Category Archives: Leaders

The romantic story behind Odisha’s Belgadia Palace

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Historical Links / Pre-Independence, Leaders, Records, All, Travel, World Opinion

A 200-year-old palace in Odisha has a Bengal connection — a little-known love story

The Belgadia Palace was built in the early 19th century but repurposed by Sriram Chandra Bhanj Deo for his second wife, Sucharu Devi. The king, however, could never live in this palace with his wife / Picture: Prasun Chaudhuri

For most tourists, Baripada is nothing more than a gateway to the Simlipal National Park, famous for its tigers and elephants, in Odisha. That there could be tucked deep within the small town an iridescent palace with an untold love story at its core, is not common knowledge.

Belgadia Palace is now home to the descendants of the erstwhile kings of Mayurbhanj, the Bhanj Deos. Praveen Chandra Bhanj Deo belongs to the 47th generation. He lives in a part of the palace with his wife, two daughters and his 91-year-old mother. On the initiative of his daughters, Mrinalika and Akshita, most of this 215-year-old palace is now open for pubic viewing. Says Akshita, “We want to make people aware of the legacy of our ancestors in the district as well as in the state of Odisha.”

Before throwing open the palace doors, the sisters undertook a thorough recce of the place that revealed a gem too many. One such was the tumultuous love story of their ancestor Sriram Chandra Bhanj Deo and Sucharu Devi, the third daughter of Keshub Chandra Sen, philosopher and social reformer of 19th century Bengal.

Akshita Manjari, the daughter of the current owner of the Belgadia Palace, Praveen Chandra Bhanj Deo, in the palace library / Picture: Prasun Chaudhuri

Sriram Chandra met Sucharu Devi in Darjeeling. She was educated, enlightened and a 15-year-old girl who was not in purdah. He was 18 and looking for a wife who would be his companion. After a brief courtship they got engaged.

That was in 1889. But the crown prince’s family vehemently opposed the match. “The daughter of Keshub Chunder Sen as Maharani of Mayurbhanj! The daughter of that rebel, that revolutionary! To the conservative, orthodox powers in the Hindu state this was preposterous,” reads Sucharu Devi’s biography written by her daughter, Joyoti.

The young prince was no rebel; he toed the family line and married a girl from a local royal family. But the romance between him and Sucharu Devi did not die. “We tried to persuade her to marry but nothing would induce her to forget her lover,” writes Suniti Devi, her elder sister — the erstwhile queen of Coochbehar — in her autobiography.

An oil painting of Sriram Chandra Bhanj Deo that adorns the palace walls along with spoils from the countless royal hunting expeditions / Picture: Prasun Chaudhuri

Sriram Chandra’s first wife, Lakshmi Devi, gave birth to two sons and a daughter and thereafter, she died of smallpox. Writes Suniti Devi, “The Maharaja’s wife died, and he came back to ask my sister to marry him. The marriage (sic) took place in Calcutta, and for some time they led the happiest lives.” This was 1904.

Since the Maharaja never dared to take Sucharu Devi to his native state, he built for her the Rajabagh Palace in Calcutta’s Mayurbhanj Road — now the building houses the J.C. Ghosh Polytechnic. They had two children — Dhrubo Narayan and Joyoti. Sriram Chandra met with an untimely and mysterious end in 1912. The accepted version is that he was accidentally shot while he was out on shikar.

Even though the construction of the palace began in 1804, it was developed in several phases. The present interiors were especially designed for Sucharu Devi since she was not welcome in the main Mayurbhanj Palace. But she visited Mayurbhanj and her palace for the first time only after her husband’s death, on invitation of her stepson, Purnachandra Bhanj Deo.

Sucharu Devi and Sriram Chandra on their wedding day. The photograph is from An Illustrated Biography: Sucharu Devi Maharani of Mayurbhanj by Joyoti Devi Kaye, their daughter

She continued to visit Mayurbhanj occasionally and was associated with social work and spiritual work in Baripada. Her involvement with the Nababidhan Brahma-Mandir in the centre of the town is known. A torch-bearer of feminism in India, she was elected president of Bengal Women’s Education League in 1931.

Sucharu Devi died in 1961 in Calcutta. To date, the rooms and verandahs of Belgadia Palace, we are told, are imbued with her refined sensibilities. As she was an accomplished painter it is believed that artists like Jamini Roy and Hemendra Nath Majumder had visited the palace.The furniture, furnishings, paintings and photographs in the palace continue to reflect her touches. Says Akshita, “She had a deep influence on most of the activities of the Maharaja, who was known as the philosopher king and also revered for his public welfare efforts.” And that is what makes intriguing the fact that to date, there is no portrait of the woman herself on display at Belgadia Palace. “This happened probably because she was never accepted wholeheartedly by the larger family and state subjects because of the difference in caste, creed and religion,” reasons Akshita. She and Mrinalika have plans to find and display the love letters and photographs of Sriram Chandra and Sucharu Devi, for all to see and appreciate.

In a letter dated January 31, 1904, the 32- year-old Sriram Chandra writes to Sucharu Devi proposing marriage once again. It goes: “Dear S… Will you then share my sacrifices if I ask you to sacrifice all worldly pleasures and to be my spiritual companion? That seems to me at present to be the voice of the Almighty. Yours S.R.C. Bhanj Deo.”

The Nababidhan Brahma-Mandir in Baripada / Picture: Prasun Chaudhuri

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, online edition / Home> Heritage / by Prasun Chaudhuri / June 02nd, 2019

The story of the fifth Bishop of Calcutta

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Historical Links / Pre-Independence, Leaders, Records, All, Travel, World Opinion

When engineers chanced upon a vault in Calcutta’s St Paul’s Cathedral, they also unearthed a singular story of a singular man


St Paul’s Cathedral in Calcutta / Picture by Pradip Sanyal

Sometime ago it was reported that the coffin of Daniel Wilson was found in a vault under the main altar of Calcutta’s St. Paul’s Cathedral. Wilson was the fifth Bishop of Calcutta and founder of St. Paul’s, which came up in 1847.

