THE QUIET CURIOSITY

This was in one of the villages near Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala in late 2004. Some of us, that included some people from Andhra Pradesh working with the state government , were visiting women’s groups supported under the Government of Kerala’s highly acclaimed programme, the Kudumbashree programme. These groups had engaged in various activities for their economic development. The group we were visiting belonged to the Dalit community. An interaction with them had been organized in the rather spacious and well maintained panchayat building.

At the appointed time, a group of about 15 women assembled in the hall. They were all neatly dressed. From their physical appearance, no one could possibly believe that they were poor. But their sense of self-esteem was striking. Each one had a note pad and a pen, ready to take notes on any useful points that may emerge from the discussions. They needed only a one-way translation. While the visitors asked questions in English which they could easily follow, they replied in Malayalam which I translated into English for the visiting group.

After a series of questions from the visitors which were very articulately responded to, one of the visitors said, “It is quite impressive to know that you all are well educated, in spite of your poverty. You dress so well that it’s so difficult for us to even think about yourselves as being poor. You are able to communicate very well. But there is one difference between you and the rural women of Andhra Pradesh. The poor women there do indeed look poor, are not able to communicate in any language other than Telugu and are not able to dress as well as you do. But they are certainly much more vocal that you are. You are a much quieter lot, responding only to the questions we ask”.

The women giggled. They found the comparison quite amusing. One of them, Geetha, who seemed to be one of the youngest in the group, then said, “Sir, we do have questions and we would have been more vocal. But we were told that you have limited time and that we should spend time in explaining to you our programme. Hence we didn’t ask you anything. But if you have the time, we would like to ask you a few questions”. Our friend from Andhra Pradesh beamed. He was happy that he had been able to get them to participate more actively. “Sure, go ahead. We can certainly spend more time talking to you”. What followed then was a volley of questions that took us all by surprise. Some of the questions were :

“What is the role of information technology in economic development of your state”?
“How have the rural poor, and especially women, benefited from the Information Technology boom that is so often mentioned in the context of Andhra Pradesh”?
“We hear that farmers in Andhra Pradesh commit suicides. If your state is developing so well, why are farmers being affected”?
“How do you ensure that rural producers are able to benefit from the market, which normally is controlled by the rich”?

We were taken by surprise, to say the least. The level of education and awareness was reflected so clearly through the sharp questions they had raised. So what if they were Dalits or if they were poor ? They had kept themselves abreast of developments in other parts of the country. Needless to mention, our group did find it difficult to answer these questions to their satisfaction. But as hosts, the women were gracious enough not to grill us too much !

A ROYAL ENCOUNTER

This is a slightly different post from what I have been posting earlier. While my earlier posts were about events way back in the past, mostly from rural India, this one is more contemporary !

A few days ago, to my utter surprise and completely out of the blue, I received an invitation from the Buckingham Palace inviting me to a reception hosted by Queen Elizabeth and her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, Obviously, it was quite exciting and when I emailed my confirmation, I received a response saying that it was being held in view of a forthcoming visit by the Indian President to the UK. There was quite a bit of excitement in my office as well, for no one before from our office had received an invitation like this. So well, I was very much looking forward to it - and of course, I was not disappointed.

The reception was at 6 p.m. on Oct 13th. 2009, Tuesday, and we were asked to be there before 5.40 p.m. I was there at about 5.30 p.m. We were supposed to enter from the main palace gates. Once inside, we were ushered into a hall (called the Investitute Hall, where the Queen normally meets foreign dignataries and where the various honours and awards include conferring knighthood, is held). As people filed in, I estimated that there were about 200 people there - a mix of British, Indian-British and Indians, quite a mixed crowd.

At 6 p.m. we were all asked to take our seats. And then there was a Bollywood dance show, with British dancers dancing to the beats of old melodies like 'Pyaar Hua Ikraar Hua Hai' and the more modern 'Dhoom Macha Le'. That was for about 15 minutes. After that, we were ushered into another room called the Picture Gallery where there are some exquisite paintings, some several hundred years old, that belongs to the palace.

And as we queued up to make our way, we saw, at some distance ahead, the Queen and her husband. She was there, greeting everybody by shaking their hand with the Duke (her husband) next to her, also greeting and shaking hands. It was quite a moment when it was my turn to shake the Queen's hand and then the Duke's. I was struck by how elegant she looked and yet very modest and greeting each person individually.

That done, I worked my way round the floor, meeting and greeting a few people, making some small and social conversations. Champagne was served and I helped myself together with some canapes - very delicious. The guests were spread across 3 halls. We had assumed that the Queen would have retired to her private chambers. But to my surprise, I found her in the midst of people, mingling with the crowd.

