The first thing you have to know about this book is that Rekha, whose story it attempts to tell, was not involved in its writing. Yasser Usman, the author, says right at the beginning in his “Note” that despite his many attempts to meet Rekha and fix up an interview, the actor refused to take his calls.

So what we read is what Yasser Usman has pieced together from interviews that Rekha has given to magazines and tabloids earlier, and information given by sources from the film industry, critics and people known to her. The tale he tells, therefore, cannot be taken as the absolute truth as the validation for it hasn’t come from Rekha.

However, once that very necessary disclaimer is put in place, the book makes for an engaging read. The story begins with Mukesh, Rekha’s first husband, who committed suicide. It was a traumatic period in Rekha’s life and one that many in the industry took as an opportunity for some tarring and feathering.

Sample this statement that Anupam Kher, Rekha’s co-star in several films at that time, made about the suicide to “Stardust” magazine in November 1990: “She’s become the national vamp. Professionally and personally, I think it’s curtains for her. I mean I don’t know how will I react to her if I come face to face with her.”

Subhash Ghai claimed in an interview given to the same magazine: “No conscientious director will work with her ever again. How will the audience accept her as Bharat ki nari or insa ki devi?”

The book reveals that Mukesh suffered from depression and suicidal tendencies even before he married Rekha, thanks to a failed relationship. The narrative, from this low ebb in Rekha’s career, moves to her traumatic past – when she was Bhanurekha - and her entry into films as a teenager pushed to earn for her family.

Rekha’s journey is testament to the double standards, misogyny and exploitation that is characteristic of the film industry. In her first Hindi film, “Anjana Safar”, Rekha, who was not yet fifteen, was tricked into performing a liplock with the hero, Biswajeet. The director, Raja Nawathe, and the producer, Kuljeet Pal, connived with Biswajeet to take Rekha by surprise and kiss her on the lips when the camera started rolling.

 This was molestation, plain and simple, but it created much needed publicity for the film and launched Rekha in Bollywood as the girl who’d go to any lengths on screen. It’s an image that Rekha grew to own and celebrate, even if she changed her version about her consent for the kiss, time and again.

Expectedly, a good portion of the book is devoted to the Amitabh Bachchan-Jaya Bhadhuri-Rekha love triangle that continues to incite gossip. However, there have been reams written about this over the years and considering none of the three people involved has given their inputs to the author, much of it is a quick refresher course than new information.

While the book starts out trying to project Rekha as a misunderstood, lonely and wronged woman, the absence of Rekha’s perspective on her journey, turns it into an extended gossip column.  There’s more about her dalliances, affairs, tantrums and her androgynous secretary, Farzana, than a serious critique of her vast filmography.

To be fair, the book is on Rekha and not her films and Yasser Usman has adopted a respectful tone throughout the narrative. However, one wonders if it was necessary to draw parallels between the many “other woman” roles that Rekha played on screen to her real life episodes. After all, how often do we dredge up the personal life of a male actor to see if it justifies the roles that he plays or if there are parallels that can be drawn between the two?

“Rekha: The Untold Story” is fast-paced and lucidly written with plenty of spice, making it a perfect airplane read. It also comes across as an honest attempt to look into the life of one of the most enigmatic stars of our times though it’s not without its limitations.

A note to the editor: on page 118, the text says that Hrishikesh Mukherjee called Rekha “Chinnapunnu” which means youngest daughter in Tamil. It does not – it means “small wound”. It’s “ponnu” (girl) and not “punnu”!

Rekha: The Untold Story

By Yasser Usman, published by Juggernaut

Price: Rs 499

Many people have done it, or seen it done, at some point or the other – calling the five-second rule to pick up some delicious morsel off the floor before the “germs” get on it. But a new study warns that food, once dropped on the floor, is not safe to eat, no matter how quickly you pick it up.

Moisture, type of surface and contact-time all contribute to cross-contamination. In some instances, the transfer begins in less than one second, the study said.

"The popular notion of the 'five-second rule' is that food dropped on the floor, but picked up quickly, is safe to eat because bacteria need time to transfer," said Donald Schaffner, Professor at Rutgers University, New Jersey, in the US.

"We decided to look into this because the practice is so widespread. The topic might appear 'light' but we wanted our results backed by solid science," Schaffner noted.

The researchers tested four surfaces – stainless steel, ceramic tile, wood and carpet – and four different foods – watermelon, bread, bread and butter, and gummy candy.

They also looked at four different contact times – less than one second, five seconds, 30 and 300 seconds.

They used two media – tryptic soy broth or peptone buffer – to grow Enterobacter aerogenes, a nonpathogenic "cousin" of Salmonella naturally occurring in the human digestive system.

Transfer scenarios were evaluated for each surface type, food type, contact time and bacterial prep; surfaces were inoculated with bacteria and allowed to completely dry before food samples were dropped and left to remain for specified periods.

In all, 128 scenarios were replicated 20 times each, yielding 2,560 measurements. Post-transfer surface and food samples were analysed for contamination.

Not surprisingly, watermelon had the most contamination, gummy candy the least. The findings were published online in the American Society for Microbiology's journal, “Applied and Environmental Microbiology”.

"Transfer of bacteria from surfaces to food appears to be affected most by moisture," Schaffner said.

"Bacteria don't have legs, they move with the moisture, and the wetter the food, the higher the risk of transfer," Schaffner explained.

"Bacteria can contaminate instantaneously," Schaffner warned.

With the incidence of child abuse on the rise, conversations about personal safety are imperative, but many parents and adults do not find the topic easy to approach. To address the issue, Surakshith - a mobile application by UNICEF and Enfold Proactive Health Trust (an NGO working towards life skills, gender empowerment and personal safety since 2001) - enables you to access child safety information and provides age-appropriate ways to talk about it to your children as well.

The app has information and guides about personal body safety, cyber-safety and even personal safety stories for children aged 6 to 18 years. With colourful illustrations and use of simple language, Surakshith makes it easy to explain personal safety issues to children.

Surakshith defines personal body safety rules and who ‘Safe Adults’ are for children.

“Most people care for children and follow Personal Body Safety Rules for themselves and others. These are Safe Adults. Think of your Safe Adults. Trace your hand on a piece of paper. Along each finger, write the name of one ‘Safe Adult’. In the palm write ‘My Safe Adults’. Pin this or keep the paper with you,” it explains.

The app also differentiates between safe and unsafe touch and encourages children to inform their ‘safe adults’ about untoward incidents. “You can keep telling until someone listens and takes steps to stop the rule breaker,” says the app.

Children often tend to blame themselves for abuse they are subjected to. Surakshith tells children that they shouldn’t be the ones feeling guilty.

The app also cautions that the internet is not only an avenue for accessing entertainment and information but a place where children could fall prey to abusers. It emphasizes on age-appropriate usage.

The internet safety section also has useful information for parents and adults on protecting identity and personal details of children, checking for trustworthy sites, cyber-bullying and the tricks abusers use to hoodwink children on the internet.

Here is an example of a personal safety story for children between 8-10 years of age.

The commendable thing about the app is that it provides information about the laws governing abuse and reporting mechanisms as well. Enfold Trust co-founder Sangeeta Saksena told The Hindu that that the aim of the app is not merely to recognize abuse but also to encourage its reportage.

The app is available in 11 languages including Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu.

Images: Screenshots from the app

Indian festivals are all about the food. While religion plays a big role in why we celebrate a certain day, most of the excitement comes from what we can stuff ourselves with and the new clothes that we can parade around in. Not to mention the associated fun and games and the special programs on TV.

Onam is no exception. The Onam Sadya is a vegetarian feast that is guaranteed to send you into a stupor. The feast is served on a banana leaf, as is the tradition in South India.

With over 20 preparations on the menu, the Onam Sadya is a grand affair that pays due respect to all six tastes – spice, salt, bitterness, sourness, pungency, and sweet.

There’s a delicious mix of the healthy and the unhealthy on the cards: from the deep fried, humble pappadam to the exquisite bitter-gourd pacchadi – a kind of chutney - that your physician will enthusiastically vote for. Many of the dishes use a liberal dose of grated or ground coconut, coconut oil, red and green chillies, and curry leaves.

The recipes for the dishes may vary depending on which part of Kerala you’re from. The popular dish, Aviyal, a thick mixture of vegetables and coconut, can be made with or without curd. The spicy Eriseri is usually made with pumpkin and beans but other vegetables may be used too.

Other must-haves include sambhar, puli-inji (tamarind-based chutney), olan (coconut milk and pumpkin curry), kaalan (raw plantain and yam curry), moru kootaan (yogurt and ground coconut curry), and thoran (stir fried vegetables with coconut). Usually, red parboiled rice or Rosematta rice is served.

4-5 varieties of payasams (kheer) are prepared for the Sadya. From paal payasam (rice and milk kheer) and ada pradhaman (rice flakes, jaggery and coconut milk) to payasams made from different kinds of dal. The nendram pazham payasam made with ripe Kerala bananas and coconut milk is a great favourite too.

