The year ended with promise of better to come. With the implementation of the Indo-US nuclear pact, we may be able to overcome our shortages of electric power. Frankly, I do not think restrictions on its military use are of any consequence. We have enough to deter our neighbours from arm-twisting or trying any hanky-panky. More important was the beginning of the process of restoration of faith in our judicial system. Convictions of Shibu Soren, Navjot Sidhu, Santosh Singh, Manu Sharma, Sharda Jain, Sanjay Dutt and others showed that no matter how important or celebrated a person, he or she is not above the law. We have much to thank Justice R.S. Sodhi for. Credit is also due to our media; to TV channels for reporting the public outrage at the miscarriage of justice and the press for its sustained pressure to bring criminals to book. I hope the process will continue. The perpetrators of the holocaust of Sikhs in November 1984 still remain unpunished. So do those responsible for the destruction of the Babri Masjid — L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Kalyan Singh, Uma Bharti and others, who were present on the scene at the time and seen on TV by millions of viewers all over the world. There are other cases relating to the attack on the train at Godhra station, followed by widespread killings of innocent Muslims: people responsible for these atrocities remain to be brought to justice — hopefully this year.

A matter which has been taken in hand is that of eye-witnesses changing their statements and turning hostile. They can, and often are, bullied by police to make statements which courts rightly disregard; but saying one thing on oath in one court and another thing in another must be put down rigorously. As in the case of Jessica Lal’s murder, they should have hauled them up, cross-examined, and if satisfied that they have committed perjury, suitably punished. I am not sure what the judiciary can do about investigating agencies. The police at the middle and lower levels remain corrupt and corruptible. Perhaps the outcome of cases I have cited will show them that their conduct will invite censure of the courts, put their careers in jeopardy and may act as deterrents. Putting the system of criminal justice back on the right track is no mean achievement.

Time for Banalata Sen

Not many people are aware that there were quite a few Bengali poets and writers of fiction who, though awed by Rabindranath Tagore’s achievements as a poet, painter, playwright, novelist and short story-writer, were critical of him, the Nobel Prize for literature notwithstanding. Most of them were professors of English literature, much impressed by T.S. Eliot and post-Eliot English and American writers. However, despite being critical of Gurudev, they sought his approval. He was not generous in bestowing his blessings. The most outstanding of them was Jibanananda Das (1899-1954). He was born in Barisal (Bangladesh), taught English in colleges in Dhaka, Calcutta and Delhi. He was always short of money, lived poorly and died a premature death in a tram accident in Calcutta. He was barely 50.

A selection of Jibanananda’s poems have been translated into English by Chidananda Das Gupta, film-maker, colleague of Satyajit Ray and translator of Tagore as well as Manik Bandopadhyay. He has done an excellent job in selecting and translating Jibanananda and written an introduction which is informative, lucid and gives the reader a clear idea of why Jibanananda deserves to be read and re-read.

Jibanananda was essentially a poet of nature: his descriptions of the Bengal countryside — rivers, lakes, ponds, rice-fields, flowering trees and singing birds — are hauntingly beautiful. He also had an eye for beautiful girls; one named Banalata Sen of Natore was evidently a creature of his fantasies. I quote his eulogy to his lady love in full:

For aeons have I roamed the roads of
the earth
From the seas of Ceylon to the straits
of Malaya
I have journeyed, alone, in the
enduring night,
And down the dark corridor of time
I have walked
Through mist of Bimbisara, Asoka,
darker Vidarbha.
Round my weary soul the angry
waves still roar;
My only peace I knew with Banalata
Sen of Natore.
Her hair was dark as night in
Vidisha;
Her face the sculpture of Sravasti
I saw her, as a sailor after the storm
Rudderless in the sea, spies of a
sudden
The grass-green heart of the leafy
island.
‘Where were you so long?’ she asked,
and more
with her bird’s-nest eyes, Banalata
Sen of Natore.
As the footfall of dew comes evening;
The raven wipes the smell of warm
sun
From its wings; the world’s noises
die.
And in the light of fireflies the
manuscript
Prepares to weave the fables of night;
Every bird is home, every river
reached the ocean.
Darkness remains; and time for
Banalata Sen.

Chidananda Das Gupta’s selection of Jibanananda’s poems have been recently published by Penguin in their series of Modern Classics.

Remixing language

Last March, I happened to be at the annual convocation of Rohtak University. I was seated on the dias between the chancellor, A.R. Kidwai, and the Haryana education minister, Phool Chand Mullana. While Kidwai and the vice-chancellor were busy conferring honours on deserving students, Mullana and I exchanged Haryanvi jokes in undertones. He told me one of the felicitous mingling of vocabulary which deserves to be repeated. The principal of a college, while expressing his inability to admit an applicant for admission, said; “Kucch conditionaat hee aisee hain — there are conditions I can’t overlook.” The Minister Sahib smiled and replied: “Kucch mumkinaat bhee to hongee — there could be some considerations as well.”