjoyed.

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As my retirement became a reality, I assumed that I would, “in the fullness of time”, be called on to serve. Nothing happened. In the meantime, my wife, a busy high school Principal, was summoned for jury service on several occasions.

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My enthusiasm unabashed, I actually wrote to the NSW Sheriff’s Office, enquiring as to why I had never been “called up”, and confirming my willingness to serve. I received a delightful letter from the Sheriff, thanking me for my interest and confessing that in all his years of office, he had never before received correspondence from a citizen actually wanting to undertake jury duty. He also indicated apologetically, that he had no control over the ballot selection system, which is completely random.

However, some few months later, (surprise, surprise), I received a formal letter from the Sheriff’s Office, advising me that I was now on a jury roll, and could be summoned for service at any time.

Within less than a month, I was!!

Good old Murphy’s Law intervened, as the relevant criminal trial was expected to last at least three months, with a school vacation smack in the middle. Now, although I have retired, my wife is a high school Principal and we are obliged to use the school holidays for our vacations.

Knowing that these courts were in the old Mark Foys Department Store building near Museum Station, I entered this once-grand establishment, to be confronted by boredlooking security officers who waved their magic wand over me, made my way through the “doorway of truth” and had my small bag x-rayed.

With no-one to guide me and faced with a bewildering plethora of signs, I made my way to the 4th floor, where, gradually, a group of equally bemused people drifted in and sat down. “Aha!” methinks. “Fellow jurors!”

Eventually and purely by chance, I discovered that they were, in fact, criminals, ne’er-do-wells and their lawyers, waiting for their trials to begin.

No official seemed to know where we would-be jurors should go, so, again by accident, I found myself on the lower ground floor, where some 200 equally lost souls (or sheep) were being herded around on the basis of being “Jury O, R, S, T etc.”

Now it may well have been that the four officials who took charge of us that morning knew what they were doing, but they gave an Oscar-winning performance of making it appear otherwise.

For reasons certainly unknown to me, the “recorded message” lady with the highpitched, breathless and high-speed voice was in charge, and was clearly in love with the P.A. system.

of us submitted such statements (so much for civic zeal!)

By some arcane process, our statements were collected, taken away and read (or marked?) to determine the validity or relevance of our various excuses.

Among those actually selected were two Chinese ladies whose English was so limited that they repeatedly failed to recognise their jury numbers, and a young man from Eastern Europe who confessed to me (in excellent English) that he’d deliberately written his statement in terrible English, as he could not afford to be away from his coffee shop.

Also chosen was a terrified young man with obvious intellectual disabilities, who had not told his employer that he’d been summoned, out of fear of losing his job. When invited to telephone his employer, he knew neither the phone number nor the company name.

judged by one’s peers.

I now have serious doubts.

The law has become so complex, our lifestyle so self-centred and our society so diverse and multi-layered, that I wonder whether 12 randomly selected citizens, who may be bored, angry, dopey, linguistically and/or culturally inept, are necessarily the best minds to adjudicate on what may be matters of sensitivity, complexity, or otherwise quite beyond their range of experiences or competencies.

Perhaps the recent circus in which I was peripherally involved has jaundiced my views. After three days of being mucked around, I was not required, and received the princely sum of $15.86 for travel and attendance. Bermuda, here I come!

If at least some of us, as responsible citizens, actually wish to serve as jurors, while clearly, many others do not, the “lottery” we currently use and the laborious sheep-herding procedures seem oldfashioned, wasteful and, in some ways, insulting.

As Judy suffers from Paget’s disease, she is unable to drive our campervan, so the driving is down to me. I wrote a “personal explanation” outlining the above and it was duly accepted. “How nice,” I thought. “How sensible.”

Lo and behold, dear readers, just before the forthcoming school vacation, I received another jury summons, again for a criminal trial and expected to last at least six weeks.

Rather than tempt fate by re-explaining that the same complication would apply, I decided to attend court on the appointed date, and to seek involvement in a shorter trial, as the accompanying pamphlet had outlined.

Having cleared the decks of all commitments for the next six weeks or so, I rang the Jury Information Line on the evening before the designated date, to see if “our jury” was required.

A high-pitched, breathless and gabbled message appeared to indicate that we were not required, after all. The same breathless

Before long, confusion and rumblings of discontent were all too evident, not least of all because it was obvious that at least 80% of the flock did not want to be there. These ranged from mobile-toting businessfolk who were “supposed to be elsewhere”, through to board-shorts and T-shirt-wearing surfies who’d checked the waves before grudgingly coming in, to several vaguelooking folk who didn’t seem to know quite where they were, or why. (I have a lingering suspicion that some of them thought Mark Foys was still open for shopping.)

Now, dear readers, as I stated at the beginning of this article, I have been a life-long advocate of our British system of justice, supposedly one of their better legacies.

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Fundamental to it is the jury system, wherein one has the benefit (?) of being

I know I found my recent experience frustrating, inefficient and personally disillusioning.

I think we can do much better.

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Furthermore, it was obvious that among the potential jury flock were large numbers of people for whom English was not their first (or second) language.

Somehow, we were divided into our jury groups and taken into a court-room, where the “System” was explained to us, in our case by a jovial gent who obviously fancied himself as “Rumpole of the Bailey”.

Perhaps more significantly, we were invited to write a “Personal Statement” if we were unable (or unwilling) to undertake jury service as allocated. At a guess, at least 80%

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Now it may well have been that the four officials who took charge of us that morning knew what they were doing, but they gave an Oscar-winning performance of making it appear otherwise

GRAHAM SIMS reveals his first-hand experience at being called to attend jury duty

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An unfair analysis

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Indians take justifiable pride in the advances which their women have made in all walks of life, an indication of which can be seen as several Indian women occupy top political positions. This is unsurprising, because women played an important part in the independence movement and thereafter, in political life. Indian universities have large female enrolments in both the humanities and the sciences. It is common to find female doctors in India and there are world class scientists amongst Indian women. There are some well-known Indian women writers which is attributable to the fact that women in India have the freedom to learn and to express themselves. This is not the case in many other countries. Women play an important role in India’s film industry.

Despite the achievements of Indian women, the Global Gender Gap Report (2009), published by the World Economic Forum (Geneva, Switzerland), denigrates India by ranking it at a lowly 114 (below Bangladesh at 94 and Nepal at 110) out of 134 countries. As has become habitual for such global reports, selfappointed international ranking agencies place Scandinavian countries at the top: Iceland 1, Finland 2 and Norway 3. Scandinavian countries seemed to be perceived as the model for both development and female advancement.

NOEL G DE SOUZA comments on the Global Gender Gap report, which blatantly ignores achievements by Indian women

farming system without there being a quantification of their economic share. Such is the case with India and Southeast Asia. Then again, what about an Indian family where an educated woman stays at home to look after young children; does she not make an economic contribution which is not quantifiable? Perhaps in countries like those of Scandinavia she might be given income support which is counted in the report.

Health and survival: the gap between male and female life expectancy is taken into account as per WHO statistics; however, good health is then surmised by considering such unmeasurable or controversial data as “years lost to violence, disease, malnutrition or other relevant factors.” How does one assess this extended and open-ended list for a population which exceeds a billion?

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Australia comes at number 20 and incredibly the Philippines at number 9, whilst Sri Lanka does well at number 16 ranking ahead of the UK at 15 and the United States at 31. The high ranks accorded to the Philippines and to Sri Lanka may be explained by the report’s assertion that “the Index is constructed to rank countries on their gender gaps, not on their development level.” Yet in most cases developed countries rank high.

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Another baffling factor is then added which is that of “missing women” where it says there exists a “strong son preference”.

…the gap between male and female life expectancy is taken into account as per WHO statistics; however, good health is then surmised by considering such unmeasurable or controversial data as “years lost to violence, disease, malnutrition or other relevant factors

The report judges educational attainment on female-to-male ratios in primary, secondary and tertiary education. It says nothing about the number of doctors, scientists and women graduates that a country like India produces. In the case of India, the numbers are staggering. However, when things are considered percentage wise, these achievements get masked and give the wrong impression that women in India are faring very badly indeed.

India, the report acknowledges, has 40% women teachers in tertiary education. This is quite good given that the UK has 41% and the USA has 45%. In contrast Bangladesh has 18% yet it ranks higher to India in “educational attainment”105 versus 121!

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The report focuses on four pillars: (1) economic participation and opportunity, (2) educational attainment, (3) health and survival and (4) political empowerment. India has very low rankings for the first three indicators, dubiously coming last for health and survival in the entire world, despite its increasing life expectancy. However, India excels in the case of political empowerment, being ranked 24. Economic participation is judged on remuneration and the possibility of advancement. These are obviously good criteria for a modern society. But the world is being judged in this report by Western yardsticks which explains why Scandinavian countries fare so well in these rankings. What about the economic participation of women in peasant farms?

In agricultural family holdings women participate in all the components of the

Females account for a healthy 44% of India’s primary teachers and 34% of secondary reachers. There is no doubt that in India’s rural areas girls from disadvantaged groups need provision of educational skills to girls. The Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya project and the Mahila Samakhya Programme are examples of successful initiatives. India has no cultural impediment that restricts education for girls.

The report seeks to quantify certain sorts of data such as “paternal versus maternal authority” which is an item bordering on the esoteric. How can one investigate and quantify such an indicator for millions of people?

The World Economic Forum claims to be “independent” and “impartial”, saying that it is “committed to improving the state of the world by engaging leaders in partnerships to shape global, regional and industry agendas.” Given the nature of its report on India, one wonders how this could be possible.

Indo-Australian Harmony Cricket series

For many it feels like home away from home. Since the start of the Indo-Australian Harmony Cricket series last year, hundreds of young and old are seen busy with their IPL-style Sunday community cricket being played in Parramatta.

In spite of all the bad media in the recent days back in India against Australia, the young subcontinent community along with the wider Australian community is definitely untouched as they are enjoying the ongoing 20/20 MIT Sydney Cup. 18 teams are vying for the prestigious 20/20 MIT Sydney Cup this year, a contest which will open its doors to 18 new teams, with a total of 36 teams, in its next edition.

