Calcutta Corner

The Scowling Hills
Darjeeling continues to scowl. Bimal Gurung, leader of the secessionist Gorkha Janmukti Morcha had said that he would ensure that agitations for a separate state would continue during the visit of chief minister Mamata Banerjee to the hills of North Bengal. And he is delivering on his promise. Throughout Didi’s visit earlier this week, Gurung organised crippling strikes and rallies and even a boycott of the planned meeting of the Gorkha Territorial Administration. An angry Mamata, who has said that she was “rough and tough” has vowed to crush the movement with “strong action” against the Morcha. In the midst of all this, the Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde has told GJM leaders visiting Delhi that tri-partite talks would be held to sort out the matter. This has further annoyed Mamata who has ruled out talks unless strikes are called off. Last month’s military intelligence to the Union Defense Ministry about the movement being fuelled from across the porous Indo-Nepal border is being looked into. Top BSF officials speaking to Outlook have indicated that secret meetings in Siliguri to discuss the Gorkha issue are being planned. The current situation also looks set to stir up some major changes in the region, including the possibility of introducing border guards in the heretofore open borders. 

Gone For A Googly
Calcutta has this way of doing a googly ever so often. No, we are not talking about the googlies of “Calcutta’s Gaurav” Sourav Ganguly, but how it quietly sidelined Bangalore and Hyderabad to be the locus of the Pricewaterhouse Coopers’ prestigious Center for Execellence. Considered the last destination – and definitely as far as cities such as Bangalore or Hyderabad are concerned – for IT-job seekers not to mention research, the CFE (which handles top IT-jobs) moved into Calcutta two months ago and is the global consultancy giant’s second biggest after New York. 

Rooted Out
Pappu Singh, the Presidency University guard, who had identified the intruders who vandalised the premises of the college earlier this year has been transferred to Jhargram Raj College. This move has been met with widespread criticism of the ruling party Trinamool, whose goons allegedly took part in the vandalism. The attack during which outsiders wielding sticks and stones broke into the campus and beat up students and vandalised property, was said to be the TMC student body’s retaliatory action to the attack in Delhi on Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Finance Minister Amit Mitra allegedly led by SFI, the Left student body. Pappu’s transfer order has generated large-scale criticism as it smacks of political vendetta. Clearly this “grassroots” administration, which has drawn criticism for transferring top police officers like Damayanti Sen, is not going to spare even the grassroots people. 

War Cry Of Beggars
Kangal Malsat, Suman Mukhopadhyay’s new movie based on the novel by Nabarun Bhattacharya, is a dark satire on the present political situation in Bengal. Two scavenger groups (no doubt allegorising the tie–up of political parties in Bengal in the past few years) unite to snatch power from a corrupt Communist regime. Inhabitants of and symbolizing Calcutta’s filthiest, most squalid - physically as well as morally – they conspire. But in the beginning of the movie they hog our sympathy, being the exploited, poverty-ridden underdogs. The strength of Mukhopadhyay’s narrative lies in his ability to maneuver our empathy until it metamorphoses into sheer disgust. 

Seagull In Germany
The most prestigious German honour (equivalent to the Padma Award) was won by Calcutta’s Naveen Kishore, managing director of Seagull Books, making him the first Indian to be honoured with the award. Seagull is one of Calcutta’s most endearing destinations, for book and art lovers. And as the brainchild of such a charming Centre of art literature and culture, there couldn’t be a more deserving candidate.