Work and life style

Many young people now a days, engaged in busy professions like finance, business management, information technology etc., in the burgeoning knowledge industry, have very little time to spare, in the course of a normal working day, either for themselves or their families. Some of them even display tendencies befitting workaholics. Their time frame is usually packed mostly with business, but sometimes also accommodates structured leisure elements or packages considered ‘cool’ or ‘in vogue’. All of these do not leave many windows allowing them to just look out watching the fading colour of the sky in the evening and wish they could become like a kite gliding into the distant horizon or do something, anything, that does not necessarily have any use value and call for approbation or sanctions of their peers.

It is as if not only are their professional life governed by parameters set by the businesses they work for, and hence ultimately, by the market, their individual life, their choices about consumption to keep their body satiated and the mind tamed, are increasingly dictated and manipulated by the omnipresent and omniscient market. Everything that they do or choose not to do must make sense in terms of a generally accepted paradigm about how to conduct life along a materially secure and prosperous path. They exist in a social ambience - in the family, within the community and wider cultural mileu, valuing and aspiring such a trajectory of life. My life, that is. Irrespective of whatever happens to the environment that supports it or the other concurrent lives in competition.   

One wonders, however, if they sometimes miss the work-life balance in an untutored common sense. Which begs the question if some of them would choose to subvert against the denominational patterns of social and cultural preferences, the choices of the items of consumption and leisure (things of desire), the subtle subservience to a ‘factory’-produced uniformity of products and customs, a fetish for efficiency and a distaste for redundancy, apprehension about asymmetry and cultural diversity that run counter to the fundamentalism of the power elite in modern democracies, especially its neo-liberal globalising variant. If they could breach this hegemony, there would have been a need to review their singular focus on profit and self-aggrandisement in both spheres of work and leisure. This also could have nucleated a question or two about the contents and organisation of their work (modularity, object-orientedness, extreme reductionism coupled with an assembly line unity), its impact on the environment and other fellow human beings and even its intellectual quality and worth. 

This interrogation of the work and its implication on the life of the workers, especially the knowledge workers, is especially important because there is an aura of superiority, novelty, modernity and of course an array of privileges associated with their exclusive domains of specialised technical competencies. There is a positive impetus, a danger if you like, for such workers to buy into an identity based on such specialised knowledge-oriented work and the consequential hubris. By allowing them to play a key role in the innovation and management of the industry and businesses and, increasingly in sprucing and speeding up governance, the work defines their relevance to those at the helm of the business and the government, in the process providing them not only their financial security but prosperity and social standing and giving them a chance and a reason to celebrate their life in style.

‘Celebration of life’ is often suggested visually on the pages of glossy coffee table books showing walls coming alive in exquisite colour and lustre, huge antique furniture pieces, plush upholstery, ethnic décor, soft lighting, sumptuous food and expensive wine laid out on a scale befitting royalty. And of course an assemblage of chic crowd with similar or higher pedigree and clout enveloped in the hubbub of good-natured banter and a sweetly nagging flavour of good and gated living.

Except that this picturesque life must unspool endlessly. For if it ever stops for want of fuel that runs the motor the response would be to quickly recover the foothold on the bandwagon. Nobody in the right mind would countenance a possibility of even a jolt to the familiar identity, let alone a loss of it.

For them the work they do is probably their only identity and their lifestyle the only acceptable one. If you take out the work, and consequently the attendant assured wherewithal and the status along with it, the emptiness of a life of ordinariness starts staring at them. A sort of life they have not been accustomed to looking at except occasionally through the windows of their cocoon and ignoring it. Work thus becomes an escape from a life which otherwise does not make much sense to them. 

Articulation and understanding

Haven’t we often come across men and women, among our friends, acquaintances, relatives who do not find it comfortable talking about most matters of public interest and importance? Or if they are forced to do so under some circumstances (over which they have little control) like suddenly becoming a part of a media campaign, involving queries or a questionaire, opinion polls on the street or at the work place, they do it in an awkward, uninspired manner.

This becomes even more glaring as in most groups one finds quite a few voluble people who like to dominate any discussion – be it soccer or cricket, gossip about stars or starlets, apparently miraculous occurrences, latest cultural trends, politics or deeper social problems. These latter set seem to have an opinion – sometimes very clear cut and at other times nebulous – on practically every issue that may or may not concern them personally or professionally but may have some bearing on the community, society or the nation in a general way and the world in the case of the international issues.

