Director Quentin Tarantino said Wednesday that the “Star Trek” movie he has pitched to Paramount will have an R rating ― “if I do it.” He told Empire the project has a script, although he has yet to weigh in on it.
If the colorful language of his previous movies is any indication, Tarantino’s version, which has been reported previously, would no doubt explore the final bleeping frontier.
Fans on Twitter definitely want this project to live long and prosper.
Thor actor Chris Hemsworth wielded a toothbrush, not a hammer, for his first job.
The “Avengers: Endgame” star said on “The Tonight Show” Wednesday that he cleaned breast pumps as a 14-year-old.
That admission ultimately drew serious doubt from host Jimmy Fallon and fellow guest Kumail Nanjiani, whose job it was to determine whether Hemsworth was lying in a game of “True Confessions.”
Turns out Hemsworth, who now stars in “Men In Black: International,” was telling the truth.
Watch above to hear how Hemsworth scrubbed away the dried milk and other details.
KOLKATA — Agitating doctors Friday demanded Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s unconditional apology and set six conditions for the state government to withdraw their four-day-long stir that disrupted healthcare services across West Bengal.
“We want unconditional apology of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for the manner in which she had addressed us at the SSKM Hospital yesterday. She should not have said what she had,” a spokesperson of the joint forum of junior doctors, Dr Arindam Dutta, said.
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While visiting the SSKM Hospital on Thursday, Banerjee had contended that “outsiders” had entered medical colleges to create disturbances and the agitation was a conspiracy by the CPI(M) and the BJP.
Listing the six conditions, the agitators said the chief minister will have to visit the injured doctors at the hospital and her office should release a statement condemning the attack on them.
“We also want immediate intervention of the chief minister. Documentary evidence of judicial enquiry against the inactivity of the police to provide protection to the doctors at the Nil Ratan Sircar Medical College and Hospital on Monday night should also be provided,” he said.
Two junior doctors were assaulted on Monday night by family members of a patient who died in the NRS Hospital.
“We demand documentary evidence and details of action taken against those who had attacked us,” Dutta said.
They also demanded unconditional withdrawal of all “false cases and charges” which were imposed on junior doctors and medical students across West Bengal in the wake of their strike.
They also stressed on their demand for improvement of infrastructure in all health facilities as well as posting of armed police personnel there.
Standing up as the end credits for Game Over rolled, I recognised that I had a rather visceral reaction to the genre-bending film featuring Taapsee Pannu and Vinodhini — even as my heart was still pounding from the truly scary, triggering moments toward the end, my lips were involuntarily breaking into a content smile. In retrospect, my entire experience of the film was primal — the film scared the living daylights out of me, strictly keeping me in audience mode instead of my oft-used critic mode. It was only after the lights came back on — I also fear darkness a little — that I could truly enjoy the experience that was Game Over.
Pannu plays Swapna, a gamer suffering from PTSD, after what seems to be a sexual assault from a year ago. Her performance in this bilingual film is one of the best we’ve seen this year (and I’m not just including women actors here).
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Vinodhini, as her house help Kalamma, is just right for her role, not overbearing, but never taking bullshit either. In her introduction scene, she tastes Swapna’s breakfast from her plate and says, ”enna konjam uppilla″ (no big deal, there isn’t enough salt is all). When Swapna retorts, ”uppe illa″ (there is absolutely no salt), Kalamma just brings her a saltshaker and goes about her business. To think of Kalamma merely as the house help would be to undermine this hard-to-define, yet intimate relationship between the two. This relationship has no name, but it’s strong enough to bear the weight of the entire film, which is what it fantastically does.
Swapna’s house, where she spends most of her time, and where most of the film’s action takes place, is the definition of a ‘lived-in’ mise en scene. Swapna always sleeps with her light on; she holds on to her joystick like her life depends on it; she always sleeps on the sofa; and insists on the comforts of familiarity — “leave things as they are,” she says more than once in the film. Yet, even in her own home, in her own body and mind, Swapna feels unsafe. Game Over is the story of how she finds her safety.
In tracing that journey, over a few weeks, Game Over treats Swapna with such empathy and understanding that I may have even cried a little. There’s a scene where Kalamma asks Swapna to let go of the pain, now that her assaulter is in prison. But both Swapna and the film reject that idea—instead, the focus stays on Swapna, and what her experience did to her.
Regret, victim blaming, self-loathing, isolation: ’Game Over’ subtly presents every emotion someone in Swapna’s state might experience but without patronising or infantilising her. In this film, her lived experience is the most important story. So much so that for much of the film, the villain is only heard in the form of loud impatient breaths. Even when we see the villain right at the end, their motives stay irrelevant. This movie is not about them.
And Swapna’s trauma isn’t turned into a sorrow-fest either. She actively tries to take care of herself, makes her own doctor’s appointments, goes in search of answers and even tries her best not to disturb Kalamma. In fact, there is a scene with a knife that I can’t discuss without revealing some spoilers, but watch out for it, watch the way the film treats it, devoid of any melodrama, without taking away the seriousness of it.
In writing Game Over, Ashwin Saravanan and Kaavya Ramkumar show us the immeasurable advantages of staying focussed. The entire film has only a handful of characters. When the backstory of a brutally murdered woman appears, we are told a succinct story, narrated over a montage—no meet-cute, love story and other unnecessary scenes to establish her personhood. No revenge either, for a change. Every conversation is measured and to-the-point. So, when there is a name card to tell us who one of the characters is, while no one else got that treatment, we are able to look past it.
To call Game Over a slasher film or even a thriller takes away from the genre-bending endeavour it is. There is a ghost-story element — but in retrospect I wonder if it was only in my mind. It’s not so much horror, unless you are thinking about the horror of a woman’s everyday life. There is a bit of fantasy in there, but I would argue that the sisterhood that the fantasy angle comes to represent is, in fact, no fantasy at all. And the biggest triumph is that through all of this, Game Over remains a coherent, focused and satisfying tale of slaying demons both inside and out.
A few minutes before the interval in Unda, a few cops from Kerala, who are posted at an isolated, rundown polling booth in the middle of a Chhattisgarh forest, find themselves being the target of a flurry of gunshots. As they muster all the courage and guns that are available and fire back, their senior, SI Mani sir (Mammootty), staggers onto a chair, sweaty and numb. As the camera focuses on his ashen face, we end the first half staring at an ordinary, vulnerable policeman who apologises to his juniors the next day and admits that he has never chased thieves in his career and no idea what to do when faced with bullets.
Wikipedia may slot Unda as megastar Mammooty’s nth outing as a celluloid cop, but what sets it apart is that his character is a subversion of all the cool, all-knowing policemen he has played on screen so far. Mani Sir is aged, has a small paunch and fears for his life and family. On one occasion, you see him weary and clammy as he curls up on the floor and you find yourself getting panicky over his heart condition. When the ITBT Commandant talks down to him, he only nods and turns to his junior for translating it from Hindi. Mammootty is superbly convincing and real as he lives the role of SI Mani. His intro is a beauty and succinctly sums up the man and his attitude: a man tries to gently steal a purse from another man’s pocket, only to realise that a policeman is watching him. As he quietly slips it on the ground and leaves, SI Mani gently allows himself a smile. Everything is there in that smile, world-weary, duty-bound and kind.
