Intelligence is usually seen as the ability to think and learn, but in a rapidly changing world it might matter more that we can rethink and unlearn.
Organizational psychologist Adam Grant is an expert on opening other people’s minds and our own. Think Again invites us to let go of views that are no longer serving us well and prize mental flexibility, humility, and curiosity over foolish consistency. If knowledge is power, knowing what we don’t know is wisdom.
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Mental horsepower doesn’t guarantee mental dexterity. No matter how much brainpower you have, if you lack the motivation to change your mind, you’ll miss many occasions to think again. Research reveals that the higher you score on an IQ test, the more likely you are to fall for stereotypes, because you’re faster at recognizing patterns. And recent experiments suggest that the smarter you are, the more you might struggle to update your beliefs.
One study investigated whether being a math whiz makes you better at analyzing data. The answer is yes—if you’re told the data are about something bland, like a treatment for skin rashes. But what if the exact same data are labeled as focusing on an ideological issue that activates strong emotions—like gun laws in the United States?
Being a quant jock makes you more accurate in interpreting the results—as long as they support your beliefs. Yet if the empirical pattern clashes with your ideology, math prowess is no longer an asset; it actually becomes a liability. The better you are at crunching numbers, the more spectacularly you fail at analyzing patterns that contradict your views. If they were liberals, math geniuses did worse than their peers at evaluating evidence that gun bans failed. If they were conservatives, they did worse at assessing evidence that gun bans worked.
Think Again || Adam Grant
In psychology there are at least two biases that drive this pattern. One is confirmation bias: seeing what we expect to see. The other is desirability bias: seeing what we want to see. These biases don’t just prevent us from applying our intelligence. They can actually contort our intelligence into a weapon against the truth. We find reasons to preach our faith more deeply, prosecute our case more passionately, and ride the tidal wave of our political party. The tragedy is that we’re usually unaware of the resulting flaws in our thinking.
My favorite bias is the “I’m not biased” bias, in which people believe they’re more objective than others. It turns out that smart people are more likely to fall into this trap. The brighter you are, the harder it can be to see your own limitations. Being good at thinking can make you worse at rethinking.
When we’re in scientist mode, we refuse to let our ideas become ideologies. We don’t start with answers or solutions; we lead with questions and puzzles. We don’t preach from intuition; we teach from evidence. We don’t just have healthy skepticism about other people’s arguments; we dare to disagree with our own arguments.
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Discover how rethinking can lead to excellence at work and wisdom in life with Think Again.
Women Who Misbehave, much like the women within its pages, contains multitudes and contradictions-it is imaginative and real, unsettling and heartening, funny and poignant, dark and brimming with light.
At a party to celebrate her friend’s wedding anniversary, a young woman spills a dangerous secret. A group of girls mourns the loss of their strange, mysterious neighbour. A dutiful daughter seeks to impress her father even as she escapes his reach. A wife weighs the odds of staying in her marriage when both her reality and the alternative are equally frightening. An aunt comes to terms with an impulsive mistake committed decades ago.
In this wildly original and hauntingly subversive collection of short stories, Sayantani Dasgupta brings to life unforgettable women and their quest for agency. They are violent and nurturing, sacred and profane. They are friends, lovers, wives, sisters and mothers. Unapologetic and real, they embrace the entire range of the human experience, from the sweetest of loves and sacrifices to the most horrific of crimes.
Here is an excerpt from the book, Women Who Misbehave:
It is a Friday evening, but you can’t head home and settle in front of the TV with beers from your fridge and mutton biryani from the dhaba across the street. It’s already been a long day and doesn’t seem to be anywhere close to ending. You now have to go to your friend’s home for a dinner party. Well, she isn’t really a friend. She is a former colleague, so you can blow it off. But you’re not an asshole, and she has invited you to celebrate the three- month anniversary of her wedding. You care neither for the occasion nor the husband. Still, you board an auto and head her way because you are a good person.
The two-storeyed bungalow-style home has a wrought- iron gate and a small garden. It is conveniently located a hop, skip and a jump from the bustling Hauz Khas market. You can’t help being envious. They probably just stand on their balcony and holler for all sorts of vendors to come rushing with platters of pakoras, samosas and hot jalebis straight from the fryer. You, on the other hand, live in the hinterland by yourself because that’s what you can afford on your salary. Which is really why you tip the dhaba boys so generously every time they deliver your order. You cannot risk angering the one source of palatable food in your neighbourhood.
You reread the directions your friend texted you this morning. You are to go straight upstairs and neither loiter around the ground floor nor accidentally ring the bell. The husband’s widowed mother lives on the ground floor, and you’ve been warned that she has little tolerance for anyone under the age of seventy.
You walk past the tidy square garden until you hit the mosaic staircase. With each step you take, the strain of jazz music grows stronger. The stairs lead you to a heavy black door, and you let your finger hover over the bell. You’re no expert, you don’t know the names and types of woods in this world, but you can tell this is expensive. And you’re happy for your former colleague, you truly are. After all, how many people your age, and with practically the same goddamned salary, get to disappear behind a door like this every evening?
