GRAHAM STUART STAINES

On 22nd.January this year the Supreme Court has delivered its verdict over the killing of Graham Stuart Staines which had taken place in the very heart of India exactly 12 years ago. The death sentence of the monster who had killed the Australian social worker so mercilessly has been converted into life imprisonment. Nobody should have a problem with that,especially who knew Graham as a person,who would have pardoned his killer anyway. What is shocking,to say the least,is the rejoinder that has come with the verdict.

A Supreme Court verdict isn't just a legally binding decision. It represents the set of values that guides the code of living of an Indian in front of the entire world. It sums up the sense of the good and the bad,of what is proper and what isn't for the average Indian. It represents the set of values that guides India to live and let live the way it wants,peacefully co-existing with all other nations. If burning a man and his two sons alive inside a station-wagon in full consciousness and in cold blood isn't a rarest of rare cases in the eyes of an Indian,I wonder what is. The entire world is watching us.

Subjectively speaking it delivers two essentially different statements.
1 ) The court has observed,as if in a mode which justifies the change in the nature of punishment,that the killing doesn't fall in the category of "the rarest of rare cases" that actually demands capital punishment. An obnoxious thought itself that outrages the moral values of the common Indian,the entire avoidable rejoinder couldn't have been more improper,shaming the nation's pride.

2 ) The Chief Justice of India has come down heavily on forced religious conversions. Was it necessary for the Supreme Court to make this observation while passing the verdict in Staines' case? Graham Stuart Staines was not a missionary zealot who made religious conversions. It seems that the highest chair of Justice in India has made a correct decision for all the wrong reasons.

January 23rd. 1999 was just another chaotic day in Kolkata.There was nothing irregular about it.When I reached The Oxford Book Company in Park Street,it was past midday. I remember waiting for 3 long weeks before I decided to pick up a copy of the unabridged King James' version of The Bible.( The Old Testament used to be - it still is - one of my most favourite books,being one of the most brilliant books of history,and a wonderful mixture of sociology & anthropology too.)
As I waited for the busy traffic to slow down a bit so that I could cross over from Flury's to the opposite footpath that bordered Park Hotel,I frowned to look up at the sky. It was a dull grey, so typical of the outgoing winter that used to keep Kolkata enwrapped in a thick,depressive smog in the month of January. Trying to read into the January sky,I couldn't understand what was disturbing me on that day. What I didn't know was that it was going to be day which would witness religious extremists brutally murdering Graham Stuart Staines and his two sons, burning them alive inside a station wagon - one of the most brutal,heinous killings Independent India had ever witnessed.

Nothing could have been so ironic. There I was,a Hindu Indian,holding the Old Testament in my hand because I loved to read it. And a few hundred miles away an Australian Christian was being burnt alive,right in the heartland of tribal Orissa. His "sin" - he loved tribal lepers and wanted to make their lives beautiful. Soon after that,the brutal killing had snowballed into a political warfare,with political parties taking sides and the newspapers screamed hoarse everyday as they covered the high-pitched political rhetoric that the two sides slung at each other. So politically Indian.

I remember standing a few paces behind  Gladys Staines as she stood in front of the entire world to softly declare that she had forgiven the brutes who had killed her husband and her two sons so mercilessly. Graham Stuart Staines was a father-figure to me. Though I have no intention of going into the details of the seemingly "blasphemous relationship" of which I had been accused of once upon a time (- how did an Australian Christian Missionary who ran a leprosy rehabilitation camp in Orissa  ever bond with a 29 year old Indian doctor that was me, born unto a Bengali middle-class Hindu family),because such an act today will degrade the memory of Graham, I remember weeping bitterly as I read the headlines of The Telegraph,trying to withstand the onslaught of the morbid helplessness that took me in,reading about the gory details of how Graham had been grilled alive a day before on the day that marked 102nd.birth anniversary of Subhas Chandra Bose.
It was going to be the first of the  serial personal losses that struck me so suddenly and quickly,as life unfolded itself over the months of '99. Though I was devastated,the memory of Graham and everything he stood for helped me and guided me away from the borders of reckless self-annihilation that had threatened my sanity over the year that saw me across to the new millenium,and a new life too.