I was obviously keen to have a word with her and as I made my way to a group of people who were talking to her, her assistants, two of them, asked me to get closer into the group so that I could talk to her - which I did ! She asked me what I did and I spoke briefly about my organisation and our work. Even at the ripe age of 80+, she spent well near 2 hours in the reception, never sitting even once, moving around, greeting people and talking to them. Absolutely amazing !

There were quite a number of known faces. One of them was the big film producer, Yash Chopra, with whom I had a chat. Then there was the Indian-British film maker Gurinder Chadda (of the Bend it like Beckam fame), Indian-British actors Sanjiv Bhaskar and Meera Syal, Bollywood actor Saed Jaffrey, business tycoon Vijay Mallya, the Indian High Commissioner to the UK and the Indian-British cricketer Monty Panesar (whose autograph I got). And of course, there were many other not-so-known members of the royal family. I met with and spoke to the Duchess of Gloucester (who apparently went to India for her honeymoon several decades ago and she said it had been organised for her by Lord Mountbatten !) and Princess Michael of Kent.

All in all, it was quite an amazing and memorable experience. But what I found most amazing and was indeed deeply impressed was how simple and modest the Queen was, so informal and pleasant ! And very interestingly, though the event was in the Palace, security was absolutely minimal. There was only a couple of cops who checked our identity card and our invitation. There were no metal detectors, no checking, no frisking ! Thought I'd share that event with you which will remain one of my most memorable evenings !!!

A SILENT REVOLUTION

It is experiences like these that convince me that a silent revolution is sweeping by the countryside, in rural areas, in far flung hamlets and villages. I was once visiting some villages in the Jalaun district of Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state of India, in mid-2003. This is a district which continues to mirror the typical characteristics of a feudal era, where land holding is skewed, where repression of dalits and women is marked and which has an adversely skewed gender ratio, low rates of education especially among the women and high rates of morbidity and mortality.

The women I met were members of a self-help group. They had initially started off 4-5 years ago by saving small amounts so that they could collect a small fund to meet their various needs. Gradually, these evolved as forums for women to look at issues affecting them. They started discussing issues of domestic violence, of sexual harassment while working on the farms of the rich and influential landlords, of the low level of education among the girl children. They started taking part in various village level planning exercises. Some even stood for and got elected into the panchayat (local government). They had started insisting on getting their daughters educated. They had negotiated with their men folk to enable women to access more opportunities.

As their work grew, and as the visible impact of their work grew, the men too started taking notice. The men had realized that their women needed to spend more time outside their homes, to visit the block development officer’s office, to go to the District Collector’s office to press for their demands, to visit the bank in the neighbouring town to deposit their savings etc. They had started getting convinced that these would help them and their villages. As a result, they had started to even undertake domestic chores – taking care of their children, cooking, fetching water and fuelwood etc. The women had also seen the advantage of getting their sons engaged in domestic chores, earlier restricted to the girl children.

While we were discussing these issues, I noticed that many women still had their faces covered. The system of purdah was still quite prevalent. I asked them about this custom and whether they thought this practice was going to change. “There have been lot of changes over the past 5 years of so. We have started taking various responsibilities and representing the needs of our village with the block and district officials. This never happened before. We have been transacting with the bank. More and more girls are getting educated. We have regular meetings. We speak up in meetings even when our menfolk are around. These are major changes for us. Yes, we still tend to cover our faces when there are other men around. But then, this too, is a matter of time. In a few years from now, even this will disappear”, they said emphatically.

I have seen such changes sweeping through many other parts of the country. Our mainstream media, especially our films and television serials, may still be stereotyping our women and glorifying their traditional roles to counter the trends of increased opportunities that women are increasingly seeking, our corporate sector may still be raking in the big bucks by continuing to project women as objects of desire, our cities may be reeling under various atrocities against women, even in the so-called middle and upper class strata, with various forms of domestic violence, our labour markets may still pay much less to women for the same kind of work - even, in some cases, in the case of skilled and professional workers, our urban educational institutions and work places may still be a melting pot of sexual harassment ……. but these belie a quiet, but significant change that is sweeping across our countryside, nothing short of a silent revolution and hopes for a lasting change, even if that's going to take a long time ……!!!

THE LETTER FROM ARULMANY

Life in Tarashiv continued to be uneventful. Days were short because of the winters. December was coming to an end and we were at the threshold of 1984. The only thing (or so it seemed to me) that made life eventful at all were our occasional visits to Tilda, Kesada or Bhiladi, or the more regular evening waits by the roadside in the dark for the milk collection van to bring us letters from our friends. Our batchmates from IRMA where we were doing our Rural Management course, were spread across many states for our mandatory 2 month rural orientation.

