All the world’s a stage for these politicos

Going by their histrionics and full-throated baritones within and without the Assembly, it seems that the long-buried actors within Samresh Singh and Satyanand Jha ‘Batul’ often dominate their political personas.

Picture this: During the ongoing Monsoon Session, JVM legislator Singh tore his kurta, rushed into the well of the House and was about to unfold his dhoti when he was requested not to, amid blushing female legislators. “Jatra party. Ye acting karta hai!” were all the plaudits heaped upon Singh.

Batul too happened to be a jatra actor, playing the role of Lord Ram and lead of the Vishwamitra-Meneka act.

At the age of 71, when many of his party leaders expect statesmanlike behaviour from him, Singh chides them, “Shut up, you fools! Just listen and watch me.”

Singh won’t mind jumping on to the reporters’ table during debate if he has a point to make. The table turns into a stage for his solo theatrics, where he delivers passionate and angry dialogues, unintentionally mimicking great Bengali film actor Uttam Kumar and Hindi film legendary Prithviraj Kapoor on many occasions.

This political heavyweight (86 kg) does not stay on the table for long — either because the table can’t sustain the weight of his rampage or he can’t sustain his own weight.

“He was part of Bengal’s famous jatra party (a theatrical troupe) during the 1960s. He often tore his clothes off to impress his heroine and audiences on stage,” said one of his close aides. Sudhamoi Chatterjee, a male actor who played the role of his heroine in most of his plays, is unfortunately not alive to narrate those kurta-tearing moments.

Politically, Singh continues it, gaining notoriety for pulling others’ dhotis too!

It is tough to estimate how many kurtas he has sacrificed for the public cause, so far. He had resorted to this and dashed his head against the wall in 1975, when the then Chas Police Station in-charge Tarkeswarnath Tiwari had put him in police lock-up during an agitation along with Badal Majumdar and Pawan Agrawal.

That year, he performed it in full public glare in Jamshedpur to support the cause of 86 unauthorised bastis. In 1980, he did it to protest against the then Bokaro ASP Manjari Jaruhar (known as Hunterwali) as she thrashed his political worker Akhilesh Mahto.

 “I tear my kurta when I am angry. But the real actors are those who pretend to serve the public,” said Singh, taking a jibe at the Opposition.

However, he doesn’t reply as to why he did a near cheerharan of the then Union Steel Minister Biju Patnaik in 1986, by pulling Patnaik’s dhoti during a public function. “Politics me ye sab chalta hai. Wo bhi ek zamana tha,” he reminisces happily.

He was considered an actor at par with famous jatra actors like Swapan Kumar, Ajitesh Bandophadyya and Rakhal Singh. A great fan of Uttam Kumar, he moved to Mumbai and screen tested with Nirupa Roy.

Batul, on the other hand, must be a keen watcher to Singh’s theatrics. This modern day Vishwamitra finds it tough to deny he has any relations with Soni Devi, who claims to be his wife and Batul, the father of her son. Even the Assembly waits for Batul to provide some comic as well as dramatic moments with his unique dialogue delivery, with the mannerism and pitch of jatra, while rebutting the Opposition’s charges.

It rarely happens that Batul is silenced as on Wednesday, when Congress’ Sarfaraz Ahmed read out an Urdu couplet for him: “Zindagi mein kuch aisa kaam kar kadradaan, ke jis gali se guzrein, bacche bolein abba jaan, abba jaan, abba jaan.”

Singh would have ripped off his kurta, something which Batul doesn’t — the only difference between the two actors.

http://www.dailypioneer.com/state-editions/ranchi/92778-all-the-worlds-a-stage-for-these-politicos.html

India is free, but not for all!

To call them servant sounds an honour — slave is more appropriate. They serve their masters under the barge of brutality and barbarism, that too without a grumble. These are sewadars in police lingo, meant to serve the police contingent. But they serve their bosses instead, as menials.

Bhukhla Bhagat, a poor CRPF policeman, is not there to narrate the story of August 4 night. CRPF DIG Bhanu Pratap Singh, drunk on malt and high on power, allegedly used his boot to deliver a deadly blow to Bhagat’s stomach that ended up killing him. Reason: Bhagat was bit late in bringing wine for Singh during a ‘party’.

Bhagat having the history of kidney disorder from 2004 and had undergone surgery in the past; was admitted at Apollo Hospital under critical condition where he died four days back.

The CRPF bosses put blame onto his poor health than to admitting wrong. “Partner, he was not kicked. He died out of kidney failure. CRPF was footing his medical expense which was around `6 lakh. Some people are wasting tears over a matter which has no base. Have any of them visited his home to help the family? We are doing it,” CRPF IG DK Pandey was eloquently best to defend. CRPF officials indeed visited his village, Lapung, to pay posthumous praises and promises on the deceased and family.

Pandey, though, apparently did great mercy on the truth; otherwise he would have claimed Singh was barefoot that night. Pandey is not a medical expert, he says, but offers examples from medical history of his family to convince that such critical patients hardly survive despite best medical care. In plain: no commission even for token examination of Singh and his savagery.

But the unbearable weightiness of unpunished guilt is hard to cover, though. The family which was under some unseen pressure finally lodged police complaint against Singh, on Saturday.

