Talk Mag March 28, 2013 by Suhas Shankarappa

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magazine

the intelligent bangalorean’s must-read weekly

MOVIES Paan Singh Tomar and the new Indian cinema 7 STRAYS Humane adoptions bring joy 9 TREND What’s electronic dance music all about? 16

EYE ON SPACE

Bangalore is pitching in to build the world’s largest telescope, to come up in Hawaii. The Rs 7,600-crore, five-nation project, helmed in India by Kannadiga astronomer Shrinivas Kulkarni, will help unravel many mysteries about the universe, reports PRASHANTH GN 11-15 11-15

FIRST IN TALK NR Narayana Murthy and Sudha Murty on family genius Shrinivas Kulkarni

Letters column on Page 31 this week

credit cards

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Don't let recovery agents harass you While wilful defaulters make life difficult for genuine borrowers, sometimes it is the recovery agents who cross the line. Learn to tackle them

editor talk In our enthusiasm for information technology, we often forget Bangalore is also a city of brilliant people working in pure science. Scientists immersed in physics and astronomy pursue ideas that sound esoteric to lay people but advance our understanding of the universe. Such disciplines offer no immediate technological benefits, but in the long run change the way we experience and perceive our world. We launched Talk with a story on the ‘God particle’ experiment, with Prashanth GN visiting Geneva, looking around the Large Hadron Collider site, and returning with an interview with CERN chief RolfDieter Heuer. Ours was a sceptical story, perhaps the only one of its kind, that suggested the announcement of the discovery of the Higgs boson was premature. Our story won an appreciative readership, and gave us the confidence to publish more science-related stories--on Bangalore’s work in nanoscience, aeronautics, and bioengineering. When we started exploring the possibility of reporting on the Thirty Metre Telescope, we were excited to find its Bangalore and Karnataka connections. Bangalore is contributing critical elements to this ambitious five-nation project, and the astronomer guiding its course for India is Shrinivas Kulkarni, brother-in-law of India’s IT elder statesman NR Narayana Murthy. We got interviews not only with Kulkarni but also with his illustrious sister Sudha and her husband Narayana Murthy, and have put together a package that should inspire this city’s science buffs and inquisitive young minds. Happy reading! SR Ramakrishna ram@talkmag.in

SAVIE KARNEL savie.karnel@talkmag,in

arch is always a tight month for finances, what with tax deductions, school fees and insurance premiums. For some of us, it might mean difficulty with EMIs and paying off credit card bills. So it is also the time when recovery agents are at work. Naveen Giddappa, general secretary of Credit Cardholders’ Association of India, says complaints about harassment from recovery agents go up during this period. “We are receiving 80 to 90

notice urging borrowers to pay up. calls every day,” he told Talk. The State Bank of India has The association has requested banks to “excuse” borrowers taken the lead and published picthis month, but banks, not sur- tures of defaulters in Delhi. These prisingly, haven’t agreed. “They people had taken loans of Rs 3 lakh could at least give borrowers two and their outstanding amounts were in the range months’ time,” says of Rs 2.6 to Rs 2.9 Naveen. Banks plan to lakh. Banks have publish names Some banks begun using harshhave decided to er methods to presand photos of publish the details sure borrowers to defaulters only in local pay back on time. in newspapers newspapers circuThe latest is the lated around the R B I- s a n c t i o n e d ‘Name and Shame’ policy,’ of what residences of the defaulters. Some banks will put up pictures of are known as ‘wilful’ defaulters. Banks publish names and defaulters on their notice boards. Of course, borrowers don’t photographs of defaulters in newspapers, along with their like it. “In India people are very addresses, within 15 days of a conscious of their reputation. The

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people default on loans name and shame policy can because of a casual attitude. drive many to suicide,” says Some borrowers think they Naveen, The association is can get by without repaying planning to approach the the loan. In such circumReserve Bank of India (RBI) to stances, banks have to use do away with this policy. strict measures. A recent RBI “Going to the Supreme Court report says bad loans could would have been better, but jump three times if not tackwe do not have the resources led. “Bad loans in India could to fight a case there,” he says. jump to as much as 5.8 per The banks have their own case. This policy is applic- Naveen Giddappa, General cent of the total within two years in a severe risk scenario, able only to those RBI calls Secretary of Credit up from 2.8 percent in ‘wilful’ defaulters. According Cardholders’ Association September 2012,” states the to RBI guidelines a wilful defaulter is one who deliberately doesn’t report. The name and shame policy is a pay his dues, despite having adequate cash result of this scenario. For smaller amounts of defaulted payflow and net worth. Banks can also classify defaulters as ‘wilful’ if the loans are utilised ments, the banks have been using the for purposes other than those previously methods that they have been using for stated, funds are siphoned off from the many years now like harassing phone calls bank-financed activity, records are falsi- and sending recovery agents to the house fied, or securities are disposed of without or office. If you feel you are being unfairly tarthe bank’s knowledge. But as Naveen points out, it is the aam geted, the Credit Cardholders’ Association aadmi who seems to suffer the most. suggests some ways in which one can han“Banks haven’t been fair with the recovery. dle this harassment. Phone calls: The association suggests For example, Vijay Mallya is a big defaulter. Why didn’t the banks publish his picture in the CVG formula, named after the founder of the association CV Giddappa. Answer the newspapers?” asks Naveen. Bankers on the other hand feel some your mobile or landline and keep the

phone aside. Let the agent keep taking. He numbers on the profile. If you do, use adewill get fed up and hang up. If your family quate privacy settings so that your number is living elsewhere, he may call your family is not visible to the public. If agents turn up at your house: and abuse them. Ask your folks also to folAccording to RBI guidelines, before sendlow the CVG formula. Beware of tricks: When borrowers ing a recovery agent, the bank is supposed change mobile numbers, the recovery to send you a letter with a picture, name agency pulls out the call list from the ser- and phone number of the agent. The agent vice provider and notes the numbers that is also supposed to carry a copy of the letwere frequently called. Most often these ter when he comes. Ask for the letter. If numbers are of family and friends. They they don’t have it don’t entertain them. If they create a scene, dial call these numbers and 100 and call the police state that they are from a control room. courier company and Some borrowers If they barge into have to deliver a parcel to think they can your house, they commit the borrower. “When they get by without a crime of trespass. You get the number the can call the police and harassment starts again,” repaying the seek their help. “If says Naveen. loan women are alone in the A recent ploy is to house and the agents call from outstation numbers. “When it’s an STD call, we tend to don’t leave, they can claim self defence and believe them and give the correct phone attack the agents. They could throw chilli number of the borrower,” he says. If your powder in the eyes, and call 100,” says family receives such a call asking for your Naveen. Above all, remember that credit is to contact details, ask them to say that they be used for convenience, to be paid back in don’t have your number, he advises. Don’t share contact details on social a planned way. It is not free money. Call The Credit Cardholders’ media: Recovery agents have started spying on profiles of borrowers on Facebook Association on 22129894 or call Naveen on and Linked-In. Do not leave your phone 9341261962

political diary

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

The Congress is the hottest destination for bureaucrats and policemen migrating to politics this season

Babugiri to netagiri BASU MEGALKERI basu.megalkeri@talkmag.in

ecause no one can vote them out, bureaucrats feel more secure than politicians, but many among them are keen to join politics once they retire. This time around, as Karnataka goes to the polls in May, hundreds of babus are turning netas. Most bureaucrats are clamouring to join the Congress, the party they believe will sweep the polls. Former IAS officers Ashok Kumar Manoli, Baburao Mudbi, K Shivaram, S Puttaswamy and Baladev Krishna are already in the party fold, and more are following them. But it is not just officials. Senior Congressman SM Krishna’s gunman R Manjunath and former superintendent of police MK Solabheswarappa are also set to don khadi, the favourite attire of politicians, and join the Congress.

B YES BOSS Former inspector general of police Shankar Bidari (bowing) is contesting on a Congress ticket

New political bosses Loyalties are shifting, too. When in service, former inspector general of police Shankar Bidari is known to have favoured Yeddyurappa. Now, he is ready to contest elections on a Congress ticket. “I have joined the Congress because I admire its ideals,” he says. The other parties attracting bureaucrats and policemen are the JD(S) and BSR Congress. IAS officer MV Veerabhadraiah, who last served as deputy general manager of the Upper Krishna project, is likely to contest on a JD(S). IAS officer Ashok Kumar Manoli, former principal secretary for IT-BT and science and technology and Cheluvaraju, former assistant commissioner of police are also gravitating towards HD Deve Gowda’s party. All the three have applied for voluntary retirement. Former deputy inspector general of police MC Narayangowda is contesting from the Chickpet constituency on a JD(S) ticket, while high-profile police officer BB Ashok

Kumar, who had earned himself the title of ‘Tiger,’ is planning to contest from Shivajinagar on a JD(S) ticket. Former IAS officer S Subramanya too will contest elections on a JD(S) ticket, but from where he is not sure. Yeddyurappa’s KJP will field former IAS officers Dr Baburao Mudbi and IR Perumal. Former inspector of Upparpet police station Lokeshwar is likely to be the party’s candidate from Tiptur.

BJP last in line The BJP holds no attraction for bureaucrats aspiring to be politicians. Karnataka State Industrial Development Corporation officer Chikkanna is rumoured to be joining the BJP. No other big bureaucrat has joined the party this time. By contrast, B Sriramulu’s BSR Congress has many takers. Former KAS officer Ramapriya has become a political advisor to the party. Senior journalist and botany professor Ravindra Reshme is its official spokesman. Former Bellary deputy commissioner B Shivappa and retired

There is no model bureaucratturned-political leader currently in India. People of the calibre of HM Patel (ICS officer during Sardar Patel's time) no longer enter politics. Bureaucrats entering politics is not new. The numbers have increased now. It's a democracy and anyone can contest elections.

Chiranjeevi Singh Distinguished IAS officer (retired), now President, Alliance Francais, Bangalore

bureaucrats Dr Chandrashekar, Cheluvaraju and Dr Hanumantappa have also joined the party. How have bureaucrats and policemen fared in politics? Ramesh Jigajinagi came from a Dalit family in Bijapur. He was select-

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BABU BRIGADE Former chief secretary BS Patil (Congress), and former IAS officers Baburao Mudbi (KJP) and Ashok Kumar Manoli (possibly JD(S))

ed for the post of a police sub-inspector and was in the waiting list. He was so influenced by Ramakrishna Hegde that he jumped into politics in 1983. He became a minister. Now, he is in the BJP and is an MP. His son-in-law Govind Karjol, a PWD supervisor, followed in his footsteps and is now the Kannada and Culture Minister in the BJP government. Both politicians have a fairly unblemished track record. Police inspector DT Jayakumar resigned following a tiff with his seniors. He joined the Janata Dal in 1985 and contested elections from Nanjanagud constituency. He lost twice and won once. He became a minister in JH Patel’s cabinet, but did not earn a good name. H Chenningappa was a head constable who went on to become forest minister in Kumaraswamy’s cabinet. He was involved in illegal mining and trapped by the Lokayukta police. He also gained notoriety for party hopping between the JD(S) and the BJP.

Suspended but rewarded IAS officers J Alexander and BS Patil held the top-most bureaucratic post in Karnataka, being chief secretaries. Of Kerala origin, Alexander was the reason for the downfall of two chief ministers. He was the excise secretary during Hegde’s rule and chief secretary during S Bangarappa’s government. During Veerendra Patil’s government, the Lokayukta trapped Alexander, and he was suspended. Despite his notoriety, he got the chief secretary’s job in Bangarappa’s cabinet. He was involved in the Classic computer scam, which resulted in the fall of the government. A CBI inquiry followed. The next chief minister, Veerappa Moily, kept Alexander under suspension. But after he retired, Alexander contested elections on a Congress ticket from Bharatinagar constituency in Bangalore. He became a minister in SM Krishna’s cabinet. BS Patil was the chief secretary in JH Patel and SM Krishna’s government. He is in the Congress now. In 2008, he contested the Lok Sabha elec-

tion from Dharwad North and lost. From a feudal Lingayat family, Patil moves around in elite circles. He shares a close relationship with former chief minister Yeddyurappa and expressway builder Ashok Kheny. Former Bangalore police commissioner P Kodandaramaiah resigned four years before his retirement. He could have become the inspector-general of police, but chose politics. He joined the Janata Dal in 1996 and was elected from the Chitradurga parliamentary constituency. He then hopped to the Congress and lost. He is again gearing up to contest elections.

Sangliana’s record HT Sangliana came from Mizoram to Karnataka and made a name for himself as a super cop. He was also Bangalore’s police commissioner. He had become a folk hero of sorts, with two commercial feature films being made on him in Kannada. After his retirement, he contested on a BJP ticket and became an MP from Bangalore North constituency. He was never accused of corruption, but his political colleagues were contemptuous of his craving for publicty. Later, he moved to the Congress and lost. Similarly, police inspector BC

Patil gave up his uniform to join films. He acted in and directed 25 films. In 2004, he joined the Congress and won assembly elections twice from Hirekerur. His performance has been average in all the three fields. Many top-ranking police officers have lost their popularity after entering politics. Prominent among them are Subhash Bharani, BK Shivaram, GA Bawa and Abdul Azeem. Subhash Bharani contested the assembly election on a BJP ticket from Kollegal in 2008. He lost by a huge margin. He then joined Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). He has now jumped over to the JD(S) and now hopes to contest from Gandhinagar. Shivaram gained popularity as ACP at the Bangalore Crime Branch. He joined the JD(S) in 2008 and lost the assembly elections from Malleswaram. He has now joined the Congress and will again contest from Malleswaram. Police officer Abdul Azeem was angry that Deve Gowda didn’t make him a MLC a second time. He spoke against the former prime minister to the media. He said that the crowd gathered for the Deve Gowda’s Muslim rally, actually consisted of Hindus made to wear Muslim skull caps. He was ousted from the party. He has now returned and is likely to contest from Hebbal. Bawa served the force for 37 years and retired as deputy commissioner of police. He may contest elections from Hebbal or Surathkal. Over the last three decades, bureaucrats and policemen have entered politics and risen to ministership, but few can claim distinguished public service records. The new crop joining politics shows no promise that things will be better this season.

Prof S Raghunath Chairman, Academy of International Business India Chapter

A writing workshop for business scholars The Indian Institute of Management is organising a workshop for scholars who want to learn to write their research papers well. The institute is hosting the Academy of International Business (AIB)'s India chapter annual conference between April 15 and 17, and the workshop is one of its highlights. How do you rate the quality of research papers in India? What areas need to be improved? Often, good work in India goes unrecognised because no one hears about it. Also, planning to publish one's research in a top journal can be intimidating. Some scholars do not really understand the mechanics of peer-reviewed publication. At our paper development workshop, editors of international journals provide guidance on these issues. How can Indian B-Schools gain from the conference? This is an opportunity to gain world-class exposure at a low cost (Rs 1,000 for three days). This will help aspiring research scholars as well as managers and academics interested in updating their knowledge of international business. What is the AIB? AIB is the leading association of specialists in international business. Present in 81 countries, IIM-Bangalore hosts the India Chapter of AIB. This year’s theme is ‘International business in the context of emerging economies’.