The murders had shamed the entire nation. Graham had been accused of forced religious conversion by those who mocked to justify the gruesome act. Yet when I made that trip to Manoharpur,Orissa 12 years back to stand by whatever was left of the Staines family-my last, I didn't find a single religious convert in the entire missionary camp that Graham ran like an angel,with Gladys by his side. And I hung my head in shame as I watched her reading out to reach out to the entire world that she knew Graham would forgive his killers as she did too. She prayed for her two sons too,and silently returned to her life without any cheap fanfare, back to the camp that loved and helped Oriya tribal lepers who had been ostracized by their own society,and by those who were "supposed" to show them the "Path to Salvation".

Since that day,life has moved on. India has moved on too to a possible redemption,that part of her that loved and understood Graham Stuart Staines has learnt to live out of the shame that had once belittled its own self. But the pathetic malady that is eating away into India's humane face every day,hurling her into a hellfire of corruption,money laundering,sex-scandals and brutal rapes of minors,just doesn't seem to  go away. And on the eve of Graham's 12th.death anniversary,as I watched the newscaster reading out the Supreme Court verdict on primetime television news,I hung my head in shame once again.

I knew Graham personally. I have been fortunate enough to have felt his love - the love that he had for one and all,cutting across countries,beliefs and religions. He took his inspiration from a man called Jesus Christ,but was gentle enough to have never forced his faith upon anybody. Yet the blind fanaticism that cuts the world into bleeding pieces today in the name of a highly dispensable folly called Religion took this man away.

Maybe it's time for some real introspection for those of us who think that they care and understand. To stop lying to our own selves once and for all,and to listen to what our hearts tell us silently every single day that witnesses the rape and murder of a brother or a sister somewhere out there. And we just keep on looking the other way.
-- anirban
-------------------------------------------------------
• Sent from my BlackBerry®Smartphone
-------------------------------------------------------
• with sincere regards from :
Dr.Anirban Chaudhuri,(MBBS)
Consultant Physician (special interest in
Cardiology & Critical Care Medicine)
Mumbai,India.
---------------------------------------------------------
"Let us all live to work for Peace towards a
United,Green World.For that is the
Tomorrow we leave for our Children,our
own Tomorrow,to live for."

THE BEST MEDICINE

I have been suffering from this neuropathy affecting my left hand over the last 6 months. Clinically one would brand the nerve disorder as Left Ulnar Mononeuropathy - the ulnar nerve is one of the 2 main nerves supplying the arm and hand - in my case it is the left one and it is my left hand that has been affected. I've been experiencing an ever-increasing pain,to the point of being excruciating,and an almost constant,weirdly tingling sensation in my left hand,particularly in the ring & little fingers & the area of the palm below them which do not exactly move the way I wish them to.

The condition seems to have developed, according to my neurologist,due to extensive playing of guitar,an exercise I had indulged in with passion,in my late teens and early-20s, when I used to play in the college rock-band which had a rather brief yet excitingly joyous professional stint later on. I had formally learnt classical &folk guitar(like flamenco,the Catalan folk)which is played finger-style,and that requires a 'classical' acoustic guitar which traditionally sports a much broader finger-board than usual. That necessitated my left fingers to stretch extensively,and all the more so when I used to hold the broken chords in the background when we played those Scorpions numbers(I still remember those initially painful hours during rehearsals as we played songs like "When The Smoke Is Going Down").

Over the last few months the left ring & little fingers had forced my hand into a clawed shape of submission,the fingers getting contracted & flexed at the little bone joints,a seemingly eternal state of Spasm that was not exactly painless. I find that rather ironic as the name of my rock-band(well it was 'mine' just as it was any other co-member's) was SPASM too, a name I'd kept myself along with Miku,the bass-guitarist who went on to become a hand-surgeon himself later on. Now that's one of 'those quirks' of destiny,isn't it?

Coming back to my neuropathy,the pain had,at one point of time,increased so much that even the strongest painkillers were not being effective,and I had become literally sick of pain-killing injections. Nothing seemed to work,and the fact that I could no more hold chords,or even use my left fingers while playing guitar(ultimately I had to quit my favourite pass-time activity)only added to my frustrated,depressing woes.

