My latest short story 'The Road to Aikon Aita's House' in New Asian Writing (9 Dec 2015)

My latest short story titled, 'The Road to Aikon Aita's House' has been published by New Asian Writing. Synopsis: In this story, the narrator talks of her life from fragments of memory, linking characters and landscapes along the way. It is as if the narrator is reminiscing about those childhood days, those journeys to upper Assam by road, which seem like a lost legacy now. And in this nostalgic trip she remembers the special relationship one of her grandmothers shared with a Muslim man from the town. 

Read the story at http://www.new-asian-writing.com/the-road-to-aikon-aitas-house-by-juanita-kakoty/

Papier Mache (Deccan Herald, 23 August 2015)

source: http://www.deccanherald.com/content/496712/genius-pied-papers.html

The genius of pied papers

Juanita Kakoty, August 23, 2015, DHNS

Family craft

Forty-three-year-old Shabir Dehqani was one of the master craftsmen who displayed his artistry at the Design Haat conducted by Apeejay Institute, in Delhi. 

Shabir Dehqani had come from Kashmir with his papier-mache products. He sat on the ground of his stall showing a painted papier-mache box to a few foreign students. He was pointing out the intricacies of the simple yet elegant craft of making the most with paper!

Listening to him talk about his family’s association with the craft was almost like flipping through the pages of history. 

“We are originally from Persia where papier-mache has been used to manufacture small painted boxes, trays of all sorts, étagères, a piece of furniture with open shelves and cases,” he said. 

He also informed his listeners that his family migrated to Kashmir in the 14th century. “There, our forefather, Raza Ali, started a papier-mache workshop and taught people this art form.” 

Apparently, in those days, there was unemployment in the region and the craft Raza Ali taught enabled many to earn an income.

As I picked up a colourful papier-mache jewellery box, Shabir explained the process behind creating such elegant products. “First, the paper is turned into a pulp with water and glue, and then it is  mashed. It is shaped after one’s choice and further smoothened. It’s in this final stage that colours and motifs are coated on it.”

Shabir informed that papier-mache is a French term that means “chewed paper”. “In Persia, bright colours are used to paint these products, and we have continued with this tradition. However, in the old days, only paper was used. But since 200 years now, we are also using wood and cardboard for our products,” he said of the craft’s evolution.

I looked at the sturdy products around me and it was really difficult to tell the paper products from the ones that were made of wood. Then Shabir revealed an interesting fact. 

“Although papier-mache is a French term, the craft originated in China!” Amrit Das, senior faculty at the fashion design department of the institute, said, “Shabir Husain and the other craftsmen from different domains that you see at the mela are master craftsmen who have won national awards and have been practising their craft for at least 25 years now. We are trying to provide platform for them to  interact with stakeholders at both the national and international levels. Through this, we hope to help them bring their crafts to a contemporary level, suited to the needs of the contemporary market, while keeping the intrinsic traditional essence of the craft alive.”

How I Realised I am a Feminist

When the Women's Reservation Bill was first introduced in the Lok Sabha in September 1996, the morning after we were gathered around breakfast and the newspaper at home. I was busy eating and wasn't paying attention to what the elders of the family, it was the men who were basically discussing this, had to say until they hurled a question at me: 'What do you think, do women require reservation to make it to the Parliament?' I was a little surprised that they asked me, a student in Class X, and not the other women present (who were mostly housewives). I cleared my throat with as much importance as I could considering kids in the family were generally not allowed their opinion in matters of the state or family when elders were discussing it. And I said what came to me naturally, that women are strong, meritorious and capable enough and do not require quotas to succeed. All of them applauded my statement. And I felt very good. And that was the truth for me at that time. I knew nobody at home supported reservations. I often heard elders complain of how somebody from a scheduled caste, scheduled tribe or other backward class had managed a promotion ahead of them because of the quota. Also, all around me I noticed women who were doctors, engineers and teachers. All doing good. What I didn't take into account was the social background they came from. All of these accomplished women I knew of were from middle class families with fathers mostly as engineers (because my father was an engineer with a state department in Assam so I knew many of his colleagues who had daughters doing very well), doctors, professors, bureaucrats, geologists and upper scale employees at Oil India Limited or the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC). So while in school, these were the families I knew and their daughters were invariably doing well and also went on to marry well, successful husbands from similar 'good families'. And yes, nobody in my family had heard of feminism till then, nor had I. 

