The recent dictum of the West Bengal government, led by Mamata Banerjee, to the public and state sponsored libraries not to subscribe to any newspaper but the eight (this figure has been revised later) has created a lot of furore. Banerjee is blamed for being partisan, an allegation she herself hurled against the Left Front, during her years of campaign which ultimately brought the Trinamool Congress to power. In his guest post for Stray Thoughts, veteran journalist Buroshiva Dasgupta looks at the complex relationship between the state and the media and reflects on how the political parties in West Bengal coax and compel the media for their own benefit.
In my days with The Statesman (1977-86), I wrote few articles, which the Left Front, then the ruling formation in West Bengal, did not like at all. One of them was on the list which the Left Front government had prepared and sent to all public libraries as a guideline for book purchases. The list had several books written by Marx and Lenin and of several writers well known for their Marxist beliefs. Only two thin volumes of the greatest Bengali poet and thinker Rabindranath Tagore (one as far as I can remember now was Letters from Russia) was included in the list.
During the time, the Left was also trying to discontinue Tagore’s ‘Sahaj Path’, the children’s primer; from schools on the ground that Tagore was ‘feudal’. I wrote another article showing how wrong it was to describe Sahaj Path as ‘feudal’. Both the stories in The Statesman created quite a public uproar and we saw how finally the government had to retreat on their decisions, seek public apology and rectify. The lists used for library purchases had to be amended in the subsequent years and the plan to remove Sahaj Path from schools dropped.
Recently, Mamata Banerjee’s decision to dictate the public libraries buy only a handful of newspapers, who are loyal to the government and keep out the major ones who are critical makes me relive my past experience of the Left’s highhandedness.
Power is surely a corrupting influence. Banerjee was very friendly across the media when she was fighting the elections to defeat the Left. She even visited the office of Bartaman (one of the popular newspapers in Kolkata) and garlanded the portrait of its founder-editor Barun Sengupta immediately after the election results were published. She was extremely cordial with Star Ananda – the television news channel of the Anandabazar Patrika (ABP) Group – and its anchors.
The channel covered initially almost every bit of her life from Kalighat home to the Writers’ Building, the state administrative headquarters. But when the media started becoming critical - first the Bartaman and then the ABP – she lost her temper. She boycotted Star Ananda and ordered all her ministers to boycott the channel. This boycott was followed by the Left Front government, once ABP’s honeymoon with Buddhadeb Bhattacharya was over.
Government’s handling of the media, one need to realise, is a specialised affair and it is not everybody’s cup of tea. Media does not exist just to write only about the ‘good work’ of the government; nor should the government think it that way. Media too is not clean enough - we have heard about the ‘paid news’ and about the lobbying of Neera Radia.
We have also seen for long the power wielded by party mouthpieces like the Ganashakti of the CPI (M) and now lately the Jago Bangla of the Trinamool Congress. But we don’t expect the frontline daily newspapers and channels to follow party lines. And that is what precisely Banerjee has charged the media of – to justify her stand of keeping out the major newspapers from the library purchase list.
All the frontline English newspapers are off the list. Are we to believe that these English language newspapers are all political? Even CNN and Fox News are sometimes accused of having rival political strings attached. But can you think of the US government boycotting them?
Dr Buroshiva Dasgupta is a veteran journalist, columnist and a media academic. He has been a practising journalist for over 25 years with major Indian newspapers like The Statesmen, The Times of India, The Economic Times, The Indian Express and The Financial Express. He writes extensively on politics, economy, environment, culture and contemporary Indian life. As a media academic he is associated with the Manipal Institute of Communication, the University of Asmara in Eritrea and many other Indian educational institutes of repute. He did his PhD on New Media and New Poetics: the changing interface from the Calcutta University, and is the founder-editor of the Indian Edition of the Global Media Journal. He has compiled a book named, ‘Market, Media and Democracy’.
Thursday
Trivialising Poverty
Listening to the debate on poverty in the Indian parliament, I was reminded of my visit to the slums of New Delhi while covering elections in India. India aspires to be a superpower in the 21st century. I wonder whether this national aspiration has anything to do with the people who live all their lives in the squalor and filth right at the heart of the national capital.
Listening to the lawmakers shedding crocodile tears for the poor, I was reminded of the people I met in Bengal's Murshidabad district, who lost their homes, schools and livelihood to the river and the government didn't do enough to stop the land erosion.
I was reminded of the people who lost their limbs as a result of arsenic contamination of drinking water and yet didn't know where to go to seek help.
Do these people aspire to be part of a nation which wants to see itself as a superpower in the post-US world order?
For a change the Indian lawmakers, went beyond discussing scandals and the triviality of blame game and political upmanship to discuss poverty. However, to my mind, all the parties - the lawmakers, the national planning commission, the intellectuals and the media - who were engaged in the debate on redefining the poverty line in the country were busy in a trivial exercise of futility.
I am not an economist but as any ordinary person would say, the objective of studying poverty is to improve the standard of living of the poor people so that they can lead a healthy life and aspire to fulfil their lifetime ambitions. One should not be too occupied with the academic discourses so as to lose sight of the final destination, which is to free India from abject poverty.
