Mamta Kalia

days after this incident, when my friend
Prof. Sandip Jena from Cambridge came
to Delhi for a vacation, I referred to this
topic.
—‘These people are preparing new
grounds in order to sell their arms and
other products. These conclusions arrived
at after stretching a lot of arguments are
not merely ‘academic’, there may be a
‘deep political strategy’ behind them.’ Prof.
Jena had exploded at once. His opinion
was that many investigative researchers
are ‘told’ what the ‘conclusions’ of their
‘research’ would be. The astonishing thing
is that these conclusions are accepted as
the positive result of the research.
Investigations and institutional research
conducted in underdeveloped and
developing societies by researchers from
most developed countries concluded with
such general surveys and analytical
conclusions’. I was shocked to hear this.
—‘And it is the limit Mr Barua that
here in our underdeveloped nations there
are some very enthusiastic ‘ultra modern’
intellectuals, who have some compulsionsfinancial
or cerebral or a great desire to
attain fame or suffer from an intellectual
emptiness. They are the ones who feel
proud and happy to propagate and
popularize these ‘scientific deductions’.
These persons snap up every ‘idea’,
mannerism or thing that has its origin
in Europe or America, one does not know
why. Opinions from our own country seem
significant and contextual to them when
their importance is stressed by some
American or European scholars. Most
Indian ‘intellectuals’ seem like parasites
to me, mouthing and digesting western
views… You should try to understand your
110 :: April-June 2010
circumstances in your own way, try to
find some solutions to them. Go in the
midst of the people and their problems,
only then you will know what the reality
is. Where is the need to depend on the
‘data collection’ of the whites? You may
explain this to them time after time, but
nobody is willing to listen.’ Prof. Jena
completed what he had to say by slapping
the table with both hands.
…What all am I writing in my diary.
I started with the debate in college and
somehow managed to link it with the
American team and Dr. Jena’s words. …Well.
I had come out immediately after giving
away the prizes and having refreshments.
The Deputy Commissioner had a routine
meeting with all the high officials of the
district at two thirty. As soon as the meeting
was over, news came that in Kheda village
there had been incidence of firing between
two groups of the same clan over land
dispute and long standing feuds. Three
persons had been killed on the spot, five
injured, two of whom were in a very critical
condition. I had to leave for Kheda along
with the police guards. There I got to
know that the local MLA was planning
to visit the victims at local civil hospital,
so I had to go there as well. So what
if he was not a minister, he was very
close to the CM…As soon as I returned
to the district town, news and TV reporters
arrived. I just about managed to talk to
them when the city SHO gave the
information that in a posh residential sector
outside the main city, some robbers had
entered a house by force and looted cash
and jewellery. On their way out they had
shot at a middle aged woman and her
young son. I had to rush there….By the