Letters from friends describing how they were getting along in their respective rural environments was pretty interesting and insightful. But the one that took the cake was the one we received from Arulmany who was in Erode, Tamil Nadu. This was soon after the New Year, in early January. He was writing this letter soon after one of the faculty members, Srinivas, had just stayed with him for a couple of days on one of the routine visits that the faculty did while the students were in the field. Srinivas was a relatively new member of the faculty and this was probably his first rural visit and stay. Having graduated from one of the elite Indian Institutes of Management in India and teaching Financial Manager, poor Srini (as he was fondly referred to) may never have expected to undergo this kind of an experience ! Arulmany's letter went something like this :

“ Having Srini around was great fun. You know what a simple, nice and shy fellow he is ! He was quite cool and we had a good time. His only problem was going to the toilet. We didn’t have one. On the day he arrived, he asked me where the toilet was. I said there was no toilet. He was horrified. What do you do then, he asked. We go out in the open, I said. But where, he asked. This place is full of houses. We do to the side of the road, I said. But then there is so much traffic passing by, he said. But I said, there is no choice. When does the traffic stop, he asked. I said, the last bus passes by at 11.30 p.m. Ok then, I will go only after that, he said. But what will you do till then, I asked. I will hold on, he said. So, he would wait till it was night. I would then escort him through the lanes to keep an eye on the snakes that could be around and about which, Srini was scared stiff. When we came up to the road, he would fit a suitable place to squat and then ask me to switch off the torch, while he went about his business. On the second day too, the same thing happened. I sat up till late and after 11.30, escorted Srini to the road which was a little distance away. At the appointed place across the road, Srini sat down and asked me to switch off the torch. I was on the other side of the road. I switched it off. And while I looked around gazing at the starts, enjoying the cool night breeze and listened casually to the sound of insects around me, I heard Srini ask, ‘Arulmany, what is the time’ ? ‘Can I switch on the torch to check’? I asked. ‘Ok, but turn the other way and switch it on. I am not finished as yet’, he said. I turned around and switched on the torch to check my wrist watch. It was five minutes past twelve. ‘It is 12.05, Srini’, I said. ‘Thanks Arulmany. Wish you a Happy New Year’, came his reply. That’s how I welcomed the new year this time ! Hope you guys had a better way of celebrating the new year!”

LIVING IN TARASHIV

Apoorva and I were gradually getting used to living in Tarashiv - our winter of 1983 ! As part of our Rural Management course, this fieldwork (of staying in a village) was meant to be our rural orientation and help us understand the dynamics of rural India.

But what we just couldn’t get ourselves to was to take a dip in the village pond. We had seen the several uses it had been put to – from washing hands after performing the morning ablutions to washing cattle. We had also come to know that the men rarely ventured out far into the fields for their morning job. They preferred to squat behind the far end of the earthern bund of the pond, so that the process of cleaning was much easier. They just had to walk up and over the bund and get down in the water, obviating the need for a lota (a small pot that is normally used to take water when going for answering the call of nature !) or a plastic mug, which always ran the risk of water being spilt. While the nature’s calls couldn’t go unanswered, we could certainly afford not to take bath. It was winter and just washing our face, hands, feet and sprinkling a little water on our heads made us feel fresh enough. And that’s how we managed for the first 10 days.

But at the end of it, one of the villagers asked us casually, “Don’t you guys take bath” ? We were taken aback. We didn’t realize that our ways of living were being noticed. “Why do you ask”, we shot back. “Well, we see you brushing, go out with your lotas, washing your face and hands sitting on the verandah, but we have never seen you go to the pond for a bath”. Now how could we put forth our reservations of getting into the pond ? “What time do you normally have your bath”, I asked the person questioning me. “We bathe early in the morning. By 8 or so in the morning, we are through”, he said. “Ah, that’s what ! We bathe a little late”, I said, “as we find the water too cold in the morning.” “That’s understandable”, this person said. “But then our women folk go later in the day and they have to spend a lot of time there, for they have to wash the clothes too. They don’t seem to have seen you either !”. “That’s precisely the point”, I said. “We know that your women folk come there later in the day and to avoid them too, we take bath after they are through”.

That answer seemed to satisfy their lingering doubts about our levels of personal hygiene. We had also scored a point by negating any lurking thoughts they may have about being lecherous at the village pond especially when their women were bathing ! We were gaining some respectability, after all, but then, we also need to provide evidence that we do what we said we were doing.

So one day, we mustered enough courage to take a dip in the pond, setting aside all reservations about the various activities that took place in and around the pond. It was important as being seen to be conscious about and practising our personal hygiene ! On the appointed day, we called out to Somu to inform us that we were going to the pond, so that at least one family can support our evidence of bathing. As we made our way to the pond which our towels and soap boxes prominently displayed, we met a few other people and without being asked, made it a point to say that we were going to have our bath. I am sure they were wondering why we should be announcing our bath !