“This is not some out-of-the-box discovery. We were all aware that the coffin was kept there,” says an official from St. Paul’s Cathedral who does not want to be identified. He continues, “In fact, there is a small opening on the outer wall of the cathedral for ventilation. It was kept covered so that no stray dogs could go in. We could see the ornamentation on the coffin. The remains of the bishop were never missing. It was just that we had never gone down into the vault.”

It seems Wilson himself had made provision for the vault under the altar. “There is a reference to his musings in the book, The Final Report of St. Paul’s Cathedral, Calcutta, written by Archdeacon Pratt, who was a close associate,” says senior researcher Mary Ann Dasgupta.

St. Paul’s is said to be the first Anglican cathedral of the Victorian age. In his book, Splendours of the Raj: British Architecture in India, 1160-1947, Phillip Davies writes: “The building was constructed in a peculiar brick especially prepared for the purpose, which combined lightness with compressional strength; the dressings were of Chunar stone, and the whole edifice was covered inside and out with polished chunam.” Up the stairs of the cathedral and next to the main door is a marble bust. Would that be of Wilson? No, it belongs to Reginald Heber, who was Bishop of Calcutta in 1827.


The bust of Reginald Heber in the cathedral / Picture by Pradip Sanyal

The story goes that when Heber’s bust was sent from England, Wilson couldn’t find a suitable space to display it. St. Paul’s hadn’t been built and St. John’s Church in BBD Bag, often referred to as the “old cathedral” in later years, was not spacious enough.

In a proposal written in 1839, Wilson wrote, “…subject of reproach, not only to the good taste, but to the piety of the greatest Empire in the Eastern world, that our Government House, our Mint, our Town Hall, our Custom House, our Bridges and even our Ghats… to say nothing of our official residences and private dwellings… should be upon a scale in some measure correspondent with the position we hold in India, whilst our Cathedral [St. John’s Church, built in 1787] is mean, inappropriate and incommodious…”

Heber’s bust became the peg on which Wilson put forth an application to the government for a site for a new cathedral. He wrote to Lord Auckland: “I beg permission to enquire of your Honour and the Government of India whether it would be possible to grant me a small angle of ground on the Esplanade near the Chowringhee Road for the purpose of erecting a Church.” Auckland gave consent and land and signed his missive “I am Your Lordship’s most truly Auckland”. That was May 1839. Eight years later, St. Paul’s Cathedral was ready.

Dasgupta is working on the history of St. Paul’s. She says, “It is not possible to explore the history of the cathedral without delving into the history of the man who founded it.” She has visited the library at Bishop’s College, St. Xavier’s College archives and the Asiatic Society.

Daniel Wilson was born in central England’s Spitalfields in 1778. The eldest son of a wealthy silk manufacturer, he was barely in his teens when he joined his uncle — an even wealthier silk manufacturer in London — as an apprentice. The young Wilson was, however, more inclined to religious studies than business. He pursued higher studies and eventually graduated from Oxford University and was ordained a priest in 1802.

Wilson was a vicar in north London when he accepted the call to become the Bishop of Calcutta. In Wilson’s biography, his son-in-law Josiah Bateman, writes: “In October 1797, Daniel Wilson felt his spirit stirred to go as a missionary to heathen lands; and in October 1832, he stood on the banks of the Hooghly as Bishop of Calcutta.”

From her explorings, Dasgupta has pieced together a portrait of Wilson. Wilson, the disciplined man. Wilson, who did not like wasting time. Says Dasgupta, “Most of the previous bishops of Calcutta did not survive for long, most probably due to the hectic schedules they had to follow. They used to go for long tours — Burma, China, Malaysia. Bishop Wilson did not do this at the onset. He waited for some time to adjust to the climes. He took care of his health.”

Bateman writes, “His personal habits at this time were very simple and regular. He rose early, and rode on a small black horse, brought from the Cape, which for a time, was able to take care both of itself and its master…”

We learn that he was a prolific letter writer and well-read in the classics.

“He had friends back in London with whom he would correspond,” says Dasgupta. In one letter to his children dated 1840, he wrote about the construction of the cathedral. It read, “Every morning I ride round on my horse and watch the different views which the Cathedral will present (sic).”

Besides being a devout Christian, Wilson was a dynamic man, full of energy. According to his biography, the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Calcutta in 1832 was far-reaching.

Bateman writes, “It was manifestly a burden too heavy to be borne. It must not be supposed that he found abundant records, well-defined duties; and established precedents… The Palace was a blank, the correspondence of his predecessors with the Government and clergy had disappeared, and the Registry contained little but a list of licensed chaplains.”


The coffin of Daniel Wilson was found recently at St Paul’s Cathedral in a vault under the main altar / Wikipedia

Bateman elaborates, “Sixty or seventy servants, turned loose into the house, and speaking an unknown tongue, had to be recognised and mastered. Guests were to be entertained, and sick friends watched over, nursed, and cheered. It will easily be imagined that some time elapsed ere light shone upon this darkness, and order issued from this chaos.”

Wilson loved good food and people and had a reputation of being a great host. Dasgupta has read his journal entries where he writes how “the wonderful young editor of Friend of India” had breakfast with him and so also “Mr Hunt, the great railway man” and Mr Wylie, “who is one of those noble, kind-hearted, thoroughly good men, of whom there are so few in the world”. Yet another entry reads, “This morning I had all my Cathedral clergy and their wives to breakfast… there were 46 present.”

But when engrossed in work, the same man did not like being disturbed and could be very impatient. Dasgupta says, “Before the visitor would settle down in his chair, Wilson would start up in a hurried but determined way and say, ‘Well, my dear friend, you must excuse me; good morning, good morning, here is your hat and here is your umbrella,’ and before the visitor left the room, he would again be buried in his books and papers. But he was always polite in his approach.”

