Southern States - Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad   

Between you & me

Bureaucrats are unjustly blamed for not doing any work. They do -- and some continue even after retirement. Two of my friends, Shravan Kumar, a former Chief Secretary, and Sushil Kumar, a former Director General of Police, along with some others, are engaged in saving part of the built heritage of Hyderabad through the State chapter of the Indian National Trust for Art & Cultural Heritage.

The Governor, S.S. Barnala, gave away the awards at the eighth annual heritage awards last week taking the tally to 47. The State Government has declared 137 buildings and 15 precincts including nine rock formations in the `protected' category. That however does not guarantee that they will be protected just as the ban on child marriage does not stop child marriages. The Government needs to take the preservation of heritage seriously and provide teeth to its regulations. In the absence of any financial assistance for the maintenance of such buildings, it is not realistic to expect private owners to forego the benefits, which they can get by demolishing them. However, INTACH's initiative has served to create some public awareness.

VST, HUDA and AP Tourism have so far sponsored the award function for three years each. From the next year, the State Bank of Hyderabad has come forward to do that. It is a good thing for the bank, which bears the city's name to take up a programme to highlight its heritage. I am sure it will improve its profit next year.

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How many newspapers do you read? Most people get just one newspaper and read it like the scriptures. Others want to know more news from different angles, and so get many papers. That is because many papers are affiliated to some political party or business interest and they publish the news selectively. But there is no end to trying to get at the objective truth. I get six papers in different languages and a dozen magazines and yet do not know whether a person reported dead in a newspaper has in fact died. Some of these newspapers are complimentary. If I read all of them, I will not be able to do anything else. Also, I will be a very confused person. So, I make a short shrift of the papers.

I finish them along with my breakfast, which takes about half-an-hour. I can do that because I don't read the sports page or the stocks and news about shares. They are the raw materials of scandals. I also don't read about murders and accidents. Same about political news. It is enough to know what one leader said. All others will either support him if they belong to his party, or oppose him if they are in the opposite camp. So, it is enough if you scan the headlines. That leaves only the advertisements. Classified ads deal with sale and purchase including things, which are `hardly used.' The hardly-user assumed that you will need something for which he found no use. I avoid them because they encourage consumerism.

Matrimonial columns are a veritable storehouse on the complex social system of India. Sociologists researching on India study them carefully. Anyone who is reduced to looking for a match through advertisements is not worth marrying. That person should be booked for soliciting.

The obituary columns are the most useful items in a newspaper. First, they reassure me that I am still alive. They also set my agenda for the day. Ordinary persons have to pay for being reported there. An important person's death is reported free by way of incentive. Some VIP's die on a public holiday. So, while dying, they also kill a holiday. Any leader who dies on a holiday should be barred from elections for six years -- and even from voting.

That does not mean that I waste money on newspapers. No, my wife reads them minutely. She does that first thing in the morning and the last thing at night. Then she proceeds solemnly to give me the news, which is really `old.' If I tell her I already know it, she asks me how because she has read it only now. But by that time, I am already snoring.

Sometimes, newspapers carry good matter. Whenever something written by me is published, I read it carefully. It enhances my knowledge. In fact, whatever I know is from what I have written. No, that is not a vain boast. Oscar Wilde said that just think. Whatever you know is also what you have written - school compositions, essays, seminars, articles, papers, love letters, complaints, appeals, graffiti.

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`For everyone growing old is mandatory; growing up is optional.'

Narendra Luther

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