So there we were at the pond. Without thinking too much about the water, we plunged in, noisily enough to baffle the cool buffaloes who were perhaps used to spending their time in the water without being disbursed. We rushed out of the water just as quickly as we plunged in. And as we dried ourselves in the afternoon sun, we felt a strange sense of baptism, or now being assimilated in some strange way into the life of Tarashiv.

Those two months of living in a village (Tarashiv) and in a small town (Rajim) helped us understand a lot about rural India. The gentle pace of life, the deep relationship with land and agriculture, the role of livestock in the economy of the family, the distant relationship with cities – these were very new for us. The milk van in the evening that came to collect the evening collection was our main connection with the external world. It brought to us letters from our family and friends. More importantly, in the absence of a telephone and transport facilities, it connected us to our friends in Kesda and Bhiladi. The milk van would first come to Kesda, then to Bhiladi and then to Tarashiv. So it meant that in addition to letters from afar, we could also potentially receive notes from Shankar and Sudhir in Kesda, and Ashu in Bhiladi.

For Apoorva and me, it became an important event in the day to look forward to, spending, at time, almost two hours by the side of the road in the evenings, a kilometer or so from our village, waiting for the milk van to arrive. And ofcourse, there would be disappointments. On many days, there were no letters and on some days, the milk van would just not come because of a breakdown, the driver’s illness or his personal problems (those were the days when he had just entered into a polygamous arrangement, having taken a second wife without divorcing the first one, who in turn, was once a second wife because of a previous wife, who then divorced him !).

Just twenty, and that age to spend time in a sleepy village, 60 kms from the nearest city of Raipur would be eminently laughable for guys that age in today’s world, possibly. But there we were, on a mission to understand rural India, Apoorva fired with excitement and me, with boredom. To cut out the boredom and the monotony of the food, I would suggest a bicycle ride to Tilda, 10 kms away, which atleast had a tiny railway station and a handful of run down shops selling a range of stuff, which gave a semblance of some activity. I could have my favourite jalebi and samosa. Motivating Apoorva was a big task. Conscientious that he was, he was more keen to complete the checklist of activities we were supposed to perform while staying in a village, that meant interviewing people, analyzing the functioning of the milk co-operative, none of which were my pressing needs as Apoorva would do it for sure, and anyway, it was meant to be a joint submission on our return to our institute, IRMA.

I would instead offer to hire a bicycle at the princely rate of a rupee an hour and then ride with him on the pillion – not an easy task on the type of road that we had to traverse, but all the same, a worthwhile effort to cut out the boredom. I would head straight for the stall that sold hot samosas and jilebi, much to Apoorva’s disgust, though he would have a generous helping himself ! Apoorva’s attraction in turn was to grab the piece of newspaper in which the samosas and jilebis were wrapped, straighten it out and read whatever was possible through the sticky liquid and the oil with which the paper was coated, so what even if the newspaper was a year old ! So much did he miss reading material of any worth.

On a couple of occasions, we extended the ride past Tilda to meet Ashu, who quite seemed to enjoy his solitude in Bhiladi. Pradeep, the guy who was to pair with Ashu did drop in a couple of times to remind him that he was part of the team and that he must be credited with any submission Ashu would prepare (for grades mattered !), which Ashu readily agreed to. It was a much better proposition that to have Pradeep hang around.

Once, the three of us decided to visit Kesda, which was farther. That was where Sudhir and Shankar were stationed. They seemed to have settled in very well indeed, much to our envy. They had a decent enough hut with a proper room and seemed to have better company. They had a much bigger pond which also seemed much cleaner. After the pond in Tarashiv, bathing in the Kesda pond was certainly very welcome !

These occasional meetings was a great time to share what we had seen, learnt and experienced. This was also the time when we shared the letters and the contents of these that had been sent by common friends going through similar experiences in other parts of the country. Some of the letters gave us a complex. They talked about how they had participated in laying a road to the village and hence had become popular in the village. Some letters made us envious, like the one from a couple of dear friends who had set their eyes on a village belle and had all intentions of cosying up to her, which, they felt, they were nearing and asked us to wait with ‘bated breath’ for the next update !