The day Wilson formed the St. Paul’s Cathedral Committee, he also announced that he had signed his will. Dasgupta came across a photocopy of it. In it, he states that he has given Rs 1 lakh for the building of the cathedral and another lakh will be paid out after his death. He also bequeathed his grand collection of 8,000 books to the cathedral library.

He died in 1858. Fifteen years before that he had inspected the vault which was being built for him under the communion table. He wrote in his journal:

“I could not but think as I walked up and down the abode of death how soon I might be called to lay down my pastoral staff and rest in that bed or grave as to my mortal frame, till the Resurrection morn (sic).

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph – online edition / Home> Heritage / by Moumita Chaudhuri / April 28th, 2019

Two decades of Sabyasachi

Amazing Feats, Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Business & Economy, Leaders, Records, All, World Opinion

The designer rewinds with The Telegraph to pick 20 landmarks that made Sabyasachi the brand that it is today!


Sabyasachi Mukherji / Telegraph file picture
  • Sabyasachi considers his graduation show at National Institute of Fashion Technology, Calcutta, as the first landmark of his career. The show had won him three awards — the Best Design Collection from NIFT Calcutta, the Ritu Kumar Award for Excellence in Textile, and the critic’s award in Confluence, which was the best among students from all the NIFTs. “That gave me my first foray into the fact that I could start becoming a designer, it gave me the confidence and the boost that I will not take up a job but start my own label. If those awards did not come my way I would probably be working in an export house now. It made me believe in myself,” says Sabya.
  • The second was being adjudged best designer at a contest called Khadi Goes International, which won him a scholarship to go to London and an internship with the Victoria and Albert Museum. “It was my first trip outside India… I had never really been anywhere except for Delhi and Bombay. So it was my first international flight. I got a lot of independence, because you know, Bengali kids are very protected, in the middle class you don’t really go out that much, so I didn’t have much exposure. So it opened my eyes about possibilities that there exists a market outside India as well.”
  • Sabya feels that his debut at Lakme India Fashion Week with his collection Kashgar Baazar in 2002 was the third and possibly the biggest landmark. “I became a star overnight. It put a lot of pressure on me. Because I did not even make it to Page 3, I made it to Page 1. I remember, The Telegraph coming up with the headline, ‘Fashion star rises from the east’. It came on the main newspaper, not in a supplement. It became a national news everywhere… I became a big star. It catapulted me into the brand that it is today.”
  • His first Bollywood film, Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Black, which won him his first ever national award for costumes, is very special to him. “When he (Bhansali) had first called me for the movie I did not even know who he was and what kind of films he made. I was a big fan of Mr Bachchan and the fact that I got to work with Rani Mukerji and Mr Bachchan in my first film was enormous.”

A scene from the film, Black
  • Retailing from Espee, one of the first multi-designer fashion stores of Calcutta by Sangita Kejriwal and Purnima Chawla, holds a very special spot in Sabya’s heart. “I remember I used to cycle to Espee to see my clothes hanging; I could not believe that a store would actually put my clothes in their window.”
  • Winning the Mercedes-Benz Asia Fashion Award in Singapore got him a ticket to Paris and the chance to intern with global fashion stalwarts Jean Paul Gaultier and Azzedine Alaia. “I came back feeling much more confident about my body of work.”

Sabya’s Spring/Summer 2005 collection Frog Princess / A Telegraph picture
  • His Spring/Summer 2005 collection Frog Princess got him his first ever international store display — Browns in London. “Ms Burstein, who owns Browns, is considered to be a fashion legend. She was the first person to retail John Galliano, Alexander McQueen and all of these people, and legend has it that if Browns puts somebody in the window of the store during London Fashion Week, that person is supposed to be a huge star in the future. She put me on the same platform. I was in the window of Browns during London Fashion Week. Of course, I became a big star in India, I did not become a big star internationally, but she must have seen some potential.” Frog Princess opened many doors and he got a chance to showcase at his first ever international fashion week — Milan Fashion Week. His next collection after that was Snail in Autumn/Winter 2006, with which he had the opportunity of showing at New York Fashion Week.
  • It was Chand Bibi in Autumn/Winter 2007 that saw Sabya flirt with a full Indian show. “Chand Bibi and much later Bridal Sutra were my first taste of how beautiful Indian clothes could be. Full Indian shows I did and I think they paved the way for the future of the brand. And if I were to give a collection for commercial success… Chand Bibi actually paved the way for the brand that Sabyasachi is today. It consolidated my position as an emerging bridal-wear designer.”

The Calcutta store was about 40 per cent retail and 60 per cent experience /
A Telegraph picture
  • The next big landmark was Opium, which he had shown at the India Couture Week in Delhi and which got rave reviews everywhere. Till today, it is one of Sabya’s biggest commercial successes.
  • A big feather in the cap of the brand was his collaborations — Christian Louboutin, Pottery Barn, Asian Paints, Forevermark — each of these have been very big landmarks for the brand. His collaboration Sabyasachi X L’Oreal Paris in 2018 was his foray into beauty.