Lok Satta Party and the power of one IAS officer Jayaprakash Narayan (57) hails from Andhra Pradesh. He was a doctor who appeared for the IAS examinations in Jayaprakash 1980. He ranked Narayan among the top 10 and chose the Andhra Pradesh cadre. He served for 16 years. People affectionately called him JP. In 1996, he resigned from his government job and founded the Lok Satta Party, with the whistle as his symbol. He created awareness about people's rights and governance. After 13 years of

social service, he contested elections in 2009 from Kuktpally assembly constituency. Without bribing people for votes, he won with a margin of 15,000 votes. His was a lone battle. He continued serving people even after entering politics. He may not have succeeded in changing the political system but he has provided a ray of hope. His party plans to field good candidates in the Karnataka assembly elections. Ravi Reddy will contest from BTM Layout, Vivek Menon from Shantinagar, Shantala Damle from Basavangudi, Ashwin Mahesh from Bommanahalli, Dr Meenakshi Bharati from Malleswaram and Sridhar Pacchishetty from Hebbal.

For details of the AIB conference, log on to hrm.iimb.ernet.in

K SRINIVAS

Prof S Raghunath, AIB India Chapter chairperson, is also Dean (Admin) and Professor, Corporate Strategy and Policy, at the Indian Institute of Management-Bangalore (IIMB).

Questions

Reactions, statements, accusations, complaints, or just straight talk—this is where you get them all

film matters

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Technically on a par with the best of world cinema, Paan Singh Tomar was also a popular success. Its winning the national award for Best Film—an honour usually reserved for arthouse productions —signals a decisive turn for Indian cinema WORLD CLASS Tigmanshu Dhulia’s (left) Paan Singh Tomar tells the real-life story of a medal-wnning athlete who becomes a bandit

A leap across the gap T M K Raghavendra is the author of Seduced by the Familiar: Narration and Meaning in Indian Popular Cinema (Oxford, 2008), 50 Indian Film Classics (HarperCollins, 2009) and Bipolar Identity: Region, Nation and the Kannada Language Film (Oxford, 2011).

he announcement of the National Film Awards on March 18 may not have thrown up surprises— Tigmanshu Dhulia’s Paan Singh Tomar, the winner of the Best Film Award, has few detractors—but it may mark a decisive moment in the history of Indian cinema. India’s art filmmakers have always denied there are two distinct categories—‘art’ and ‘commercial’—in cinema, insisting that there’s only ‘good’ and ‘bad’ cinema. But, the fact is that popular and art cinema have always addressed two different constituencies. Art cinema began as an initiative from the government in the early 1970s, during Indira Gandhi’s regime, due to a desire—on the part of the state—to help create a valid Indian film aesthetic. While this was responsible in the 1970s and 1980s for much of the best cinema ever made in the country, it gradually became a method by with the state exhibited ‘social concern.’ Wherever the State

was failing in its social duties, it attempted to compensate by rewarding artistes who brought its failures to public attention and this, in turn, became a token of its sincerity! If one considers the subjects dealt with by art cinema—farmers’ suicides, displacement of local populaces by development projects, caste oppression, globalisation and its effects upon traditional livelihoods, etc—they almost entirely represent areas in which the state has failed. To phrase it differently, the art filmmaker was expected to be ‘socially responsible’, i.e. help extricate the country from the morass in which politics had placed it. Needless to say, this is plainly impossible and has resulted in the gradual decline of Indian art cinema. The best art cinema made in the country—like two or three films each of Adoor Gopalakrishnan and G Aravindan from Kerala, and Aribam Syam Sharma from Manipur—has not been ‘socially responsible’ in this narrow sense and has tried to be more personal. Art cinema today—whether

in Malayalam, Kannada, Assamese or this film the National awards have Marathi—hardly has a paying public been dominated by directors like and the constituency it addresses is Shaji N Karun, Buddhadev Dasgupta, only the state. As a result, art films are Girish Kasaravalli and Jahnu Barua made on small budgets, have poor who represent the art film in India technical qualities and the actors are today. But Paan Singh Tomar is a new rarely paid. Many people work on art films in various capacities with only a experience; having found a paying national award in mind, creating a public, it was made with a budget of huge gap between art films awarded around Rs 7 crore where most art locally and cinema acknowledged as films have to manage with budgets of aesthetically significant around the less than Rs 50 lakh. The film may not win major international awards, but world. Indian art films do not win it is, technically and in terms of performances, an accomawards at major plished work which international festiThe state backed can still compete vals and one cannot art cinema to internationally. One recall the last one has only to compare even allowed into exhibit its it to the Marathi art competition at ‘social concern’ film Dhag (about Cannes, Berlin or someone born into a Venice. The last nonart film to receive a best film award at caste traditionally engaged in crematthe national level was perhaps ing the dead) which won the Best Madhur Bhandarkar’s Page 3 (2005), Director Award, to recognise the difbut that film was too sensationalist ference that it represents for Indian and exploitative to represent a cinema—not only technically but also change for Indian cinema. Apart from thematically.

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This is not a review of Paan Singh Tomar, but the film fits into a pattern emerging in Hindi cinema today. The film is about a patriotic sportsman who later comes into conflict with a corrupt State by becoming a dacoit. Increasingly, it would seem, Hindi cinema is addressing the Anglophone public from the metropolises which seek to connect directly with the Nation without the State as intermediary. The State may have grown weak and wasteful in the past decade or so, but this may be due to the attempts by elected governments to hasten its withdrawal from areas in which it had been active, to make way for private enterprise. Although it is only the State that can ensure an inclusive Nation, this withdrawal has been supported by the upwardly mobile classes—perhaps because they are implicated in the private sector as employees, vendors and shareholders. The association of sport and individual achievement with ‘patriotism’ is therefore a corollary to the State being deliberately distanced from the Nation. One may, as I do, find Paan Singh Tomar to be politically dubious. And yet, its concerns make it much more widely acceptable than Indian art cinema has ever been. It provides evidence that there is now a large public in the metropolises which is

prepared to support cinema addressing its concerns even though this cinema is formally indistinguishable from the cinematic norm around the world. This makes for a cinema as different from HAHK or DDLJ as cheese is from chalk. Paan Singh Tomar may be the most accomplished among the new films, but others like Kahaani, directors like Anuraag Kashyap and actors like Irrfan Khan and Nawazuddin Siddiqui announce this just as clearly. If the gap between the Indian blockbuster and the international film once seemed unbridgeable, the day is not far off when there will be more films like Lagaan—Oscar nominees if not winners— although another Pather Panchali is as unlikely as ever. New directors like Tigmanshu Dhulia may eventually put Indian cinema in a category technically comparable with mainstream cinema in the rest of the world (although countries like South Korea and Taiwan achieved this earlier). But the issue is also whether a country like India, with its claims to high culture, should not also have a cinema in the Satyajit Ray mould, a more intimate cinema that will place Indian cinema firmly in film history. The State, it is apparent, cannot ensure this; although it is going on with its

ART FIRST Unlike Indian arthouse films, Amour, the last film to win the Golden Palm at Cannes, does not echo the State's social agenda

tired system of national awards and TV rights on Doordarshan. Since the affluent class which might support such a cinema values individual achievement, perhaps a businessman (who can afford to lose money) will start an international film school for gifted film talents with profit not as its only motive.

The exorbitant new film schools in India, it is evident, are essentially scams because none of them has the capacity to create international winners, and the traditional ‘Indian’ way of making films needs little formal training. These schools have been recycling the same human resources from the FTII for eons and new blood from outside is evidently needed. A new kind of training could create a new cinema in which only artistic expression is paramount. The last film to win the Golden Palm at Cannes, Michael Haneke’s Amour, one may be sure, is not echoing the social agenda of the European Union. Indian cinema today is unrecognisable from its avatar just a decade ago and if an overarching reason is to be found, it is evidently in globalisation and the coming together of culturally diverse populations. Audiences in Mumbai are therefore closer to those in LA or Seoul than they were at one time. That a Paan Singh Tomar won the National Award at this juncture only underlines this fact, because Tigmanshu Dhulia’s film is ‘mainstream’ fare comparable to cinema from anywhere in the world and with performances to match. It needs no special tolerance levels that we were once forced to concede to our own popular cinema and this is heartening.

RAMESH HUNSUR

‘You can make a film with Rs 30 lakh’ P Seshadri is the only director in India to have won seven national awards for seven films in a row. His latest, Bharat Stores, has won the national award for best regional feature film in Kannada. The former journalist has also directed several documentaries and TV serials. Excerpts from an interview with Basu Megalkeri

WALLED MART Senior actor Dattatreya in P Seshadri’s (right) Bharat Stores. He plays a shopkeeper affected by giant MNCs cornering the retail market

How did Bharat Stores, your award-winning film, come about? On September 14 last year, the central government decided to allow foreign direct investment in retail. It set me thinking. Several shops had closed down when Big Bazaar opened shop in my neighbourhood. Why, even a chain like Food World had shut shop. I spoke to 25-30 Setty and Malayali shop owners. I decided to make a film on what was happening around me. Small traders and their customers share a certain bond, and I wanted to capture this emotional aspect. Once FDI flows into India, about six crore traders are likely to go out of business. How much does it cost to make a film like yours? About Rs 30 lakh. With the Canon D5, it has become easy to make films inexpensively. About 15 Kannada films have already been made with this camera. When I took the script of my first film Munnudi around, one producer laughed at me and said the Rs 15 lakh I was asking for was what he spent on just a song. Yet, he refused to fund it, saying it had a Muslim theme. His rationale was that Hindus wouldn't be interested, and the Muslims didn't watch Kannada films. My friends and I formed a co-operative and made the film, and it

went on to win a national award. Jayamala produced my children's film Tuttoori (Trumpet). Basant Kumar Patil has produced my last two films. Commercial film-makers complain art film-makers are an elite club... We have never distanced ourselves from the industry. They ignore us. Under Girish Kasaravalli's leadership, we have started Chitrasamooha, a society to promote art films. We regularly arrange shows at Tribhuvan cinema. How many from the commercial circuit come to watch our films?

humane adoptions

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Stray, disabled and loved RAMESH HUNSUR

Bangaloreans with a heart are taking home crippled street dogs and nurturing them with affection

SAVIE KARNEL savie.karnel@talkmag.in

ittle Chinky in her black coat whizzes past you like a bullet. At her Rajajinagar home, it is difficult to get a good glimpse of her, for she is forever speeding. She jumps on the bed and over the sofa. It’s only when she stops to take a breath that you notice she is three-legged. The year-old-dog stands in a dignified poise on her three legs. “I don’t think she knows that she has a leg missing,” says Kamala Vaidyanathan, a retired employee of National Textiles Corporation. For Kamala, Chinky has been a companion and friend since her husband’s death. It is eight months since Chinky came to her house. “My husband was bedridden then. Chinky used to play with him. He was happy to have Chinky around,” says Kamala. When her husband passed away four months ago, Chinky ensured Kamala didn’t feel lonely. “She doesn’t leave me alone even for a minute. She comes wherever I go,” she says. Kamala never thought of having a pet. One day her nephew Vinay Narayanaswamy was passing by in Vijayanagar when he noticed a crowd on the road. “Everyone was watching an injured puppy run over by some vehicle,” he recalls. Vinay picked up the pup and went to the Veterinary College Hospital in Hebbal. The doctors said she would survive if her leg was amputated. “I brought her home after the treatment, but I already had three dogs, so I asked my aunt to keep her until she recovered,” says Vinay.

WOOF! Kamala Vaidyanathan with Chinky, who was rescued by her nephew Vinay

other. When Vinay Chinky’s disreturned to take ‘I don’t think ability doesn’t seem Chinky from she knows her to have caused any Kamala, she didn’t leg is missing,’ problem with their want to part with relationship. “She is her. “She is just like says Kamala faster than any other my child. She makes dog,” adds Vinay. me understand whatever she wants to say in her language,” she says. When Kamala Caught under an auto throws a ball, Chinky fetches it two Pinky Chandran’s dog Bonnie was times, but doesn’t do so the third run over by an auto. She rescued her time. “She says bow-bow asking me to and got her treated by a vet, but her get it,” Kamala laughs. The two stay leg also had to be amputated. Since inseparable and sleep next to each nobody wanted to adopt her, Bonnie

now lives at the community radio station Pinky runs at Jain College. “She is healthy and active. Her missing leg hasn’t stopped her from having a litter,” says Pinky. It is not uncommon for people to choose a street dog as a pet. But if the animal happens to have a disability, no one wants it. Debadrita Jadhav found such an unwanted puppy in Malleswaram. Hatchi was born in a litter of 11 pups. “When they were young, they looked like Labradors, and people adopted them all, but no one took Hatchi, who was born with a deformed leg,” says Debadrita. Debadrita fostered Hatchi and put her up for adoption at an adoption camp. “But no one picked her up there either,” she says. She decided to keep Hatchi as her pet. “She is my daughter,” she says. Nothing has been able to stop Hatchi from walking gracefully. The three-legged dog won the title of Showstopper at the recently held The Great Indian Dog Show. She runs and plays with Debadrita’s five-year old son. “I think she is as active as any other dog,” she says. When retired teacher Savita Sharma brought Pulla home, he was in a coma. He was flung from the fourth floor and had suffered spinal cord injuries. She took him to several vets and cared for him. Some told her Pulla would not survive. He was on drips and steroids. “We poured milk in his mouth. The only hope was that he was urinating when in coma. It meant that his kidneys weren’t damaged,” she says. Savitha sat by Pulla day and night, tending to him. “I kept chanting the Mahamrityunjaya mantra. It is a powerful mantra which brings victory of life over death,” she says. True to her belief, Pulla stood up after a week. “He couldn’t walk properly for some time, but is perfectly fine now.” Before Savita adopted Pulla, he was a stray who lived outside a restaurant in Sadashivnagar. Every day at about 4 pm, Pulla used to knock at Savitha’s gate. She and her grandson would feed him milk and

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rice. It was a routine for about two years.

Festival outrage On a Diwali day eight years ago, Pulla didn’t turn up. Savita assumed he was hiding somewhere because of the sound of crackers. When he didn’t come even after two days, she sent her grandson to look for him. “My grandson returned and said that Pulla was lying dead. I ran in my nightie without chappals. He was lying outside the restaurant, motionless. He was breathing, and there was no bleeding,” she recalls. Savita carried him in her arms and brought him home. She found out from the restaurant staff that a man had thrown Pulla down from the fourth floor. He had been lying there for two days. The restaurant staff lived on the fourth floor and had a day off on Diwali. They had sat gambling that night. “One of them lost all his savings of Rs 4,000. Frustrated, he flung Pulla down. Nobody bothered what happened to him after that,” Savita recalls. After Pulla recovered, Savita adopted him and walked him regularly. The restaurant staff started demanding Pulla back. They claimed it was their dog. “I fought back. I said they would once again throw Pulla down when they got angry. I couldn’t let him go to those cruel people again,” she says. Savita is 76, and Pulla is 10. Pulla came

into her house eight years ago. “He is still disturbed and traumatised. He shakes violently in his sleep,” she says. Savita asked a vet the reason. He said Pulla hadn’t overcome the shock of being flung to the ground. Her family cannot think of a life without a pet. “He is my grandchild. When someone says where Naani is, he runs to me,” she says. These are among the lucky strays who have found happy homes despite their disability. But for the majority of crippled strays, life is a nightmare.