THE MORNING RITUALS IN TARASHIV

The first day in Tarashiv, our chosen village, was pretty okay. This was way back in December 1983 when Apoorva and I were to spend a month in this village as part of our rural orientation, as part of our Rural Management studies from the Institute of Rural Management - Anand (IRMA). We didn’t have anything to do. We walked around a little bit to get to know the lanes. There were not very many, anyway, so it didn’t actually need much time. The houses were in neat little rows facing each other. In the evening, we went to the milk co-operative, in time for the evening collection, of milk hoping to be of some help. The secretary, our land lord, was there, waiting for people to come and pour their milk. The people were coming in a trickle, with milk in bottles and small utensils. They didn’t have much to contribute to the pool anyway. No single contribution had exceed a litre, a far cry from the Kheda co-operatives in Gujarat, where there used to long queues to pour milk, after which they would move to another queue to collect their cash payment for the previous day’s milk and after which they stood in yet another queue, some of them, to buy cattle feed. So it meant on their way back, they (mostly women) would have an empty brass pot or big steel utensils with a long handle, all empty, a kilo or two of processed, nutritious cattle feed and still have enough money to take back home as hard cash, in their fists or tucked away into their blouses or in a cloth purse that would hang around their waist.

However, none of this was required in Tarashiv. Cash could be available only once a week, or if the Raipur (district level) dairy was going through a liquidity problem, it could be once a fortnight or even longer. There was no cattle feed stock. In fact, no one bought cattle feed, as no one could afford to. Which then meant that the bullocks were only big as the cows, the cows looked like calves and the calves were barely bigger than the mongrels that roamed around ! We once came across a family of 17 cows and so, we thought they would be the single largest contributor to the milk society. But that was not the case. They had barely managed to pour 10-15 litres of milk during an entire month as most of the cows were dry and there was only one which gave milk everyday, most of which had to be used for home consumption !

Coming back to our first day in Tarashiv, as night came nigh, the winds got a little chilly. Our landlord, the secretary of the milk co-operative, was also the provider of our food. We were never very clear on the terms. We weren’t told, nor did we ask. The arrangement had been made by the Raipur Milk Union who told us that we would have to pay a ‘reasonable amount’, though the reasonable amount was not specified. We welcomed the darkness. It helped us to get over the inconvenience of not having access to a toilet. We didn’t have to go far to urinate, atleast ! Any bush round the corner was fine. Not that we were not used to urinating in the open. It was quite easy in the anonymity that a city like Ahmedabad could offer, where the chance of a person seeing you pee in public would be one in a thousand and hence worth taking the risk. Whereas here, on the first day itself, we had been seen and noticed by several people in the village and several more would see us and we had to continue living there for atleast a month !

The food was hot and delicious (it was partly because we were very hungry and partly because it was our first meal, not realizing that the menu would largely be unchanged throughout the month). It consisted of white plain rice (which had a nice aroma - remember, we were in the rice bowl, Chattisgarh) in a heap in a round thali (plate) and dal (lentils) made of green grams. Yes, we did look at the dal very carefully. Those were the days when there was a raging controversy on the after effects of regular use of the saffron-coloured (kesar) dal which was commonly consumed in Raipur and the neighbouring districts (which now form the state of Chhattisgarh). It was said that regular consumption of kesar dal could lead to paralysis. Though the local people couldn’t care less, for us, we did not want to take a chance. Hence the sight of a green gram dal was very welcome. There was also a little vegetable (this would change regularly, but normally it was potatoes and brinjal).

It had been a long day. A 60 kms. ride by jeep from Raipur, settling in our new home, walking round the village, an evening the milk co-operative – well certainly, our insulated carefree life on the IRMA campus with its idyllic setting had not prepared us for something more taxing ! We snuggled into our beds, one on the cot, one on the floor. And while we were dying to sleep (we actually went to sleep at 8.30 p.m., again, a far cry from our sleeping time at IRMA, which was never before 2.00 a.m.!), we found ourselves tossing and turning around.

For me, it was possibly because it was a new place. But then there were other factors too. The excitement of being in a new place, the slight discomfort at the complete silence all around, except for the grunting noises that our bovine neighbours made occasionally, worrying sick about the possibility of having to share the floor with snakes or scorpions or other insects…..! For Apoorva, it was almost entirely to do with the threat of the cows knocking down the rear door and trampling him or goring him, depending upon where and how they caught him ! He cursed the cows each time the thought about them disturbed him, cursed himself for choosing to come to a village and stay in a place where the cows could just walk it with little effort with their threatening horns and hooves, cursed himself for having joined IRMA and having to undergo such unusual travails, far from the comforts of his home in Ahmedabad ! But somehow, we managed to sleep.

We kept hearing various sounds and noises from early in the morning, but it was too early for us to wake up. 8 a.m. was normally a reasonable time to wake up while we were on the campus and we had thought we will give up an hour’s sleep and wake up at 7 instead. With every passing moment, the type of sounds kept increasing. People talking, the heavy metal handle of the buckets hitting the rim as women poured water into the various brass pots they had collected from the village well, the creaking sound of men’s footwear as they untied the cows and led them to wherever they intended to take them, of sounds and smells from the kitchen and so on. And yes, the cocks crowing (well, they kept on crowing endlessly even after they would have managed to wake up the entire village !) and the cows mooing, calling out for either getting their udders emptied or to draw attention to their empty stomachs. 7 still seemed quite early in the morning, for we had no work to do, no classes to attend. All that we had to do was understand and observe life in rural India and then write about it.

