SUDESHNA SEN
VISITORS to London over the past few weeks, especially from India, are usually puzzled as to why everyone, from CEOs to secretaries, are wearing a strange, red paper blotch on their lapels. If you happened to be around at about 11:00 a.m. on November 11, you’d wonder why the whole country came to a standstill. Those odd badges are red poppies — everyone wears them for almost a month before and after November 11, which is variously called Armistice Day, Veterans Day or Remembrance Day around the world. The tradition goes back to the end of the WWI, to the ubiquitous red poppies that insisted on blooming in the killing fields of Flanders, according to a Canadian medical poet.
Now it’s more or less a generic day honouring any soldiers who’ve died in battle, in every Commonwealth country, Europe and the US. And no, we’re not just indulging in one of those sentimental British things — the origin of the artificial red poppy was to raise funds for soldiers’ charities, and even now we all drop a few coins in the charity box to buy our funny red lapel badges. It helps. India is perhaps the only Commonwealth country that doesn’t mark this occasion in a big way. And, umm, if South Africa can, after what they’ve been through, the argument that it’s a symbol of white, colonial rule seems a bit weak. And if Europe and Germany can do it together, the argument that remembrance breeds division is even weaker.
Sometimes, hapless tourists from India, who happen to be at my mercy, get dragged off to trudge around Hyde Park Corner — not, as they’d like, on the way to Harrods but in the opposite direction, up Constitution Hill. It’s usually when I’m in a cranky mood, and insist on making them look at the World War memorial for soldiers from the Indian subcontinent, Africa, and Caribbean — an estimated 5 million — and crane their necks to read the names of all those from the erstwhile British Indian army to get the Victoria Cross — the highest bravery award then.
I was once told, can’t vouch for it, on a cold foggy November morning, to the accompaniment of Gurkha bagpipers and a smattering of octogenarian British Indian Army veterans in wheelchairs, that the British Indian army has the highest tally of VCs from the World Wars. Something to be proud of, I’d think, but it never made my history books in school.
Usually, my traumatised victims are more than glad to escape and run off to shop on Oxford Street. As Baroness Sheila Flather, one of Britain’s leading diaspora luminaries and an architect of the memorial, once told me rather sternly, it’s almost impossible to get anyone in India interested in these things. But British Indians make the effort, every year. So if you had a grandfather in North Africa, Burma, or Japan, well, someone cares.
I’ve recently taken to wondering why India doesn’t do memorials as a cultural thing. One of the first things that strikes one in Europe is the number of war memorials. These are not, like Emperor Constantine’s arches or Nelson’s column, odes to military victory. These are plain, simple memorials for mortal souls, a name etched in stone, metal, bronze, plastic. Non-denominational, non-communal, non-political, remembering the boys (and girls) who died so you and I could live.
I’ve walked up a hill in an Enid Blytonish village in rural England, and under the moss and heather, there’s a weathered stone plaque with names of long-dead village boys who gave their lives in various wars. It’s a bit of history, a bit of local pride, a bit of sentimentality. And usually, there will be a few funny paper poppies lying around. Someone cares.
And then, I remember flying back to Delhi from Leh, very touristy, generally peeved about the hyper security… until I saw the flag-covered coffin sharing airplane space with me. Who was that boy? Dunno, but I don’t think I’ll forget him. It isn’t as if Indians aren’t patriotic. We celebrate Independence Day, Republic Day et al with extreme zeal. We teach our school children how wonderful our armed forces are, to revere war heroes. We weep buckets in Bollywood war movies, or when Lata Mangeshkar sings Ae mere watan ke logon. But we simply refuse to remember our soldiers who’ve died, consistently, in every war or engagement since 1914. We have national holidays for mythical superheroes from 2000 BC, but we cannot set aside a single day to remember our war heroes from the last century? Maybe sociologists, anthropologists and psychologists who study these things can tell me why we Indians insist on having mass amnesia.
As we come up to another anniversary, 26/11, how many memorials have you ever seen in India? There’s a 7/7 memorial in Hyde Park Corner — with names of all those who died in the tube bombings in London. Who will remember Tukaram Omble, 90 years from now, so a transient tourist could stumble on a plaque and know how and what he died for? Me, I’ve got my red poppy. In the absence of any Indian symbol, I wear it for all of them. The bodies I’ve seen, the heroes whose names I’ve forgotten, the martyrs whose names I never knew. That coffin I came home from holiday with. Someone cares.
Jai Hind.
Yesterday I visited Thane Kala Bhavan, the art gallery built by Thane Municipal Corporation near Kapurbavdi Naka.
The first gallery on the ground floor –“Ulhas” depicts the historical, geographical and cultural facts about the city. It gives information about various landmarks of the city and how they were built.
Currently the gallery is holding a group exhibition of paintings - Stroke of Trinity, by Mr. Madan Mane, Mr. C.V. Gadkari and Mr. Sagar Bondre. The seiries of paintings titled “Reflections” by Mr. Mane is particularly exceptional.
presentations and slide shows. I watched a vary interesting and informative slide show by Mr. Girish Vaze about fauna of Mumbai city. Did you know that you can watch about 360 species of birds in and around Mumbai?
presentations and slide shows. I watched a vary interesting and informative slide show by Mr. Girish Vaze about fauna of Mumbai city. Did you know that you can watch about 360 species of birds in and around Mumbai?
The gallery also has 2 conference halls dedicated for workshops and performing art and a library.