SAFETY NET Savita Sharma with Pulla, who she adopted after he was thrown down from the fourth floor of a building. (Left) Debadrita with Hatchi, rescued from the street.

eye on space

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Reach for the stars

COURTESY TMT OBSERVATORY CORPORATION

Hubli man Shrinivas Kulkarni is the moving spirit behind India being on board the Rs 7,600-crore, five-nation Thirty Metre Telescope project, comparable in some ways to the scale and ambition of the ‘God particle’ experiment

ALL-SEEING Twelve times more powerful than the Hubble Space Telescope but not as expensive, some experts believe that the TMT can unlock the secrets of the very nature of the universe

PRASHANTH GN prashanth.gn@talkmag.in

eep in the recesses of space are secrets still waiting to be discovered, resistant even to the most advanced optical and radio telescopes and the efforts of brilliant astrophysicists and astronomers across the world. These scientists are now looking forward to the building of the Thirty Metre Telescope (TMT), the world’s most advanced ground-based observatory, with a ‘light gathering power’ 10 times of what exists today. Set to become operational sometime after 2020 on a hill in Hawaii, five countries are coming together to build and operate the

TMT. India is one of them. Bangalore is set to play a key role in more ways than one. After all, one of the key personnel driving it is the brilliant, soft-spoken, Dharwad Kannada-speaking scientist Shrinivas Kulkarni, currently based in the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), the premier agency in the TMT Corporation. Kulkarni, who also happens to be Infosys icon NR Narayana Murthy’s brother-in-law—he is Sudha Murty’s brother—is on the Governing Board of the TMT Corporation. The TMT will be 12 times more powerful than the well-known Hubble Space Telescope. With its primary mirror designed to be 30 metres wide, and made up of almost 500 hexagonal mirror segments, it is a massive undertaking. It will cost 1.4

billion dollars, or about Rs 7,600 crore. India will fund 10 per cent of the cost — about 100 million dollars, or Rs 540 crore. In a day and age when countries resort to international cooperation even for strategic defence projects, it is not surprising that major scientific endeavours take multiple countries on board. The Large Hadron Collider at CERN (See Talk Issue 1) is an example of how such expensive projects are undertaken today. The Indian government’s Department of Science and Technology (DST) has been involved in the project since 2010. Bangalore’s Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) is the nodal agency in India, the others being the Aryabhata Research Institute for Observational Sciences (ARIES) in Nainital and the Inter-

The Thirty Metre Telescope story  Countries building it: USA, Canada, Japan, China and India.  Location: Mauna Kea in Hawaii, at a height of 4,050 m  Primary mirror is 30 metres wide, with 492 segments; is 10 times more powerful than anything existing today; 12 times more powerful than the Hubble Space Telescope  Project cost 1.4 billion dollars (about Rs 7,600 crore)  Construction begins after 2014, operations begin around after 2020

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University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune. Avasarala Technologies, a Bangalore-based company, will be supplying the actuators (motors for moving or controlling the system).

Meeting Manmohan Kulkarni had begun to contact Indian scientists and administrators around 2006-07 to persuade them to get into the project. He made a series of visits since then, incuding one to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in 2011. Kulkarni told Talk (see interview) that like many expat Indians, he was motivated to “return something of value to India.” Saddened that Indian astronomy was “always 20 years behind,” he decided India had to take a bold leap forward. India only has a 2.6 metre telescope and was considering building a 4-metre, a 10-metre and then a 30-m telescope. “The alternative was to take a risk and jump to 30-metres. With the new found confidence in India, especially among our youth, I thought the latter was the way to go,” he said in an e-mail interview.

Distinction in the US Kulkarni was born in Maharashtra, and educated at Kendriya Vidyalaya in Hubli, Karnataka. After an MS in physics from IIT Delhi, he went on to do a PhD in astronomy at the University of California in Berkeley. Today he is MacArthur Professor of Astronomy and Planetary Sciences at Caltech. He has held positions in and been honoured by top institutions like NASA, MIT, Cornell, Princeton, University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University. Prof Bhanu Das, astrophysicist and Acting Director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (it works from Koramangala in Bangalore, told Talk:

“But for Shri, as we call Prof Kulkarni, India today would not have been part of this project or may not have been contributing in the very substantial way in which it will now.”

ture and supply the 1,500 actuators. India will also contribute the complete segment support system including the actuators, and some control software. (See box). IIA being the nodal agency for the project, India TMT Coordination Centre Critical meetings has been set up at IIA, Bangalore. At the Kulkarni did not for a moment cease efforts to get India on board the project. lab here, engineers are involved in develJust one year after India decided to join oping hardware to test and calibrate the telescope project in 2010, he and some systems. Also, scientists are develother scientists of the project arrived in oping tools that could help the astronoIndia to discuss progress on the tele- my community to better utilise the TMT scope. Kulkarni persuaded President once it is commissioned in 2021-22. Each mirror segment will be driven Jean-Lou Chameau of Caltech and by three actuators and Chancellor Henry Yang altogether 1,476 actuaof the University of tors will be required to California, Santa The TMT will be keep all the segments Barbara, who was chairthe world’s most aligned. There can be man of the board, to advanced no space between each travel with him to meet observatory segment, so the mirrors the Indian PM. will have to be crafted Das said, “There is carefully. Reddy says 12 no room for error in building the telescope. The mirrors can- Indian companies have been identified not afford to have a speck of dust. The to supply components. surface should be so fine and so precise that it only reflects the light it sees and The CERN comparison nothing else.” India will be building On a visit to Bangalore in 2011, Kulkarni about 15 per cent of the mirror seg- had said on the sidelines of a lecture: ments. “India participated in the Large Hadron Collider project at CERN, but when it comes to the TMT, it will have an even Birth of the galaxies The research the telescope will enable is bigger involvement.” Ram Sagar, director of the far-reaching, from the birth of the very first stars and the formation of the earli- Aryabhata Research Institute for est galaxies, to the nature and composi- Observational Sciences, had told the tion of the universe and the search for media two months ago: “Qualitatively, life outside earth. Further work on what this will be a more important contribuare known as dark matter and dark ener- tion by India than to the CERN project.” For non-scientists, 2020 may seem gy—calculated to make up the bulk of the universe but for which direct evi- a little far away, but for a discipline that dence has been difficult to obtain— studies the very creation of time and the should add to the excitement. (See box). bending of space, it will be well worth According to Eswar Reddy, pro- the wait. gramme director, India TMT (Information in boxes sourced from Coordination Centre, Bangalore-based Avasarala Technologies will manufac- India TMT Digest)

What will the telescope see and study?  Birth of the first stars and formation of the earliest galaxies. “The TMT will be able to look farther back in time than is currently possible”  Nature and composition of the universe “Normal matter - baryons that constitute stars, planets and life make up only a small fraction of the universe. Much more plentiful is dark matter, matter that neither emits nor reflects light. The vast majority is made up of dark energy, a mysterious repulsive force that is responsible for the accelerated expansion of the universe.”  Relationship between black holes and galaxies. “At the centre of our Milky Way galaxy, and perhaps inside every large galaxy, lurks a super-massive black hole — an infinitely dense point that can wrap space, trap light and stretch time.”  Study of the Milky Way Its origins  Formation of Stars and Planets When stars collide, leftover debris becomes planets. “The TMT's infrared mission will peer into these dusty areas, revealing new solar systems in the making.”  Extra-solar planets and search for life “The first planet around another star was discovered in 1995. Since then, the number of exoplanets discovered by space and ground telescopes has crossed 1,000.” Can we find a planet with life on it?  Our solar system Plenty left to study in our own 'home' environs.

What is India's contribution?  10 per cent of the cost -- 100 million dollars or about Rs 540 crore  15 per cent of the 492 mirror segments that make up the telescope  1,500 actuators, for precise positioning of the segments  3,000 edge sensors, which measure the displacement, tip and tilt of the segments  Major part of the observatory control software  Mirror segment polishing  Segment support assemblies MIRROR, MIRROR An artist's impression showing the TMT’s primary mirror, consisting of 492 hexagonal segments. (Above) Dr Shrinivas Kulkarni.

eye on space

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

GREAT LEAP FORWARD Kulkarni believes India can reap significant R&D ‘spinoff’ benefits from the TMT project

Indian astronomy has to

take risks to go global: Kulkarni Shrinivas R Kulkarni, is professor of astronomy and planetary sciences at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and a Fellow of the Royal Society, London. He is on the governing board of the Thirty Metre Telescope (TMT) project. Shuttling between cities in the US, Kulkarni outlined for Talk readers his vision for Indian astronomy

PRASHANTH GN prashanth.gn@talkmag.in

As TMT board member, how often do you interact with DST or Indian scientists? I travel to India four times a year and in addition I meet Indian colleagues at the TMT Board meetings (which now rotate among the collaborating countries and partners: Canada, China, Japan, India, UC and Caltech)—also four times a year. Sometimes I find this exhausting but I’m energised by the fact that when the project is completed young Indian astronomers will have access to a global facility and thus can compete on an equal footing with the rich countries. What inspired you to bring India on board the TMT? Like many expatriate Indians I wanted to return something of value to India. I tried many small schemes but found that it was hard to have a major effect. In 2006, when TMT was launched, I thought I should do something completely different from the approaches I had tried before—namely a bold project that would catapult Indian science on to the global stage. Actually we

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had only two choices: Indian astronomy remains behind—in fact, always 20 years behind—as we build a 4-m, a 10-m and then a 30m telescope. The alternative was to take a risk and jump from our existing 2.6-m telescope to a 30-m one. With the new found confidence in India, I thought the latter was the way to go.

demic but is practical, which most academics are not. I too have a bit of that combination and that is why we really get along well. All my sisters really showered, and continue to shower, affection on me. They have been supportive of my dedication to research. My sister Jaishree was particularly helpful and affectionate during my schooling.

How will the telescope help dark energy and dark matter research? One of the great hopes of TMT is that we can start addressing the origin of dark matter. We have inferred that dark matter exists and we know that each galaxy has a large halo of dark matter. How is this ghostly matter organised? Is it in clumps and if so what is the size of clumps? What determines the size of these clumps? Through a variety of techniques, TMT will be able to trace this ghostly matter on especially small scales—something that we have not been able to do so far. I am not an expert on dark energy. That field is very active now and so it is very difficult to predict what TMT can contribute in about eight years from now, when we expect to see the first light of TMT. TMT is expected to make great contributions to the study of extrasolar planets, in particular, spectroscopy of their atmospheres.

How has education in Hubli influWhat will be the R&D contribution enced your choice of science and of India to the project and what will astronomy? I attribute my interest in science be our R&D takeaway? entirely to my great teachers at the One of the reasons the TMT project has received Central School great support (Kendriya Vidyalaya) ‘Astronomy in from DST, DAE in Hubli. I had truly India remains 20 and the Indian exceptional teachers astronomical in all subjects. I years behind the community is attribute my interest world’ the R&D spinoff in astronomy to Prof to India. TMT, Govind Swarup (now retired from TIFR). He is my unlike traditional telescopes, is not role model and I truly admire the made of one mirror. The mirror is amazing work he has done and made of 492 hexagonal segments each 1.4 m across. Through clever What are the most recent developachieved in the Indian context. electro-mechanical system, the 492 ments in the thirty metre telescope segments are aligned and the light project from the India perspective? What was the influence of your sisfocused. This “segmented” We had an extensive road show ters, Sudha Murthy, Jaishree Deshpande, and your brother-in-law, approach is the future of telescopes about two years ago and nearly a for the simple reason that this is a dozen major companies in India Infosys icon NR Narayana Murthy, cost effective way of making them. showed interest. TMT-India is now on you and your outlook? I am the youngest in the family. My The segments can be thin since putting out RFP (request for prosisters were all brighter than me. they are not large. In contrast, the posals) for ‘proof-of-concept’ or They won gold medals at the col- single mirror (old style ‘monolithic’ ‘preliminary work’ to those who lege and university level. As a result telescope) has to be thick so as not responded to the RFPs. Some I have grown up with the idea that to deform. I hope that as a result of recent examples are Avasarala of women are smarter than men. I did India participating in the TMT Bangalore (actuators for the prinot win any gold medal at IIT project, and with the Indian com- mary mirror; segment support Delhi, which I joined after KV panies heavily involved in segment assembly), GOAL of Puducherry Hubli, and while I did well there support, segment polishing and (edge sensors of the primary segwere many people brighter than segment alignment, we will see the ments). RFP for software is now me. I did win a gold medal at the rise of several companies which can active. Our engineers are shortly age of 35—the National Science offer next generation cost-effective leaving for Chennai to discuss an Foundation Alan T Waterman telescopes not only to India but also ‘electronics fab’ with several Indian companies. award—given to the best researcher for export to other countries. in science, medicine and engineering in the US. I proudly gave this to my father and said he should be happy his son is now equal to his daughters. We had a very academic background in our family—and I attribute this to my mother. To my father, I ascribe my ambition and energy. I have known Mr Murthy since I started going to IIT Delhi. I used to stop in Pune en route to Delhi where he was working. I was really happy when my sister got married to him. Little did I realise that both of them would scale such great heights. Murthy is a true academic. He greatly values the fact that I do research. I think in another life he would have been quite happy to be an academic. He thinks like an aca- TWIN PIONEERS Kulkarni with former President APJ Abdul Kalam

How we got on board Shrinivas Kulkarni recalls how India became a partner in the TMT project

n 2006 I was appointed as the Director of the Caltech Optical Observatories. The remit of the Observatories includes the iconic Palomar Observatory, the WM Keck Observatory (which is managed jointly with the University of California) and the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) project. The TMT partnership at that time consisted of University of California (UC), California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and Canada. It was clear that the scale of the project was such that an additional partner or partners were needed. Japan was very interested in participating in a large telescope project and discussions had begun. We still had room for a partner for a 20 per cent stake in the project. I proposed that we approach India and China for a 10 per cent stake each. I did appreciate that neither country had telescopes larger than 2-m. In contrast, the US had gone through two additional generations of telescopes: 4-m class and then 10-m class of telescopes. My view was that if India and China wanted to be serious players across board (industrial production and research) then they did not have the time to go through two generations of telescopes (with each generation lasting about 10 to 15 years). Of course the alternative view is the traditional one; namely, these countries should undergo a sequential development. I disagree with this approach because we have a burgeoning population of young people. We can either have a demographic dividend or a demographic disaster (or demographic fizzler). India does not have time to go through the sequence of developments that took place in the West. It was also clear that should India and China take up the offer then both countries would have to rapidly develop a world class astronomy program in less than a decade. The upshot was that I was empowered by the TMT Board to go and discuss TMT with India and China. Over the period 2007-2009 I visited both countries. Each country undertook their own studies of next generation telescopes and the astronomers in India and China decided that TMT was their choice project.