Another huge collection was Big Love in 2015 / A Telegraph picture
  • Another huge collection was Big Love in 2015, when the brand started flirting with modern Indian clothing. It was still lehngas and everything, but it was a modern concept, which is still continuing today. A big landmark for the brand was introducing the Royal Bengal Tiger logo and it started with Big Love. “I thought the brand was getting bigger and bigger and it was important to anchor the brand with a signage which could replace my name Sabyasachi. And the Royal Bengal Tiger was a beautiful logo and it has become a bestseller because we have started putting it into the waistbands of lehngas, on belts and bags. I think the logo would find many iterations in many things to come.”
  • The brand’s first Cannes red-carpet appearance was with Aishwarya Rai Bachchan wearing a Sabyasachi sari. “That was my first red-carpet moment. She wore a sari of mine at Cannes and the kind of traffic it generated it has never generated that kind of traffic again.” His first public criticism was dressing up Vidya Balan for Cannes and Sabya considers that a landmark, too. “I learnt a very important lesson that when you are a very big brand the onus lies with the public too. So the people who praise you today are the ones who are going to criticise you tomorrow. You need to understand that people are going to criticise and you have got to respect that but you still got to move on and do what you want to do and not get shaken by public criticism. It made me stronger.”
  • The first interior designing project that Sabya did was for Taj 51 Buckingham Gate in London. Sabya designed the hotel’s iconic Cinema Suites.
  • A game-changer for the brand from the communication point of view was opening Sabyasachi Instagram and the first Instagram show that was Firdaus (2016). “I think I changed the format and a lot of big designers ever since have shifted away from doing fashion shows and switched to doing shows on Instagram. So we changed the way fashion communication was done in India.”

Sabya started his jewellery line in 2017 / The Telegraph picture
  • Sabya started his jewellery line in 2017. “I have ambitions to make it India’s number one jewellery brand. I started it two-and-a-half years ago and it is already over-performing. There are conversations with big stores overseas to stock Sabyasachi jewellery.”
  • The year of the big weddings in India saw Sabyasachi become the go-to name for weddings. In a span of a year he did the wardrobes for all the big weddings in India —Anushka Sharma, Deepika Padukone, Priyanka Chopra and then Isha Ambani and Shloka Mehta. 
  • One important personal landmark for Sabya was speaking at House of Commons and going to Buckingham Palace for dinner. “(The experience was) surreal! I had always seen Buckingham Palace from outside, to go inside… I remember I went with Manav (from his team), and Manav pressed his nose against the glass window and said ‘Oh so this is how it feels to look at people outside’. We could see all the people outside staring at the palace and we thought we could have been one of them.”
  • His show Band Baajaa Bride has been one of the most popular programmes on Indian television. It ran for eight seasons and won numerous awards.
  • His foray into the Far East with Lane Crawford and his White Wedding line with them was very important because “I want to own the wedding space not only in India but internationally as well”.

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, online edition / Home> Culture / by Smita Roy Chowdhury / April 27th, 2019

Amartya Sen awarded Oxford University Bodley Medal

Leaders, NRI's / PIO's, Records, All, World Opinion

The Medal is awarded to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the fields in which the Bodleian is active, including literature, culture, science and communication.


Noted Indian economist Amartya Sen. (File | PTI)

London :

Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen has been awarded the prestigious Bodley Medal, the highest honour bestowed by the University of Oxford’s world-famous Bodleian Libraries.

The Medal is awarded to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the fields in which the Bodleian is active, including literature, culture, science and communication.

“The honour was awarded (to Sen) during the Founder’s Lunch on 15 March, an annual event commemorating the birth of the Libraries’ founder, Sir Thomas Bodley, and his legacy of philanthropy,” the Library said in a statement on Wednesday.

The 85-year-old winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, who is the Thomas W Lamont University Professor at Harvard University and a member of faculty at Harvard Law School, received the Medal from Lord Patten of Barnes, Chancellor of the University of Oxford, and Bodley’s Librarian Richard Ovenden.

This year’s other winner of the Bodley Medal is Nobel Prize-winning novelist Kazuo Ishiguro, who will hold an in-conversation event with Ovenden next week to celebrate the honour.

Past winners of the honour include physicist Stephen Hawking, novelist Hilary Mantel and inventor of the World Wide Web Tim Berners-Lee.

source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> World / by PTI / March 28th, 2019

New strain on ancient post of village headman

About Kolkata / West Bengal, Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Leaders, Records, All

Recently, a Santhal village in Birbhum killed the post of majhi haram or morol. We visit the headman of a nearby village


Majhi haram Nilu Mardi with a neighbour / Image: Moumita Chaudhuri

Gopal Nagar Dakshin Palli in Bengal’s Birbhum district is a tribal village. The drive from Bolpur town to the house of Nilu Mardi, the village headman, takes all of half an hour. The reason behind the trip — a recent report about another tribal village in this very district doing away with the concept of morol or village headman. Reports attributed the move by Chatormath village in Suri town to political interference. It also said that other villages were planning to follow suit. Nilu Mardi is a majhi haram, a term used to describe the headman of a Santhal village.

A majhi haram performs the role of a morol, but all morols are not majhi harams. Mardi hurries out of his mud hut, his hands folded in greeting. The 40-something moustachioed headman is of shy demeanour; he offers his visitors a charpoy and fetches a low cane stool for himself. Over steaming cups of milky tea, he starts to talk.

He says, “My father was a majhi haram and I have inherited the title from him.” According to him, the headman in every Santhal village is actually the religious head, selected quite literally by the higher powers. Mardi describes how a jaan or seer performs rites, which involves among other things blessing a magic stick.

The stick hops out on its own and stops at a house of its choice and the male head of that household is anointed majhi haram. Says Mardi, “One cannot assume or give up the title at whim. It remains in the family as long as it has to be there.” In case there are no male successors, the stick and the title are passed on to the son-in-law.

At this point in the conversation, Balu Tulu, a man of average build, not more than 60 years old, enters the courtyard. There is another mud hut facing Mardi’s home; the courtyard is common to both.

Tulu lives in the second hut; he is also a relation of Mardi. A concrete structure is coming up on another end of the courtyard — an uncommon sight in a village where there is no pucca house — which houses a common kitchen with two clay ovens. A little away from it, there is a generous stack of straw.

Tulu expresses shock and surprise at the fact that a tribal village has decided to do away the headman’s post. “Chatormath will actually lose the status of being a Santhal village in that case,” he announces to no one in particular. As it turns out, to date, in a Santhal village, money and social hierarchy is no great divider. Tulu speaks freely in front of the headman.