You take a deep breath and press the bell even though your throat feels like it is closing in, like flowers whose petals clam up at night. We are done preening for you, sucker! You hear the momentary lull in conversation, but you have already recognized the voices. You quit these people a few months ago in pursuit of a flashier salary, but now you have to spend an entire evening with them. You press the doorbell again. Urgently. As if you are here to take care of serious business.
Tanu opens the door, her face awash with happiness. Marriage hasn’t changed her, at least not on the outside. She is dressed simply in her usual blue jeans and a pale T-shirt, her outfit of choice for practically every occasion. She gives you a hug and you breathe in a cloud of familiar smells— lemon verbena soap, sandalwood perfume. Mahesh slides up beside her, his shaved head hovering like an egg over her bony shoulder, his arm possessively gripping her tiny waist. He smiles too and says, ‘Welcome, welcome. Please come in.’
Women Who Misbehave | Sayantani Dasgupta
You say ‘thank you’ although you can’t help but think that the deep lines under his eyes and the tight way his skin stretches over his face make him look less like Tanu’s husband and more like a creepy uncle. Somehow, the fifteen-year gap between them is more pronounced this evening than it was on the day of their wedding, when you saw him for the first time. But you were too drunk then, and so all you remember is how after a few drinks Mahesh began telling everyone what he would like to do to every man who had ever hurt Tanu. You had giggled along with the others, but, secretly, you had wondered what it might feel like to be the object of such passion. You catch Mahesh’s eyes sweeping over your black shirt. His gaze doesn’t linger on your breasts—maybe if you weren’t so flat-chested things would be different—but out of habit, you surreptitiously glance down to check that the buttons haven’t come undone.
‘Black really suits you,’ Mahesh says. You laugh because you haven’t mastered the art of accepting compliments. You follow Mahesh and Tanu into the drawing room where a cluster of familiar faces acknowledge you with varying degrees of nods and smiles. It’s a smartly put-together room—stainless steel and white leather, with tasteful accents of bamboo. Two love seats face an enormous couch and the side tables have neat stacks of expensive-looking coffee-table books, lit up just so by stark, Scandinavian-looking lamps. On one of the love seats, Pia and Projapoti are smashed next to each other, gazing into a glossy book of black-and-white photographs of umbrellas. Their romance is as new as it is tumultuous, so you tell yourself to forgive them if they ignore you. But they don’t. Pia looks up to give you a cheery wink and Projapoti, who took you under her wing when you first joined the company, sets downs her drink, stands up and wraps you in a hug.
Rani is sprawled on the couch. Swathed in a voluminous pink and red sari, she looks like a porcelain doll. Her eyes are closed; her lips are pressed together. She is the picture of calm, a far cry from the perpetually anxious person she is at work. Auro, the only other man in the room besides Mahesh, is on the other end of the couch. He was hired to replace you, and you trained him during the last week that you were there. But from the cocky, two-fingered salute he gives you, you would think it was the other way round. He slides towards Rani to make space for you on the couch. You sit beside him, and as if to deliberately ignore your irritation, Auro stretches languorously and crosses his long legs at the ankles.
In Indus Basin Uninterrupted: A History of Territory and Politics from Alexander to Nehru, Uttam Kumar Sinha paints a vivid historical narrative of the Indus Basin and how it shaped India’s history. The book looks at the interplay of the territory and politics through the ages, starting from the Indus Valley Civilization to the medieval and colonial periods till the time of Partition and the difficult years of negotiation that led to the treaty. Here is an excerpt from the book that tells us what gave birth to the idea of the Bhakra Dam.
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The history of canals in the Indus basin offers a fascinating narrative of its interactions with power and knowledge, and how the rivers were negotiated through formal engineering and localized skills. It brought forth, in significant ways, the pioneering role of the civil engineers whose understanding of the hydrology advanced the irrigation system. However, engineers and civil administrators often disagreed on how to run the canal system. While the engineers believed in their surveys, the administrators had their own ideas about the administration of science. Notwithstanding the tussle, many engineers did impress, through constant interactions, the administrators of the overall imperial imperatives of
. . . control, profit and colonisation.
The overriding economics created a new class of administrators referred to as the ‘colonial-official scientist’. This new class formation in a class-conscious England did not go unnoticed. In 1870, the Spectator of London described the qualities required of the engineer working in India thus:
The ideal engineer for India is a man who will take £1000 pounds a year as his average income for life, and insist that all under him shall be content with their wages . . . who will regard an offer of a commission from sub-contractors as a deadly insult; who can keep accounts like a bank clerk . . .