But then, Unda, directed by Khalid Rahman, is the story of ordinary policemen like those, and its beauty is that it never forgets that. Nine such cops, who are deputed under Mani sir, are clueless and anxious about what’s in store for them in Maoist-ridden Chhattisgarh, where they are assigned for election duty.
If you think too much about it, Unda really floats on a thin storyline. But it’s how Khalid crafts the scenes, drizzling them with humour, satire, suspense (aided by some terrific background score by Prashant Pillai) and sensitivity, that makes it a compelling watch.
He gives each of these havildars and constables a definitive character sketch and allows them space and thoughtful conversations that help shape them for the viewer. There is Jojo (Shine Tom Chacko), Mani sir’s second-in-command, who likes to throw his weight around. But then he is also going through an imminent divorce. Biju (Lukman) who is mourning over his wife’s desertion and his own caste identity. Gireesh (Arjun Ashokan) who is savouring the excitement of a romance and Aji Peter (Rony David), who happens to be his future brother-in-law. Naushad, who fantasises about being an actor one day, or Gokulan, who has left his pregnant wife to join the camp. They are all people with complexities, uncertainties, fears and anxieties.
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The junior-senior dynamics, the gentle and cruel ragging that ranges from casteist slurs to vulgar curiosity about personal lives, are all in here. Biju is constantly taunted about being an ‘Adivasi’ by his colleague. When they later survive a bombing together, the latter apologises, saying that “that man is dead now”. There are no fiery speeches or easy advice about bravery or nationalism, just simple powerful lines borne out of fear and the need to survive.
When you have a superstar headlining the narrative, it’s often tempting to allow him to take the reins (as has happened in most of Mammootty’s recent outings) but Khalid overcomes that
The doctor-turned army officer they meet at the camp, the local Adivasi man who talks about identity politics and their land being snatched away are unforgettable images. It tells us about police forces who are often forced to survive with minimal resources and amenities, about helpless senior cops who are not equipped to take on bigger dangerous missions, about tribal minorities in India who are still reeling under water scarcity, caste oppression and land attacks. There is a hilariously ironic scene where a cop propels himself over a tree and shoots (with rationed bullets) on the attackers. But none of it hits the target and Mani sir shouts in exasperation: “Can’t you even get one right?”
When you have a superstar headlining the narrative, it’s often tempting to allow him to take the reins (as has happened in most of Mammootty’s recent outings) but Khalid overcomes that, coming up with a sensitive balancing act that never lets the star overpower the narrative.
Under India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who assumed office in May 2014, India has increased investment in the military and, especially, the navy. In addition to the facilities on the Andamans, there is now also a base at Campbell Bay on the largest island in the Nicobar Islands. The aerodromes of both the Andaman and the Nicobar Islands have been expanded and modernised, now taking both advanced hunting planes, transport planes and aircraft that can detect submarines from the air.
Modi is the leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a Hindu nationalist party with a strong anti-Chinese orientation, and he has found a soul mate in Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who shares his concern about China’s expansion. But the India-Japan alliance actually predates Abe’s and Modi’s respective premierships. Abe, in power from 2006 to 2007 and again since 2012, signed a pact with India for regular military exercises and Japan agreed to sell India two advanced amphibious aircraft a year before Modi became prime minister. A visit to India by then Japanese Prime Minister Yoshi Mori in August 2000 resulted in a document called ‘Indo-Japanese Partnership for the twenty-first century’. In the same year, Japanese aid was also restored after having been suspended since India’s 1998 nuclear tests. As Michael J. Green, Japan chair and senior adviser at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies pointed out in 2012, by the 1990s ’conservative Japanese politicians on the right … found common cause with conservative, anti-Chinese Indian political figures.
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Anti-Chinese sentiment is a feature not only of conservative Indian politicians. During a visit to Japan in October 2008 by Modi’s predecessor Manmohan Singh, a member of the centrist and some would argue leftist Indian National Congress, documents titled ‘Joint Statement on the Advancement of Strategic and Global Partnership between Japan and India’ and ‘Joint Declaration on Security Cooperation between Japan and India’ were signed with Japan’s then prime minister, Taro Aso.
The United States remains an important partner for India, but as the Japanese security analyst Satoru Nagao pointed out in a 2013 article, the US is no longer the strong global power it once was. Nagao contends that it falls on India to fill the resulting security vacuum and that Japan would be its willing partner. Increased Indo-Japanese cooperation is also reflected in the volume of bilateral trade between the two countries. From 2000 to 2012, it quadrupled to US$18 billion – which still is much smaller than the US$340 billion Sino-Japanese trade the same year. But the trend is clear: Japan and India are partners in trade as well as regional security, and that relationship has strengthened considerably under Abe and Modi. India is the largest recipient of Japanese aid, while bilateral trade is expected to reach US$50 billion by 2020.
Japan, in accordance with the pacifist constitution the United States forced it to adopt after World War II, should not actually have any military that could once again threaten the Asia-Pacific region. But that attitude towards defeated Japan changed after the Korean War in the early 1950s, when the United States and its allies fought against North Korea supported by China. The US needed a new, powerful military ally in the region – and the response was Japan’s ‘selfdefence forces’, which are now one of Asia’s strongest and one of the world’s best-equipped military units. At the outset, it was stipulated that they would not participate in military activities beyond Japan, but that decision was reversed in the 1990s. It began with Japanese participation in a UN peacekeeping operation in Cambodia in 1992 and was followed by similar interventions in East Timor, Iraq, Nepal and South Sudan. Today, there is no nation – except perhaps China – that challenges Japan’s role in, for instance, Exercise Malabar. And the cruelties that the Japanese military committed during its occupation of the Andamans and Nicobars in the 1940s is no longer a topic people wish to talk about today.
Under President Donald Trump, who assumed office in 2017, it is not only the international reputation of the United States which has weakened but also its military commitments abroad – and that despite the US President’s seeing eye to eye with both Modi and Abe when it comes to China. It has thus fallen on India to assert its role as a regional superpower, above all in the Indian Ocean, which the Indians have long regarded as their own waters. But for India to do so, it has had to confront a new and more assertive China. As the Indian Vice Admiral Anup Singh wrote in 2017: ‘There is no doubt in anyone’s mind now, that China craves a permanent strategic presence in the IOR [Indian Ocean Region]. After all, the various ports and other infrastructure projects she has established in Myanmar, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and in a number of East African countries over the past decade, were planned only with the purpose of “enabling” presence in this ocean.’
Singh also believes that China has learned from the experiences of the previous Cold War and added allies in the region by combining long-term strategic plans with loans and financial assistance rather than through direct and open military alliances. And that is the strategy which will secure the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and, in particular, the so-called ‘Maritime Silk Road’ through the Indian Ocean.