We came out to the verandah and started brushing our teeth. It must have seemed a strange sight to those who walked past, seeing us brush in a very strange manner with white froth forming at the corners of our mouth. Most of the people we saw had a neem twig which they kept on chewing while they went about their other errands – herding their cattle, carrying wood and haystacks on their heads, cycling down the road. Some were, like us, stationed at one place while they rubbed their teeth vigourously with the kala dant manjan – the black tooth powder, which was locally made and commonly used in several parts of rural India. We even had it in Kerala. It was called ‘mukkeri’. In cities, they came in neat little and for some reason, red coloured packets. I remember, in Ahmedabad, one of the most popular brands was the ‘Monkey’ brand. Later on, these were replaced by Dabur’s lal (red) dant manjan and the Colgate’s white tooth powder.

So far, so good ! But then, the rumbling in our stomachs started. It was time to answer the nature’s call. For some reason we were quite optimistic to find a toilet, but did not quite know how to go about identifying one. Just as we were wondering about asking our landlord, his mother came out and handed over a steel lota to us which could just about hold a litre of water, “Yeh bahar jaane ke liye hai” (This is for you for going 'out' - 'out' being an euphemism for toilet, which we did not know at that time). We did not quite understand what that meant, for we hadn’t asked for one. But then, the lota, in addition to being symbolic for various other things, was also symbolic of the morning (or the evening ) ablutions ! Fortunately, we were carrying with us a plastic mug too, so that we did not have to be sequential about answering the call of nature, the longer one, that is ! “You can fill the water from the pond which is on the way to the fields”, Somu said helpfully.

It was a cold morning. Our rubber chappals (slip-ons) were not good enough to keep them from freezing. But our pressing need and the anxiety of finding a good enough place to let it all out on our first day in the village (we had hogged the whole of the previous day in Raipur, considering the fact that urban food would now be a month away) made us tread gingerly on the path that led us out of the village to the pond where many like us were visible. They seemed to have completed their task as we could see them wash their hands.

We didn’t have the faintest idea where we needed to go and how far we needed to go. We hadn’t bothered to check it out with Somu. We thought of walking as far away as possible. As we made our way through the freshly ploughed farms that grew pulses, over the lumps of damp earth, our feet started freezing even more with the fresh cold dew that was very visible on the plants and wild grass. And as our need became more pressing, we started walking faster, awkwardly negotiating over the lumps of damp earth in our most unsuitable chappals (no wonder those who wore footwear chose to wear a very rigid sort of a leather chappals). The now-less-than-a-litre water from our plastic mug and lota started spilling miserably, drastically reducing the quantity of this precious liquid that would ensure our hygiene !

Finally, we came to the corner of a farm with a nice protective hedge all around. “This place looks safe” said Apoorva in great relief. And just as we were about to go onto our haunches, we saw someone coming straight across the farm from behind the very hedge which we thought would give us privacy ! And before he could notice us, we darted to the other side of the hedge, looking for a safer place. It took a good five more minutes to identify the next safest place. This time, we said enough was enough. We could not hold on any longer. And if someone did see us in the act, well, there was no choice. So there we were, out in the open on a cold morning in Tarashiv, delightfully relieving ourselves, happy in the thought that our act of commission would make someone’s farm organically more rich !

This was the first time I was going out in the open. Not that I was used to attached toilets all my life. In the government quarters that we stayed in Ahmedabad, the toilet was in our backyard, a good 10 feet away from our living space. That was okay except on freezing winter early mornings, when we had to go to school early in the morning, twice a week on a Wednesday and a Saturday. As a kid, the cold and the dark were ingredients for a certain mortal fear, till I was about 7 or 8. Our village in Kerala was different. At least, till the seventies, the toilet was about 40 feet away from the house, in the midst of our ‘parambu’ or the open land dotted with coconut palms and various other trees that was typical of most houses in the country side. There were two neighbouring houses. One belonged to my great grand mother and the other to my grand aunt, both on the maternal side. One was a pucca one, the other, a kutcha one. The pucca one was pretty much like the typical Indian ones that you would see in a government quarters, like the one we lived in, except that there was no water tap. Instead, there was a water tank into which we had to pour water drawn from the well. The kutcha one was made of sheets of coconut leaves woven like a mats which provided for an enclosure without a door. You had to turn in left to enter it and then turn right to get to the place where you would perform your job. It didn’t have a septic tank. It had a pit. You had to squat on the two wooden planks while you relieved into the pit. To avoid looking below, one would look up at the heads of the swaying palms, which made for a much better sight and also enabled you to keep the nose turned up. I would avoid this structure as much as possible. I was most worried that someone would barge in while I was there and hence keep on coughing incessantly to keep the potential trespassers away.