The common tendency of self-projection discernible in the behaviour such as above in many among this latter category, is rather natural and in conformity with the general social nature of engagement of most people. There may be inaccuracy in the facts and inconsistency in the logical arguments they marshal. Sometimes there could be discordant notes or even violent disagreements among those entertaining quite different perceptions formed from the same set of real life observations. But by and large they reflect the dominant paradigm (including prejudices) of the community or the cultural milieu they belong to. In this environment of preponderant urge for self-expression, it is not easy, given the brevity of expression or relative inarticulateness in many people (actually they are, probably, in the majority), to interpret the implication of what they choose to say as much as what is left unsaid.

It is possible that some among this category of people may choose to be economic with their words as their understanding is genuinely not good enough, they lack clarity in thinking and are confused, or do not have the right words to describe what they have in mind. However, can lack of articulation or ambiguity in that, by itself and in general, be taken to be an indicator of lack of understanding ? 

As it happens, the opinion of such people, if any, often go unrepresented if not ignored, simply because they do not or can not express their point of view with sufficient force, flair and urgency which some of their fellow participants in a discussion muster with relative ease. A quiet leader, who speaks occasionally and only briefly at that and not forcefully enough might find it hard to carry friends, associates and followers along unless people get to see his mind in action, in terms of planning and execution of concrete deeds leading to positive results. In the realm of the current Indian politics, names of two politicians exemplifying the two contrasting categories - a super-articulate politician, almost a hustler and a bully to boot on the one hand and an erudite but reticent, almost a reluctant counterpart - obviously come to one’s mind.

The acrimonious debate on the economic development of our country vis-à-vis the care and the protection of the endangered environment is well known. Ideologically inspired people angrily and decisively arguing on either side of this divide may win the debate on the television or at a ‘social impact’ awards function. But the complexity of the ground reality that eludes them may be understood much better by many illiterate villagers, grassroots activists and even some local administration officials with hands-on knowledge. However, the opinion of most of them are routinely ignored or overruled by their superior officers in the capital and metro cities while presenting status reports and offering false diagnoses in national and international conferences.   

There are a number of known examples from the field of literature of an apparent disconnect between the deep understanding by an author, expressed through a body of creative work, say, plays, novels and stories, and his publicly articulated social and political opinions, moral and philosophical views. The well-known Marxist literary critic, Georg Lukacs, had extensively discussed and illustrated this dichotomy in several of his books, notably, in ‘Studies in European Realism’. For instance, Honore de Balzac in his cycle of novels ‘La Comedie Humaine’, writing on the French society during the first half of the nineteenth century, meticulously documented the real ups and downs of the various social classes – the royalists and the feudal landowners, the bourgeois or the new business and entrepreneurial classes, the cultural elites – and unfailingly indicated the decline of the erstwhile upper classes despite Balzac’s known royalist sympathies. He never flinched from a realistic depiction of growing dominance of money in the contemporary society, unscrupulousness and moral turpitude irrespective of his yearning for and espousing virtues of Christianity, especially, the catholic religion in his other writings.

Almost a similar detached noveist’s and a social historian’s judgment was delivered by Tolstoy in his novels and stories with regard to the failure of the Tsarist Russian aristocracy and the landowning noble classes (of whom he himself was very much a part) to be the vanguard of the emancipation of the Russian peasantry from their age-old misery and bondage and therefore these classes being eventually overtaken by the new and revolutionary social forces (at the time the anarchists) brewing in the mid-late nineteenth century Russia. Even his early fictional writings show that he was acutely aware of the growing chasm between the landowners and the serfs as a reality as much as the brutal role of the Tsarist state in maintaining the status quo. However, the expressed political views of the author were often critical of some of these new social movements (especially their proclaimed violent methods). On the contrary, during the later part of his life, Tolstoy propounded his Christian-anarchist and anarcho-pacifist version of a religio-social conception of morality and love (Tolstoyanism) that neither quite explained the diagnosis of the social and political changes in Russia nor its potential directions one finds glimpses of in his creative writing. 