India has therefore begun to apply a similar policy, which Prime Minister Modi calls SAGAR, an acronym that stands for ‘Security And Growth for All in the Region’ and includes helping smaller countries with infrastructure projects as well as combating piracy, smuggling and illegal fishing. The aim is that it will lead to closer economic cooperation between India and its neighbours in the Indian Ocean. But although the Indian economy is expanding rapidly, it lags far behind China’s, and SAGAR can hardly compare with the BRI. The emphasis of India’s foreign policy will, therefore, be on its navy’s military cooperation with like-minded countries, especially Japan and the United States.
And much depends on India. Nagao believes that there are, as he says, three reasons why India is the power that could challenge China’s growing influence: ‘Firstly, India is located at the northern centre of the Indian Ocean. This means that India can access the Indian Ocean from all sides relatively easily. Secondly, India is the only country among the countries around the Indian Ocean to possess a strong navy. Thirdly, India has long respected the freedom of navigation in the SLOCs [Sea Lines of Communication] for all the countries which are near India, in the manner of a responsible maritime power. Thus, if India has the will and enough capabilities, the Indian Ocean will become India’s Ocean.’
Excerpted with permission from Costliest Pearl: China’s Struggle for India’s Ocean by Bertil Lintner, published by Context, May 2019
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will chair the fifth meeting of the Niti Aayog’s Governing Council On Saturday which will focus on issues like the drought situation, farm distress, rain-water harvesting and preparedness for Kharif crops.
The five-point agenda for the meeting also includes aspirational districts programme, transforming agriculture and security related issues with special focus on left wing extremism (LWE) districts, an official statement said.
The meeting, to be held at Rashtrapati Bhavan, will be attended by chief ministers, lieutenant governors of union territories, several union ministers and senior government officials.
This will be the first governing council meeting under the new Modi government.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, however, has refused to attend the meeting, saying it is “fruitless” as the Niti Aayog has no financial powers to support state plans.
Headed by the Prime Minister, the Governing Council includes ministers of Finance, Home, Defence, Agriculture, Commerce and Rural Development, besides state chief ministers and Niti Aayog vice chairman, CEO and members.
The Governing Council reviews the action taken on the agenda items of the previous meeting and deliberates upon the future developmental priorities.
So far, four meetings of the Governing Council have been held under the chairmanship of the Prime Minister.
The first meeting of the Governing Council was held on February 8, 2015, at which the Prime Minister laid down the key mandates of Niti Aayog such as fostering cooperative federalism and addressing national issues through active participation of the states.
The second meeting on July 15, 2015 reviewed the progress made by the three sub-groups of chief ministers and the two task forces.
In the third meeting on April 23, 2017, Modi had pitched for conducting simultaneous elections of the Lok Sabha and the state assemblies and shifting to a January-December fiscal year.
The fourth meeting of the council on June 17, 2018 deliberated upon measures taken to double farmers’ income and the progress of the government’s flagship schemes.
Kate Middleton has revealed how she boosts her children’s mental wellbeing every single day – and it’s achingly simple.
The Duchess of Cambridge, who appeared on Blue Peter on Thursday, said making sure her kids played outside was a key part of their daily routine.
“Rain or shine, they’re dragged outside,” she said. “It’s great. It encourages creativity, confidence and even a short amount of time – 10 or 15 minutes – makes a huge difference to physical wellbeing but also to our mental wellbeing.”
[Read more: How To Help Children Living With Mental Health Conditions]
The Duchess, who was taking part in outdoor activities with schoolchildren at Westminster City Council’s Paddington Recreation Ground, also said pond dipping – using a net to find tadpoles and newts – was “massively up my street”.
And she said she was determined to instil similar interests in George, five, Charlotte, four and Louis, one.
Kate was given a green Blue Peter badge for her efforts to encourage families to get out into nature – and gave out similar badges to the children who took part.
She attended the event to launch a contest to design a sculpture that will go in her Back To Nature garden. The winning entry will be installed in the Chelsea Flower Show concept garden in Wisley, Surrey, in September.
For more information or to enter the competition, see here.
Dear reader,
Nenookaasi Ogichidaa identifies as two-spirit, an umbrella term that indigenous people from North America use to describe their place on a spectrum of genders and sexualities.
The mental wellness navigator, who works with black and indigenous communities in Ontario, Canada, goes by two sets of gender pronouns: they, their and them, as well as she and her. For them, it was important to be identified by both sets as they navigate our gender-normative world in a fluid way, and as a way to embody their two-spirit identity.
Nenookaasi (or Neno for short) is also a powwow dancer. Powwows are traditional social gatherings in many Native American communities that allow people to come together to celebrate age-old traditions. And nothing says powwow like the Fancy Dance – a ubiquitous staple of these gatherings. But the dance is also strictly gendered – there’s one version for men and another for women.
For Neno, who loved dancing, the gender confinement of powwows was stifling: the expectation that men and women could only perform certain dances and wear certain outfits. And slowly, they realized the binary world they were forced into didn’t promote their well-being and they stopped dancing altogether.
But when HuffPost Canada reporter Al Donato meets Neno, who is one of 24 LGBTQ+ change-makers being profiled for HuffPost’s global pride project – “Proud Out Loud” – they are wearing a yellow shawl they found on the street, blooming with fiery wings that trails into fringes. On their feet are handmade moccasins, decorated with flames and enforced with reclaimed leather from couches. Underneath the fancy shawl – typical of the women’s powwow dance – Neno wears a black hoodie, emblazoned with the words “Resilient And Relentless.”
In a bid to break free from the confines of gender norms and represent their gender fluidity, Neno is wearing both male and female regalia, and after three years of no dancing, they are back, dressed to the nines and ready to dance to the big drum. “I missed this so much,” they say.
They are still processing what their complete two-spirit, powwow regalia will look like, and until then, Neno is diverting their energies to community organizing and educating others about their cultures.
It’s this unrelenting authenticity that makes Neno such a beacon for others – especially for black Native Americans, according to Donato: “Whatever responsibility they inhabit, be it at a powwow or a nation-wide Pride advisory, they carve out space for their most authentic self.
“Canadian LGBTQ representation has historically and continues to leave out two-spirit contributions. Neno’s plurality of identity — black, indigenous and Ukrainian; queer, two-spirit, and polyamorous; partner, parent, and puppy mom — exists without compromising on any of them, which we love.”
We hope you’ll enjoy this spotlight on just one of the many inspiring voices that make up HuffPost’s “Proud Out Loud.” Our heroes span the globe — from the U.K. to Korea to Canada and beyond — and they cut across identities and professions and passions. Read the full series of profiles here.
Signing off from our London HQ.
Until next time,
Lucy
For more on LGBTQ+ issues in Canada, follow HuffPost’s@AlDonato
Mim Skinner used to be shocked to see women prisoners released onto the streets with nowhere to go. But after working as an art teacher in a women’s prison, her shock was quickly replaced with resignation and disappointment. Mim is this week’s contributor to HuffPost U.K.’s “The Case I Can’t Forget” – a series that hears from those working at the coal face of public service about the cases they’ve carried with them throughout their careers. In this poignant episode, Mim remembers Catherine, a 19-year-old inmate who was usually the life and soul of the prison classroom. But as she prepared for her imminent release, Catherine also steeled herself to return to the abuse and homelessness that being incarcerated had sheltered her from. An eye-opening read.
