Sunday 11 August 2013

YOU CAN ALSO  WIN :LIFE OF A MIRACLE MAN!
Dr Jaydeep Sarangi

Itibritte Chandal Jiban (2012) is a thrilling and blood chilling discourse!! We hardly meet a person like him who is a living example of indomitable vitality for survival in a class and caste ridden society.

We don’t know his exact birth year (1950?) as Manoranjan Byapari’s mother could not record the date of his birth. He came from Barishal, Bangladesh to West Bengal at the age of three. He was in Bankura, Shiromanipur Refugee camp for nearly seven years since he was three years old. Suddenly one day, the dole given by the government to the refugee camp was stopped and the family had to move out to the Ghutiyari Sharif, Gholadoltala Refugee Camp in South 24 Paraganas. His parents lived there till late ‘60s. In 1964 he left home at the age of fourteen in order to earn a living for my family. He went to New Jalpaiguri and worked in a tea stall. Then he moved on to Assam, Lucknow, Delhi and Allahabad. In 1969 he and his family (his parents, two brothers, two sisters) moved to Jadavpur, Kolkata. In 1971 they moved to Dandakaranya, Paralkot. Byapari shifted back to Kolkata in 1973 while his parents kept living in Paralkot for sometime more. In the same year he took up rickshaw-pulling as occupation near Jadavpur railway station. Both his parents were illiterate. He had no dream for a better tomorrow. In 1975 he was involved in hooliganism in the Jadavpur area. Byapari was arrested and convicted under sections 148, 149 and 307 of the Indian Penal Code. While in jail for two years from 1975 – 1977. A chain of experiences there influenced significantly in his life.

There he met a man who claimed to have turned mad reading Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyaya’s ‘Charitrahin’. It immensely surprised Byapari.The possibility of such long years of imprisonment intimidated Byapari. He expressed concern to one under trial prisoner saying that he could not imagine how he would spend so many years in the prison, when life was proving to be so frustrating already! In response the prisoner pointed out to a banyan sapling on the wall of National Library (whose adjoining Campus was visible from the jail) and asserted: if that sapling could draw its nutrients from those concrete walls, then it was definitely possible to absorb life from within this apparently dismal jail campus too! One only needs to search it out!! He then went on to sing the glories of education, which could give life to humans even in most deadening situations – he would share stories of how a character of the story accepted voluntary isolation for years in lieu of a great amount of money, but then he started reading, and how learning helped him out of maddening loneliness, and how he was emancipated to the extent of deliberately breaking the terms of the challenge by leaving the confinement a day before the stipulated time would end and thereby forgoing the prize money, as he had experienced that knowledge had enriched him far more than that awaiting money ever could! Byapari had a complete paradigm shift and the stories ignited in him the hunger for education.

From then on the prison-friend started teaching him Bengali alphabets and he practiced them with twigs on the dust and chalk on the floors! In those days they used to buy blood from willing donors. He used to sell blood for Rs 20/- and buy pen and paper with that. He was in three jails in a span of two years time : Alipore Special Jail, Central Jail and Presidency Jail.

Byapari started pulling rickshaw and rough days followed. One day a lady got on to my rickshaw. As he pulled the rickshaw through the streets, he asked her the meaning of the Bengali word “jijibisha”. The lady was taken aback and asked him wherefrom he got this word. When he mentioned the source, the lady was surprised to learn that he could read! She then revealed herself as activist-writer Mahasweta Devi!! Thus, on goes the narrative of the incredible vicissitudes of his life.

The life that Byapari has lived must be shared with many. He has come back from the jaws of death many times. Recently again he was fighting death, and he had a strong feeling that his life-story must be documented in print, or else it will be lost with him. He feels it’s important for people to know that someone survived in such horrid conditions. His writings represent all those people who continue to live in such inhuman circumstances. Professor Meenakshi Mukherjee’s contribution to Economic and Political Weekly (2007), where she voiced his works, remains a milestone in his life. She propagated Byapari’s works all over India and in alien shores. Through her article, many realised for the first time that there are Dalit writings in Bangla.

Itibritte Chandal Jivan is a reading wonder indeed; a fascinating account of a miracle man! If he can, we all can make our days count!

(a version of this appeared in muse india: http://www.museindia.com/ )

INDIAN  ENGLISH POET

Saturday 10 August 2013

Book Review: Silent Days: Poems by Jaydeep Sarangi

“I love your silences, they are like mine. You are the only being before whom I am not distressed by my own silences. You have a vehement silence, one feels it is charged with essences, it is a strangely alive silence, like a trap open over a well, from which one can hear the secret murmur of the earth itself.”
― Anaïs Nin
This is something exact to quote about Silent Days, a collection of poems by Jaydeep Sarangi. This collection is like the garland made up of varieties of flowers from the experiences of life. Poetry, after all, is to be found in the thick of life's activities and experiences; Sarangi is a keen observer of the same. His poems give the sense of familiarity to the readers which are most of the times ignored in the haziness of life. His simplicity is the weapon of his writing spirit, which touches the soul of the readers. Recipient of Sahitya Akademi Award, Sarangi gives a fresh signification to everything. Silent Days is a collection of 50 poems expressing the ideas and emotions of the lived moments of the poet. Hailing from the city of Joy, Sarangi writes about his childhood days on his native land, collages of rural life, personal emotions, social pangs, modern lifestyle and much more.

