Life on a rewind..

Life’s on a rewind mode (the wife says - it's a 'winding down' phase). I am in the throes of moving work base to Calcutta – once again, taking up a new assignment (in Sales) within the company. Straddling between 2 charges for a while, travel has been crazy over the last 2 months and showing no signs of let up – as the demands of the job can only increase in a tough market. At 50, that’s going to be a difficult transition – but, I guess, being away for 3 years from front line action was getting a bit tiresome.

It’s no secret that none of us (me, perhaps, a little more than N & J) would like to leave Bombay – which has always been our favourite city. After 3 years of rather a pigeon-hole existence – just as we were beginning to get comfortable in our new home – when the news of this transfer came along in December. Jaya’s Class 10 (ICSE) exams are going on now. So, it won’t be before the results come out in May and we sort out her next steps – that we can physically move residence. Till then, I will have to continue the inter-city weekly commute. Having done that for long periods in the past (nearly 2 years, when I used to be with HT in Mumbai and N & J stayed back in Cal) know how stressful it can be.

But, there’s always an alternate way of looking at things - and with age one does tend to become a bit sentimental. In 2009, I was literally drafted in - out of the blue as it were - to trouble-shoot the tricky IR situation at our company’s new plant in Mejia, Bankura. This required me to camp in Calcutta for 2-3 weeks every month for the better part of the year. Looking back, I feel there could have been an underlying reason for it – as otherwise I couldn’t have spent as much time with my mother – little knowing that she would leave us so suddenly before the turn of the year.

This time around too, what I am enjoying most is the time I am getting to spend with my father – whether sharing a quiet drink in the evenings after coming home or having breakfast or dinner together. It’s amazing how – at 81, he has pulled his life together – trying to maintain his routine and keep the house just as my mother had left it. It’s touching how – he goes out of his way to make my stay comfortable taking care of every little detail – from my food to laundry and even making the bed – as if he is standing in for Amma. And, me shamelessly lapping it all up as the spoilt only child. But, it’s father-son bonding like I have never experienced in all these years. Or, may be it’s just time created for my unfinished lessons in growing up.

A season of autobiographies

It’s a season of autobiographies. Some weeks back – I had written about Fali Nariman’s memoirs (read here). If that was a gem - B G Verghese’ “First Draft” (Tranquebar) is a rare treat.

Reading the lives of the “good and the great” is always inspirational. But, I find the memoirs of contemporary stalwarts no less fascinating as long as they are not just exercises in self-glorification and intellectual narcissism.

Sure, their accounts are bound to be coloured by personal bias and they would no doubt apply their own filters (or else – why would they undertake the audacious journey of writing a book if they didn’t have something of their own to say). Yet, they offer the by-stander valuable insights and perspective on people and events that has shaped some of our contemporary reality.

Besides, there is always something instructive not only in the successes and achievements, but even in the failings of people, who have lived a full life in every sense – personally and professionally.

GnT loaded Voyeurism

It’s with similar expectations, I had picked up the much-hyped autobiography of Tony Blair– but couldn’t make much headway. May be I am not so interested in modern British political history, but more likely I didn’t take to his style of writing. Even the chapter on Lady Di made tedious reading and despite my self-professed inclination for vicarious voyeurism didn’t manage to reach the part where, I believe, he admits that he was quite “an animal in bed” after downing several GnTs.

Although there are no such salacious confessions in either Nariman’s or Verghese’ book, I like them because these 2 very distinguished gentleman - both doyens in their own field have recounted their experiences spanning over 5 or 6 decades – keeping themselves firmly on the backseat. Not an easy thing to do for people who have not only been there and seen that but done pretty much everything there was to do in their chosen arena.

the many genres of illiteracy

The sheer sweep of BGV’s book, the range of his interests, the span and depth of his knowledge across subjects is truly awesome. No wonder he is concerned that, ‘…many educated middle-aged Indians, including policy makers, are astonishingly ill-informed about the context and background of seminal topics such as Kashmir…, Siachen…’. He attributes this to the absence of books on the general history of post-independence India. A void he has tried to fill in some measure in his own way.