Sintu Bagui was 14 when she dropped out of school and started working in a plywood factory. Her hands were red raw by the end of the day but anything was better than having to wear a boy’s uniform and use the boys’ washroom. Her mother, a sex worker who lived in a red-light area, was devastated – she had hoped for a better life for Bagui and was unable to accept Bagui’s gender expression. It was only after her mother’s death that Bagui started to wear a sari and jewelry for the first time. Bagui identifies as a transgender woman and while India decriminalized gay sex in 2018, transgender individuals still face discrimination, social stigma and violence. But she’s unrelenting in raising the visibility of the community and was recently appointed a local judge in her community. Bagui is profiled here by HuffPost India’s Piyasree Dasgupta for “Proud Out Loud.” From the factory floor to a seat on the court, there’s no doubt that Bagui is an LGBTQ+ change-maker.
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Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan broke the diplomatic protocol at the opening ceremony of the SCO Summit here when he sat down even as all other leaders, including his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, were standing, an embarrassing gaffe for which he was trolled online.
In a video shared on the official Twitter handle of his party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, prime minister Khan is seen sitting while the rest of the world leaders and dignitaries at the event in the Kyrgyz capital stood when head of states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation arrived for the opening ceremony.
He stood briefly when his name was announced and then seated himself again before the other leaders, in a breach of protocol.
The cricketer-turned-politician, who has not attended many international summits, was trolled online by the netizens for the seating gaffe after the video went viral.
“Imran Khan again caused national embarrassment at Bishkek, ShanghaiCooperation Organisation. When everyone was standing. He sat, stood when the presenter took his name but sat again. Arrogant, ill mannered, or an idiot?” one Twitter user wrote.
“Must study the decorum of diplomatic visits to make some mark in future Mr Imran Khan,” wrote another.
“He came, he sat, he got up, he sat again. Haters gonna say PM Imran Khan has no manners, I’d say he’s still handsome,” another tweet said.
The video went viral and the Pakistani prime minister was criticised for his “high-handed” attitude.
Earier, Khan broke the diplomatic protocol at the 14th Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Summit held in Saudi Arabia earlier this month.
At the sidelines of the OIC Summit, Khan walked away after speaking to Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz’s translator without waiting for him to translate the message.
Chandigarh : The doctors of the All India Institute Of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) today called off their protest and gave a 48 hours ultimatum to the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee to meet the demands of the protesting doctors.
Dr. Jawahar Singh, Vice President of the Resident Medical Association (RDA), AIIMS informed HuffPost India that if the demands of the West Bengal doctors were not met within 48 hours, they would be forced to resort to an indefinite strike.
“The situation in West Bengal has deteriorated further. The doctors are being threatened, held hostages inside their hostels and were even assaulted. We are watching it closely and will soon intensify the stir f the WB government fails to address the safety of doctors in the state,” said Dr. Singh.
The doctors continues to wear red-stained bandages and helmets as a mark of protest against the assault on their counterparts in WB during duty hours.
Meanwhile, Union health Minister Dr. Harshvardhan has written to WB Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee and urged her to personally intervene to resolve the current impasse and ensure security to doctors in the state.
The doctors strike held immediately after the shocking defeat of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) in the recently held Lok Sabha Elections has posed a serious political challenge for the state government in West Bengal. The government on Friday issued a four hours ultimatum to the doctors to either resume duties or else vacate the hostel but the young practitioners refused to quit. They even turned down the CM’s invitation to meet and instead demanded an unconditional apology.
Meanwhile, Calcutta High Court gives 7 days to WB govt to respond while hearing a PIL on doctors strike in the state. Court asked state what steps were taken by the govt to end the impasse. Court also said that state will have to put an end to this & find a solution.
The AIIMS doctors’ 48-hour ultimatum came a day after Mamata Banerjee gave them a four-hour ultimatum to withdraw their strike. Facing demonstrations from striking doctors, Mamata Banerjee on Thursday gave them a four-hour ultimatum to either withdraw their strike or vacate the hostels.
The young medicos, however, refused to budge.
On Friday, doctors of several hospitals in Delhi, including AIIMS, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana went on a strike in solidarity with the striking doctors of West Bengal, demanding safe environment for the practitioners.
The Indian Medical Association (IMA) also called for a nationwide strike on June 17, demanding safe working conditions for doctors. It also launched a three-day nationwide protest, beginning Friday to express solidarity with the West Bengal doctors agitating against the assault of their colleague in Kolkata.
After the agitating doctors declined Mamata’s invite for a meeting, the West Bengal chief minister gave them time again at 5 pm on Saturday for the meeting “to find a solution to the ongoing impasse”.
“Don’t leave it too late.” It’s a phrase most women circling 30 will have heard if they’ve ever expressed a desire to have children in the future – often from well-meaning relatives, echoing newspaper headlines.
Far less is said about how a man’s chance of conceiving a child also decreases with age, despite the fact men are choosing to become fathers later in life. The average age of new fathers is now 33.3 years, up from 32.9 years in 2013, while 10% of new dads are now aged 40-44, and 5.1% over 45.
“There is a ticking male biological clock,” says Sarah Norcross, director of fertility campaign group Progress Educational Trust, citing studies that show men over 40 are half as likely to get their partners pregnant as men under 25.
“Miscarriage rates rise,” she adds, “and the likelihood of having a child with Down’s syndrome increases. Research also suggests an association between advanced paternal age and higher risk of preterm birth, schizophrenia and autism.”
[Read More: How Do Men Really Feel About Taking The Male Contraceptive Pill?]
Despite the fact the quality and quantity of men’s sperm declines with age, traditionally, says Norcross, fertility has been viewed as a “female issue”.
Darren, 27, from Kent agrees. “I have never had a chat about fertility with other men,” he says. “But I do think about it and with the whole ‘not getting any younger’ stigma often attached to women having kids, it is something that I believe men should talk about more.”
Research indicates male fertility isn’t something men – or their partners – can ignore. Last year data from the The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, which regulates fertility treatment in the UK, found the most common reason for a couple to seek fertility treatment was male fertility problems.
It’s not always easy to pinpoint the cause of an individual’s low sperm count. It can be down to lifestyle factors (such as excessive alcohol consumption or smoking), a hormone imbalance, or genetics. But age is also known to be a contributing factor. “Men are irrefutably half of the fertility equation,” says Norcross. “Fertility is a male issue.”
Professor Geeta Nargund, founder and medical director of Create Fertility clinics, believes media reports of male celebrities becoming fathers well into their fifties and sixties skew some men’s perceptions of fertility. It is possible for men to become fathers much older than women, but fertility isn’t a given.
Clients are sometimes surprised when she tells them the statistics on male infertility. “These figures often come as a shock to men, as it is the woman who has to go through fertility treatment, and men can be less likely to speak with family or friends about their difficulties with conceiving,” she says.
Although none of us can slow time, Dr Anupa Nandi, a consultant gynaecologist and specialist in reproductive medicine at Lister Fertility Clinic, says there are some lifestyle changes men can make to limit the impacts of ageing on fertility.