For the best experience, crush a pappadam into your payasam and slurp it up.

Some advice for people outside South India who want to have Sadya: please don’t use a fork and knife. There’s nothing like eating with your hand and licking every morsel off your fingers!

And oh, wear loose clothing.

Ask anyone what their five best buys from Kerala are, and they’ll probably tell you spices, coconut fibre products, banana chips, big brass lamps and may be a Kasavu, the traditional weave. Ask them their favourite spots to visit and you’ll hear everything from Palakkad and Kovalam to the backwaters elsewhere.

But this Onam, let me take you to a rather less known destination. About a 116kms away from the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram, in the Chennganur district, is the little town of Aranmula. The word comes from ‘aru’ meaning six and ‘mula’ meaning bamboo.

The earliest reference to Aranmula we have is from the poetry of the famous Alvar saints who lived between the 6th and the 9th century in the Tamil speaking regions of South India. Nammalvar (880-930 AD) in his poems mentions Aranmula as Thiruvaranvilai. Aranmula hosts an ancient temple of Lord Krishna where he is prayed to as Lord Parthasarathy, or the divine charioteer.

Nammalvar describes Parthasarathy as Thirukkurallappa Perumal and his consort as Padmasani Naachiyaar. Situated on the banks of the Pampa river, the Aranmula Parthasarathy temple is as important as the other popular temples in Kerala, like Guruvayur Krishna, Chottanikara Bhagawathi and Sabarimalai Ayyappa.

There are several fascinating stories from different versions of the Mahabharata on how Parthasarathy landed up here but we won’t get into those now. The place gets its name because the idol of Parthasarathy was supposed to have been shifted here from a forest, on a little boat made of six pieces of bamboo. Hence the name Aranmula stayed on.

The temple is also considered one of the 108 Divya Desams of the Shri Vaishnavas. The villages around this temple consider Parthasarathy as their family god. Every year around the period of Onam, the residents of the villages around the temple commemorate the instillation of this idol by taking part in ritual boat races. The long snake boats accompanied by much fanfare and local participation compete with each other in a high-energy recreation every year.

Three snake boats row in union to the accompaniment of songs and reach their destination. The oarsmen dressed in white dhotis and white turbans around their heads row the snake boats to the rhythmic tunes of traditional boat songs. Fifty-one snake boats from different provinces participate in this race. The boats are called ‘Palliyodam’ or ‘boat of the lord’. This is a community initiative and everyone participates in it with much merriment. You can see an earlier video recording of it here: 

Story goes that a pious Bhattadri devotee who fed the poor a day before Onam was once waiting when no one showed up. A small boy appeared, received his hospitality and while leaving said from the following year he must bring food to the temple. That night the Bhattadri has a dream where it is revealed that it was Lord Parthasarathy who came in the guise of that small boy to partake food earlier. Ever since, year after year, the families continue to take food to the temple. Over a period of several centuries, this has become a large community ritual. Food is got on boats from the other side of the bank and offered at the temple.

The largest Onam feast is first offered to Lord Parthasarathy before thousands of devotees, especially the oarsmen who participated in the boat races are fed. In fact, it is easily the largest vegetarian feast offered in any temple across India. On manicured banana leaves, an array of foods is spread out to make an exhaustive Onam Sadya. This is also the end of the monsoon season and the freshest of crop is offered. If witnessing the boat races is a once in a lifetime experience, eating this Onam Sadya is likely to send you into a food coma! You can see a little video of the famous feast here:

But this is not the end of it. There is more to Aranmula than you can imagine.

One of the best things you can ever find for your home is made here in Aranmula. The famous Aranmula Kannadi – or a mirror. You’ll wonder what is the big deal about a mirror. The mirrors of Aaranmula are special for various reasons.

First, they are not made of the usual glass and silver nitrate combination. When they fall down, they don’t break. Yes, mirrors that don’t crack so easily!

Aranmula Kannadis are hand made from a metal-alloy. This is the brilliance of ancient Indian metallurgy. The history of Aranmula Kannadi is peppered with folklore and a hundred anecdotes. Each of these stories claim something different.

Aranmula mirror as an auspicious gift

Story goes that the crown of Lord Parthasarathy was once found cracked. The local ruler summoned the head goldsmith and ordered him to make a new crown within three days. The goldsmith was worried as he neither had sufficient materials for this task nor had sufficient time. He returned home distraught and told his wife. The wife was a great devotee of a goddess and prayed for help. That night she had a dream where the goddess revealed to her proportions for a bronze alloy that shone like a mirror. The condition was that all the ladies in their community must sell the gold they had, to collect enough tin and copper. The crown made out of the combination of copper and tin turned out to be a miracle of sorts. It looked silver in color, like a regular mirror, was brittle like glass and shone with great brilliance. It reflected like a proper mirror. This metallurgical wonder was transferred from generation to generation over time.

The exact recipe of this mirror is a closely guarded secret of the Vishwakarma community. It is considered one of the ‘Ashtamangalyams’ or eight auspicious things every family must own. It is supposed to bring good luck to the owner.

Making this mirror is a highly skilled and tedious process. A single mirror takes several weeks to make. It cannot be mass-produced in a factory. Each mirror is handmade. Only mud from the local paddy fields is used to make the mould.

For a long time, this art form was neglected. It is only in the recent past it has gained limelight. In 2004, the Aranmula Kannadi was patent protected and given the coveted geographical indicator (GI) tag. The government of Kerala now promotes it highly.

This Onam, if you are lucky enough to visit Kerala, head to Aranmula for the best experience. If you cannot go there, get one of your Malayali friends to gift you an Aranmula Kannadi. It is common to enjoy the Onam Sadya and dress up in the beautiful Kasavu weaves of Kerala. But get yourself one of these magic mirrors. Own a piece of ancient Indian science and bring that proverbial good luck into your homes.

A very happy and prosperous Onam to you!

Images courtesy : Jeevesh Menon, Anasuya Padath, Selva Kumar 

(Veejay Sai is an award-winning writer, editor and a culture critic. He writes extensively on Indian performing arts, cultural history, food and philosophy. He lives in New Delhi and can be reached at vs.veejaysai@gmail.com) 

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) added over 1,000 revised and updated entries to its September update.

"Squee", an exclamation expressing delight or excitement, was added to the updated list, along with "YOLO", "moobs", "gender-fluid", "yogalates" and "Westminster bubble".

YOLO is the acronym for "you only live once", while moobs refer to male boobs. Gender-fluid means a person with a fluid or unfixed gender identity while yogalates is yoga combined with Pilates. 

Westminster bubble indicates an insular community of British politicians and civil servants who are out of touch with the experiences and concerns of the wider public.

Besides online slangs, some of the new entries have been introduced from other languages, including food terms like "spanakopita" or Greek spinach pie and "kare-kare", a traditional Filipino stew.

The OED is updated every three months. What makes the September update unique is that this month marks the centenary of the birth of Roald Dahl, a British author and screenwriter widely known by his famous children's book "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory".

To mark this occasion and the publication of Oxford's Roald Dahl Dictionary, September's quarterly update to the OED contains a range of revised and newly drafted entries described by another newly added word "Dahlesque".

"Oompa Loompa" is one of the newly-added words with a sense of "Dahlesque delight in the bizarre". 

In the 1971 film adaption of Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Oompa Loompas were featured as knee-high beings with green hair and orange skin working in the factory run by chocolatier Willy Wonka.

"Ever since the release of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, while a person may be likened to an Oompa Loompa in stature or industriousness, such comparisons are now much more likely to allude to the Day-Glo effects of some fake tanning products," said Jonathan Dent, a senior editor for OED.

Some readers may say the updated entries and new words were "splendiferous" (full of splendour), but if they don't make any sense, just "fuhgeddaboudit" (forget about it)! 

The oceans are a dark mystery. They surround us, and yet they are largely unknown. We once thought they were flat and boring. We now know they are anything but. And there's so much more to discover.

Have you ever heard someone say that such-and-such would be as difficult as emptying all the oceans? And have you ever wondered what it would actually take to do that - to empty the oceans of all the water? For a start, where you put it? You could hardly store it on land. More than 70 percent of the Earth's surface is covered by water, so you'd quickly run out of space.

The US Geological Survey says it's estimated oceans store 1,338,000,000 cubic kilometers (321,000,000 cubic miles) of the world's water supply. The world's water supply is roughly 1,386,000,000 cubic kilometers. So oceans make up about "96.5 percent of all Earth's water."

That's a lot of water. It stands to reason that we know so little about it (even human don't know everything).

So we're drowning in oceans?

Yep. That's one way of putting it. And most of it's unusable for humans because of its saline composition. There are desalination systems. But we tend to use fresh surface water from rivers - where we can. Rivers, however, only make up 1/10000th of one percent of Earth's water supply.

How many oceans are there?