In many areas of life and human endeavour, particularly those involving decisions regarding environment, social transformation and accretion of culture through creative work, all thinking is not necessarily and immediately actionable or possible to validate in terms of results visible in the short term. It is in such situations that the test of understanding and the long-term correctness of a judgment do not always lie in just a clear enunciation of certain inflexible premises and decisive actions based on the same. Sometimes certain ambiguities in the stated positions should not disqualify them for further serious consideration.

Rebuilding the emotional fabric in northern Sri Lanka

Had recently re-read a wonderful article ‘Beyond the scars’ published originally in The Hindu Magazine dated 23^rd October 2011 (I retained a clipping). This is about certain impressions retained by a leading Tamil musician T. M. Krishna from his then recent concert visit to a few towns in northern Sri Lanka, Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Vavuniya. Names that automatically evoke tragic images of a people caught in the apparently interminable crossfire between two implacably hostile political opponents fighting a brutal war in the name of the same ‘people’.

The savage scars the war left on the geography almost everywhere in these parts could not be glossed over even in an officially sponsored visit. Perhaps more important is the psychological mauling suffered by the Sri Lankan Tamils in terms of their linguistic, cultural and even religious identity. As if being a Tamil, speaking the language, loving and yearning for the rich cultural heritage seemed almost a crime to borrow an expression from a poem by Brecht.

It is in this backdrop that the enthusiasm, serious intent of the appreciative audience of a Carnatic music recital in Jaffna was so moving, somewhat like an awakening from a long nightmare. The accompanying picture of a large relaxed young audience at the Ramanathan Academy of Fine Arts, Jaffna (“the faces, the laughter, the curiosity, questioning, smart answers”) enhances this feeling.

One cannot agree more with the author for tasking the Indians (particularly the Tamilians) to rebuild the tattered emotional fabric using many coloured threads of culture and history in that shell-shocked island. And one hopes strident competitive politics in the mainland would not snuff out the candle the intrepid cultural ambassadors might manage to rekindle.

The situation calls to mind the timeless visualization by Tolstoy in his masterpiece ‘War and peace’, of Natasha’s subtle awakening to life and new love from the devastation suffered by death of her betrothed Andrei in the 1812 Franco-Russian war. In a remarkably perceptive dialogue between Pierre and Natasha almost towards the end of the novel, both the characters realized through a catharsis of emotional maelstrom of grief and the new enchantment that there is more to life than death, that one can’t help feeling glad, being happy and hoping for new life while feeling sad, occasionally even somewhat guilty of leaving the past in favour of the future.

About faith, surrender, peace and reason

Let me begin by quoting, rather extensively, from an article by columnist David Brooks ‘Faith, not just creed’, Reprinted from New York Times News Service by The Hindu, January 29, 2014.

 

There is a yawning gap between the way many believers experience faith and the way that faith is presented to the world.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel described one experience of faith in his book God in Search of Man : “Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement ... get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal. ... To be spiritual is to be amazed.”

…

…Heschel understood that the faith expressed by many, even many who are inwardly conflicted, is often dull, oppressive and insipid — a religiosity in which “faith is completely replaced by creed, worship by discipline, love by habit; when the crisis of today is ignored because of the splendour of the past; when faith becomes an heirloom rather than a living fountain; when religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion.”

…

And yet there is a silent majority who experience a faith that is attractively marked by combinations of fervour and doubt, clarity and confusion, empathy and moral demand.

…..

If you are a secular person curious about how believers experience their faith, you might start with Augustine’s famous passage “What do I love when I love my God,” and especially the way his experience is in the world but then mysteriously surpasses the world: “It is not physical beauty nor temporal glory nor the brightness of light dear to earthly eyes, nor the sweet melodies of all kinds of songs, nor the gentle odor of flowers, and ointments and perfumes, nor manna or honey, nor limbs welcoming the embraces of the flesh; it is not these I love when I love my God. Yet there is a light I love, and a food, and a kind of embrace when I love my God — a light, voice, odor, food, embrace of my innerness, where my soul is floodlit by light which space cannot contain, where there is sound that time cannot seize, where there is a perfume which no breeze disperses, where there is a taste for food no amount of eating can lessen, and where there is a bond of union that no satiety can part. That is what I love when I love my God.”