These include:
Stopping smoking, limiting alcohol intake, getting medical advice regarding various medical conditions or medicines which can adversely affect sperm.
Getting checked for any sexually transmitted infections (chlamydia and gonorrhoea can both cause low sperm count).
Doing mild to moderate exercise to keep BMI in the healthy range of 20-25.
Eating a healthy balanced diet to get all the necessary minerals, vitamins and antioxidants needed for optimal sperm production and function. However, there is no medically proven diet for fertility.
The ideal temperature for sperm production is 34.5 degrees, lower than the body temperature of 37 degrees. “Men should try and avoid activities that increases the scrotal temperature like avoiding very tight underwear [and] take regular breaks if the job involves a hot environment,” advises Dr Nandi.
Gym-goers should also be careful taking any muscle-building supplements, she adds, because “many of them can have testosterone to build muscles but can kill the sperms permanently”.
A recent study by Rutgers University suggested men should consider banking sperm in their mid 30s to avoid putting the health of their unborn children at risk.
Egg freezing is the fastest growing fertility trend among women, but Dr Nandi says sperm freezing “is not a solution” for men who wish to delay parenthood. Instead of normalising increasingly expensive artificial reproductive techniques, she’d like couples to feel better supported to have children at a younger age.
“We need more input in raising fertility awareness and supporting young couples to balance career and relationship so that they complete their family at a younger age before the natural decline in fertility and be more aware of the implications of delaying pregnancy,” she says.
And despite being founder of a chain of private IVF clinics, Professor Nargund agrees that relying on artificial techniques is not the way forward.
“Many men and women coming to my clinic simply aren’t aware of just how common male factor infertility is,” she says. “Educating young men and women about their fertility at school, a cause I have championed for many years, would mean that they can better monitor and protect their future fertility, and increase their chances of natural conception.”
Just when we thought we’d reached peak gorgeous birth photos, a new one comes along to remind us what love is.
On Monday, Florida photographer Melissa Benzel shared pics from a photoshoot that took the internet’s breath away. In the most stunning photo, new moms Jaclyn and Kelly Pfeiffer look into each other eyes while breastfeeding their newborn twins, who are nestled between them.
Their story is as remarkable as the photo: Kelly carried the twins, but one is biologically Jaclyn’s. After years of failed IVF for Jaclyn, the pair made one last attempt with Kelly, Benzel told HuffPost Canada.
As a surprise for Jaclyn, Kelly used one of her eggs and one of Jaclyn’s. Both embryos took. Kelly gave birth to their twins (who are technically half-siblings) in May.
Is it dusty in here?
WATCH: How same-sex couples are co-breastfeeding. Story continues below.
Thanks to hormone medication and “pumping around the clock,” Jaclyn was able to breastfeed, too, Benzel explained. In fact, she was able to breastfeed moments after the birth, so Benzel knew she wanted to document both moms nursing the babies in the lifestyle shoot.
The photos went viral for the best reason: love. Hundreds of commenters gushed over the affection evident in the post, with some adding that it’s even more perfect during Pride month.
“The images of them breastfeeding are incredibly special and heartwarming, not only do they truly show the love they have for each other but that breastfeeding is possible for a non-carrier mom,” Benzel said.
“They are overjoyed by the amount of love this is getting and I am thrilled and honoured I was there to capture such an emotional and important moment in their journey,” Benzel said.
But their journey hasn’t been an easy one.
A few months after they started dating, they made headlines for being fired from the Methodist daycare where they both worked because they were gay. They decided to take a public stand, but it came at a cost.
“Most people plan for a long time about how to come out and who is safe to come out to. We had a few short hours to prepare to come out to thousands — if not millions — of people at once. This included our families, our friends, and the rest of the United States. No big deal, right?” the two wrote in a post on their blog Rainbows and Babies.
They married in 2016, but then, nearly three years of infertility followed.
“It’s a strange thing to prepare a place in your heart for a baby that never comes. For almost three years, every month ended the same – with negative tests, broken hearts, and empty arms. We spent every penny we had trying to bring a baby home with nothing to show for our investment, and the more money we spent, the more it felt like our dream would never be a reality,” Kelly wrote in Love What Matters.
So, after they made the difficult decision that they’d try with Kelly instead of Jaclyn, Kelly decided to surprise Jaclyn. She made arrangements with the fertility clinic to transfer Jaclyn’s embryo, a boy, as well as Kelly’s embryo, a girl.
Kelly had a positive pregnancy test just a few days after the transfer, she wrote. A few weeks later, an ultrasound confirmed both embryos had implanted.
Jackson and Ella were born May 14, Romper reports.
“After years of trying, waiting, heartbreak, patience, and so much love, they finally have their little ones here!” Benzel wrote on Facebook.
Jaclyn worked hard to induce lactation so she could breastfeed, as well.
Co-breastfeeding between lesbian couples is not uncommon, and allows both parents to share the responsibility and experience.
“When you have two babies and two moms, what’s better than two sets of boobs to feed them with?” the couple wrote on Rainbows and Babies.
To induce lactation, the non-birth parent follows a protocol that typically involves hormones, the medication domperidone (which increases milk production), and pumping. Jaclyn started taking birth control pills after Kelly’s embryo transfer, then added doses of domperidone, and started pumping (as often as five times a day), Kelly explained.
The protocol can also be used by adoptive parents, moms who have babies via surrogacy, and trans parents. In 2018, a transgender woman who was able to produce breast milk with the help of hormone treatments became the first in medical literature to be able to breastfeed her baby.
Also on HuffPost:
A bomb hurled at a Trinamool Congress (TMC) worker’s house killed three people on Friday night.
The deceased were identified as 19-year-old Sohel Rana and 55-year-old Khairuddin Sheikh. The incident took place under Domkol police station in Murshidabad, West Bengal.
Speaking to ANI news agency, deceased Khairuddin Sheikh’s son accused the Congress supporters behind the attack and said, “We were sleeping, suddenly our house was bombed. They shot my father.”
He claimed that his uncle, Altaf Hossain, was also killed a few days ago. Sohel Rana is son of Altaf Hossain. Several people are said to have injured in the clashes.
Another relative of the deceased told The New Indian Express that the accused were convicts in another murder case. “They were after me as I am one of the witnesses. Yesterday, they came here and killed my uncle and nephew after they could not find me in the house,” said a relative of the deceased persons.
Police said raids were on in the area but no arrests had been made so far.
More details are awaited.
Queer literature in the Indian subcontinent goes back a long way, as established by scholars Ruth Vanita and Saleem Kidwai, who collected over 2,000 years of Indian writing on same-sex love and desire drawn from Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim and modern fictional traditions, in their seminal book, Same-Sex Love in India.
But the past couple of decades, especially, have seen a staggering proliferation of modern queer writing, cutting across genres—memoirs, novels, essays, poetry, ethnographies, short stories and graphic narratives. While this rise has been mostly concentrated in India, other countries in the region have also witnessed an increase in representation. Pride Climbing Higher, an anthology of writings by LGBTQ people in Nepal was published in 2015. This month, the publication of The Carpet Weaver, a gay novel by Afghan writer Nemat Sadat has fiction readers already excited.
