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The first mention that one gets is about the celebration of shining lights is when Ramachandra returned victorious to Ayodhya, though Lakshmi does not feature here. The Kamasutra of Vatsyana, whose final product also appears like the Ramayana in the 3rd or 4th century AD mentions Yaksha's night, when houses should be illuminated with numerous tiny earthen lamps. ‘Yaksha’ were usually short pot-bellied indigenous creatures who stood outside temples as dwaar-paals. The Jain acharyas, Hemchandra and Yashodhara, describe this ‘Yaksha night of lights’ and this point to the Brahmanic adoption of a popular local observance.
B V Keskar was Pandit Nehru’s Information Minister for a decade, from 1952 to 1962. For him, Hindi film songs were a strict ‘no-no’ where Akashvani was concerned, as in his opinion, it should be the mission of the public broadcaster, to encourage only classical music. He had to face a lot of pressure and ridicule for this rather obdurate stand, but there is no doubt that had it not been for him, Indian classical music may have never reached and enthralled the common man,because classical music by its very nature was meant primarily for the elite.
The year was 1967. I had joined Class X, in the Humanities Section, with an enviable track record of standing last or second last in every class from VI onward. The crowning glory was my failure to pass Class VIII, followed by my close shaves in my second year in the same class as well as in the next class, when I studied Science in the ‘Higher Secondary’ stream, where one had to fight all the time. The other ‘feathers’ in my cap were the several warnings received for ‘poor conduct’, mischief and misbehavior. In other words, I was declared an ideal bad student when I joined, not without trepidation, the first day in my new class.
Every major nation in the world has a public broadcaster and there must be some reason why they do. Before we can discuss the shortcomings of Prasar Bharati, the autonomous body that supervises Doordarshan (DD) and All India Radio (AIR), we may recall that even as its Act was passed by Parliament in 1990, its spirit of autonomy was vitiated by two sections, 32 and 33, which took away with the left hand what the right gave. They ensured that all its major decisions like manpower, recruitment, service conditions, salaries and critical issues would be decided only by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (I&B).
On the 16 th June 1912, Rabindranath Tagore reached London aftersailing for three weeks. He had utilized the journey to complete the last lotof his translations and was relieved that he had finally made it. His disappointment for not being permitted to travel in March of that year, on health grounds was thus overcome.
Prasar Bharati came into being on 28 th November 1997 after Prasar Bharati Act of 1990 was finally implemented by the Government and the Directorates of All India Radio (Akashvani) and Doordarshan were separated from Ministry of Information & Broadcasting and placed under an ‘autonomous body’. It was a momentous decision that came some seven years after Parliament had taken pains to conceive of a Public Service Broadcaster, whose character was eloquently worded in the Statement of Objects and Reasons.
Swami Vivekananda was one of the greatest patriots, thinkers, philosophers and spiritual leaders, India has ever produced. He lived only for thirty nine and a half years, of which he devoted the last nine and half years totally to the service of humanity. Though he left the world well over a century ago, Swamiji’s teachings remains very relevant to us in the twenty-first 21st Century. This is more so because mankind is struggling more now to adjust to more frequent socioeconomic changes. The very rapid pace at which developments are overtaking us is surely leading to a transitory segment of social confusion, unrest, and apprehension. This produces a very demanding and stressful life style.
“Life was solitary, poor, nasty,” droned the professor on a hot, lazy afternoon when the body clocks of most students signalled that it was time for a lovely surreptitious siesta, without actually dozing off on to the next guy’s shoulder. This was sometime in my first year at Presidency, when I was being introduced to the wondrous possibilities of how the State had emerged in history.
I had no idea that George W Bush had chosen to accompany me to Rome during the weekend — en-route to Albania from his G-8 conference in Germany. This gentleman seems to excite agitationists all over the world, and Italians are, even without much provocation, a rather excitable lot. Thus the city of St. Peter was now in the hands of protestors and the Italian government felt that the situation was so serious that the normal police would be unable to handle it. Hence, one was treated to a very rare spectacle of witnessing the smart, semi-military crack force, the carabinieri on real time prowl all over Rome — in their dark blue macho uniforms and their threatening rifles and pistols. Girls, both turisti and local drooled over those handsome hunks that were straining to impress them with their crackling walky- talkies.