At another place – he laments how much of our high politics is conducted “in a state of cartographic illiteracy” with even elementary geography having been devalued educationally as a discipline. He dares to say, therefore, “few of our policy makers have ever looked at a map of India and its neighbours in 60 years”.

Reading his memoir, at one level, I feel how little we have moved on certain issues as a nation over the last 60 years – Kashmir for instance. Simply, “changing the names and dates… (would make) it appear totally contemporary” – as he writes in the foreword.

The irony though is, issues which agitated our public psyche in the 60s and 70s – such as corruption in public life, professional (and intellectual) integrity of the bureaucracy and attempts towards having a ‘committed’ judiciary – all seem so passé now.

the price of feudocracy

Today – the going ‘price’ of an MLA or MP is general knowledge; that bureaucrats will be hand-maidens of their political bosses is an accepted fact and there is not even a flutter when one of the senior most and highly respected lawyer of the country hands over in an open court sealed envelope to the Chief Justice of India containing names of previous CJIs who were ‘known’ to be corrupt. It is, therefore, hardly surprising that - the rot has also insidiously crept in to our armed forces - still one of the finest and most respected in the world.

The parts of the book (other than, of course, his account of the Emergency era) – which I found particularly riveting were the chapters on his tenure as the Press Officer of Indira Gandhi during her first term as PM and, thereafter, his stint as the Editor of the Hindustan Times.

a little left of self-interest

In the 2 Chapters “Enter Mrs. G: Madam Prime Minister, Sir” and “A Mandate for Change” he provides a invaluable peek into Indira Gandhi's formative years in office and early events that shaped her attitude - deeply suspicion of her advisors - trusting only her won instincts (like Joan of Arc listen to her ‘inner voice’, which – as they said – was only “a little left of self interest”) and her family. A trait that now appears to be deeply embedded in the genetic code of the dynasty.


‘The Editor’s Den’ read with what he has written in a later chapter (‘The professor will see you now’) as a footnote serves as a capsule commentary on the gradual ascent and the quick decline of the Indian media. (Journalists as activists and propagandists, editorializing in news columns, decline of editors lack of editorial control, deals struck with business houses and political interests, the spoils being shared all along the line). While, he admits, that “there are exceptions, of course, and some of the best writing and coverage is superior to what there was earlier….But the average is sorely disappointing.”

True the age of the 'larger-than-life' Editors has been long gone (and, not just in India) I can't help recalling here the quip of a proprietor-editor, one of the last of the Mohicans. Talking of a poster-boy of the current lot of celebrity-editors - he said in his inimitable style - "the chap may have gone to Oxford, but even his best friend would not accuse him of being educated".


But, the central story, of course, is that of his historic sacking from the position of the Editor of HT. He has reproduced the correspondence exchange preceding that between him and the owner of the paper (K K Birla) and the proceedings that followed in the Press Council and the High Court. This was– perhaps – the first big ‘acid test’ of Editorial independence in Indian media (barring, probably, the lesser known episode in The Statesman relating to Pran Chopra in the 60s).


Saints, SUVs and Sweat Equity

Though not comparable either in stature or circumstances - the recent tale of a young editor (co-incidentally a product of that very same stable on KG Marg) who suffered a similar fate at a fledgling TV news channel (To read click here: My Settlement with NewsX by Avirook Sen) will make the earlier generation of proprietors look like saints. (Avirook managed to get Rs 2 crores and keep his SUV by threatening to take them to court. Then he went on a sabbaticcal to write his just published travelogue "Looking for America", Harper Collins, India)


That brings me to another little anecdote. Post the Emergency, Verghese contested the election as an independent candidate from Kerala. Funding came from ‘friends, family and those who believed in press freedom’ (which was his electoral ‘platform’). He lost despite support of the CPIM.

Though he doesn’t talk about it himself, a professional compatriot of his has written about this in his review of the book for a magazine. It seems that, after the elections there was still some money left in the kitty. Verghese returned it to all the donors in proportion to their original contributions.