For the engineers, the Indus basin presented a new work culture and a new professional outlook. Some of the colonial civil engineers in the Punjab in the latter half of the nineteenth century were making a scientific mark by writing professional papers on the connection between engineering and management of nature. Prominent among them was Proby Cautley and his works, Report on the Ganges Canal Works in 3 volumes (1860) and A Disquisition on the Heads of the Ganges and Jumna Canals (1864). Other significant works that become a repository of irrigation knowledge and reference include Captain Haywood’s Practical Gauging of Rivers (1870) followed in 1879–80 by four papers published in the proceedings for the Institution of
Indus Basin Uninterrupted || Uttam Kumar Sinha
Civil Engineering: W.H. Grethed’s Irrigation in Northern India (1872); Robert Buckley’s Keeping Irrigation Canals Clean of Silt (1879) and Movable Dams in Indian Weirs (1880); and C. Greaves’s Evaporation and Percolation (1879). All these findings had a deep impact on the irrigation system in the Indus basin. Others engaged in important comparative studies and brought in the best practices from other water development works in Europe. For example, Baird Smith’s Italian Irrigation (1855), Allen Wilson’s Irrigation in India and Spain (1867) and as earlier mentioned Scott-Moncrieff’s Irrigation in Southern Europe (1867–68).
At times, the sheer perchance of a natural site inspired impossible engineering as when the governor of Punjab, Louis Dane, an engineer who shifted to administration, floated down the Sutlej in 1908 from his official tour to Bilaspur State and saw with transfixed gaze
. . . a narrow gauge with high abutments . . .
that made him in wonderment conceptualize a high storage dam which had never been built before in the world. Dane’s restless eagerness led to many investigations on the feasibility of the storage dam before, in 1915, the spirited H.W. Nicholson, working in the Punjab Irrigation Department, volunteered to take on the task. In1919, after extensive study, a detailed proposal was put forward that
. . . visualised a dam at Bhakra across the Sutlej, 390 ft high impounding 2·50 million acre-ft, of water to extend irrigation in the famine areas of Hissar, Rohtak and all the adjoining states of Patiala, Jind, Faridkot and Bikaner.
This World Below Zero Fahrenheit: Travels in the Kashmir Valley is an insightful travelogue that breaks away from the clichéd view of Kashmir, one that sees it either as an earthly paradise or a living hell. In this book, Suhas Munshi takes you to unexpected places, into the homes of poets, playwrights and street performers; to a heartwarming Christmas service with the minuscule Christian community in Baramulla; and inside the barricaded city of Srinagar’s football stadium, which is a lively refuge for the elderly and their memories of a glorious past.
Here is an excerpt from the chapter ‘Merry Christmas in Baramulla’ for you to experience the Kashmir presented by Suhas Munshi in his book.
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Up there, on the bridge, it was so cold that staying a minute longer was impossible. I spotted a masala-wallah. Masala is a unique Kashmiri street-food item. Soft bread wrapped around chickpeas laced with a spicy chutney. I polished it off as I reached my destination, St Joseph’s Church. St Joseph’s school and hospital, two institutions run by missionaries of the church for hundreds of years, were the best in the area. They had also suffered casualties during the 1947 tribal raids. But I hadn’t come to talk to anyone about violence, old or new. It was 24 December, and I was here to celebrate Christmas Eve.
This World Below Zero Fahrenheit||Suhas Munshi
As I stood outside the church, beside a cheerful-looking Santa Claus figure, a woman approached me. ‘Excuse me, who are you?’ she asked. It naturally made a lot of sense to be watchful around these parts. I told her that I was writing a travelogue. I had met the vice principal of their school two days earlier and sought permission to join in the Christmas Eve celebrations. I couldn’t say for sure how much my answer had satisfied her because just then a man, who looked like a local and was presumably an employee there, arrived with some sweets and extended his best wishes to the nun. She asked him to stay a while but he was in a hurry. She offered to take him on a quick tour of the church. ‘You also,’ she said to me with unquestionable authority, ‘you also come along. We’ll all pray.’
We first gazed at the life-sized figure of Santa Claus. One of his arms was extended in an invitation for embrace. The other one rested on a stick. Next to him was a tree with strings of decorative, colourful lights. From the canopy above the church door were hung several loops of the same decorative lights. High above the church was a neon-lit Star of David. It was a small church built mostly of stone and brick.
‘You know the story of Santa Claus comes from St Nicholas actually. There was once a poor man who was very worried about how to marry off his three daughters. He was very distressed. St Nicholas arrived at his doorstep and quietly dropped off three bags of gold. That’s how Santa Claus, the quiet, silent beneficiary, came into existence. So every Christmas Eve we invite him to come to us again and shower us with gifts,’ she explained.
We took a step sideways to admire the Christmas tree. ‘This tree symbolizes the cross where Jesus died and also his birth. In Rome I have seen bread becoming flesh. When the priest prays over it, holy wine becomes blood. Jesus Christ comes alive in the mass. Come,’ she said in a staccato burst and asked us to step into the church. We took our shoes off and went in.
People praying at St Joseph’s Church, Baramulla, on Christmas Day
Despite four bukharis—the large wood-burning stoves that are Kashmir’s traditional heaters—the church was as cold within as it was outside. And the outside was very cold. These were the days of Chillai Kalan, the harshest forty-day period in Kashmir when even piped water freezes and all water, including the Dal, turns to ice. But it was extra cold this season. ‘It mostly snows by this time and the temperature improves. But this time it hasn’t snowed, so it is much colder this time,’ the watchman outside the church had told me.