David Brooks probably was on the one hand trying to describe, using the mystic language of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel or Saint Augustine what the essence of faith in and love of God may appear to the devout and the savant, with more than a suggestion that despite persistent doubts and a conflict riven mind common men and women, at least have fleeting glimpses of these moments of ecstasy. He has also argued, I think convincingly, that this spirit of living faith, in the practice of organised religion, more often than not, have come to be hemmed in rather badly by ossified creed. 

The article prompted me to flag a few irreverent questions:

-         What does a common man’s faith in and ‘love’ for God amount to? Is there more often than not a sense of indirect quid pro quo in his expectations from a supposed communion with God? How often are the wishes really altruistic like what Swami Vivekananda had experienced in his famously rumoured first encounter with the Goddess Kali in Dakshineswar temple near Calcutta? It was said that he planned to ask the goddess to alleviate his personal financial distress, but apparently he was so enthralled (by experiencing a sort of divine presence?) all he could manage to ask the goddess to bestow on him were knowledge, wisdom and devotion.   

-         Is the ‘sublime feeling or satiation/satisfaction’ what Augustine had described in the above quotation an experience reserved for the lucky few tuned to mysticism? Is it also the most optimistic or the ideal scenario?

-         Is there a sense of peace in giving up fighting irreconcilable mental conflicts, making difficult, uncomfortable and suboptimal choices and surrendering to some superior power or consciousness that has to be only ‘believed’ (not questioned) to be capable of finding a way around (not necessarily resolving) the conflict and bringing closure to problems (by not making any choices at all)? Choosing peace over reason?  

-         Does faith provide a new paradigm not accessible to reasoning a human mind is capable of – does one have to give up reasoning (ego?) to attain faith, a different way of life?

-         Does faith encourage one to become a pacifist, a status quoist (even fatalist), a non-believer in active intervention at any level beyond the individual? What is the moral position (distinguishing right from wrong) of an individual professing faith vis-à-vis too many inhuman acts of omission and commission of other individuals and communities and nations (as collectives of individuals) all over the world? Should that provoke a breach in faith sometimes? Can faith remain immune? 

(This post has appeared in another blog elsewhere)

Media’s freedom of expression, need for introspection

Not too long ago Delhi High Court had passed an order barring the newspapers and the TV channels (all media organizations) from reporting on a law intern’s complaint of sexual harassment against a former Supreme Court judge, (Justice Swatanter Kumar). A day after this order was passed, the Editors Guild of India in a statement said that the order made a mockery of the rule of law and the open and fair justice system by setting different and a very restrictive standards for the coverage of such allegations against judges (than what is applicable to any other citizen) and that this would mean an unwarranted intrusion on the media freedom.

Among the arguments marshaled by the Guild one finds the contention that such restrictions on the publication in a case such as this was uncalled for as this did not pose a serious threat to national security or would not lead to grave prejudice and miscarriage of justice. Also the presumed damage to reputation of a judge or any other person does not warrant prior restraint and would not pass the test of reasonableness under Article 19 (2) of the Constitution. There was also no justification for an assumption implied in this order that publication of mere allegations against an individual judge would inordinately and unjustifiably damage the image of the judiciary as a whole. The order for gag on the print and the electronic media also may not achieve a complete blackout since through social media and internet so much material continue to be disseminated in any case both within the country and outside.

It is the job of the media in a democracy to report court proceedings including court filings. Of course the only reasonable restriction should be that the reporting is accurate and fair. To lay down how and what exactly they should or should not report, including the type of headlines, whether or not the photographs of a public person should appear, when his images have been widely available in the media, is an avoidable intrusion into media freedom, the Guild said.

The Guild also emphasized the context of the current national debate on protecting women against sexual harassment where cases of this type raise important public issues of how to facilitate and deal with complaints by harassed women who may feel otherwise intimidated even to lodge a formal complaint with the police, who are apt to ignore them because the alleged perpetrators are well known and powerful people.

According to the Guild, responsible media houses can and should be trusted with conducting informed debate through complete and fair professional coverage of the case without critical information being held back from the public. On many similar instances, in the past, of alleged sexual assault and harassment it is only through sustained media pressure by holding open discussions with no prejudice to either the accused or to the judicial process that police have been forced to act and register cases.

