Need some rural Bengal dose
Despite religious festive season going to get over in Kolkata and Bengal, winters provide some serious cultural festivals pertaining to baul (wandering mystics of Bengal) and rural arts festivals in different parts of rural Bengal including Santiniketan in Birbhum district and Karimpur in Nadia district. So, many of the Kolkatans are getting ready with their recorders and cameras to capture the true essence of Bengal which many of the city residents miss in their clockwork routine. These festivals in the winter give an excuse to the city dwellers to inhale some fresh air and listen to some natural music of the nature and not the honking of horns.
After festive siesta, dharnas return to Esplanade
After taking a brief hibernation, political parties are back to business by holding their regular dharnas and rallies in Kolkata’s nerve centre, the Esplanade. The sheer size of the square and the central location give an impression to the cadres of the political parties that by sitting and shouting slogans at Esplanade, they would grab the attention of the people and the state government.
But one thing many seem to have forgotten - the state Secretariat is no longer a block away at Writer’s Building, it’s miles away near the Vidyasagar Setu connecting Kolkata with Howrah. Secondly, Kolkatans have developed an amazingly thick rhinoceros skin with regard to unchanging political slogans and the traffic jams induced by the rallies. There’s ample scope of innovation in sloganeering and tactics to attract more people in the rallies.
Winter is coming, need better momos!
While Kolkatans prefer to have momos throughout the year, the dip in temperatures in the winter months surely call for increased dependence on the meat-filled Tibetan dumplings and piping hot soup to make the wear and tear of the work at office vanish in the evenings. However, with only a handful of restaurants selling well-stuffed momos with authentic flavours, the city residents are calling for more established outlets selling the delicacy rather than the street-side vendors making a mess of the beloved momo by stuffing more of cabbage and onions requiring us to carry magnifying glasses to search for chicken pieces.
Police act swiftly, arrest man behind gory rape threat
A Kolkata resident Agniswar Chakraborty gained the city’s bad limelight for threatening an Australia-based woman with the goriest possible details of rape after she deleted one of his comments from her Facebook profile picture. While the victim found it logical to remove a stranger’s comment from her picture, Agniswar treated the delete button as an insult. The rape threat comment created such a furor in the social media that the Kolkata police arrested Agniswar and announced the same on Twitter. Police later revealed that the accused has been stalking the victim for more than a year. A petition in change.org with 32,700 supporters also urged the Calcutta High Court to give exemplary punishment to Agniswar.
Aishik Chanda
The author is the correspondent of the New Indian Express in West Bengal.
Email:chanda.aishik@gmail.com