With more than 500 players registered, this has become a way of life for many New Australians and International Students studying in various universities and colleges here in Sydney.

After four rounds in the current series, Ryde Automotives and MIT Reds along with Limra have claimed the top spots in the ongoing 20/20 MIT Sydney Cup.

Stars of the Week

Sukhendra Dahiya of Ryde

Automotives Haryana Bulls who hails from the state of Haryana (district Rohtak village Rohna) has played most of his cricket back in India, with state representation at a young age. In the MIT Cup, he earned a Man of the Match award against Indian Marts West Ryders. His fantastic last ball 6 brought back memories of Javed Miandad’s famous 6 off the bowling of Chetan Sharma. Sukhendra claims he will never forget this memorable knock and the last ball 6 to clinch a memorable victory against Indian Mart’s West Ryders.

Harjinder Singh Harry (pictured right) would like to thank his wife Pardeep Kaur who has encouraged him to keep playing cricket upon moving to Australia. Harry believes his strength has more than doubled ever since he was blessed with a daughter Harnoor Kaur, his first child, on 16 Nov 2009. He says, “I’d like to thank everyone who had faith in me and gave me a chance to play in their team to show my skills. Special thanks to MIT and

Sanjiv Dubey who come up with such a great competition”. Harry has put MIT Red in stellar form as he anchored two emphatic wins with two Man of the Match performances, one in which MIT scored an upset win against Mantra Ryde Chandigarh.

Mohammad Jahangir of Limra earned a Man of the Match award with his performance against ICAI Challengers that has also helped put his team earn the top spot in their group. The hardhitting Jahangir has played a key role in his team’s success.

Gaurav Rohinton hails from the state of Gujarat, village Navsari, where he played local cricket. The son of a farmer, he is now enjoying the community cricket series and won a Man of the Match award for his team MIT. His school Meridian College, where he was studying commercial cookery, has closed down – he is still awaiting admission into another institution.

Teams of the Week

Macquarie Eleven as the team of the week for the true sportsmanship they have shown on and off the ground. With a win in their last game, their spirit would have really gone high. The team members, most of who live in Auburn, have backgrounds of Indian, Pakistan and Afghanistan heritage and have played with a great spirit under the leadership of Sohail. The tournament is still wide open for this young team and they are just 3 more wins away to qualify in the knock-out stage.

The team members of Macquarie Eleven are Jameel, Shakeb, Sanketh, Baba, Jasim, Sohail (Junior Captain), Sohail (Senior Captain), Wasif, Asgar, Umjad and Zubair.

MIT Reds have shown great team effort and surprised one and all as they have maintained a clean chit in all of their three outings. Made up of students from the Melbourne Institute of Technology, Sydney, under the leadership of Maharshi Dave, the team needs to continue with the same effort

to progress into the knock-out stages of the

The team members of MIT Reds are Maharshi (Captain) Gaurav, Jass, Monil, Jack, Karan, Ashu, Vicky, Hary,

Sydney Cup

Round 3 Results

Group Colleges Australia Red (157/8) defeated Macquarie

Man of the Match: Binith 78

Billu’s Shere Punjab (127/7 in 19.3 Overs) defeated MIT Yellow (123 all out)

Man of the Match: Sanjiv

Ryde Automotives Haryana Bulls (170/5 in 20 overs) defeated Indian Mart’s West Ryders

Man of the Match: Sukhendra Dahiya

Hyderabad Travel Deccan Chargers (115 for 5 in 13.1 Overs) defeated CQU Challengers 115/7

Man of the Match: Dinesh Mendiratta 44

Mantra Ryde Chandigarh (94/4) defeated Group Colleges Australia Yellow (97 all out)

Man of the Match: Raman 52 MIT Red (154/2) defeated Lankan Cobras (146/8)

Man of the Match: Harry 63

Ken Oz SKLPS Simba (163/5) defeated Ahmedabad Warriors (98 all out)

Man of the Match: Harish Pindoria 54 runs

Limra (177/8) defeated ICA1 Challengers (5/104)

Man of the Match: Saleem Akbar

Round 4 Results

Macquarie Eleven (188/6) defeated CQU Challengers (139 all out)

Man of the Match: Sohail 46 runs

SriLankan Lions 117/8 defeated GCA Red 77 all out.

Man of the Match: Oscar 30 runs

MIT Yellow (104/7 in 19 overs) defeated Indian Marts West Ryders (103 all out)

Man of the Match: Gaurav 4 wickets for 10 runs

Hyderabad Travels Sydney Deccan Chargers (126 all out) defeated Billu’s Shere Punjab (118/9)

Man of the Match: Shakeel 32

Ford Pro Vibarant Gujarat (77 in 15 overs) defeated Group Colleges Australia Yellow (75 all out)

Man of the Match: 38 runs

MIT Red (114/4) defeated Mantra Ryde Chandigarh (112/8)

Man of the Match: Harry 28 runs and 2 wickets

Lankan Cobras (156/7) defeated ICAI Challengers (120 all out)

Man of the Match: Alawi 66 runs

Limra (156/9) defeated Ahmedabad Warriors (104 all out)

Man of the Match: Jahangir 41 runs

Upcoming Women’s Cricket Day and Men’s Winter Cricket comp

Contact: Sanjiv Dubey 0433 669 334

SANJIV DUBEY reports on the latest on the community cricket series

Macquarie Eleven

MIT Reds

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Very Vancouver

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By THOMAS E KING

Cities by the sea have long held a special fascination for many people.

Vancouverites are no different, declaring there’s no place quite like their city on the water. Apart from the fabulous harboursited metropolis in Australia where I have lived for the past 35 years, Vancouver - I must agree - has one of the most beautiful settings in the world.

Embraced by the Pacific Ocean blue and back-dropped by Coast Mountains green, Vancouver not only has scenic diversity beyond comparison but it also sports numerous contrasting recreational opportunities. Anyone with a desire for an active life can jog in Stanley Park before breakfast, then leave the central city by mid morning and go skiing less than an hour later on nearby Grouse Mountain, play 18 holes of golf at a chic country club in the afternoon, fish for salmon or trout at dusk and top off the day with a cooling swim at the stylish English Bay before dinner.

James Cook, the emergence of the fur trade and the discovery of gold, the decade of initial development was in the 1850s.

An eager entrepreneur heard of vast opportunities in this part of the Canadian province of British Colombia and set off to make his fortune. “Gassy” Jack Deighton beached his canoe on the shores of Burrard Inlet, landing with his First Nation (Native American) mistress, some furniture, a few chickens, a dog and a barrel of whiskey. His objective was to build a saloon.

With the help of labourers from the sawmill who were eager for liquor, a forbidden commodity at the mills, the saloon was built and ready for business by 1867. A small community soon grew up around the establishment and in 1871 Gastown, as it had become known, consisted of three saloons, two stores and a hotel. The town was close enough to serve the mill, but far away enough to be beyond its control.

Vancouver’s Canada Place … will be the glittering venue for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games

clock with plumes of steam venting from its ornate top. A whistle blast regularly marks the time and cameras capture the moment at Vancouver’s most photographed attraction. Several blocks away is Chinatown, the second largest in North America, exceeded only by San Francisco. Walking along Pender Street I gazed at an odd assortment of old wooden curio shops, restaurants serving enticing dishes from most provinces of China and spacious oriental stores with the world’s thinnest office building included for good measure. (Barely the width of two outstretched arms more people come to photograph this architectural oddity than buy insurance from the proprietor!)

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During warm summer weekend evenings Pender as well as Keefer Streets become a bustling open air market. If shopping isn’t your game then explore the Dr Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden. Weather gnarled pines, limestone formations with character and

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If you had visited the area around Vancouver 160 years ago you could also hike, fish and swim but instead of the modern compact concrete and glass high rise-central city seen today, the tallest horizon hugger would have been a pine tree. Following Russian and Spanish explorers, the arrival of British Captain

The village back then housed a rather rough community. Occasionally mill hands would go on a spree in Gastown and work would stop for days. The only spree that’s likely in Gastown these days is a shopping spree, as the rejuvenated area centred on Maple Tree Square boasts of slick boutiques as well as swish restaurants, jazzy nightspots and trendy offices all located in historic environs. In mid summer when I walked along Water Street, the arterial that bisects this colourful district, Gastown was ‘tourist central’.

Every quarter of an hour, crowds gather at a rather unusual attraction midway along the street. The object of interest is an antiquated

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(Above) Surrounded by the aura of yesteryear, Gastown’s steam clock is Vancouver’s most photographed attraction.

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(Top left) Stanley Park is dotted with walking tracks that lead to flower gardens and totem poles carved by First Nation people.

occupies a narrow peninsula bounded on three sides by Burrard Inlet, English Bay and False Creek with Stanley Park at the tip. Originally the town’s military reserve, this 400 ha. retreat of native forest is crisscrossed by 17 km of motorable roads and 35 km of footpaths.

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the odd turtle swimming in sun-warmed lily pond waters are features at the only full-scale classical Chinese garden outside China. As you leave the sanctuary and the colourful area, you’ll walk past the three storey Chinatown Millennium Gate en route to the next point of interest.

Two more standout options still await discovery: a city park that’s almost as big as the city centre and an island that’s not an island! Granville Island, the tip of a squat peninsula that juts into False Bay at the edge

of the CBD, was formerly an industrial area filled with musty warehouses. Located beneath bridge and highway overpasses and easily accessed, the district has been transformed into a lovely leisure area with a jovial marketplace, buskers, theatres, marina and galleries. The international food court dishes up Indian favourites which you’ll enjoy as much as I did during my foray through this city named after British naval captain, George Vancouver.

The fourth must-see is also located on a peninsula. Much of Canada’s third largest city

(Above) Accessed by scenic cable car, Grouse Mountain - a winter and summer sports retreat – has spectacular vistas over Vancouver.