Readers and viewers are generally mature enough not to mistake allegations for proof and would not assume that a person is guilty the moment a charge is published, the Guild averred and added that a judge who is trained to evaluate the evidence would be unlikely to be swayed by whatever is published.

On the face of it many of the arguments marshalled by the Guild is unexceptionable. The cumulative effect of deficit in governance and in the administration of justice in India has indeed made general public weary of the so-called ‘due process of law’ where due to sloth and corruption months elapse before police investigations are completed and charge sheets are produced. Charges are often diluted due to witness tampering through threats or inducements if the ‘accused’ happens to be an influential person. And then years pass before trials are completed in lower courts where often due to shoddy police investigation, witnesses turning hostile due to delay and/or manipulation and weak prosecution case, the ‘victim’ may not get justice to his/her satisfaction (if the case is not altogether dismissed). In case the justice goes in favour of the victim, the final closure of the case is indefinitely delayed due to challenges to such judicial orders in various higher courts where verdicts are many times overturned. Everybody spouts the statistics of the pending cases in the Indian courts. Only those fighting for justice appreciate the enormity of the odds against their goal.

It is in this hopeless environment that the dictum ‘one is presumed innocent till pronounced guilty by the courts’ (watch the plural which is indicative of the due process) appears like a cruel joke to the victim, his/her supporters and the public at large, who are becoming more and aware about such cases through media. And it is in this context that the new activist role that both the print and the electronic media in this country have started playing over the last several years can be understood and analysed. For the good it has done, and equally for its pretensions, motivations and the irreparable damage it can cause in some cases. It is as if the media in this country has found a way (which is also a commercially viable business model) for the general public to vicariously satiate its thirst for justice by providing a short cut through media trials conducted under its aegis. Editors Guild and the media in general are loath to give up this freedom and hence are protesting hard.

There can be no denying the fact that but for the wide dissemination in the media, debates, open and critical discussions (often critical of the judicial pronouncements) over the last several years the series of high profile criminal and corruption cases, especially those involving people occupying official and exalted positions, would not have the intense focus of public attention that they secured. Partly as a result of such a media pressure the government administration indirectly had to admit several lapses on their part, took some steps, though admittedly far short of what would have been desirable and in a fairly half-hearted manner. At least the need for ensuring accountability and transparency of many public institutions, government administration including police in particular, has gained currency.

By the same token, the process of justice and, in particular, judiciary itself, could not remain immune from this strong current of public scrutiny. Especially when individual members of this exalted institution have, time and again, shown themselves as susceptible to moral turpitude in corruption or sexual misdemeanour cases. The widely publicised case of Justice Soumitra Sen some years ago which went as far as potential impeachment by the parliament may be recalled.

Late last year, the allegation of sexually inappropriate behaviour against the retired judge Justice A. K. Ganguly by another intern was widely reported and discussed in the media, with pro- and contra-positions ranged in no-holds barred debates. Justice Ganguly, at the time the Chairman of the West Bengal Human Rights Commission, by and large maintained dignified silence through out the ugly, practically one-sided publicly conducted hate campaign (tendentious ‘leaks’ in the media about privileged documents to show him in poor light, insinuation and character assassination) and finally resigned from his position, which he said in his resignation letter that he was unable to do justice to in then prevailing environment. With his resignation, everybody including the media, having satiated the righteous indignation of a section of the public, lost interest and has put the matter in the backburner. Media has not informed us what progress, if any, has been made on the original case (like filing a charge sheet in a court of law) of the sexual misdemeanour of the judge.

Justice Ganguly did not resort to a defamation suit to remedy the loss of reputation he had obviously suffered, though he could have. Many participants in the media debates at the time even questioned his silence. Probably they did not know or care to respect his fundamental right to silence even as an accused of an alleged conduct.

In the light of the defamation case filed by Justice Swatanter Kumar at the Delhi high court and the court’s order about the restriction of the ‘freedom of press’ which the Editors Guild vociferously protested as above, certain issues about the freedom of expression in and by the media again come into sharp focus. Despite Guild’s protestations about the sense of responsibility or the sense of proportion of the media institutions about maintaining fairness and balance in presentation, any independent observer of the kind of media debates conducted these days on most issues of public importance including ongoing criminal and or corruption investigations and court cases will find it difficult to vouch for the media’s ability to fulfill those responsibilities.