Mardi too does not seem to mind. “I am the majhi haram but he is an elderly person and in a Santhal village we always consult the elders and respect their knowledge,” he says humbly. The women of the family are sitting out too, witnessing the conversation unfold; from time to time there is giggling, oftentimes someone makes a point without any inhibition. “I have to preside over cases where one has stolen a morog (rooster) or a handi (utensil),” says Mardi and there is tittering all around. He also settles household feuds, big and small, and skirmishes.

The main issue these days, however, is inter-caste marriage. There is an unwritten rule among the Santhal tribes that if two adults marry without the consent of their families, then the families have to bear the consequences. Tulu says, “If two adults marry within the community, they are allowed to stay together but then both the bride and the groom’s families have to do the ritual goat sacrifice — the boy’s family has to sacrifice two goats, while the girl’s family has to sacrifice one.” But when the marriage happens outside the caste, there is a problem. “We generally call off the marriage and order them to stay apart. And if they refuse to listen to the village head, they are asked to leave the village,” says Tulu. But matters don’t end here. “Nowadays, aggrieved parties approach courts of law and even the panchayat. They also take the help of the police and are eventually allowed to stay on,” he adds.

The older man repeats what Mardi has already explained — that the majhi haram of a Santhal village is not a political post. “That is why political parties do not interfere in the works of a majhi haram,” says Tulu. So when a village in Birbhum has turned hostile towards an age-old Santhal ritual, we have to understand there are other reasons, he adds knowingly. Mardi agrees: “Let alone the police, the panchayat won’t even entertain a case from our village if anyone tries to bypass the majhi haram.”

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, online edition / Home> Heritage / by Moumita Chaudhuri / March 17th, 2019

Matua community matriarch Binapani Thakur passes away

Historical Links / Pre-Independence, Leaders, Records, All, World Opinion

The chief adviser of All India Matua Mahasangha, Binapani Devi, popularly known as ‘Boro Ma’, passed away on Tuesday evening due to multi-organ failure.


The chief adviser of All India Matua Mahasangha, Binapani Devi, popularly known as ‘Boro Ma’, passed away on Tuesday. (File)

The chief adviser of All India Matua Mahasangha, Binapani Thakur, popularly known as ‘Boro Ma’, passed away on Tuesday evening due to multi-organ failure. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee e and several state ministers rushed to SSKM Hospital and her death was announced by Banerjee in the evening. Thakur’s last rites will be held on Wednesday with full state honours. পরলোকে মতুয়াদের বড়মা বীণাপাণি দেবী

Binapani Thakur was brought to the SSKM Hospital in Kolkata from Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital in Kalyani due to a rapid decline in physical condition. She was bedridden for a long time and was suffering from respiratory problems. Prime Minister Narendra Modi i had met the 100-year-old matriarch of the Matua community on February 2 at Thakurnagar.

During her last visit to Thakurnagar, Banerjee had announced several projects and declared that Binapani Thakur would be honored with the honorary de -Litt title. Banerjee was seen to be close to Boro Ma.

Since 2009, the Matuas were mostly known to be Trinamool Congress supporters, and the party had fielded members of her family in elections. However, the family has been divided over its political leanings in recent years.

Matuas trace their ancestry to East Bengal, and many of them entered West Bengal after Partition and after the formation of Bangladesh. Matuas are Namasudras, a Scheduled Caste group with a presence in at least six parliamentary seats. While no official count is available, community leaders put their population at 3 crore.

source: http://www.indianexpress.com / The Indian Express / Home> Cities / by Express Web Desk / New Delhi / March 05th, 2019

The Winners scripts a success story in Kolkata Police

Amazing Feats, Inspiration / Positive News and Features, Leaders, Records, All, Travel

The Winners, an all-women patrolling team by the Kolkata Police, was launched in July 2018, with an aim to check crimes against women and make public places safer for them.

“Oye, akeli hai kya? Chalegi park me? 300 dunga. Arey bol na, jyada chahiye? (Hey, will you come with me to Park, I will pay you 300 bucks. If you want more, tell me,” said a man in his twenties to a woman near Mohor Kunja Park under Hastings police station area around four months ago. The offender had no clue that he was messing with the wrong person. Arpita Mallik, a constable with the Kolkata Police and a member of the team The Winners, made her first arrest that day.

The Winners, an all-women patrolling team by the Kolkata Police, was launched in July 2018, with an aim to check crimes against women and make public places safer for them. The team with personnel trained in self-defence has so far apprehended more than 200 “Road Romeos”.

“I was on duty in civil dress. When the man teased me, I asked him to wait and grabbed him by the collar. He put up stiff resistance but was soon surrounded by a group of policewomen and he started apologising. We arrested him and I felt good,” Arpita said with a wide smile. She stays alone and meets her husband in Malda on holidays.

EXPLAINED

Step towards better gender equation in Kolkata Police

The Kolkata Police has always been keen on increasing the presence of women in their force. The State Home Department has set up eight women-only police stations in Kolkata to investigate crimes against women. A rape or molestation survivor will be comfortable with a woman police officer, they feel. More women in the force means more women reaching out to report incidents that bother them. Several crimes, including eve-teasing, often go unreported. An all-women battalion is a step towards betterment of city police’s gender equation — 800 women in the 26,000-strong police force.

“He wasn’t very keen on me joining police but I managed,” she said. The Winners has 28 women personnel, including three senior officers. All the 25 constables are in their mid-twenties. In white uniform, they conduct patrol on scooty.

“They have been rigorously trained in self-defence and have revolver licence. Our objective is to make the city safe for women,” said Sampa Guha one of the senior officers of the team. “I am happy to see such young, smart women cops in our city. Once a man in lungi started following me on the street and retreated as soon as he spotted a group of policewomen. Cheers to these ladies,” said Anindita Ray Choudhuri, a management student.

