About 600 or so people—according to media estimates—gathered for Bangalore’s second gay pride parade on 28 June 2009. On display were an array of mismatched rainbow paraphernelia, including T-shirts, scarves, flags, posters, umbrellas, hats and bandanas. Add to that the music and the enthusiasm of the participating crowd, and it would be safe to say that fun was had by all.

The march was the culmination of the week-long Karnataka Queer Habba (habba = festival) organized by the Campaign for Sex-workers and Sexual Minorities Rights (CSMR), a collective of individuals and organizations. Events in the habba included a cricket match, film screenings, discussions, a story-telling session and more. Among the organizers were Alternative Law Forum, Sangama, Good As You, Karnataka Sex Workers’ Union, Karnataka Sexual Minorities Forum, Swabhava, Aneka and a number of others.

The participants of the march included LGBT representatives and supporters, activists, students and many more people. It appeared to generate a decent amount of interest in bystanders as well, many of whom were overheard talking about “gay rights” and such. Pamphlets in English and Kannada with information about the significance of the day, about rights of sexual minorities, and about Section 377 were aslo being distributed. Since only part of the road was occupied, curious onlookers leaned out from buses and cars, and waved, including a bunch of saffron-clad folks who probably didn’t know what it was all about!

For a very modest collection of photos: clicky here.

~PD

Starting off with a note on Hollywood celebrities who have had affairs with nannies and various other domestic help, Sharma shifts the focus to India. Her opening point itself is completely off target as she says how “the issue that was till now the domain of the West has come closer home”. Wrong, so wrong.

It is no secret that class and gender distinctions plague everyday life in our society, and that the brunt of it is borne by those in the margins, including domestic workers, who have no recourse to redressal for the sort of ill-treatment meted out to them on a daily basis. Sharma’s bizzare display of ignorance only reinforce the prejudices and worse faced by these women who have no-one to turn to.

She then goes on to focus on the rising infidelity of men “at the hands of maids”, thus again making the assumption that the blame is automatically ascribed to the woman. In the very premise of her article she appears to absolve men of all blame for cheating on their partners, thus reinforcing the very harmful and regressive gender stereotype of men being unable to contain their desires. This, in fact, reminds one of the ill-considered dress codes imposed by certain colleges on women students with the thinking that it is their manner of dress that provokes sexual harassment; or worse, the theory that some women ask for it by their mode of dress and behaviour.

Sharma also objectifies domestic helpers — already powerless women, often illiterate and usually forced to work without any sort of expectation of fair treatment — as sexual objects by using some shockingly inconsiderate — and one hopes misrepresented — quotes from a noted psychologist. The author writes, “The fact is that men don’t really fall in love with a maid but feel like exploring the alternative world of headless, harmless women.” Notice the carefully chosen words “headless, harmless” — implying that playing around with such women is “safe”. She also adds how, since domestic workers in India are unable to stand up and fight for their rights, it gives men the power and control they crave. A female professional is quoted as saying that it enables men to “unleash the beast” in ways that they know their wives and girlfriends won’t put up with!

On the whole, it is demeaning and disrespectful on multiple levels. Putting the stereotype aside of “men will be men” and “women must behave appropriately”, there is also a deep contempt displayed for the working class. From the tone and the words used, it would appear that the writer thinks of the domestic help as a lower form of life, “harmless and headless”, and therefore not worthy of respect as a fellow human being.

She ends with some friendly woman-to-woman advice: “choose your maid with care”. Nothing about choosing your partner with care?

It has been long since one stopped expecting any sort of standards from Times of India, but this time they have plumbed fascinating depths. With popular culture and the media intent upon maintaining the status quo in a society mired in patriarchy, glorifying the “Indian culture and tradition” in its current imbalances of class and gender, one wonders what hope remains, especially for those who need it most.

~PD

But on taking it out for a spin, the smirks and raised eyebrows dry up.

Opera Unite is a technology built into the Web browser that makes it possible to share data — including files, photos, music — on your computer directly from your browser. So basically, share photos with friends without having to sign up for a Flickr-type service, access your music remotely, share files with friends, have them leave messages for you directly on your computer, host a chat directly on your computer without needing a third-party service…. Heck, you can even turn your computer into a Web server and host your own Website on it!