In Hindu College, Delhi University and JNU, New Delhi, where I pursued a Bachelor's, Master's and an M.Phil. in Sociology, I became aware of India's caste system for the first time. I devoured the books by stalwarts M.N. Srinivas, Andre Beteille and Yogendra Singh and declared to all I knew how 'safe' Assam has been for everyone. Weren't we lucky we had no caste system or its perils ever? And my non-Assamese friends always marveled when I told them this because they could not fathom a world without the caste system. Where they lived, who they interacted with, dined with and married was always dependent on what castes you came from. I was shocked and enlightened them about how we can marry just anyone other than the 'tribals' because the tribals are not like us, we are like the rest of the Indians (although at that time I only meant the Hindus when I said 'rest of the Indians'; also my idea of how the rest of the Indians were was limited to what Bollywood showed me). Also, I had no idea how I was using the word 'tribal', placing them lower in the social hierarchy as if it was alright. And I hated the sight of the feminists - the fabIndia kurta wearing, kohl-eyed women who aggressively shut you up, or rather shut me up. They would never listen to me and dismissed me like  a non-entity. Not just me but everybody else like me who had no interest in discussing what the state was doing, how oppressed women were, etc. etc. And they talked so much about 'gender' issues that I skipped opting a paper on gender studies for as long as I could. No, I didn't want to be like them. And I am glad I am still not like them. I can listen to your opinion calmly even if it is bang opposite of what I have to say.    

In 2007, for the first time in my life, I came face to face with the caste system right at the heart of my beloved Assam. I was at Patbaushi, a village in Barpeta district for my PhD research. There I saw how the lower castes are not allowed entry into the homes of the upper castes. I came across a few cases where two or three Scheduled Caste women had married upper caste men. These women were not allowed entry into the kitchen and prayer room in the household, and were given rooms further or cut off from the rest of the household. I was stunned. These women were also outcasts in their own communities. I had never lived in the villages of Assam and I realised how protected a life I led. I just had no access to anyone who wasn't from my social background or who actually came from rural Assam. Yes, I interacted with many people in school, the prestigious convent Holy Child school precisely, and Cotton College (for my XIth and XIIth), but who spoke about caste and communities at school? We were talking mostly about crushes, textbooks, film stars, fables, films, music, and the paranormal.

At Patbaushi, I had gone to study the changing socio-religious status of the Xatras (vaishnavaite religious establishments) in the village and stumbled upon the persistent caste dynamics instead; and how it always manifested in how the women were treated. Which is why I could not finish my PhD perhaps because my focus just shifted! Where was I living all this while? How was my world so different? And why did I think my world is everybody's world too? I felt so bad for these lower caste men and women who thought it was fine, and not their right to question, if they were not allowed entry into the upper caste households. And that was when I started to think about what marginalisation meant.

