On one of the days I wrote a letter to Subhadra in a possible explanation as to why I would want to do such things as Im doing in Dantewada. In as much as Subhadra should be getting a copy of the letter, I managed to make a copy and have produced it below.
Dear Subhadra,
Every time I do something different as I’m doing now in Dantewada, Chhattisgarh, people start wondering as to what a weirdo I am. I see this to be the right moment to explain to friends and acquaintances alike as to why I love doing stuff like this. Sridevi and I were talking the other day as to how would we’d manage to tell everyone what we’ve seen, how bad the conditions are out here and all that; now it doesn’t seem to be of any use because people just don’t understand and just don’t give a damn.
There are times when I cannot sit within the four walls of the college campus and remain in total oblivion to certain events that may never be correctly recorded by history. I have felt that this world I live in is so fake that I want to distance myself away from it at the slightest opportunity. That’s a reason why there has always been Darfur, Palestine or Chhattisgarh on my mind. Henceforth , when I’m in Hyderabad or Mumbai and I see people reading the newspapers and discussing an Arushi Talwar or Jessica Lal, my mind would wander to a Hemla Pandey who was killed pregnant while in her hut or the many more whose stories of death I heard from the relatives of those killed. I see people thronging the malls and supposed intellectuals talking about due process and rights when I’m reminded of those who wanted to live and educate their children and didn’t get a chance to do so.
Truly NALSAR has taught me what I don’t want to be in the early part of my life. I don’t want to sit in cramped up corporate offices reading documents but want to work on the law. Part of it should also involve looking that the application of the law at the ground level which doesn’t seem to be happening in Dantewada or Gujarat or Punjab where I’ve been. I remember when I was to go to Darfur you asked me why I would want to go to Darfur and I replied that danger fascinates me. I must confess that I lied. Neither is the reason that I want it to help for a Rhodes or something; I don’t think I’m that ambitious. Its just that I like doing work like this. Its where I can think freely and do some minuscule part to help when thousands are dying. I don’t want to be a hero or anything but am just appalled at the way my friends and acquaintances perceive an issue so grave as this to be trivial.
T.S. Elliot wrote that between the idea and the reality, between the motion and the act falls the shadow. There are times when this shadow may mark the beginning of a new life. I now do not want to share the misery of these people because I cannot afford to spend sleepless nights having nightmares about horrid stories and deaths. I do not want to get into human rights as a profession. If this is to be a new life, I do not want to live it. After all this, I’d still prefer an Alan Shore wearing a saville row suit and arguing in Court.
However still, when people die in numbers that are not yet correctly known and their women are raped and houses burnt, it doesn’t help being indifferent. I meet people I don’t know and they tell me the story of their misery as if I’m a member of their family. Death seems to be normal in what has become a numbers game. I recall reading Elie Wiesel who wrote that indifference then, in certain circumstances such as this, is not only a sin, it is punishment. I certainly would not want to be amongst those sitting in a chair all day, sipping coffee and talking about these deaths as if they’ve done it and seen it all. Id’ rather go and see the situation for myself and see if I can help a little. This is a time when I’m at the cross roads of life with two different paths and I don’t know which to choose from really. This is when I would require you to be there for me and be supportive of whatever decision I might make. Not that it would affect you or anything for I shall be a fool to expect something on that front. Just that it’d be good to have you around.
I remember once quoting Emerson who reckoned a friend to be a masterpiece of nature. One whose very magnificence one is proud of. Needless to say, I still reckon you to be that masterpiece. Things are not so dangerous here as I thought so when I get back to Bombay, even though I might laugh it out, I would not want you to doubt the truth in what I’ve written.
Regards,
Aditya Swarup
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p.s: in paragraph 10 talkin about now i deeding some money i forgot to mention i figured out that modelling was a good source of income. one photshoot got me a 10,000 ruppees. yah. so that was sorted.
dear aditya
it was a pleasure to go through your post,but the pleasure was of ironic sorts. while everytime i hear about a free soul feeling another soul’s pains and problems it makes me feel good that well, there’s another of ‘us’ at the same time reminding me of a question so basic and yet never asked… so in to our faces and yet never looked into the eye of. should these matters need a writting… and what is more should your friends find it ‘weird’ that you recognize the need of basic justice in our country?
your article reminds me of my first encounters with the city of joy calcutta. when i landed at the station i felt something strange deep inside me. there was something i didnt feel comfortable with, but it felt right at the same time. i was in for a three years that have so far been the most fullfilling part of my life.