Those who know the Deputy Chairman of the Indian Planning Commission Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia well will possibly agree with me that, ideologically he is a firm believer of the 'Trickle Down Hypotheis', i.e. if the economy grows then its positive effects percolate from the top to the people who are at the lower levels of the economy. Since India is on a growth path ranging from seven to nine per cent annually, there is an ideological obligation on the part of people like Dr Ahluwalia to claim that poverty level is coming down, which is probably true but not enough in a country which houses almost two-third of the world's poor people and with such stark economic disparity.
There are empirical studies to justify and negate the trickle down effect, but as an ordinary man I think that the social, economic and political architecture of our society has become so complex now that it is almost Utopian to assume that the hypothesis works in its entirety.
Rather than assuming that the trickle down hypothesis works, both the central and state governments should make targeted efforts to bring people out of poverty. Large scale poverty alleviation programmes may lead to leakage by way of corruption and bureaucratic mismanagement. Targeted programmes may also suffer from such menace, yet it may be proportionately less as the number of people involved will be less.
In the final analysis though, whatever the path, poverty alleviation will be possible only if there is good governance, the system is transparent and the responsible and the powerful have impeccable integrity. The country may debate in a million voices, there may be thousands of legislation and hundreds of anti-poverty programmes, yet the poor may find themselves caught in the poverty trap for generations to come.
All comments are personal.
Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
Listening to the lawmakers shedding crocodile tears for the poor, I was reminded of the people I met in Bengal's Murshidabad district, who lost their homes, schools and livelihood to the river and the government didn't do enough to stop the land erosion.
I was reminded of the people who lost their limbs as a result of arsenic contamination of drinking water and yet didn't know where to go to seek help.
Do these people aspire to be part of a nation which wants to see itself as a superpower in the post-US world order?
For a change the Indian lawmakers, went beyond discussing scandals and the triviality of blame game and political upmanship to discuss poverty. However, to my mind, all the parties - the lawmakers, the national planning commission, the intellectuals and the media - who were engaged in the debate on redefining the poverty line in the country were busy in a trivial exercise of futility.
I am not an economist but as any ordinary person would say, the objective of studying poverty is to improve the standard of living of the poor people so that they can lead a healthy life and aspire to fulfil their lifetime ambitions. One should not be too occupied with the academic discourses so as to lose sight of the final destination, which is to free India from abject poverty.
Those who know the Deputy Chairman of the Indian Planning Commission Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia well will possibly agree with me that, ideologically he is a firm believer of the 'Trickle Down Hypotheis', i.e. if the economy grows then its positive effects percolate from the top to the people who are at the lower levels of the economy. Since India is on a growth path ranging from seven to nine per cent annually, there is an ideological obligation on the part of people like Dr Ahluwalia to claim that poverty level is coming down, which is probably true but not enough in a country which houses almost two-third of the world's poor people and with such stark economic disparity.
There are empirical studies to justify and negate the trickle down effect, but as an ordinary man I think that the social, economic and political architecture of our society has become so complex now that it is almost Utopian to assume that the hypothesis works in its entirety.
Rather than assuming that the trickle down hypothesis works, both the central and state governments should make targeted efforts to bring people out of poverty. Large scale poverty alleviation programmes may lead to leakage by way of corruption and bureaucratic mismanagement. Targeted programmes may also suffer from such menace, yet it may be proportionately less as the number of people involved will be less.
In the final analysis though, whatever the path, poverty alleviation will be possible only if there is good governance, the system is transparent and the responsible and the powerful have impeccable integrity. The country may debate in a million voices, there may be thousands of legislation and hundreds of anti-poverty programmes, yet the poor may find themselves caught in the poverty trap for generations to come.
All comments are personal.
Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
Jaundiced eye can't see true colour
A maverick Mamata Banerjee has the rare ability to make and unmake peoples' political fortunes. Mukul Roy, who is no different from an average Bengali, is now tipped to be the next Railway Minister of India. If Banerjee has her way then Roy will preside over the largest railway network in the world. There are many others who have made political fortunes riding on Banerjee's popularity.
On the other hand, veteran politicians like Somen Mitra, Subrata Mukherjee and Sudip Bandyopadhyay have been pushed to political insignificance by Banerjee. Mitra, who presided over the expulsion of Banerjee from the Congress, had his political rehabilitation at the mercy of the Trinamool Congress supremo. Similarly, Mukherjee and Bandyopadhyay, who revolted against the whims and fancies of Banerjee during the KMC polls and the Lok Sabha elections respectively, were reduced to being paper tigers as they got re-elected only with the blessings from Banerjee.
Dinesh Trivedi, whose railway budget anguished Banerjee, was the Trinamool Congress supremo's point man in the corridors of power for a very long time. Now that he has drawn Banerjee's ire, doesn't change his political credentials. Yet he has been upgraded to the position of a martyr, as if he has dedicated himself for a noble cause.