first person

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Star gazer, dreamer, potential Nobel laureate NR Narayana Murthy, Infosys founder and chief mentor speaks fondly about his elder-brotherly relationship with the astronomy genius NR Narayana Murthy

BACK THEN Kulkarni with sister Sudha Murty and wife Hiromi Komiya

Lover of Nusrat, jolada rotti and spy fiction Sudha Murty on how she grew up with her brother Shrinivas Kulkarni hrinivas is a quick learner. We were three daughters, and he was the last child. We would knit often. One day he asked my father and mother why only women were knitting and he too would like to. He quickly learnt knitting from us and knitted two elephants. We were surprised he had picked it up fast. He is extremely passionate about anything new. One of my sisters used to paint. He learnt painting from her and did his own paintings. He then jumped into photography. We became aware he possessed an inquisitive spirit and the ability to learn things quickly. One summer, he and I were sitting together, bored. We suddenly decided we'd read dictionaries. And we competed reading them! I read the Kannada dictionary and he read the Oxford English dictionary, completely from the first word to the last. We were exhausted, but it was fun. He and I would do things together. I was the second child, he was the fourth, so No 2 and No 4 was one team, and No 1 and No 3 was another. We have similar attitudes—we enjoy reading, exploring new things… we love the same food, too. We love the Dharwad speciality jolada rotti (jowar roti) to this day, and the other

favourite is avalakki (beaten rice). In our younger days, we frequented a corporation library. We had breakfast at home, and packed lunch for the day at the library. We reached the library five minutes before it opened and left when it was about to close. We went there every day for two months. He picked up the reading habit from our mother. She was reading even on the day she died in hospital. Our father had a strong scientific outlook, but Shrinivas's choice of astronomy was his own. He caught the interest from one of his teachers. Our parents gave us the freedom to make our own choices in marriage and careers. So Shrinivas has married a Japanese. He hasn't forgotten anything he picked up from Hubli, and remains frank and open. He refrains from idle comment, and works hard. He loves Hindustani music, and his great passion is Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. He has all his collections. We keep in touch often. I visit him at least four times a year and he makes several visits to Bangalore. Over time we have built private libraries in our homes and we borrow and return books. We are very particular books are returned, we consider them very personal. He has plenty of Japanese writing and Agatha Christie. He loves detective stories. Whenever he is in Bangalore, we watch a detective DVD. It's a must. Where we differ is—I love history, he doesn't. He's an atheist, I am religious. But our love for life makes up for all that.

hrinivas Kulkarni is a phenomenon. When he was doing his PhD, he discovered millisecond pulsars. (A pulsar is short for pulsating star). When he was teaching at Caltech, he discovered the first brown dwarf (a distinctive class of stars), and later, he was the first to discover gamma ray bursts (extremely energetic bursts in distant galleries). He has 58 papers to his credit in the science magazine Nature. I understand having two or three papers in Nature is considered good, and to have 58 in the most prestigious science magazine in the world is stunning, and possibly the highest in the world for an astronomer. I've always looked at him as a bright and young member of the family. He looks at me as an elder member of the family, particularly after the death of his father in 2000. I happen to be the eldest now. I have an elder-brotherly relationship with him. I am proud of him, and I have a lot of affection for him and his wife Hiromi. He is equally fond of me and my children. Of course, he is very close to Sudha. My relationship with him has been largely familial. If you ask me how much astronomy I discuss with him, I can only say he works at such a cuttingedge level that I wouldn't be capable of holding a meaningful conversation with him. He's way too advanced in his field. I have had interest in electrical engineering, and I dabbled in computer science. I am deeply interested in popular science and popular astronomy, but I can't claim his kind of knowledge. Shrinivas is a rare combination. He has built a lot of instruments. He is as comfortable in engineering as he is in physics and astronomy theory. He is a sharp theorist, and he's also a wonderful engineer. He sees through all the software we've done. The Caltech physics

department is considered the best physics department in the world, so to be there is truly a big honour for him. I first met Shrinivas in Pune way back in 1976 when he came to meet his sister Sudha. He was in the third year of his programme at IIT Delhi. He was full of curiosity and confidence. It was clear he would go far in science. I was impressed with how hard he worked. I am reminded of my son Rohan whenever I see Shrinivas. Rohan is just like him, bright and hardworking. The good things I see in Shrinivas, I see in my son. Shrinivas is honest, and he is a truth seeker. He has no hesitation in standing up for his beliefs. He has tremendous insight. And he loves to encourage younger people. When we meet we discuss our family all right, but we also share thoughts on how India is progressing in science and technology. I am proud of his initiative to get India on board the Thirty Meter Telescope. My understanding is, with this project, young Indian science students and astronomers will get to use the most advanced telescope in the world. Indian science will reach a high— it has not in some time. I saw progress during the time of Nehru and Indira Gandhi, it dipped in between, and now it’s resurfacing with Dr Manmohan Singh. It's a very positive sign India is getting into the project. There is need now to catapult Indian science to become a world beater. Since you ask me, I'd say we can never tell whether a person will get the Nobel Prize. It's too competitive now. Shrinivas has secured all the awards in the world of astronomy, and the Nobel is the only thing in the coming. We pray God smiles on him. (As told to Prashanth GN)

dance music

ncessant beats and 20,000-odd people grooving and crooning Don't you worry, don't you worry, child, see heaven's got a plan for you. Bangalore witnessed this electronic dance music (EDM) mania when Swedish House Mafia performed here in January. Many other international acts have spun their tunes here, and March will see Tiesto, voted the greatest DJ of all time, give us a taste of his music at a much-awaited gig (see interview on page 18). EDM, also known as dance music or club music, is typically created by disc jockeys using electronic equipment in a nightclub setting. Many people still associate EDM with rave parties where dopey people get high to thumping music, but fans say there’s so much more to this genre. Take for instance, the various sub-genres —ranging from house to trance and drum and bass to dubstep—which it breeds with surprising ease. All of them are created with synthesisers, sequencers and keyboards, apart from computers that use a whole array of software programmes. EDM is called so because it uses no acoustic instruments, such as the piano and the violin. “It has many sub-genres bordering each other, all of them up tempo and danceable,” says Bangalore-based DJ Anoop. For Ivan, a well-known city DJ, EDM is the ideal dance music in a club setting because it not demanding. “It requires no sense of rhythm on the part of the listener to understand the music. It's a 4/4 beat, there are not too many lyrics. You can just put your hands up in the air and become a cool dancer. Dancing to D&B and hip-hop may require genuine talent, but house is easy to dance to," he says.

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EDM gear

DJ Ivan Ableton 9 (loop-based music sequencer) DJ Rohit Pioneer CDJ 2000 disc players DJM 900 mixer DJ Anoop Yamaha Motif ES sequencer Nuendo digital audio workstation Pro Tools HD recording platform

Ikyatha Yerasala takes a close look at Bangalore's love affair with electronic dance music and finds that for every sceptical voice that considers it a rehash of original music, hundreds sing its praise

Gigs galore

Popular Indian EDM artistes

Tuhin Mehta Lost Stories Jalebee Cartel Nikhil Chinapa Bay Beat Collective

The popularity of EDM has brought some of the biggest names in the genre—David Guetta, Fatboy Slim, Avicii and Armin van Buuren among them—to Bangalore. Even the second rung of artistes, acts like Laidback Luke, DJ Chuckie and Richie Hawtin have made their presence felt here. Sunburn, India's biggest EDM festival held in Goa, can be credited with popularising the genre in the country, and has seen such biggies as Dutch DJ Armin van Buuren play. Grammy winners Paul Van Dyk, and Roger Sanchez, English trance trio Above & Beyond, Swedish DJ Axwell and Indian artistes like Anish Sood and Lost Stories have been part of the line-up there. Popular DJ Rohit Barker, who has been playing electronica for a decade and a half, believes EDM has exploded the world over and is on every DJ's 'want to play' list. “India, and especially Bangalore has become a must-stop for every international DJ touring the region,”

he says. Part of the attraction, he believes, is the fact that "a Bangalore audience is always enthusiastic, always up for it and very educated when it comes to music." Ivan agrees with Rohit that Bangalore's crowd is more receptive. "The audience here respects the DJ and there's also a superior dance culture here. Kids here are exposed to the biggest and the best," he says. While Anoop agrees Bangalore's crowd is willing to experiment, he prefers to use a pseudonym when he's having a dubstep night. "I use the name 'biaatch' while spinning EDM. If I were to play dubstep using my actual name, the crowd would go 'what the hell is happening.' It still needs a lot of exposure and support. During EDM nights, people walk up to me and ask for desi music!" he says. Storm festival, held in Kodagu (Coorg), is the other major gig on the EDM calendar for

Bangaloreans. Artistes featured include names like Dash Berlin, Pearl, Nikhil Chinapa, and Tuhin Mehta. Another crowd puller was the NH7 Weekender, which held its first edition in the city this year.

Moneyspinner DJ Rohit says things have changed over the years. "EDM is more popular than ever now because it has crossed over into mainstream territory and therefore has brought a much bigger audience into the fold. What was once considered underground or niche or music from and for Europe is now in every club, every car and every iPod!" says Rohit. Ivan has a more sceptical take on the sudden interest in EDM in India. "What happens in America determines how worldwide pop culture moves, be it in music or fashion. EDM was huge in the early ’90s with acid house popular

in clubs, rave parties and festivals. Then there is David Guetta, who made a name in the States, and who knows how to make things bigger than they actually are. With the music getting on to the radio and topping the charts, it’s now become a mass phenomenon. And the growing number of fans here makes our country a massive market to exploit." Anoop is frank in his assessment of the EDM scene when he says that "it's all about making hay while the sun shines." For a fan, there's nothing like attending a live performance by his favourite DJ, but not everyone can afford to go to major international gigs like Tomorrowland (Belgium) or Sensation White (Toronto). For their benefit, big players like Percept Entertainment (organisers of Sunburn) brings down heavyweight names to a venue where the average fan can drive up and catch a glimpse of the stars. "Eventually, some realise

they're spending way too much money on these concerts," says Anoop, who believes that Indian artistes are equally talented and they need their share of promotion too.

Fan-atic following Senior business manager Anand Vecham belongs to the kind that eats, breathes and sleeps electronic music. "After I started listening to EDM, I got addicted to it. I can't listen to any other music. The kind of energy and high it gives you especially after you drink is amazing.” Citing progressive rock and trance as his favourites, Anand says he wakes to EDM every day. “My friends wonder how I listen to it all day. Even when it comes to artistes like Coldplay, I like the EDM remixes more than the originals,” he says. Ask 26-year-old marketing professional Akersh David why he likes the genre so much

and he goes, "EDM makes all your worries go away. You are completely engaged in the beats and they make you groove. It's so much positive energy and it makes you feel light." Avicii, Afrojack, Calvin Harris, and Dmitri Vegas are his favourites. An ardent EDM follower since 2006, Akersh says, "The good ol' days had rock ruling the world, but in this era its EDM that does it!" For 25-year-old advertising professional Amogh Sridhar, EDM is a form of expression. "The beats are awesome and this music helps me connect with my inner self. It's like a form of meditation and if you connect to it, you don't even need alcohol to get you high," he quips. Anand has been religiously attending all the dance music fests. "I've been going to Sunburn for five years. The first time I went, there was hardly any crowd, but last year there were more than a lakh people." As for Indian EDM artistes, he picks Tuhin Mehta, Lost Stories, Nikhil Chinapa and Rohit Barker. "The kind of marketing done by the organisers makes a difference too. Chinapa has a huge fan following." Not all fans can afford the shows. "Of late, there's a concert happening every fortnight. They are pretty expensive for students and for those who've just started earning," says Akersh. Dubstep (the music that Grammy winner Skrillex is known for) is a genre that's been

FIRESTARTERS A performance by EDM pioneers Daft Punk, whose 1997 album Homework was rated number one in the genre’s history by Rolling Stones magazine. (Top) Indian EDM pioneers Jalebee Cartel

catching up here. Actress Jennifer Kotwal says, "Right now, I'm drooling over dubstep. Also, I've already made plans to go for Tiesto's gig in India." That's not all—she'll be heading to the Coachella festival in the US. "I've even booked tickets for Tomorrowland, but if work comes up, I won't be able to make it," says Jennifer.

Upbeat downbeat While so many youngsters swear by this genre, there are those who still think that EDM's just noise and that the beats get monotonous. Analyst and music lover Pria Robert is categorical in her rejection: "EDM cannot classify as a genre of music. It's simply a rip off from all the beats and tunes of existing music created by talented musicians. It doesn't appeal to everybody. I guess you need to be high to enjoy it," she says. Veterans like Ivan question the very concept of EDM. "It's just a term made for convenience. What I play is house music and I've been playing it since 1994. It's music with a lot of soul, it has evolved into something more electronic and it's going back to soul all over again —it works in cycles." He thinks EDM will soon reach its saturation point, "It might just die or morph into something else," he says. This feeling of spuriousness could also be why a couple of accomplished Bangalore musicians who have experimented with EDM, refused to comment when approached for this story. Rohit, on the other hand, is more upbeat about EDM's prospects, saying "Every big artiste around the world now has dance music influences in their music. The biggest festivals and concerts are now led by DJs. It's not a fad, it's here to stay, the water is warm. Jump in!"

dance music

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

EDM gear

DJ Ivan Ableton 9 (loop-based music sequencer) DJ Rohit Pioneer CDJ 2000 disc players DJM 900 mixer DJ Anoop Yamaha Motif ES sequencer Nuendo digital audio workstation Pro Tools HD recording platform

Gigs galore

Popular Indian EDM artistes

Tuhin Mehta Lost Stories Jalebee Cartel Nikhil Chinapa Bay Beat Collective

Bangaloreans. Artistes featured include names like Dash Berlin, Pearl, Nikhil Chinapa, and Tuhin Mehta. Another crowd puller was the NH7 Weekender, which held its first edition in the city this year.

they're spending way too much money on these concerts," says Anoop, who believes that Indian artistes are equally talented and they need their share of promotion too.

FIRESTARTERS A performance by EDM pioneers Daft Punk, whose 1997 album Homework was rated number one in the genre’s history by Rolling Stones magazine. (Top) Indian EDM pioneers Jalebee Cartel

dance music

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

The cat that strayed

‘I’m inspired by everything’

Suryakant Sawhney, vocalist and guitarist of popular band Peter Cat Recording Co, is one of the few established rock musicians in India to try his hand at electronica

Says the world’s highest-paid DJ Tiesto, ahead of his show in the city

SANDRA M FERNANDES e prefers to drop the ‘DJ’ label and likes to be known only as Tiesto. Ranked the world’s number one consequently for three years by DJ Magazine, he is the only DJ in the world to have a wax statue at Madame Tussauds. Excerpts from an email interview:

What were the early days of your career like? It was a very smooth journey. I first started playing at a small club in my hometown Breda on weekends and since then, there has been no looking back for me.

