Long ago I had read Tom Junod's The Falling Man and feel the way he describes the descent of the man from the burning Twin Towers is unparalleled. I was asked to write about the jump in this case. It took a few seconds for the man to land on the greens but in those few seconds, a lot happened. An edited version of the story appeared in the Indian Express on October 30, 2010. http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Fall-and-rise-of-India-s-first-BASE-jumper/704754/
This one's about the jump, and how he fell from the tower, the way I wrote it and I saw it.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 29, 2010
The tower looked like a needle that shot up to the sky from the earth
– lean, cowering, and intimidating. At 235 meters, everything looked
puny in front of it, including the man who was to jump from the top,
who was reduced to a dot in the context of the looming tower.
On top of it, at the platform 158 meters from the ground where
spectators lined up early morning to see the “fall”, he hesitated for
a mere two minutes. The winds were rough.
On Thursday, Lt. Col. Satyendra Verma, 42, had felt a little nervous.
His BASE jump, the first in India, was part of the centenary
celebrations of the Corps of Signals, Indian Army. He had proposed the
feat, trained for it, and it was a few hours away.
“I had apprehension. I have jumped from Kuala Lumpur KL Tower, which
is more than 900 feet. But the higher the structure, the less the
danger because then you have time to react and plan. Pitampura tower
was a challenge,” he said. “The winds were strong last evening. I
thought if it continues in the morning, I won’t jump.”
He took the elevator to the top of the structure at 5:30 a.m. Friday.
The jump was scheduled at 6:15 a.m.
“The winds were strong,” he said. “I was hoping the winds calm down
even for a few seconds. I would use the window of opportunity.”
It was man against the force of nature. Man on a mission to prove he
is bigger than his creation, in this case, the tower that formed the
backdrop, the focal point of his base jump. He needed to conquer the
fear, the tower, the nature, and the spectators.
At 6:17, he jumped. A tiny bird falling in the sky, vertically.
For a fraction of a second, his feet swerved. He drifted towards the
left where a eleven storey building stood. For a fraction of a second,
in the space of the blink of the eye, nature took over. If he hadn’t
manoeuvred, harnessed his will and the parachute, he could have hit
the walls, brick and mortar.
“The winds were coming from right hand side. The parachute went in the
direction of the wind. So I had to correct,” he said. “You have to
maintain your body position. Once you tumble, it can be dangerous.”
The winds did shake him a bit. But he managed to get vertical again.
And in his fall, he rose in stature.
At about 120 meters from the ground, after about 2 seconds after he
jumped of the platform, Col Satyendra Sharma pushed the button to open
up the parachute. The green and blue parachute gave him wings. The
gravitational pull, another force of nature, was defeated.
He rose, the green and blue fluttering above him, and he fell. The
steep jump transformed into a slow motion gliding almost. If he hadn’t
opened the parachute, it would have taken all of 4 seconds for him to
hit the ground. The wings broke the speed. He drifted for 15-20
seconds before he landed.
Legs down, he drifted in the sky, the tower behind him, despite the
“environment forces”. He was carried by the wind, and then it was an
effortless fall that started with a determined “jump”.
He landed gently, and before his feet touched the ground, cameras had
already surrounded the first man to ever jump from the high rise
tower.
His wings lay collapsed. As he walked towards the “picture frame”, a
board celebrating the centennial of the Signals, he carried the blue
and green wings that looked like a mutilated butterfly. On his helmet,
the Indian tri colour was pronounced. Two cameras too had been fixed
to it to capture what the earth looked to him from his height as he
fell.
It all took a few seconds. Groggy-eyed photographers and reporters
gasped. A few missed the spectacle. He jumped while they were still
walking towards the spot. Cameras secured in their backpacks, they
looked up, and in moments, the spectacle ended.
The tower looked forlorn. Its height, pride had been breached. It had
been subdued by human endeavour and spirit.
On top of the building, men and women had collected to watch him jump.
“It happened like ‘dhurrrr’ and it was done. Maybe 6-7 frames. That’s
all I got. The light wasn’t too good,” a camera person said.
When he jumped, the skies were a dull grey and orange. Minutes after
Verma attempted India’s first BASE jump, the sun came out. And he had
his moment under the sun, with shutterbugs clicking at the speed of
light.
His family – wife Monika and a son, 9, and daughter, four-and-a-half
years – weren’t there to witness his free fall.
“I think she was scared,” Verma said, as he laughed.
Verma has trained in Kuala Lumpur and has performed BASE jumps at KL
Tower in Malaysia and Perrine Bridge in the USA.
Now, he wants to attempt wing flying in the Himalayas next year. He
started training in BASE jumping a year ago but has been involved in
adventure sports for a long time.
“It is adrenaline rush. It is a thrill from conception to planning.
You get a great satisfaction,” he said.
At the lawns of the TV Tower, a few staff from the DD were standing.
For three months they had been roped in to facilitate the event, JR
Arora, station engineer, said..
Cameras had been installed at the ramp on top of the tower on Thursday
night. Each moment of the free fall had to be captured, history had to
be manufactured through the lens.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Sunday, October 24, 2010
In the Ramlila green room - Gods in the making.
I had never watched Ramlila so I went to the Red Fort grounds one evening to watch the epic being enacted. Found my way to the green room and spent time chatting with gods in the making.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 12, 2010
It took a few strokes of the brush, and greasy Camlin Oil Colour, to transform the mortal into the God he was to play. They were still using the old techniques. Black oil colour was best to paint moustaches, and dye eyebrows. This was in epic proportions, a morality play of good over evil, the characters had to be "done up" likewise.
Bhaskar Joshi, 23, a management student from Moradabad, was almost in a trance. Once in a while he liked to step into God's shoes. At 23, that was his high. With his lips painted bright red, and mascara loaded eyelashes, he felt beyond the mundane. The Ramlila was his arena. Here, he would weep, sacrifice, kill, forgive, repent, lament, go through all emotions and bring God to the masses.
Last year, the President folded her hands in front of the epic hero of the Ramayan. That was it. Other mortals would fall at his feet, look up at him with moistened eyes brimming with hope, prayer, devotion, everything.
