"Duniya Dot Com"

It was a weekend of song and dance and also a drift down memory lane. At a Bengali cultural programme here in London, I came across quite a few people after a span of many years. As one recollects the years gone by, there is a feeling of nostalgia and also a sense that the world is changing everyday and getting even smaller.

Who would have thought that one day I would come across Samit-da here in London. Samit Ray is now the Managing Director of the Rice Group and we share the same root of growing up at Jatindas Nagar in Belgharia. Although, he is a few years senior to me, yet as young boys we were associated with the same Udayan Club for years. Seeing the organisation headed by Samit-da making strides in India, I sometimes felt if we could come across but never dreamt that it would come true of all places in London and that too possibly after almost three decades.

The two people who influenced me most in taking up journalism as a career almost two decades ago were my two great friends Ritwik Mukherjee and Debasish Choudhury . Ritwik had joined the profession during our college days and almost regularly we used to walk to the office of Kolkata, a daily which is now defunct, at Lenin Sarani. It was there at the Kolkata office that I came across Kunal-da. Kunal Ghosh, now the Executive Editor of Sangbad Pratidin,a Bengali daily published from Kolkata, and the Chief Executive Officer of Channel 10, a same city-based television channel. More than two decades ago he was one of our windows to the world of journalism and we would be mesmerised by the exciting stories he would tell us about shoulder-rubbing with people at the helm and getting hold of those in power, especially the Congress politics with which he was then very organically linked.

While in Kolkata, I came across Kunal-da a few times later but not so much ever since joining journalism myself. Probably, the last time we met was during a demonstration at Esplanade East, one time well known rallying point for protestors and demonstrators in Kolkata, in 1995, which he was covering possibly for Aajkaal, another Bengali daily. As I get to read the articles written by Kunal-da for Sangbad Pratidin, here in London, thanks to the internet, and with the political metamorphosis that has taken place in the Indian state of Bengal, it was a pleasure meeting him here in London after over 15 years.

Nearly 20 years ago when I first joined journalism, we were a group of 20, selected to revive an ailing Bengali newspaper, Jugantar, with a rich history. It was during those days when the print media had not been shadowed by the glitz and glamour of television journalism. Veteran journalist, late Niranjan Sengupta was entrusted with the responsibility of training us. It was during the training stint of three months at the St. Xavier's College in Kolkata that four of us - Anindya Chattopadhyay, Joydip Chakraborty, Santanu Mukhopadhyay and I - got very close. Every evening after our training sessions we used to cling like a group and it was so conspicuous that one of the fellow trainees then and now the Assistant Editor of the Anandabazar Patrika, a Kolkata-based Bengali daily, Ishani Dutta Ray chose to write a creative piece on the group "Ekti Bakul gachh ebong charte chhele" , meaning one Bakul tree and four boys. I still remember a Bakul tree on the Park Street footpath just outside the college.

Since my leaving Jugantar for The Financial Express in 1994 the four of us were not as close as before because of practical reasons but we were still in touch. In 1997, when I returned from Delhi, to join the Press Trust of India in Kolkata, I heard that Anindya has taken up a career in singing and set up a Bengali band called Chandrabindoo.

Just before leaving for London in 1999, Anindya presented me with a cassette of one of their popular numbers. Since then we hardly met, except for a brief stint in 2001. Anindya and his group have since grown to be one of the popular Bengali bands. It was only through his performance at London that we got to meet each other after a span of over ten years.

All these meetings, with the three very successful people in their respective fields,are sure to incite nostalgia but at the same time it gives me a cosy feeling of how small the world is becoming with every passing day. Technology and its advancement have transformed the world in such a way that even a foreign land is no longer alien. At the same time aspirations are skyrocketing in a globalised world with increased opportunities. Many professional Indians are realising that the world is there for them to grab. As I am sipped with nostalgia after drifting down memory lane for the past two days, I can only think of a popular number by Anindya and his band Duniya Dot Com. Those who understand Bengali would definitely appreciate the wonderful lyrics of the song. Even those who don't, and hence deprived of such a wonderful performance, also realise how the worldwide web has literally transformed this globe into a virtual village.

I hope Anindya and his band wouldn't mind me using the title of one of their popular numbers as the title of this post. It is me basking in reflected glory.

All comments are personal and have no bearing on my present or past places of work. Comments on the post are welcome at the blog site.