There are five oceans. In order of size, we have:

Pacific ocean (168,723,000 square kilometers / 65,144,314 square miles)

Atlantic ( 85,133,00 square kilometers)

Indian (70,560,000 square kilometers)

Southern (21,960,000 square kilometers)

and the Arctic (15,558,000 square kilometers)

People do talk of the "Seven Seas," as in "to sail the seven seas." It's an ancient phrase, and it's a bit of a cheat. You only get seven seas if you split the Atlantic and Pacific oceans into north and south (seas).

Where is the deepest point?

The deepest known part of the ocean is the Mariana Trench in the western Pacific. It has a depth of about 10,994 meters. Some estimates say it could be as deep as 11,034 meters but this is unconfirmed. Initially the Mariana Trench was found by explorers using ropes and lead weights, which they lowered to the seabed. Later more accurate readings were taken using sonar. But the trench is still largely unknown. In 1960, explorers Don Walsh and Jacques Piccard reached a depth of 10,911 meters. And in 2012, film director James Cameron undertook the first solo dive in a submarine vessel to reach 10,898 meters.

Other great depths include the Puerto Rico Trench in the Atlantic, the Java Trench in the Indian ocean, and the Arctic Basin.

What are ocean zones?

The oceans are divided into five main zones or layers. At the surface, there is the Epipelagic Zone - that's in line with the Continental Shelf and the warmest part of the ocean. Sunlight reaches down to about 1000 meters, allowing phytoplankton to thrive, which is vital for the marine food chain.

Then there's the Mesopelagic Zone, down to about 1000 meters. From there it's the Bathypelagic Zone, down to 4000 meters. The Abyssopelagic Zone - also known as The Abyss (for obvious reasons) - stretches from a depth of 4000 to 6000 meters, where it meets the ocean basin and Continental Rise.

From there on in, it's the Hadalpelagic Zone, a sharp drop into those ocean trenches.

Do oceans move?

Yes, but slowly. There are waves, tides, and currents, of course. But it's more than that. The oceans move along a great "ocean conveyor belt" - otherwise known as the thermohaline circulation. The conveyor belt is a continuous loop that turns over the ocean from top to bottom, moving nutrients as it goes. It is driven by temperature and salinity and can take hundreds upon hundreds of years to complete a full cycle of the globe.

Does the amount of water ever change?

Yes. But, again, this takes time. The global sea level rose by about 1.5 centimeters (0.6 inches) per decade from 1900, with satellite data showing a sharp increase of 3 centimeters per decade since 1992. But sea levels were significantly lower during the Ice Age, which began about 2.5 million years ago. Back then you could have crossed from Asia to North America via the Bering Strait - but the strait is now submerged. And before the Ice Age - about 3 million years ago - it is thought the oceans were 50 meters higher. 

Are ocean temperatures rising?

The US Environmental Protection Agency reports an average steady increase in sea surface temperatures since 1880. There have been various peaks, including one in the mid 1940s, and many dips, but the oceans are currently the warmest they have been for 130 years. Rising sea surface temperatures are taken as an indicator of climate change. Changing ocean temperatures can influence marine ecosystems - what species of plant, animals and microbes live where - affect migration and breeding patterns, and threaten sensitive marine life, such as coral reefs. The Great Barrier Reef on Australia's eastern coast has suffered "coral bleaching," which is due "heat stress" from rising surface temperatures.

Submerged mountains. What?

You may think Mount Everest is the highest mountain. And you would be right. Sort of. Mauna Kea, on Hawaii, is even higher. It's over 10,000 meters tall, but most of that is underwater. A mere 4,200 meters are visible above sea level. It's considered a dormant volcano. 

What lives in the ocean?

Sharks, turtles, fish (the type we eat), fish (some deeper down, which we don't eat), giant squid and see-through shrimp, jellyfish, whales and dolphins… and about three times as many unknown species.

What about other marine life? Is it all over when you hit the floor?

No. Researchers have long studied marine life under the seabed. Living organisms have been found in sediment samples from 860 to 1626 meters below the seabed, including intact prokaryotic cells, which are micro-organisms that lack nuclei. One study found that bacterial cells in sediment took between 1,000 and 3,000 years to reproduce - where usually it takes a matter of hours.

And finally, got any fun facts about marine life?

Sure have. Sharks have an appetite for submarine telecommunications and power cables. Sperm whales can stay underwater for nearly two hours and dive to depths of more than 2000 meters. And while the sperm whale has the largest head in the animal kingdom, the southern right whale has the largest testicles. A pair weighs in at about a ton.

(This article was first published on DW. You can read the original article here.)

By Sahana Ghosh 

Known largely as a poor man's crop and rich man's food, the leafy moringa, or drumstick tree, is an important tool to fight nutrient deficiency in the wake of climate change, says noted development practitioner Basanta Kumar Kar, terming it a naturally-occurring bio-fortified crop suited to India's climatic conditions.

Moringa is included in the array of such nutrient-enriched produce as oranges, sweet potatoes, minor millets, amla and others which are key to combat micronutrient deficiency in the climate change scenario, said Kar, opining that genetically modified foods are not sustainable solutions.

Kar is a 2016 Global Transform Nutrition Champion for South Asia and senior advisor at The Coalition for Food and Nutrition Security (India).

He believes in a food-based approach and sustainable climate-smart agriculture to tackle problems of malnutrition triggered by climate change.

This includes bringing out a comprehensive and mandatory food fortification regulation with a focus on bio-fortification, a process by which the nutritional quality of food crops is improved naturally through agronomic practices, conventional plant breeding, or modern biotechnology.

"We are arguing with the government to bring out a comprehensive food fortification regulation with an emphasis and focus on bio-fortification," Kar explained.

Bio-fortification differs from conventional fortification in that it aims to increase nutrient levels in crops during plant growth rather than through manual means during their processing.

"We are urging the government to establish a bio-safety authority, map our flora and fauna and promote awareness about nutrition-rich crops and species. Genetically modified food is not a sustainable solution for the future. There is a gold mine of naturally enriched crops and species which are invisible and often ignored," Kar said.

And the humble moringa, described as a "miracle tree", extolled for centuries for its medicinal properties in India, could make a big splash in that direction, in the country where the nutrition scenario for children remains bleak, Kar contended.

Vitamin and mineral deficiencies are highly prevalent throughout the developing world and 90 per cent of the developing world's chronically under-nourished (stunted) children live in Asia and Africa, according to Unicef data. In India, 18 per cent of children under five years of age suffer from wasting due to acute under-nutrition.

With climate change acting as a hunger risk multiplier in Asia, Kar stressed that moringa, a power food (a serving of fresh leaves has more vitamin C than seven oranges) and other naturally enriched nutritious crops and species are important in tackling the problems of micro-nutrient deficiency and food insecurity without damaging the ecology.

"It is rich in micronutrients, vitamins and minerals and adapted to local climatic condition. It is drought resistant and less water is required for its cultivation," said Kar who has been involved in many successful nutrition initiatives in South Asia (particularly in India and Bangladesh).

Kar and his colleagues were instrumental in pushing for integration of nutrition in the Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan. Prior to this, in 2013, he also worked with stakeholders to support the Fortification in Edible Oil with Vitamin A Bill, 2013, that the Bangladesh parliament passed.

Drawing from his own fight against poverty and malnutrition as a young boy in Orissa (now Odisha), Kar, now Delhi-based, highlighted the big picture linking climate change, food security and nutrition.

"Like the green and white revolutions, India needs a nutrition revolution to transform the country into one without malnutrition.

"The Green Revolution was based on water-intensive crops and over the years we have seen a depletion of water...a scarcity of water which is manifesting in terms of drought. From one of our own studies, we have shown the depletion of micro-nutrient levels in the soil and ultimately leading to the lowering of micro-nutrient levels in food crops, due to climate change, flood and saline inundation," he said.

For example, in Bangladesh, Kar said, a decrease in zinc content in rice has been observed because of its shrinking levels in the soil.

"It's happening because of climate vulnerability. At the same time, carbon emissions because of pesticide and fertiliser use has gone up. We have pitched the idea of promoting climate smart organic agriculture and bio-fortified crops to the Indian government and they are positive about it," Kar added.

(Sahana Ghosh can be contacted at sahana.g@ians.in)

In a unique initiative, three law students in Kerala have come together to provide sanitary napkins to girls and women, who do not have access to this basic necessity during menstruation. 

Sara Fathima (20), Ayushi Dangre (21) and Pritishree Dash (21), all fourth-year students at the National University of Advanced Legal Studies (NUALS) in Kerala, started the CodeRed project earlier this month. While Sara is a resident of Alleppey, Ayushi and Pritishree hail from Nagpur and Odisha respectively. 

The idea for CodeRed stemmed from another project that they were working on. The young women decided to design and sell bookmarks, the proceeds of which would go to Swanthanam, an orphanage near their college. 

"After we had collected some money, we went to the orphanage to do a head count. We wanted to buy them material for art and craft. However, on speaking to the orphanage in-charge, we were shocked to know that the girls there had no access to sanitary napkins," says Pritishree. 