He felt like the avatar. In the green room with its gauzy pink curtains, and tin trunks overflowing with God's garb, he sat with a coterie of friends, including Hanuman,who wore his shades and called him “Prabhu”. Hanuman had no business hanging around in the greenroom. Tonight, it was Manthra-Kaikeyee Samvad, a part of the epic that told the story of how the queen went into her “warth palace” as it was explained in a notebook designed especially for foreigners who the organizers expected would come by the dozen, and Ram's exile.
In the little tent that looked like a square box, fortified against mosquitoes that could spread the Dengue fever, something the foreigners were wary of as they poured into the national capital for the Commonwealth Games, with rectangular glass windows for viewing, a few Indians, mostly the privileged, sat. The Lav Kush Ramlila Committee had put up this little enclave with seating for 50 for the Germans, French, Australians, Kenyans, everyone that was not Indian. This was their commitment to merging the epic tale with yet another epic event – the CWG.
Indians were mostly confined to the grounds with its army of mosquitoes.
“We are habituated to this. We don't mind,” a committee member said. “Yesterday, a couple of Africans were in the tent watching the Ramlila. The notebook has all details of embassies and illustrations and maps. We have worked hard on this.”
Besides Ram and Sita, Shera, the official mascot, was prominent on the posters, on the little coffee mugs they had designed as part of the welcome kit for the people beyond the seas so they could take home the lessons from the epic.
Next to Joshi, Neha Vashisth, a 21-year-old “fresher” from the Uttar Pradesh town, was waiting to get her face painted. Among the various gods and his family, she, who was to play Sita, the wronged goddess who triggered the battle because Ravan, the anti-hero took a fancy for her, was looking too brown, too mortal.
Ram preferred this Sita. The other one who he acted with for the last three years got married. Besides, she looked much older than him. Neha was younger and he thought they looked together.
“He is handsome. He has good personality. I like him as Ram,” she said, blushing. “No, no affair between us.”
“I like this Sita,” Ram said, unabashed by Sita's denial.
Maybe there is an affair. All sorts of things happen when Gods and humans interchange roles. Million possibilities can arise.
For the Ramlila committee too, possibilities have come marching. Now, they are streaming live telecast of the nine parts of the epic on their website www.lavkush.com. Besides, a team of public relations strategists have totally delved into pitching faith to all. Already , 2200 members have joined the Facebook page. Big leap of faith for all.
They aren't twittering yet. In the server room at the back of the giant stage, there are laptops, entangled wires, harried staff.
They are trying to connect, merge the new and the old. Faith needs to be revived, sold in a package with freebies.
With Commonwealth Games consuming the imagination of the young and the faithless, they have a strategy too. Instead of Bollywood stars who the committee called to attract more public, this year they have banners with faces of the known Indian sports persons like Sania Nehelwal, Abhinav Bindra, and Vijendar, the boxer, a pin-up poster boy for the young girls who go gushing over his looks.
“Today, things have changed. Today Ramlila is standing with the country in its glorious moment of hosting the CWG. We are with it. We sent out 5 lakh invitations, we are into technology, everything,” Arjun Kumar Singh, 55, the “permanent” secretary of the committee, said.
For 31 years, he has been involved with promoting the faith, the values that the epic endorses through its characters.
As a kid, he watched the numerous small neighborhood Ramlilas.
“Ramlila is the solution to mankind's problems, to disintegrating families. They only need to learn from Ram and his brothers Bharat and Lakhsman the virtues of sacrifice, how to keep families together,” he said.
Arjun Kumar is in the construction business. Each year, he digs into his wealth like 20 others who are associated with the committee and funds the extravaganza at the Red Fort grounds.
It cost the committee Rs. 1 crore this year.
On the stage, Manthra was convincing the queen Kaikeyee to send Lord Ram into exile so her own son could get to rule Ayodhya. At 9:11 p.m., a power cut froze King Dashrath. At the moment, he was crouching on the floor, overcome with sadness and the price of his promise to his beautiful queen.
Manorama Joshi, who enacted the stepmother, was in her element. For a few seconds, she didn't move. Then she looked around, adjusted her hair, and took in the audience.
In the greenroom before it all started, the start of the 14-year-old exile and the making of the epic, Manthra stood, trying to fit a pillow in her already-bursting velvet bustier. For 32-year-old Sanjay Sharma, who always wanted to be an actor and even spent time lounging outside the filmistan studio in Mumbai hoping that someone would take notice of his acting talent, playing Manthra was a challenge.
For 12 years since he first got on to the stage and felt liberated, he had played the character of Lakshman, Lord Ram's brother, who accompanied him into the exile.
In Lakhman's character, he felt like a Black Cat Commando in his element. Once, the commandos gave him a thumbs up.
“There's anger in me. Lakshman was an angry man. In my life, I have anger too. He was also committed to sacrifice. I wanted to make my father, a railway official, proud of me, but he passed away. There's so much I wished for. But wishes are elusive beings. They never come true,” he said, chewing paan masala, holding his saree while the director fixed his hair.
“You see, I can do roles that no man here can. I can become this scheming Manthra. Why not,” he said.
The Ramlila was not just about faith then. It was also about pent-up frustration, broken dreams, crushed aspirations, and an outlet for the creative, artistic urge that never found a footing the other grand stage, the Bollywood.
Rishi Pal, in his white wig, was counting the beads he held. In his Saint Vashishth role, he felt he was doing great service to the cause of religion that was soon exiting the human mind and soul.
The 55-year-old has been part of the Ramlila for 40 years. The committee pays the artists a lump sum and bear their expenses for the 11 days that they are in Delhi, giving the national capital its tryst with gods.
“Ramlila has changed. Now, we don't wear garish makeup. It is more like Bollywood makeup but then the artist can come out more. The dark makeup hid the expressions,” he said. “Religion is important. I am doing my bit for it.”
Outside, in the barricaded seats, 32-year-old Satish Kumar, a Bihari migrant worker, sat engulfed with an overdose of faith and gods. Each time, Ram came on stage, he would fold his hands, utter small prayers that had remained unfulfilled.
“I come everyday. For me, he is god incarnate,” he said.
As Kaikeyee stomped and kicked and threw her bangles and beads that looked more like the Mardi Gras pink and green beads in her fit to have Dashrath announce her own son as the king, Kumar looked crestfallen. Of course he knew this was coming. But for god to go through all this, it wasn't a nice thing, he said.