However, the team has to fight odds while on duty. Once a constable in the team was bitten on her hand while another was heckled while on patrol inside the Millennium Park. Six persons, including two women were arrested for allegedly harassing personnel on duty.

“We face a lot of challenge and even get teased but when we are in uniform, people respect us also. There have been instances when during midnight patrolling, women came and thanked us for making them feel safe. It gives us immense satisfaction,” said Zinnatara Khatun, another member of the team.

Team Winner is headed by three sub-inspectors, including Sampa Guha, Mita Kansabanik and Zinnatara Khatun. Sampa has various accolades to her credit in power lifting in international, Asian and national events. Zinnatara Khatun is an athlete who has won the Indian Police Medal. Mita is also a power lifting champion.

“We love catching Road Romeos,” laughs Zinnatara. Mita is married and has a 16-year-old daughter, while Zinnatara and Sampa are single.

“Earlier marriage used to give a woman financial security and an identity, but nowadays it has nothing exceptional to offer a woman,” said Zinnatara and Sampa.

Madhumita Mahapatra, another member of the team, says, “My husband is very proud to see me in uniform. I have a tight schedule but he is always there to pick me up when I finish work.” Another member, Debolina Das Rai, feels they stand for themselves to bring the change. “My husband mostly takes care of our son as I have a tight schedule. We manage well and he never complains,” she said.

Their message on Women’s Day

“People talk about women empowerment but hardly practice it. We are educated and present ourselves well but our mentality remains the same. Real change has to come from within. All women should be financially independent and should speak up. Once a woman starts sharing financial responsibility of her family and her parents, people will stop craving for male child. To bring a change, it is important for women to learn self-defence. Girls are mentally much stronger than men and we must celebrate womanhood.”

source: http://www.indianexpress.com / The Indian Express / Home> Cities / by Sweety Kumar / Kolkata / March 08th, 2019

The altruist of Naradari

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Inspiration / Positive News and Features, Leaders, Nature, Travel

This retired professor in West Bengal is the reason many children of his region have an education and career


Lifeline: Professor Dilip Roy with Belaboti (left) and Uma / Image: Rabindranath Bera

Where is Dadu? Why haven’t you brought him along,” demands the petulant eight-year-old with closely cropped hair and a beige jacket over a pink frock. Her name is Bela, short for Belaboti, often referred to as Belu too. Just now she is standing akimbo, blocking the entrance to our lodgings adjacent to a two-storey mud house in Naradari, a village in Nandakumar block of East Midnapore district, five kilometres from Tamluk. The object of her query, or Dadu, meaning grandfather, is Dilip Roy, a retired professor of History and man of the house.

Bela knows that the septuagenarian had accompanied this gaggle of strangers from Calcutta to the flower show — an annual affair organised by the Tamluk Flower Lovers’ Association, founded by the good professor over 40 years ago. She is the youngest member of the Roy household, which includes Biswaranjan Pal or Bisha, Bishnupada Maity or Dipu and Joyinandan Maity or Joyi. While Bisha and Dipu are preparing for their higher secondary exams this year, Joyi is in the first year of college. There is Uma, too, whom Roy calls Kochi. She got married to Rabindranath Bera or Robi two years ago and is currently in Naradari with their newborn.

Roy is actually no kin of Bisha, Dipu, Bela, Joyi, Kochi or even Uma; at least not in the accepted sense. But each of these lives has got so entangled with his own that it is difficult to tell his story without straightening out a reference, giving an explanation or two to their lives’ stories and experiences. Also, these are lives that refract his own story, one that he himself is loath to tell.

Bisha, Dipu, Joyi were inmates of an ashram on the banks of the serene Roopnarayan river in the adjacent village, Betalbasan. When it closed down, Roy took them in. Uma is the daughter of farm labourers from Narghat village some 17 kilometres from Naradari. She had heard about Roy and his extended family from an uncle. She says, “I was not interested in studies and my parents would often beat me up for that. I literally ran away from home to escape studying and came here to work as a domestic help.”

But as it turned out, she had walked, rather run, straight into the tiger’s den. First, she was home-schooled, then at 14 she was enrolled in Class V of a local school. When the neighbours smirked, Roy — whom she and many others call Jethu, or uncle — told her, “Clear the Class X boards, that will shut them up.” Uma cleared her Class XII boards last year and is raring to resume college once her daughter is six months old.

Unlike Uma, Robi had wanted to study. He was a good student too, but his father was a hawker and couldn’t afford to support his son’s dreams. Once, while visiting his maternal grandmother in Talpukur village adjoining Tamluk, he approached Roy for help. Actually it was his grandmother who spoke to Roy as the boy explored the estate. The professor visited the boy’s school, paid for Robi’s textbooks, even arranged for free tuitions for the Class X student. And then, he supported him right through high school and graduation in every possible way. Today, Robi is team leader, back office operations, with Tata Consultancy Services, and posted in Calcutta.

Roy was born in Naradari in the late 1940s, but had left for Calcutta for his postgraduation. His father was an advocate while his mother, a housewife. When he returned home at 24, it was to teach at Moyna College, about 20 kilometres away. The youngest of three brothers, he had always been reclusive. And when he came back he chose to stay, not in the family home, but in the other two-storey mud house on the estate jointly owned by his father and uncles. He says, “The house was lying uncared for. The main house was too crowded. My parents, uncles, aunts, cousins, my Didi, her family…,” and his voice trails off as he looks at the manicured garden between the two houses.

Roy turned the ground floor into his living quarters and the upper floor he dedicated to Rabindranath Tagore. That became his library-cum-temple. He would sit there singing and listening to Tagore’s songs and reading his works. He would organise, and still does, cultural dos on Tagore’s birth and death anniversaries. “Even today, I begin my day reading sections of Tagore’s lectures, just like people read the Gita. Of course, of late, I have begun reading the Gita too,” laughs the lean, greying philanthropist.