They found that the girls mostly used cloth and did not seem to have basic provisions like lukewarm water and antiseptic liquids to clean them regularly. 

"It is unhygienic and can lead to a lot of diseases," adds Ayushi.

And so they decided to provide them with sanitary pads. 

They first approached the girls in their hostel after which they also asked their classmates, including boys, to contribute. And the response has been positive so far. 

They collected Rs 1,600 and have already given a month's supply of sanitary napkins to Swanthanam. 

Three girls at Swanthanam

People can buy packets of sanitary napkins and hand them over to the CodeRed team who will in turn distribute it to orphanages or NGOs that need them. Alternatively, contributors can also donate money which will be used to buy sanitary pads. 

"People don't have to buy luxury sanitary napkins. The regular ones will do just fine. Those interested can also take a monthly subscription of Rs 50 in order to ensure a healthy period for one girl," Pritishree explains. 

CodeRed/Facebook

Not only have they been receiving messages from Kerala and other cities expressing interest in their initiative, the students now also have a sponsor. Desitude, a Kerala-based Khadi venture, will be giving 10 per cent of the proceeds from its sales during the months of September and October to CodeRed. 

The students also plan to expand to other cities once they are able to cover Kerala. A CodeRed website, which is currently in the making, is also expected to be launched soon. 

According to a 2011 study, 88 per cent of India's 355 million menstruating women did not use sanitary napkins but resorted to the use of unhygienic cloth or other dangerous material including sand and ash. 

In addition, 27 per cent of the world's cervical cancer deaths reportedly take place in India and doctors have said that poor menstrual hygiene is partly to blame.

Speaking about the taboo regarding menstruation in the country, Pritishree and Ayushi say that there is a need to first accept that a woman having a period is one of the most natural processes. 

They give the example of how one male classmate himself bought six packets of sanitary napkins and gave it to them for the initiative. Another classmate, also male, however, donated two packets anonymously. 

"Everyone knows what menstruation is but we don't talk about it openly. Sometimes girls miss classes due to cramps during their periods. If asked why they had not attended classes, they'll say they were sick, or had stomach ache but won't talk about the real reason. Only when we talk about it openly will it lead to change," the duo say. 

Viren Swami, Anglia Ruskin University

Many Londoners were appalled by adverts last year featuring a woman in a bikini asking others if they were “beach body ready”. For many, these type of adverts are emblematic of the sexist cult of thinness that is so pervasive in contemporary Western culture. But surely, there have been all sorts of body ideals throughout history – are things really any different today?

Venus von Willendorf – from the Stone Age.MatthiasKabel/wikimedia, CC BY-SA

If we go back far enough in time and look at sculptures created by ancestral humans populations, we get a very different picture of what the ideal body for women may have looked like. Our ancestors inhabited environments characterised by food shortages and individuals who were able to quickly increase their body mass may have had an advantage in terms of health and even fertility. This is supported by the archaeological record of Venus figurines – such as the “Venus of Willendorf” from the late Stone Age – which suggests that between ten and 100,000 years ago, the ideal female figure was robust and round.

This was the case up until the 19th century. Artists like Titian, Rembrandt, and Rubens all portrayed the ideal woman as voluptuous and round. Venus, the goddess of beauty, was typically portrayed with a round face and a pear-shaped body.

Frailty and subservience

In the late 19th century, this started to change. An idealised image of a woman with a slight shape and a small, corseted waist, sloped shoulders, tapered fingers and delicate feet started to emerge in North America and Western Europe. Known as the “steel engraving lady”, this ideal came to be associated not only with frailty, weakness and subservience, but also with high social status and moral values.

By the end of the 19th century, another ideal began to emerge - the “Gibson Girl”. This image combined features from the steel engraving lady and the previous voluptuous woman to create an ideal that was slender in the waist and legs, but still curvy with wide hips and with corseting.

Man having a crush on a Gibson girl.Charles Dana Gibson, CC BY-SA

In the 1920s, the exchange of corsets for new undergarments that bound the breasts created a flat-chested, boy-like appearance. During this era, the beauty ideal shifted to an almost exclusive focus on slenderness, requiring the use of starvation diets and “rolling machines”. It was also in the 1920s that the proliferation of mass media helped to create a standardisation of beauty ideals in North America and Western Europe. Movies and magazines, as well as Hollywood stars, presented a homogenised vision of beauty and it’s also during this period that we see the first adverts for weight loss.

By the 1940s, slender legs became the focus of beauty ideals -– emphasised with hemmed stockings and high-heeled shoes. Bust size also grew in idealised images and would soon become the dominant feature of female ideal beauty. Interestingly, researchers during this period began to document the first instances of negative body image, with women desiring smaller body sizes and larger breasts.

Twiggy.Amaryllis Sternweiser/Flickr, CC BY-SA

By the time the supermodel Twiggy debuted in the United States in 1966, the trend toward increasingly slender bodies had taken hold. Playboy centrefolds and Miss America pageant winners all showed a decrease in body weight and hip size, and an increase in waist size, bust size and height between the 1960s and 1980s. By the mid-1990s, this female beauty ideal had become synonymous with the thin ideal, which has remained at clinically underweight levels.

It is certainly true that, in the early 1980s, a more muscular ideal of female beauty emerged – exemplified by broad shoulders. In fact, shoulder pads became became the defining fashion statement of the era, known as “power dressing”. Nevertheless, the focus remained on a thin, slender body shape. Likewise, the re-emergence of particular types of exercise regimens – such as high intensity interval training and weightlifting – has resulted in a more muscular ideal for women more recently, but typically the ideal remains thin.

Doomed to failure?

Another significant change that began in the 1990s was the denigration of overweight women. In popular TV, for example, overweight women were stereotypically portrayed as unintelligent, greedy, and unable to form romantic attachments. There has also been increasing focus on the health risks associated with being overweight across all media. The effect of the combination of the idealisation of thinness and the denigration of overweight has been the homogenisation of a beauty ideal that is unachievable for the majority of women.

Contemporary Western women are exposed to this thin ideal in almost every form of media – from magazines to TV shows and popular films. So it’s no surprise to learn that so many of women in the West are dissatisfied with their bodies. In one large survey of almost 10,000 women in the United States, for example, my colleagues and I found that almost 85% of respondents were dissatisfied with their current body size and wanted to be thinner.

Even more concerning is evidence that the thin ideal is now a global phenomenon, with women in most urban, developed settings – including places like India and China – reporting an idealisation of thinness and a desire to be thinner. For body image scholars, this is worrying because of the overwhelming evidence that body dissatisfaction is a risk factor for disordered eating, consideration of cosmetic surgery, and poorer psychological well-being in general.

All this seems to indicate that today’s body standards are indeed becoming increasingly unattainable. However, in the 21st century, encouraging signs that the thin ideal is being challenged have begun to emerge. In some parts of the developing world, the thin ideal is being questioned and re-negotiated in line with local norms. In Belize in Central America, for example, young women have re-interpreted the thin ideal – allowing it to be more curvy, which is consistent with local norms and body shapes.

Similarly, when the “beach body” adverts first began appearing in London, many were vandalised by women inspired by the resurgence of feminism. In a globalised world, connecting body-positive movements across borders is easier too. When the adverts reached the subway in New York, for example, women there followed those in London to deface the adverts. This is just one small example, but it points to greater awareness of the detrimental effects of the cult of thinness and points to a future in which women are no longer judged solely on their appearance, but on their real competencies.

Viren Swami, Professor of Social Psychology, Anglia Ruskin University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

We’ve all been in a situation when we get our period and realise we’re out of pads or tampons. Looks like this is what happened with this 13-year-old American girl who was then driven by her mother, Belinda Hankins to a neighbouring store.

Simple enough right? If only it was. Turns out, the teen couldn’t find where they were kept because no one likes to advertise loudly that they have sanitary napkins and tampons or “stuff for your vagina” here. Because, it’s taboo and secret and WE MUST NEVER SPEAK ABOUT IT. Shhh.

This is exactly the point that this hilarious text exchange between the mother-daughter duo, posted by Belinda on Facebook, makes. Oh and, the little genius proceeds to draw a map for her mother so that she doesn’t have to navigate through the huge store the way she had to.

The Facebook post went viral thereafter, being shared over 55,000 times. And while there were those lauding the pair for their brilliant take on the simple situation, there were others who came up with all sorts of concerns about the child’s safety and their lack of preparedness at the time of the month. Others accused Belinda of having staged the conversation to gain traction on the internet.

In another Facebook post, Belinda gives it right back to the haters.

Adorable and on point. Mother-daughter relationship goals, you all!

For a while now, Bollywood has taken an interest in portraying “consent” in mainstream cinema. If in a “Bhaag Milkha Bhaag”, we had a brief scene portraying marital rape, “Phobia” had a female protagonist who has casual sex with a man and later decides not to continue sleeping with him. Even in the immensely forgettable “Heropanti”, Tiger Shroff looks into the camera and soulfully says, “No means No!”. It’s another thing that he stalks the heroine and ‘wins’ her heart in pretty much the time-honoured tradition of Indian cinema.