the first time i watched a man eat out of a community dustbin. i recall that seen so clearly. i was out in the night and walking alone on street, with some people here and there awake due to the wet heat of august, i found a man looking with his hands into the dustbin and i stopped. first i couldnt comprehend was he was upto. and then i got an idea which i instantly refused. no thats not rice he’s picked up. no he’s not goin to eat it. and he did and i threw up.
back in my hotel room just around the street i wondered lesser at the misery of that man eating out of the dustbin but more at my own misery. i had gotten sick seeing a man eat perhaps the first meal of his day. was i a foreigner? no. was i his fellow country man and he then my brother?
i couldnt sleep. met a girl that night and all was ok.
but not for long. the city that calcutta is, the school that it can be for a thirsting soul didnt let leave me alone for long. for it was everywhere. everyy child was hungry, not today but had been hungry for a long time. maybe never had a stomach full of food. maybe never had a house to live. not maybe a lot of the kids off the street acctaully have never had a house to live. and the dangers it exposed them to. so they never had safety. and here was i the fool. taking time to style himself before he went to college. looking sharp. and looking good.
no idea did i have of how the food that nourished my body intoxicated my soul. the safety i had in my appartment made me impotent. and how my looks that i thought were stunning made me so ugly.
some time passed. i became a popular guy in college and made some friends. but friends they were not. they found my ideas about justice ‘weird’. and i had suffered through my school days an acute sense of loneliness because my friends then too thought i was weird. it scared me. not again i said to myself. but it happened yet again. finally i had a pact with myself, with my soul, and when you’re in calcutta your soul is in full bloom, its with you at every step. i mean with so much going on you cannot not speak to your soul every minute. the point is i concluded on my loneliness bein absolute. i said to myself that maybe i am not meant to have friends. maybe i am weird. but there was no deal really. i mean on one hand i had loneliness hurting me like a terminal wound and on the other hand i had ideals of basic justice for fellow countrymen. i chose the latter ofcourse.
than the lonely days. some girls and a lot of soul seking. a lot of times when my hearing was so acute that in nights i’ld wake up to a far away song by a street walker. this one time for example i heard a blind man sing ‘is dunaiya ko kya dikharaha hai?’ what are u trying to show the world? i coulnt sleep.
as time passed i walked the college paths alone, just like i had in school walked alone.
and then in times so disdain emerged a friendship so pure. and it blossomed. and now that i’ve left calcutta i think the friends i made there are my best friends. we’ve even pictured how when we’ll be old drinking friends who will look like what.
we picked up kids from the streets and they liven in my appartment during the months of the monsoons. so there were around 8 to 10 kids on an average in my house. some slept on the sofa around five slept on the beds. i slept on a mat… never slept better.
now i realized i needed some money so sustain this independent reationship i had with the kids. and one day i hadnt eaten and one of the kids had 5 ruppees and we both ate dinner together. i used to tell them like we did in rimc ‘my treat’. so that dinner he seemed to say today its my treat.
my friends from college loved me all the more because how weird my thinkin was … rather how unconventional it was. how i was like no one else thats why they loved me. they, i dont even need to mention this, respected me for what i was doing for the street kids. one of them even introduced me to some kids who needed help and we helped them together.
now three years have ended and i dont see that i made much of a difference in the lives of the kids on the streets of calcutta. maybe i was able to help a few. maybe not. maybe they’re now back on the streets. i do not know.
aditya i guess we have to do our bit. just do it. people might never see it , they might. one day maybe the world is perfect and everyone recoznises each others problems and pains and extends a hand of help. maybe. maybe not.
when you feel pain seeing people in injustice. when u sometimes feel you cannot breathe because your throat is so thick with tears, remember to breathe. and breathe well.
and feel good about your being. for you’re fortunate. for your soul is alive like it should be. fel great.
recently i read a poem mr ramaswamy has translated from a bengali book. he’s called it the fatal seed. its on his blog cuckooscall.blogspot.com
it talks about how did this degradation happened to the human soul. the poet talksa about how the huamn soul is not earth bound.
so my friend keep your soul above the clouds. keep it tender and welcoming, even to pain.
congratulation. i bask in your magnificence.
adil.
I’m moved to say the least. I’m also incredibly jealous of the better human being you have become at the end of this week. There’s a lot of cruelty and unfairness in this world but the worst is perpetrated by those who see it and ignore it.
Thank you for sharing this experience and letting us see through your eyes- this is the first thing that will come to my mind when I have to choose between a sexy pay packet and doing something ‘real’.
Very very sweet.. I love the last part you wrote about Subhadra.
Lovely
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