On the periphery, there were food stalls. A woman in a bikini smiled from one the advertisemnts. Too many advertisements dotted the Ramlila landscape.
Rahul, a 12-year-old volunteer in his white trousers and shirt, was busy checking passes. For the last four years, he had been part of the Ramlila Committee as a volunteer. This was his service to go for a better life, a job, too.
“We are only sewaks,” he said. “God will give blessings.”
On the stage, Ram was preparing for his ordeal. The audience was “tch tch” on his plight. But the story had to go on. It would go on.
Kaikeyee, in her “warth palace” and in her black saree, had won the round. Dashrath lay slumped on the floor.
Manthra was busy chewing her gutkha inside. He had totally killed it. It was kick-ass, his performance.
Meanwhile, Shera looked a misfit in the battle of the evil and the good.
Going hi-tech, the future of Ramlila
An edited version of the story appeared in the Sunday Eye magazine of The Indian Express. on Oct. 24, 2010.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 19, 2010
Squeezed in between the Yellow Sea and the East Sea, the red dot showing Ramlila viewership seemed an anomaly.
Arjun Kuma Singh, the 55-year-old organizer, looked again. Yes, they were watching online Ramlila in South Korea. Total adrenaline rush.
Singh was kicked. His investment of Rs. 10 lakhs on making one of the oldest Ramlilas in the country, the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee, hi-tech by installing a separate server in the backroom, setting up a technical team headed by his son, invading the social networking website www.facebook.com and making Lord Ram a Facebook celebrity too, had paid off.
“Online Ramlila, live telecast is the only alternative to continue the faith. Else, all be lost. South Korea surprised me the most. Imagine, they were watching the live telecast there too,” Singh said.
On Monday, after eleven days of telecasting Ramlila with the help of three cameramen and six others, Singh was sitting with the Tata Communication Server representatives to discuss feedback. More than six lakh hits in 11 days on the committee’s website www.lavkush.com and it was from all over the world. The seas, the mountains, the
enmity, the foreign relations, all of those didn’t come in the way of Lord Ram making way to the thousands of screens worldwide at the click of the mouse.
Viewership spanned America, Dubai, Canada, England, South Asian countries and Gulf countries. Last year, they broadcast live the eleven parts of the grand narrative but it was through broadband and it was a failure like with other Ramlila committees too that were trying to go hi-tech, Arjun Kumar said.
This year, they connected the uudio and video input to a computer complete with a special software to stream the telecast online at Tata Communication Server through high speed internet connection. The streaming is then picked up by several servers located across the globe. Organizers said buffering would be no issue as the telecast can be viewed with as low as 250 kbps speed connection.
But on facebook, several members had issues with the buffering. As the battle between Sri Ram and the demon king Ravan, who abducted the god’s wife Sita, technical glitches as one tried to connect to the online Ramlila in Bhopal caused the sword to be stalled in the air.
Hanuman, the monkey god, was fixated in his antics as he flew in the skies. It was buffering, the epic.
But datacards weren’t capable of handling the war of epic proportions.
Speed was crucial. But of course the organizers are brainstorming on how to make it better next year. Even the effigies are going to be fitted with gadgets and gizmos and special effects so the charm in unparalleled like how Ravan effigy had tears in his eyes and had tape recorders fitted in his mouth for high-strung shrieks that seemed as if the effigy had suddenly turned human with all the attributes.
“You see, we did it for the first time. Now, we will go on twitter, other such sites. We needed to attract youngsters and empty stalls were an issue. We had been researching all through the year. We got calls from London, America asking us to come there and stage the Ramlila. All this was because we decided to go onine in a big way,” Arjun Singh said. “Hi-tech Ramlila is the way. This is the only
alternative.”We are the first ones to sue this separate server technique. There is only a 10-second telecast delay. Others have buffering issues because they are using broadband.”
It is not just the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee that decided to harness the powers and scope of Internet, but others too like the Nav Shree Dharmik Leela Committee that decided to integrate technology with spirituality and are present on Twitter, Orkut and Facebook.
Lord Ram needs networking, a viewer said.
“Facebook is crucial for his status. We need status updates from gods,” he said.
In just about a week, the viewership burgeoned to hundreds, then thousands came on board.
“More than 50,000 are watching every day. We are getting professionals to act in the Ramlila. We have a team of 10 people who are dedicated to make this online Ramlila a hit,” Piyush Agarwal, who is in charge of the technical team, said. “Because of facebook we got connected to 6,000 youth.”
Arjun Singh was already recieving calls from people in Pakistan, Canada, USA thanking him for the live telecast of Ramlila. He was happy. Maybe next year, they'd do more. The empty stalls at the Red Fort grounds didn't dampen his spirits. Server problems were proof that virtual stalls were full of the faithful and the curious. It was all god's grace, he said.
It took a few strokes of the brush, and greasy Camlin Oil Colour, to transform the mortal into the God he was to play. They were still using the old techniques. Black oil colour was best to paint moustaches, and dye eyebrows. This was in epic proportions, a morality play of good over evil, the characters had to be "done up" likewise.
The “godliness” had to be applied carefully, keeping in tandem with the changing times. Now, it is more “Bollywood” with glittering, shimmering eyes, defined lips, highlighted cheekbones. Sita looks uber cool in her matted makeup, her lips painted bronze.
To keep up with the times, the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee has expanded its space and it is not just the sprawling grounds of the Red Fort that it occupies, but virtual space too. Live telecast through a separate server so the net is cast far and wide, across the seas and mountains, and quite a following on the social networking site
www.facebook.com are how the organizing members of the committee, one of the oldest in the country and established in 1979 in Delhi, ensured the tradition survives. Such traditions can’t be in isolation. They must be integrated with the technology for survival, the members said.
The website, www.lavkush.com, where the live telecast of the epic in 11 parts is being played, has registered more than 6 lakh hits already. On www.facebook.com, there are upwards of 6,000 members who “like” the group.
It is not just the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee that’s into harnessing technology and the worldwide web for expanding its reach to millions of youngsters and others elsewhere in the world, who can’t be present in the stalls to watch the actors playing their parts in the centuries old epic, but hundreds of other such organizations too that are increasingly becoming tech-savvy to ensure the continuity of a tradition that many feel could well become extinct if not promoted on the virtual space. After all, Ramlila isn’t just about tradition but also about one’s moral duty towards faith and its survival despite the distractions of the modern world, members said.