Coming to marginalisation, at a recent screening of the film 'Meena' on a prostitute who comes from a community that practices inter-generational prostitution in India, a lady came up to me and remarked how everybody is talking about the marginalised these days. Are there so many marginalised people? Who are the privileged then and where are they and why is no one talking about them? she asked me. And somehow I found myself answering her although I had no idea who she was. 'It is only in the arts, movies and books that people are talking about the marginalised,' I said. 'Do you talk about yourself or somebody else with a nice house where maids and domestic help cannot sit on your sofas or eat with you at the dining table? That's because you are in the privileged lot and what's there to talk about it? So we talk of what's happening to the marginalised who cannot sit with you or eat with you, among other things. Have you ever considered what caste or communities they came from? And if this is something regular in their castes/communities? And if ever one of them sat with you on the same sofa, then you would talk about it! The beggars that we see at Delhi's red lights - you drive by, stop at the red light, you give a rupee or maybe not to them. What's there to talk about this? But yes, there is a lot to talk about them because they are mostly from the Sansi community in Rajasthan who are nomadic tribes, and who have been practicing beggary since ages as livelihood because they cannot think of any other livelihood option. Their children do not go to school, they do not own land and houses, and most of the freed/denotified and nomadic tribes in India are not even enumerated by the Census, which is why they are neither scheduled castes, scheduled tribes or other backward classes and thus remain outside the realm of benefits provided by the state. So should we be talking about you and I who are entitled to provisions and benefits primarily because of the social and cultural capital we have been born with, or should we be talking about them, the marginalised who are not equipped in the first place to compete for these provisions and entitlements? You may ask why, and I may say 'what about the social and cultural capital which has helped you, me and the rest like us.' She looked at me a little bewildered and said, shrugging her shoulders, well I don't know maybe I will think about it, and walked away. But I am grateful she listened to me. And after she left, I pondered, if I were born in one of these communities, would it have been possible for me to be where I am today? In that case, would reservations for my education and employment have improved my life? I had goosebumps all over.   

I have seen how reservations have indeed improved the lot of many men and women. They don't have to emerge as world class leaders, but as Shweta Katti says, 'For the women of the community I come from, healthy childbirth and raising their children in a way that they can access education is a huge success.' Shweta Katti grew up in Kamathipura, Mumbai's red light area, where she spent the first 17-18 years of her life. As a child she went to the day care Apne Aap Women Worldwide set up in the neighbourhood for the children of prostituted women, where free tutions were provided to them. Today Shweta is at Bard College, New York and is one articulate, confident young woman. Her story is actually the story of how meaningful intervention and education can change people's lives. You can watch her talk in a video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR8KarGOAoQ&feature=youtu.be 

Yesterday, I was at the launch of a report on women police in South Asia by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative and learnt that of the total strength of Indian Police (Civil and Armed) - 22,83,646 - women constitute only 6.11% (1,05,325 in numbers). There were reports about how women are thought of as unfit for policing jobs! How they are perceived as physically weaker (when there were many women officers in the gathering who looked as physically tough and at times tougher than some of the men around). But the bigger question is: Would a larger number of women in the police force imply a greater sensitivity to how cases are dealt with, cases particularly related to women? We can only wait and watch, like how we can only wait and watch if a greater participation by women in the Parliament would bring a change to law and administration. But at our hearts, we know it will, because in all of my 36 years now I have seen how women can rescue other women, how women can understand other women, how across all sections, certain issues that women face are the same, and when women talk about these to each other they listen with an inherent sympathy. It is not to demean men and say they don't want to understand these issues, but the thing is they cannot understand these issues simply  because they have not faced them. 

Now some might say what kind of an argument is that! But the fact is until the time I started living in a Muslim ghetto, I had no idea what could the insecurity of those who lived in a ghetto be like. Today, when I often face the scathing remarks of autorickshaw and cab drivers about how 'dangerous' Muslims are and how 'dangerous' these colonies are, where they are either picking me up from or dropping me at, I feel the pain of all those who live in these ghettos like me. I am a Hindu, yet I feel the pain of all those who live in the Muslim ghetto where I live. And I wonder, had I still been living in the protected shelter of my home at the upper middle class neighbourhood in Guwahati, would I still feel the pain? Maybe not and I am ashamed to admit it today. But the question is, where are our policymakers, who shape the country's 'growth,' from?  Are they mostly from such upper middle-class neighbourhoods and have they ever lived in a ghetto or in a neighbourhood where communities like the Sansi live? In that case, do we understand the implications of this? 