CATS UNITED Suryakant Sawhney (third from left) with his bandmates in Peter Cat Recording Co

PRACHI SIBAL prachi.sibal@talkmag.in

elhi-based band Peter Cat Recording Co is best known for its unusual sound, often described as ‘orchestral folkrock’ and ‘gypsy-rock.’ All the more surprising to see its lead vocalist and guitarist going solo into eletronica, which some would consider a ‘downmarket’ genre. Yet Suryakant Sawhney seems to have pulled it off; Rolling Stones magazine described his solo electronic act Lifafa as “a different persona,” and the tracks in his first album, Lifafa I, as ‘stoner electronica,’ though Sawhney himself calls it ‘post-party music’ (same thing, we thought) Here, Sawhney candidly tells us that it wasn’t the sleek consoles that seduced him, but an early fascination for disco music. Excerpts from the interview:

What made you want to take to electronic music? I’m not really treating it as an electronic act. But yes, there is the drum machine being replaced by a computer. Frankly, I have always had this side of me that is interested in disco music.

tion ought to have come from the likes of Burial and James Blake, but honestly, I don’t have the orientation. For me, the idea is to create my own catalogue of sound. I try to tap into childhood Is there pressure on bands and memories of disco and imagine musicians to go electronic? It has become part and parcel of it sounding something like Bappi music these days. People are get- Lahiri or Namak Halal. ting more dance oriented. Also, it is obviously a cheap way of What’s good and bad about a making music. But then, if you musician shifting to electronica? are a really good band you can You obviously have the advanget away without having to play tage of having your sense of music in place. As a musician electronic stuff. your knowledge of things like the ‘tempo’ is more pronounced. Electronic music seems easier to The disadvantage really is the produce. Is that why more people fact that I don’t listen to much are taking to it? Yes, some aspects have become electronic music. easier, but some have become more difficult too. The major Where do you see Lifafa going? It is too early problem of electo talk about tronic music ‘The two gigs my future in remains with I’ve had so far the genre, as playing it, where the two gigs I one person ends have been quite have had so far up having to do a drunken mess’ have been everything. quite a drunken mess. But, once it goes right I What software do you use? I use Logic, VLC for the film part want to be able to take over the and VDJ. I keep trying different whole evening. I feel we can create a set where the band appears stuff. in intervals between the elecWhere does your electronica inspi- tronic act, creating room for continuity. ration come from? Do you listen to a lot from the genre? I am actually not an avid listener Suryakant Sawhney performed at CounterCulture last weekend of electronic music. My inspiraAlso, I didn’t like it when at a concert, after we finished, a DJ came and played dance music for the rest of the evening.

Who or what inspires your music? I’m inspired by everything around me—from young producers to my travels. There are also many great producers and DJs from Holland who I grew up listening to. You play House, Electro House and Progressive House mostly. Which do you relate to most? I connect with each of these genres. I connect with music, period. You have collaborated with many well-known artistes. Which one was the most memorable? I like to collaborate with artistes of whom I’m a fan of. I recently worked with Bono of U2 and was very impressed. He’s a legend. How do you react to rumours like the one in which you were supposed to have died in a car crash? (Laughs) I don’t know where these stories come from. I had to assure my fans that I am alive. Though it was nice to know that people care about my life. What are your future projects? I am working on new music, doing some great tours, etc. I am also working on a new installment of my ClubLife mix series and my new artist album. My tour of American universities has just finished and I’m really looking forward to returning to India. Tiesto will be performing at Bhartiya City, Thanisandra on March 30

OOKtalk

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Authorspeak Excerpt

‘People also react to how you say things’

A cat only sees a rat 'O sho’ Rajneesh calls Zen “a way of dissolving philosophical problems, not of solving them.” ‘Dang Dang Doko Dang’ represents the sound of the drum beaten by a Zen Buddhist master as an existential lesson for a disciple. Dang Dang Doko Dang (Rs 399) a collection of Osho’s commentaries on wellknown Zen stories, is meant to serve the same purpose. It has now been re-issued by Penguin under their Ananda imprint. Below is an excerpt: A small girl came once to me, and I asked her, ‘Do you want to say something to me?’ She said, ‘I would like to sing a small song.’ She was a very small girl, and she sang a small song, and I loved it. The song was: Pussycat, pussycat, where have you been? I have been to London to look at the queen. Pussycat, pussycat, what saw

you there? I saw a mouse under the chair. Of course, a cat cannot see the Queen, it is impossible. A cat can only see the rat. The Queen was there sitting on the chair, but the cat could not see; she saw a mouse under the chair, and it is absolutely logical. A cat has eyes for the mouse and for the rat, she has no eyes for the Queen. We only see that which we can see:

Web stop

Google’s e-book store Google has opened its e-book collection to the Indian market, which are now available at the company’s India Play Store. Users can now download e-books from a collection of more than 4 million titles including thousands by Indian authors. Prices start from as little as Rs 49, and there are also ‘free’ books to draw readers in. In all there are 10 categories (such as biographies & memoirs, business & economics, children’s books, cooking, fiction & literature and more), each featuring various sub-categories. Going by the display on the home page, the usual suspects (Vayuputras, Fifty Shades etc) are the star attractions here too. You can also preview some of these books before buying. Log on to: play.google.com/store/books

If you don’t see godliness in existence, then you have to remember one thing: you don’t yet have eyes for godliness. So work hard to have eyes, and don’t borrow eyes; eyes are not like glasses. You can borrow somebody else’s glasses, and sometimes they may even fit, but eyes are not like glasses. And when I’m talking, or Zen people are talking about eyes, they are not like your ordinary eyes. It is an inner vision. Even these eyes can be transferred; you can have my eye, my physical eye. I can have your physical eye, they can be transplanted; but the inner vision, the inner eye, the third eye, is impossible to transfer. (Extracted with permission from Penguin India)

In the news

Death, dressed as a General The recent news of the exhumation of Chilean Nobel Laureate poet Pablo N e r u d a ' s remains created a flutter in literary circles worldwide. Reports say the exhumation, to be conducted on April 8 by a team of international experts, was ordered after officials began looking into the possibility of him having died of poisoning and not prostate cancer, as is believed. The claim of Neruda having been poisoned by agents of the Chilean military dictator General Pinochet's regime first came from his driver.

This excerpt from Neruda's famous poem, Death Alone, which imagines death as an Admiral, shows an eerie resemblance to the rumours circulating about what actually happened on September 23, 1973, the day he died. Death lies in our beds: in the lazy mattresses, the black blankets, lives a full stretch and then suddenly blows, blows sound unknown filling out the sheets and there are beds sailing into a harbour where death is waiting, dressed as an admiral.

MA Yadugiri, author of The Pronunciation of English A former professor of English at Bangalore University, MA Yadugiri is the author of The Pronunciation of English, Principles and Practice, just out from Viva Books. A PhD in Linguistics-Stylistics from the Indian Institute of Science, she has also taught and researched in the University of London. She is the author of Making Sense of English, and the co-author of English for Law. Who is your book aimed at? The book is designed in such a way that it can be used for classroom teaching or for self study and self improvement by anyone interested in English pronunciation. Isn’t this an age when all kinds of English accents have gained acceptance? Why should we worry about pronunciation? Globalisation has revolutionised technology and communication and given rise to a large number of new professions and careers. However good your command over vocabulary and grammar may be, you will not be able to speak English well if you have problems with your pronunciation. And in today’s world you have to make yourself understood to native as well as non-native speakers of English. Pronunciation problems affect your performance in another way too. People react to not only what you say but also how you say it. British and American pronunciations are well defined. In multi-lingual India, is there something that could be classified and standardised as Indian English pronunciation? Even British and American pronunciations show a lot of variation. I don’t know if you can define or describe something called ‘standard Indian English pronunciation.’ Any Indian wishing to speak English well should aim at being comprehensible to Indian as well as speakers of English anywhere in the world. What are the biggest pronunciation problems Indians face? How can we overcome them? We should try to speak English as English and not as we speak Kannada, Hindi or Bengali. The usual excuse given is that we don’t have to speak like a British or American speaker. Exactly. This is not only unnecessary but also impossible. What is crucial is that we should be aware of the pronunciation features that characterise clear English speech and learn to use them. We don’t have to lose or suppress our Indian identity. The Pronunciation of English, Principles and Practice, (with CD) Viva Books, Rs 495

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Rewind The week that was  Anniversary killings: Car bombs and a suicide blast hit Shia districts of Baghdad and south of Iraq’s capital killing at least 50 people on the 10th anniversary of the invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein.

Flood of petitions against Maverick Holdings able to go to school and seniors citizens are suffering.

 Chemical charges: Syria’s state news agency accused rebels of using chemical weapons in an attack in the northern province of Aleppo which it said killed 15 people.  Bomber flights: The United States said it was flying training missions of nuclear-capable B-52 bombers over South Korea, in a clear signal to North Korea at a time of escalating military tensions.  Dutt conviction: TThe Supreme Court has upheld the conviction of Sanjay Dutt and has sentenced him to five years imprisonment in the 1993 serial blasts case  Missile test: India carried out the maiden test firing of the over 290km-range version of BrahMos supersonic cruise missile from underwater—becoming the first country in the world to have this capability.  Honchos summoned: A Delhi court summoned Bharti Cellular chief Sunil Mittal, Essar Group promoter Ravi Ruia and five others in a spectrum allocation case.  Kashmir attack: Three Border Security Force (BSF) troopers were injured in Srinagar when separatist guerrillas fired at their vehicle.  Startup programme: Nasscom announces the launch of 10,000 start-ups programme aimed at incubating technology startups over the next 10 years.  Prosecute Mallya: Kingfisher Airlines employees, frustrated over not getting salary for last 10 months, have asked the government to prosecute promoter Vijay Mallya.

More than 6000 people were thrown out of their homes in EWS quarters, Ejipura, between January 18 and 21, many of them living there for more than 25 years. Now online petitions put up on the popular Change.org site wants the state government to cancel the commercial project that is to come up on the site. One of them is started by Karthik Ranganath, who has been active at the site since the demolition. His petition demands that Maverick Holdings, the company that operates

the Garuda mall chain and has won the contract for the project, to step out of the deal. It says that “the land in question was originally allotted and legally meant for building houses for the economically weaker sections (EWS). No rehabilitation has been done by either Maverick or the BBMP and thousands of people have been out on the streets, without shelter, water or sanitation. Many of them have lost their income as they are not able to go to work, children are not

“The people living in Ejipura are lawful residents and the Government has issued them biometric cards, BBMP ID cards, Voter IDs and Ration Cards. However, they were not even consulted before a decision was made to develop the land. “I think this is unfair and this needs to stop. As owners of the popular Garuda mall in Bangalore, Maverick Holdings has a responsibility towards its customers and the citizens of Bangalore. We also demand that Maverick step out of this atrocious deal and cancel the agreement to build a commercial complex on land earmarked for EWS quarters.” To view the petitions, search for ‘Ejipura on Change.org.

Get online for your ration card Don’t have a ration card? People living within Bangalore city limits can now apply for one online. Step 1: Send in your full name via SMS to 9212357123 (format: RCNEW Karthik M Patil). Make sure your name is complete and spelt correctly. The moment you send this SMS, you will get a token number and a security code. Step 2: Use this number and code to open your online ration card application at the nearest Photo Bio Centre. Make sure you do this in the presence of a valid ration card holder. Step 3: Fill all required information in the form correctly. Step 4: Upload pictures of your family members and their biometrics.

Step 5: While going to the photo centre, make sure you carry a recent electricity bill, a photo ID proof and original address proof. Scan and upload them there. Step 6: To make the process effortless, make sure you are introduced by a valid ration card holder. He or she should also carry his or her original ration card and a recent electricity bill. Step 7: After filing your online application, download a self declaration form and print it at the Photo Bio Centre. This form should then be signed by the applicant and the introducer and submitted. For more details log onto www.ahara.kar.nic.in

A wish list for the Pope Author Jerry Pinto has a wish list for the new pope, Francis, which he shared on his Facebook wall 1. Treat women with respect. This means women priests too. 2. Treat gays and lesbians and people with alternative sexualities with respect. 3. Butt out of science. Don’t even apologise to scientists. They don’t care any more. Just stay out of the way. 4. Treat women’s bodies with respect. This means letting them decide about birth control and abortion. 5. Treat other religions with respect. Your boss did say, “My father’s house has many mansions”, remember? 6. Treat children with respect. Do not protect child molesters. 7. Treat the law with respect. That means if a cardinal is wanted by Interpol, you give him to Interpol, you don’t hide him in the Vatican. Your boss did say, “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and render unto God the things that are God’s”, remember? 8. Treat the poor with respect. They’re your last bastion and they still love you. Don’t talk rubbish about the church not being “a compassionate NGO”. It is in its role as a compassionate NGO that it has earned the world’s respect, even the respect of those who follow other faiths. 9. Treat Jesus with respect. Ask yourself: “How would Jesus deal with this?” Remember his friends were among the poor and the downtrodden; and he forgave freely including those who killed him. 10. Treat love with respect. Remember the holy book says: “...the greatest is love”.

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Forward

Contest for children’s book illustrations iPad and motion sensitivity An ad doing the rounds on the Internet shows a man going about flaunting how tablets offer apps for everything: painting, posting notes, making notations, printing, reading, and so on... And then, he walks to the bathroom and sits on the commode. Job done, he gives a voice command, only to find the tablet slide up with a picture of a toilet paper roll. The message: There are still some things you can't do with an iPad. The Le Trefle toilet tissue ad concludes: Paper has a great future.

If you like drawing things that interest children, then this contest is for you. Singapore-based Asian Festival of Children’s Content (AFCC) has announced AFCC Sketch, an online contest for children’s illustrators. The theme is ‘One Big Story’ and the illustration should interpret what it means in the context of content for children. Hand-drawn or digital art is also accepted, as long as it can be emailed. All entries will be posted on AFCC’s Facebook page. A panel of judges will rate them for skill, aesthetic quality, and adherence to the theme. The winner will get one AFCC Writers and Illustrators Conference Pass and a voucher from NoQ Store worth 300 Singapore dollars (approximately Rs 15,000). First and second runners-up will win vouchers worth 200 Singapore dollars and 100 Singapore dollars respectively. Send high resolution PDF/TIF copies of illustrations to afcc@bookcouncil.sg. The

Film on the comic strip Stripped:The Death of the Funny Pages a feature documentary on the world's best cartoonists: talking about the art form they love. Its makers Fred Schroeder and Dave Kellett are currently in the process of obtaining funds through crowdfunding website Kickstarter. Highlights of the film are interviews with comic world giants like Bill Watterson (Calvin and Hobbes), and Jim Davis (Garfield)). The film will also feature original background score by Stefan Lessard of Dave Matthews Band.

last date for submission is May 13, 2013, 3 pm. For details visit afcc.com.sg/_2013/programme/ afccsketch

Free cancer detection camp

themes, the show addresses all the key aspects of an urban woman’s life, including career, motherhood, work-life balance, selfesteem, health, money, happiness and the different pathways to it. Namu Kini doesn’t follow the predictable Q&A format, and instead initiates a free-wheeling

 Racism probe: More than one and half months after a UK-based Indian bank officer was brutally assaulted by racist thugs in a tram, Manchester police has finally swung into action seeking help from the public to track down the attackers.  On the boil: Dhaka is on the boil in the lead-up to the two-day-long nationwide shutdown, beginning Monday, called by the 18-party opposition alliance led by the Bangladesh National Party.

