SATYANESWAN

I came to listen to the term "Civic Sense" while I was a kid young enough to study at class II.We were recent residents of Kalighat then. One of our neighbors made it a habit of throwing his family's garbage promptly in front of our entrance every morning. The narrow street used to remain dirty until the municipal sweeper arrived on the scene.It was real difficult for someone to enter to or go out of our house meanwhile.As was the practice in the locality no one came forward to object.Perhaps hoping that one day the gentleman responsible would understand the agony of his close door neighbors. But that fateful day never came. My father lost patience one sunday morning and asked the gentleman to stop the practice.He,in turn, got infuriated and questioned the authority of my father . His logic was simple.As the street belonged to commoners using the road all users had similar claims.He refused to accept that he was doing anything wrong. He assured my father that he would not...

Bimal Mitra's literary works always fascinate me,specially the novels.He had the capacity of writing novels with the characteristics of an epic.His central character,may not be the principal one but stories revolves around him.He remains a helpless bystander putting his best efforts to influence incidents but mostly in vain. This time I am not here to discuss Bimal Mitra and his works though.I took the reference as he came to my mind while I was roaming around the Auckland streets just like that. This city was built by the British settlers and as elsewhere they made it a point to recreate London here too. Therefore, the old buildings ( and believe me,there are too many) were built in greco-roman majestic style and invariably features a clock on the top or middle of the building. As such, kiwis apparently have an affinity towards clocks too. They have created a clock within the famous Albert Park ( the oldest volcanic site in the region,conver ted to a park and got the name of prin...

Rongitoto.The name sounds a bell in your ear. Around 600 years back it rang a bell no doubt but that was a bell to give alarm to the Maori settlers who used to live in the nearby Motutapu island.Rongitoto literally means 'bloody sky' in Maori language.In fact it reddened the sky line of the country whose original name i,e Aotearoa ( to-day's New Zealand) reminds you of long white clouds.Out of the deep blue pacific a big red mass started erupting some day 600 years back in a series of dramatic explosions and gave a different shade to the nearby clouds. It is the youngest island in the Hauraki Gulf in the North Shore of Auckland and the last and largest volcano to be formed in the Auckland volcanic field.It is also one of the biggest volcanic eruptions which earth had ever witnessed. From a distance you can never imagine there may be anything unique within the island you are about to set your foot on.It is as nice as others, majestically sitting just off the Auckland c...

The sensitive and emotional Bengalis do not think that the word “Brother –in-law “does enough justice to the designation. A brother-in-law in English tends to be a brother but never equals him. Rather remains always a lesser being. Poor English! How can they estimate that too often a brother-in-law comes out to be more than your own brother? Especially in Bengali middle class household he may even attain a father like status on occasion. In Bengali literature and films the position of “Jamaibabu” is adorable-yet-respectable one. I am not sure whether you saw the film “Chupke Chupke” which was a popular Hindi version of Bengali film “Chadmabeshi”. If so, you may remember Late Bikash Roy or Omprakash doing the pivotal role. For me, my Jamaibabu remained always a special person, .Hence I never dared to mention my beloved Jamaibabu as brother-in law. I never needed to. I can fairly remember the day we first met. It was May 25, 1956; Jamaibabu got married to our Didi. Hindu marriage in itse...

Sharu Rangnekar, the noted management guru and author of “In the wonderland of Indian Managers” have very few strips of hairs on his skull. While questioned about his early baldness in an informal get together he described a theory on “Hair Falling” in his defence. The theory went like this. Among male human beings, hair grows downwards after one crosses the age of forty. On its path of growth while a strip of hair confronts a bit of gray matter it gladly turns gray .While it finds nothing it falls off. For Sharu the latter was the case. I was present on this fateful party and believed every bit of what Sharu said. After all, Sharu just can not be distrusted. Afterwards when a bunch of my gray hairs was discovered by my better half in her utter dismay, I was perturbed to the least. Rather I felt jubilant. At last, the God has disproved what my elders, my teachers, my bosses and ultimately my wife at home opined about the status of the availability of gray matter in my brain. The Man pr...

Just a few days back, some TV channel telecasting Gumnaam, the sensational bolywood thriller of sixties. While I was eager to continue viewing the others of the family present in the lounge preferred to switch on to their favored serial. Perhaps, you are smiling Lattu da as you only know what prompted me to see much viewed Gumnaam once again. You are on the dot; it was not film but the memories which came along with. It was some middle of the week .I came back from my 2nd year classes to my Hostel Number 10 at BE College campus and chatting with mates. We just heard some one shouting calling some one. One confirmed it was me who had a visitor. Though surprised as I was not supposed to get one I came down to find you standing Lattu da between the two adjacent hostels. You were in absolute hurry and told me to accompany immediately to “Shyamali, a cinema hall far away at Santragachi which was an obscure village and around an hour’s journey from our place. Why so far? Your excuse was simp...

Did I ever aspire to be literate? I do not remember. However, I can remember a scene of my early age where Kutu da, an elderly cousin, had been performing the domestic Saraswati Puja in our Kalighat house and I was taken to him while he guided me to write my first alphabet. The ritual known as Hate Khari means holding the piece of chalk (Khari) by hand (Hate). It is a sort of permission given to a kid to initiate study. Kutu da , being a brilliant student of Sanskrit poetry and grammar , Kabya Byakaranthirtha , was one of the best available person to give the permission and guidance. But the kid in question never was eager to seek the permission. From then onwards, my didi ,the elder sister ,took the lead. She took it as a moral duty and made me sit with a piece of slate and chalk pencil. I had to religiously observe the scripts as depicted in the Adarshalipi , one of the first books in Bengali, and copy them to the satisfaction of didi. Writing was not that difficult but satisfying di...