Three weeks back,as I was having my morning cold coffee,my 21 month-old daughter tiptoed her way into the hall,nimble-footed,and stood in front of me,looking at me with her sparkling, bright eyes. I knew that look. She wanted to climb up and sit on my stomach,straddling her legs on the sides facing her father - her favourite "seat" in the morning,as she would excitedly tell me how the pigeons had looked at her from outside the kitchen window or how busily the crows had pecked at the crumbs on the parapet. That day I found it difficult to give her a hand to take her morning seat. The pain was too much in my left hand which found itself too weak to carry her weight. I knew she would be disappointed.

As I looked back at her eyes with helpless apology written all over my face and with a tinge of guilt too,trying to shake my afflicted hand off the pain,I spoke to her in my Bengali mother-tongue,telling her,"Aaj baba'r haate khub byatha je.."(which vaguely translates into - "But there is too much pain in father's hands today...". She isn't too familiar with that language as her father has got only a handful of relatives and none in Mumbai to pay the occasional visit so that the language is spoken. I really don't know what she understood,but she didn't show any disappointment. What she showed in her eyes was gentle and tender care. She took my hand in her soft,little fingers kissing it mildly, looked up at me and said in broken English,"Baba?pain no...Baba?pain no no.."..

Well,my left hand hasn't exactly stopped paining since,but that was the last time I felt the pain. I have not needed any pain-killers since then simply because I don't feel any pain anywhere,anymore. And as I watch my daughter growing up each day,every hour,every minute,I just wonder how beautiful life can be for anybody in the simplest of ways,in spite of all the pains & troubles,the aches & breaks it keeps on dishing out on a regular basis. No matter how much one cries,life always gets back to you as a great leveler,giving you something to smile about,and perhaps with a little reward at the end. It is just only a matter of time.

Let it be.
-- anirban
-------------------------------------------------------
• Sent from my BlackBerry®Smartphone
-------------------------------------------------------
• with sincere regards from :
Dr.Anirban Chaudhuri,(MBBS)
Consultant Physician (special interest in
Cardiology & Critical Care Medicine)
Mumbai,India.
---------------------------------------------------------
"Let us all live to work for Peace towards a
United,Green World.For that is the
Tomorrow we leave for our Children,our
own Tomorrow,to live for."

THANK YOU

Thanks to all of you who have lent your strong voices through your personal mails to me here and in Facebook as I remembered Graham Stuart Staines the other day-voices so eagerly needed to keep alive the Hope of the Good Cause that Graham personified - one desperately seeks voices like yours that actually become kindly leading lights when social stigmata come across your way, revealed so shockingly that normal cerebration get numbed - not only for the uncivilized perceptions to the point of barbarism that they represent, but the "educated and liberated" quarters of our society that they originate from - even from acquaintances,my own blood relatives near and distant - that commanded my respect and who once used to be valued to be high.

Personally speaking,in my relationship with Graham,I 've come across innumerable taboos that I wouldn't have known otherwise,existed for real,haunting to plague our educated society. In difficult and changing times like now it is all the more important not to be silenced..

My association with the Staines goes a long way in moulding the aggressive ignorance that plagued my entity once,into the relatively civilized ( and far-from near perfect) tolerance that guides me as a husband,a father and a professional.

Graham's memories show me still that It is so important not to lose one's self to the coward compromise that trying times like today coldly demand round the sudden bends in one's walk of life. Certain compromises are just unacceptable because if you do so,you just stop being the very person you are,you lose that minuscule island of Truth that you still rule in the midst of the chaotic oceans that you have tamely forfeited and surrendered over the years.
This is what Graham taught persistently, even in the face of death threats - one of them came back and took him away. Yet he lives on - In my memories and in your voices. One can only see Hope from here.

Thank you so very much.
-- anirban
-------------------------------------------------------
• Sent from my BlackBerry®Smartphone
-------------------------------------------------------
• with sincere regards from :
Dr.Anirban Chaudhuri,(MBBS)
Consultant Physician (special interest in
Cardiology & Critical Care Medicine)
Mumbai,India.
---------------------------------------------------------
"Let us all live to work for Peace towards a
United,Green World.For that is the
Tomorrow we leave for our Children,our
own Tomorrow,to live for."