Developers are encouraged to build applications (services) that use the Unite platform using Web standards like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, AJAX and SVG. At present a limited number of services are offered by Opera, and the advantage of the platform is that any application served on the Opera Unite platform will be accessible from any modern browser. The implications of the technology are quite significant: it will eliminate the need for the middlemen who provide the infrastructure and technology to host Web services.

Opera Unite is sandboxed and secure. This means people your share with cannot mess around with your computer. All it needs is a computer running Windows, Mac or Linux, and the latest Opera 10 beta built.

The technology is an alpha build now, and if you want to try it out, download the special build of the Opera 10 beta.

~PD

After months of blood, sweat and toil, The Timeless Land’s cover has been finalized and it looks like we’ll be rolling out soon. Just to recap — yes, it has been a long time and you’re forgiven for having forgotten — the Shadow in Eternity series consists of:

• Book 1: A Shadow in Eternity
• Book 2: The Key of Chaos
• Book 3: The Timeless Land

Hoping to be back very soon with news of the book being out! Meanwhile, what do you think is going to happen? Who will die and who will live?

~PD

Mother’s Day. Yet another largely Western concept conveniently commercialized and cleverly hijacked into the calendar. And funnily enough, this is not something even the most rabid right-winger is going to object to. Because, after all, we are the epitome of the worship of mothers and motherhood. Right?

Sadly, it couldn’t be further from the truth. Speaking in the Indian context, “worshipping” mothers is just another handy excuse society has thought up to keep women in their “place”, a place defined and restricted by men, it must be added. It’s an easy way to brush under the carpet the many ways and means to keep women marginalized. It is an interesting dichotomy indeed: you “worship” a woman so long as she limits herself to the role you decide she may have. You make a song and dance about dedicating a day to her, yet gloss over whether she has the freedom to live her life by her choices and be respected for that.

This hypocritical stand is enough to make one inarticulate — less with rage than with a complete frustration at those who cannot see how two-faced the reasoning is. Thus, I borrow the words of Urvashi Butalia, director of Zubaan [shameless self-promotion: my publishers] and co-founder of Kali for Women, India’s first feminist press:

It’s not enough to worship mothers, they need attention and consideration in real life too. But worship becomes a convenient excuse – for then you can say, ‘look, how much we look up to mothers in our society’ and actually continue to do the opposite. People may remember the case of Gudiya, the young girl whose husband disappeared during the Kargil war, and then reappeared four years later when she had remarried and was about to become a mother. No one listened to her pleas to be allowed to stay with her current husband, the father-to-be of her child, and she was forced to go back to a man she barely knew and with whom she had no relationship at all. So much for our respect for mothers.

She goes on to say:

It’s worth remembering that celebrating or marking one day does not change the hard reality on the ground. Every day as we look around us, we see increasing violence towards women, whether in our villages, or towns, or cities. The statistics on rape in India are staggering, and among the highest in the world, and as we know only too well, motherhood is no guarantee against rape.
So if we’re really to make this day meaningful, rather than just a gimmick and an opportunity for advertising to find another peg, let’s take a good hard look at the reality around us. Let’s ask ourselves how we treat our women, how we relate to our mothers, what rights they have, what are their needs, and really, what our attitude to them should be. Let’s start to make motherhood respected and meaningful, rather than just an empty sham.

The full story: Don’t Worship Them, Just Learn to Respect Women

~PD

These are workshops in the sense that they are online communities where writers get together to read each other’s stories and discuss them. The aim is to help each other write better and also learn about how to analyse others’ and one’s own work. There are dozens of such communites around, covering various genres; some of them require you to pay for membership and others are free. I was looking out for sci-fi/fantasy communities, and a few of them caught my attention.

Other Worlds Writers’ Workshop or OWWW functions as an e-mail list on Yahoo! Groups. Any serious writer of speculative fiction above the age of 18, irrespective of skill level, is free to join. You are allowed to submit your own work after you have completed six critiques of others. Both short stories and novels are allowed, as well as works in progress, covering various sub-genres like sci-fi, fantasy, alternate history, alternate reality, and mixes of the same (apart from horror and mainstream). OWWW also runs a beginner’s programme called the Six Keys.