(Left) The ski resort of Whistler will host 30 per cent of medal events during the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games. (Photo credit: Tourism BCRandy Lincks

Travel Notebook Vancouver

FLIGHTS:

Visitors are seen throughout good weather days sniffing (in season) roses, photographing totem poles carved by First Nation people, waving from chauffeured horse carts and just admiring the magnificent panorama that incorporates mountain, sky, water and one familiar looking building in the distance.

With a soaring superstructure reminiscent of the Sydney Opera House, Canada Place is Vancouver’s most distinctive landmark. Built for World Expo 1986 as a convention centre and cruise ship terminal, the iconic structure will again be seen by a global audience next month. Canada Place will not only be the glittering venue for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games and nightly victory celebrations, this futuristic structure will once more act as a glimmering beacon welcoming the world to a very special city by the sea.

old Hotel Vancouver. A chateau-style hotel in the middle of the city, this elegant 556 room property oozes charm and dishes up a huge Canadian breakfast. Reservations can be made through the local office on 1800 804 456. See www.fairmont.com/hotelvancouver.

INDIA & THE GAMES:

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Air Canada operates a daily non-stop service from Sydney to Vancouver. The 14 hour flight is in a Boeing 777-200LR equipped with a personal touch screen TV at every seat and in-seat power points for laptops. See your travel agent or contact Air Canada Australia-wide on 1300 655 767 for details of flights and fares. See www.aircanada.com

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TRAVEL:

The new Canada Line SkyTrain connects Vancouver International Airport with the CBD in 26 minutes. There is good bus, trolleybus and SkyTrain service in and around this city of 2.2 million. Public transport will become 24/7 during the games with the Olympic Bus Network operating frequent services to the ski fields of Whistler, 120 km north of the city.

ACCOMMODATION:

Except for the period encircling the Winter Games, accommodation is widely available in all price categories. During a midsummer stay in Vancouver, I enjoyed the cosy ambience of several Fairmont properties including the grand

The 2010 Olympic Winter Games will be India’s 8th international snow sports spectacular. A team of four athletes is scheduled to compete and hopefully bring back the country’s first-ever Olympic Winter Games medal. Even if this doesn’t happen, India is already a winner as Akshay Kumar was the only actor among 14 international celebrities to carry the Olympic torch in mid December. As well, the Bollywood superstar has been nominated as India’s Ambassador to the Games which will be held from February 12 – 28, 2010.

INFORMATION:

For advice on planning your holiday in Canada visit www.canada.travel or call the Canadian Tourism Commission on 1300 300 576. See www.vancouver2010.com for details and www.2010destinationplanner.com for accommodation during the games. Available from leading outlets, Lonely Planet’s Canada has substantial information about Vancouver and the rest of this diverse country.

Seekingsensationalskin

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Ever wondered how you can get rid of awkward pimples on your back, stretch marks and other similar annoying skin issues? I am constantly seeking answers to these problems myself, and have rounded up some

typical FAQs which will help provide a solution to skin problems.

What is pigmentation during pregnancy?

Some women find that when they get pregnant, the skin around their mouth

and eyes gets significantly darker than other areas. This condition known as chloasma is caused by the change in hormones and usually goes away post-pregnancy. For damage control during pregnancy, use sunscreen all over and sunblock on the dark patches, to prevent them from getting darker. If it persists, it would be advisable to see a dermatologist.

Is there a substitute for sticky moisturising lotions?

Can I get rid of back blemishes?

Our back is probably the most covered up part of our body and because we are unable to reach it effectively, it takes more effort to keep it blemishfree. Sometimes the skin on the back breaks out in a rash or pimples. The best way to prevent this is to exfoliate regularly with a body brush so that the dry skin comes off. If you like getting a massage, indulge in a spa treatment especially to relax and nourish your back.

How can I lose stretch marks?

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Most of us like to lather our skin with a body lotion after a bath – or at least on our hands and feet. However, I find some of them very sticky and tend to wash my hands with soap after using the body lotion, simply to get rid of the sensation of stickiness. A friend suggested a wonderful substitute. Some companies make body mists or spritzers which have the best of both worlds. They have the moisturizing and toning properties of a body care lotion and the fragrance of a perfume, which is usually fresh and non-sticky. These are usually part of the product portfolio of companies that make perfumes.

What are age spots?

When you gain weight suddenly, the skin cannot expand as quickly and elastin fibres under the skin tear with the pressure. Stretch marks are most visible during pregnancy. They look like reddish stripes when they first appear, but they fade to thin silver lines with time. Using Vitamin E oil or keeping your body well-moisturised are good preventive measures. Some companies make anti-stretch mark products too. If you have stretch marks in visible areas like the upper arms, use a concealer or foundation to camouflage them.

Using Vitamin E oil or keeping your body wellmoisturised are good preventive measures to keep stretch marks away

Does my neck need moisturising?

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You may have noticed brown spots on the back of people’s hands, especially very light skinned people or Caucasians. These spots are known as liver spots and appear as people age. They can also appear on the neck, torso and back and are caused by the uneven production of melanin, the skin’s pigment that is responsible for the colour and tanning of our skin. Excessive exposure to the sun can also be a cause. It is best to see a dermatologist for the problem, but there are a few creams in the market that are targeted to treat this problem. Using a sunscreen is also a preventive measure.

How do I get rid of dark circles?

This is an extremely common problem and we have all faced it. Usually, with a few nights’ rest and good sleep, dark circles do vanish. In some cases they are due to fatigue, a poor diet or digestion, or insomnia. If they are chronic, see a doctor because it could be due to anaemia. There are a lot of herbal remedies that help reduce dark circles. For a temporary cure, cover your eyes with ice-cold used teabags or iced water for ten minutes. Changing your dietary patterns, cutting down on fat and increasing your intake of fibre and iron-rich foods will also help.

An unbelievable number of women moisturize their faces and apply makeup, but they forget their necks! This, more often than not, results in the neck region looking drier and duller than the rest of your face. Also, the signs of ageing are most visible first on the neck area. It is best to use a good antiwrinkle cream for the neck from your mid-thirties onwards. Also, regularly exfoliate and moisturize to prevent it from looking dry.

How do I deal with body odour?

When we sweat, we don’t necessarily smell. The odour comes in when we wear fabric that doesn’t allow the skin to breathe and when sweat comes into contact with this fabric on the surface of the skin. It helps if you keep your underarms free of hair at all times. Also after exercising, make sure you shower soon after so that sweat doesn’t dry on the skin leading to odour. Use an anti-perspirant deodorant at all times instead of just a deodorant. Antiperspirant ones prevent you from sweating and the fragrance keeps the odour away. As far as possible, try to wear natural fabrics like cotton or cotton blends as these help your skin breathe.

MINAL KHONA offers answers to frequently asked questions on skin

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Mmmmm rasmalai

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out the antique silver bowls….

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One of my favourite memories from my wedding ever, served in beautiful antique silver bowls. It is my all-time favourite Indian mithai, and so of course my big event would not have been complete without it.

My folks made sure that my second favourite mithaikaju burfi - was also at hand at every major ritual, so we ate lots of it every time we complied with the “muh meetha karo” command. We didn’t know then, that my poor bridegroom has never been able to handle kaju burfi well, and so by the end of it all he had quite a sore throat. (It was really his delicate NRI-insides that were rebelling against the desi hawa-paani, but I’ve always let him believe it was the burfi).

But my love for rasmalai, the bridegroom continues to share with me to this day. On special occasions, a few times a year, we indulge – and if I had them, I would surely bring

I wish I had an equally happy story to tell my readers, about my attempts at making rasmalai. I have tried, and I have failed, every time – including once when I started making it foolishly late one night after a particularly hectic week at work. I thought it would cheer me up, as cooking usually does, but I ended up with aching arms with all that kneading of paneer. It put me off making rasmalai, and I did not even try it when a friend emailed me a no-knead recipe a couple of years ago.

Why knead, when Maya Sweets can meet all your mithai needs, I reckoned.

An eastern Indian dessert, rasmalai is essentially cheese dumplings soaked in a sweet and creamy sauce. Traditionally, it is made with sweetened paneer which is kneaded till smooth and then immersed in the ‘ras’ (cream sauce) – milk which is reduced to half its quantity by repeated boiling, and then sweetened.

Many variations of this delicious concoction have been tried, such as Angoori rasmalai (where the paneer balls are the size of grapes), or Mango rasmalai where mango puree is added to the cream sauce and the whole dessert is served with fresh mango slices.

(Squeeze out the juice gently from the rasgollas so as not to ruin the shape). Or using canned condensed milk to make the ‘ras’. Mix half a can with a cup and a half of whole milk, and heat gently.

Hey, how about canned rasgollas and condensed milk together?!

But if you want to be less sloppy than that, try this technique. I haven’t myself tried this one, but you might be more adventurous. Mix 50 gms of whole milk powder with about half a teaspoon of baking powder. Wet your palms with beaten egg and make a dough out of the milk powder (do not pour the beaten egg on to the milk powder). Then make tiny balls out of the dough – marble sized. Meanwhile boil milk and cream together and reduce; add sugar, saffron and the regular condiments. Introduce the milk powder balls gently and watch them grow. Cool and decorate with nuts.

Only hours ago, as I polished off some amazingly good rasmalai this time from Blacktown’s Singh da Dhaba, I found courage again to try making some. I’ve brought out my friend Anuradha Kelkar’s “new age” recipe for rasmalai to share with you this issue.

Bake it!

500 gms ricotta cheese

250 ml milk

250 ml thickened cream

1 ¼ cup sugar

Pinch saffron

½ tsp rose water

If

Meanwhile, quickfix cooks will give you ‘jhatpat’ versions that they swear by, such as buying a can of readymade rasgollas and using them with home made ‘ras’.

I’m going to go one up on her and use my slow cooker to make the cream sauce …

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And while the sales are still on, do you know where I can get some antique silver bowls?

¼ tsp coarsely crushed cardamom seeds

4 tsp blanched and slivered almonds

2 tbsp coarsely crushed pistachios

To make the cream sauce, put cream and milk into a heavy bottomed pan and heat on medium flame. Simmer till it all thickens somewhat. Then add 1 cup of sugar and saffron dissolved in a little warm milk. Dissolve and then turn the heat off. Check for sweetness.