Coming back to Tarashiv, the most anxious moments, especially in the early days, was about finding out a safe place to relieve ourselves. Thankfully, I found Apoorva more fastidious than me. By the time he has scouted around for a suitable place with his own security checks to make sure that he could get his 10 minutes of peace to complete his job, I would have done mine. And it was this type of pressure that made us alter our waking up timing. We were now up at 6 in the morning to take advantage of the morning winter darkness. Ofcourse, it meant we would encounter more people on our way to or way back from the fields, but the morning darkness lent us a relative anonymity that we welcomed !

OF LIVING IN RURAL INDIA
It was during the winter in 1982. I was in Anand, a small, sleepy town of Gujarat in western India then, and probably, a small, sleepy town still. I had come to appear for an interview, on clearing the written admission test for the Institute of Rural Management - Anand (IRMA), which offered a Post-graduate Diploma in Rural Management (PGDRM). The sight of the lush green campus enthused me, coming from a dry and dusty city of Ahmedabad. The interview panel consisted of 5 members of faculty. One of them, the only lady on the panel, was Rajeshwari Rao. She started off with her first question, “What do you know of life in rural India”? Now that was a tough question. I had never seen rural India before. All my knowledge of life in a village was based on my once-in-two-years sojourn to my native Kerala in south India. But then, villages in Kerala are not quite like villages in other parts of the country. Or so I thought ! My other source of information on villages was thanks to Bollywood, with films “Mera Gaon, Mera Desh” and I thought villages were probably full of beautiful belles with those enticing back-less cholis (blouses) or dacoits with rifles riding on horses, where there were endless fairs around temples and where everyone wore colourful dresses. But then obviously, that was not the answer that I could give Rajeshwari Rao, much as I wanted to get admission to IRMA. So I said something that I thought was pretty innocent and straightforward, “Oh ! Life in the rural India ? Well, it is about cocks crowing in the morning and cows mooing, where there are beautiful mud huts and a nice pond”. I am not joking. That’s exactly what I said – just cannot imagine that I said it then, so naïve was I in my understanding of rural India, at a time when I was hoping to get into rural management !

Now I suppose that must be the type of answer that many of the potential candidates gave, or would have given, and still possibly give, year after year. Which is why, during our time, there was a 2-day village orientation visit. But then, this visit was to a village in Kheda district, one of the most prosperous districts of India with very high levels of agriculture and milk production, dominated by the enterprising Patel community. We didn’t really get to understand rural India, but yes, we did get to see the co-operative milk society function, which had a larger than life presence. Even the local buses and shops were willing to trade in the coupons issued by the milk co-operatives in lieu of change, for shortage of small change was quite common. The women, to the disappointment of many of us guys, were not as gorgeous as the Asha Parekhs and the Rekhas who normally played the roles of village damsels with great aplomb in many a Bollywood films. But then, of course, we did see some beautiful women ! Soon after, we were shown ‘Manthan’, a film almost like a documentary made on the success of the White Revolution through the dairy co-operatives that made India one of the leading producers of milk and dairy products. Now that film provided some real insights into life in rural India. It was not the gorgeous women-dacoits on horses-village fairs formula film. It was about solidarity at the community level, about the resolve of women and about how village communities were capable enough to bring in an economic revolution. We now felt better informed.

But then, the real education on life in rural India came a few months later when, in December 1983, the entire batch of about 60 students trooped to various parts of the country in small groups of 4-6 students to spend 2 months in a rural area. It was all quite exciting. We had formed groups amongst ourselves based on common interest and friendship that had been developed over the past 5 months. The group that I was in, wanted to go to Madhya Pradesh. We had a choice of Jabalpur and Raipur districts. We opted for Raipur, which then was part of M.P. It was an enjoyable 36 hours train journey by Howrah Express from Ahmedabad to Raipur. The group consisted of Shankar, Ashutosh, Apoorva, Sudhir and myself. We also had a sixth member, Pradeep Gantayat, who had made it clear to us fairly early on that he just wanted to get into a group but then we should not expect him to be actually part of our group. He was more keen to spend time with his friends in Nagpur, provided we covered up for him. That was okay by us since he was never an integral part of our group. And we needed a sixth guy anyway so that we could be evenly split in groups of 2 to spend time in 3 different villages of Tilda block of Raipur, about 60 kms from the district headquarters. The logistics support was to come from the Raipur Milk Union, who has fixed up basic staying and food arrangements for us in the 3 villages – Tarashiv, Kesda and Bhilodi.