As communities across the globe celebrate all things queer in June, here is a list of 12 books—we aren’t all that big on Pride Month in South Asia so it’s only fitting to have a book for every month of the year—consider this your starter kit for LGBTQ literature by South Asian writers.
Born in Colombo to a Sinhalese mother and a Tamil father, Shyam Selvadurai and his family were forced to leave Sri Lanka and migrate to Canada in the aftermath of the ethnic riots of 1983. In 1994, the writer published his debut novel, Funny Boy, partly based on his memories of growing up as a young gay man in a time of conflict.
Arjie Chelvaratnam, the novel’s eponymous “funny boy”, is part of a wealthy family in Colombo, is attracted to boys and does not conform to the rigid codes of masculinity that are expected of him. Told through six stories, we witness Arjie’s recognition of his sexual identity, the first flushes of love and the eccentricities of his extended family as tensions simmer and the characters hurtle towards inevitable tragedy.
A deeply sensitive and intimate coming-of-age story, a novel about the peculiar vagaries, joys and sorrows of a childhood that deviates from the norm turns into a vividly realized portrayal of a land torn apart by violence in Selvadurai’s deft hands. A film adaptation by Deepa Mehta is slated to go into production this year so we can expect the already beloved novel to attract a whole new generation of readers.
Revathi is an immediately recognisable face in LGBTQ circles in India. The Tamil activist and writer has worked relentlessly for the rights of sexual and gender minorities, is a theatre actor, and also played a role in the Tamil film, Thenavattu. But Bengaluru-based Revathi remains best known for a striking autobiographical account of her life as a transgender woman.
From descriptions of her childhood in a village in Salem in Tamil Nadu, marked by a strong and early dissonance with the gender assigned to her at birth, to her eventual escape from her birth family to a hijra household, Revathi’s memoir is unflinching and captivating and charts an extraordinary quest to lead a life of dignity.
Published nearly two decades ago, Firdaus Kanga’s novel tells the story of Brit (short for “brittle”) Kotwal, born with Osteogenesis imperfecta, a condition that leaves him with bones and teeth as fragile as glass. Brit grows up in the heart of Bombay in a music-loving Parsi family that learns early on to stop attempting to “fix” his condition but instead let him experience the best life possible, one imbued with literature, music, love and sex.
Heavily inspired by his own life, Kanga spins the semi-autobiographical novel with an irreverent and barbed authenticity. Even as Brit discovers his attraction to men, all the while living with a disability, he rejects any attempts to be viewed as a victim or an object of pity. What you get instead is a no-holds-barred, brutally honest and often wickedly funny account of a boy’s convoluted journey to adulthood.
Edited by the iconic poet Hoshang Merchant, Yaraana, published in 1999, takes pride of place as the first South Asian anthology of writing about male homosexual desire. “Literature has no sex,” Hoshang Merchant writes in the introduction to the book, “There is only good writing and bad writing. India’s homosexuals have produced a lot of good writing, over the centuries a veritable feast.”
These writings take the form of poems, autobiographical accounts, short stories and excerpts from novels, with contributors ranging from Vikram Seth and Bhupen Kakkar to Mahesh Dattani and R. Raja Rao.
Some of the pieces in this anthology may not land as much of a punch as when they were first published, but this trailblazing book is an integral part of the South Asian queer literary canon.
Suniti Namjoshi is a writer who needs to be read more widely. The wildly imaginative author has been writing deliciously clever, subversive spins on fables for decades. Bringing together the best of her stories, The Fabulous Feminist is a delight—funny, dark, moving, occasionally shocking and bursting with originality. In the queer feminist writer’s world, Beast is not a nobleman but a woman (“that’s why her love for Beauty was so monstrous”), gender is based on the role that an individual wants to play and the moralising of classical fables is substituted for a complexity of lives and identities that rejects easy answers.
An enigmatic paying guest becomes the object of affection for siblings Tanay and Anjuna in director and screenwriter Sachin Kundalkar’s evocative novel about love, desire and heartbreak. Translated from Marathi, Cobalt Blue is told in two halves, from the perspective of both siblings, who are consumed by their adoration of the mysterious man their parents have taken on a boarder. Tender and spare, Cobalt Blue is a quietly devastating meditation on the transformative power of love, regardless of sexuality.
SJ Sindu’s debut novel pulls back the curtain on a “marriage of convenience”, an open secret that is prevalent particularly within South Asian communities. Lucky, a lesbian, is married to Krishna, a gay man, a decision they’ve taken to appease their conservative Sri Lankan-American families. Even as they present a picture of wedded bliss to the outside world, an accident in the family takes Lucky back to her childhood home, leading her to reconnect with Nisha, her first lover, who is preparing for her own arranged marriage with a man.
The terrible secrets of families, the claustrophobic oppression of tradition and a simmering sexuality run through the novel as Sidhu brilliantly explores how queer women are viewed and treated based on their presentation of femininity.
Poet and academic Kyla Pasha has played an instrumental role in fostering an open dialogue around sexual and queer rights in Pakistan as the co-founder of ChayMagazine: Sex and Sexuality in Pakistan, South Asia and Abroad, but it is in verse that the queer feminist poet shines most brightly. High Noon and the Body, a book of poetry published in 2010, remains a mesmerising collection that merges the personal and political; love and anger; the physical and the intangible. It’s wholly original, fresh and captivating.
Indra Das’s speculative novel is hard to slot into easy genres – it’s gruesome, strange, primal, fantastical and stunningly imagined. Extending from the 17th Century Mughal Empire to modern day India, the novel tells the story of shape-shifters who prey on humans souls. Yet within this grotesque world, Das plays masterfully with the idea of queerness – gay sex and love stories, yes, but more profoundly, the inherent fluidity of sexual identity and gender. It may not be a novel for everyone but it’s a glorious testament to the power of storytelling when you get to create your own worlds.
Sex, love, betrayal, nostalgia and identity are all mashed up in Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar’s compelling novel set in Jharkhand. Told in three parts, the unnamed protagonist in My Father’s Garden is a young Santhali doctor navigating his sexuality, his Adivasi identity, a desire for companionship, and his father’s legacy – the confounding, arduous journey of a young person trying to figure out their place in the world.
Gritty and vulnerable, the novel is at its most powerful in the first section, “Lover”, which vividly exemplifies how most male sexual relationships in India fall outside the neat boundaries of defined identities. “A kiss is for someone special,” our protagonist is told by his lover, Samir, whose relentless appetite for sex with the young doctor stops short when it comes to this final threshold of tenderness and acceptance. Shekhar’s searing novel, finally, is an interrogation, not of sexuality, but of masculinity itself.
A necessary correction to the predominantly urban and upper class literary depictions of homosexuality in the country, this book documents the stories of ten working class queer women across North India. Through their lives, the intricate complexities of female relationships and sexual intimacy, which do not always borrow from the familiar lexicon of being “lesbian”, are unraveled and brought into sharp focus.