On its facebook page, discussions are on in full swing.
One Sukhbir Soni wrote “I am very happy to see The great Indian role history on line Thanks.” Others too expressed their gratefulness online. This tryst with online Ramlila was way too cool.
This online approach was inclusive, it was all-encompassing. This is where physicals, externals melted and only spiritual remained.
For years, the traditional art form demanded the actors stuck to the morality play rules, apply makeup that also reflected the good or evil in them for this was Ramayan, and not Mahabharat where the hero was a tragic one with redeeming qualities. Here, it was clearly good and evil.
But as with the online crossover, adoption, adaption, other cosmetic changes too have changed the art form. Previously, there were seasoned actors whose faith made them join the moving committees from small towns in India. They traveled, dedicated their lives to the service of Lord Ram, and brought the God to the masses. Now, there are management students, athletes, professionals who feel being part of the committee may give them a break in Bollywood, or bring them closer to faith that
they are so out of sync with.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 12, 2010
It took a few strokes of the brush, and greasy Camlin Oil Colour, to transform the mortal into the God he was to play. They were still using the old techniques. Black oil colour was best to paint moustaches, and dye eyebrows. This was in epic proportions, a morality play of good over evil, the characters had to be "done up" likewise.
Bhaskar Joshi, 23, a management student from Moradabad, was almost in a trance. Once in a while he liked to step into God's shoes. At 23, that was his high. With his lips painted bright red, and mascara loaded eyelashes, he felt beyond the mundane. The Ramlila was his arena. Here, he would weep, sacrifice, kill, forgive, repent, lament, go through all emotions and bring God to the masses.
Last year, the President folded her hands in front of the epic hero of the Ramayan. That was it. Other mortals would fall at his feet, look up at him with moistened eyes brimming with hope, prayer, devotion, everything.
He felt like the avatar. In the green room with its gauzy pink curtains, and tin trunks overflowing with God's garb, he sat with a coterie of friends, including Hanuman,who wore his shades and called him “Prabhu”. Hanuman had no business hanging around in the greenroom. Tonight, it was Manthra-Kaikeyee Samvad, a part of the epic that told the story of how the queen went into her “warth palace” as it was explained in a notebook designed especially for foreigners who the organizers expected would come by the dozen, and Ram's exile.
In the little tent that looked like a square box, fortified against mosquitoes that could spread the Dengue fever, something the foreigners were wary of as they poured into the national capital for the Commonwealth Games, with rectangular glass windows for viewing, a few Indians, mostly the privileged, sat. The Lav Kush Ramlila Committee had put up this little enclave with seating for 50 for the Germans, French, Australians, Kenyans, everyone that was not Indian. This was their commitment to merging the epic tale with yet another epic event – the CWG.
Indians were mostly confined to the grounds with its army of mosquitoes.
“We are habituated to this. We don't mind,” a committee member said. “Yesterday, a couple of Africans were in the tent watching the Ramlila. The notebook has all details of embassies and illustrations and maps. We have worked hard on this.”
Besides Ram and Sita, Shera, the official mascot, was prominent on the posters, on the little coffee mugs they had designed as part of the welcome kit for the people beyond the seas so they could take home the lessons from the epic.
Next to Joshi, Neha Vashisth, a 21-year-old “fresher” from the Uttar Pradesh town, was waiting to get her face painted. Among the various gods and his family, she, who was to play Sita, the wronged goddess who triggered the battle because Ravan, the anti-hero took a fancy for her, was looking too brown, too mortal.
Ram preferred this Sita. The other one who he acted with for the last three years got married. Besides, she looked much older than him. Neha was younger and he thought they looked together.
“He is handsome. He has good personality. I like him as Ram,” she said, blushing. “No, no affair between us.”
“I like this Sita,” Ram said, unabashed by Sita's denial.
Maybe there is an affair. All sorts of things happen when Gods and humans interchange roles. Million possibilities can arise.
For the Ramlila committee too, possibilities have come marching. Now, they are streaming live telecast of the nine parts of the epic on their website www.lavkush.com. Besides, a team of public relations strategists have totally delved into pitching faith to all. Already , 2200 members have joined the Facebook page. Big leap of faith for all.
They aren't twittering yet. In the server room at the back of the giant stage, there are laptops, entangled wires, harried staff.
They are trying to connect, merge the new and the old. Faith needs to be revived, sold in a package with freebies.
With Commonwealth Games consuming the imagination of the young and the faithless, they have a strategy too. Instead of Bollywood stars who the committee called to attract more public, this year they have banners with faces of the known Indian sports persons like Sania Nehelwal, Abhinav Bindra, and Vijendar, the boxer, a pin-up poster boy for the young girls who go gushing over his looks.
“Today, things have changed. Today Ramlila is standing with the country in its glorious moment of hosting the CWG. We are with it. We sent out 5 lakh invitations, we are into technology, everything,” Arjun Kumar Singh, 55, the “permanent” secretary of the committee, said.
For 31 years, he has been involved with promoting the faith, the values that the epic endorses through its characters.
As a kid, he watched the numerous small neighborhood Ramlilas.
“Ramlila is the solution to mankind's problems, to disintegrating families. They only need to learn from Ram and his brothers Bharat and Lakhsman the virtues of sacrifice, how to keep families together,” he said.
Arjun Kumar is in the construction business. Each year, he digs into his wealth like 20 others who are associated with the committee and funds the extravaganza at the Red Fort grounds.
It cost the committee Rs. 1 crore this year.
On the stage, Manthra was convincing the queen Kaikeyee to send Lord Ram into exile so her own son could get to rule Ayodhya. At 9:11 p.m., a power cut froze King Dashrath. At the moment, he was crouching on the floor, overcome with sadness and the price of his promise to his beautiful queen.
Manorama Joshi, who enacted the stepmother, was in her element. For a few seconds, she didn't move. Then she looked around, adjusted her hair, and took in the audience.