Next to the pulpit, the parishioners had built a beautiful minisized manger, complete with snow and colourful lights, small plants and dry twigs, in the backdrop of a blue satin-like material. From the ceiling were hung cut-outs of various letters in different languages. Colourful lights made these letters glow brilliantly. Right in front of us, the pulpit was decorated with lights and colourful fabric, and in bold white three words were inscribed on it: ‘WORD MADE FLESH’. To our left were placed a keyboard, guitar and drums. The sister walked right towards the manger and said, ‘See, these are letters from different languages—English, Tamil, Malayalam, Hindi, Urdu, Gurmukhi—which teach us the oneness and love there is in all our cultures. Come, let us bow our heads and pray,’ she said. I quietly tiptoed my way back, leaving the two of them.
Behind the pulpit was the image of Jesus on the cross. Placed beside it were two figurines, of Joseph holding baby Jesus and Mary. Mary stood slightly taller than her husband. Above us were carved arches of wood. Although the church was carpeted quite comfortably, it was still getting colder by the second. The other two walked back to the door of the church as soon as they finished their prayers. The man offered some more gifts and sought her permission to leave. I couldn’t believe I had come empty-handed.
Is India in a position to focus on its foreign policy, or does it have more pressing domestic matters at hand? In this excerpt from his book Flying Blind, Mohamed Zeeshan takes a look at the relationship between India and South Asia.
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Welcome to the world’s most fearsome neighbourhood. It hosts two nuclear-armed residents, has seen civil wars in at least three countries, and houses the world’s oldest, earliest and longest- running United Nations military observer mission. There is a third nuclear power just outside the door, and one of those civil wars ran for as long as three decades. All this is while discounting other nearby countries (hint: Afghanistan) which have been ravaged by multilateral fighting and terrorism for decades.
South Asian countries rarely contain problems within their own borders. Over the years, the region has witnessed cross-border military action on numerous occasions on multiple fronts—from Afghanistan in the north-west to Sri Lanka in the south-east. Domestic troubles often have region-wide implications—and civil wars in one country have killed prime ministers in another. Domestic political interests in provinces of India have often compromised deals and agreements with neighbours. In 2011, India and Bangladesh tried to sign a water-sharing agreement, in a bid to put an end to the long-running dispute over the Teesta River that flows across the two countries. The deal was quickly thwarted by opposition from the state of West Bengal.
Flying Blind||Mohamed Zeeshan
Such difficulties have led South Asia to become the least integrated region in the world. In his 1914 poem titled ‘Mending Wall’, Robert Frost wrote, ‘Good fences make good neighbours.’ South Asia took him seriously. South Asia is one of the world’s fastest-growing regional economies, but that is not because of ties among its members: Trade between South Asian countries is a negligible 5 per cent of the total trade conducted by all South Asian countries (it was 3 per cent in 1990)—and represents just 2 per cent of South Asian GDP. Compare all this with the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) in South East Asia: Trade within that region is a healthy 25 per cent of all trade by ASEAN countries—and represents more than 20 per cent of ASEAN GDP. With nearly all intra-ASEAN tariffs eliminated, trade grew from $68.7 billion in 1995 to $257 billion in 2017, according to the Asian Development Bank.
But this sort of heavy fencing makes South Asia a problem for India; indeed, it is so critical a problem that New Delhi’s plans for global leadership will fall flat if India does not win support in South Asia. Consider this the veto vote over Indian leadership. No global power ever rises if it is constantly putting out fires in its neighbourhood. And the bad news is that it is much easier for India to take action and gain influence as far as Nicaragua or New Zealand than it is to win over its neighbours.
In recent years, South Asia has increasingly become a distraction for India while it seeks to spread its reach further afield in the world. For little gain to anybody in the region, New Delhi’s resources of strategic thinking have been drained disproportionately by intractable challenges in the neighbourhood. With every country, there is a headline dispute to which everything else is often held hostage: In Sri Lanka, it is the rights of the Tamil minority and Indian Tamil fishermen; in Nepal, it is the rights of the Madhesi tribes which populate the Terai plains; in Bangladesh and Pakistan, it is the partitions and their many associated headaches. In all countries, there is of course the big white elephant: Chinese interference to counter-balance Indian hegemony.
Indian diplomats are often frustrated that South Asia is not well-integrated. All large neighbours are always treated as threats by default anywhere in the world. But economic interests often help boost at least economic integration. This is what China has managed to do in East Asia and South East Asia, despite long- running animosity in those regions towards Beijing and even explosive ongoing disputes. The Philippines, for instance, welcomes in Chinese investment on its railroads and highways, even as it locks horns with Beijing in an international tribunal over the South China Sea. Yet, in South Asia, even economic ties are scorned at suspiciously.
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Flying Blind is an essential read for anyone hoping to understand the multi-layered complexities of India, its relationship with the subcontinent, and its foreign policy.
Twenty years later, three people are looking for you.
One is dying to meet you again.
The other wishes you had never met them.
The third wishes they could have met you at least once.
You are one person. Aren’t you? But you are not the same person to each of them.