An astute politician and an MBA from the University of Texas, Trivedi, however, worked out his exit strategy well. He didn't pretend to be a revolutionary as Mitra, Mukherjee and Bandyopadhyay tried to be, rather his pragmatic business plan acknowledged the fact that without Banerjee's support he cannot continue in the government or in the party. Trivedi, therefore, made it amply clear that he would step down the moment the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his leader Banerjee would want him to do so.
The brand of politics as practised by Banerjee is often quite rightly brandished as bad economics. She is not the only one though to take that path. Given a choice, a majority of the Indian politicians would tread the populist path as they simply do not care for any form of accountibility in public life. Fiscal prudence might be the buzzword of India Inc but that does not necessarily mean that all Indian politicians are enlightened about the the virtues of presiding over a state in good economic health.
Even those who understand the benefits of good economics do not necessarily do what is necessary to ensure that. People like Pranab Mukherjee, P Chidambaram have been in charge of the Indian exchequer for quite a long time, yet they often do not practise what they preach.
Trivedi is turned into a martyr as he claimed to have worked towards making the Indian Railways economically healthy. Those who are shouting in his support are often overlooking some glaring facts which testify the fact that not enough is being down to ensure the health of the national economy or to provide the necessary support to those who have been left out of the story of shining India.
The government of India offered Rs 4.6 lakh crore in tax exemptions and incentives to industrialists, compared to Rs 1.54 lakh crore in subsidies to the poor and farmers. If this piece of statistics is true then one needs to raise the question as to why the industrialists are favoured at the cost of the poor people. The common argument is that the industrial sector creates jobs, but they also make profits and what about their corporate social responsibility. Moreover, the government has a responsibility to look after the poor and work towards reducing economic inequality.
That apart, the subsidies given to the large (rich) farmers, the huge non-planned expenditure and the non-taxation of agricultural income (many Indian politicians own agricultural land to avoid taxes) point towards the hostile attitude of successive governments towards the poor.
So Banerjee is not the only one to be blamed for the economic mess the country is in. This, however, does not in any way justify her action of demanding Trivedi's resignation following the presentation of the Railway budget. The way Banerjee is being projected in the social networking sites and the Indian media is that she is holding the nation and good governance to ransom. If that is the case then the politicians with high political acumen and experience need to do a lot of answering about their ability to diffuse crises.
It is funny that people close to the CPI-M are also bestowing martyr hood on Trivedi, the man who till recently was Banerjee's man Friday in the corridors of power and thrashed the Left on every available opportunity. To hold the Indian politicians to account the people of the country should learn to shun the partisan attitude of assessing every event. They should stop seeing things with a jaundiced eye.
All comments are personal.
Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
On the other hand, veteran politicians like Somen Mitra, Subrata Mukherjee and Sudip Bandyopadhyay have been pushed to political insignificance by Banerjee. Mitra, who presided over the expulsion of Banerjee from the Congress, had his political rehabilitation at the mercy of the Trinamool Congress supremo. Similarly, Mukherjee and Bandyopadhyay, who revolted against the whims and fancies of Banerjee during the KMC polls and the Lok Sabha elections respectively, were reduced to being paper tigers as they got re-elected only with the blessings from Banerjee.
Dinesh Trivedi, whose railway budget anguished Banerjee, was the Trinamool Congress supremo's point man in the corridors of power for a very long time. Now that he has drawn Banerjee's ire, doesn't change his political credentials. Yet he has been upgraded to the position of a martyr, as if he has dedicated himself for a noble cause.
An astute politician and an MBA from the University of Texas, Trivedi, however, worked out his exit strategy well. He didn't pretend to be a revolutionary as Mitra, Mukherjee and Bandyopadhyay tried to be, rather his pragmatic business plan acknowledged the fact that without Banerjee's support he cannot continue in the government or in the party. Trivedi, therefore, made it amply clear that he would step down the moment the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his leader Banerjee would want him to do so.
The brand of politics as practised by Banerjee is often quite rightly brandished as bad economics. She is not the only one though to take that path. Given a choice, a majority of the Indian politicians would tread the populist path as they simply do not care for any form of accountibility in public life. Fiscal prudence might be the buzzword of India Inc but that does not necessarily mean that all Indian politicians are enlightened about the the virtues of presiding over a state in good economic health.
Even those who understand the benefits of good economics do not necessarily do what is necessary to ensure that. People like Pranab Mukherjee, P Chidambaram have been in charge of the Indian exchequer for quite a long time, yet they often do not practise what they preach.
Trivedi is turned into a martyr as he claimed to have worked towards making the Indian Railways economically healthy. Those who are shouting in his support are often overlooking some glaring facts which testify the fact that not enough is being down to ensure the health of the national economy or to provide the necessary support to those who have been left out of the story of shining India.
The government of India offered Rs 4.6 lakh crore in tax exemptions and incentives to industrialists, compared to Rs 1.54 lakh crore in subsidies to the poor and farmers. If this piece of statistics is true then one needs to raise the question as to why the industrialists are favoured at the cost of the poor people. The common argument is that the industrial sector creates jobs, but they also make profits and what about their corporate social responsibility. Moreover, the government has a responsibility to look after the poor and work towards reducing economic inequality.