Contrast this with another illustrious Malayali - of his partner’s “sweat equity” fame - who fought and won in the last parliamentary elections from the same state and it would, more or less, complete the picture of our drifting value system.



Finally, Verghese’ prescription for staying young is to be ‘active and engaged’ (he says – he has been ever more active in retirement). He advises – “eat what you will in moderation and do not exercise too much - (as even) that too is an indulgence”. Wonder what does he say to his younger son Rahul who has taken to running Marathon for a living (Virtual Marathon - click here).

3 Wise Men......

A hospital – no matter how plush – is not the most exciting place to spend the better part of a week. Any amount of flirting with the docile “Mallu” nurses (no offence meant – some of my best women friends have been from that southern-most region of our land) or the pretty dietician can uplift the spirit.

But, it isn't so much the after-effects of my tryst with a female of the wrong species (‘Aedes’ as distinct from ‘Anopheles’ – yes, I am down with Dengue and not Malaria !!), what I am forced to watch on prime time television every single day that's making me depressed.

…. a virgin ??

There is an unkind joke about why Christmas is not such a popular festival in Delhi. That’s because, it is difficult to find 3 wise men and a virgin in the capital city. While I have no authority to comment on the latter (tho’ not too long ago Matrimonial Columns - of what was then proudly proclaimed as Delhi’s “Best Punjabi Newspaper in English” - used to be replete with ads of “5 figure earning businessman looking for a beautiful virgin”), watching the debates on TV I would tend to believe the former. It is always the same set of the – so called – commentators, party “spokespersons”, self-styled citizens champions and an ubiquitous ‘ad-man’ who hop from channel to channel holding forth on issues as diverse as Kashmir, corruption, Rail accident, the Maoist menace, cricket, floods, rail accidents and even gay rights. If that is an index of the collective intellectual capital of the country – then God save us all.

What’s irking me the most is, people who I would like to hear most on these subject – the Prime Minister being foremost among them - are maintaining a deafening silence. The Congress spokesperson tried to justify his reticence the other day saying – if he is not making statements in public doesn’t mean he is not talking through other channels. I cannot think of an Obama, Cameron or even the otherwise flippant Sarkozy keeping mum if a crisis like Kashmir or a CWG scam were to happen in their countries. While the latter would have certainly invited the proverbial ‘kick-ass’ response, they’d be taken to the cleaners by the media and the public - with their popularity ratings plummeting - if they didn’t voice their concerns, tried to reach out to the affected people and assure the country at large about effective steps being put in place to tackle the situation.

Karan Thapar has written a beautiful piece in last Sunday’s HT – Silent Shame in which he makes this point rather tellingly thru the voice of his pet dog Pertie (to read click here)

when silence tells a thousand words


This policy of studied silence reminds me of what used to be said about Narasimha Rao’s : “No decision is also a decision”. Tho' it's co-incidental that MMS was his Finance Minister - the similarities don’t end there. By all accounts, corruption has acquired epic proportions under the UPA as it had in the Narasimha Rao regime which was largely considered to be the first era of reforms. To me having a squeaky clean PM (who would make the legendary wife of Caesar blush by his high standards of integrity) is of little value if under his watch we have purveyors of large-scale corruption.

Political scientists teach us that, good governance and good politics are not necessarily peas of the same pod. It may be argued that, corruption is only a topic of cocktail conversation for the urban elite and the masses couldn’t care less about it. The same, I am afraid, can’t hold true for price rise and development. It’s all very well for the Finance Minister to justify Inflation on the back of Economic Growth in his Parliament speech and the same to be parroted ad-nauseam by his less fecund junior colleagues in the party seeking their 2 minutes of limelight on national television.


There is a rather cynical school of thought that, the government can afford to be blasé because there are no major elections in sight. If that were so, then it is indeed a sad commentary on our national leadership. But, somehow – in my layman’s view (literally, lying in the hospital bed), I don’t think this going to cut ice for much longer even with their “aam-admi” vote-bank. There may be a silent momentum gathering - that is not yet visible to the untrained commoners’ eye. It is only a matter of time before this seething anger boils over as a groundswell of public opinion. That’s when, they too will have to start seriously worrying about corruption and price rise.