In You Only Live Once, find the answers about your own life in this story about searching for love and discovering yourself. Join a broken but rising YouTube star Alara, a struggling but hopeful stand-up comedian Aarav, and a zany but zen beach shack owner Ricky as they undertake a journey to find the truth behind the disappearance of Elisha.
Here’s an excerpt from the book that throws light on the quandaries in Alara’s heart and her longing for love.
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Irena, my stepmother, is a new-age fashion influencer and helped me set up my YouTube channel. She isn’t really talented, but she married a wealthy guy, and fancy social media accounts are part of the assets you create if you have a lot of money. After all, rich people can afford to buy new clothes for every post they make.
Having said that, she is a nice person at heart. I don’t really hold anything against her.
I’m not close to anyone at home. Not really. I’m close to my guitar. It’s because it always meets my expectations. People? They often fail to do so. Unfulfilled expectations lead to unfulfilled relationships.
‘Hey! Alara,’ says my step-aunt Betty as I enter La Epicurean.
‘You’ve grown up to be a beautiful woman,’ she continues.
‘Thank you,’ I respond. I don’t talk a lot when it comes to Irena’s siblings. They’re five women, full of gossip and unnecessary banter. Also, here in Czech, women outnumber men, so they’re on a constant lookout for a foreigner to settle down with. Betty is the youngest one and I heard her own siblings discuss her relationship with a guy from New York who is half her age. He is the one who gave her the name Betty too. Living the American Dream has fascinated the world since the 1960s.
‘Which song are you performing tonight?’ she asks.
‘Time,’ I say, wondering if she would even understand the depth of the concept. Time it is, the one thing that has never been on my side. Time is what ruined my game early on. Time is what I challenge as I hope to find my mom, or perhaps, an answer.
‘You have not published a new song in months. What keeps you busy these days?’ she inquires. ‘You don’t even have a day job,’ she adds.
You Only Live Once || Stuti Changle
Yes, this is where I draw the line. Relatives can get so unbearable at times. I am facing a writer’s block, I write my own songs after all. What would she know of it? She is the kind who would seek Irena’s help to write even an email.
‘Soon,’ I smile wide. Curt. Short. Sweet. She deserves to know that much.
It’s been quite some time since I last published a song on YouTube. I wish to release my first album. But I have run out of ideas, literally. I know deep within my heart that leaving this place would help me ideate and write songs. Here, I am consumed with much more than writing and performing at cafes. I have to attend customary functions like today. My dad is respected in the community, and that’s the thing about rich people. They never get bored of partying and socializing. Me? I told you, right? I struggle with a sense of belonging.
I long to be myself sans all the responsibilities and sensibilities I find myself compelled to fit into. I long to meet you, mom. Let me tell you, your mother would perhaps be the most overlooked person by you, trust me. You might not even appreciate the food that she cooks with all the love. But there are people like me who don’t even know what food cooked with love tastes like.
Preparing a meal for someone is an act of love, says Charmaine D’Souza, a nutritionist and a writer of many kitchen exploits. In her latest book, The Good Health Always Cookbook, D’Souza, along with her two daughters, Charlyene and Savlyene, offers the reader a peep into her childhood memories and her comfort food. Read on for a delicious vegan recipe from her book.
VEGAN JACKFRUIT ‘PULLED PORK’ BURGERS
( Chefs the world over are using raw jackfruit in vegan cookery because the unripe flesh has a pork-like texture. The shredded fruit is a popular alternative to pulled pork and is now being used as a vegetarian pizza topping and a filling for tacos. It has a hard bite and absorbs the spices and flavours of a dish just like meat. Try this recipe for our burgers. You will soon become a jackfruit convert. -Savlyene)
Preparation time 30 minutes
Cooking time 20 minutes
Serves 4
INGREDIENTS
4 whole wheat garlic buns
For The Jackfruit Filling
400 gms green jackfruit ( Save the seeds for a curry or hummus)
2 tablespoons jaggery sugar or brown sugar
1 tablespoon finely minced garlic
2 teaspoons smoked paprika powder (or you can use red chilli powder)
1/2 teaspoon pepper powder
½ teaspoon star anise powder
Salt to taste
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup BBQ sauce (preferably vegan. To be used for the filling as well as for serving)
For the Mixed Vegetable Slaw
1 cup finely sliced mixed vegetables (onions, cabbage with the outer leaves and inner core, carrots with the peel and red, green and yellow bell peppers with the inner pith and seeds)
1 tablespoon jaggery or brown sugar
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon pepper powder
Salt to taste
METHOD
In a large bowl mix the ingredients for the Mixed Vegetable Slaw thoroughly to ensure that the veggies marinade in the seasonings. You may need to add a tablespoon or two of water.
Refrigerate.
Mix the jackfruit with the rest of the filling ingredients ( with the exception of the oil and BBQ sauce) and toss them well to coat each bit.
Keep this aside for 5 minutes.
Heat a pan and add the oil.
Add the marinated jackfruit and cook for 5 minutes.
Add ½ cup BBQ sauce and 1 cup water and cook for about 15 to 20 minutes.
Using 2 forks shred the jackfruit as it cooks in the sauce.