That apart, the subsidies given to the large (rich) farmers, the huge non-planned expenditure and the non-taxation of agricultural income (many Indian politicians own agricultural land to avoid taxes) point towards the hostile attitude of successive governments towards the poor.
So Banerjee is not the only one to be blamed for the economic mess the country is in. This, however, does not in any way justify her action of demanding Trivedi's resignation following the presentation of the Railway budget. The way Banerjee is being projected in the social networking sites and the Indian media is that she is holding the nation and good governance to ransom. If that is the case then the politicians with high political acumen and experience need to do a lot of answering about their ability to diffuse crises.
It is funny that people close to the CPI-M are also bestowing martyr hood on Trivedi, the man who till recently was Banerjee's man Friday in the corridors of power and thrashed the Left on every available opportunity. To hold the Indian politicians to account the people of the country should learn to shun the partisan attitude of assessing every event. They should stop seeing things with a jaundiced eye.
All comments are personal.
Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
Saturday
Custodian of decency and determination
Some people do not believe in springing any surprise. For them the only route to success is hard work and determination. Not everybody has the charisma but Rahul Dravid has proved that one can still steal the show through dedication, not only in cricket but also in other things in life.
Much has been written about Rahul Dravid as a cricketer. Someone with a track record as enviable as Dravid's deserves such a standing ovation on his exit from the glamorous world of cricket. The glamour though, never lured him from the gritty determination that he nurtured all his life. Such was his dedication for cricket that, as a fellow cricketer says, Dravid would be seen shadow-playing a faulty shot that got him out even in the dining room.
The man who literally built his innings putting one brick after another with acute precision and purpose never allowed his emotions to reign in over rationality. In his long cricketing career, anybody has hardly seen Dravid burst into the level of emotions that doesn't measure up to his neatly organised and disciplined character.
In a world dominated by superficiality and pomp, Dravid was modest, meticulous and detailed not only in his thinking and actions in the field but also outside. The Bradman Oration, first by any cricketer from outside Australia, that he delivered in 2011, is a testimony to the depth of his knowledge and understanding that transcends beyond the world of cricket.
A well known cricket correspondent once told me that books were an essential part of Dravid's luggage, on trips both in India and abroad, and he would use them to keep himself focused ahead of any match.
I came across him only once in 2000, when he was probably the vice captain of the Indian side and was playing English county cricket for Kent. While travelling in the District Line of the London Underground, I soon discovered that none other than Dravid was my co-passenger, sitting literally opposite to me. Realising that I was watching him, arguably one of the most confident batsmen of his time, who faced many great bowlers with straight bat, looked utterly embarassed that someone has noticed him in a London train. On our way out of the Temple tube station, when I wished him, saying, "Hi Rahul", the shy person in him couldn't offer anything more than an unassuming and nervous smile.
For him the fame attached to being a worldclass cricketer was never bigger than the game itself. Dravid not only epitomised dedication and determination, but was also known for his decency and dignity. With his retirement, the world of cricket will miss a gentleman cricketer who never believed in any short cut to success and had the rare ability of thinking his way through both on and off the field.
All comments are personal. Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
Much has been written about Rahul Dravid as a cricketer. Someone with a track record as enviable as Dravid's deserves such a standing ovation on his exit from the glamorous world of cricket. The glamour though, never lured him from the gritty determination that he nurtured all his life. Such was his dedication for cricket that, as a fellow cricketer says, Dravid would be seen shadow-playing a faulty shot that got him out even in the dining room.
The man who literally built his innings putting one brick after another with acute precision and purpose never allowed his emotions to reign in over rationality. In his long cricketing career, anybody has hardly seen Dravid burst into the level of emotions that doesn't measure up to his neatly organised and disciplined character.
In a world dominated by superficiality and pomp, Dravid was modest, meticulous and detailed not only in his thinking and actions in the field but also outside. The Bradman Oration, first by any cricketer from outside Australia, that he delivered in 2011, is a testimony to the depth of his knowledge and understanding that transcends beyond the world of cricket.
A well known cricket correspondent once told me that books were an essential part of Dravid's luggage, on trips both in India and abroad, and he would use them to keep himself focused ahead of any match.
I came across him only once in 2000, when he was probably the vice captain of the Indian side and was playing English county cricket for Kent. While travelling in the District Line of the London Underground, I soon discovered that none other than Dravid was my co-passenger, sitting literally opposite to me. Realising that I was watching him, arguably one of the most confident batsmen of his time, who faced many great bowlers with straight bat, looked utterly embarassed that someone has noticed him in a London train. On our way out of the Temple tube station, when I wished him, saying, "Hi Rahul", the shy person in him couldn't offer anything more than an unassuming and nervous smile.
For him the fame attached to being a worldclass cricketer was never bigger than the game itself. Dravid not only epitomised dedication and determination, but was also known for his decency and dignity. With his retirement, the world of cricket will miss a gentleman cricketer who never believed in any short cut to success and had the rare ability of thinking his way through both on and off the field.