In the greenroom before it all started, the start of the 14-year-old exile and the making of the epic, Manthra stood, trying to fit a pillow in her already-bursting velvet bustier. For 32-year-old Sanjay Sharma, who always wanted to be an actor and even spent time lounging outside the filmistan studio in Mumbai hoping that someone would take notice of his acting talent, playing Manthra was a challenge.
For 12 years since he first got on to the stage and felt liberated, he had played the character of Lakshman, Lord Ram's brother, who accompanied him into the exile.
In Lakhman's character, he felt like a Black Cat Commando in his element. Once, the commandos gave him a thumbs up.
“There's anger in me. Lakshman was an angry man. In my life, I have anger too. He was also committed to sacrifice. I wanted to make my father, a railway official, proud of me, but he passed away. There's so much I wished for. But wishes are elusive beings. They never come true,” he said, chewing paan masala, holding his saree while the director fixed his hair.
“You see, I can do roles that no man here can. I can become this scheming Manthra. Why not,” he said.
The Ramlila was not just about faith then. It was also about pent-up frustration, broken dreams, crushed aspirations, and an outlet for the creative, artistic urge that never found a footing the other grand stage, the Bollywood.
Rishi Pal, in his white wig, was counting the beads he held. In his Saint Vashishth role, he felt he was doing great service to the cause of religion that was soon exiting the human mind and soul.
The 55-year-old has been part of the Ramlila for 40 years. The committee pays the artists a lump sum and bear their expenses for the 11 days that they are in Delhi, giving the national capital its tryst with gods.
“Ramlila has changed. Now, we don't wear garish makeup. It is more like Bollywood makeup but then the artist can come out more. The dark makeup hid the expressions,” he said. “Religion is important. I am doing my bit for it.”
Outside, in the barricaded seats, 32-year-old Satish Kumar, a Bihari migrant worker, sat engulfed with an overdose of faith and gods. Each time, Ram came on stage, he would fold his hands, utter small prayers that had remained unfulfilled.
“I come everyday. For me, he is god incarnate,” he said.
As Kaikeyee stomped and kicked and threw her bangles and beads that looked more like the Mardi Gras pink and green beads in her fit to have Dashrath announce her own son as the king, Kumar looked crestfallen. Of course he knew this was coming. But for god to go through all this, it wasn't a nice thing, he said.
On the periphery, there were food stalls. A woman in a bikini smiled from one the advertisemnts. Too many advertisements dotted the Ramlila landscape.
Rahul, a 12-year-old volunteer in his white trousers and shirt, was busy checking passes. For the last four years, he had been part of the Ramlila Committee as a volunteer. This was his service to go for a better life, a job, too.
“We are only sewaks,” he said. “God will give blessings.”
On the stage, Ram was preparing for his ordeal. The audience was “tch tch” on his plight. But the story had to go on. It would go on.
Kaikeyee, in her “warth palace” and in her black saree, had won the round. Dashrath lay slumped on the floor.
Manthra was busy chewing her gutkha inside. He had totally killed it. It was kick-ass, his performance.
Meanwhile, Shera looked a misfit in the battle of the evil and the good.
Going hi-tech, the future of Ramlila
An edited version of the story appeared in the Sunday Eye magazine of The Indian Express. on Oct. 24, 2010.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 19, 2010
Squeezed in between the Yellow Sea and the East Sea, the red dot showing Ramlila viewership seemed an anomaly.
Arjun Kuma Singh, the 55-year-old organizer, looked again. Yes, they were watching online Ramlila in South Korea. Total adrenaline rush.
Singh was kicked. His investment of Rs. 10 lakhs on making one of the oldest Ramlilas in the country, the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee, hi-tech by installing a separate server in the backroom, setting up a technical team headed by his son, invading the social networking website www.facebook.com and making Lord Ram a Facebook celebrity too, had paid off.
“Online Ramlila, live telecast is the only alternative to continue the faith. Else, all be lost. South Korea surprised me the most. Imagine, they were watching the live telecast there too,” Singh said.
On Monday, after eleven days of telecasting Ramlila with the help of three cameramen and six others, Singh was sitting with the Tata Communication Server representatives to discuss feedback. More than six lakh hits in 11 days on the committee’s website www.lavkush.com and it was from all over the world. The seas, the mountains, the
enmity, the foreign relations, all of those didn’t come in the way of Lord Ram making way to the thousands of screens worldwide at the click of the mouse.
Viewership spanned America, Dubai, Canada, England, South Asian countries and Gulf countries. Last year, they broadcast live the eleven parts of the grand narrative but it was through broadband and it was a failure like with other Ramlila committees too that were trying to go hi-tech, Arjun Kumar said.
This year, they connected the uudio and video input to a computer complete with a special software to stream the telecast online at Tata Communication Server through high speed internet connection. The streaming is then picked up by several servers located across the globe. Organizers said buffering would be no issue as the telecast can be viewed with as low as 250 kbps speed connection.
But on facebook, several members had issues with the buffering. As the battle between Sri Ram and the demon king Ravan, who abducted the god’s wife Sita, technical glitches as one tried to connect to the online Ramlila in Bhopal caused the sword to be stalled in the air.
Hanuman, the monkey god, was fixated in his antics as he flew in the skies. It was buffering, the epic.
But datacards weren’t capable of handling the war of epic proportions.
Speed was crucial. But of course the organizers are brainstorming on how to make it better next year. Even the effigies are going to be fitted with gadgets and gizmos and special effects so the charm in unparalleled like how Ravan effigy had tears in his eyes and had tape recorders fitted in his mouth for high-strung shrieks that seemed as if the effigy had suddenly turned human with all the attributes.
“You see, we did it for the first time. Now, we will go on twitter, other such sites. We needed to attract youngsters and empty stalls were an issue. We had been researching all through the year. We got calls from London, America asking us to come there and stage the Ramlila. All this was because we decided to go onine in a big way,” Arjun Singh said. “Hi-tech Ramlila is the way. This is the only
alternative.”We are the first ones to sue this separate server technique. There is only a 10-second telecast delay. Others have buffering issues because they are using broadband.”
It is not just the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee that decided to harness the powers and scope of Internet, but others too like the Nav Shree Dharmik Leela Committee that decided to integrate technology with spirituality and are present on Twitter, Orkut and Facebook.
Lord Ram needs networking, a viewer said.
“Facebook is crucial for his status. We need status updates from gods,” he said.