Once the shredded jackfruit has properly cooked, turn up heat and cook for 2 more minutes. Then remove from the stove top.
The Good Health Always Cookbook || Charmaine D’Souza, Charlyene D’Souza and Savlyene D’Souza
TO ASSEMBLE
Cut the whole wheat garlic buns in half and put 2 heaped tablespoons of the mixed vegetable slaw on the bottom buns.
Top with a generous serving of the shredded jackfruit filling and cover with the other half of the bun.
Alternatively you can omit the slaw and just use thinly sliced onions and tomatoes.
Serve with the remaining BBQ sauce.
NUTRITIVE VALUE per serving
Energy-206.33 kcal
CHO-30.09 gms
Protein-3.29 gms
Fat-8.09 gms
Sodium-366.53 mg
Potassium-525.94 mg
Calcium-90.88 mg
Iron-1.51 mg
Vitamin A-3.83 mcg
Vitamin C-30.61 mg
FEEDBACK Having seen Savios post on FB about how Charmaine had fooled him by replacing a pulled pork burger with a pulled jackfruit burger I asked her for the recipe. My husband is a staunch non-vegetarian and I am elated to say that he too got fooled. The burger was hot, juicy and wonderful. Best of all no fear of cholesterol and fat. No more pork for us! Thanks to team GHA. – Cheryl Lopes, Mumbai.
Beginning at the peak of Nehruvian era and ending in the early seventies, Devesh Verma’s sharply witty saga The Politician gives an enthralling, evocative view of provincial northern India-once the political heartland of the country-and the ebb and flow of the fortunes of its protagonists. Ram Mohan is an intrepid and ambitious young man in newly independent India, who refuses to be held down by his humble origins. Spurred on by his diehard optimism, he aims for things usually inaccessible to people of his extraction. However, he soon realizes that without political or bureaucratic power, the idea of a respectable life in India is nothing but pretense, and after a Gulab Singh rescues him from being insulted by a thug, Ram Mohan becomes persuaded of the efficacy of violence in certain situations. Read on for a glimpse into Ram Mohan’s early days, and his initial faux pas balancing political ambition and political correctness!
The flame of political ambition kindled by Kishan Lal Tiwari was still burning bright in Ram Mohan. It was one of the reasons Ram Mohan did not want to defer his research work any further.
Parliamentary and Assembly elections might still be a few years away; he wanted to employ this time to achieve his scholarly objective, a feather in his cap; after which he could think of a way to assert his presence in the political arena as well. It could be either through contesting an election as suggested by Tiwari ji or through associating with the campaign of some important candidate of the Congress. But he was sure if he decided to be in the fray, it would not only be to prove his following. He would fight with a view to securing victory by convincing castes other than Kurmis of his merit. The mere thought of surprising them by his ability to quote from Sanskrit classics and Tulsidas’s Ramcharitmanas was uplifting.
He was never apolitical, but his interest in politics after meeting Tiwari ji had jumped to another level; he would make it a point now to keep abreast of all important political happenings. Just the previous year, he had taken part in a public meeting in Kanpur organized to condemn the allegations of corruption against Nehru government. It was district Congress committee’s answer to the protest rallies of the Communist Party and the People’s Union, the right-wing Hindu party; the former had a strong support base among the workers in state-owned mills of Kanpur, the latter drew its strength from the city’s Hindu shopkeepers. Given his poor grasp of the details, Ram Mohan simply lambasted the opposition, declaring that it was a sin to even insinuate that the allegations could be true; to back up his contention, he invoked the figures of Gandhi, Patel, Nehru and the like whose values were the cornerstone of the Congress. Biting at each word, Ram Mohan wondered how a respectable member of the Union cabinet chosen by Nehru ji could be accused of any financial misconduct. His speech had brought tears to the eyes of some old Congressmen.
Later however, the controversy had transformed into a monstrous scandal, brought to light by none other than Nehru’s estranged son-in-law, a Congress MP. He had raised the issue in Parliament. What had seemed to have transpired was that the Life Insurance Corporation of India had ploughed a huge amount of money into a private company of tenuous reputation; the shares were bought the day the stock markets were closed and at a price much above their market-value. The resulting uproar forced the government to order a judicial enquiry, which found the finance minister guilty of making the fraudulent investment. He had no option but to resign. It was the first big instance of government corruption coming to surface in independent India, which shocked Ram Mohan into making a fetish of financial honesty and pouring scorn on people suspected of bribery. Before Ram Mohan could plunge into research on the poetsaint, there had been a couple of more Congress-related events to engage him.
Soon after the scandal, Nehru dropped the bomb of his reluctance to continue as PM, arguing the position demanded ceaseless work, leaving him with no time ‘for quiet thinking’. The Congress was thrown into turmoil. Congressmen across the country were falling over themselves to issue appeals to the party to pay no heed to the hideous idea. When local congress leaders in Kanpur met to pass a resolution against Pandit ji’s ‘request’, Ram Mohan committed a political faux pas by suggesting— to the extreme embarrassment of all the office bearers in the committee—that the resolution should also urge Nehru ji to identify and nurture an alternative leadership before he could think of quitting. Ram Mohan had to be shouted down by all those present. ‘We’re shocked and disgusted at this temerity,’ bellowed a committee member. Anyway, the crisis blew over shortly as Nehru quit the idea of quitting by bowing down to the party’s wish.