Media’s freedom of expression has to be valued. An independent media in India have demonstrably strengthened our democracy by informing the lay public, raising pertinent   issues of governance or the lack of it, have been bold enough (and in the process have emboldened ordinary people) to question some of the privileges that those in high places in our society and political-government establishment have been habituated to exercise in an axiomatic manner. But this democratization process has, unfortunately, generated an irreverence (a particularly cheap, sweeping and strident form of the tendency) about all or most of our institutions for governance and the constitutional procedures. For its claim to freedom of expression to be respected the media has to eschew its current tendency to play to the gallery, settle for the lowest common denominator. It should reform and refine its own news generation and dissemination functions so as to maintain the fine balance between public’s democratic right to know and an individual’s (even an accused) equally right to silence if only as a part of his/her democratic right of defence, including that of his/her reputation. There is a danger in media’s playing a moral crusader, a vigilante role.  

A new-age Satyagraha

Grace has become much less common than even common sense! Indeed, rude behaviour, if that is symptomatic of a graceless society, abounds in our daily social interactions, at home, in public places, offices and finally on the streets where this can easily turn into road rage incidents which sometimes lead to violent crimes. 

Most people following politics in India today will testify to the fact that the quality of grace is becoming conspicuous by its absence in any political discourse either inside the parliament (or any other legislative bodies) or out of it (say, in TV studios of big national news channels). Political opponents are routinely seen to interrupt each other and blatantly usurp the debating space to voice one’s partisan positions.  These could be something like a speculative promise of an intangible beneficial fall out of this or that government policy as a foregone conclusion or an exactly opposite view expressing apprehension of an unmitigated disaster and a dark future guaranteed to unfold from the same policy, depending on their relative coordinates vis-à-vis the political divide.

Just look at the comments people proffer in the ubiquitous electronic space, in respect of the e-paper or ezine articles, blogs and the social media postings. The proclivity to post comments is often not commensurate with minimum required knowledge about the subject, basic civility to engage in a conversation, attitude to learn and contribute to take a discussion thread forward. On the contrary, utter arrogance and extreme and foolhardy self-righteousness often characterize such responses. The more sensitive the topic is the chances are that the author has to walk a sharper razor edge so as not to offend one side or the other and invite virulent comments. To be fair, sometimes the original blogs/postings themselves are tendentious, judgmental, make sweeping statements, and include tasteless insensitive pictures, almost as if spoiling for a fight. And the extreme sensitivity and touchiness about our opinions or beliefs on virtually any subject is legendary.

Intolerance of any view, worldview or even perception other than one’s own is often found in individual or group interactions, and this probably is pointing towards a fact that Indian society is becoming increasingly intolerant. Our prescription of economic development and the way its fall out has been managed has unleashed not only irreconcilable aspirations among various sections of the people but often an ugly conflict between simultaneously prevailing centuries as a part of this modernisation project. We are a divided, indeed, very fragmented society and have too many identities - ethnic, caste-based, religious, regional (even sub-regional), and of course political identities to defend from each other’s perceived pillory.

Just imagine, on the other hand, how different our world would have looked if we, at least the majority among us, could pause in our fast-faster-fastest track of furious one-upmanship before complete derailment and choose, individually, to be the slower coach and address each other with that famously under-used quaint Indian phrase ‘pehle aap’ ! Or perhaps could have reconsidered the strategy of withering contempt for our opponent, whatever his or her identity, in real life (or virtual) and be prepared to acknowledge the inherent ‘otherness’ as a matter of diversity of ways of life, much like the bio-diversity, to be protected and celebrated rather than being demonised, hated and demolished.

   

I wish we could, in a new form of Satyagraha, disown the inept puppeteers of our economic and political choices, manipulators of our taste, and all those who goad us in our every waking moment into frenetic competition, as if our life is but a dissipative T20 match between India and Pakistan winner taking all, for space, for the right of way, for the wherewithal for conspicuous consumption now and the security to keep doing the same in a distant future. And make these choices and respond not in anger and antipathy but in awareness of colours that the colour-blind would never see.

And persuade the stalker to take the ‘no’ for an answer, admire the candle in the wind and move on. 

(A modified and updated version of an older post of mine appearing in another blog)