THE BEST MEDICINE

I have been suffering from this neuropathy affecting my left hand over the last 6 months. Clinically one would brand the nerve disorder as Left Ulnar Mononeuropathy - the ulnar nerve is one of the 2 main nerves supplying the arm and hand - in my case it is the left one and it is my left hand that has been affected. I've been experiencing an ever-increasing pain,to the point of being excruciating,and an almost constant,weirdly tingling sensation in my left hand,particularly in the ring & little fingers & the area of the palm below them which do not exactly move the way I wish them to.

The condition seems to have developed, according to my neurologist,due to extensive playing of guitar,an exercise I had indulged in with passion,in my late teens and early-20s, when I used to play in the college rock-band which had a rather brief yet excitingly joyous professional stint later on. I had formally learnt classical &folk guitar(like flamenco,the Catalan folk)which is played finger-style,and that requires a 'classical' acoustic guitar which traditionally sports a much broader finger-board than usual. That necessitated my left fingers to stretch extensively,and all the more so when I used to hold the broken chords in the background when we played those Scorpions numbers(I still remember those initially painful hours during rehearsals as we played songs like "When The Smoke Is Going Down").

Over the last few months the left ring & little fingers had forced my hand into a clawed shape of submission,the fingers getting contracted & flexed at the little bone joints,a seemingly eternal state of Spasm that was not exactly painless. I find that rather ironic as the name of my rock-band(well it was 'mine' just as it was any other co-member's) was SPASM too, a name I'd kept myself along with Miku,the bass-guitarist who went on to become a hand-surgeon himself later on. Now that's one of 'those quirks' of destiny,isn't it?

Coming back to my neuropathy,the pain had,at one point of time,increased so much that even the strongest painkillers were not being effective,and I had become literally sick of pain-killing injections. Nothing seemed to work,and the fact that I could no more hold chords,or even use my left fingers while playing guitar(ultimately I had to quit my favourite pass-time activity)only added to my frustrated,depressing woes.

Three weeks back,as I was having my morning cold coffee,my 21 month-old daughter tiptoed her way into the hall,nimble-footed,and stood in front of me,looking at me with her sparkling, bright eyes. I knew that look. She wanted to climb up and sit on my stomach,straddling her legs on the sides facing her father - her favourite "seat" in the morning,as she would excitedly tell me how the pigeons had looked at her from outside the kitchen window or how busily the crows had pecked at the crumbs on the parapet. That day I found it difficult to give her a hand to take her morning seat. The pain was too much in my left hand which found itself too weak to carry her weight. I knew she would be disappointed.

As I looked back at her eyes with helpless apology written all over my face and with a tinge of guilt too,trying to shake my afflicted hand off the pain,I spoke to her in my Bengali mother-tongue,telling her,"Aaj baba'r haate khub byatha je.."(which vaguely translates into - "But there is too much pain in father's hands today...". She isn't too familiar with that language as her father has got only a handful of relatives and none in Mumbai to pay the occasional visit so that the language is spoken. I really don't know what she understood,but she didn't show any disappointment. What she showed in her eyes was gentle and tender care. She took my hand in her soft,little fingers kissing it mildly, looked up at me and said in broken English,"Baba?pain no...Baba?pain no no.."..

Well,my left hand hasn't exactly stopped paining since,but that was the last time I felt the pain. I have not needed any pain-killers since then simply because I don't feel any pain anywhere,anymore. And as I watch my daughter growing up each day,every hour,every minute,I just wonder how beautiful life can be for anybody in the simplest of ways,in spite of all the pains & troubles,the aches & breaks it keeps on dishing out on a regular basis. No matter how much one cries,life always gets back to you as a great leveler,giving you something to smile about,and perhaps with a little reward at the end. It is just only a matter of time.

Let it be.
___________________________________________
• Sent from my BlackBerry®Smartphone
----------------------------------------------------------------

• with sincere regards from :
Dr.Anirban Chaudhuri,(MBBS)
Consultant Physician (special interest in Cardiology & Critical Care Medicine)
Mumbai,India.
____________________________
"Let us all live to work for Peace towards a United,Green World.For that is the Tomorrow we leave for our Children,our own Tomorrow,to live for."
-----------------------------------------