Bangalore Baptist Hospital (BBH) is holding a free cancer awareness and detection camp from March 21 to 28. The hospital will conduct basic cancer screening for all women and men who are over 20. The camp will be held in the Radiotherapy Department of the hospital from 9 am to 3 pm from Monday to Friday, and from 9 am to 11.30 am on Saturday. Advanced tests will be provided at a subsidised cost . For more details, contact KR Seshadri on 9945816005

An inspiring talk show for women Conversations with Namu Kini is a live talk show for urban women that aims to inspire women to reach out, meet kindred spirits, find relevant role models and personal heroes. Hosted by Namrata Kini, owner of Kynkyny Art gallery, it puts the spotlight on high-achieving women and men and celebrates their life journey and personal and professional triumphs. With assorted

The week ahead

conversation that goes right to the heart of issues, while leaving sufficient room for humour and anecdotes. Through the 60-minute session, intimacies are shared, notes swapped, victories celebrated and goals set. The idea is to bridge the gap between the high-achieving

guests who feature in the show and the women in the audience, and make success and transformation seem achievable. The recorded conversations will be aired on www.namukini.com, which will be launched on April 12. To attend Conversations with Namu Kini, drop them an email on namu@namukini.com. For more info, visit the Namu Kini Facebook page.

 Lanka tense: British tourists are tense over Sri Lankan immigration authorities deporting a British national for having images of Buddha tattooed all over his body.  Taking charge: Noted journalist Aparisim ‘Bobby’ Ghosh, an Indian national is all set to take charge as editor of Time International.  Wooing DMK: As the DMK decided to withdraw support, the government is moving to bring a resolution on the Sri Lankan Tamil issue in Parliament in an attempt to placate the key ally which has set it as one of the conditions for reconsideration of its decision.  K’taka polls: The state is expected to witness heated political action after the Election Commission announced single phase assembly polls to be held on May 5.  Electric car: Mahindra & Mahindra is driving in the e2O electric car, promising a running cost of 50 paise per km, nearly one tenth of a petrol car.  Free Wi-fi: Free wireless internet services are expected to commence in Bangalore, the first for an Indian city.

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

echwalk

Coming out party for startups The first edition of DEMO India presents a platform for maturing enterprises Varun Thakur Stand-up comic

‘I was just the funny guy in my group’ What’s the funniest case of unintended humour you’ve witnessed on stage? There are two actually. At one of my shows, a girl in the audience had a peculiar laugh and she kept laughing throughout the show. So, my jokes, followed by her laughter, brought double the laughs.

SRIDHAR K CHARI Send feedback to sridhar.chari@talkmag.in angalore's start-up ecosystem has been getting stronger, and while problems remain, there is no longer any real excuse to put off action on that idea of yours, or ramping up what you are already playing around with.

Angel networks and VCs are fairly active, and start-up events abound. This week saw online financial news portal VCCircle network bring in the international 'Demo' conferences to India, starting off with an edition in Bangalore. The vehicle is VCCircle's Techcircle.in, which focuses on the technology world, and it is the sole DEMO licensee in India. DEMO, owned by IDG enterprises, is a conference platform which gives startups old and new a platform to showcase their new products, to not only the investor community and the media, but significantly to "influence early adopters." The more users come on board quickly, the better for the baby product. Twenty two-year old DEMO boasts of providing such a launch pad to now well-known companies like Picasa, Salesforce, Palm, VMWare, Tivo and Webex. It has offices in Boston and the Silicon Valley, and conducts four 'editions' a year in the US. The first edition of Techcircle DEMO India will feature 29 companies, shortlisted from over 100 applications. Simultaneously, one in China was launched. Companies pay to be on the platform. PV Sahad,

VCCircle founder said that while three of them were already big companies, like Makemytrip, the bulk were new startups—18 to 20 of them still unfunded. A handful is from Bangalore.

Jaffri pointed to another interesting phenomenon. Expats in Bangalore are quite active. "We worry so much about the deficiencies in our system, but these expats actually find the system quite supportive."

"It is a 'coming out' for startups. We sharpen their offerings, provide mentoring support, and get them ready for a platform like this. While there are other such avenues, I don't think anyone else is as stringent with quality checks as we are, as organised," Sahad said.

Interestingly, there are three 'foreign' companies in the list, including Moxtra from the US and Khemela from Paris, founded by desi expats. A bonus for them is that presenting here enables them to present for free in a US edition.

Presentations are highly disciplined, with no gimmicky stuff, or attempts to out-do one another—a key benefit of that is those watching get a good idea of the product and the capabilities of the company. That is something that doesn't always happen when you listen to "pitches."

 Little Eye Labs: A mobile app for performance management and analysis for Android developers.

Also on hand are top investors and start-up veterans. Sahad is careful not to gloss over lingering problems with the start-up ecosystem. One of the things he emphasised is the need for established companies in India to get into an "acquisition-mode." "In the West, big companies might acquire a start-up a week. This doesn't happen here and is the biggest bottleneck," he said. Of course, what we also need is a good number of exciting start-ups with appealing products that quickly gain market traction. VCCircle's Business Director Chandni

Another time, I was mimicking Shah Rukh Khan on stage and a very big fan of his (a girl) yelled out, ‘I love SRK and you remind me of him, so I love you too’. ‘I only wish I had his money,’ I responded. What do you do when a joke falls flat? I make a joke about how the joke didn’t work. That way the audience realises you are an honest performer and not arrogant.

Here are the Bangalore companies:

 Vivyo (from photography startup Canverra): An online platform for photographers to showcase, collaborate and market work online.

What would you have been if not a standup comic? I always wanted to be an actor and I still do work as an actor. Being a standup comic wasn’t intentional; I was just the funny guy amongst my group of friends. I love the camera and would be comfortable in front of it for all 24 hours.

 WebMobi: Began as an app creation platform, now a mobile customer relationship management platform  Relona: Synchronising animation and video across multiple page views —useful for advertisers.

PRACHI SIBAL

 Safekar: Personal vehicle tracking product meant for families who have driver driven vehicles

Varun Thakur is actor and standup comic based in Mumbai. A former UTV Bindaas VJ, he has also dabbled in humour writing for shows on MTV, UTV Bindaas and NDTV Good Times. He performs at bFlat on March 23

 Zoom: A membership based, selfdrive car club. Techwalk will keep an eye on them, and the others, and bring you more as we go along. Watch this space. And in the meantime, do something about that idea, now!

Questions

Reactions, statements, accusations, complaints, or just straight talk—this is where you get them all

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

The ‘barbarism’ that became the byword

Scientist SAVIE KARNEL savie.karnel@talkmag.in

e do not need to look up a dictionary for the meaning of scientist. We all know what it stands for. It is a term used in common language. More than a century ago, though, it was word to be avoided. It was considered ignoble and prohibited by W reputed publications. The term science entered English in the 13th century, but scientist is a recent addition. Unlike with most words, we can pinpoint the exact date the term scientist was coined. It was on June 24, 1833, but gained acceptance only in the 1900s. Before the coinage of scientist, people involved with science were called The Talk column on natural philosophers, word origins men of science, or cul-

tivators of science. There was no single term to define practitioners of science. The most common of the many terms was natural philosophers. Thinkers, writers and philosophers (the ones not into science), were not happy with rationalists too being called philosophers. They thought that the vision of men of science was superficial, while philosophers went far beyond in their thinking. The romantic poet Samuel Coleridge wrote a treatise on scientific methods and was invited to a meeting of the newly formed British Association of the Advancement of Science. Coleridge had been a recluse and was ill, but managed to attend this conference held on June 24, 1833. At the meeting, when William Whewell, a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge and a former professor of mineralogy finished his opening speech at the conference, Coleridge who was in his early 60s, stood up. He said the members of the association should not refer to themselves as natural philosophers. Laura J Synder, the author of The Philosophical Breakfast Club puts it this way in an essay, “Coleridge remarked acidly…that men digging in fossil pits, or

K E Y

O R D S

The 'Flammarion engraving,' by an unknown artist, depicts the scientific quest for knowledge

performing experiments with electrical apparatus, hardly fit the definition. They were not, he meant, “armchair philosophers,” pondering the mysteries of the universe, but practical men—with dirty hands, at that. As a “real metaphysician,” he forbade them the use of this honorific.” The people gathered there sat dumbstruck, and some took offence. Whewell courteously said he agreed with Coleridge that a term to describe the members of the association was required. He said that philosophers was a too wide and lofty a term. He suggested savant, which meant learned. But this was found to be rather

presumptuous and too French. The English did not share a great rapport with the French and so savant didn’t make it. Whewell then thought of the German term naturforscher, which means naturalist. The members expressed concerns that people may make fun of them, pronouncing it as nature-poker or nature-peeper. Whewell then suggested that by analogy with artist, they could coin the term scientist. He added that there were similar words like economist and atheist. Citing the word atheist as a parallel created a problem. Whewell in his report in the periodical Quarter Review recalled how geologist Adam Sedgwick exploded and said, ‘Better die of this want [of a term] than bestialise our tongue by such a barbarism.’ However scientist came into general use, especially in America. But the term was not regarded as respectable. Many publications like The Chicago Daily News, London Daily News, New York Evening Post and Century Magazine, mentioned it as a term to be avoided in their style sheets. Perhaps it was for want of any other term for men in science that the word gained popularity in common parlance. Publications could not ignore it any longer and had to start using it.

L I S T I NGS

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

music

The Great Galata God’s Robots

LEKHA NAIDU AND ASHIQA SALVAN

Hagadur Road (Behind Forum Value Mall) Whitefield, March 23, 7.30 pm 65475610  Here come the Gods: Presenting Carnatic music with an influence of dub and trip- hop are Gods Robots. Gods Robots comprises Janaka Autugo and Shridevi Keshavan aka Taamara. bFlat , 100 Feet Road, Above ING Bank, HAL 2nd Stage, Indiranagar, March 22 , 8.30 pm 41739250

 They are not fat: Watch All the Fat Children perform live this weekend as they perform some of their original songs. The band has Eben Johnson on guitars and vocals, Vickram Kiran on vocals, Sachin Savio Dane on drums and Naveen Thomas on guitars. Opus, 4, 1st Main, Chakravarthy Layout Palace Cross Road, Sankey Road , March 22 9008303330  Music with a twist: Performing this weekend is Parvaaz, a Bangalore based band that is known for their music in Urdu and Kashmiri. Their music is a mix of blues and psychedel-

ic rock. Watch Khalid Ahmed on vocals and guitars, Kashif Iqbal on lead vocal and guitars, Fidel Dsouza on bass and Sachin Banandur on drums. Bak Bak Bar, # 1, Kira Layout, Kormangala, March 22, 8.30 pm 9243777970  Four Stroke live: Bringing you a mix of rock ‘n’ roll, blues, country, rock and jazz this weekend is Four Stroke. The band has Gerard Besterwitch on guitar, saxophone and vocals, Joe Louis on guitar and vocals, Charles Reigo on bass and Mark Besterwitch on drums.

Opus in the Creek, No 2, Doddanekkundi Industrial Area Mahadevapura, Brookefields Main Road, Off ITPL Road ,Whitefield, March 23, 9 pm 9844030198  Jazzy weekend: Head out this weekend to lend an ear to Emiliano and his Trio. The ensemble will play some gypsy, jazz and American-Latin tunes. It has Emiliano Da Cruz on violin, mandolin and vocals, Oscar Rozario on guitar, Avelino Cardoza on mandolin, recorder and percussions and Zubin Da Cruz on mandolin and vocals. likethatonly, #14/31A,

retail therapy  Look like a star: Go crazy as you shop at Adidas’ Jeremy Scott’s Spring Summer Collection. The collection is inspired from Eagles and billiard balls and has eagle prints throughout. Priced at Rs 8,999 onwards. Available at select Adidas outlets  Dressed to kill: Ladies will be spoilt for choice as with a new range of dresses from Jade, a collection by designers Monica and Karishma. You can choose from cocktail dresses to short dresses and more. Available at www.jadecouture.com  Vintage Touch: This Spring season don the rosegold watch from Fossil and sport the

 Music from the bassment: Bombay Bassment is one unique band. The members of the band itself prove this. The band has two Goans, one South Indian and one African member; hence their music is a mix of hip-hop, rap, reggae and funk.

CounterCulture, 2D2 , 4th cross, Dyavasandra Industrial Area ,Whitefield, March 23, 8.30 pm 41400793  Relive the classics: Enjoy your share of classics and like Pink Floyd, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and newer ones like Nickelback, Maroon 5 and Adele. Watch Radler perform some numbers by these bands and artists. bFlat , 100 Feet Road, Above ING Bank, HAL 2nd Stage, Indiranagar, March 24 , 8.30 pm 41739250  Magical night: This week witness the magic of Mandolin maestro U Shrinivas and Hariharan as they perform live. Lakeside Amphitheatre, Orion Mall, Rajajinagar, March 23, 6.30 pm

Emiliano and the band

 Galata in town: A unique concept that began last year, The Great Galata aims at bringing together the theatre community under one roof. The entire process kicks off with the playwrights being given the concept or the idea four days prior to the performance. The playwrights will have to write the script and submit it within 24 hours. The next day, actors will be chosen through a pick of lots. What follows next is two days of rehearsals and then the final performance. There will be noted theatre personalities like Prakash Belawadi, Pawan Kumar, Walter D’Souza, Rajiv Krishnan, Rajat Kapoor, Atul Kumar and others. This will be performed in three languages; Kannada, English and Hindi respectively with 12 actors for each. Ranga Shankara, 36/2 8th Cross II Phase, JP Nagar, March 27, 7.30 pm 26493982

food vintage look. The collection offers watches in black and gold dials with gold straps. Available at all leading Fossil outlets

sauce, braised chicken and vegetables with soy sauce and stir-fried eggplant with soy sauce and more at the Korean Food Festival. Sheraton Hotel, 26/1, Dr Rajkumar Road, Malleshwaram, till March 24 42521000

 A splash of colour: This Holi season add a splash of colour to your inner wear too. Choose from a range of bright colours and style to suit every need and outfit. Say Happy Holi like a diva. Available at www.zivame.com

 Hone your cooking skills: Learn to make pastas like fettucine, ravioli, macaroni and more at this workshop. Participants will be provided with a recipe kit and ingredients at the end of the class. You can also get hands-on experience on the pasta machine. Cilantro, Halcyon Condominiums, 9, Drafadilla Layout, 4th Block, 4th Main Rd, Koramangala, March 24 9844707517

 Smell good: This season smell fresh as a fruit as you try out the Anna Sui’s range of perfumes, Fairy Dance. The fragrances available are tangerine, mango and pink pepper. Available at leading lifestyle stores

 Eggless baking: Learn to bake hand rolled orange truffle, olive and paprika roll, fresh fruit pastry, brown bread and semolina turuline, sugar free panacotta, honey and oatmeal biscuits and more. The highlight of the workshop is that all desserts will be eggless. Lavonne, No. 151, 2nd Cross