Often a boot, often a slap and frequent derogative adjectives make them feel their position. A decade back an IPS officer in Jharkhand had brutally behaved with one such underling. The matter was brought to the notice of the National Human Right Commission, but nothing happened. The said officer known for abusing poor sewadar at disposal illegally retains more than three dozen sewadars and cops as gardeners, cooks etc. Flippantly one of the jawans is said to be on 24 hrs duty to keep mosquito away saheb’s resident.

Against a contingent of 150 policemen, five cooks, three water carriers, one sweeper and one barber are appointed to serve the force. But most of them are illegally retained by police bosses at their residence.

A mere visit of police barracks unveils the story of subjugation. When asked about the condition of sewadars Shrawan Dubey chief cook of mess number four of Ranchi police barrack, sardonically smiled as though a fool is trying to be intelligent. Dubey won’t speak. Bosses have sweeping power to suspend and dismiss them. Sudhir Thapa of JAP 1 having served as cook of an IPS has unspent payload of furry to release. “Ham hai sarkari pagar pane wale sahib ke gulam. Ham unke kutte ko bhi aadar se pukarte hain kyun kee sahib naraz ho jayenge,” he said. Bosses’ pet dogs are in more respectable position then them.

In Jharkhand there are 2500 such fourth grade sewadars. But most of them are retained by senior IAS and IPS officials. “We had requested police headquarter to supply us the details of such sewadars who are working as personal staffs of senior officials but nothing happened. Our boys are taken to serve retired officials, their relatives and those who on deputation in Delhi also,” said president of Jharkhand Police Fourth Grade Employees Union, Shashi Thakuri.

Sandeep Gurung of JAP 1 has still been retained by a former IAS, as cook. Two former IPS running—one believed to be running a dairy—has retained sewadars from JAP. Singh’s leather boot, half kg no more, has achieved a metaphoric leap of synonyms — a sorry exemplars of the ineffable crime.

http://www.dailypioneer.com/state-editions/ranchi/95097-india-is-free-but-not-for-all.html

Jharkhand Cong woes to hobble Rahul on 3rd visit

Rahul Gandhi, Jharkhand Congress pleads sincere attention for an urgent housekeeping. The party is inching to a ‘cold and tearful termination’ in Jharkhand.

Gandhi twice visited Jharkhand in 2009 and 2010 to recruit young members to revive the sagging prospects of the party and its students’ wing NSUI. He had instructed immediate membership drive, saying subaltern voices and faces must get equal representation.

It will be his third visit. But his previous visits seduced many into promoting their family, sons and brothers in organizational and electoral politics. Union Minister Subodh Kant Sahay, probably remained the most blatant and sorry example of this when he fielded his younger brother Sunil Sahay in Hatia Assembly by-election despite doctoral pulses from ground suggesting his total rout. Rather than repenting and repairing that mistake, the warring group resorted to a reprisal act by turning violent in one such review meeting at party headquarters, few months back.

The drive netted less members and courted more controversies - membership list forged it was blamed. Only the number of leaders has swelled, not workers, and far and few left in a forced hibernation. And its staunch supporters are wheezing on expired emotion, too unattached and anaemic even to talk about the party today.

Old timers like Arun Pandey who took retirement from active politics are painfully nostalgic about lost old tradition of the Congress: part-timers replaced by full timers. It gets worse than that funereal lament.

Organisational elections are an unscheduled affair and a full-time elected president is an old demand. Pradeep Kumar Balmuchu overstayed beyond his tenure otherwise he had to be replaced after 2008 state organizational election. Twice in the past Balmuchu pretentiously resigned from his post and every time the slumbering central Congress leadership asked him to continue as an ad hock that forced many to question whether Jharkhand Congress really lacks in talent.

Balmuchu would parry to answer whether he is the only talented person left to run the party.

But many in the Congress feel that Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and her general secretary son Rahul Gandhi are serious about Jharkhand. Though, detailed itinerary of Gandhi, media was given to understand, a mere gossip job - meeting elected panchayat representatives, party workers, functionaries etc. Some of the district and block presidents will be felicitated and appreciated for their good performance on this occasion for all that they have not done.

However, top party sources confided that Rahul is on a mission in Jharkhand to help her mother who plans to rejig her team by October to face the 2014 general election.

Hopefully, Rahul will recommend somebody equally talented for the State president post. But Rahul’s efforts in Hindi-speaking States have always been a sorry excursion. Bihar had bemoaned him, Uttar Pradesh recently rasped him and Jharkhand unit has enough troubles to jangle him. Jharkhand unit is a deeply divided house, “where everybody is loyal to somebody,” observed a party senior.  

The Congress actually severed ties with party tradition and the masses that matter. It was probably after the end of popular era of Satyadev Narayan Tiwari and Jagganath Prasad Chaudhary who had called a many public stirring and kept the party organizationally robust and mobile.

The pity for the Congress is which its spokesperson Sailesh Sinha would often deny strongly. “Our mass base helped to survive …Our shares in vote have leaped into double digit,” he said.

But the Congress has never been a credible Opposition hardly summoning any mass agitation these years. Such a serial electoral defeats right from Jamshedpur to Hatia, more than a dozen high power committees including of KN Jha committee failed to stir party in right direction. That’s how lonely your party’s Jharkhand cortege is, Mr Gandhi.

http://dailypioneer.com/state-editions/ranchi/96986-jharkhand-cong-woes-to-hobble-rahul-on-3rd-visit.html