I came across a photograph of Pandit Nehru sitting on a simple wooden bed, covered with a frugal white sheet and a few batik spreads, and a couple of pillows strewn behind and beside him. There were no crowds on the dais, which was obviously during the Convocation of Visva Bharati in (1954), and while the Upacharya, who was at the right corner of the photo, delivered his address over an ancient microphone, Panditji looked straight at the audience.
The dichotomous relation between the two extremities of any religion, however rigid be its structure or dogma — between the formal, scriptural version on the one hand and the plethora of practices and rituals that pass off as the ‘little’ or popular tradition on the other — have never ceased to enchant the observer and entice the researcher.
Of the millions who stand reverentially before the thousands of Durga images in Bengal during the annual pujas, how many wonder as to why Kartikeya — the valiant general of the gods — looks away so apathetically, when his mother is locked in a mortal conflict with one of the most dangerous adversaries of the gods? Why do the daughters, Lakshmi and Saraswati look so benign and disinterested, when Durga’s eyes puff and widen in rage and fury? And their potbellied elephant-headed sibling, Ganesha: what is his role?
Of all the quaint and colourful foreign communities that have contributed their distinctive hue to the kaleidoscopic variety of Calcutta's life during the preceding centuries, the Chinese stand out prominent, bright and with a rare degree of permanence. For, while the Jews and Armenians have almost entirely left the second city of the Empire, and the European nationalities have dwindled to miniscule numbers, the Chinese have swelled their ranks to carve out for themselves a special niche in the hearts and minds of Calcuttans.
The story of how Job Charnock landed at a place near Nimtala Ghat on August 24, 1690, is so much a part of recorded history that is seldom questioned. The Diary and consultation book of the Rt. Hon'ble East India Company chronicles the event quite authoritatively. But as the city prepares for its tercentenary celebrations, a challenge to that theory is worth recalling. Charnock's credit was contested, almost by accident, 204 years after Calcutta was founded. It was in the early part of 1894 that the Government of India directed the Government of Bengal to compile a list of Bengal's old Christian tombstones and monuments of historical and archaeological interest. An Armennian scholar and businessman, Mesrovb Jacob Seth, was invited to translate into English a number of the Inscriptions in classical Armanian on the tombstones in the Armenian churchyards of Calcutta, Chinsurah and Saidbabad.
The history of Calcutta in the first half of the 18 th Century remains a never- ending source of interests and speculation. Yes, speculation — for the official records of Calcutta were all destroyed during Shiraj-ud-Dowla’s attack and occupation of the city in 1756. Hence, the supreme importance of non-official reports and letters, including those of travellers.
‘Akaal Bodhan’, or the untimely invocation of Goddess Durga in the month of Ashwin (mid-September to mid- October), has been an intergal part of Bengal's social and religious culture, for centuries. When the first British merchants entered Bengal in the seventeenth century and came in contact with Hindu religious festivals, their initial reaction ranged from curious appreciation to outright horror. The strange deities, the colourful costumes and the cacophony of weird flutes, pipes, cymbals and drums of all types, conjured an impression that evoked either admiration or disgust.
The Sunday Statesman’, Literary Supplement, 4th March, 1984 Which is the oldest surviving newspaper in India? Which Indian newspaper started publication at least three years before ‘The Times’, London, and is still continuing? The answer to both queries would surprise many. ‘The Calcutta Gazette’, which completes 200 year of publication today.
As Calcutta approaches its tricentury (1990), and urbanologists and forecasters quarrel over its future, nostalgia rules the day for a dedicated band of historians, researchers and simple Calcutta-lovers. Anthologies, histories, sketches and hitherto unknown facets of the city's chequered past are churned out with persistent regularity. The latest book on old Calcutta is mainly a reproduction of the writings of two famous 19th century British commentators who lived and worked in this city, and is profusely annotated and edited by an Indian expert.
It rained incessantly on Sunday, the 24th of August, 1690. The English ketch fought the monsoon swell in the unruly Hooghly and dropped anchor at an obscure village on the east bank of the river. Little did the band of muttering Englishmen realise the significance of the event when the Lancashireman, Job Charnock, Agent of the London East India Company, waded through the squishy silt and clambered onto higher ground. The place of landing is supposed to be Muhonto's Ghat near Nimtollah.
December, 1921. The Calcutta race course. Backers and bookmakers were screaming themselves hoarse as the thundering phalanx of horses drew closer to the post. The steward discreetly observed the Prince of Wales mopping his regal brow, as frenzied punters broke into hysterics. “Galway Gate’ streaked past the winning post — nose, neck, hood, head and all length.