Domulur, 2nd Stage, Indiranagar, March 23 9740544442  Korean flavours in town: Try out some authentic Korean dishes like three coloured pancakeswrapped with seafood and vegetables, assorted vegetables salad with mustard

 Seafood delight: Craving for some seafood? Then head here and try out some grilled seafood, rock lobsters and jumbo prawns. Priced at Rs 2,500 Zen, # 25, The Leela Palace, Old Airport Road, March 24 2521 1234  Choose your own poison: How many times do you get to choose ingredients

for your cocktails? Well you can do the same now as Le Cristaal has a celebrity bartender who will attend to you. Cocktails are priced at Rs 375 each. Le Cristaal, #36, Vittal Mallaya Road, 8 pm onwards  Holi special: This Holi festival after you are done with your share of colours, head here to relish some dishes like ramo ram khichdi, thandai, rose sharbat, phool kachori, keri panna, methi pakoda chat and more. Available at all Rajdhani outlets  Sweet tooth craving: With over 15 home bakers participating at the Baker’s Showcase, this place ought to be heaven for people with a sweet tooth. You can try out homemade simple desserts or even the exotic dishes. Choose from a variety of cupcakes, rainbow cake, pastries, tarts and more. So drop by to indulge and satiate your sweet cravings. NGV Club, National Games Housing Complex, Koramangala March 23 25702247

L I S T I NGS

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

theatre

book launch So Many Socks Chaitanya, Bikhre Bimb is one of the most talked about plays and has seen more than 100 shows in the country. It brings theatre personalities and actors Arundhati Nag and Girish Karnad together on stage. The play is about an English professor, who has had an unsuccessful stint as a Kannada writer. It is a journey of this professor, who later goes on to be a bestselling writer. Ranga Shankara, #36/2, 8th Cross, 2nd Phase, J P Nagar, March 22 and 23, 7.30 pm 26592777

 How I learned to Drive: A Pulitzer Prize winner, this play by Paula Vogel is about the childhood journey of Lil’ Bit. She recounts her experience of a colourful journey that has some dark secrets. The play brings out the strained relationship that Lil’ Bit has with her Uncle Peck. Lil’ Bit's relationship with her Uncle Peck is as sweet as it is lethal, as paternal as it is co-dependent, as innocent as it is dark. Directed by Sidharath Selvaraj, it has Mario Jerome, Shubangi Sunder, Maliha Ibrahim, Naomi Menon and Sudhir Selvaraj in the cast. Alliance Francaise de Bangalore, # 16 GMT Road, Vasanthnagar, March 22, 8 pm, March 23, 5 pm and 8 pm

41231340

 So Many Socks: The play is about three generations of a Tibetan family. Scripted by Annie Zaidi, it explores the situations the family is stuck in. Directed by Qasar Padamsee, it has Vinati Makijany, Shruti Mishra, Saattvic, Shivam Sharma, Suhaas Ahuja, Abhishek Saha and Bhavna Pani in the cast. Jagriti Theatre , Varthur Road, Ramagondanahalli, Whitefield, March 22 and 23, 8 pm and March 24 , 3 pm and 6.30 pm 41248298  Bikhre Bimb: Directed by Girish Karnad and KM

 What's Up with Indian Men: From the makers of Love, Sex and Mocha comes another comedy about love. The play is about the journey of a girl who is looking for true love. It highlights well-known stereotypes of men like the pretentious metro sexual, the penny saving marwadi, the dowry seeking Reddy boy to the shaadi.com stalker and the sleazy Sindhi. It has Raj B, Karan B, Krishik, Ashwin N, Vamsi, Varnika, Shruthi and Neha in the cast. Alliance Francaise de Bangalore, # 16 GMT Road, Vasanthnagar, March 24, 5.30 pm and 7.30 pm  41231340  Male Mantrika: The play is about Lizzie who gives away her house to her father and the cattle ranch to her brothers. She then goes to meet her cousins who are looking for a groom for her but things don't go as planned. As she returns, she sees that the farm is

suffering from drought and the cattle is on the verge of dying. She then comes across Starbuck, a trickster who promises to bring rain in exchange for a 100 dollars. Ranga Shankara, #36/2, 8th Cross, 2nd Phase, J P Nagar, March 24, 7.30 pm 26592777  Sahebara Saarkeetu: Based on MR Srinivasa Murthy's book, Rangannana Kanasina Dinagalu, the play is about Ranganna, a school-teacher who is promoted to the post of inspector. After visiting a number of schools, he realises that his job is not easy. His mission to improve the working of schools earns him the love of teachers and the wrath of local politicians. Ranga Shankara, 36/2 8th Cross 2nd Phase, JP Nagar, March 24, 7.30 pm 26493982  Rabdi: The play revolves around Saavantri and her mentally challenged child. Though her dreams of her child having a bright future remain unfulfilled she does not lose hope. In order to enroll him into a special school she offers to be a surrogate mother for an IT couple. Directed by Nithish S, the play delves into motherhood, love, societal issues and human emotions. Tickets priced at Rs 50. KH Kala Soudha, Ramanjaneya Temple Compound , Banashankari, Hanumanthanagar, March 27, 7 pm 26539239

 Book Launch: Best-selling author Amish Tripathi will be in town to launch his latest book The Oath of the Vayuputras and will oblige his fans by signing the books for them. The Oath of the Vayuputras is the last book in the Shiva trilogy. In this book, Shiva reaches Panchvati and comes face to face with his biggest enemy. Amish is an IIM graduate who gave up his banking job to become a writer and has written The Immortals of Meluha and The Secret of the Nagas in the past. Reliance Timeout, Mantri Square, Sampige Road, March 23, 12 pm 2667122

To get your event listed, write to us at listings@talkmag.in

film Django Unchained

 Aatma Hindi The movie is about the journey of a single mother, Maya who begins her life afresh with her six-yearold daughter, Nia. As Maya begins a new chapter in her life, her daughter starts talking to her dead father. At first the mother believes that she is just imagining things but she realises that is far from the truth. Her dead husband is back to take the one thing that he loves the most, his daughter. Directed by Suparn Verma, the film stars Bipasha Basu and Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the lead role. Innovative Multiplex, Marathahalli- 11 am, 4 pm,

8, 10 Fun Cinemas, Cunningham Road- 10 am, 12 pm, 7.45 Cinepolis, Bannerghatta Road- 10 am, 12 pm, 2.10, 5, 10 Gopalan Cinemas, Bannerghatta Road- 10 am, 2.45 pm, 8.10 Rex Theatre- 11.10 am, 5.45 pm Gopalan Mall, Sirsi Circle- 12.30 pm, 10 Gopalan Grand Mall, Old Madras Road- 12.45 pm, 5.15, 10 Everest Theatre, Frazer Town- 6.30 pm, 9.30 INOX, Mantri Mall, Malleswaram- 10 am, 4.10 pm, 7.25, 10 INOX, Garuda Mall, Magrath Road- 10.10 am, 2.50 pm, 7.30, 10 INOX, Central, JP Nagar10.15 am, 2.50 pm, 7.35 Fame Lido, off MG Road- 10 am, 2.30 pm, 7, 10 Fame Shankarnag, MG Road-

6.50 pm Fame Forum Value Mall, Whitefield10.20 am, 1.30 pm, 5.25, 7, 10

theatre- 12.55 pm Everest Theatre- 11.30 am, 2.30 pm Gopalan Cinemas, Bannerghatta Road- 10 am, 5.30 pm Gopalan Mall, Sirsi Circle- 10.15 am, 7.20 pm Gopalan Grand Mall, Old Mdras Road- 10 am, 7.15 pm INOX, Mantri Mall, Malleswaram- 10.20 am, 4.40 pm, 9.25 INOX, Garuda Mall, Magrath Road- 10.35 am, 3.35 pm, 6.25, 9.15 INOX, Garuda Swagath Mall, Jayanagar10 am, 3.30 pm, 9.25 INOX, JP Nagar- 10.20 am, 4.50 pm, 9.25 Fame Lido, off MG Road- 10 am, 12.45 pm, 6.40, 9. 25 Fame Shankarnag, MG Road12.45 pm Fame Forum Value Mall, Whitefield10.40 am, 3.35 pm, 6.25, 9.15 Visions Cinemas10.30 am, 4 pm, 9.45

 Rangrezz Hindi The film is based on the idea of friendship and love. The movie has been in news for Jackky Bhagnani's number on Psy's Gangnam Style. Directed by Priyadarshan, it has Jackky Bhagnani, Priya Anand and Akshara Gowda in the lead. Innovative Multiplex, Marathahalli- 4.25 pm Urvashi Multiplex- 2.30 pm Fun Cinemas, Cunningham Road- 10.20 am, 3.25 pm, 9.35 Cinepolis, Bannerghatta Road- 11 am, 1.50 pm, 6.25, 9.25 Rex

 Django Unchained English The movie is set against the backdrop two years prior to the Civil War. It is about Django, a slave whose brutal history with his former owners lands him face to face with German born bounty hunter Dr King Schultz. Schultz is on the lookout for the murderous Brittle brothers and only Django can lead him to them. Directed by Quentin Tarantino, it has Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Kerry Washington,

Leonardo DiCaprio and Samuel L Jackson in the lead. Innovative Multiplex, Marathahalli- 10.30 am, 1.30 pm, 7, 10 Urvashi Cinemas- 11 am 6,15 pm, 9.45 Fun Cinemas, Cunningham Road- 12.30 pm, 6.35, 10 Cinepolis, Bannerghatta Road- 10.10 am, 1.05 pm Rex theatre9.50 pm Gopalan Cinemas, Bannerghatta Road- 11.50 am, 4.40 pm, 10 Gopalan Mall, Sirsi Circle- 3.45 pm, 9.15 Gopalan Grand Mall, Old Madras Road- 10.15 am, 4 pm, 7 INOX, Mantri Mall, Malleshwaram10.35 am, 3.45 pm, 8.45 INOX, Garuda Mall, Magrath Road- 10 am, 12.30 pm, 3.40, 6.50, 8.55 INOX, Swagath Garuda

Ziddi

Mall- 6.15 pm INOX, JP Nagar- 10.10 am, 3.40 pm, 9 Fame Lido, off MG Road10.50 am, 3.30 pm, 6.15, 9 Fame Shankarnag, MG Road- 3.35 pm Fame Forum Value Mall, Whitefield- 10 am, 12. 40 pm, 3.50, 6.25, 9 CineMAX, Total Mall- 10 am, 1 pm, 3.45, 9.30  Olympus Has Fallen English The whole of USA is in shock when the White House is captured by a terrorist and the President is kidnapped by him, a former Presedential guard Mike Banning finds himself

trapped within the building. As the National Security team is trying to respond to this, they are forced to rely on Banning’s inside knowledge to help save the White House and the President. Directed by Antoine Fuqua, it stars Gerard Butler, Morgan Freeman and Aaron Eckhart in the lead. Fun Cinemas, Cunningham Road- 10 am, 2.05 pm Cinepolis, Bannerghatta Road- 10 am, 4.40 pm, 7.30, 10 INOX, Mantri Mall, Malleswaram- 11.55 am, 4.50 pm, 9.35 INOX, Garuda Mall, Magrath Road- 10 am, 12.15 pm, 3.45, 9.35 INOX, Swagath Garuda Mall, Jayanagar2.25 pm, 7.35 INOX, JP Nagar- 10.15 am, 9.20 pm Fame Lido, off MG Road- 12 pm, 4.30, 9.30  Ziddi Kannada The movie is directed by Anantha Raju and stars Prajwal Devraj, Aindrita Ray and Aishwarya Nag in the lead roles. The music has been composed by Giridhara Diwan. Bhumika Theatre, Gandhinagar- 10.30 am, 1.30 pm, 4.30, 7.30 Navarang Theatre, Rajajinagar- 10 am, 10 pm INOX, Mantri Mall, Malleswaram- 12.55 pm Rockline Cinemas, Jalahalli- 12.45 pm, 4.20

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

DEMONSTRATED BY PRIYA CRASTA. PHOTOS BY RAMESH HUNSUR. TRANSCRIBED BY RADHIKA P

How to deal with grief and sadness ome events cause intense grief: death of a loved one, breach of trust, or heartbreak. To survive grief you need to be able to isolate pain and keep it away from the other emotions in your life. This ability can only be built with great determination, responsibility and spiritual strength. Intense grief arises from intense love, not from love that can be measured. Grief arises, for example, from the unconditional love of parents for their children. A few examples in my life: I loved two cats beyond anything in this world, and my father. TMeow was a cat I had saved and she believed I was her mother. We shared an inexplicable bond beyond that of a man and animal. It was a bond of life and death. One day she was bitten by a dog when I was away at work. When I found her, it was too late and I couldn’t save her. I went mad and dug her grave with my hands till they bled and had no flesh. It took about three months for my hands to recover. Six hellish months went by. It was like I had lost my daughter. Kuruvilli and I shared a love as deep, if not deeper, than any human relationship. We used to play hide and seek every morning. She used to get into my sock and tear her way out of the other end. I had to get myself a fresh pair every time she did this. I must have bought myself more than 150 pairs. She would tear my

Way of Budo 25 Nothing drains the lifeforce like sustained sorrow, but it still can be overcome with training, says Sensei Avinash Subramanyam

track suits and business suits, but all that was okay. My friends told me to wear ordinary clothes instead of expensive ones. But for me that meant cheating her of her fun, something I couldn’t bear. It would have made me and our bond cheap. When Kuruvilli died, it was such agony I decided I would never love anyone like that again. The man I loved the most in this world was my father. When I was six and he was late returning from work, I would sob my heart out for fear that he wouldn’t return. In later years he was paralysed, and I managed to remain detached from all his suffering. I did not let the pain reach me inside. I have learnt over the years to isolate pain and go about life as if it did not exist. I suffer chronic physical pain because of injuries sustained over the years, and the tough training I put myself through. But I can tuck the pain away and go about my work and have more fun than most others. This is not repression. It is the ability to be unperturbed after arriving at an understanding of the truth. A few years ago, my father died. At that moment I asked myself: What should I do? Give him a hug? Tell him all that I wasn’t able to over the years? Cry? Can I cry enough for the 25 years of not having done enough for him? As a sensei, don’t I teach my students not to hold on? For a brief second these questions flashed through my mind. I

believed, like my students, that I was different. So I didn’t cry. I went to a darshini with a friend and fed her idli-vada, and went to class as usual the next day. I was in emotional pain but asked myself why I should let it affect the other aspects of my life. The grief was intense but I left it behind. Extreme sorrow can be disastrous because it burns the lifeforce in your body. If you are constantly in pain, it weakens you. Grief kills faster than anything. Haven’t we heard of people who don’t live long after their spouses’ death? How to cope with emotional pain? Say the one you love fought with you. And it was totally unexpected. Ask yourself: Should I call the relationship off or forgive the person? If I love the person and want to continue the relationship, I will say why agonise even for one day. Never answer to prove a point or win a battle. That is mere ego. In fact if you know the person really loves you and feels bad about the fight, don’t even show you are hurt. If your grief is a response to events (like death) that can’t be reversed, give up the sorrow. Know that the universe’s spirit is to survive, heal and bring to life. How to train to overcome grief? When in pain know why you are in pain. Is the knee pain because of too much walking or running? Find a method of reliefpainkiller, for example-and then

go about doing what you have to do. With emotional pain, analyse similarly. Reflect, pack away the pain and get out of misery as soon as possible. Practise isolating pain. It is only in real time that you will know how to do this. I am what I am only because of the intense pain in my life. Only by putting away the pain in a box have I become stronger. Today, I burn away the boxes I have accumulated. A student once accidentally shot himself and was in shock. I diverted his mind from the wound, and joked on the way to the hospital, saying the bullet scar would make him look nice! He underwent surgery and was advised three weeks’ bed-rest. As one trained in budo, I said, he would need only three days. In fact, he got out in three days and overcame the trauma. I had told him what he could have told himself or what you should tell yourself when in pain. In life you will experience grief, so be prepared. The budo path is constant growth and preparation for war. In the movie Shooter, the hero is ridden with bullets and near death. But he doesn’t worry about logical consequences and comes back to life to fight his enemies. Never give up. As long as you breathe, you can always do something more. Make life your choice. Don’t become life’s choice. Live with that spirit and you will win.