In just about a week, the viewership burgeoned to hundreds, then thousands came on board.
“More than 50,000 are watching every day. We are getting professionals to act in the Ramlila. We have a team of 10 people who are dedicated to make this online Ramlila a hit,” Piyush Agarwal, who is in charge of the technical team, said. “Because of facebook we got connected to 6,000 youth.”
Arjun Singh was already recieving calls from people in Pakistan, Canada, USA thanking him for the live telecast of Ramlila. He was happy. Maybe next year, they'd do more. The empty stalls at the Red Fort grounds didn't dampen his spirits. Server problems were proof that virtual stalls were full of the faithful and the curious. It was all god's grace, he said.
It took a few strokes of the brush, and greasy Camlin Oil Colour, to transform the mortal into the God he was to play. They were still using the old techniques. Black oil colour was best to paint moustaches, and dye eyebrows. This was in epic proportions, a morality play of good over evil, the characters had to be "done up" likewise.
The “godliness” had to be applied carefully, keeping in tandem with the changing times. Now, it is more “Bollywood” with glittering, shimmering eyes, defined lips, highlighted cheekbones. Sita looks uber cool in her matted makeup, her lips painted bronze.
To keep up with the times, the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee has expanded its space and it is not just the sprawling grounds of the Red Fort that it occupies, but virtual space too. Live telecast through a separate server so the net is cast far and wide, across the seas and mountains, and quite a following on the social networking site
www.facebook.com are how the organizing members of the committee, one of the oldest in the country and established in 1979 in Delhi, ensured the tradition survives. Such traditions can’t be in isolation. They must be integrated with the technology for survival, the members said.
The website, www.lavkush.com, where the live telecast of the epic in 11 parts is being played, has registered more than 6 lakh hits already. On www.facebook.com, there are upwards of 6,000 members who “like” the group.
It is not just the Lav Kush Ramlila Committee that’s into harnessing technology and the worldwide web for expanding its reach to millions of youngsters and others elsewhere in the world, who can’t be present in the stalls to watch the actors playing their parts in the centuries old epic, but hundreds of other such organizations too that are increasingly becoming tech-savvy to ensure the continuity of a tradition that many feel could well become extinct if not promoted on the virtual space. After all, Ramlila isn’t just about tradition but also about one’s moral duty towards faith and its survival despite the distractions of the modern world, members said.
On its facebook page, discussions are on in full swing.
One Sukhbir Soni wrote “I am very happy to see The great Indian role history on line Thanks.” Others too expressed their gratefulness online. This tryst with online Ramlila was way too cool.
This online approach was inclusive, it was all-encompassing. This is where physicals, externals melted and only spiritual remained.
For years, the traditional art form demanded the actors stuck to the morality play rules, apply makeup that also reflected the good or evil in them for this was Ramayan, and not Mahabharat where the hero was a tragic one with redeeming qualities. Here, it was clearly good and evil.
But as with the online crossover, adoption, adaption, other cosmetic changes too have changed the art form. Previously, there were seasoned actors whose faith made them join the moving committees from small towns in India. They traveled, dedicated their lives to the service of Lord Ram, and brought the God to the masses. Now, there are management students, athletes, professionals who feel being part of the committee may give them a break in Bollywood, or bring them closer to faith that
they are so out of sync with.
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Election Commission, UIDAI recognize third gender ...
This is for Frances Mary Fischer, the transgender woman I met in New York.
An edited version appeared in The Indian Express on October 12, 2010.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 11, 2010
It was a fight for a column, a space where the numerous transgender could affirm their identity and not be compartmentalized into either male or female.
With Bihar becoming the first state to implement the Election Commission's mandate to have a separate column “Other” in the voter enrolment and registration, Dr. SE Huda, a Bareilly-based doctor who had approached the apex body that conducts elections in 2009 asking them to recognize the third gender, feels vindicated.
It is not just the Election Commission that took the lead so “others could follow suit” as per the Chief Election Commissioner SY Quershi, now the UIDAI, a Planning Commission initiative to accord identity to all Indian residents, has also extended the gender identity and inclusion to “Transgender” on their enrolment forms and their database.
The UIDAI enrolment form will now have “M”, “F” and “T” so the one million eunuchs can register as themselves.“It was a legitimate demand and we said let others follow out example. It is a good thing that the UIDAI is doing it. In the voter enrolment, the officials refused to register them as females because of their male voice so we decided to do this,” Chief Election Commissioner SY Quershi said.
“There was some representation to Navin Chawla and we immediately decided to do it. It is an all India instruction but starts with Bihar in the upcoming elections.”In February 2010 the election commission of India allowed intersex and transsexuals the right to register as voters with “Other”.
This was what Bareilly-based Dr. SE Huda, secretary of Syed Shah Farzand Ali Educational & Social Foundation of India, which has offices in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi where they work with women, children and eunuchs, fought for. At a conference for third gender equality in Bareilly in April 2009, his organization had decided they would take this up with the Election Commission, with the Census, and with the UIDAI, so the right identity is accorded and statistical data on the number of transgender in the country becomes available. Dr. Huda was also called to Delhi by former chief election commissioner Navin Chawla to discuss his work with the community and how to reach out this segment of voters with a low voting rate.
In August, the UIDAI wrote back to Barielly-based doctor Huda that the authority had already provided a third option – transgender – on their enrolment form and in the database. The 30-year-old doctor had asked the Planning Commission to include the “third sex” to accord them their rightful identity so they could access various government welfare schemes like the Tamil Nadu government's scheme of a welfare board and free sex reassignment surgeries at the government hospitals for the transgenders and the Karnataka's government pension scheme for the members of the community. For the UIDAI Huda's letter was an endorsement of sorts, and a reassurance that they were in the right direction with the marginalized community, UIDAI Deputy Director General K. Ganga said.
Ganga had responded to Dr. Huda's RTI application and she told Indian Express that the Demographic Data Standard and Verification Procedure Committee had already decided to capture the information whether a person was transgender though it wasn't their mandate to collect statistical data on eunuchs way back in December 2009, something that Dr. Huda wanted. "We had received this letter and I was the one who had responded," Ganga said. "We wrote to the President office who Huda had also written to telling them we could capture the gender but that would not be for statistical purpose. For us, it was an endorsement of our plans." In future, the UIDAI may also partner with groups and organizations that work with the transgender community.