His love for the native land, where he was born, is very significant in his writings. The poems like 'The Red Soil Allure' 'I'm On Your Side', 'Refugee', 'Small Rivers of the Mind', 'My Family Tree' etc. portray the deepest connection with his homeland artistically.  
MY FAMILY TREE
The sap of History of the land is a long pedigree.
My forefathers settled near the temple of Kanakdurga
Near the bank of a rivulet
Flowing gently in a soothing pace.
Where I sit and whisper in history forgotten
Like long barren trees in late autumn
Calm as history books
Where dry hard facts are written in black ink.
Sarangi's concern for his city and modern busy life comes out as beautiful verses through his pen when he describes 'Morning' and 'Missed Calls'
The day in Kolkata opens, delayed by
A dim sun, to the haze of 
Last  night's fervour. The note of
Church bells and twittering seep into every derails.
Yogic chants follow a
Rhythm of bridge between a noisy head and a calm mind.
The day poisons night's lullabies,
As my little daughter paints
Shiva's poison-green neck.
MISSED CALLS
"In Tollygunj auto line", "In a crowded bus"
"Will you call back a little later?" "In the metro"
"...calling later" "call back little later"...
The cell phone can erase boundaries 
Between meeting up or not.
Some calls can be received
Others are missed calls
In the buzz of the auto or the metro tunnel
Its not always possible to call back.
Promises hide their faces
Amidst crowds of everyday duties.
With the aroma of chanachur and puffed rice
I remember...
The pleadings of the boy back home -
"Bring me colour pencils today". 
Being an observer of life and society, Sarangi pens the tensions and pressures prevailing in society with a personal touch. 
A ROSE IS A ROSE
She has returned to the dark womb
Of silence and eternity
With lleaves green
And blossom red and white.
Blue wings of my imagination.
Run wild among my ruined terrace
Of sad history of women in our country
Sarangi has given a splendid tribute to his friend Niranjan Mohanty through his poem 'Friendship'.
There is a door in the deep heart of my private chamber
It opens at times, sometime in midnight when the clock marks
'twelve'.
With a descent key
When it does, it takes all of me in.
Your Tiger poems haunt me like
Rhododendron for flies in the upper Himalaya.
My imagination shines with colours
Red and blue
On the banks of Beas.
I register my random thoughts
In my urn of tears. 
At last, it would be better to say, that, this book is a collage of emotions and sentiments uprooted in the poet's silent days; which he lays bare for the readers to witness their own-selves through this book, Silent Days.

About Indian English poet Jaydeep Sarangi:
Jaydeep Sarangi is a bilingual writer, academic, editor and translator with several seminal books as well. He has delivered keynote addresses in several national and international seminars and conferences and read his poems in different continents. He has been anthologized widely in several shores. One of the reviewers has made an honest observation by calling him Bard on the Banks of Dulong . Sarangi is the Vice President, GIEWEC (head office at Kerala) and one of the founder members and the Vice President of SPELL (Society for Poetry, Education, Literature and Language), Kolkata. Anchored in Kolkata, his poetry defies boundaries and resonates with glocal experiences.

Friday 9 August 2013




 




 Indian English Poet::Jaydeep Sarangi


Jaydeep Sarangi is a bilingual writer, academic, editor, interviewer, translator and author of a number of significant publications on Postcolonial issues, Indian Writing in English, Australian Literature, Marginal literatures and Creative Writing in reputed journals/magazines in India and abroad. He is in the editorial board of several refereed journals in different continents including Mascara Literary Review  (Australia), Virtuoso(Hyderabad),Cavalcade (Nigeria), Pegasus (Agra), The Okigbo Review (Nigeria), Unheard Melody, Parnassus (RaeBarelly),Prosopisia(Ajmer), Labyrinth(Gwalior),Indian Journal of World Literature and Culture (Bhubaneswar), IJPCL (Kerala), Scholastic International Journal of Language and Literature (Chennai), Reflections (Tezu),ArsArtium,(Ghaziabad),Conjunctions- An International Refereed Journal of Language, Literature & Culture(Jalandhar),etc..He edits "New Fiction Journal" (ISSN 0978 – 6863)and one of the Editors of "Writers Editors Critics",theVice President of GIEWEC (Guild of Indian English Writers, Editors and Critics, head office at Kerala),as well as SPELL(Society for Poetry,Education,Literature and Language)in Kolkata. Sarangi has delivered keynote addresses in several national and international seminars and conferences. Widely anthologised and reviewed as a poet,he authors three poetry collections in English and one in Bengali. His latest book of poems in English, Silent Days was released at the Westerly Centre,UWA, Perth in the Summer 2013. He can be reached at: jaydeepsarangi@gmail.com