The book might occasionally stray too far into the realm of the academic, but these empathetic stories demonstrate the multiplicity of women’s sexuality and the agency they grant themselves, a far cry from the simplistic narratives of victimhood that are usually bandied about.
Celebrated Kannada author Vasundhendra waited for several years before he finally gathered the courage to publish Mohanaswamy, a collection of short stories about gay men in India. An established writer, Vasudhendra knew that the release of the autobiographical stories would mean embarking on a process of his own coming out. Coincidentally released on 11 December 2013, the day the Supreme Court of India upheld Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code criminalising gay sex (the draconian law was partially struck down on 6 September 2018), the book eventually went on to become a bestseller.
Occupying a rare space in Indian language writing that addresses homosexuality, the short stories centre on Mohanaswamy who is abandoned by his partner for a woman at the very start of the book. Through the vivid and gritty stories that follow, we glimpse the experiences, insecurities, humiliations and fears of a gay man staring down bigotry and embarking on a search for acceptance.
The goal of making India a USD 5 trillion economy by 2024 is “challenging, but achievable” with the concerted efforts of states, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at the fifth meeting of NITI Aayog’s Governing Council here Saturday.
The meeting is being attended by all chief ministers, except Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal) and K Chandrashekhar Rao (Telangana), and senior union ministers
Modi, according to an official release, stressed that NITI Aayog has a key role to play in fulfilling the mantra of “Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, SabkaVishwas”
Recalling the recent general elections as the world’s largest democratic exercise, the prime minister said that it is now time for everyone to work for the development of India
He spoke of a collective fight against poverty, unemployment, drought, flood, pollution, corruption and violence
The goal to make India a USD 5 trillion economy by 2024 is challenging but can surely be achieved and stressed that the states should recognise their core competence, and work towards raising GDP targets right from the district level
Amid several parts of the country facing drought-like situation, Modi called for effective steps to tackle it by adopting ‘per-drop, more-crop’ strategy
He said that the newly created Jal Shakti Ministry will help provide an integrated approach to water and states can also integrate various efforts towards water conservation and management.
HONOLULU (AP) — A snake stowed away in a man’s bag and remained undetected until it completed the trip from Florida to Hawaii, officials said.
The southern black racer snake slithered out of the man’s backpack when he arrived on Maui Monday, KGMB-TV reported Wednesday. Snakes have no natural predators in Hawaii and pose a threat to Hawaii’s native species.
The 20-year-old Virginia man was not aware of the animal until it emerged after he arrived at a vacation rental property in the community of Pukalani, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said.
The non-venomous snake measured about a foot (0.3 meters) long and a quarter-inch (0.63 centimeters) in diameter, officials said.
The property owner told the visitor that snakes are illegal in Hawaii and alerted police, who captured the snake along with state Department of Land and Natural Resources personnel.
The man said he did not intentionally bring the racer snake when he traveled from Florida, where the species is common and can grow up to 6 feet (1.8 meters) in length.
The snake is expected to be transferred to Oahu, officials said.
Owning or knowingly transporting illegal pets is a felony in Hawaii punishable by a $200,000 fine and up to three years in prison.
Visitors may not understand “the threat that snakes pose to our community and our unique environment,” said Phyllis Shimabukuro-Geiser, chairperson of the Hawaii Board of Agriculture.
“It is fortunate that the owner of the rental was aware of the seriousness of the snake being transported to Hawaii and took appropriate action and reported it,” Shimabukuro-Geiser said.
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Information from: KGMB-TV, http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/
One of the women assaulted and robbed on a London bus for refusing to kiss her female date released an opinion article Friday saying the outrage over her attack should be the norm, regardless of the victim’s race or outward appearance.
Identifying herself only as Chris in her op-ed for The Guardian, the author recounted what a disturbing experience it was to have a bloody photo of her and her date’s faces ― ones that are “white, feminine, draped in pretty hair” ― become clickbait for media outlets and politicians who don’t typically support LGBTQ rights.
For several days, a graphic, triggering photo of our bloody faces satisfied voyeurs and enriched companies whose values counter my own, such as News Corps and Sinclair Broadcast Group. Many of the outlets publishing my face without permission endorse racist, misogynist and xenophobic platforms and politicians. One world leader on her last day in office concluded a long career voting in favour of anti-gay, racist, colonial policies by expressing her condolences to us.
The world leader she refers to is likely British Prime Minister Theresa May, who stepped down as the leader of the Conservative Party last week and has come under fire for her handling of LGBTQ issues.
In Chris’s op-ed about the May 30 attack, for which several male teenagers have since been arrested, she recalled how quickly they were able to get police attention ― something she says non-white victims can’t always count on.
The press coverage, and timely law enforcement response, was not coincidental to our complexions. Neither was the disproportionate online reaction over the victimisation of a pretty brunette and blonde. The commodification and exploitation of my face came at the expense of other victims whose constant persecution apparently does not warrant similar moral outrage.
The vast majority of hate crimes documented by the United Kingdom in 2018, for example, were racially motivated. Concern for victims can’t only exist when those victims are conventionally attractive white women, Chris wrote.
Make the extraordinary reaction to our attack the norm. I beg you to amplify and channel this energy to hold accountable the intersecting web of elected politicians, government agencies and corporations who have reinforced a status quo of clearly delineated inequality long before this single attack in 2019. Redirect your money from rainbow capitalism to people-of-colour-led organisations striving for justice.
You can read her full op-ed on The Guardian here.
Ragini Devi stepped into India’s dance scene just as the Anti-Nautch Movement was gathering momentum and reaching a crescendo. A missionary from London known only as Miss Tenant, who was the driving force behind the movement, had crusaded zealously to abolish Indian dance. The “notorious nautch,” performed by dancing girls, was a typical after-dinner entertainment Indian merchants provided for their customers from abroad. European men were beguiled by the charm of the dance, but European ladies, scandalised by the dancers’ languishing glances and sultry smiles, declared them wicked.
The Devadasis, socially ostracised by the British, had similarly fallen into disrepute. Loss of royal patronage had forced some into dubious professions. Their ancient art, rooted in the sacred Vedas, was deemed immoral. A Devadasi bill prohibiting the employment of dancers in the temples was proposed in the Madras Assembly. Disdainful English puritans, as well as upper class Hindus who had adopted Victorian attitudes, condemned indigenous artists, yet tolerated foreign ladies performing in public.
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Occidental theatrical conventions—the proscenium stage, special lighting effects, beautifully crafted sets, a price for admission—imbued public performances by foreign artists with a semblance of propriety and sophistication. The moral conduct of an individual artist was seldom an issue. Ballet, symphony, opera, theatre and art exhibits were essential components of “civilised” societies.
When Anna Pavlova toured India in the early twenties, her ballets were received with reverence. When Ruth St. Denis performed her interpretation of the Nautch during her 1926– 27 tour of India, she brought the house down with roars for an encore. Pavlova’s early interest in traditional Indian dance coincided with the country’s changing political climate: a growing surge of nationalism, bolstered by Mahatma Gandhi’s efforts to emancipate women, had sparked in some Indians a renewed pride and awareness of their ancient heritage.