STRETCHING EXERCISE 1

1: Starting Posture: Stand erect with feet shoulder width apart and parallel to each other. Back straight. Body relaxed. 2: Move feet two shoulder-width apart. Bend knees as in horse rider's stance. Fold palm into fist and bring to waist. 3 & 4: Draw in left leg and push hands upwards. Inhale in the process. 5 & 6: Bring down left leg and hands and return to posture shown in Pic 2. Perform the technique similarly with right leg. Do the entire technique 4-6 times. This gentle exercise is a whole body tonic. It helps exercise shoulder, back, hip, arms, neck, knees and legs. It improves balance.

memoir

Bangalore's evil sadhu sacrifices four boys ‘Sadhu’ Lakshmana Giri was finally caught, but his torture and death in police custody leaves the government reeling

THE STORY SO FAR

VIVEK ARUN

A seemingly gentle sadhu moves into a burial ground in Okalipuram and wins the confidence of its residents, especially the kids. But unknown to them, he plans to sacrifice 11 young boys over 11 full-moon nights to gain magical powers, following the advice of a tantric.

t was a full moon day. That after- stage, he slit open the boy’s throat with a noon, a boy walked into sadhu blade and collected the blood in a bowl Lakshmana Giri’s house. to offer to Smashana Taradevi, the deity Oblivious to his fate, he got his he had been told by a tantrik to worship. share of milk and toffee. He was Within minutes, the boy was dead. The delighted at the bonus that day: the first of 11 recommended sacrifices was sadhu handed him a Rs 10 note with the done. A human sacrifice had taken place milk and toffee. As soon as he drank the so quietly and so easily milk, he collapsed on that he felt he could sacrithe floor. The sadhu He slit open the fice hundreds of boys, not had mixed bhang boy’s throat and just 11. After the murder, (cannabis) in the safthe sadhu buried the bowl fron-flavoured milk. collected the in a corner of the burial Lakshmana Giri blood in a bowl yard, stuffed the body into locked his house from a gunny sack, and threw it the outside and entered it from the back door. As dark- into an open drain. The discovery of the body was big ness fell, he started his ritual. It reached its climax at midnight. The boy was still news in the city, with all news papers under the influence of bhang, and the carrying it prominently. The boy’s parsadhu sealed his mouth with a piece of ents were inconsolable. They worked in cloth. As the ritual reached the final a factory producing incence sticks, and

crime folio

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

Fabled ranconteur and Bangalore’s top-notch criminal lawyer brings you moving, sensational and bizarre stories from 40 years of his practice

CH HANUMANTHARAYA

the father suspected one of his enemies. The grief-struck mother came to the sadhu and fell at his feet. He consoled her with his characteristic mild talk. As murders were not rare in Bangalore, the buzz died down once the newspapers stopped reporting on it. But the city was shocked when a similar incident took place exactly a month later. The morning after a full moon day, another young boy was found dead in an identical fashion in the same drain. His throat had been slit the same way. The police started thinking a serial killer was out to murder boys from the Okalipuram slum, and suspected he could have a strange motive as the mur-

memoir

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

ders had taken place on full moon nights. This was followed by the murder of another boy the subsequent full moon day, and people were terrified. There was a big public outcry, and the government came under pressure, with the media asking tough questions. Chief minister R Gundu Rao faced severe criticism in the assembly for his government’s inaction. The government formed a special investigation team led by Circle Inspector Shivalingaiah. The police did not suspect the sadhu as his words and behaviour showed no signs of violence. In fact, Shivalingaiah sought his blessings for speedy completion of the investigation. One day, when he was passing through the burial yard after meeting the sadhu, Shivalingaiah found a dog scratching the ground in a corner. Curious, he went closer. The earth was wet and bloodstained. He collected a sample and sent it to the forensic lab. When the test revealed the stains as human blood, and that too of a boy, the thought entered Shivalingaiah’s head that the sadhu could be the murderer. Keeping a watch on Lakshmana Giri, Shivalingaiah’s plainclothes men started spying around the burial yard. Alarmed by the vigil, the sadhu left the place a week

before the next full moon day, saying he head of the forensic division of Victoria Hospital. The report said Lakshmana Giri had to visit his native village. On the full moon day, detectives had died of internal bleeding after he had climbed the trees in the burial yard and sustained severe injuries. Armed with this report, Deve Gowda remained there all night to see if they could catch the murderer red-handed. No killer insisted on the chief minister’s resignation. Gundu Rao ordered another post mortem turned up. But the body of another boy was and the sadhu’s body was exhumed for the found in the drain the next morning. An purpose. The second post mortem was done by enraged Shivalingaiah asked his men to Dr Somaiah, and this time around, the arrest the sadhu. The police locked up Lakshmana Giri report said the sadhu’s death was caused by asthma, high blood pressure, at the Kengeri Gate and diabetes, and not police station in Friends said, ‘You because of the injuries he Cottonpet. They torhad sustained. tured him, and he conare indirectly The opposition and the fessed to his crime and arguing for the government started squabexplained how he had cruel Sadhu’ bling over the contradicting killed the boys. reports. The government However, the third degree treatment the police had meted out constituted an inquiry commission under VK Govindaraju to find the truth. to him was so harsh he died in custody. Chandre Gowda wanted my senior As he was close to many VIPs, including ministers and rich industrialists, the lawyer Devadas and me to appear for him news of his death rattled the government. before the commission. He approached me HD Deve Gowda, then Leader of the and pleaded that I convince Devadas to Opposition in the Assembly, demanded the take up his case. Chandre Gowda was chief minister’s resignation and an investi- known for his honesty. When I took him to Devadas, he obliged. However, when I met gation into the death. The post mortem of the sadhu’s body him with Chandre Gowda two days later, was done by Dr BC Chandre Gowda, then the scene had changed. Devadas was sitting

The con who sold the moon In 1925, con artist par excellence Victor Lustig approached wholesale scrap dealers in Paris, posing as a government official. He claimed the city could no longer pay for the upkeep of the Eiffel Tower, and intended to dismantle and sell it as scrap. Lustig’s scam worked, and he famously made a pile collecting an

advance from the gullible businessmen. But Dennis Hope of Gardnerville, US, has taken the game to a whole new level; over the past three decades, he has built a thriving business by “selling” plots on the moon, Mars and Venus. Why, he even issues certificates that confirm your ownership of this or that piece of lunar

Cambridge researchers just dragged in. Their study, which used something called Algorithmic analysis (go look it up), found that your FB ‘likes’ give everything away—your IQ, personality traits, drug usage, and even whether your parents divorced during your

with some police officials. It turned out he had changed camp. Struggling to explain his shifting loyalties, Devadas said he would fight Dr Somaiah and the police. I had always fought the police in court. Even in this case, I stood against them as I represented Chandre Gowda. Prof MR Janardhan guided me. Lawyer Kotyan extended me special help, but I still had to face my mentor as my opponent in court. Some of my friends criticised me, saying, “By fighting for Chandre Gowda, you are indirectly arguing for the cruel sadhu.” Prof Janardhan and I jointly appeared for Chandre Gowda before the inquiry commission. During the arguments, I had to clash verbally with Devadas. Finally, the commission ruled that the sadhu’s death had been caused by his injuries and held the police guilty. It even named the police officers responsible for his death. But the government threw the report into the dustbin. I wondered whether there was any sense in the government appointing inquiry commissions, and any respect for the efforts of lawyers like me. (Concluded) Translated by BV Shivashankar

The latest saviour of rainforests: porn

land. Now, the man has no legal authority to do so, but gets away with it because 1)

people like the idea of owning property in space 2) you can say anything you want to anybody as long as you smile, a trick he says he picked from his dummy during a former avatar as a ventriloquist. Incidentally, the word ‘lunatic’ was derived in Latin from the word luna, meaning “moon.” Coincidence, you think?

Why you should think twice before you ‘like’ We promise that this is the last Facebook study that we will burden you with for a while, but look what these

childhood. For example, they found that they could correctly distinguish between gay and straight men on the site 88 per cent of the time by analysing the kinds of TV shows and movies they liked. In other words, with every click on Facebook, you are building a nuanced picture of yourself. Since we have always

believed that only the paranoid survive, this merely confirms our suspicion—that FB is a machine designed to suck up every little detail of everyone, and then sell them down the river to whoever wants it—whether marketers or governments. Next time you ‘like’ something, remember, you just might be getting Zuckered.

We have called your attention before to the love Germans have for all things natural, manifested in such ideas as a project to develop ‘eco-friendly’ bombs. Now a bunch of them have taken the whole naturelove thing in another direction —pornography. Berlin-based F*** for Forest, described as “a raggedy group of hippies,” do just that; they film and sell homemade pornography to raise funds so that they can do their bit to help save the rainforests. Their motto is, ‘Have sex. Save the world.’ Founded by Tommy Hol Ellingsen and Leona Johansson (in pic below), the group films

themselves having sex (often in public), and also invites others to do so. If we can believe them, one in 10 people they approach agree to feature in their films. It seems the strategy devised by Tommy and crew (including a Mumbai girl called Kaajal Shetty) does pay, for the group has raised nearly Rs 3 crore so far, meant to fund ‘ecological activities,’ and have even had a documentary made on themselves that’s now doing the festival circuit. Whatever floats your boat, Tommy. Given your love of all things green, we’re sure that’s a, umm, radical thing to do… but just what’s natural about porn, again?

fun lines

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

T I M E P A SS

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

30 Prof Good Sense

 I am 21 years old. My problem is that I cry whenever someone talks to me in a rough manner. When I was a child, if my parents raised their voice with me, I’d be inconsolable for hours. I think there’s something wrong with me. Even a squabble with friends sets me off. How do I handle this? Anonymous, Bangalore There’s nothing wrong in showing your emotions—it shows you are human. But it makes sense to control your emotional outpouring to some extent. We can’t stop friends from saying things that might hurt us. And things can get worse when people know you are affected easily. I suggest you undergo Cognitive Behaviour Therapy from an experienced therapist to rid yourself of toxic thinking schemas. Don't forget to smile more often. Prof M Sreedhara Murthy teaches psychology at NMKRV First Grade College. He is also a well-known photographer. Mail queries to prof@talkmag.in

talk the intelligent bangalorean’s must-read weekly

1st Cross

Talk’s weekly crossword for Bangaloreans who know their way about town 15 According to a recent survey the average size of an ____ in Bangalore is the highest amongst the major metros in the country (9) 16 The BDA recently razed unauthorised structures in this colony (6,7) 17 A laser fountain in Mysore will tell this great philosopher's tale (11) DOWN 2 Select cities in the state will soon get a ____ response force to deal with nature calamities (8) 3 SR ____ : MLA from Yelahanka named in a case from 2009 which involves fudging revenue records of government land in Madappanahalli (10) 5 Hospital in the news when a new-born

baby abandoned in a dustbin was ravaged by stray dogs (8) 6 Motorcycle company which conducted a training programme at Maharani Women's College (6) 9 Hospital on Bannerghatta Road (6) 11 DK _____ : Former minister who was told by the High Court that courts are not shopping centres (5,5) 12 According to judge K Sreedhar Rao Bangalore is worse than this famous city when it comes to crime (3,4) 13 Government organisation which handles our city's transport service (4) 14 A BBMP ____ was in the news recently for owning 5 houses and 2 acres of land (4)

How do advertisers talk to Bangalore’s most intelligent readers?

Last week’s solution

ACROSS 1 ____ Memorial Hall: Venue for plays and musical performances in Malleswaram (8) 4 Director of Topiwala (8) 7 Deputy CM who has been sent a notice by the High court for allegedly falsifying income details (1,6)

The ____ Room : An upmarket continental restaurant that shut down (6) 10 ___ Hills: The highest point in Bangalore (5) 11 ____ Datta: Captain of MT Royal whose ship was hijacked by Somali pirates (7) 12 Theatre in Rajajinagar (7)

Across: 3 Spielberg, 5 Green, 6 Walkathon, 8 Six AM, 9 Sahakarnagar, 11 Neha Ramu, 13 Palace Grounds, 15 Kashi, 17 Vasan, 18 BWSSB, 19 Rahul Dravid. Down: 1 Menaka, 2 Cancer, 4 Eshwarappa, 7 Air India, 8 Smart cards, 10 Amritsar, 12 Udupi, 14 Katju, 16 Anshi.

They call these numbers Abhay 95388 92618 Mithun 98864 69787

talk|28 mar 2013|talkmag.in

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Excellent story on Bhanwari Devi Read the latest issue of Talk and found the story on Rajasthani rape victim Bhanwari Devi (The fiery one, Issue 32) interesting and well-written. Please convey my appreciation to the writer. Kavitha K by email Helps people make better decisions I am writing to you to appreciate this week's cover story in Talk magazine. I enjoyed the story about the apartment glut in the city (Flat glut, Issue 32). At a time when real estate prices are rising, the buying and selling trends are quite erratic. Telling a reader that this realisation is not a figment of the imagination is helpful. The information helps us make better decisions. I look forward to

reading more such stories in future editions. Ayesha Aleem by email Hilarious Ayyotoons The Ayyotoons on Union minister P Chidambaram (Fin Min Chidu, Issue 31) in the recent Talk issue was tremendously funny, especially the Sivagangnam style bit! Congratulations to the writer and the artist. Mala S by email Want Talk in Singapore My brother was in town last week, and read the current and back issues of Talk. He immediately fell in love with the style and the

content. He lives in Singapore, and is keen on reading the print version of the magazine regularly. Would you be able to courier bunches of Talk to him, say, once in two months? S Mangala Padmanabhanagar (Thank you for the interest. Please call us on 95388 92600) Proud subscriber Talk subscribed for, finally! After repeatedly failing to find Talk at my neighbourhood news stand (note peeve: I live pretty much in the heart of the city), I finally decided to settle for the foolproof option. So, now itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s entirely up to you guys to make it worth it for me. Just kidding! Deepa B by email Write to letters@talkmag.in

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