So, I have now realised, quite late in life, that I am a Feminist, but surely not the kind I hated in the university. I am a feminist like hundreds of others who believe in an equal world, a more compassionate world, a world where everyone is given equal opportunities, be it a man or a woman or a transgender, a world which allows greater freedom for everyone, where there is equal access to life opportunities for everyone, and a world where everyone feels safe and secured. This is because now I understand that being a feminist primarily means an alternative perspective to look at the world. And I know, like we all do, the world I contemplate is far from the truth today. So until it becomes the truth for each of us, I will support reservations to bring marginalised people to a level from where they can set off to creating such a world. But in the end, I do realise how tough it is to explain why I am a feminist and how such enormous changes are possible.    

(This piece was reprinted by The Thumb Print in August 2015 http://www.thethumbprintmag.com/how-i-realised-i-am-a-feminist/)
           

My latest short story 'Letting go' in Himal Southasian. 13 Aug 2015.

My latest short story in Himal Southasian. 13 Aug 2015.

Excerpt: 

“Lokhora! Lokhora!” shouted a lean fellow, announcing the destination, in a sleeveless banyan that has become a dirty grey from its earlier white colour. Like a ballet dancer he flung open the back door, leapt on to the foothold at the same time, and balanced himself gracefully as he stood there keeping the door ajar with one hand. Three people got off, stooping to avoid hitting their heads on the ceiling of the Tracker, and another three standing on the pavement stepped in. There were already four passengers sitting in the row behind the driver. And three were squeezed in the front seat alongside the driver such that when he changed gears, he roughly brushed his fist against the knee of the passenger sitting next to him. Women, therefore, generally avoided sitting in the front row. 

“Oi! Move from there!” cried out Brojen Barua agitatedly from the netted verandah of the house. “How many times should I tell you guys not to park yourselves here!”

The people in the Tracker didn’t see him, but the driver started the engine and sped away. Brojen Barua was getting tired of these Trackers that had converted the spot right outside his gates into a stop. This had happened in the last two years or so with these vehicles almost taking over public transport in Guwahati. They were now seen in every nook and cranny, covering parts of the city where no buses go. “Who gave you the permission to make this a stop?” he often barked at them. And they ignored him, looking at him as if to say, do you own the road?

Read the rest of it at http://himalmag.com/letting-go-fiction-juanita-kakoty/

My latest short story 'Family Drama' in Eastlit, Volume 4, Issue 32, August 2015.

My latest short story 'Family Drama' features in Eastlit, Volume 4, Issue 32, August 2015.

An excerpt:

"I was the eldest among my siblings and helped Mother take care of the rest of the brood by bathing them, feeding them, cleaning their poop, etc. I even learnt to cook the waterydail and bhaat by the time I was ten years old. Which is why, I think, Mother found a confidante in me. She told me stories from her past while we washed clothes, made the beds, cleaned the house, or sang our prayer together – “Tumi Sitto Britti Muro” –  Mother singing from memory and I by following the words in the sacred text,Naamghosha.

“The Tipling High School was established by Gulok Chandra Baruah when we moved to Duliajan,” she told me one day when both of us were alone in the house. Father was away for a few days on work and my siblings were away at my aunt’s for a while. “Our house was right by the Tipling river. Father had a tiff with one of his brothers over land and he stormed out of the ancestral house in Jorhat, taking us with him.”

“How old were you then, Mother?” I asked.

“Hmmm 12 years I guess. I can’t say exactly,” she replied. The year she was born, nothing significant had happened, she said, hence no one remembered it.