To make the sweet cheese dumplings, mix the remaining sugar with the ricotta cheese. Use a hand held mixer if you like, or just knead gently with your hands. Check for sweetness and add more sugar if you feel it needs it. Grease a muffin

pan and put 2 tablespoonfuls of cheese mixture in each cup. Smoothen tops with a spoon or press down gently with the base of a glass. Bake in a preheated 180-degree oven till it sets, about 35-40 minutes. Insert a toothpick to check – it will be done if it comes out clean. Cool, and then gently take dumplings out.

Place in a flat bowl. Pour the cream sauce over, add rose water, and decorate with pistachios and almonds. Let sit for about 2-3 hours, in the refrigerator, so the dumplings soak in the ‘ras’.

Styling and photo Rajni Anand Luthra, Rasmalai courtesy Singh da Dhaba (Blacktown)

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Healthy eating tips

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I’m sure many of my readers made health-related resolutions at the start of the new year. To Have a Healthy Lifestyle and Healthy Eating Habits – what a fantastic resolve!

Healthy eating does not necessarily mean missing out on tasty food, or depriving yourself of food, or having boring, bland and unappealing food. It is not that difficult to have healthy eating habits if we just keep a few tips in mind. Read on!

* Make simple changes to your diet that suit you and your lifestyle, as all individuals are different.

* Eat small and frequent meals throughout the day instead of having three large meals.

* Avoid skipping any meals whether it is breakfast, lunch or dinner, as this leads to excess eating in the next meal and eventually putting on weight.

* Aim for achievable health goalsdo not look for unrealistic goals.

healthy new year

GEETA KHURANA on how to start off a

excludes any particular food nutrient.

* Eat fats in moderation. Try to include some polyunsaturated fats and mono unsaturated fats such as olive oil and canola oil in your everyday cooking. Also try to use oil sprays rather than pouring oil.

* Use low fat variety of foods such as fat reduced milk products, lean meats and skinless chicken.

* Try to include fish at least twice a week in your menu. Fish contains omega 3 oils, which helps keep your heart healthy. Oily fish like ocean trout, salmon, sardines and tuna contain the most omega 3 oils. Baked fish is better than fried.

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* Replace full fat cream with low fat ricotta cheese, evaporated skim milk or yoghurt for cooking.

* Use less fat by using cooking methods such as boiling, steaming, grilling, baking, micro wave and pressure cooking.

eater and eat when you are happy or sad, then do not stock high calorie foods such as potato chips, ice creams and candy in the house. Keep healthy snacks like fruits, crunchy vegetables with dips, or nuts handy. If you absolutely feel the need for a treat, then have a fun size dark chocolate.

free days a week. A standard drink is for example-100ml of wine; 285ml full strength beer; 60ml port or sherry.

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* When drinking alcohol drink lots of water along with it to prevent dehydration.

* Start your day with a healthy breakfast to improve your concentration and memory.

* For healthy and balanced meals, start with a carbohydrate such as bread, rice or chapattis; add lots of vegetables; include a moderate serving of protein such as dal, fish, chicken or meat, and add a little fat and flavour with lemon, herbs and spices.

* Try to add fish with bones such as salmon and sardines for extra calcium.

* Include 3 serves of milk and milk products or calcium enriched soy products everyday for enough calcium. A glass of milk or a small tub of yoghurt or a slice of cheese constitutes a serve of milk.

* Try to replace plain flour with whole meal or multi grain flour to make it more nutritious and healthy.

* Try to have different kinds of breads such as soy, linseed, pita, baguettes and wraps for variety and nutrition.

* Eat more foods with soluble fibre, such as dried beans, lentils, baked beans, fruit and vegetables to help lower your blood cholesterol.

* Read food labels to make healthier food choices. Foods labeled high fibre should have at least 3g of fibre per 100g and foods labeled low salt should have a maximum of 120mg sodium per 100g or 50% or less sodium than the original food.

* Substitute coriander mint chutney or tomato chutney for tomato ketchup and creamy mayonnaise.

* Try to involve your kids in everyday grocery shopping, cooking and at meal times to teach them good healthy eating habits.

* Be creative with your child’s lunch box so that children enjoy their meals.

* Avoid unnecessary snacking in front of the television and computer.

* Keep to the safe limit and enjoy your drink. The safe limit for alcohol for males is 2 standard drinks and for females is one standard drink per day with 2 alcohol

* Try to have low calorie snacks along with your drinks such as fresh salads, paneer, papad and crackers rather than having namkeen mixtures and fried snacks.

Hope you all have a healthy 2010.

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* Check the saturated fat on the label of ‘cholesterol free’ food as saturated fat will also increase your cholesterol levels more than cholesterol in food.

* Be role models to your children and help them develop healthy eating habits.

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* Try to eat a variety of foods everyday as it kills boredom and also no food is perfect and has all the required nutrients in proper proportion.

* Try to add whole fruits preferably with skin where possible instead of fruit juices.

* Have small sized in-between snacks. Do not convert your snacks to large-sized meals. Try to have small packets of nuts, muesli bars and low fat fruit yoghurt as inbetween snacks instead of namkeen bhujias, doughnuts and creamy biscuits.

* Have at least 2 serves of fruits and 5 serves of vegetables every day.

* Try to be active every day anyway. Take the stairs, walk to your colleague instead of emailing, work in the garden, chase your pets and play sport with your kids.

* Do not follow a weight loss plan that

* Keep celebration foods such as cakes, chocolates, samosas and jalebis for celebrations only.

* When going to restaurants, try not to order oversized meals, split desserts with friends, try to order salads without added cream as side dishes instead of French fries.

* Reach for a glass of water to quench your thirst instead of sodas, tea or fruit juices. You could reduce hundreds of empty calories in your diet by switching over from sodas and fizzy drinks to plain simple water and lemon juice. Make sure you have at least 10-12 glasses of water every day.

* If you are an emotional

40+Forty plus

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NIMA MENON shares her experience of being a confident, empowered achiever at the exciting age of two-score and more

Now that I am 40+, I would prefer looking at myself as a person who is 18 with more than 22 years’ experience. Women get flirty at 30 and men get naughty at 40, but what happens to women when they are at 40?

If anything a 40-year-old woman is no longer considered “mature, middle-aged or older”. She is classy, sassy, stylish, a woman of the world, who wants to look her best, feel her best and live her best in an empowered way. Gone are those past days of mother and grandmother, today’s woman of 40 doesn’t even look her age, for she doesn’t even feel forty. She has gone through the throes of life; she is experienced, but not embittered. She is ready to take on the world and carve a niche for herself. Life is more of a challenge filled with fun, less a cumbersome endurance. Go into shopping malls and you’ll no longer find them moving to sober colours because they are older, they are not threatened by brighter colours for they no longer care what the world thinks of them. What matters is what they think of themselves and what they want for themselves. They have a gym/fitness centre membership and it is no more “Oh! I am old, I cannot exercise. I’ll just go for a stroll every evening.” My mother thought that way, but I don’t.

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of the best decisions I made. For today, my boys are all grown and I have a full life ahead of me. There were times when I asked myself if I made the right decision in having a child straight after marriage: shouldn’t I have taken a few years off to enjoy my life? But today, I am glad that I didn’t wait. I played cricket and football with my boys when they were young, I had the energy and the enthusiasm for it and today as I have grown older with them, I understand them better and they understand me. My husband and I are free to go on a holiday on our own without worrying about who will look after the kids. I feel 18 again, carefree, full of

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Gone are those past days of mother and grandmother, today’s woman of 40 doesn’t even look her age, for she doesn’t even feel forty

I married early in life and that was one

plus. You reach your peak income when you are forty plus, and this financial power pumps up your air of confidence.

Moving into the 40s is all about aging

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Forty plus role models from Bollywood: (from left) Juhi Chawla, Rekha, Madhuri Dixit and top, Hema Malini

Keaton, Naomi Watts, Nicole Kidman, Michelle Pfeiffer, Demi Moore, Halle Berry, Salma Hayek, Julianne Moore or our own Rekha or Dimple. These are women who are forty plus and even today are more gorgeous, sexy and beautiful than all those twenty or thirty plus women out there. And as I have turned forty plus, I bask in the fact that I look and feel like I have the whole world at my feet and it is my life to live the way I please. Though that may sound like the words of a rebel, I am not one for I am wise enough to know my limitations, the norms of society and how to work well within the parameters I and only I have created for myself. There is no need to throw caution to the winds to do as you please; in fact you are smarter when you do as you please and still have the people who matter on your side. That’s what it is to be forty plus – clever, cheeky, classy and charismatic! Welcome to my world………

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A resolution for 2010

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SHERYL DIXIT examines the year gone past and plans for the one ahead

As 2009 drew to a close, I began to wonder if it would be worth opening a doc and speed-typing a few New Year’s resolutions. Of course, laziness and good food made short work of that thought, and now that 2010 is well upon us and I have a deadline to meet, I have decided to put the last year into perspective and think about what this year has on offer.

For me, 2009 was a year of revelations, particularly in the latter half, and specifically during my trip to India. I guess living in Australia lulls one into a sense of comfortable balance and routine ennui, so being up against it in India certainly caused an upheaval in my relatively placid life. However, some memories are best forgotten as we glide into the New Year, and I guess this was one of the most important lessons that I learned from the past year – to haul up one’s chaddis and move on!

do, and that their logic is simple, instinctive and wonderfully insightful. I learned that cruelty comes in many forms, that trust and betrayal are synonymous and that the power of affection is the strongest emotion in my life. I learned to trust my instinct and to be thankful to an omniscient presence who, in some indefinable way, always protects me and my family.