Around five years ago, a transgender person had asked for an appointment at a hospital in Barielly but at 10 in the morning she didn't turn up at the hospital. She came later in the evening and Dr. Huda, a 30-year-old doctor who wrote to the UIDAI earlier this year to ask them to include the third sex on their enrollment form, asked her why she didn't come earlier.
She was in pain as she was suffering with cervical spondylitis and pain was radiating towards her heart and her limbs had become numb. But even acute pain couldn't bring her to go to the hospital earlier.
She asked if he wanted her to go through yet another round of humiliation in a crowded general OPD ward. Dr. Huda recalled he didn't know what to say.
“She asked me if I had the courage to diagnose her in front of everyone,” Dr. Huda said. “That led me to work towards the inclusion of the transgender in the mainstream society. I had followed it up. It is good that they did it."
An edited version appeared in The Indian Express on October 12, 2010.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 11, 2010
It was a fight for a column, a space where the numerous transgender could affirm their identity and not be compartmentalized into either male or female.
With Bihar becoming the first state to implement the Election Commission's mandate to have a separate column “Other” in the voter enrolment and registration, Dr. SE Huda, a Bareilly-based doctor who had approached the apex body that conducts elections in 2009 asking them to recognize the third gender, feels vindicated.
It is not just the Election Commission that took the lead so “others could follow suit” as per the Chief Election Commissioner SY Quershi, now the UIDAI, a Planning Commission initiative to accord identity to all Indian residents, has also extended the gender identity and inclusion to “Transgender” on their enrolment forms and their database.
The UIDAI enrolment form will now have “M”, “F” and “T” so the one million eunuchs can register as themselves.“It was a legitimate demand and we said let others follow out example. It is a good thing that the UIDAI is doing it. In the voter enrolment, the officials refused to register them as females because of their male voice so we decided to do this,” Chief Election Commissioner SY Quershi said.
“There was some representation to Navin Chawla and we immediately decided to do it. It is an all India instruction but starts with Bihar in the upcoming elections.”In February 2010 the election commission of India allowed intersex and transsexuals the right to register as voters with “Other”.
This was what Bareilly-based Dr. SE Huda, secretary of Syed Shah Farzand Ali Educational & Social Foundation of India, which has offices in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi where they work with women, children and eunuchs, fought for. At a conference for third gender equality in Bareilly in April 2009, his organization had decided they would take this up with the Election Commission, with the Census, and with the UIDAI, so the right identity is accorded and statistical data on the number of transgender in the country becomes available. Dr. Huda was also called to Delhi by former chief election commissioner Navin Chawla to discuss his work with the community and how to reach out this segment of voters with a low voting rate.
In August, the UIDAI wrote back to Barielly-based doctor Huda that the authority had already provided a third option – transgender – on their enrolment form and in the database. The 30-year-old doctor had asked the Planning Commission to include the “third sex” to accord them their rightful identity so they could access various government welfare schemes like the Tamil Nadu government's scheme of a welfare board and free sex reassignment surgeries at the government hospitals for the transgenders and the Karnataka's government pension scheme for the members of the community. For the UIDAI Huda's letter was an endorsement of sorts, and a reassurance that they were in the right direction with the marginalized community, UIDAI Deputy Director General K. Ganga said.
Ganga had responded to Dr. Huda's RTI application and she told Indian Express that the Demographic Data Standard and Verification Procedure Committee had already decided to capture the information whether a person was transgender though it wasn't their mandate to collect statistical data on eunuchs way back in December 2009, something that Dr. Huda wanted. "We had received this letter and I was the one who had responded," Ganga said. "We wrote to the President office who Huda had also written to telling them we could capture the gender but that would not be for statistical purpose. For us, it was an endorsement of our plans." In future, the UIDAI may also partner with groups and organizations that work with the transgender community.
Around five years ago, a transgender person had asked for an appointment at a hospital in Barielly but at 10 in the morning she didn't turn up at the hospital. She came later in the evening and Dr. Huda, a 30-year-old doctor who wrote to the UIDAI earlier this year to ask them to include the third sex on their enrollment form, asked her why she didn't come earlier.
She was in pain as she was suffering with cervical spondylitis and pain was radiating towards her heart and her limbs had become numb. But even acute pain couldn't bring her to go to the hospital earlier.
She asked if he wanted her to go through yet another round of humiliation in a crowded general OPD ward. Dr. Huda recalled he didn't know what to say.
“She asked me if I had the courage to diagnose her in front of everyone,” Dr. Huda said. “That led me to work towards the inclusion of the transgender in the mainstream society. I had followed it up. It is good that they did it."
Monday, October 04, 2010
Living behind the CWG posters
An edited version appeard in The Indian Express Real Page 3 on October 3, 2010.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 1, 2010
There is a hole in everything. And through that whatever it was that
they were trying to hide comes pouring out. In this case, a little
child, in his rags, who stood in the hole, or where the Commonwealth
Games posters let the world seep in, or the poverty peep out, was
crying, mostly sobbing for his mother who had gone off to the other
side, across the road to fetch water.
At the Cooli Camp in Vasant Vihar, under the shadow of the Vasant
Continental Hotel, this hill, rendered blue with the brightly painted
walls of the jhuggis, the posters that the city administration has put
up everywhere they thought poverty was at its best in its drive to
deck up the city and hide its truth, the bitter sad truths of poverty
hunger and marginalised lives in the middle of luxury and brands, they
came Monday evening and put up the bright blue posters, enough to hide
the squalor at the ground level. But the rise of poverty, its
placement on the hill, defied the efforts. From atop the hill, the
poverty, naked, stark and in-your-face, came tumbling down like little
secrets of a child, too flimsy, and vaporous yet too large to be
contained in a box, into a sea of shining roads, luxury malls and
luxury cars and denial.
The bright blue with Shera, the official mascot for the CWG,
contrasted with the other blue, that of peeling paint, and the
shabbiness of it. The MCD staff came at 6:30 p.m. Monday evening and
the whole slum of about 1,000 people, watched as the posters
barricaded them in. They didn’t protest. They were too overwhelmed.
The games were coming. They had to be shut out from the view.