Mother put some lentils and tomatoes to boil in a pot; I washed some rice for the two of us; Mother fetched some greens which she had cleaned earlier in the day and stored in a container in the fridge and continued with her story. “I was the eldest and the most hard-working like Ma. Ma used to get up before sunrise and sleep after everybody in the household had gone off to sleep. She would clean the area around the house, give fodder to the cows, feed the ducks and hens, cook food for all of us and the anxious guests who kept coming from father’s village to ask after us. I was the one up and about with Ma from sunrise.” Suddenly her voice became tender. She sniffed. “Ma worked so hard for all of us. And whenever there was fish or meat in the house, she would see to it that father and we got to eat well even if that meant she had to go without any.” A tear rolled down her right eye, which slanted a little more than the other eye, and she cried out softly, “Ma!” She closed her eyes and stayed still for a while, lips pursed as if that would keep the tears from gushing out. I didn’t disturb her. I quietly got up from the low wooden pira where I sat watching her clean the greens, and put the rice to boil on the stove. She got up in a short while and joined me with a bunch of little fish in her clenched hands. Saying move to the side, she deftly removed the hot lid of the pot where the lentils and the tomatoes were boiling with her bare hand and threw the fish into it. She then added the greens, some turmeric and salt and covered the pot once again. Turning to me, she whispered, “You have a beautiful face. Your aunt’s.” I melted and wrapped my arms around her and dug my face into her stomach, soaking in her familiar smells: of the earth, of garlic, of onions, of coriander, of fish, all mixed. “Had I a pretty face too, maybe I wouldn’t have been made to work so hard,” Mother spoke wistfully, “Meera has always been beautiful; she was a gorgeous child. No one made her work. Not even Ma.” My heart pained a little and I tightened my grip around her."

Read the rest of the story at http://www.eastlit.com/eastlit-august-2015/eastlit-content-august-2015/southlit-supplement-august-2015/family-drama/

Conversations with an autorickshaw driver: Do I like Modi sarkar?

I have been thinking of writing about this conversation that I had with an autorickshaw driver sometime early this year for a long time now. It went like this. He picked me up from Shaheen Bagh and because he learnt that I live in Shaheen Bagh, he assumed that I am a Muslim. I did not feel like correcting him. So I just let it be and went ahead with the curve that he lent to the conversation.

"Why do you Muslims hate Modi?" he asked me. And that's when I knew that he had mistaken me for a Muslim.
"Who told you Muslims hate Modi?" I responded.
"Well, I know," he answered with a strange laughter in a very matter of fact manner.
"In that case," I said, "Let me tell you, I don't. In fact, I don't give much thought to him at all. But just that, I don't know if you know, he has not done good things to Muslims in Gujarat, therefore I do not have much fondness for him."
"So it is a community thing for you Muslims not to like him?" the auto guy charged. So I put the question to him instead, "Do you like Modi sarkar?"
"Of course, I do!" his emphatic cry still rings in my ear. "He is such a nice man, he has such nice things to say, he has done so much for India's development, for Gujarat's development. He is not a man but a devta. And you Muslims make a demon out of him!"

I went quiet for a while. This guy will definitely not understand the politics of Modi's development approach in Guajarat where the Muslims and denotified tribes have been kept outside the ring of benefits and affirmative action. And I was sure he had not seen the NDTV report on TV, just before the elections in Delhi this year, where the journalist went to one of the Muslim neighbourhoods in Ahmadabad, a place which is like a wound in an otherwise 'shining' example of development that Gujarat is for the Modi camp. Why was this neighbourhood reeking of poverty and wretchedness? No electricity, no drinking water, no sewage. And this has been the case here for the last forty years, they said.

So I just told the guy that I was the wrong person to ask the question. In all of my 35 years, I have never voted, I said. Because I never needed to. I have never needed the government to do anything for me. I have my own house, I earn my own money to spend it as I please. The government has not given me my house; and in Shaheen Bagh, I told him, I buy my mineral water regularly. So I am not the right person to pose your question to. Go ask this to someone who has no house, no money, no electricity, no drinking water. Ask them if the government has given them a nice decent house in a nice neighbourhood with hygienic conditions to live in. A decent salary to live with their self-esteem in tact. Go ask them, I said. Only they will be able to tell you if the Modi sarkar is good or not. This time it was the guy who kept quiet for a while.