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2010 would have been a year like any other for me, if it wasn’t for all that I learned and experienced in India. I would have gone through another year without realising the value of family and their unspoken, but unshakeable support. My good friends would have continued to be entities on Facebook and Outlook, without the reassuring intimacy that only actual contact can bring. I learned to see people from a different perspective, from the humble istriwala by the side of the road, sifting coals to reload his iron to the wealthy, living in the lap of luxury and making sure everyone around knows it. I realised that children have the ability to comprehend much more that we think they

SEEKING BRIDES

Fiji Indian Hindu family from Sydney, seek alliance for son, age 26, Australian citizen, fair, educated, 160 cm. Seeking bride under 25 years, slim, fair, sincere and pleasant personality. Contact parents at PO Box 502 Plumpton NSW 2761 or email at hum772009@gmail.com

Which is why, this year, I have decided to make one single New Year’s resolution. To be a better person. In every way, on many levels – physical, moral, emotional, social, perhaps I can even endeavour to be politically correct, an area in which I sadly lack common sense. I want to shape up a bit, having finally convinced myself that regular exercise is indeed good for health. I hope to lock away my excuse about housework being an adequate substitute or feigning tiredness to mask sheer laziness.

On a moral level, I hope to be less judgemental and more compassionate, to listen more, “even to the dull and the ignorant…they too have their story.” I want to think before I talk, and to never, ever commit an act of deliberate cruelty to any being, in word, deed or even thought, if that’s humanly possible. Well, that last one will certainly be a tall order, but I can try!

On an emotional level, I want to try and not lose my temper, particularly when some jerk in the car behind me keeps flashing his headlights to make me change lanes and also when my kids are being their cheeky selves. I want to learn how to take a deep breath and count to ten before losing all rational thought, regardless of how provoking the situation may be. I have had

little success with this one too, but fellowmums console me that yelling at your kids is an essential part of a mother’s job description. On a social level, I want to give more to society than just articles on how to live life, and I am determined to make this happen.

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and do one’s best, and keep at it, without letting lapses into the real world of irritation and angst get you down.

I have deliberately left out forgiveness of slights, insults or people I dislike, because if I did, I would be up for sainthood. I am not a forgiving person. I brood, ruminate, occasionally even forget, but I don’t forgive. It’s an unpleasant and certainly unchristian trait in one who was brought up with the highest ethics of the religion.

In retrospect, I realise that I’ve set the bar a mite high, but if I can get through a day, a week, a month or even this year by achieving any or all of the above, I think it will make a difference to my life. It is probably one of the most clichéd lines in the world, but the important thing is to try

Matrimonials

Like the rest of humanity, I wonder what 2010 will have in store for me. There will be challenges, opportunities, and at the same time, disappointments and perhaps even tragedy. But with the resilience of the rest of humanity, we will all plod through the year and as it draws to a close, we will either heave a sigh of relief or look back with regret at its passing. But whatever the year ahead brings all of us, I hope it will be one that has its fair share of moments filled with joy and laughter, happiness and contentment. And that is my wish to all of you, even those who haven’t made a single resolution and don’t intend making any. Find time to enjoy this year, be at peace with yourself and the world at large, and in the words of Max Ehrmann, strive to be happy.

Australian citizen, Indian origin male, uni educated, govt job, own house, mid 40s, seeks honest Indian/ Fiji Indian lady for marriage. Please send details to email: tamave@hotmail.com or phone 0404 263 400.

Indian Catholic gentleman, 38 years, innocently divorced, handsome, responsible and affectionate nature, excellent family background, requests to meet a girlfriend or a female in matrimonial alliance. Hindu vegetarian lady welcome; nationality, religion or caste no barrier. Detailed information will be given in person. Please contact me by phone for appointment: (02) 9676 2512 or 0419 792 947.

AGujarati Brahmin family invites proposals for their pure vegetarian, non-smoker, non-drinker, broadminded, family oriented son, Permanent Resident

of Australia, 24 years, 5’ 7”, B.E.Mechanical Engineer, settled in Perth. Alliances are sought from well educated, family oriented, spiritual and good looking girls from well cultured Gujarati families. Initial contact can be made at kulfunda@ gmail.com or 0402 433 385.

recent pictures to Meghna.joshi@ato.gov. au or contact 0433 613 676.

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Sister and brother-in-law seek a suitable groom for a lovely Hindu Punjabi Brahmin girl, professionally qualified. Family well settled in India. Seeking a 25-29-year-old, professionally qualified match, with strong cultural and family background. Please email bio data and recent pictures to mittalarvind@hotmail. com or contact on 0421 669 534.

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Sister seeks suitable bride for her handsome professionally qualified Punjabi Hindu Brahmin boy 27 working as MBA in HR department in a reputed company in India. Boy teetotaller and belongs to well respected and well to do family in India. Please respond to sharmamona26@yahoo.com.au or call at 0433 602 032.

SEEKING GROOMS

Sister and brother-in-law seek suitable groom for Gujarati Brahmin girl, professionally qualified. Family well settled in India. Seeking 26-29 year old, qualified match with strong cultural and family background. Please email biodata and

Parents seek educated and wellsettled boy for Hindu Punjabi girl, IT professional, Australian citizen, born 1977, 5’ 6” slim, never married. Please send details and recent, clear photo to vnsb2009@gmail.com

Australian resident, born December 74, 5’ 3” slim, fair, Hindu Punjabi Khatri girl, never married, seeks Hindu Punjabi educated boy. Please send details and recent photo to ranjeev333@yahoo.com phone 0061432 020 702.

Sister and brother-in-law invite well settled/educated match for a lovely Jatt Sikh girl, 24 / 5’6”, completing IT in May 2010 (USA), plans to settle in Australia. Early marriage. Caste no bar. Seeking a suitable match with strong family values. Genuine enquiries please e-mail to shaadi1109@gmail.com with biodata and recent photo.

Seeking a groom for sister who is very warm hearted, caring, attractive, good cook and home-maker. Never married, 47-year-old Hindu Marathi. Hotel management qualified. Can work in Australia as a Certified Cook. Half of the family based in Australia. Australian PR or citizen only. Please email at rnita45@ yahoo.com

Seeking alliance for our 24-year old, 5”4’ beautiful Sikh daughter. She is a finance professional with strong family values. We are settled in Sydney for many years. Please send your details and photo at kuldeeponly@gmail.com

Brother seek suitable groom for Hindu Gupta girl, professionally qualified. Family well settled in India. Seeking a 2830 year old, professionaly qualified match, with strong family values. Please send biodata and recent picture to vikjas@gmail. com or contact 0401-318-439.

GET SOLUTIONS FOR ANY PROBLEM CONTACT ASTROLOGER(SWAMY JI)

(LANGUAGES SPOKEN: ENGLISH, HINDI, TAMIL, TELUGU, KANNADA)

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FAMOUS ASTROLOGER HAS VISITED AUSTRALIA PANDIT: SWAMY JI

This is to announce the citizens of Australia that there is no person in the world without problems. Everyone in this world have problems. If you want to find a solution for all your problems or clear any doubts then this is the right opportunity to contact Swamy. His astrology has been passed to him as hereditary and it is accurate and true because it is based on sun and moon which are true. By reading your palm, horoscope, face and Numerology Swamy will predict your past, present and future. That is Education, Job, Promotion, Business, Health, Enemy problems and All KIND OF PROBLEM in your life can be solved by swamy. He performs Shanti Poojas, Lakshmi Poojas, Ashtabandhana Chakras, Vaastu Dosha Poojas etc in favour of you and your family.

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TV or not TV

t the beginning of the month we resolve not to spend any money. Two days later the husband decides we need a new LCD TV.

What’s wrong with our Panasonic? I say looking at the giant box that the husband saved up for and bought when he was 17. First of all, he explains, this one’s a Palsonic not Panasonic. It’s a piece of crap.

I’d come to think of the old TV as a benign avuncular presence in a corner, presiding over our domestic trials and triumphs. It was my only companion when the husband abandoned me for his computer games. And, it’d become a resting place for the cats en route to the top of the bookshelf. I still like it, I say.

We get 2.5 grainy channels and you usually have to guess what’s going on, the husband is listing. And in order to get the 0.5 reception, I have to take my clothes off and stand on one leg with my arms raised. All of this is true, so I nod dumbly. And that’s how after work on a late night shopping Thursday, we find ourselves in the newly opened JB HiFi at World Square. It’s full of people and I start counting the number of interracial couples I can spot. How come most of the Aussie guys here are with Asian chicks? I’m wondering out loud. But I get no response because the husband is standing face-to-face with a 40-inch Sony Bravia. The look on his face makes me think he’s going to drop on his knees any minute now and kiss the ground. High definition, I hear him say several times.

I’m less impressed when I look at the price tag scribbled in red marker. $2229.

Are you sure about this? I thought we were going to save money this month...

He spins around, a crazy gleam in his eye. Sweety, look at it. High definition, you can see every pore and hair.

Bolt is playing on all the screens and I’m surrounded by eager white dogs all doing the same thing. And yes, I can see every hair on the animated pooch.

Now, the guy’s going to ask us to bundle it with HDMI cables and a power board. We don’t need those. Okay?

What? Huh? I say distracted by the dog on the screen. But the husband’s hunted down a tiny Japanese salesman who is completely

bald and looks distressed. My husband is negotiating a deal. I go and stand by him thinking he needs my support.

He doesn’t. He whips out a couple of printed pages from his pocket and goes for the jugular: Clive Peters’ is selling this for $2000. What’s the best deal you can do?

The Japanese salesman cowers a bit as if he’s been struck. Let me see what I can do he mumbles and shuffles off.

I regard the husband with suspicion. Where is my indecisive procrastinating husband?

What have you done with him?

The salesman returns. I can give it to you for $2000 if you take the HDMI cables and the power board.

We’ve rehearsed this. I know the answer to this one!!

But the husband’s on to it: Don’t need the cables. Is that the best you can do? Yes, says the man.

Okay. One minute, says my negotiating husband and takes me aside.

Shit! he says. Can you talk to him? You’re Indian, you can haggle.

What? No! Besides why are we even doing this?

Because it’s a great deal and they are literally giving away PlayStation 3 with the TV...

Ah-ha! The truth is out!

...And it’s a great TV.

We walk around the store whispering furiously. We can feel the sad eyes of the Japanese salesman following us. We stop to look at what seems to me the identical twin of the TV we want. It’s $500 cheaper and comes with the PS3.