If these films had consent as an aside, “Pink” makes it its main subject and is keen to drill the lesson into your head. Interestingly, though the film’s posters have had Amitabh Bachchan towering over the three female actors, his name appears after theirs in the credits. And in the same sized font. One wishes that the script had followed this good beginning.

“Pink” is immediately intriguing as we’re shown two cars driving down different roads in the opening scene: one has a man with a head injury, accompanied by his male friends, and the other is a cab with three women who look tense and upset. We’re not told what has happened. The three women, Meenal (Taapsee Pannu), Falak (Kirti Kulhari) and Andrea (Andrea Tariang) go about their everyday life, avoiding discussing the events of that fateful night. However, Rajveer (Angad Bedi), the injured man who has powerful political connections, and his friends are not going to let them get away so easily.

Meenal is soon embroiled in a police case and the character of the three women is called to question by what we like to call the “system” but is really just a projection of the many misogynistic notions and ideas that we carry in our minds as individuals. Deepak Sehgal (Amitabh Bachchan), a retired, eccentric lawyer comes to their aid and the rest of the film is a mirror held up to society.

Meenal, Falak and Andrea are typical urban, elite, young women, trying to survive in Delhi (where else?). They have tattoos and piercings, they drink and party, they have sex without marriage and they wear “short” clothes. Although the narrative doesn’t delve into who they are and what they do, they come across as authentic sketches, if not portraits, of the average urban woman trying to walk the tightrope of personal choices.

Taapsee is convincing and draws out your empathy as a wilful yet traumatized Meenal. Her alternating expression of rebelliousness and disbelief in the court room scenes are commendable, even though the screenplay falls into predictability in these portions. Kirti and Andrea, as her friends, deliver good performances too.

Where the film falters, is when it projects Deepak Sehgal as their saviour. When he begins his arguments, Sehgal starts out by sarcastically stating that this trial ought to become a manual for what a girl must not do in society. And that is precisely what the film turns into: a manual. The deliberateness with which this happens encumbers the storytelling; it is as if, Ritesh Shah (who wrote the story and the screenplay) and Aniruddha Chowdhury (director) were pre-empting criticism from the “bindiwale”, a disparaging term that a policeman uses to refer to women’s rights activists in the film, for not adequately covering all aspects of the issue at hand.

For instance, Andrea is from Meghalaya and when Rajveer’s counsel suggests that she is a sex worker because of this, Andrea bursts out saying, “I feel North Eastern girls are harassed more on the street.” The line is out of place and looks like an amateur attempt to tick all the right boxes. Amitabh Bachchan mansplains a lot about women and the prejudices against them with occasional interruptions from the ladies themselves. The three women, however brave and outspoken, still need a “hero” to save them, even if he’s an aged, somewhat strange patriarch. But despite this, it’s not as if the second half does not have its moments. Raashul Tandon as Dumpy, especially, provides some mirth in the sombre proceedings.

“Pink” winds up being a tidy lesson on consent and the double standards that society has for men and women. Its messaging is loud, repetitive and sometimes borders on sloganeering. But the authenticity of its female characters and their realities saves it from turning into a placard. The music and taut editing do their bit in helping one remain invested in the story.

 As a film, “Pink” might have worked better if the messaging had been subtler and the storytelling had stuck to showing and not telling so much. However, Indian films have been screaming misogyny from the rooftop for aeons now, so why be disconcerted by the loudness of the backchat? 

By Kaushik LM

Slasher films are a popular genre in Hollywood.  Films like the “Scream” and “Saw” series, and “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” all have violence, torture and disturbing visuals that are not meant for the faint-hearted.

Indian audiences, too, have taken a liking to these films mostly by watching them online. However, Indian film-makers had not ventured into such gore yet. A young Tamil filmmaker, Sumanth Radhakrishnan, has finally taken the step to bring such a film to Indian audiences through “Sadhuram 2”, featuring a cast of mostly new faces.

“Sadhuram 2” loyally follows the first film in the “Saw” series and the makers have also credited the original. Yog Japee (playing a doctor) and Riaz (playing a photographer) end up abducted and chained in a grungy room, with a dead body lying between them. Each of them has a cassette, through which the kidnapper addresses them, telling them why they have been held captive and what they should do to win their freedom.

The narrative goes back and forth in time and we are shown overlapping episodes from the two men's lives. They frenetically look for clues and signs in the room to break free and the doctor, in particular, turns increasingly desperate. A young working professional with a terminal illness and his pregnant wife are also key characters.

The director has infused some “Indian” tropes in the film by including a grieving pregnant woman and a rape victim who is denied justice. “Sadhuram 2” isn't just about raw visuals and violence. In fact, the violence been toned down to acceptable levels and the film carries a U/A certificate, unlike its original.

Girish Gopalakrishnan’s tense, moody background score is a big plus in the film. He has previously done good work in films like “Marina” and “Vidiyum Munn” prior to this. However, a quirky sound effect which keeps coming whenever there is a shift in the narrative, gets on our nerves beyond a point. With a short run-time of 90 odd minutes, the film does not have any songs but the decision not to include commercial elements is a good one. The edits by S.P.Raja Sethupathi are intelligent and do justice to the non-linear nature of the plot.

The performances are adequate. Excluding Yog Japee and Suja Varunee, the rest of the cast is made up of new actors. Yog Japee is a trained theater artiste and is convincing as an affluent and sophisticated doctor. Rohiet Nair gets a pivotal part and he showcases sufficient intensity in the film's riveting finale, when all the dots are connected.

“Sadhuram 2” is not for everybody but it will appeal to a niche group that enjoys the slasher genre. 

24-year-old Catherine* doesn’t have many regrets but the one she has spans eight long years. The relationship began with a man seven years older than her. “At the time, I thought physical intimacy can only end in marriage. So when Sam* kept pursuing me, I started reciprocating after a year,” says Catherine.

The years that followed, Sam and Catherine’s relationship was a cat and mouse chase where Sam isolated her from her friends, refused to give the validation she constantly craved for and made her go to extreme lengths to prove her feelings for him. And while it’s been two years since Catherine ended their toxic relationship, she didn’t identify it as an emotionally abusive or manipulative one until a few months after the breakup.

Catherine’s case is not an isolated one. Because the abuse in such cases is not as apparent as it is in physically abusive relationships, many fail to recognize it. Dr Kumar Babu, a Chennai-based psychologist says that while even a child is manipulative when he says he is sick to skip school, when the manipulation is done without a regard for the other person’s feelings is when things go wrong.  

“Emotional neglect is a typical form of emotional cruelty where the abuser will isolate the other person from friends and family to a point where he/she becomes emotionally dependent only on the abuser,” explains Dr Kumar Babu. And why do victims comply? “In young couples especially who may be in the nascent stage of the relationship, the initial attraction may overshadow their instinct,” he says.

Karthik*, *Lavanya’s (now former) boyfriend of eight years, was two years older than her and began pursuing her when she was around 16-years-old. “I didn’t want to be in a relationship but because he was relentless, I agreed to talk to him. I liked the attention at that age. So after a month when he asked me out, I said yes,” recalls the 24-year-old.

Karthik would insist that Lavanya inform him whenever she was going out and with whom. “Even if I was going with my mother to a nearby market, he’d ask me to give him a missed call from my mother’s number,” Lavanya says. And while she didn’t see anything wrong in his overly possessive behaviour initially, it got to her after two years of their relationship because he would never reciprocate. “He even began avoiding my calls when he was out but I couldn’t do the same,” she says.

She even joined an all-girls college because he threatened to leave her if she went to a co-ed one. “He would doubt me even if I spoke to his own friends in front of him. He even started badmouthing my friends. He wanted to cut me off from others but wasn’t willing to be there for me either,” Lavanya says.  

Dr Babu says that while many psychological disorders are unhealthy extensions of normal human emotions, things like excessive possessiveness and jealousy when blown out of proportion can turn into fully fledged paranoia.  

He also explains that sometimes, it’s not just the abuser who has a part to play in the toxic relationship. The victim may act as the “enabler”, because he or she is too emotionally, socially or financially dependent on the other. “When a relationship doesn’t make you feel good, you shouldn’t stay. Everyone will have that instinct. But people end up staying because they may be afraid of being alone or may have become habituated to the cycle of abuse; so much so that sometimes the enabler will make the abuser angry deliberately so that the latter tries to make it up by being nice the next day,” Dr Babu says.   

The emotional maturity and background of the abused must also be taken into account, which may compel them to stay.

Catherine for instance, thinks that because of how the relationship began, she was constantly trying to reassure herself that she was important to him and not just someone he “experimented the dating thing with”, so she put up with his behaviour. Lavanya on the other hand, had working parents whose time and attention was lacking as she grew up. So when she got the attention and emotional response from someone else, she justified his manipulation and neglect to herself so he wouldn’t leave.