All comments are personal. Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
Thursday
When a Mother is a Foreign Correspondent
Maintaining work life balance is never an easy task, especially for women with children. Frances Harrison, former BBC correspondent in Iran, Sri Lanka, Malayasia and Bangladesh, tells her story of juggling between two extremely demanding jobs. This Guest Post is Stray Thoughts' tribute to all working mothers.
Two months after giving birth, I was off to a new assignment as the BBC correspondent in Sri Lanka, a country wracked by civil war. I remember packing my suitcase, placing tiny baby clothes, milk bottles and nappies on top of armour-plated flak jackets, stab vests, helmets and battlefield first-aid kits.
Sri Lanka is where Marie Colvin, whom we mourn today, lost an eye bravely telling the story of civilians battered by war. When I arrived a Tamil stringer for the BBC in the north of Sri Lanka had just been murdered at night at home in front of his wife and children in an area controlled by government troops. The Tamil Tiger insurgency was at its height and suicide bombings in the capital were almost a routine occurrence. Mysterious murders and disappearances were rife.
Convinced I would never get another foreign posting after having a child, I hid my pregnancy from my managers, wearing loose jackets to hide the bump. I was careful not to inhale too much mace or tear gas while covering street protests. It helped that I was based in Malaysia, out of sight.
When I came back to London to give birth the BBC telephoned to offer me work as a roaming reporter. No longer allowed to fly on a plane, I finally had to own up that I was eight months pregnant.
Later I realised my instinct to hide the pregnancy came from my mother. She qualified as a lawyer in the late seventies and for the first few months didn't tell her male colleagues she had children. At lunchtime she would secretly go out of the office to a telephone box around the corner in order to call us.
Sri Lanka is where Marie Colvin, whom we mourn today, lost an eye bravely telling the story of civilians battered by war. When I arrived a Tamil stringer for the BBC in the north of Sri Lanka had just been murdered at night at home in front of his wife and children in an area controlled by government troops. The Tamil Tiger insurgency was at its height and suicide bombings in the capital were almost a routine occurrence. Mysterious murders and disappearances were rife.
Convinced I would never get another foreign posting after having a child, I hid my pregnancy from my managers, wearing loose jackets to hide the bump. I was careful not to inhale too much mace or tear gas while covering street protests. It helped that I was based in Malaysia, out of sight.
When I came back to London to give birth the BBC telephoned to offer me work as a roaming reporter. No longer allowed to fly on a plane, I finally had to own up that I was eight months pregnant.
Later I realised my instinct to hide the pregnancy came from my mother. She qualified as a lawyer in the late seventies and for the first few months didn't tell her male colleagues she had children. At lunchtime she would secretly go out of the office to a telephone box around the corner in order to call us.
Inevitably my child was born while my journalist husband was on a reporting trip. I remember the BBC's Lyse Doucet coming to visit the newborn and asking whether it was harder to be a foreign correspondent or a mother. More than a decade later I know it's hard to be both at the same time.
A few weeks after giving birth I was sent on the "hostile environment" course and had a great excuse for not doing the fireman's lifts – my bones hadn't yet slotted back into place after childbirth.
I flew to Sri Lanka for a handover, discussing press cards and death threats and, for the first time in my life, attending embassy coffee mornings to ask ladies wearing matching handbags and shoes how to find a nanny.
A few weeks after giving birth I was sent on the "hostile environment" course and had a great excuse for not doing the fireman's lifts – my bones hadn't yet slotted back into place after childbirth.
I flew to Sri Lanka for a handover, discussing press cards and death threats and, for the first time in my life, attending embassy coffee mornings to ask ladies wearing matching handbags and shoes how to find a nanny.
My husband and I resolved never to fly on the same flight to the war zone in case it was shot down and there was nobody left to look after our son. We never left the baby in the care of the nanny alone overnight. The BBC sent security expert to fit bomb film to all the windows of our house in case someone lobbed a grenade over the wall. They installed security cameras and high fences to make extra sure.
Leaving TV Centre in London I heard that female colleagues had muttered about how I was going to manage. The main problem was having to travel at short notice. After 9/11 when my husband had been dispatched to Afghanistan, the BBC decided I should go to Delhi immediately. I had no choice but to take my child too. I was saved by a colleague's wife, who looked after my Sri Lankan nanny and baby, and invited them to the playgroup/coffee mornings organised by the families of foreign journalists who'd all gone off to Afghanistan. I had a dual perspective. I could relate to the wives' frustration at being left behind with the children in a foreign country but also understood their husbands' excitement at being sent off on a good trip.
Leaving TV Centre in London I heard that female colleagues had muttered about how I was going to manage. The main problem was having to travel at short notice. After 9/11 when my husband had been dispatched to Afghanistan, the BBC decided I should go to Delhi immediately. I had no choice but to take my child too. I was saved by a colleague's wife, who looked after my Sri Lankan nanny and baby, and invited them to the playgroup/coffee mornings organised by the families of foreign journalists who'd all gone off to Afghanistan. I had a dual perspective. I could relate to the wives' frustration at being left behind with the children in a foreign country but also understood their husbands' excitement at being sent off on a good trip.