A few years into teaching, he decided to remain a bachelor. He began to spend more and more time on his two passions — gardening and travelling. His closest friend, a doctor who died in an accident a couple of decades ago, was his travel companion. Together, they have traversed the length and breadth of the country. Somewhere along the way he began helping students from impoverished backgrounds in their pursuit of education and learning. And the more he got involved in the lives of his students, the more acutely aware he became of their hardships.

Around the beginning of the 1980s, he started providing food and lodging too to poor and meritorious young men. Today, so many years later, Roy cannot remember the first time he brought a student home. I point out that it is most odd, this date slip, of someone who teaches History, but he is distracted by Bela, who has given lunch a miss and is sulking. “She is angry with me for having my lunch without her,” he explains.

What happened was that one by one many students came to live with him. Not everyone stayed the course though. Many were taken away by their parents or guardians. But there were exceptions like Bela — the little girl from a cobbler’s family in Uttar Pradesh’s Saharanpur. She and her older sister were brought to Roy by their maternal grandmother but a few years later taken away by their parents. Her sister notwithstanding her pleas to return to Naradari was married off, but her parents eventually let Bela go back to Roy. She is being home-schooled currently.

When his college teacher’s salary could no longer sustain the expenses, Roy started to scout around for financial help. Over time he has developed a network of connections — civil servants, engineers, doctors, authors, teachers, businessmen, artists. Some pay the fee for these students, some buy the books. And while he is dogged in his pursuit of funds, Roy is careless about his own money.

To date, Naradari and its surrounding villages have produced six doctors, all of whom have flourished under Roy’s munificent shade. He paid for their admissions, entrance tests and connected them with foundations that bore their expenses at the medical colleges. And despite Roy’s advancing years, the effort to help students continues. Says Uma, “At the beginning of the new school session villagers line up for help. Every year, Jethu buys textbooks worth Rs 25,000-30,000 himself.”

During his student days in Calcutta, Roy would spend time at the city libraries. The National Library was his home on holidays. He says, “I’d go to there, borrow a book and spend hours on the veranda. I’d hardly read though. Most of the time I would look at the lawns and trees on campus.” And that’s how another interest took shoot. Roy started frequenting the neighbouring horticultural society.

His time at the horticultural society made him aware of environmental issues. In time, he launched a movement to educate villagers and schoolchildren on the need to plant trees, especially flowering ones. The movement gradually spread to neighbouring villages. Today, there are legions of gardeners working under Roy’s supervision, planting, landscaping. “Even the nurseries here seek his advice,” says Robi, the pride in his voice pronounced.

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph – online edition / Home> People / by Swachchhasila Basu / February 17th, 2019

Minto stops at ancestor’s home

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Historical Links / Pre-Independence, Leaders, Records, All, Travel, World Opinion

A flesh-and-blood Minto and his wife were in Calcutta on Saturday, retracing the steps of his ancestors who lived here over a century ago


Gilbert Timothy George Lariston Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, the seventh Earl of Minto, with his wife Diana Barbara Trafford in front of the Old Government House in Barrackpore on Saturday. / Pradip Sanyal

Minto, to most Calcuttans, is a bus stop scrawled in black on an yellow band across the sides of ramshackle minibuses. For some, it is the patch of green in front of Belle Vue Clinic named after the governor general of India.

But a flesh-and-blood Minto and his wife were in Calcutta on Saturday, retracing the steps of his ancestors who lived here over a century ago.

Gilbert Timothy George Lariston Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, the seventh Earl of Minto, visited the summer residence of the governors general of India where the first Earl of Minto (governor general of India, 1807-1813) and the fourth Earl of Minto (governor general and viceroy of India, 1905-1910) are said to have spent many a happy weekend, “arriving on Fridays and leaving only on Monday mornings”.

“I can absolutely see why they built the summer residence right next to the river. It gives a real atmosphere of India, and I just spent a magical time there,” Minto told Metro after touring the Old Government House in Barrackpore.

“The entire purpose of this time was to visit Calcutta,” said Minto, on his second visit to India but “the very first to Calcutta”. He is scheduled to travel to Goa and Hyderabad before leaving for London.

Minto’s earlier stops in the city included Victoria Memorial Hall and the Raj Bhavan, where he saw a photograph of Lord Minto’s appointment as governor general in 1807.

“There was a lot of talk about India at home and the country was remembered with much affection,” said the current Lord Minto, pausing before his ancestor’s statue on horseback at Latbagan. “My great grandparents made many good friends in India and were in touch with them all their lives.”

With Minto on this trip are his wife Diana Barbara Trafford and author and family friend Anabel Loyd.

“The Government House designed by Captain Thomas Anbury in 1813 was used as a country residence for the British Governor-Generals,” according to the British Library online gallery.


Lord and Lady Minto at (in the background) Lady Canning’s tomb. / Pradip Sanyal


The present Lord Minto in the Westside Gallery where seized arms from the pre-and post-Independence era are displayed. / Pradip Sanyal

Lord Wellesley, who took over the commander-in-chief’s residence in 1801 in Barrackpore, commenced the building of a summer residence for the future governors general of India. He got the gardens landscaped in “English style” and added an aviary and a menagerie, both of which are in a shambles. However, only the first storey was built before Wellesley was recalled to England.

Wellesley’s dream house was added to and expanded in bits and parts by the governors general who lived there. Sir George Barlow, acting governor general, converted each corner of the verandah into a small room. In 1814-15, the building was expanded by the Marquis of Hastings who added a new storey, side wings, a portico and the Upper Entrance Hall. Lord Auckland (1835-1842) added the balcony on the western side, Lord Lytton (1876-1880) replaced the unseemly iron staircase on the southern front, Lord Ripon (1886-1884) installed a wooden porch in front while Lord Minto (1905-1910) electrified the building, laid the floor in the drawing room and redecorated the house.

The house was taken over by the Bengal government and turned into a police academy and police hospital in 1948. The hospital was later shifted out.