And then there are films and novels which make us think these things are normal when they are not, remarks Dr Babu. Unlike Lavanya who found Karthik’s overly possessive nature problematic, Catherine never made the attempt to speak to other guys. “I had put Sam on a pedestal and I had seen too many films where guys don’t like it if their girlfriends spoke to or looked at other guys. So I never did it,” she says.

The abuse is not limited to women either. 26-year-old Mayank* has been with Kriya* for about two years now. He says Kriya constantly blames him for not finding her attractive and pairs him with his female friends who he hasn’t met in months. “Things got so bad once that she hit me,” says Mayank.

Shalini Aiyappa, HOD of the Psychology Department in St Aloysius College, Mangaluru says that in most cases, the abuser’s behaviour is triggered by low self-esteem, his or her own deep-seated insecurities and inability to handle rejection.

Coincidentally, in all of the above cases, the abusers came from abusive family environment. “In these cases perhaps, the abuser was seeking the attachment and validation which never materialized in their family,” explains Shalini. “However, everyone who comes from an abusive background is not an abuser,” she cautions.

Shalini also points out how it’s difficult for young couples to talk about these things because of patriarchal values instilled from childhood. “That a woman must always put up with it and a man cannot be abused – these perceptions stop men and women from talking about emotional abuse,” she says. The silence about these issues is louder in married couples because of the finality with which marriage is seen, says Dr Babu.

Shalini also says that while the society is becoming more open to pre-marital relationships, youngsters and parents/guardians are still unable to have as open a dialogue as they should be. “There’s increasing acceptance of relationships, but not about the problems in them,” says Shalini. 

(*Names have been changed to protect identity.)

By Ramachandra Guha

‘In my humble opinion,’ wrote Gandhi, ‘every man has a right to hold any opinion he chooses, and to give effect to it also, so long as, in doing so, he does not use physical violence against anybody.’

*****

This caveat in place, let me now analyse what I regard as the eight major threats to freedom of expression in contemporary India. The first threat is the retention of archaic colonial laws. There are several sections in the Indian Penal Code (IPC) that are widely used (and abused) to ban works of art, films, and books. These include Section 153 (‘wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot’); Section 153A (‘promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony’); Section 295 (‘injuring or defiling [a] place of worship with intent to insult the religion of any class’); Section 295A (‘deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage the religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs’); Section 298 (‘uttering words, etc., with deliberate intent to wound the religious feelings of any person’); Sections 499 and 500, which make defamation or harming another person’s ‘reputation’ a criminal offence; Section 505 (‘statements conducing to public mischief’); and most dangerously, Section 124A, the so-called sedition clause (‘whoever, by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the Government established by law in India, shall be punished with imprisonment for life’).

These sections give the courts and the state itself an extraordinarily wide latitude in placing limits to the freedom of expression. Ironically, the penal code of which these sections are a part was originally drafted by Thomas Babington Macaulay. Macaulay was also the man who promoted English-language education in India. Left-wing patriots dislike Macaulay because he was an imperialist, while right-wing patriots detest him because, while promoting English, he brimmed with contempt for indigenous intellectual and literary traditions. Hindutva ideologues have even coined a phrase, ‘Macaulay putra’, to describe those intellectuals, cosmopolitan from one vantage point if deracinated from another, who write largely in English and are open to western ideas and influences.

Thomas Babington Macaulay by Claudel (Image courtesy: WikiCommons/The Works of Lord Macaulay. Albany edition …, by Macaulay, Thomas Babington)  

The Indian Left and the Indian Right both profess to dislike Thomas Babington Macaulay. And yet the penal code drafted by Macaulay has been enthusiastically used by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI[M]) and the Bharatiya Janata Party to suppress freedom of expression when these parties are in power in the states, and, in the case of the BJP, when in power in the Centre as well.

These IPC sections have, of course, been extensively resorted to by governments run by the Congress party too. The Congress claims to revere Mahatma Gandhi; and Gandhi was a lifelong Congressman himself. One should remind the Congress of Sonia and Rahul Gandhi that the asli or greater Gandhi was himself often a victim of the sedition clause in the IPC. I’ve spoken of how his book Hind Swaraj was banned in 1910. Twelve years later, after he had returned to India, Gandhi was arrested after the non-cooperation movement he had initiated generated massive popular support. This unnerved the British, who decided to prosecute and imprison Gandhi, basing their case on articles he had published in his journal Young India, these deemed ‘seditious’ under Section 124A of the IPC.

Gandhi was not the first (nor would he be the last) nationalist prosecuted and jailed by the British Raj for writing articles critical of state policy. Gandhi hoped that these laws, which had no space in a democratic and free government, would be removed after Independence. In 1929, he wrote a stirring editorial in Young India calling for a countrywide agitation demanding the repeal of Section 124A. The section, said Gandhi, constituted ‘a rape of the word “law”’; it ‘hung over our heads’ whether ‘we are feasting or fasting’. Section 124A was ‘established by the naked sword, kept ready to descend upon us at the will of the arbitrary rulers in whose appointment the people have no say’. The ‘repeal of that Section and the like,’ remarked Gandhi, ‘means repeal of the existing system of government which means attainment of swaraj. Therefore the force required really to repeal that Section is the force required for the attainment of swaraj.’

Tragically, after India became independent in August 1947, instead of doing away with Section 124A and the like, we have retained and even strengthened them. This may have happened in any case, as many states like laws that give them residual powers to suppress dissent. But two events soon after Independence added to the insecurities of the Indian state. The first was the murder of Gandhi on 30 January 1948 by a fanatic acting ostensibly on his own, but in fact part of a wider political movement to make India a Hindu Pakistan. Six weeks later, at a secret conclave in Calcutta, the Communist Party of India (CPI) called for an armed war against the Indian state. Thus, the newly-born government of free India was threatened by right-wing extremism as well as by left-wing extremism. Adding to the worries was scarcity of food, the challenge of settling millions of Partition refugees, and the conflict with Pakistan over Kashmir.

Nehru, Gandhi and Patel (Image courtesy: WikiCommons/ Life Photo Archives)

How would the Centre hold? This was the question faced by the prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, the home minister, Vallabhbhai Patel, and the law minister, Dr B.R. Ambedkar. Seeking to buttress a fragile Centre against the violent extremists of Left and Right, the government now banned the Organiser, the weekly mouthpiece of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, as well as a communist journal called Crossroads. The editors of these journals appealed to the courts, who struck down the ban, saying that free expression must be maintained. Nehru, Patel and Ambedkar then introduced what became the first amendment to the Constitution of India. Article 19(2) of the Constitution, as originally drafted and passed, had stated that the state could make laws restricting freedom of expression where the exercise of such freedom ‘offends against decency or morality or which undermines the security of, or tends to overthrow, the State’. The first amendment expanded the areas where the state could intervene to restrict freedom of expression. The revised Article 19(2) thus stated that the state could make laws restricting freedom of expression ‘in the interests of the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, [and] decency or morality’.

The new clauses introduced by the first amendment were ‘friendly relations with foreign States’ and ‘public order’. The second clause especially was capable of very flexible interpretation, since, if any book or film or work of art now offended a few people and they protested on the streets, it could constitute a threat to ‘public order’. The original Article of the Constitution would have most likely rendered infructuous Sections 153, 153A, 295, 295A, 499, 500 and 505, since ‘public mischief’, ‘outraging religious feelings’, ‘wantonly giving provocation’, ‘defaming reputations’, etc. do not constitute a threat to the state itself. But they can, in the eyes of a conservative judge or judiciary, be construed as constituting a threat to ‘public order’.

Nehru, Patel and Ambedkar were acting under great duress, taking extraordinary measures at a time when the very survival of independent India was at stake. Yet that first amendment was not, in retrospect, conducive to the freedom of expression in India. For, it reintroduced the power of the colonial laws which the Constitution had tried to remove or supersede. The amendment allowed the government of independent India much leeway in suppressing dissent and criticism, but the courts little leeway in protecting it.

Excerpted with permission from ‘Democrats and Dissenters’ by Ramachandra Guha and published by Penguin Books

You can buy the book here

The history of the ‘barotta’ is complex, but it is believed to have roots in South India. It is significantly different from the North Indian ‘paratha’, and is usually made of maida. It is possible that the North Indian ‘paratha’ and our own ‘parotta’, or ‘barotta’, have links or share common roots, but the barotta today has a strong South Indian identity.

V Thilagarasu, who fancies himself as a globe-trotting barotta connoisseur, says the barotta’s southern roots trace back to the 15th century. “It was a staple for many communities, like the Vaniba Chettiar and Keelakarai Muslims,” he says.

It did not, however, get world famous until after it traveled to Malaysia. As the British colonialists shipped Indian slaves to Malaysia to work in plantations, the Indians took their food along. They did not have enough rice to make idli or dosa, but their familiarity with making flatbread with wheat came in handy. And thus, the Malaysian Roti Canai was born, bearing close resemblance to what we still devour on the streets of Chennai and Madurai.