As it turned out we spent two months camping in a hotel. At one point my husband had to fly in from Iran to babysit as I went off to Kashmir – and it was good he did because that was the weekend the child got ill. By the end my toddler got so used to room service that if he was hungry he just pointed to the telephone. A decade later he still yearns for room service.
On another trip to Pakistan I stayed in a communal house for BBC staff. A female producer staying there went around telling everyone it was ridiculous that I'd brought my baby and nanny – again I had no choice as my husband was abroad. Female colleagues trying hard to be one of the lads seemed to find a child more outlandish than the Taliban. I was rescued this time by a Pakistani colleague and his wife who decided I'd better stay with them to avoid the backbiting.
On another trip to Pakistan I stayed in a communal house for BBC staff. A female producer staying there went around telling everyone it was ridiculous that I'd brought my baby and nanny – again I had no choice as my husband was abroad. Female colleagues trying hard to be one of the lads seemed to find a child more outlandish than the Taliban. I was rescued this time by a Pakistani colleague and his wife who decided I'd better stay with them to avoid the backbiting.
In Iran, my next posting, it was routine to be reading a goodnight story to my son, only to have to rush off to the office and go live on TV. There were so many cancelled family outings and holidays cut short because of the BBC that the intake desk in London used to joke that when my son grew up he'd probably take revenge by burning down Bush House. There were some amusing moments like when I covered a conference of holocaust deniers in Tehran and my son went to school and cheerfully informed his teacher, "Mummy has gone to the holocaust".
The Iranian authorities seemed to know childcare was my Achilles Heel, as with every working woman. I had failed to find any Iranian who would work the hours I did, so eventually I brought our Sri Lankan nanny to Tehran, flying her home three times a year to keep her sane. After Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came to power, the Iranian immigration department abruptly decided not to renew her work permit. She was given a week to leave. The Iranian government said it would provide us a nanny to live with us – or rather to spy on us. Paranoid, I was sure it was a soft way of kicking me out – less glamorous than being expelled. I made a huge fuss, appealing to every official – all of them male – and somehow I got away with it.
Women should be foreign correspondents but not at the price of giving up having a family. It's not just about equal rights or being representative of the population. Female journalists get access to stories men cannot do, such as sexual abuse. They are often better listeners. Women in repressive countries often tell you things more honestly because they're anonymous, all covered up in Islamic clothing. All female spaces, like swimming pools, were a great place to do vox pops in Iran. In conflicts women reporters are often perceived as less threatening – underestimated so that all sorts of confidences slip out because officials are less on their guard. Women reporters tend to be less excited with new weapons of war – the human story appeals more.
Women should be foreign correspondents but not at the price of giving up having a family. It's not just about equal rights or being representative of the population. Female journalists get access to stories men cannot do, such as sexual abuse. They are often better listeners. Women in repressive countries often tell you things more honestly because they're anonymous, all covered up in Islamic clothing. All female spaces, like swimming pools, were a great place to do vox pops in Iran. In conflicts women reporters are often perceived as less threatening – underestimated so that all sorts of confidences slip out because officials are less on their guard. Women reporters tend to be less excited with new weapons of war – the human story appeals more.
In some countries you need to be a woman to understand the oppression; being a female bureau chief in Iran was like being a black reporter in apartheid South Africa. No man could know the daily humiliations of being a woman in the Islamic Republic; you had to live it.
In London being a foreign correspondent and a mother is a very rare phenomenon. When Alex Crawford of Sky News recently scooped her male colleagues in Libya I was delighted to discover she has four children.
And yet in the countries where I worked in Asia and the Middle East, a woman who doesn't have children was the odd one out. Single women were often viewed with suspicion. Politicians and officials who regarded me as an alien strident female mellowed somewhat when they realised I had a husband and child; I became a lot more "normal" in their eyes. Being a parent also gives an important perspective on reporting wars; you really understand how much love and care goes into bringing up a child.
The recruitment system for foreign correspondents does not make it easy for families, especially couples with two careers. It's no surprise that Alex Crawford has a husband whose career currently takes second place. The first time I was offered a foreign posting in 1996, the BBC initially refused to give my husband, who was working for the corporation at the time, a leave of absence to accompany me.In London being a foreign correspondent and a mother is a very rare phenomenon. When Alex Crawford of Sky News recently scooped her male colleagues in Libya I was delighted to discover she has four children.
And yet in the countries where I worked in Asia and the Middle East, a woman who doesn't have children was the odd one out. Single women were often viewed with suspicion. Politicians and officials who regarded me as an alien strident female mellowed somewhat when they realised I had a husband and child; I became a lot more "normal" in their eyes. Being a parent also gives an important perspective on reporting wars; you really understand how much love and care goes into bringing up a child.
Flexible working arrangements and job shares would help, as well as planning deployments further in advance to fit in with schooling. The BBC's habit of requiring correspondents to return to London after each foreign posting doesn't work for families.