Krishna Iyer, an orthodox Brahmin advocate and freedom fighter, challenged opponents of dance by dressing in female Bharatanatyam costume and performing in public. His campaign to remove the stigma attached to dance further fueled the battle between supporters of Miss Tenant and supporters of the Pro-Nautch Movement.
Yet dance had not been entirely wiped out. Numerous dedicated Devadasi families, believing it was their sacred duty, disregarded the ban on dance and continued to practise their art in secret. Mylapore Gouri Amma, a retired Devadasi living in Madras had, as a young woman, been the principal dancer at the Kapaliswaram temple. She agreed to take Ragini on as her pupil.
A Bharatanatyam dancer of dignity, grace and expressiveness, Gouri Amma excelled in the art of abhinaya, and possessed a wealth of rare dances, taught to her by her mother. In the two months Ragini spent with her in 1931, Gouri Amma, with the help of her daughter who spoke a little English, passed down to Ragini the intricacies of expressive dance, gesture and music.
Each gesture Gouri Amma imparted came with quotations from the Natya Shastra, with demonstrations and discourses on the subtle aspects of aesthetics connected to each minuscule glance.
By the time her training in Madras ended, Ragini once again found herself short on funds. Although Venkatachalam had arranged for her to stay with friends, there was still the tuition to pay, plus a small salary for the nanny she had hired to care for the baby. An invitation from a charitable organisation in Bangalore to participate in a performance of music and dance brought her back to the comfort and security of 6 St. John’s Road.
Her performances in Calcutta, a stronghold of puritans eager to banish the arts, had caused a stir.
Ragini was not properly prepared to perform since she was still without her costumes. It was a while before she discovered that Bajpai had taken possession of her costume trunk. Although she had contacted a lawyer in New York, claiming her husband had no right to her things, she had little hope of ever seeing the trunk again. With a small advance from the sponsors she managed to have some new costumes hastily tailored in Bangalore. She pulled some of her New York repertoire out of moth-balls, added the Kite Dance she had learned in Mysore, and began to practise daily. Musicians, both North Indian and South Indian, also participating in the performance, volunteered to accompany Ragini’s dances. Since there was no printed programme, she prefaced each dance with brief explanations of the themes and gestures in English. The audience and the press were charmed. Many were convinced she was “a high caste Hindu lady.”
Spurred on by this enthusiastic reception, Ragini set off to conquer and to educate modern Indian audiences in other cities. She became her own impresario, stage-manager, lighting designer and costume designer, and booked herself into the Royal Opera House in Bombay. The week’s engagement drew glowing praise from the Indian audiences and received extensive press coverage.
“The purity and precision which characterized the dances of Ragini Devi...” wrote the Times of India critic, “reveal the reverence with which she approached her art, and the care with which she has mastered the symbolism of the ancient dance of India.”
Her performances in Calcutta, a stronghold of puritans eager to banish the arts, had caused a stir. Would pure Bengali society tolerate a white dancing girl who had mastered the technique of Indian classical dance? Ragini believed they would. Calcutta was ripe for appreciation of her art. Genuine lovers of art had flocked to her performances at the Dalhousie Institute. Close to fifty respectable Hindu ladies, seated in the lower priced seats, were exposed for the first time to the vast possibilities of the technique of classical Indian dance in a modern setting. Ragini’s dances, one observer commented, gave expression to “a quiet enjoyment of healthy vigour and the joy of life, ingredients essential to the nation in its present stage of progress.”
“At the formative period of reconstruction in art,” another observer commented, “the Nation needed the assistance of those like Sri Ragini Devi who could give the degraded and decadent art of the dance, intellectual and social status”.
O.C. Ganguly, renowned art critic, wrote in The Amrita Bazaar Patrika: “Our thanks are due to Ragini Devi, an enthusiastic lover of Indian Art, and a skillful and accurate interpreter of Classical Indian Dancing for proving through demonstration that the great traditions of the old art of Indian Dancing and Dramatics are still living, foolishly neglected by modern exponents of so-called ‘Oriental Dancing’ and awaiting to be recognized, understood, learnt, and interpreted in its true and correct spirit, as a marvellously articulate and developed language of gestures, ready to hand, bequeathed to us in an unbroken sequence of development by generations of old masters and expert exponents from century to century.”
For the next few years Ragini toured India from the Himalayas to Cape Comorin. She performed in theatres, movie houses, railway sheds, universities, and in grand palaces for nawabs, begums and maharajahs. India’s finest musicians including Abdul Karim Khan and Bismillah Khan often shared the stage with her. Ragini’s entourage, in addition to her daughter, included four musicians, a variety of instruments, trunks bursting with costumes, and a Pathan bodyguard.
Describing her arrival into Sholapur for a performance she said: “My tonga led the procession, the bells on the horses jingling merrily. On the way we passed a brass band escorting a huge sign fixed on a bullock cart announcing the dance performance of Ragini Devi, world famous dancer. People stopped to stare at our cavalcade of musicians with red fezes, turbans, and musical instruments, and the baggage carts in charge of the Pathan, in his turban and pajamas. It was like a circus coming to town!”
Excerpted with permission from Dancing in the Family by Sukanya Rahman, Speaking Tiger.
A San Diego high school valedictorian began her graduation speech as most do ― by thanking her parents and role models. Then she unleashed a firestorm of criticism against her guidance counselor, main office staff and a teacher she accused of being drunk on the job.
Nataly Buhr, a San Ysidro High School senior, elicited a roar of shouts and applause from her peers in the crowd during the June 6 commencement ceremony when she called out “the teacher who was regularly intoxicated during class this year.”
“Thank you for using yourself as an example to teach students about the dangers of alcoholism,” she quipped. “Being escorted by police out of school left a lasting impression. I hope that future students and staff learn from these examples.”
Buhr also thanked her counselor for “teaching me to fend for myself,” deriding the employee as practically useless.
“You were always unavailable to my parents and I, despite appointments,” she said. “You expressed to me your joy in knowing that one of your students was valedictorian when you had absolutely no role in my achievements.”
Continuing, Buhr skewered the school’s main office for allegedly almost costing her hefty sums of financial aid.
“Thank you for teaching me how to be resourceful,” she said. “Your negligence to inform me of several scholarships until the day before they were due potentially caused me to miss out on thousands of dollars.”
The blistering speech, which appeared to be well-received by students who reacted with cheers, went viral online, being shared across Twitter and receiving hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube.
But the school wasn’t as thrilled.
In a statement to the San Diego Union-Tribune, Sweetwater Union High School District spokesman Manuel Rubio scolded it as “inappropriate and out of line.”
“While we definitely welcome the concerns of students and their families regarding any situation at one of our schools, doing so in such a manner without any prior knowledge of this situation by the school, is not the right way of handling this,” he added. “Ultimately this takes away from what should have been a day of celebration for the school and their community.”
Addressing the controversy in a statement to local CBS affiliate KFMB-TV, Buhr didn’t back down.
“I understand that those I criticized may be facing personal issues, but I don’t think that should be affecting their commitments or the school’s responsibility to fulfill their commitments,” she said.
Watch the speech below:
