Oh Bengal!

“E re bus driver! Michil aasche.. Gaadi ta Jore kore daudao na hole din bhar ekhane amra morbo”. Roughly translated into, “O mighty bus driver, Please drive fast. A Michil (procession) is coming. If we get caught we have to rot here whole day”.
Whoever said that negativity clings was absolutely correct. Here I salute those who believe in the positives and continue to strive to attain their dream despite all the odds, without the surroundings letting them affect in any manner. Past one month has been tough. Tough in the sense, I never felt so helpless and frustrated at the happenings. And when you are not doing something which reduces the helplessness, it just adds fuel to the fire.
Whatever I may say or do, I always had a soft corner for Bengal and still believe it’s the best place on earth. But the recent spate of happenings has just left me unhappy. And the innumerable hoardings of our very own Mamta Baneerjee, which surprisingly found its way all through Calcutta post Nano, just leaves me mouthing obscenities. It’s strange how she has managed to gather so much fund and colour the whole of Calcutta after that ‘oh so famous incident’. In the last 22 days that I have been here I have seen 9 Michils (processions), 1 state wide Bandh, 2 National holidays, 3 Sundays (full day off for babus and the likes) and 3 Saturdays (half day off for some Government babus, which undoubtedly gets transferred for full day, and half day off for others). Now my tryst with Michils:
I remember my school days in Bengal. Whenever a huge Michil was scheduled to take place ‘The Telegraph’ would write pages about it. Why is it useful or useless, which places to avoid, which routes to take....... and stuffs like that. With time these Michils became so common that the newspapers baron thought that if they continue to publish news like that there would be no space to print the other relevant news and so it stopped. And so I think the progress of Bengal. Out of the 9 michils I was caught in 7. Now what do I mean by caught? Ever imagined yourself stranded somewhere in the middle of sea? The feeling is something like that. Nowhere to run.. Nowhere to walk.. Just keep sitting or worse standing where you are and watch the endless list of people cross the road behind their so called leader. Sometimes it takes as much as 2 hours to get your car to cross a stretch of 1 kilometer. This is Michil. And their effect? Well I sometimes fail to even know the reason why and what those people are doing. But some of the reasons were:
• Making the para teachers permanent and increase their salary. After endless search I got this piece of information from a teacher which was in a Bengali newspaper. “I know our act caused inconvenience to many people of Kolkata. But this was necessary to let our voices be heard”. I felt like cutting his throat so that he does not even dream of letting his voice heard ever again.
• Reducing the price of Petrol and reducing the fare of buses... Heights... Someone please tell them Calcutta has one of the cheapest transport facilities... By the way as this Michil was not as successful as they had planned so they called a state wide bandh in which they threatened that not even the IT companies’ buses will be allowed to run.
• Today there was a Michil in Esplanade, the heart of Kolkata. I asked a person who was standing there and listening to someone shout at the top of his voice, “yeh Kya ho raha hai”. He smiled and replied, “Pata nahi bhaiya. Kuch der me nasta milega. Isliye main khada hoon”.
• One procession said, “Say No to Terrorism”.

I was so disgusted by all this that I would not be surprised if tomorrow I am stuck in a Michil which says, “Say No to michils”...... It’s such a wonderful place but sadly now it’s being fed to dogs and bitches. And all I can do is stand and watch and watch till the line of procession gets over and everyone returns back to work as if nothing happened.
But still I am in love with this place because of the sheer attitude of its people... Because of the simple Nature to take everything positively that comes their way. Times are bad but everyone is sure that one day all this politics will come to an end and everyone will get his due. People have got tired of complaining. Solutions are being worked upon even though many have given hope for this city’s revival, the young stalwarts have hope in their stride and they are working towards the betterment of this city. I am not just speaking out of the blue. I have seen it and am seeing it. Follies have been realised and maybe this statement is apt for the situation- “We have hit rock bottom. Now the only way is up”.... Despite everything I still love this place and long to get back here every vacations :)