The first two days in Raipur were quite exciting. Five guys in their early twenties in a new city (so what if it was Raipur ?). We started exploring the popular hang-out joints which included the ubiquitous India Coffee House with turbaned waiters in white starched dresses and a couple of theatres. The mode of transport was cycle rickshaw. It was difficult for us to fit into one rickshaw. So it was “ek mein teen, ek mein do” (3 in one, 2 in the other). In a way, it was good. It helped in bargaining, since we needed 2 rickshaws. Accounting systems to account for the money we were to spend on common items were devised, based on some basic cost accounting principles heavy loaded in favour of cost apportioning . Sudhir was to maintain accounts, which suited most of us.

We were still quite excited when a couple of days later, we headed to our respective villages. Sudhir and Shankar were to stay in Kesda, Ashu (poor Ashu, he was alone, but then he really didn’t mind) was in Bhilodi. Further down, past the block headquarters of Tilda, was Tarashiv, where Apoorva and I were to stay. It was almost afternoon when we reached our village. Crisp dry winter winds blew, the effect of which was toned down by the afternoon sun. As we got out of the jeep, we took a quick look around. This looked like a real village. Not like the semi-urban look of Kerala villages. Not the prosperous look like the villages of Kheda. A dusty one kilometer path led us from the main road (which an apology of a road, just wide enough to let a truck pass, for which all the rest coming from the other direction had to jump off the road, literally, a few feet away and below to avoid a collision). It was not a large village. There were 50-60 houses, many of them thatched. The better looking ones had rounded tiles made locally of earth and heated in a local kiln, supported by a mesh of bamboo poles.

Our first stop in the village was the dairy co-operative, housed in a dingy one room measuring barely 10 feet by 8 feet. A small wooden table, a steel almirah, four folding chairs and an assortment of measuring vessels was what the co-operative had, a far cry from the pucca two-storey building measuring about 2000 square feet that we had seen in Kheda. As true beneficiaries of the White Revolution that was instrumental in giving birth to IRMA, we asked a few quick questions. Milk collection was a measely 20 litres per day, which was considered good, as it could drop down to 10 at times. 20 litres was respectable enough, for it meant one full can.

The next stop was our home, our home that was to be for the next one month. It belonged to the young secretary of the milk co-operative, Somu, who lived in the house with his parents, his wife and his two children. Our home, or to put it more plainly, the room, was just as big, or probably a shade smaller, than the office of the milk co-operative. It had no windows. It had a door which had to be fastened by a chain that was hooked on to….well, a hook on the wall. The door had vertical fissures in it, big enough to let the outside sunlight come in when it was closed – which was useful, for the room had no window. There was a similar door on the other side of the room, but that opened out to the courtyard of Somu’s house. In the corner of the courtyard right outside the rear door of our ‘home’ was the barn where their two bullocks and two cows (a nice couple of bovine couples !) lived. They had been strategically placed behind the rear door of our room, I thought, for it provided them with the support when their foreheads were itchy. Except that it always gave us an eerie feeling that someday they would kick or hit the door open and trample over us. There was only one cot which was a traditional rope cot with wooden frames, just big enough for one person to sleep. The other person had to sleep on the floor. Initially, Apoorva and I took turns at sleeping on the cot, but then he decided that his life was too precious to be trampled under the hoofs of a naive cow or a bullock !

The day time was okay. There was enough sunlight, thanks to the gaps on our door. It gave us the privacy we wanted, because we could close the door and yet ensure that there was enough light in the room. The cows and the bullocks didn’t bother us in the day. You see, they had their own sense of decency and were loathe to disturb our afternoon siesta. But then, having granted us that liberty, they would then be liberal in their snorts and farts, grunting with satisfaction every time they urinated loudly or lay their dung. The only other noise they would make was when they shuffled impatiently, kicking with their hooves to keep the flies and mosquitoes away. But I am sure they never meant to disturb us. They were far too innocent for that. But Apoorva would not buy that theory. You see, he had always been brought up in a big city. It was Bombay initially and then Ahmedabad. And before that, he also had a brief London stint. He could barely make out the difference between a cow and a bullock. I was more empowered with my knowledge of cows and bullocks, having seen them at my grand parents place during my summer vacations in Kerala. But the only thing I found difficult to accept and where I joined ranks with Apoorva was the strange smell in our room. It was a mixture of the body smell of the animals, the dung and urine, the hay and an assortment of cattlefeed and of wet earth – partly because we had an earthen floor and partly because of the dampness of the barn behind. So much so that even we started smelling like them, meaning, our bovine friends !