It’s the same one, I announce.

It’s not, says the husband. This one’s only 100Hz the other one’s 200Hz.

Is that bad?

The human eye can’t really see the difference beyond 70Hz so not really...

The sad-eyed Japanese salesman is by our side again.

This one’s cheaper, he’s saying, but it’s only 100Hz. The other one’s 200Hz...

I know the answer to this one!

Yeah, but beyond 75Hz it doesn’t really matter, does it? the husband counters.

No, it doesn’t, the salesman concedes. My head moves from one to the other as if

… the husband is standing face-to-face with a 40-inch Sony Bravia. The look on his face makes me think he’s going to drop on his knees any minute now and kiss the ground. High definition, I hear him say several times

watching a game of tennis. So what about a deal?

That’s the deal.

Can you at least do free delivery? Sorry. It’ll cost you $79. Or you can take it home in a cab.

Can you call us a cab then? No.

10 minutes later, we’re heaving a box that’s bigger than the two of us up an escalator. Excuse me, excuse me, we’re chanting and weaving our way through the crowd on Goulbourn Street. The crowd parts to let us pass. Wow, says a man looking at the huge box with BRAVIA emblazoned in red across it.

We carefully lift the box into the boot of a station wagon cab. The husband positions himself in the rear seat, his hands bracing the

box for the ride home. We are as nervous as new parents going home from the hospital. I’ll drive carefully, the cabbie solemnly promises.

At home the husband opens the box like a kid at Christmas. He lifts the old TV from the spot that’s been its home for a decade and puts it in a corner. He installs the slim new TV in less than a minute and hands me a brand-new black remote as long as my forearm.

Go on. Turn it on, he’s saying to me. I look at the gleaming new TV, the size of a small car, occupying the entire width of the TV unit. I nervously push the button. The picture booms onto the screen, larger than life. My eyes widen. I’m thinking I need bigger eyes.

We finally have a TV, the husband’s saying, his face bright. He shows me how to run through the 24 channels and find my favourite ones.

Beauty and the Geek is on. Everyone’s enormous. I sit fascinated staring at the giant screen. The gorgeous are gorgeouser. The ugly are uglier. Every flaw is magnified 10 times over.

I glance guiltily at the old Palsonic sitting in the corner. It sits with its enormous hunched back to us, its face turned to the wall, like a child in disgrace.

Goodbye my friend, I whisper and think of how tired, old and dispensable it looks in the festive glare of its replacement.

There’s a sleek new presence in APARNA JACOB’s living room

ARIES March 21–April 20

Tarot indicates the simple union of two people in love. A good partnership or bond is suggested here. It is a time for harmony and unity. Tarot suggests that matters can be healed and peace can be restored. This month brings love, passion, friendship, affinity, union, sympathy and harmony. There is a spiritual connection where there is an equal partnership which benefits both the parties. In a relationship reading, Tarot foresees marriage, or a deeper commitment to an existing union.

TAURUS April 21–May 21

Tarot sees a confident approach to life in general. You are required to be adaptable. Gains and victory are on the cards. Past efforts bring rewards. Legal matters would be resolved favourably. You may receive public acknowledgment for your work. In a relationship reading, it appears both you and your partner have similar goals in the relationship and are likely to achieve these goals. A new stage of commitment may be seen in your relationship.

GEMINI May 22–June 23

Tarot indicates that you will have a favourable encounter with an assertive person who will support you during a difficult time. He/she will be good looking, well built, honest and kind. Being a mature person, he/she is good with people and is helpful, though he/she may not be emotionally involved in the situation. Tarot suggests that it will be beneficial for you to adopt these qualities yourself. If choosing a career, sales or any goal-oriented position is suitable for you.

CANCER June 23–July 22

The present time may be financially challenging. Be careful not to miss any opportunity towards advancement. You may find your work uninteresting. You may be feeling lonely and low at this point of time. There may be problems in a relationship — money being one of the issues. Tarot indicates spiritual emptiness: it appears your spiritual life is suffering due to narrow-mindedness or an inability to change. The lesson for you is to be open to change from within.

LEO July 23–August 23

There seems to be an illusion that there is no choice other than to accept things as they are. Tarot indicates the hold of materialism on you, because of the temptations it provides. Your free will seems to have been lost, as being controlled seems an easier way out than taking responsibility for yourself. It could even mean a reluctance to change at the cost of growth. It is only you who can liberate yourself from this situation.

VIRGO August 24–September 22

You will not only live well within your means but also save towards a project. This month the focus is on material wealth which you are likely to receive from some source. You are cautioned not to let materialism overpower the emotional values of a relationship. In your relationship, it appears that there is a stagnation of sorts, perhaps because one of the partners may not be open to new ideas and change, a prerequisite for a relationship to develop.

LIBRA September 23 – October 23

Tarot signifies the need to adopt the qualities of strength of purpose and being steadfast in approach. This month, you are able to think effectively about your emotions in order to get a clear perspective of what you desire, and you plan your line of action for future success accordingly. Don’t let past difficulties faced in a relationship hold you back from experiencing what life may have to offer to you in the present – you might be pleasantly surprised!

SCORPIO October 24–November 22

This month the focus is on self confidence and perfect planning leading to success and happiness. You may have been self-reliant in your project while working hard with your inner strength and putting in the best efforts. The success achieved by you is likely to make you feel happy and secure. Financial rewards are around the corner. You are likely to have a comfortable success. Business decisions emerging from negotiations are likely to be fruitful. It’s full speed ahead!

SAGITTARIUS November 23–December 21

Your focus this month is likely to be on circumstances concerning legalities and partnerships. You are likely to receive positive advice at this point of time. You need to be decisive and take responsibility for your actions. You need a balanced approach to resolve any problems that confront you. You are likely to reap what you have sown. The future is yours to make, based on your present decisions. Honesty with self and the partner is the key word.

CAPRICORN December 22–January 19

As a new year – a new decade – is born, Tarot indicates the inevitability of change. Certain events in your life may be unexpected. Remain optimistic as changes at home or in relationships are likely to be for the best. You need to leave behind old beliefs and values which no longer support you and adopt a new approach in order to progress ahead. You need to accept the fact that old forms collapse and give way to new forms, for the better.

AQUARIUS January 20–February 18

This month there is a focus on the recognition of talent and hard work. Your efficiency at work will be noticed by your employers. You may be deputed to a project which will surely benefit you in the long run. Improve your circumstances by laying solid foundations for long term rewards. Tarot indicates that strong efforts will be made to build and maintain a stable relationship. Hard work and efforts at this time will bring you recognition and renown.

PISCES February 19–March 20

Tarot signifies a new beginning for you. You may be required to take a decision and act on it. Hence, it is important for you to keep yourself emotionally balanced. You will act with utmost passion towards your desired goal. In your relationship, you have a clear idea of what you want. Your purpose is clear, so you are able to focus on what you desire. Perhaps greater mental compatibility is required in your relationship.

3 Idiots: A young, vibrant film

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Film : 3 Idiots

Cast: Aamir Khan, Kareena Kapoor, R. Madhavan, Sharman Joshi, Boman Irani

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Director: Rajkumar Hirani

By now, Aamir Khan has hit so many sixers in his career that we can only wonder what this maestro of marketing intends to do next. For sure, 3 Idiots is yet another vehicle to showcase Aamir’s sparkling ability to be part of a cinema that creates a colloquial yet classy language of thought provoking punctuation, syntax and exclamation.

3 Idiots is first and foremost a tremendously entertaining piece of cinema. The boys-will-have-fun atmosphere on an engineering campus is shot with the devious humour and warmth of a joke that has not lost its punch even after years of re-telling. Some things never change in a straightjacketed society like ours. And really, when Rajkumar Hirani, with help from his co-writer Abhijat Joshi, sets down to criticise the glaring anomalies in our education system, we are compelled to wonder for a few seconds, if flogging the sacred cows of our institutionalised system of governance in cinema is not just an excuse to pull out all stops and let the young heroes have all the fun that their more disciplined counterparts deny themselves.

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inspiring situations in the script come from Aamir. And boy, does he play the boy-man with restrained relish!

But it is a vital, inspiring and life-revising work of contemporary art with some heart imbued into every part.

save lives. But cinema sure can make you feel life is worth living. 3 Idiots does just that, and much more.

The thought processes underlining the film’s super-vibrant but calm surface are never allowed to seep out and bubble to the exterior of the narrative. If at heart 3 Idiots is a serious indictment of our education system, at the surface it’s a character-driven film played out at an observant and opulent but always-feisty octave.

The sounds of protest against the curbs, checks and downers in our education reach out to us in a cascade of crisply-written lines spoken by characters who have lived out the nightmare that precedes that long journey into the realisation of our dreams.

At times, the narrative is savagely funny. Note the sequence where Rancho (Aamir Khan) and his girl take the critically ill old man to the hospital on a scooter. Hirani has always seen humour of mortality. He has a potent style of storytelling, a mix of street wisdom and cinematic sensitivities that come together in a noiseless tango of social comment and entertainment. The director is strangely shy of displaying emotions. So he counters the melodrama of his third hero Raju Rastongi (Sharma Joshi)’s life with black-and-white 1960s’ self-mocking background music.

Sharman as the poor middle-class boy driven to near-suicide by his parents’ ambitions gets two meaty sequences. He chews on them with careful sensitivity, leaving a lasting impression. Madhavan as the third ‘idiot’ expresses his smothered dreams through a series of half-expressed thoughts and a fear of unhappiness that reach his eyes without transit.

In a country where students are driven to suicide by their impossible curriculum, 3 Idiots provides hope. Maybe cinema can’t

By Subhash K. Jha, IANS

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Kareena as the girl engaged to the tycoon with a penchant for putting a price tag on all his gifts, brings a dollop of sunshine and feminine grace to an otherwise masculine tale. She is so spunky and spontaneous you wish there was room for more of her. There’s even less of Mona Singh who’s again a spirited free soul.

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Ironically, Hirani’s unconventional hero Rancho often goes the other way and sheds manly tears for colleagues, friends and tormented young citizens of modern India who are crippled by a despotic disregard for their natural creativity.