If the glaring disparity between Hyderabad and the rest of Andhra could be the cause of undoing of the Chandrababu Naidu government – the sharp contrast of Delhi (both pre and post CWG) with the rest of the country ( including even the other metro-cities with their crumbling civic infra-structure ) could raise similar issues of lop-sided development at a national level with certain regions developing at the (perceived) expense of others.

the "Price" of National Pride

I am not a Leftist in either thought or temperament. But, I do feel that, had the money being spent on the Commonwealth Games (Rs 50,000 – 80,000 crores – USD 10-15 billion going by various estimates) in the name of buying “National Pride” been spent on development of regions like Dantewada and Bastar, we would have been closer to solving the Maoist problem and that would have contributed much more to reinforcing our ‘national pride’ than any number of CWGs and Asian Games can do.

Overall, we are in for tough times ahead – double-digit growth projections notwithstanding.


In my mind, I have no doubt that this government too wants to tackle price rise, corruption, insurgency and even Kashmir. But the question is do they know and, more importantly, have the will to do what it takes ?



Foot-notes:

1)The visuals coming in from Leh shows foreign tourists joining the armed forces in rescue operations. Wonder whether there were also some Indian tourists among them or were they all queuing up at airport for the first available flight.

2) A few days ago I surprised to see in front-page of The Economic Times photographs of the former MOS of External Affairs and his wife-in-waiting at a private dinner event and wondered about its relevance to the readers of a financial newspaper. For the last 2 days I find - all leading TV channels beaming footages of the same couple’s pre-nuptial visit to the Ajmer Sharif. Obviously, I have got my news-sense all screwed up.

Salt and Pepper

Took in 2 good movies last weekend – one a breathless entertainer and the other a mellow reflective romantic drama. The first was the over-hyped – Angelina Jolie’s thriller - S.A.L.T . It was so fast paced that it didn’t allow any time to think or question the sheer absurdity of the script. The original screenplay, I believe, was written for Tom Cruise and had to undergo a sex reversal of sorts when he turned it down and Jolie stepped into the role. I must admit it was much more fun watching Angelina perform the high voltage stunts and (even though the sex sequences - as shown on the TV clips - had been censored) her feminine vulnerability succeeds in arousing the audience's adrenalin (and related hormones) more than a cold-as-steel Cruise could possibly have.


And some pepper ......


(Penelope Cruz in a scene from the film)

old age is not for sissies

The second movie, which I downloaded from the net, was more up my street – Elegy starring Ben Kingsley and Penelope Cruz (click here for synopsis and previews). In a screen adaptation of the Phillip Roth novel – The Dying Animal, Kingsley plays David Kepesh a charismatic author and professor who serially bedded the best looking student of his class (taking care to skirt the sexual harassment code of the college by waiting till they get their grades). “When you make love to a woman you get revenge for all the things that defeated you in life” says Kepesh. He finally meets his nemesis – when he gets into a erotic entanglement with the stunningly beautiful Cuban co-ed - 30 years his younger – Consuella Castilo



Not quite in the league of Brando’s – The Last Tango, Kingsley is brilliant as the ageing academic who is trying to come to terms with the existential enigma of growing old vs growing up – something I had touched upon in my earlier blog Midlife Delinquencies (click here to read). The subject of an older man having an affair with a woman much younger to him has been beaten to death in literature and the movies. But, this one treats a serious subject without making it heavy - made possible by a very intelligent screenplay and superbly calibrated acting by all the lead characters. The film is full of some profound dialogue - gain delivered very lightly. For eg - Kepesh says : "Beautiful women are invisible because we get so dazzled by the outside we fail to look inside."



Standing by the window watching the rain, he talks to himself - “Old age sneaks up on you, and the next thing you know you're asking yourself, I'm asking myself, why can't an old man act his real age? How is it possible for me to still be involved in the carnal aspects of the human comedy? Because, in my head, nothing has changed”

The sexual chemistry between Kingsley and Cruz palpably pierces through the screen. But, this PC (unlike another I was briefly obsessed with sometime ago !!) is something else. To call her ravishing or just hauntingly beautiful would be an understatement – sans her clothes she is like a Goddess – worthy of worship as her on-screen predator honestly admits (see clip).