I went on to tell him that I am definitely grateful for many things in life. Like the UGC (University Grants Commission) scholarship I received as a student, the SAI (Sports Authority of India) scholarship I received as a sportsperson while in school, the Delhi Metro which has made life so easy for me in the city. In that case, the governments who made these things possible, I am grateful to them. But I know for sure Modi sarkar was not anywhere in the scene when all this happened. So I told the guy that I will be more than happy if Modi sarkar gives me a reason to be grateful to it. And that it is not about being a Muslim or a Hindu. But that for people like him and me, it is about what benefits the government brings to us. And how secured it can make us feel. And to just pinch him a bit, taking the conversation back to where it started, I said, "I won't be bothered about how Modi treats Muslims in Gujarat until and unless it affects me directly. Like I am sure you would not be bothered if Hindus in Assam or Bihar are ill treated until and unless it affects you here in Delhi directly, isn't it?"

The auto guy kept quiet for the rest of the journey.
   

Craft. Wooden blocks. (Deccan Herald, 12 July 2015)

Source: http://www.deccanherald.com/content/488722/carving-designs-livelihood.html

Carving designs & a livelihood

Juanita Kakoty, July 12, 2015, DHNS

Block printing

The courtyard at the Apeejay Institute of Design in New Delhi was dotted with clusters of workshops recently, where master craftsmen taught eager students the craft secrets. In one corner, 52-year-old Manzar Husain from Pilakhuwa, a village in Uttar Pradesh, sat with a slab of wood on the table in front of him, skillfully engraving delicate patterns on it with a fine tool.

“This is a family occupation,” he said, pointing to the beautiful wooden blocks laid out on a table nearby; something that he learnt from his father. 

“Some of these designs that I make are from my father’s and grandfather’s times, and the rest are my own. These blocks have been traditionally used for printing designs on saris, ladies’ suits and quilts. Now they are no more used for creating designs on quilts and sarees. Till a few years ago, wooden blocks were used by rural women for their products of domestic use. Nowadays, in comparison, such work has gone down,” he added.

Referring to the impact of workshops as such, he said, “This workshop is for five days only, but to master the craft of creating wooden blocks for printing, one needs about a year-and-a-half or two.” Nonetheless, he admitted that it was heartening to see enthusiasm among youngsters, and how those from foreign lands were trying to create their own designs by learning his techniques. 

Block printing is an ancient Indian craft. Uttar Pradesh has been an important centre for hand block printing with the classical butis (dots), paisley designs, and the ‘tree of life’ motif being widely used. “Hand block printing is appreciated in the West for its patterns and vibrant colours. Traditionally, the practice has been to use natural vegetable dyes. But synthetic colours are also used now,” revealed Manzar Husain.

“Besides, with machine-based printing capturing the market, the demand from garment and quilt factory owners for wooden blocks have come down. They now churn out finished products much faster and therefore stand to gain in the process. Also, machine printing is cheaper than hand printing. This has adversely affected the artisans who practise the art.” Nonetheless, he said, “there are people ready to pay for it. That keeps us going.”

These wooden blocks have been put to various uses. Women by the roadside and in the markets in Delhi are seen applying mehendi on eager customers with these blocks. “It’s easier for us because patterns can be made in less time. With a tube of mehendi, one takes at least 10 minutes to draw a pattern on one palm. With these blocks, we need only two-three minutes,” a woman with a basket of wooden blocks and mehendi paste at Dilli Haat recently told me.

Interior designers now employ the blocks in decorating walls. “I often use these wooden blocks with ‘tree of life’ or paisley patterns to decorate my clients’ walls. They come cheap. The aesthetic value is also immense,” commented interior designer Urmimala Bhuyan Bora. Celebrating its annual event, the design institute displayed exquisite traditional Indian crafts amongst a host of other things. “We look forward to such events,” confessed Manzar Husain, “They give us good exposure.”