Many say that ‘Roti Canai’ is ‘Roti from Chennai’. Not true, says travel journalist John Krich. “Instead, canai is a Malay word sometimes translated as "to knead,"… "more correctly meaning 'to stretch or push something pliable or elastic’,” he writes.

It was the Roti Canai which made the humble barotta famous all over the world. And now, the curry dipper has at least 20 different names across the continents, and has been modified to create some fantastic gastronomic experiences.

The different names of Barotta. Source: Barottas.com

Making the Roti Canai is also an art form, celebrated in food festivals across the world.

But what has happened to the barotta? Why has the tasty, traditional food lost its charm?

“Think about it,” says Thilagarasu, “I am a barotta lover too. I can eat it in every meal. As youngsters, we would eat it very often. But now, as we grow older, richer and more health-conscious, we eat it very rarely.”

Barotta today, is an unhealthy street-food which is cheap and not classy enough. We like it, but there are compelling reasons why we choose not to eat it.

“There are usually three reasons. One, health – it is made of maida, so people avoid it. Two, it’s served mostly in unhygienic stalls and places and we don’t want to go there. Third, and this is not often said, but the barotta has acquired an image of being inferior. We want to hang out at a pizzeria, not a barotta stall,” Thilagarasu explains.

For the barotta lover in Thilagarasu, this was a disappointing trend. He loved the barotta, but couldn’t eat it as often as he’d have liked to.

This was why Thilagarasu started Barottas, a food tech company and Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) chain. “I used to joke in college when the barottas got over at the canteen that one day I will start my own barotta kadai, well here I am,” he says, as we sit down for a chat at his office in Nungambakkam, Chennai.

A food-commodities trader and restaurateur, Thilagarasu says he has spent years traveling and researching the flatbread. He has held workshops and discussions with chefs to get to know the barotta better, looked into the science of barotta-making and travelled to several parts of the world to study the dish and other QSR models.

“I wondered, when the idli, dosa and biriyani have been marketed to the hilt across the world, why not the barotta? There is a Mr. Idli and a Dosa Corner in every city, there are no organized players who have only barotta as the concept,” he points out.

And that became his Mission Barotta.

In the Chennai market, barotta is both a food and a memory, says Thilagarasu… and that presents both advantages and problems.

It is a dish from our childhood about which we like to reminisce. For many, the barotta is an emotion. But it also one which is stereotyped and seen as a cheap and unhealthy dish. Barottas’ idea is to first play on the emotion, and then correct what they see as the “three pain points” – health, hygiene and class.

Over the years, street-vendors, owing to thin profit margins, have started using the cheapest variety of flour – maida – to make the barotta.

So, Thilagarusu started with changing the flour. “What is maida? Maida is the lowest grade of wheat, which is low on fibre. Barotta does not have to be made with just ‘maida’, it can be made healthier with more fibre too,” he says. Since the barotta cannot be made with extremely high fibre wheat, Barottas has created a medium-fibre Special Purpose Flour, which they use in their kitchen.

“Barotta is an awesome, wholesome meal – and I have kept it that way,” Thilagarusu says.

The next challenge was to make the barotta classy and hygienic. Thilagarusu has imported food-grade packaging material from Japan, and designed it with a lot of thought, for what he calls the ‘wow’ factor. “We offer over 500 combos and my QSRs will have good ambience,” he says, adding that he has taken lessons from global brands like McDonald’s and Chipotle.

For now, they are only available on the web, and on an app. “We have a central kitchen in Vadapalani, and 6 other finishing kitchens in the city,” Thilagarusu says.

With a little over three months into business, and Rs. 2 crore in the kitty from funders, Barottas has evinced much interest in town. In August, they clocked close to 3800 orders. “That’s a 125% growth,” Thilagarusu claims. There are plans to open QSRs in Chennai and Bengaluru too, he adds. The plan is grow to about 250 stores and franchises in 5 years.

But what’s the end of the road? Thilagarusu says, “I want to create a culture where everyone orders barottas like pizzas.”

Chennai-based techies, SP Balamurugan, Sridevi and Arun Prakash, were working at PayPal in 2011, when they noticed that there were many talented people around them whose only barrier on the path to achieving professional success was that they weren’t well-versed in English. The language is the medium of instruction for most engineering and technology courses, so with a little help from friends, the three of them started a YouTube channel with tutorials in native languages and christened it ‘GUVI’.

GUVI stands for ‘Grab Your Vernacular Identity’ and provides aspiring technologists with video tutorials, courses and practice material in their own language. It began as a self-learning initiative but has now grown into a platform which not only provides full-fledged college courses with assignments, but also has videos in Tamil, Kannada, Telugu and Hindi.

While the videos can be accessed by creating an account on their website, the courses and practice platforms like online code compiler require payment. Balamurugan says that they have also tied up with colleges in Chennai and Coimbatore – 13 of which have bought GUVI’s courses for their students. 52 others have students enrolled for courses on a voluntary basis.

GUVI is not only helping people learn but aiding them in finding employment too. In 2014, GUVI placed more than 50 people in startups and MNCs. “Employers began approaching us when they realized that we were good with what we did,” says Balamurugan. GUVI works by awarding points to users who practice and finish courses on its platform. These performance profiles also help employers in finding the right people for the jobs that they are offering, Balamurugan adds.

Balamurugan says that they are currently focusing on Tamil. 

But how did GUVI go from being a vernacular video hub to an online learning and recruitment platform?

Balamurugan says that the turning point was their pitch in IIT Madras in 2014, following which GUVI was incubated as a startup and became associated with the QEEE project which aims to teach Python, a computer programming language, to 150 colleges in India in their mother tongues.

By June 2014, the trio had quit their jobs in PayPal and registered GUVI as a company. And while they assumed in the beginning that GUVI would mostly appeal to rural audiences, they were quite surprised when students from cities and towns also began using their platform. “The feedback we got indicates that they connected more with the content in their native language and engaged more actively with it,” Balamurugan explains.

However, the team realized that if they wanted to become a sustainable business model, they needed to involve educational institutions. That’s when they held boot camps in 10 colleges, and created courses, complete with assignments and advanced levels, along with the web platform which allowed users to practice.

The text in their videos is in English, however, the voiceover is provided by industry professionals in native languages. These voiceovers were initially given by their colleagues at PayPal but now, they have plenty of industry professionals approaching them to help. “We usually hold a mock session with them in one of the colleges we have tied up with to see if they are good teachers. In case the professional cannot be physically present, we provide them with a video and ask them to record a voiceover to see if they can explain things well,” says Balamurugan.

While they deal primarily in computer engineering courses, they have introduced a few courses in mechanical engineering recently.

“We want to continue to bridge the gap between knowledge and talent which is created by language. Because it can be bridged by language too,” states Balamurugan.

Watching “Just Akasmika”, I kept thinking of the excellent reality show, “Masterchef Australia”. More precisely, I was thinking of the one time I saw an exquisite chicken, cheese and ham preparation and thought to myself, “Hey I can do that!”

I bring up this experience because I imagine Himayat Khan, the director of “Just Akasmika” felt something similar while watching the Alfred Hitchcock classic “Rear Window”.

Although the ‘amateurs’ on "Masterchef Australia" made it look easy, my experiment at copying them ended with something that looked like ET mud-wrestling Arnold Schwarzenegger and tasted worse. Himayat Khan’s “inspired” film goes much the same way.

This is the main thrust of the film – a young man, Shankar (Vinod Patil), sees his famous artist neighbour (Tilak Shekar) doing chilling things like dragging a  bloody sack or carrying a body in a cardboard box out of his house, but can’t find proof and can’t get anyone to believe him about any of it.

But Himayat doesn’t seem to have been confident of pulling off the film with just that formula alone, and so he throws in extra ingredients in hopes of finding a recipe that pleases everyone.

So the film starts off with Shankar being an orphan who’s reunited with his parents 18 years after he gets lost. But that plot point only serves to bring him to the house where he sees his neighbour doing crazy things. And one doesn’t get why the film couldn’t have started with him being there in the first place.

Then there’s the love story with Aarohi (Sanjjanaa Galrani), which could have been an integral plot point if the director had done more to build it up. But all he has in this department is a convoluted story of childhood sweethearts reunited and another copied idea, this time from stop-motion music videos like the song “Her Morning Elegance” by Oren Lavie.

The neighbourhood gang of young men alternate between harassing the young neighbourhood women on the street and trying to beat up Shankar for encroaching their turf. They fail to induce the necessary action thrills with a number of hastily put-together chase and fight sequences that largely involve Shankar jumping over motorbikes and terraces in a bad imitation of parkour sequences that are all the rage in Hollywood these days.

The main plot of the suspicious neighbour and his night-time activities seems almost an afterthought, after all these sub-plots and diversions until an abrupt and very confusing climax.

You can see the actors earnestly trying their best to hold this film together. And newcomer Vinod Patil’s enthusiasm is endearing in some ways. If the film had kept to a single plot and just played off the enthusiasm of the young actors, it might have gone somewhere. But the script and the direction are such a letdown that you can’t blame them for this film that looked much like my Masterchef dish at the end of the runtime. 