After all, as Kepesh paraphrases Betty Davies, “old age is not for sissies”.

another kind of BIMARU

Reading the memoirs of Ashish Bose – Headcount. Bose is a pioneer of demographic studies in India and is credited with the coinage of the term – BIMARU states (referring to the population issues of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh) and other theories such as “linguistic displacement” in states like Assam post-independence.

Though, by his own admission, Bose has at times got valuable insights from ordinary people such as his “maalishwala” – he is undoubtedly a man of great erudition, who has also led a full life beyond academia. But, the book is poorly written and badly edited (surprising for a Penguin title). Coming right after Fali Nariman’s autobiography it makes a disappointing read (especially his rather simplistic account of the Emergency and mild fawning of the Nehru-Gandhi clan).

A mentors' mentor

I didn’t know Tarun Sheth, former Head of Management Development of Hindustan Lever – later mentor at the HR Consulting and Search firm, Shilputsi – that his wife founded and run for the most part by his 2 very talented daughters – Shipa and, later – only, Purvi, too well. I was traveling in the hills of Kumaon last week and missed the news of his death in the papers. I came to learn about it from the email of an old colleague and at once knew that I wanted to attend his memorial service on my return to Mumbai.

the missing "merchants"

So, I went to the Indian Merchants’ Chamber Hall at Churchgate on Thursday evening. It wasn’t a very large gathering. I thought that most people who had come were there not merely to mark attendance. – but, because, they genuinely felt that Tarun had touched their lives meaningfully at some point in their careers. And, this was not limited just to the old Levers fraternity. Apart from family, friends and old neighbours there were few elder IIM – A alumni (he taught there before joining HLL) and some senior corporate professionals whom he would have befriended during his Shilputsi years. The current top-brass of “HUL” were conspicuous by their absence except for Harish Manwani and Shreejit Mishra whom I could spot. But, coming to think of it – Tarun had retired in 1987 and most of today’s stars weren’t – so to speak – even “born” then.


The function itself was understated and dignified in keeping with the personality of the man who was being remembered. A small bunch of people spoke – 6 to be precise including his daughter -Atsi and Ashok Vasudevan who sent a very touching voice-recorded tribute from the US.

the amraas guru

The remembrances marked the measure of the man that visibly resonated with the audience. As in modern high rises, low-ceilings being the order of the new corporate architecture - It’s not just they don’t have room in organizations for professionals as tall – but, as RG (an old friend and associate) wrote in his piece in ET (click here to read) he was a rare HR practitioner with a “humane” side (an oxymoron as it may sound to be).

I didn’t spend much time in Lever House between 1983 (when I joined HLL) and 1987 (when Tarun left) – so didn’t get the opportunity to know him very closely. I have a rather sepia tinted recollection of him in his corner room on 2nd Floor West Wing (which was later appropriated by Amy Kharas and successive Heads of Administration) – that was like an in-house shrink’s cabin of sorts before it was turned into a police station interrogation room in times to come.

{I didn't have the privilege of being invited for any of his fabled "Amraas" parties and, so, had no idea of his legendary capacity for mangoes (believe he could down 25 katoris in a single sitting !!). I do remember a funny incident though, when a new recruit – taking his offer to help him “settle in” too literally – went to him for getting a gas connection that rattled even his most unflappable self.}

I was there at the condolence meeting because, for me Tarun embodied much of the values that, the old HLL – that youngsters joined with stars in their eyes - stood for. If today, Lever can boast of the maximum number of CXOs to have come out of its stable spreading across industries in India and, now, even overseas– a large chunk of the credit must go to the likes of the Sheth - for laying the foundations of the HR system which withstood the ravages of time till the 'age of deconstruction' began.

In a way – therefore - I felt, I was representing in a small way many old compatriots - whose careers he had helped to shape - who wanted to be there but couldn't make it - either because of distance or some other reason.