Aamir undertakes his character’s journey through the paradoxical labyrinth of an ambition-driven education system -incidentally the loopholes in our education was also the theme of Aamir’s Taare Zameen Par and Hirani’s Munnabhai

M.B.B.S. -- with a gut-level understanding of what pains today’s average 20-something.

Aamir’s transformation into a 22-yearold collegian is so complete you end up wondering if he has been lying about being 40-plus in real life! Like most Aamir starrers, 3 Idiots too is predominantly his vehicle. Most of the funniest lines and

The two ladies are, fortunately, part of the climax where our three heroes deliver Kareena’s sister (Mona Singh)’s baby on the office table - a clear indication that even an all-boys tale has no qualms about embracing maternal responsibilities if the situation arises.

But did 3 Idiots really need a manufactured child-delivered-in-crisis climax? Did it need those endless toilet-andbum jokes? Couldn’t Boman Irani and the new actor Omi Vaidya have been delineated less hammily?

It’s not that 3 Idiots is a flawless work of art.

Film : Pyaar Impossible

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Cast: Priyanka Chopra, Uday Chopra, Dino Morea

Director: Jugal Hansraj

today’s working women, their effort to balance home with work.

Sushmita shimmers, but the movie is a mess

Pair impossible? You bet! Uday Chopra as the geek in love and Priyanka Chopra as the unattainable self-declared 10-on-10 beauty, is a bit of a long shot.

But in films about the romance of the impossible, anything is possible. In the first 15 minutes of the narrative, Uday gawks, sighs and grins goofily every time Priyanka passes by on the college campus. She’s so hot she could scald the film’s frames if only the basic treatment was not so thanda

We see Priyanka on roller-skates, on stage pounding a guitar, at the cafe gabbing with the boys... everywhere except in the classroom.

So who said anything about studies?

Soon Alisha (yup, that’s Priyanka’s name) is back in India with a little daughter named Tanya who is the most annoying child actor in recent times. When Uday masquerades as her nanny, Tanya threatens, “I’ll call the cops and tell them you’re doing bad things to me.”

them all on television.

Most of the narrative unfolds in Alisha and her daughter’s home where the geek, still smitten after seven years, becomes the monstrously illbehaved daughter’s nanny.

Her world in Pyaar Impossible seems strangely bereft of harassment. Her greatest stress is to find a nanny for her insufferable daughter. When that is in place, she needs to treat her suave but evil suitor, played with a likeable glint by Dino Morea, to dinner at home.

That too is taken care of by her allpurpose nanny. The dinner sequence has the potential of being a laugh riot. Instead it just stretches on like acres of unkempt grass in need of a mower.

Most of the film replicates the overstudied rhythm of a sitcom about a smart working-class babe who can’t see love staring down at her right inside her home.

Film: Dulha Mil Gaya

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Cast: Sushmita Sen, Shah Rukh Khan, Fardeen Khan, Ishita Sharma

Director: Mudassar Aziz

There is only one reason why this hideous satire gone awry can be tolerated for a bit. Sushmita Sen playing the broadly satirical and hugely selfimportant Shimmer just simmers on screen!

The world outside this quaint and over-cute domestic scenario is inhabited by corporate types pounding away millions worth of deals on their sleek computers. The geek can only be sleek when he wants. But he’s content in his placid cocoon. Who needs style when you have spectacles and braces?

Priyanka in a stunning new hair cut looks every inch her part. But would someone please explain why she needs to show her legs 24x7? Is there some kind of a hidden statement in her leggy presence?

Dazzling despite her fluctuating weight, in-sync with her character in spite of a script that doesn’t seem to know its mind, and utterly oblivious of the bustling mess that first-time director Mudassar Aziz has created, Sushmita just has so much fun with her character.

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Sadly no component in the plot supports Sushmita’s unique ability to create a woman who is simultaneously sexy and cerebral. How did Aziz think he could pass off this exotic but idiotic echo of Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s 1969 Pyar Ka Sapna as a contemporary take on commitment-phobia?

The daughter’s lines are written to sound cool. And the seven-year-old girl mouths them as though she heard

Film: Chance Pe Dance

Cast: Shahid Kapoor, Genelia

D’Souza

Director: Ken Ghosh

At one point in this heartwarming journey into the life of a Bollywood struggler, one of the kids in the school where our hero teaches dance wonders how he manages to wear such trendy T-shirts when he lives in a car and has no money for food.

“Arrey, those are duplicates of branded T-shirts, you can get them at Rs.150 on the pavement,” retorts a know-all kid. That one fleeting moment sums up what Chance Pe Dance strives to squeeze into two hours of fluid playing-time.

It’s a ‘jingle’ out there. The soundtrack is suffused with sounds that you want to squeeze down the toilet. The single-mother as played by the excessively self-confident Priyanka seems well-equipped to cope with the quirks of the concrete jungle.

When opposites attract Shahid steals show

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Priyanka’s character offers much room and potential for comment on

Some of Priyanka’s best scenes suffer from the actress’ discernible over confidence. Where is the vulnerable quality in this single mother’s personality? In contrast, Uday is understated gentle and incharacter throughout. He knows the inner world of the geek.

Technically competent Love Impossible is not a bad film. It’s just a dull film.

a better dancer in the film industry today?

The slim but confident plot moves on a smooth surface. This is a romcom with a pleasing, pungent flavour of Mumbai’s sorrowful underbelly that is hidden but palpable beneath the smooth surface.

While Shahid struggles for stardom, the narrative glides along at its own even pace seeking out the wannabe star’s life as a homeless road-dweller who sleeps in his car, and smirks at life’s cruelties.

There are some interesting sporadically-touching moments in the mish-mash of chaotic comic timing and misguided social messages. Watch Sushmita in that moment when all her cynicism about the validity of the sweet innocent village girl from Amritsar dissolves in a fleeting close-up. That moment is worth more than the entire film.

Dulha Mil Gaya seems to endorse garishness in place of glamour, hedonism rather than a highlife and a ceaseless stream of awkwardly-written jumble of scenes that would probably be rejected in a halfway decent American sitcom on the haughty heiress and the incorrigible playboy. Sushmita is every inch the haughty heiress. But how much of the rest of the cast ranging from Fardeen Khan to the over-the-top Howard Rosamayer (playing the effeminate man Friday) can she control?

One expects the screen to light up when ‘guest’ star Shah Rukh Khan turns up in the second half. Tragically the anarchic humour of the second half dips to an all-time low, leading to a fractured climax that even the most diehard romantic would find hard to stay awake for.

struggler in all its shades. Samir has defiantly left for Bollywood while his dad (Parikshat Sahni) is left wondering why his son needs to be a film hero in the first place.

There are very few characters in the plot. There’s Genelia D’Souza playing a choreographer. Satish Shah, Mohnish Behl and Vikas Bhalla come and go like images seen from a moving train.

Yes, the first half has its interesting interludes. Shimmer’s first encounter on flight with Samarpreet (Ishita Sharma), the poor lost bride looking for her playboy husband in Trinidad, crackles because of Sushmita’s patronising preening. The way Shimmer takes the bereft Samarpreet under her wings could have been done with more restraint and panache.

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The gaudy interiors just don’t match with the natural scenic splendour of the Trinidadian outdoors. Artificiality is the middle-name of this wacky wedding on speed.

Right from the credit titles, where we see our struggler-hero prepare for another day of selling himself to an unthinking entertainment industry, a slightly seamless splendour lurks at the heart of this film about a Dilliwallah’s struggle to become a star in ‘Big Bad Bollywood’.

Cliched theme? Yup. But some times, some of the most endearing truths of life emerge from situations that work in a direction opposite to the unique.

The fact that Shahid plays the struggler helps... really helps. Here’s an enormously watchable actor who can take away the ‘acting’ from a character and just make you look at what is being said and done on screen without the baggage of the actor’s personal life being carried forward.

Shahid’s Samir is a portrait of a

Shahid goes through the predictable grind, but with such extraordinary sincerity and involvement, you suddenly realise the one truth about life’s vagaries. Every struggle, no matter how similar on the surface, is different underneath.

Shahid brings out all the shades, nuances and layers in the struggler’s inner life without bending the rules of commercial hero-giri. This is a far better performance than it outwardly seems.

Whether romancing the funny girl next-door, manifesting the disappointments of a struggler who’s getting emotionally worn-out waiting for the big moment, or interacting with the kids in school...Shahid just goes with the flow with a fluidity that goes beyond the dance floor.

Oh, about Shahid’s dancing...is there

Director Ken Ghosh keeps the narrative free of complexities beyond the struggler’s immediate preoccupations. And that suits the film’s moderate temperature just fine. Some moments, specially with the kids, exude the warmth of a ray of sunshine peeping through a partially open door. Watch the sequence where the kids share their lunch with their famished teacher... You’ll go Awwwww!

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Most of the time we get the feeling that the crew of this film went to Trinidad to party with noisy music for company. Someone forgot to carry the script for this corny Caribbean cruise. It’s largely unbearable even for diehard Sushmita Sen fans.

Though the choreography is uneven and the climactic dance a bit of a disappointment, Shahid comfortably keeps us watching the predictable but perky progression of this penniless pilgrim from the backseat of a car to the red-carpet.

While giving groovy guru-gyan to his students, dance teacher Shahid mentions Michael Jackson, Govinda, Prabhu Deva, Hrithik Roshan and Shia

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PREITY PLEDGES SUPPORT FOR WIDOWS

Citing the example of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Bollywood actress Preity Zinta recently pledged to work for the welfare of widows and said they could achieve a lot, if given an opportunity. Preity, 34, became the brand ambassador of Loomba Trust that supports widows and their children around the world.

“Sonia Gandhi is a perfect example. If a woman is not stolen of her opportunities, even if she is a widow, she can do great things and achieve a lot. This is more than enough reason to say that a woman can stand shoulder to shoulder with any man anywhere in the world,” Preity said.

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“I have always held women’s causes in India very close to my heart. I have always felt that women get a raw deal. This cause was a little more close to my heart because I lost my father when I was very young,” added Preity, who lost her father at the age of 13.