It has been over a year now since Duncans Industries shut several of its plantations in West Bengal. The company, which produced around 15 million kg of tea a year, had crop loss estimated at 80% of its production capacity in 2015. 

And the worst hit by the crisis have been the workers in the tea gardens. Around 25,000 workers became unemployed when Duncans closed seven of its tea gardens in the northern region of the state.

From extreme poverty to malnutrition, workers migrating to other states in search for jobs to young girls taking to prostitution to feed  their families, the issues that plague the people are multiple and dire.

The union Commerce and Industry Ministry had, on January 28, issued the notification under section 16E of the Tea Act, 1953, for taking over the management/control of seven tea estates, contending that they were "managed in a manner highly detrimental to the tea industry and public interest".

While six of the estates, namely Birpara, Garganda, Lankapara, Tulsipara, Huntapara, and Dhumchipara, are run by Duncans Industries, the seventh - Demdima tea estate - belongs to Duncans but is operated by the Santipara Tea Co Ltd.

Challenging the notification, both Duncans and Santipara Tea moved the Kolkata High Court, which in March upheld the notification.

"The state government has been doing all it can for the welfare of the workers of these estates. We have been providing them food, health services and electricity," Mamata Banerjee, West Bengal Chief Minister, who had also announced forming a directorate for the tea gardens, had earlier said.

Freelance news and documentary photographer Tanmoy Bhaduri recently did a photo feature on Duncans’ closed tea gardens in north Bengal.

“We have formed a self-help group. We pick tea leaves in season and sell them on a daily per-kg basis, like it’s done in other Duncans estates, to protect our garden and factory. The earning is divided among workers,” Janak Singh, Secretary of Bagan Banchao Committee, Dimdima Tea Garden told Tanmoy.

Dhumchipara Tea Garden: The distance from Siliguri to Dumchipara tea garden is around 130 km.

Birpara tea garden.

Main Gate, Birpara tea factory.

Administrative office, Birpara tea factory.

Inside the now closed factory.

Rahul Mitra, a guard at the Birpara tea factory, says, “We have not received any payments since 2014, but we try to protect our gardens and factory. We have no option but to move.”

The health centre at Birpara tea estate is an abandoned building with no electricity and a small stock of a few basic medicines.

Motish Chandra, hospital staff says, “I am the only person here, I have nothing to do. No medicine, no facility to provide. Doctor and nurses stopped coming after closure of garden.”

A broken window: Workers, angry over non-payment of their wages, broke windows of the administrative office during a protest.

Now closed workshops at the Birpara tea estates.

Leaves being taken to the local market for sale.

Budhmunia Devi (73), a worker at Birpara tea garden says, “We get Rs 8 per kilo in the local market. We can pluck 25 kilos in a day to feed our families. From December to February there will be no work. We have no idea how we will live during those three months.”

Petti Dorji (65), a worker at Dimdima tea garden says, “My son went to Kerala for work. I have three granddaughters. How can I feed them?”

Rina Minch (35) is a worker at Dimdima tea garden. She lost her husband two months ago. She has four children. She has now started to work at the garden.

Nilima Minch (13), daughter of Rina Minch, stopped going to school because she has to take care of her younger siblings as her mother works in the garden.

Tiji Minch (70), a worker at Dimdima tea garden says, “We are six family members including three children. We do not get rations regularly. The state government is giving us rice at Rs 2 per kg which is not sufficient. There is no medical facility in this tea garden.”

After the gardens were closed, the bus service run by Duncans for school going children was also stopped. Children have to travel 5kms to reach their school.

Inside the now closed Dumchipara tea garden.

Asha Chengbabal, a former mechanic at Dumchipara tea factory, says, “In the part of the gardens where Nepali-origin workers reside, the most visible sign of crisis is the number of children and adults cycling through the gardens to fetch water in jerry cans. Sometimes they travel as far as 3km. Ration supply here is very poor. There is no medical facility. We have to arrange a car during an emergency to reach the Birpara hospital. But hiring a car costs around Rs 800 to Rs 1000, and we cannot afford it.”

Many of the public health engineering pipes have broken. People usually wait in long queues to fill water from taps that are still in working condition.  

Dumchipara Primary School: There is just one teacher in the school.

Anjali Beck (65) used to work at the Dumchipara tea garden till 2014. She is paralysed and is not receiving any medical treatment. In the picture, she can be seen lying in her sister Ruma Orao’s quarter.

Sukro Orao (58) is another worker at the tea garden. She cannot stand without support. She met with an accident in the Dumchipara tea garden four months ago.

The other employment option available to workers in the region is stone crushing, which is illegal. A worker gets Rs 20 for each bag.

"We earn Rs800- Rs1200 in one night. Who would have given us this money otherwise?" says Pinky (name changed) when asked why she took to prostitution.

A young sex worker. 

In every tea garden, Tanmoy says, the story is the same - of school dropouts, of malnutrition, of migration for jobs. “They yell to me, ‘Only if you see this and write, will the government hear’,” he says.

All photographs and captions by Tanmoy Bhaduri

(Additional text inputs: Agencies)

Parents are the most wonderful, self-sacrificing people in the world, always thinking about their child’s best interests and how much more they can give to make junior’s life prosperous. If you’re nodding in agreement, you probably think Karan Johar films are the last word in verisimilitude.

Most parents in the real world, though, are just ordinary mortals – stressed, tired, frustrated mortals – and mostly stumped about how to bring up a tiny person. And let’s admit it, most of them had no idea what they were in for when they signed up for the job.

There are reams online about parenting tips and tricks to manage it all, not to mention parenting books and guides that hit the market with frustrating regularity, all advising you on how best to bring up your child.  But it’s one thing to read the advice and quite another to live it every day. So not surprisingly, parents do a number of things that are not strictly kosher to survive the day.

Like Chennai-based Aparna Naveen, for instance, who lets her four-year-old daughter splash around in the bath whenever she wants to eat something on the sly.

And no, it’s not for the noble cause of keeping her child healthy. “I give her a chocolate if I want to get out of the house with my husband and spend time with him. I can’t eat dessert in peace without her pestering me for a bite, so I hide and eat,” she says.

Another thing Aparna loves is a nap in the afternoon, but nothing can get her daughter to like it too. So what’s the solution? “I put on videos on YouTube and let her watch when I’m catching up on sleep.”

Sidharth Balachandran, a stay-at-home dad, agrees that the TV-mobile phone-iPad is the holy trinity that most parents turn to for much-needed quiet time. And this is true even as you’ll find most of them enthusiastically sharing articles on social media on why Steve Jobs never gave his kids Apple products.

As Sheetal* from Bengaluru puts it, “Without any gadgets, I’d probably never be able to take a bath or pee for that matter.”

Then there’s the noise that kids love, but which no sane adult can take over and over again. So Mumbai-based Jaya Shravan takes out the batteries from her son’s favourite musical toys and pretends that they are broken.

“I can’t take the noise beyond a point,” she says. Even if that makes her sound like an evil mommy, Jaya thinks it’s a fabulous idea that helps her stay sane.

“How to get your child to sleep?” is another problem that haunts parents across continents. Sometimes, reading, storytelling, and lullabies just don’t cut it. Bobby Pullabhotla came up with a most unusual solution, guaranteed to raise more than a few eyebrows. “I pretended that there was a ghost in the next room to scare my son into sleeping,” says Bobby Pullabhotla. “I asked my mother to go to the next room and bang on the walls.”

Veena* and her husband, Shyam*, follow the scare-your-kid-to-sleep method too. “I lie down next to my son and close the door. My husband stands outside and barks. My son thinks a big, black dog has come and closes his eyes,” Veena laughs.

And of course, with the arrival of a baby, most couples’ sex lives are the first thing that goes for a toss. They don’t have the time or energy for it and even if they do, it’s impossible to get some privacy, what with the little one staring at them with bug eyes all the time.

Black Lace, who writes a sex column for a parenting website, recalls, “When my son was around 18 months old, I strapped him to the high chair, put ‘Peppa Pig’ on TV AND gave him an iPad to play with. This was so my husband and I could break our dry spell and have sex after a very long time. But barely had we started that he came knocking at our door, crying that he couldn’t see me!”

And so, she says, some couples might take an extra step they’re not very proud of. “I know a couple who gave their child Benadryl cough syrup to knock him out for an hour in the afternoon so they could have sex. He was sleepy but refusing to take a nap."

The couple in question co-slept with their four-year-old and he’d fall asleep very late every night. It was impossible for them to stay up. They had to break the dry spell somehow and well, Benadryl it was, Black Lace says.

Treats, threats, bribes and Benadryl are unlikely to feature as recommendations in any parenting manual. And most parents know they can’t be quick-fixes for every occasion. But sometimes, these shortcuts help them stay sane through the most difficult parts of raising a child. Even if the tradeoff is a whole lot of guilt and worry over it.