There are more women mangers now but very few have done time in the field and had a family. There needs to be more thought about the career path for returning correspondents whose experience and sacrifices are not valued when they come home. It seems men and women who spend years safely sitting at their desks choosing managerial paths have far better career prospects. There's still an attitude that you can't have it all – the thrill of foreign reporting and being a mum and having a full career.
Frances Harrison was BBC correspondent in Bangladesh, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Iran and is the author of "Still Counting the Dead", a book of survivors' stories from the end of Sri Lanka's civil war to be published this summer by Portobello Books. Harrison has written a section for the International News Safety Institute new publication "No Woman's Land: On the Frontlines with Female Reporters".
This article was first published in Journalism.co.uk.
Stray Thoughts thanks Frances Harrison and Journalism.co.uk
Tuesday
Rahul Gandhi eclipses even before his rise
Indian media is no short of ideas. The leading television channels attach a moment to everything that happens in the country and around the globe, which are then blindly followed by others in the trade. Such terminologies, irrespective of whether they make any real sense, are so contagious that they spread from the conversation on the streets to intellectual discourses.
The latest in the long list of momentary terminologies is the ‘Rahul Moment’. The latest phase of polls in a number of states was branded as the mini general election, not because polls were being held in a good number of important states but because, the ‘Prime Minister in waiting’ Rahul Gandhi single handedly took up the cudgels of making the Indian National Congress, the grand old party of Indian politics, relevant in the country’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, which sends the largest number (85) of representatives to the lower house of the Indian parliament.
Like the Indian media, Indian politics is also no short of contrasting colours, and it would interest any political thinker. One such interesting shade is provided by Uttar Pradesh, which so far has returned the largest number (eight) of Indian Prime Ministers and yet the two major national parties, the Congress and the BJP, are nowhere near the political power in the state.
Before the concept of the Indian nation state emerged, the vast piece of land stretching from Afghanistan to Burma have been ruled by kings and emperors and Indians fancy such celebrated company even after the country emerged, and takes pride, as a successful republic and also as the world’s largest democracy. The fascination of the Indian electorate and the media with the Nehru-Gandhi family can be seen as a function of such attitude.
Despite, the nationwide interest, Rahul Gandhi has miserably failed, as the Uttar Pradesh election result demonstrates. If the electoral verdict is any indicator, the Congress party continues to be trailing as fourth in a list of influential political parties in the state, which has backed Rahul Gandhi’s great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, grandmother Indira Gandhi and father Rajiv Gandhi to the position of Indian premiership. This is not a new phenomenon in India, the only difference this time is the fact that Rahul Gandhi has doctored a situation depicting an expectation of his party’s revival in the state and accordingly led the campaign during the assembly polls.
Many saw the assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh as a test for Rahul Gandhi before he assumes the most coveted position in Indian politics from Manmohan Singh, who was made the Prime Minister in 2004 to keep the seat warm for the Nehru-Gandhi scion. Even from a distance, one would infer that Rahul Gandhi has failed the test, not least because he was unable to bring the Congress to power in the state, but because of his demonstration of lack of political understanding.
Rather than trying to project the age old party as a platform, reflective of the mass aspiration of the Indian population, Rahul Gandhi belied mass expactation by resorting to the arrogance that the Congress is used to. If Rahul Gandhi can blame the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party for the lack development and progress in the state, then his party needs to answer similar charges on as to why India is lacking behind in so many areas, despite the Congress being in power for most of the time since 1947. He also failed to offer a credible explanation as to why the Congress-led UPA government was so sipped in corruption, lacked the political authority to govern and was insensitive to the issues affecting the ordinary man following a policy paralysis.
As indications became clear that the Congress was not doing well enough, sycophants within the party, like Digvijay Singh and Rita Bahuguna Joshi rushed to stick their necks out to become the sacrificial lamb. People used to the Congress culture are well aware that sacrificial lambs get looked after well in the long run. May be the likes of Bahuguna-Joshi and Singh will be accommodated as governors in the future.
Rahul Gandhi needs to acknowledge a few things following the Uttar Pradesh outcome. He should only try to preach what he, his party and the government led by the Congress are practising. Although Uttar Pradesh has been a Congress bastion for many years after Indian independence, yet the party leaders should now come to terms with the fact that such a phenomenon is only a matter of the past. Old hats like Salman Khurshid, Sriprakash Jaiswal and Beni Prasad Verma should now make way for fresh blood. Merely promoting the youth at the top is not enough to rejuvenate the new generation at the grassroots. The outcome in Amethi and Rae Bareli is also a stark reminder that the people in Uttar Pradesh want to look ahead, like the rest of the world, rather than delving in the past.
All comments are personal.
Tirthankar.Bandyopadhyay.Blog@gmail.com
Saturday
Azizoor Rahman comes to Oxford Street
Thirty-one year old Azizoor Rahman (name changed) is from Maulvi Bazar in Bangladesh and is living in East London for the past 10 years. I caught up with him at Oxford Street to hear the story of his migration from Bangladesh to the United Kingdom.
