Once More Removed

Grit, determination and sheer focus helped 26-year-old Shundell Prasad to trace her family tree back to the 1800s. The process took her a tedious three years.
New York-based Indo-Guyanese film maker, Shundell Prasad, was at her final year in New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts when she decided to make a film on something she was always curious about— her identity.
She traveled three continents in search of her roots. “It is a great feeling to know about one’s roots,” she revealed.
Her journey to trace her roots in now in the form of a documentary film – Once more removed- a journey back to India.
When asked why she wanted to find her roots – prompt came the reply from her – “I started researching this film while I was still in university, simply because I wanted to know why I looked Indian, but did not have any connections or ties with India.
"I am a descendent of the people who were transported from India 150 years ago to inhabit what was then known as British Guyana, as indentured servants for the British Empire," she said.
Prasad's journey in the film begins from Queens, NY and then to the sweltering sugar cane fields of Guyana.
"I have managed to exhume my forefather's 19th Century ship records from the massive vaults of Guyana's record room. These records were a huge discovery, as they became my navigational map back to India."
She further says: "My expedition into mapping the pattern of migration backwards to India's remote villages is very exciting. Based on the information extracted from the ship records, we pursue India's northeastern belt. We travel to the two main areas in India that were part of Indian Sepoy Mutiny of 1857: Bihar and East Uttar Pradesh."
"In Bihar, I found my roots in Muzaffarpur. In Uttar Pradesh, I found relatives of my father in Azamgarh. It is here, in India, that I am graciously welcomed back to my ancestral homeland. It is stranger than fiction to come face to face with my relatives who live in dire poverty. It is here that I realize the spirit and dignity of these people," said Prasad.
Prasad was six when her parents immigrated from Guyana to the US, making her a second-generation Guyanese. However, given that her forefathers were migrant settlers in Guyana from India, makes Prasad an Indo- Guyanese. “Knowing I was a Guyanese of Indian origin created a lot of conflict about my identity,” says Prasad. “ I was also fascinated about India and where I came from in India.” She adds that neither her parents nor her grandparents had the answers to the questions she posed about her true identity.
"It was stranger than fiction to come face to face with my relatives who live in dire poverty. It was here that I realised how removed I had become", she says. The documentary has a 90-minute product for the world to see

Dad - I Miss you

SUNDAY was Father’s Day and for the first time in my life I missed my father. I never knew how much important he was to me. What all I could achieve in my life was due to him. He never questioned he never asked he just showed path. My dad I miss you.
Two months have passed
I’ll never forget the day
Someone rang to tell me
That you’d gone away

The hurt is the same
Like an open wound
There are days
I don’t utter a sound

Some days the pain is stronger
It makes me sick and weak
I can’t stand this much longer
I just sit here and weep

I’ve shut my private door
And let no one in
Locking myself in a box
They try, but I won’t give in

You were like a rock
Strong, faithful and true
What worth has my life
Now I don’t have you

I always loved you
My dad, my star
Now my pain is
To worship you from afar

I love you now
As I did back then
I just hope... one day
I will see you again

I am so proud of you
Brave and strong to the end
Now when asked “how are you?”
There is no need to pretend

We all love and miss you so much, sleep well
and take care of all who went before you

Forever in my heart x

ATTACKS ON INDIANS in Australia

ON WHAT’S going down under - INDIANS are divided in Australia on the issue and particularly on the word ‘RACISM’. Students are labeling it as racist attacks. Students want to label it as racism and so do the media but those permanent residents and citizens categorically deny it.
I was in Melbourne for around two weeks covering the story of attacks on Indian students in Australia. Baring couple of incidents – I would definitely raise my voice that it is not racism but a deliberate attempt to scare the Indian students. Who are those involved in the attack? That’s a question – police and even the Ozzie government has to answer to pacify the issue.

Here I am reproducing a story, which I penned for a local newspaper in India last week:

GURLEEN GULATI was flying high when she was selected for a master’s course in Swinburne University in Melbourne eight months back. She had plans to bring her younger brother to Australia for further education. But now everything has changed. “I will never allow my brother to come here, this place is no safer for Indian students a,” she stressed.
Over seven students all from India were attacked in Melbourne in last 10 days. And attacks are still on. Racism is the tag word being used while the Australian government refuses it stating that Indians are soft target.
There are 90,000 Indians studying in Australia. Education of foreign students has become big business in Australia, generating 15.5 billion Australian dollars (US$12.54 billion) in 2008. And Indians now make up 25% of students, up from just fewer than 10% in 1997. The tertiary-education sector is now the nation's third-largest export earner behind coal and iron ore. In Victoria state, education is the biggest export earner. The number of Indian students has doubled in the past three years, with two-thirds studying at private colleges.
Gautam Gupta, spokesman for the Federation of Indian Students of Australia said that violence against the foreign students has been escalating over the past four years. In Victoria state, police said 1,447 people of Indian origin were victims of crimes such as robberies and assaults in the year ending June 30, 2008, an increase from 1,082 in the previous year.
Now Indian students studying in Melbourne and Sydney are getting phone calls from families concerned for their safety in the wake of recent attacks against Indian student. “ I do not want to stay here. I came here last September and now I want to go back,” Anil Kumar, a student from Hyderabad informed. He said attacks on Indians are widespread and they are fearful to travel, especially at night.
Meanwhile, a sense of uneasiness is gripping Indian community, with suggestions and rumours flowing thick and fast. In absence of any common platform to share information or to give suggestions, SMS service has emerged as a major source of communication among Indian community in Victoria.
A SMS which was making round on the night of rally asked Indians to join the protest. “Guys show ur support and come to Fed Sqr, there’s been one more attack on an Indian student in Hoppers Crossing today and there this evening they entered in Gurudwara n beat one lady and her husband. Our 3 guys have been arrested, but the offenders are still free. It is time to raise our voice, plz forward this to all.” Another, which started circulating early Tuesday morning, asked Indians to sit in one carriage. “To travel safely all Indians are to travel in the first compartment known as Desi Dabba of the train. That way we can be in numbers and help each other at any time day or night. Plus introduce yourself to other Indians that travel with you everyday at same time and going to same place, Plz forward to all Indian community.”
It is difficult to ascertain source of these SMSes, and thus the validity of the claims they make. However, such messages are adding fuel to already panicked Indian population. In India, Australia is being labeled a racist nation in media reports, a claim made a number of times in recent years around Asia. "There is a definite risk that this violence will affect the flow of students," said Andrew Smith, national executive officer of the Australian Council for Private Education and Training, which represents private vocational colleges. He added that "the majority of students have a safe and enjoyable time" while studying in Australia and those one in five students seek to settle here after graduation. Still, he said, the reports of the attacks hurt the nation's reputation. Now not only the students’ community but also those who have got permanent residents are also worried. Srilakshmi is married to Chandrasekhar in Melbourne is also worried. “When I came here two years back things were normal but now suddenly these attacks have created an atmosphere of fear,” she said. Australia Government has asserted that hate crimes would be considered offensive and a task force would look into the cases of attacks on Indian students.

Girl in Oscar film turned prostitute

A FRIEND of mine from UK called up the day after Slumdog Millionaire won 8 Oscars. He wanted to know whether the children living in Asia’s largest slums – Dharavi in Mumbai, would have a better future, now that the film has exposed the pathetic living conditions of the slum. Would the Oscars to the movie showing these children provoke some thoughts in the minds of the government to take some measures to better the things for the slum children? I simply said ‘NO’.

And the next moment I was on phone assigning a story to our news desk in Kolkata to track the whereabouts of a girl in a red light area who rose to limelight after a documentary – “Born in Brothels” got accolades from across the world and also an Oscar in 2005.
“Is she enjoying a new life? Did Oscars change her fate? Is she happy?” Cascades of such thoughts were wrestling in my head. But an hour later I was told that the story was lined up as they had tracked the girl in Asia’s largest red light area, Sonagachi.

Puja is her name and she is 18. She was one of the nine children who were part of the Oscar-winning documentary Born Into Brothels, directed by Ms Zana Briski. The film won 20 international awards. How is Puja? Has the Oscar recognition changed her life at all?

The story is disheartening to say the least. Fate hasn't spared Puja. She has slipped into the same formidable pit. She got sucked into the sex trade just a year after her brush with the Oscars. She was barely in her teens. 'It seems like a fairy tale now. I still see it in my dreams. I get goose bumps when I remember the heart-stopping moment when the award was announced,” she told my correspondent at her house in Kolkata.

"All of us kept screaming with joy. Zana aunty made sure we too went along to collect the statuette. My head was swimming, there were so many eyes on us, the deafening applause, so many cameras flashing...' Puja said.

While the children were in Los Angeles, Ms Briski and others tried their best to help them lead new lives. Puja was in High School then. The children took part in the documentary got an offer to stay back in the US and study. Some did. But Puja backed out.

'Aunty (Zana) gave a lot of money by cheque to my mother and asked her to release me, but she was unwilling. I am a girl and the only child; my mother wouldn't let go. Call it family pressure if you will. It's quite simple, really,' Puja said with a dismissive shrug followed by a short helpless laugh.

'So, you see me here.'

Dressed in jeans and a trendy shirt, Puja could pass for any other college student, until the whiff of smoke and alcohol in her breath hits you.
She is adamant about staying in the sex-trade.