If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.- Dr Martin Luther King, Jr
Bike Ambulance Dada, the authorised biography of Padma Shri awardee Karimul Hak, is the most inspiring and heart-warming biography you will read this year. It documents the extraordinary journey of a tea-garden worker who saved thousands of lives by starting a free bike-ambulance service from his village to the nearest hospital.
Here is an excerpt from Bike Ambulance Dada by Biswajit Jha titled A Bike Ambulance Takes Shape.
Bike Ambulance Dada || Biswajit Jha
Now that Karimul had a bike, he was no longer dependent on his cycle to ferry a patient. The bike gave the patients a greater chance of survival by ensuring they got to the hospital quickly. Karimul, too, was under less pressure, physically and mentally; he could be more certain of patients getting timely medical attention, be they sick or injured, and riding a motorbike was far less physically taxing than cycling all the way with a passenger.
One day, in 2008, when Karimul was enjoying a cup of tea with some acquaintances at a tea shop in Kranti Bazaar, one of them, Babu Mohanta, suddenly cried out. The engrossing discussion on political affairs was halted abruptly. The small group sprang into action to find out the reason behind Mohanta’s shriek. Investigations revealed that a snake had bitten him just above the ankle. Karimul immediately made up his mind to identify the snake, as this would help the doctor decide on the course of treatment; it was imperative in such cases. He saw the snake but could not identify it. Thinking fast, he somehow caught the snake and put it in a small box so that he could carry it to the hospital. He applied a pressure bandage on the wound as well. With the help of those around them, Karimul got Mohanta tied to his back and asked a villager to ride pillion with him. Before starting out for Jalpaiguri Sadar Hospital, Karimul instructed the man to make sure that Mohanta did not fall sleep. The snake, carefully locked in the box, accompanied them to the hospital.
On the way, they met with a huge traffic jam on the bridge over the Teesta, just 5 kilometres from the hospital. The road was chock-a-block with vehicles stranded on the bridge, all trying to find a way out and, in the process, aggravating the situation. As Karimul zipped past the four- wheeled vehicles, he saw an ambulance stuck in the traffic. When he asked the ambulance driver for the patient’s details, he was told that the man had also been bitten by a snake, and they were heading for the same hospital as Karimul. Manoeuvring his much-smaller vehicle between the cars and moving towards the hospital with Mohanta, the soft-hearted Karimul felt sorry for the patient in the ‘proper’ ambulance, unable to get out.
Karimul soon reached the hospital. Once there, he showed the snake to the doctor, who was at first startled but then observed it intently for a few seconds before springing into action with the treatment.
After getting Mohanta admitted, Karimul went back to the bridge where they had seen the ambulance. He saw that the ambulance, along with other vehicles, was still there; the patient had, unfortunately, passed away.
After a couple of days, Babu Mohanta was released from the hospital. He was the first person bitten by a poisonous snake in the village to be saved—all because of Karimul’s timely intervention and bike ambulance service.
Before this incident, though Karimul had ignored the taunts of some of the villagers and had gone about ferrying patients to hospital, he had sometimes harboured misgivings that his bike ambulance was a poor substitute for the conventional ambulance. But that day, he realized that his bike ambulance was sometimes far more convenient than a standard ambulance. From then on, there was no looking back for him. His new-found confidence enthused him to serve people with increased passion.
After he was awarded the Padma Shri, the Navayuvak Brindal Club, Siliguri, donated to him an ambulance that he used for some months. But the traditional ambulance not only consumed more fuel, it was also rather difficult to drive it to remote and far-flung areas. After some weeks, he stopped using that ambulance; though it is still with him, he doesn’t use it. Instead, he now has three bike ambulances at home; one is used by his elder son, Raju, another by his younger son, Rajesh, while Karimul himself mostly uses the bike ambulance donated by Bajaj Auto, which has an attached carrier for patients.
Thanks to Karimul Hak’s unique initiative, the bike ambulance has become popular in rural areas of India. Inspired by him, some social workers, as well as some NGOs, have started this service too, thereby saving thousands of lives in far-off areas of the country.
While Karimul has saved many lives, he deeply regrets not being able to save some. Still, he derives immense satisfaction from the fact that a person like him, with a paltry income and limited capacity, has made a difference in the lives of so many people. Relatives and family members of those who died en route to the hospital, or even after reaching the hospital, at least know that they, through Karimul, tried their best to save their loved one. This is a noteworthy achievement for Karimul, who dreams of a day when lack of medical treatment will not be the reason for someone’s death.
Bike Ambulance Dada is a must-read today as it will inspire us to do and be better in our lives.
Not Many, But One combines knowledge from Sree Narayana Guru’s Advaita philosophy and the latest findings of modern physics, astrophysics and life sciences to tackle some fundamental scientific and philosophical issues. Here is an excerpt from the second volume, which explores how Sree Narayana Guru revived the Advaita philosophy.