It was Rahman's first trip to the Oxford Street. I offered to buy him a Cappuccino, but he refused stating that it goes against his religious and cultural beliefs. I was taken aback but not surprised. Over the past 12 years, I have come across many people, in the United Kindom and in other European countries, who think that learning English tantamounts to surrendering to the West and the values it propagates. I must admit though, that Rahman was the first person I came across, who thought that having a Cappuccino from the Starbucks would compromise with his beliefs.
Rahman went to a Madrassa in Maulvi Bazar and his journey to the West was made possible as Imtiaz Chowdhury (name changed) wanted his daughter to get married to a fellow Sylheti.
Chowdhury's daughter was born in East London, went to a school in the area, yet she can't speak proper English and is totally isolated from the worldview of an average Londoner. Rahman is proud of his wife "as she shunned western values despite living in London all her life".
Rahman and his family, with two children, live in social housing in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and survive on benefits dished out by the government. Neither Rahman nor his wife work and Chowdhury, who runs a restaurant, help them meet both ends.
"You are only 31, have two kids. Why don't you go for a job?", I asked Rahman.
"I can't work here as I do not know English. Neither do I want to work with the westerners, as that would liquidate my values", he replied.
I wondered if one is so sensitive about his values, why did he come to London in the first place.
Rahman is not a unique case though. He is one of the many, spread over the whole of the United Kingdom, who constitute a social underclass and have been let down by the system, a false sense of expectation from the West, and above all by themselves mainly due to their vexed perception of self respect. Most of them lack the skills to survive in a modern society and clamour for a sense of identity as they negotiate the wider world. Probably, this struggle for an identity makes Rahman so sensitive about what he terms as his 'religious and cultural values'.
Such underclass occupies the social and physical spaces in places like White Chapel in East London or Southall in West London and elsewhere. White Chapel seems like any dusty town of Bangladesh and Southall resembles an extension of Karol Bagh in Delhi. It is not only specific to the South Asians and can be seen among most of the ethnic minority communities in Britain, who prefer to live in enclaves which are misunderstood for social and cultural integration.
Despite tall claims of social cohesion and racial integration by successive British governments, such underclass exists in Britain. The constituents of this underclass are physically situated in the West but psychologically find themselves in the places they come from. Even after living in the United Kingdom for generations, many Sylhetis, Punjabis and Gujaratis do not see themselves as part of the British society. This is where the British state has failed. The failure of the state to include this underclass in the wider social functioning has created patches of darkness within the western claims of modernity and enlightenment.
All comments are personal.
Email: tirthankarb@hotmail.com
It was Rahman's first trip to the Oxford Street. I offered to buy him a Cappuccino, but he refused stating that it goes against his religious and cultural beliefs. I was taken aback but not surprised. Over the past 12 years, I have come across many people, in the United Kindom and in other European countries, who think that learning English tantamounts to surrendering to the West and the values it propagates. I must admit though, that Rahman was the first person I came across, who thought that having a Cappuccino from the Starbucks would compromise with his beliefs.
Rahman went to a Madrassa in Maulvi Bazar and his journey to the West was made possible as Imtiaz Chowdhury (name changed) wanted his daughter to get married to a fellow Sylheti.
Chowdhury's daughter was born in East London, went to a school in the area, yet she can't speak proper English and is totally isolated from the worldview of an average Londoner. Rahman is proud of his wife "as she shunned western values despite living in London all her life".
Rahman and his family, with two children, live in social housing in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and survive on benefits dished out by the government. Neither Rahman nor his wife work and Chowdhury, who runs a restaurant, help them meet both ends.
"You are only 31, have two kids. Why don't you go for a job?", I asked Rahman.
"I can't work here as I do not know English. Neither do I want to work with the westerners, as that would liquidate my values", he replied.
I wondered if one is so sensitive about his values, why did he come to London in the first place.
Rahman is not a unique case though. He is one of the many, spread over the whole of the United Kingdom, who constitute a social underclass and have been let down by the system, a false sense of expectation from the West, and above all by themselves mainly due to their vexed perception of self respect. Most of them lack the skills to survive in a modern society and clamour for a sense of identity as they negotiate the wider world. Probably, this struggle for an identity makes Rahman so sensitive about what he terms as his 'religious and cultural values'.
Such underclass occupies the social and physical spaces in places like White Chapel in East London or Southall in West London and elsewhere. White Chapel seems like any dusty town of Bangladesh and Southall resembles an extension of Karol Bagh in Delhi. It is not only specific to the South Asians and can be seen among most of the ethnic minority communities in Britain, who prefer to live in enclaves which are misunderstood for social and cultural integration.
Despite tall claims of social cohesion and racial integration by successive British governments, such underclass exists in Britain. The constituents of this underclass are physically situated in the West but psychologically find themselves in the places they come from. Even after living in the United Kingdom for generations, many Sylhetis, Punjabis and Gujaratis do not see themselves as part of the British society. This is where the British state has failed. The failure of the state to include this underclass in the wider social functioning has created patches of darkness within the western claims of modernity and enlightenment.
All comments are personal.
Email: tirthankarb@hotmail.com
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