“ Even the wind stopped coming. It is a strange feeling when you live
behind these huge posters. You know they are trying to hide you
because you are what they call shame on the city’s image. Not that I
mind. But it feels as if we have been imprisoned,” Usha, a 15-year-old
girl who lives on one of the little shanties on top of the little hill
said.
The posters, their brightness and their message is turned towards the
city and its visitors. On the other side, the side that Usha and
others confront everyday, is a dreary grey colour, no variations to
it. Plain, dreadful, dark and grumpy grey. Even the sun doesn’t make
it come alive.
In the evenings when their cooking, cleaning and other such chores
were done, Usha and her sister-in-law would squat outside their little
huts, too small to contain them all, its low roof hanging oppressively
on their minds, and watch the cars and people. The bikers were Usha’s
favourite.
With the posters, there’s only a dull grey that lines their vision.
“This is the first time they have done this. I have lived here for 10
years. It feels a little strange. Down there, they have problems with
light. They blocked the sun,” she said.
Women in the slum now have to circle the whole area to get out to
fetch water from the other side. Children have to squeeze themselves
in and out through the chinks to be able to avoid the longer, new
route.
Dhiraj, 8, and Niraj, 7, were on their way back from their MCD school
in Sector 5, Monday evening when they encountered the mascot who
covered their homes. They climbed up, and then looked down. The view
wasn’t quite right.
“This is dirty. That’s why they have done it. Maybe some important
person is coming. They say some games are happening,” Dhiraj said.
While the posters come in the way of the view from the top, their grey
forming an ugly line, from the street below, the poverty rises above
the posters, and seems to mock the effort. Yes, everything has a hole.
The posters, too.
The Delhi government has come under fire for its drive against the
poor and the homeless in the city as news of beggars and other people
who don’t have an identity card being driven out of the city’s borders
by the police. It has also done what other global cities have done in
their moments of hosting such mega events. Put up walls, posters,
everything to hide what is perhaps the underlying truth of all urban
cities – its rampant, ugly poverty.
But then these can only hide so much. In Safdarjung Enclave, the
garbage containers have been swished behind two huge posters. But then
the stink knows no walls.
In Nizamuddin, where thousands of homeless slept on the pavements and
lived their lives in full public view, the posters have replaced the
humanity. Nobody knows where these people have gone. Maybe they will
return, they say.
A few peeped out from the hole, the point where one poster is joined
with the other, as they sat there, hunched against the grey.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, October 1, 2010
There is a hole in everything. And through that whatever it was that
they were trying to hide comes pouring out. In this case, a little
child, in his rags, who stood in the hole, or where the Commonwealth
Games posters let the world seep in, or the poverty peep out, was
crying, mostly sobbing for his mother who had gone off to the other
side, across the road to fetch water.
At the Cooli Camp in Vasant Vihar, under the shadow of the Vasant
Continental Hotel, this hill, rendered blue with the brightly painted
walls of the jhuggis, the posters that the city administration has put
up everywhere they thought poverty was at its best in its drive to
deck up the city and hide its truth, the bitter sad truths of poverty
hunger and marginalised lives in the middle of luxury and brands, they
came Monday evening and put up the bright blue posters, enough to hide
the squalor at the ground level. But the rise of poverty, its
placement on the hill, defied the efforts. From atop the hill, the
poverty, naked, stark and in-your-face, came tumbling down like little
secrets of a child, too flimsy, and vaporous yet too large to be
contained in a box, into a sea of shining roads, luxury malls and
luxury cars and denial.
The bright blue with Shera, the official mascot for the CWG,
contrasted with the other blue, that of peeling paint, and the
shabbiness of it. The MCD staff came at 6:30 p.m. Monday evening and
the whole slum of about 1,000 people, watched as the posters
barricaded them in. They didn’t protest. They were too overwhelmed.
The games were coming. They had to be shut out from the view.
“ Even the wind stopped coming. It is a strange feeling when you live
behind these huge posters. You know they are trying to hide you
because you are what they call shame on the city’s image. Not that I
mind. But it feels as if we have been imprisoned,” Usha, a 15-year-old
girl who lives on one of the little shanties on top of the little hill
said.
The posters, their brightness and their message is turned towards the
city and its visitors. On the other side, the side that Usha and
others confront everyday, is a dreary grey colour, no variations to
it. Plain, dreadful, dark and grumpy grey. Even the sun doesn’t make
it come alive.
In the evenings when their cooking, cleaning and other such chores
were done, Usha and her sister-in-law would squat outside their little
huts, too small to contain them all, its low roof hanging oppressively
on their minds, and watch the cars and people. The bikers were Usha’s
favourite.
With the posters, there’s only a dull grey that lines their vision.
“This is the first time they have done this. I have lived here for 10
years. It feels a little strange. Down there, they have problems with
light. They blocked the sun,” she said.
Women in the slum now have to circle the whole area to get out to
fetch water from the other side. Children have to squeeze themselves
in and out through the chinks to be able to avoid the longer, new
route.
Dhiraj, 8, and Niraj, 7, were on their way back from their MCD school
in Sector 5, Monday evening when they encountered the mascot who
covered their homes. They climbed up, and then looked down. The view
wasn’t quite right.
“This is dirty. That’s why they have done it. Maybe some important
person is coming. They say some games are happening,” Dhiraj said.
While the posters come in the way of the view from the top, their grey
forming an ugly line, from the street below, the poverty rises above
the posters, and seems to mock the effort. Yes, everything has a hole.
The posters, too.
The Delhi government has come under fire for its drive against the
poor and the homeless in the city as news of beggars and other people
who don’t have an identity card being driven out of the city’s borders
by the police. It has also done what other global cities have done in
their moments of hosting such mega events. Put up walls, posters,
everything to hide what is perhaps the underlying truth of all urban
cities – its rampant, ugly poverty.
But then these can only hide so much. In Safdarjung Enclave, the
garbage containers have been swished behind two huge posters. But then
the stink knows no walls.
In Nizamuddin, where thousands of homeless slept on the pavements and
lived their lives in full public view, the posters have replaced the
humanity. Nobody knows where these people have gone. Maybe they will
return, they say.
A few peeped out from the hole, the point where one poster is joined
with the other, as they sat there, hunched against the grey.
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