The current renovation and conservation of Old Government House, now Swami Vivekananda State Police Academy, has been undertaken at the initiative of Soumen Mitra, the additional director-general of police (training). “Work is on, it will take a long time to finish,” said Mitra, as he took the Mintos around.

Strolling through the lofty rooms, both the Lord and the Lady marvelled at the architecture and the ventilators that naturally cooled the rooms with the river breeze passing through the shafts and lofty windows. They were accompanied by G.M. Kapur of Intach.

Barrackpore, a cantonment area, was built at the bend of the Hooghly river, 20km north of Calcutta, and offered a splendid vista, making it the perfect “weekend retreat”.

The couple from Minto, Roxburghshire, also stopped by the Minto Fountain, a marble fountain added to the sprawling acres by Lord Minto. “The fountain was designed by Lady Minto who inaugurated it before leaving for England in 1910,” said Mitra, who found it dysfunctional and buried under a pile of rubbish.

The Mintos were taken to Flagstaff House, the current residence of the Governor. They strolled around the garden, peered at the old lighthouse, stood before Fourth Earl of Minto’s statue, inspected a series of Raj statues shifted from Calcutta to the statuary and stopped at the restored cenotaph built by the First Earl of Minto in commemoration of officers who fell in the battles of Java and Mauritius and Gwalior.


In front of Minto fountain, which was designed by Lady Minto and inaugurated by her before she left for England. / Pradip Sanyal

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, Online edition / Home> People / by Anasuya Basu in Calcutta / February 10th, 2019

Life and times of an Indian civil servant

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Leaders, Records, All

Writer Ashok Basu served the bureaucracy for over 40 years, through Naxalism, the Emergency and liberalisation


Jawaharlal Nehru visits workshops and laboratories at the Campsite Hirakud DamImage: Wikimedia Commons

Told by a sycophantic colleague that crime had gone down significantly since he became West Bengal’s chief minister and that there were “fewer robbers and dacoits” about, Bidhan Chandra Roy replied, “No wonder. Some of them are in my government.” Many such anecdotes enliven what might otherwise have been a somewhat solemn account of Ashok Basu’s 42 years as a civil servant in the state and Central governments.

Not many bureaucrats have such varied experiences in so many vital ministries, shape crucial developments like deregulation and decontrol in the iron and steel industry, or ensure transparency and accountability in electricity regulation. The reader shares his pleasure in these achievements and in his and his family’s academic brilliance and his father’s professional reputation as a policeman. Basu emerges as a thoroughly nice family man who bears no grudges and casts no stones. One wonders how his colleagues — not always one happy family — responded to this panglossian (“all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds”) benignity. Calcutta Corporation’s unions did not take kindly in 1983 to his plan as commissioner to engage Thames Water to restore the city’s sewage system which it had helped to lay a century earlier. They might have sung a different tune if China Investment Corporation had already bought 9 per cent of Thames equity which it didn’t do until about 20 years later.

While he avoids being judgmental, opinions are not altogether absent. But they are either attributed to someone else (like the wry comment about the “Rig Veda” explaining successive Left Front election victories) or so nuanced as almost to be overlooked. When Kishan Chand, Delhi’s former lieutenant-governor, an Indian Civil Service officer whom the Shah Commission gave a rough time, was found dead in an abandoned well two kilometres from his South Delhi home, leaving two suicide notes, the police had no doubt he had killed himself. But Basu’s “allegedly committed suicide” recalls India Today’s report that “a host of prominent politicians seem equally convinced” he “was murdered to stop him from giving evidence against Mrs Gandhi and her Emergency cohorts”. He is more forthright about the Left Front’s stand on English. “An extreme view started gaining ground that the Left Front wanted the masses to remain uneducated so that they could be manipulated and prevented from questioning the system.”

Detailed case histories make this a valuable addition to the literature on a bureaucracy considered one of the world’s most powerful. But it would have benefited from professional editing, some fact-checking (How can a Paris city tour include the Vatican, or Bulgaria have been “a constituent of the USSR”?) and an Index. A more detailed analysis of the IAS’s role in contemporary India, possibly compared to those whom Philip Woodruff — Philip Mason of the ICS — immortalized as the Founders and Guardians, might also have added value to the volume. Basu’s definition of the IAS being “about sharing space with colleagues and the highest in the land, and knowing them better” echoes Lee Kuan Yew’s belief that only “an elite administration” can effectively “run a vast country like India”.

This now unfashionable view was ridiculed in a History Today writer’s mockery, “Much nonsense has been written about the romantic, glamorous notion of a single ICS officer riding around his district, dispensing even-handed justice to a grateful and submissive peasantry. Settling law cases before breakfast, such a paragon apparently corrected land records before lunch, shot a tiger or two before dinner and wrote some Latin verse before taking a cold bath and retiring to a camp bed.” Basu’s indulgence is Hindi film songs. References to the “steel frame”, Lloyd George’s term for the ICS, perpetuate that heaven-born mystique. Dipak Rudra, two years Basu’s senior in the IAS, more realistically called it the “bamboo frame” in several newspaper articles. That suggested a cadre that is more vulnerable to pressure, persuasion and all the weaknesses from which Indian institutions suffer.

Basu rightly says Nehru “had a clear perception of the India he wished to create” but may err in claiming that “the senior officialdom advised him (Nehru) impartially to enable him fulfil his dream”. Nehru himself did not feel his dream was fulfilled. Asked three years before he died to identify his greatest failure, he replied after a long reflection, “I failed to change this administration. It is still a colonial administration.” Tarzie Vittachi, his Sri Lankan interlocutor, felt that for Nehru, the IAS was too much like the ICS.

Power, Duty and the Game Changer: Reflections of a Civil Servant By Ashok Basu, Mitra & Ghosh, Rs 400

source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph – online editon / Home / by Sunanda K Datta-Ray / January 11th, 2019