'At this age, I have a flat, a laptop, costly phones and plenty of money. What do I lack?' she asked.

'Zana aunty and I are in touch by e-mail. She was upset that I, too, had joined the trade like my mother, something she wanted to save me from.

'But this trade has really paid off for me.'

A sign of her 'prosperity' - she has rented rooms in Prem Kamal, one of the most expensive Sonagachhi buildings. Mother Rakhi lives in the opposite building.

Puja pays for her living expenses. Her mother says she wanted a 'normal' life for Preeti. She still has a fading photo of Preeti with the Oscar statuette stuck on the wall.

'That is all I have left of her...' she said looking at it, as tears welled in her eyes.


Born into Brothels, by Ross Kauffman and Zana Briski, is the winner of the 77th annual Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. A tribute to the resiliency of childhood and the restorative power of art, Born into Brothels is a portrait of several unforgettable children who live in the red light district of Calcutta, where their mothers work as prostitutes. Zana Briski, a New York-based photographer, gives each of the children a camera and teaches them to look at the world with new eyes.

GIR PICS

The above photographs were clicked at Gir Lions Sanctuary.

THE KINGS of GIR

READ somewhere that Greece saw its last lion shortly after the birth of Christ. Most of the countries in the world have no presence of lions. Apart from Africa the only place where Asiatic lions, a regal subspecies, can be spotted is in the Gir forest in Gujarat (India).

IT was not planned nor was it there on the itinerary of my visit to Gujarat last week. It just happened. My passion to witness the Asiatic lions made me maneuver my work time and sneak into the Sasan Gir Forest Reserve – the only place, outside Africa, where lions can be still seen in full flesh and ferocity. It was created in 1913 and accorded the sanctuary status in 1965.

Before taking the 8-hour-long drive to Gir – I was told that it was not easy to actually witness the royal animal due to the fact that they are in small number spread over a large area; a 300 of them spread over 1000 sq kms area.

As you stroll into their natural habitat, it takes no time at all to realize why lions have come to stand for royalty and greatness. A tiger will slink through the forest unseen, but a lion stands its ground, curious and unafraid—lionhearted.

It takes hours and sometimes days around the dry forest and bumpy roads to track lions. I was lucky as it took me only 2 hours to see two big Asiatic lions walking majestically on the muddy track leaving behind pugmarks denoting that they control the expanse.

One of the forest guards told me that the lions were least bothered about the presence of humans near them. They just live royally unmindful of whoever is in the vicinity. The lion trackers follow these epic animals wielding a wooden stick in their hands – their job is to ensure that they are physically fine.

It was a breathtaking moment when I finally got close to a pride of Asiatic lions. Fear didn't grip me even for a moment when the big cat straddled gracefully; just a couple of feet away from me. A thrilling moment, indeed!

I chided myself for not being equipped with a professional camera to capture that never to be relived moment of my life. I managed to click few photos with a small digital camera and was happy with one particular frame when the Asiatic lion was crossing the road.

I have got to thank my friend – Kalpak Kekre – channel head of TV9 Gujarat, for facilitating such a fulfilling experience. He took off time to accompany me to Gir. Kalpak informed me that the Gir lions would most likely have disappeared by now, were it not for the Nawab of Junagadh. At the turn of the 20th century the Nawab saved the lions by declaring that any one wanted to hunt the lion in Gir required the royal license. It was not an entirely selfless effort. In order for him to continue to kill a few lions for sport, he needed to save many. Thanks to his 'license raj' there are about 300 lions still alive today in and around the Gir Forest, treating the eyes of many a curious eye.

White Blanket Over London

LONDON, 2007. I stayed at Bakers Street for sometime couple of years back. I heard ample of time about the bad weather in this part of the world. True! Come summer and it was raining.
I wondered does it ever snow in the capital of Britain. I was told most of Londoners have had never seen snow on the London streets since long, long and long time indeed. And if I had the fascination for snow then London was not the place to be. But I stayed. Completed my work. And left with a bit of disappointment of seeing all weathers except the white coloured flakes on the streets and on the rooftops and on the trees. And now when I am not there “SNOW” is smiling …...ooops it’s laughing all over the place. Londoners are witnessing heaviest snowfall in 20 years, which they never ever dreamt off. Tubes are jammed, buses are not plying and my friends called me to inform they are not going to office and having all the fun in this WHTE WEATHER. HO! SNOW you cheated me. I am missing you.

Falling Snow
See the pretty snowflakes Falling from the sky,
On the wall and housetops soft and thick they lie. On the window ledges,

On the branches bare,
Now how fast they gather, Filling all the air. Look into the garden,

Where the grass was green;
Covered by the snowflakes, Not a blade is seen.
Now the bare black bushes, All look soft and white,
Every twig is laden - What a pretty sight!