[Reader-list] Thinking Freedom

[shivam]

Dear Zainab,

An inspiring and fascinating posting as ever. About hawkers, I vaguely
remember hearing once that the supreme court had passed a judgement
saying that hawkers had every right to practice their trade on the
street, as they had been doing for centuries in India.

I went to Connaught Place yesterday and one of the things that
distinguishes this erstwhile centre of consumerism in Delhi from the
new centre - South Delhi - is the presence of hawkers. The problem
with the presence of such hawkers sometimes is that they can pester
you even if you don't want to buy what they are selling; secondly,
they quote high rates and expect you to bargain. Hawkers do put off
foreign tourists, and so in Agra they're having a tough time at the
hands of the police.

But the greatest reason why hawkers are troubled by the municipality
officials or the police is because of 'hafta' or bribe. I don't know
if this is true for Mumbai's beaches but this is what I saw in
Lucknow.


About beggars, I suppose begging is looked down upon because it is not
considered 'work'. The money a beggar earns is 'free money', as bad as
black money, because you haven't 'earned it'. Beggars can overcome
this limitation and gain legitimacy if they are disabled - or pretend
to be so. Similarly, children are pushed into begging - by syndicates
who kidnap such children or by parents/ step-parents - as poor (or
poor-looking children) can evoke sympathy in the restaurant-going
class more easily than adults who look completely fit.

So in the case of children, the ideas of freedom need to be
investigated at two levels: not just vis-a-vis the state, but also in
the context of their personal freedom vis-a-vis the authority who
forces them to beg.

Just as paedophilia is considered a crime because the child is not
considered to be mature enough to understand what's going on, children
who beg in urban India's streets, temples and bazaars and not exactly
'free'.

Just my 50 paisa.

Cheers
Shivam

On 5/6/05, zainab at xtdnet.nl <zainab at xtdnet.nl> wrote:
> 
> Thinking Freedom
> 
> These days, the person most on my mind is Santosh Yadav, the chanawala at
> the Marine Drive promenade. Santoshji and I had gradually become known to
> each other â€" he watching me regularly and I seeing him regularly on the
> promenade. Our interactions began with smiles, then short chit-chats and
> on the last day when I met him, we had a pretty long conversation where he
> also introduced me to his cousins who were selling sing-chana at Marine
> Drive. On that day, Santoshji spoke with me about his lifestyle. “I come
> to the promenade at 4 PM in the evening and am here till 10 PM. I earn
> enough money and am able to save about five to six thousand rupees a
> month. I sleep behind the Express Towers. Mornings are for myself. Life is
> good. Today, a lady from this area offered me a job. She says I will be
> treated well and the salary is also good. I shall go and see how it is
> there and then decide.”
> Santoshji was recounting how life had become tough for him with the
> surveillance daily from the Municipality, preventing him from doing dhanda
> on the promenade. I don’t see him anymore. And perhaps he has taken up the
> job that was offered to him, not because he wanted to trade his freedom
> for a regular job, but because the very conditions of freedom for him to
> do business are increasingly being curbed by the state and he was clear
> that soon, hawkers would be evicted completely from the Marine Drive
> promenade.
> 
> I have narrated Santoshji’s story on my blog before, but these days, my
> thoughts are wavering on the ideas of freedom and in this regard, I miss
> Santoshji immensely. Santoshji, when he had spoken to me about his
> lifestyle, appeared satisfied with the way life was for him. He had no
> qualms about sleeping behind Express Towers and was happy to save enough
> money to send to home at the end of the month. Living on a day-to-day
> basis has perhaps been life for him â€" not intensely speculating about the
> future, the concerns of security which haunt our culture.
> 
> While thinking freedom, I remember also this vivid picture at Marine Drive
> one evening. I was waiting for Rads outside Pizzeria. Opposite the
> restaurant were two beggar girls, one beggar woman and two beggar boys. Of
> the two girls, one was about three to four years old. She was an amazing
> girl, completely relaxed and basking in the sun. She was lying down, her
> head on the pavement and one foot on top of the other, swaying the free
> leg in the air. After a while, she got up and the other girl and she began
> dancing. I was too tempted to remove my camera and shoot some pictures of
> the sight â€" the freedom in their dance, in the little girl’s mannerisms
> was too tempting for me. But I hesitated, lest my camera bring in pretense
> or consciousness.
> As I think of the girl, I begin to also recollect practices in the local
> trains these days. Children often come begging in the ladies compartment.
> Day before yesterday, two ladies in the compartment were lecturing the
> beggar boys to find jobs in restaurants â€" “so many children are studying
> in school in the day and working in restaurants at night. Go seek some job
> like that instead of begging.” This kind of didactic lecturing is not
> novel to beggar children and drug addict children these days. I hear these
> repeatedly, from my own friends and kith and kin. Why does our culture
> reprimand begging? Is it wrong for some people to be dependent on society
> and for them to lead their lives the way they want to? What is it that
> disturbs our society about beggars, drug addicts, etc.?
> 
> While I write these words and articulate my own thoughts on freedom, I am
> likely to be criticized about not caring for the poor and being taken up
> their overt conditions. I am confirming my own thoughts on freedom whereby
> I don’t want state intervention in my life as well as interventions
> necessarily from organizations with good intentions to help the poor.
> 
> When I look at conditions in the city presently, undoubtedly there are
> strong attempts at homogenizing lifestyles and in this respect, cultures.
> Management style bureaucracy and ‘place branding’ are today’s mantra.
> Underlying these notions is the desire for control. The state wishes to
> bring loose spaces under its control, to curb business practices of
> unorganized economy because everything must be brought under central
> control. I am not meaning to present the idea and practice of control in a
> condemning manner, but am questioning the very sustainability of practices
> of control. Is that how life works â€" through centralized control?
> 
> As I think of Santosh Yadav and the little girl who was dancing opposite
> Pizzeria, my mind also wanders towards ideas of security for which we are
> each struggling and aspiring â€" purchasing property, fixed deposits, bonds,
> loans, assets, etc. Is this where true security lies?
> 
> In my experiences as a researcher, I realize that ‘leap of faith’ is a
> difficult notion for all. But I am convinced for myself that my survival
> is guaranteed by the relationships which I am constructing and developing
> with people. Maybe that’s the way life works as well …
> 
> Zainab Bawa
> Bombay
> www.xanga.com/CityBytes
> http://crimsonfeet.recut.org/rubrique53.html
> 
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