Critters is also an online critique group for SFF writers, and is run by Andrew Burt, former vice-president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, an association of professional SFF writers, whose alumni includes the likes of Isaac Assimov, Anne McCaffrey and Ray Bradbury. Critters works on a similar concept of “critique and be critiqued”. Again, they accept both shorties and longer works, and have a separate programme for full-length novels.

Members of such workshops are expected to provide (and expect to get in return) detailed critiques of their work, including feedback on character and world building, technical help, line edits in some cases, and analysis. While it seems hard work, it also appears that one can get a lot back from a community of this sort.

Finally, a word about privacy. While members agree to abide by the confidentiality rules of the communities and respect other people’s work, remember that you are submitting at your own risk.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, this a new Web template for download, created in honour of a friend’s birthday. Download it here. The usual conditions apply, which are: do what you want with it, but I’d really appreciate it if you left the credits intact.

Certain design compromises had to be made to make it render correctly on certain browsers, but there were no known bugs at the time of release. If you find any problems, do let me know.

Meanwhile, enjoy Hey Kitty!, and let’s hope the designs keep flowing.

~PD

Take the latest one to make its way into my inbox. I wasn’t particularly surprised to find a mail from an eminent Indian historian with the subject line “Very Urgent”. Having worked with him in the past, I just assumed he was contacting me for work. My hopes were dashed, though, for this is what the mail said (original punctuation retained for added entertainment!):

Please, i am in a Critical situation right now which i will need your urgent response.Actually, I had an urgent trip to United Kingdom but unfortunately for me Armed Robbers attacked the hotel i lodged and all my money and some of my luggages was stolen .I had been so restless and hopeless because i have been without any money. All the Hotel telephone lines here got disconnected by the robbers and they are still trying to get them fixed so i only have access to emails, my mobile can’t work here so i didn’t bother to bring it.All i want you to do is to help me with some money,please kindly send me 1450 pounds, so i could pay my hotel bills and return home.I would refund it immediately i get home,please help me send it through Western Union Money Transfer because it is the fastest and safest way i can receive it.

Send it with my name and the address of the hotel below:

NAME: [...]
ADDRESS: [...]
CITY: Middlesex
COUNTRY: UK
ZIP CODE: TW2 7QT

I will be waiting for your help soon,i will really appreciate your quick response.

cheers
[...]

~PD

Jan 003 has been lovingly hand-coded and it has been tested on Firefox, Opera and Safari (on Mac OS), and IE8 and IE7 (on IE NetRenderer). Which means I haven’t actually seen in it on Windows yet. Thus, if anyone finds any niggles and bugs, please let me know.

In the public domain, Jan 003 is yours to do with as you wish, though a credit line or link back will always be appreciated. Download it here.

~PD

Personally, the ability to pay bills online is the one aspect I am particularly grateful for. Gone are the days of standing in unending queues and grappling with surly employees trying to pay your electricity or telephone bill month after month after month. The other convenience is registering change of address. For nomads like me who are compelled to change residence every few years, this becomes a massive project. From the bank to the credit card company to the telephone company to the Internet service provider… A few years ago it involved running all over the city, but now, all you need is an Internet connection or a phone.

In the wake of all this, however, one institution has remained blissfully inefficient: BSNL. The Bangalore Telecom website is itself a horror in design, but otherwise looks fairly innocuous. Till, that is, one tries to do anything half useful.

In possession of a wireless EVDO Internet connection, I have tried in vain to find one scrap of information on it on their website. There also appears to be no central helpline for EVDO subscribers, and one usually gets kicked around from number to number to find someone who can put together a coherent answer. (A better option is to use one of the unofficial sites.) Six months after shifting residence I have yet to have my billing address changed. It requires one to present oneself at a particular telephone exchange, armed with a letter asking for an address change. As to where exactly one has to go… the helplines seem rather vague about it and unable to provide a full address. (The funny thing is is, even my bank and credit card company accept a change of address over the phone.)

Thankfully, it doesn’t make a difference at the end of the day as I can automate the bill payment via my bank account or credit card. I can also view my bill on the BSNL site, though I cannot have it e-mailed to me because, it tells me, “You have no number in your profile.” Erm… oo-kay.

Finally, guess what happens if you forget your password to your online billing area? I quote:

Approach nearest BSNL’s customer service centre with a letter signed by the owner of the phone, giving details of your phone like phone number, consumer number, user name etc.

Tell me: laugh or cry?

~PD