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In India, religion and spirituality are used very often as synonyms. While religion is more to do with rituals, spirituality has more to do with one’s self or, the spirit. In India, spirituality and religion are inherent parts of the day-to-day living of people in all walks of life. In India, people belonging to all the major religions of the world coexist in harmony for centuries. We begin with Hinduism since it is the dominant religion in the subcontinent.
Not Many But One Volume I||G.K.Sasidharan
For the study of Indian spirituality, it is essential to understand the basic tenets of Hinduism, a rich, complex and deeply symbolic religion. Hinduism is otherwise known as sanatana Dharma, or the eternal truth/tradition/religion. the Vedas are considered as superhuman-divine revelations, revealed to sages and seers in higher states of communion with ‘the one’—the Absolute. the Vedas are believed to be the world’s most ancient scriptures.
The Absolute is understood in three ways: one, as Paramatma or nirguna (unattributed) Brahman (the unattributed, all-pervading aspect of the supreme); two, as saguna (attributed) Brahman (the supreme soul as the aspect of God within the heart of all beings); and three, as Parameswara, the Absolute in the Jagrat or visual feature.
The entire universe is an illusion, a Vivartha (reflected image) of the absolute reality. the absolute reality can be seen only by turning inward as if it is you or inside you. the Indian philosophy differentiates between ‘belief’ and ‘faith’. A belief may or can be true, whereas faith can never be so; though faith is very often used to mean acceptance. For example, in earlier times, the earth was believed to be flat (belief). now, we know precisely that the earth is spherical (faith). According to Hinduism, experience is the key to faith.
The mother, father and the guru are akin to God. Ahimsa or non-violence to all forms of life is a basic principle. nothing is considered bad so long as it is within limits and the body accepts it. Hinduism believes in the following aspects: An absolute ‘one’, all-pervading supreme being both immanent and transcendent, the creator of un-manifest reality, though it is the only ‘Reality’.
According to Karma, the law of cause and effect, each individual creates his own destiny by his thoughts, words and deeds. Karma is not fate; for man, his deeds create his own fate. God does not punish anyone; one reaps what he sows. the effect of his acts makes him take several births until all the debts of his deeds—good and bad—are returned. still, prayer and nobility give Divine Grace. Man is not a born sinner. Divine grace is equal for all. Hindu philosophy believes in equality of well-being for all— Lōkā Samasta Sukhinō Bhavantu.
Reincarnation (where the soul evolves through many births) continues until all Karma is resolved. then only one attains Moksha or liberation from the cycle of rebirth. this destiny is common for all souls—the existence of divine beings in unseen worlds, temple worship, rituals and devotion lead to communion with the ‘Devas’ or gods in other worlds.
Not Many But One Volume II||G.K. Sasidharan
The history of spirituality and religion in India extends back to the end of the Palaeolithic period. this is evidenced by early traces of it excavated from different parts of India. there is evidence of ‘fire worship’ and ‘mother goddess’ worship as early as 10,000 BCe to 30,000 BCe. In Baghor situated near Kaimor escarpment Medhauli village in Madhya Pradesh, the excavated triangular stones and altars of fire worship seem to be 30,000 years old. A triangular stone was found incised with triangles, marked in red ochre, at an altar for a goddess. even today this practice continues in many villages in India, where similar stones, smeared in red and incised with triangles are offered to village deities. the triangular shape is generally taken as the basis for creating yantras, which are used for the worship of various deities. In the Indus Valley civilization (Harappan civilization) Kalibangan proto-Harappan age (3500 BCe–2500 BCe), they practised worship of the mother goddess, phallic worship and worship of a male god.
The new ideas of spirituality built up through the last couple of centuries, combining Western materialistic ideas with mystical traditions of Asia; especially of Indian religions. the ultimate endeavour was to find the truth of the individual’s entity ‘I’. With the advent of translations of Hindu texts in the West, mostly during the last century, transcendentalist thoughts started influencing Western thought, which led to the endorsement of universalist ideas and to Unitarian Universalism.
The theosophical society that searched for sacred teachings in Asian religions contributed to the major influence on model spirituality. It was influential on several Asian religions, especially on neo-Vedanta, the revival of theravada Buddhism, and Buddhist modernism, which adopted modern Western notions of personal experience and Universalism and incorporated them in their religious perception.
The perpetual philosophy of Asian tradition furthered the influence on the Western model of spirituality. An important influence on Western spirituality was neo-Vedanta, also called neo-Hinduism and Hindu Universalism, a model interpretation of Hinduism which developed in response to Western thoughts and oriental thoughts. the Unitarianism and the idea of Universalism were brought to India by missionaries and had a major influence on neo-Hinduism. this universalism was further popularized and brought back to the West as neo-Vedanta by swami Vivekananda.
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The translations, explanations and commentary given in the two volumes of Not Many, But One are simple and conceivable by ordinary readers who may not be well equipped to grasp the complexities of the intuitional spiritual findings of Advaita and hypothetic conclusions of quantum physics-but without compromising on the authenticity of the works.
