Jodo Gyan!!

So, here is the background. Just a few weeks back, we chanced upon a lot of magicians inside a classroom. They had coem to show us how they are porposing to teach Mathematics to the next lot of production, they said. They said they are from JODO GYAN, which is THIS. 

And then, when asked, they asked us in reply to follow their instructions as they’d take us through the day. 

So we did!

Why it is not easy to take sides on the recent Supreme Court ruling!

(This article was first published in Feministaa)

It is tempting to have an opinion on everything, as it gets you facetime across the screen with several people from across the globe. They may like you or hate you, but ignore they cannot, for you have a valuable Facebook profile, a Twitter handle, and a whole series of I-know-better proclamations in place. Especially when you have an issue that is easy to stand by and take sides upon, it’s a cakewalk. You know what to say, and you know the predictable pat backs on the way all too well. I run a Facebook group around the theme of Equality, which really, in many frequent threads, stand to vouch more for the equation of gender equality than of other forms. So, it was easy for me to hit the share the scream and outcry of gross injustice and I’d know that I’d have unquestioned weight of support on my side. And yet, I found it not easy at all to reach my own conclusions on this subject.

It is on us, Parents. It is on us! - PART 2

This is in continuation to my previous article, which you can read HERE!

(This too was first published at Feministaa)

Talking of bodies and touches, as parents the other things we need to keep a watch on are these:

TONE!!

Something we need to keep in mind as we interact with our kids on these issues is that – we need to keep the conversation LIGHT AND EASY!

Bring My Flowers!

কোম্পানির নাম - Bring My Flowers। শুনতে কিরকম জানি একটা, প্রথমে ভেবেছিলাম। “বেয়ারা, চালাও ফোয়ারা!” গোছের, উদ্ধত। আহা, ফুলের দোকান যখন ফুলকুমারী নাম রাখলেই পারে!

বাড়ি বয়ে ফুল দিয়ে যায় ওরা, প্রতি সপ্তাহে। সই করে দি, বুঝিয়া-পাইলাম এই মর্মে।

তবে ফুলগুলো খুব একটা আমার বুঝিয়া পাইবার ধার ধারে না। সোজা চাবুকের মতন চেহারা, ইয়া লম্বা লম্বা ডাঁটি, গরবিনী রাজহংসীর মতন গ্রীবা। রোজ তলা থেকে দু আঙুল ডাঁটি কেটে দিতে হয়, আর জল বদলে দিতে হয় নিয়ম করে। ভুলে গেলেই অভিমান, মুখ কালো হয়ে যায় সবার। সপ্তাহে একদিন করে ডিটারজেন্ট দিয়ে ধুয়ে নিতে হবে ফুলদানি, ওরা নির্দেশ দিয়ে গেছে।  ফুলদানি? গোল কাঁচের ঘর ওদের, সান-রুফ সমেত। ফুলদানির খোলা আকাশ দিয়ে কৌতূহলী মুখ বাড়িয়ে থাকে ফুলগুলো, আমার দিকে চেয়ে থাকে অবাধ বিস্ময়ে। ওদের নতুন মালিক, নাকি? অত সহজ, ফুলের মালিক হওয়া? ফুলের মালিক কেউ হয় নাকি, কোনদিন? হলে হওয়া যায় বড়জোর মালি! তাই অপটু মালির মতন আমি ওদের জল দিয় গ্লাস ভরে, নতুন অতিথির মত করে। ওরা হাসে। হাসতে হাসতে ঢলে পড়ে এর ওর গায়ে। আমি ওদের বাড়তে দেখি, কমতে দেখি। প্রতিদিন।

In search of Her identity...

This column was first published in Feministaa.

The social media has come to become a platform of endless provocations. Like the one that floated up on my newsfeed as I was hurriedly dressing up for the coveted Ashtami’s Pushpanjali this Durga Puja. A friend has started a question on his timeline, crafted cleverly to pinch and squeeze a few points out of people who’d stumble by it. It is a patriarchal conspiracy to pose Durga as The Mother, while really She is the Warrior - he stated. It is a patriarchal conspiracy and a trap, entrapped in the veil of religious piousness.

আবার আসিস, মা!

পুজোর পাঁচটা দিন জুড়ে মাটির মূর্তিগুলো হয়ত নেহাতই উপলক্ষ্য মাত্র। হাসি ঠাট্টা, নাচ গান আনন্দ, মায়ে ফ্যাশন-শো আর র‍্যাম্প ওয়াক, সবাই মিলে খুব খানিকটা ভালো থেকে নেওয়া। চুটিয়ে!

#RhymeIndia by Times Of India!!

Okay, so be it!!


The OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT is here, and I am so, so, so glad to have won this one! :)

:) :)

Book Review: Forgotten affair (Kanchana Banerjee)

“A Forgotten affair” has a storyline with a rather unpredictable kickstart.

The prologues and the opening chapter throws a flash forward into a couple of snapshot scenes, showing us how the regular life of the protagonist characters are over certain new year eve party scenes. Past the prologue and just a couple of chapters, the book now opens into a scene in a hospital ward. A lady named Sagarika. An accident, a bomb blast in a local train. In Mumbai. A fatality. A cut mark on her head. A return from the dead. A journey, in which she has left her memory behind. A loss, unaccounted. Yet, has her past left her too?

No! The power and the right. The answer. And, the questions!

This column has also been published at Readomania.


“Pink is not just a movie. It is a revolution,” team Pink has recently said. I wish. I wish to believe. I wish to believe in the strength it has just handed out to me. The strength of rights over the petty pity of sympathy. I am floored by the brave attempt by team pink. I have no words, but silent gratitude.

Think of it! Pink did not seek your sympathy of any kind. Exactly how it should be. We don't need your sympathy by being poor, by having carefully dressed up, by cracking a difficult admission test, by being the only daughter, by being the puny, fearing kind who doesn't dare give friendship a chance lest the friends prey on her. We don’t seek your sympathy by playing the game low key, by the rules of safety and pepper sprays. No.

And then, Pink didn’t play the cliché “us” and “them” too. It didn’t mark a gap between genders. It picked up the issue, instead. It pointed out the patriarch staleness in men and women alike, and the call of equality, in rights and respects, again in the both of them.

Pink started in each of us a thought process.