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“I was lucky to come from a family that was financially stable, but I did grow up realising that it was definitely more difficult for a woman. I can identify with this problem very closely,” said the multi-faceted actress.

Preity also revealed that a documentary by filmmaker Deepa Mehta’s brother influenced her and she realised it was important to work for the welfare of widows.

“Deepa Mehta’s brother made a documentary called The Forgotten Woman. It’s a documentary on widows and what really happens to them. That was the first time I looked at this besides something I had grown up with and that stayed with me,” she said.

“So when I was asked to be a part of this Trust I thought that God has given me more than I can ever imagine and if I can give back, it will make a difference; in whatever way we can raise awareness, we will,” she added. Good on you, Preity, you’re so much more than a pretty face.

Shahid’s single and ready to mingle

After being linked to a string of actresses, Bollywood star Shahid Kapoor has finally cleared the air about his relationship status. Not surprisingly, he says he’s single. “I am very much single, available and definitely ready to mingle,” Shahid said on Sony TV’s new reality show Lift Kara De. Shahid was a celebrity guest on the show, and found himself on sticky ground when host Karan Johar asked him about his link-up with Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi actress Anushka Sharma,

Sethi’s untitled directorial debut.

“You had better ask Parmeet that question. After all directors have all the fun these days!” he quipped. “I want to clarify that I am not dating Priyanka Chopra or anybody else,” added Shahid. I’ll bet single Bollywood babes make a beeline for sexy Shahid.

signing a relatively smaller film like Pyaar Impossible? Though she claims it was the film’s script that made her sign, she admits that big banners like Yash Raj Films have their relevance.

Priyanka won’t play…

Describing her fundamentals about working in films, she said, “It’s best not to do any prior calculations and instead just step into doing something where your instinct drives you. This is why I concentrate completely on my work.”

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The numbers game, that is. Priyanka Chopra has enjoyed back-to-back hits with Dostana and Fashion in 2008. Last year, her Kaminey succeeded and if What’s Your Raashee? had worked, she would have certainly come one step up the rung to being number one. But the actress refuses to get drawn into the numbers game. “When a couple of my films would succeed at the box office, people would start commenting, ‘Oh yes, you are at the number one spot’. But one flop later they may end up stating, ‘Arrey, yeh spot toh thoda hil gaya’,” said a sensible Priyanka.

“In fact, sometimes you experience something even worse because the same people may even end up saying that she is gone and there is no future for her... However, one hit later, every statement would be retracted. No one can be really blamed because this entire numbers business is so fickle,” said the actress who has seen quite a few ups and downs in her career.

“Yes, one can’t deny the relevance of big banners. However, a fact that also cannot be denied is that sometimes even big films don’t work. I have first-hand experience in that because there have been some really big films that I wasn’t convinced about and hence had to decline them,” Priyanka said. “I have also done small films out of sheer gut instinct and they went on to be very good successes. So, you know, one can’t really be sure about this industry which is anyway so unpredictable,” the former

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“As long as people say that I am a decently good actor and a very fine professional, I can say that I am in a happy place. I would be quite worried if they start saying anything to the contrary,” added Priyanka, who has worked in around 30 films during the last six and a half years in Bollywood.

Priyanka will be seen in Siddharth Anand’s Anjaana Anjaani with Ranbir Kapoor and she will begin work on Vishal Bharadwaj’s

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yet untitled film. She is now set to play Malayalam superstar Mohanlal’s wife in Vishal Bharadwaj’s next movie, Seven Husbands. This will be the second time Priyanka has played multiple characters in a single film, the first being What’s Your Rashee? Priyanka’s heading for the number one spot, that’s for sure!

Canada calling!

loved this film. It proves true Rancho’s (the protagonist in the movie) mantra - chase excellence and success will follow.”

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Akshay Kumar, one of Bollywood’s leading hunks is planning a cross-cultural film on Canada with their favorite sport ice hockey, as the main theme of the movie. He decided this when he ran for the Winter Olympic Torch Relay in minus eight degrees.

“I love hockey, and am in the processing making this film. I will start work on it next

Aamir echoed the sentiment, saying, “As a member of the team I am so happy with the kind of success that the film is achieving.

Thanks to Raju (Hirani), for making the film so well, to Vinod for doing such a great job as a producer and to Reliance BIG Pictures for the kind of release they gave the film.”

According to a statement released, more that 60 million people have so far watched the film in theatres since its release on Dec 25. Its box office collections have exceeded the over Rs.260 crore earned by another Aamir starrer, Ghajini, considered Hindi cinema’s highest grosser till date.

3 Idiots is also being touted as the highest grossing Indian film ever to release in the US, Middle East, Australia, South Africa, Pakistan, Kenya and Fiji.

The film has retained its position in the top 10 film at the British Box Office and is also Aamir’s biggest grosser so far and highest box office grosser of 2009. The screen count in the US for 3 Idiots has increased by 25 percent by the third week. Indian multiplexes added on an average 14 to 21 new shows in the second week of the movie compared to its first week with 150 additional shows. Even the paid previews of the movie garnered over Rs.9 crore worldwide. The film also stars R. Madhavan, Sharman Joshi, Boman Irani and Kareena Kapoor in pivotal roles. Proves that the movie’s not so idiotic after all, right?

Bips-John still going strong

the impression that people in past eras never used to laugh, but promises that his new movie Veer will have its light moments. “We haven’t followed the regular format. This has emotion, drama and comedy unlike other period films, which always casts an impression that no one used to laugh in those days,” said Salman in an interview. “The language has undergone a huge change. The dialogues are in contemporary language but would show that people of that time used to speak and behave like this,” he added.

Explaining how his co-star Zarine Khan joined the cast, Salman said, “The film is of a different genre, so we needed a young fresh look. More than that, we needed somebody with a yesteryear look. With just two weeks left to start the film, we didn’t have anyone who would fit the role. Then I met Zarine by coincidence on the set of Subhash Ghai’s Yuvvraaj.” Salman denies any resemblance between

Zarine and his girlfriend Katrina Kaif. “Except being fair and having a sharp nose, I don’t see any similarity between them,” said a smug Sallu. The film’s story has been written by Salman himself and while scripting it he was scared whether his father Salim Khan, a noted writer, would approve. “I showed the story to my father and the biggest fear was what he was going to say. But he said it’s a good story.”

When asked why he chose to make a period film now, he said, “I had written the story 20 years ago but at that time it wasn’t possible to make the film. I thought now is the right time to make it, so I did.” This is Salman’s second film as a scriptwriter, his first was Baghi (1990). “Baghi showed a good relationship between a father and son and Veer does that too. I believe that father and son should be the best of friends. Today, my father and me chat, drink and chill out together. But if I cross my line, I run away. I stay outdoors for two months. That’s the chemistry they should share. The respect should also be there,” said Salman, who claims that he could be a good father. “I am not sure how good I would be as a husband, but I believe I would be a good father. One has to get married, I will also get married but haven’t decided when.”

The actor has been in the industry for more than two decades and has played a variety of roles, worked in various genres and sported different looks. Asked if there was anything particular he looked forward to as an actor, he said, “No yaar. I do whatever comes my way.” Well, let’s hope Veer leads Salman to victory.

gaps between people. He is also keen on making a Punjabi movie, because he is a Punjabi and loves the language. This Bollywood star also has a house in Canada with a permanent residence status. “Canada is like a second home to me. I love Canada. Though the weather here is cold, people are very warm,” added Akshay, whose connection with Canada goes way back to 1995 when he visited the country and fell in love with it.

He says, “Seven to eight of my films have been shot in Toronto and Vancouver, and six of them have done very well. So I have special connections with this country.” The privilege of carrying the Olympic Torch was a rare honour, and Akshay said, “It is a dream come true. I am honored and privileged to have been selected as an official torchbearer for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic torch relay. I would like to thank Canadians for this honor and recognition.”

The actor is also very happy that Toronto is hosting the Bollywood Oscars in 2012. “I am very happy that the event is coming to Toronto. It will be a great honor for Canada,” he said. Well, let’s hope Akshay plans some more movies in Canada – he desperately needs a hit right now!

3 Idiots hits the jackpot

Aamir Khan starrer comedy-drama 3

Idiots” has grossed over Rs.315 crore ($70 million) globally in the 19 days since its release, with a huge response across continents. Based on Chetan Bhagat’s bestseller Five Point Someone, the film has opened new visats for the Indian Film industry, says Amit Khanna, chairman of Reliance BIG Entertainment. “The huge response across continents reinforces our belief that a well-made, well-exploited film can still create magic in the darkened auditorium. We are proud to be associated with Vinod, Aamir, Raju and the talented team of 3 Idiots,” he continued.

Added Chopra, “I am thrilled and humbled that so many people all over the world have

They’re undoubtedly one of Bollywood’s best-looking couples, but rumours were in the air that all was not wonderful between Bipasha Basu and John Abraham. Apparently, Bips decided to end the relationship around the time John made New York. But now the truth emerges that the couple are very much together, and have even moved in together. A source close to Bipasha says, “John is now living with Bips at her Khar residence. Even though the move is not permanent, the two spend a lot of time together. Like any couple, John and Bipasha also have arguments but that does not mean they have split.” When asked about their relationship, the sultry Bips laughed and said, “I guess we are

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I reckon my 3 Idiots is going to be a bigger hit then your Paa

Chandra Malhotra

good luck to the couple, let’s hope their next step together puts the rumours to bed once and for all.

Veer will have light moments

Salman Khan is excited about the release of Veer, a story of bravery, treachery and love. The story revolves around the 18th century Pindaris who preferred death to

Amitji, I will beat Paa and get best actor award for 3 Idiots and again I won’t be there to receive it. Hun na mein idiot!

Saurav Gupta

Your performance was brilliant as Auro but I could have gotten a more refined Auro out of you.

Aditi Sood

WHO: Moushumi Chatterjee

AKSHAY KUMAR

JOHN ABRAHAM & BIPASHA BASU

SALMAN KHAN

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