Activists as Entrepreneurs: Boot Strapping to Fund Raising

Activists are pejoratively called ‘professional dissenters’, who do not create ‘value’ by the business community at large. In fact, to invert the lens, they are intellectual entrepreneurs who are bringing their thoughts to life. An idea is undergirded by tangible resources to last a while. Activists are traditional organizations in a very corporate sense. The bottom line lies somewhere else, only the quarterly reporting format differs. Ask any fundraising manager for a non-profit the reality and he would be speaking the same lexicon as a corporate manager. Boot-strapping for scaling is the forte of an activist, working on scant resources, long before the term became cool in contemporary literature. Hiring the correct talent becomes as headache as cash is often in short supply unless it is an INGO such as the International Rescue Committee which can hire David Miliband as its CEO. There is no Series A Funding round for an activist, as the funding rounds are perennial.

All social movements need resources and are limited by the same variables which start-ups are limited. Non-profits need war rooms to coordinate efforts for large scale projects. ‘Blitz scaling’ as coined by Venture Capitalist Reid Hoffmann (HBR April 2016) is performed out by mobilizing the common spirit of the times. #FeeltheBern or the Sanders presidential campaign is classic example of reaching out to small donors and scaling a movement. A performing social movement like a political campaign for elected office, serves a purpose. Activism such as selling a product is also selling an idea. The idea becomes the basis of the product cycle. The campaign for the food security legislation in India took decades to be written in to law, but the ground work intellectually started many years back by activists such as Aruna Roy, Jean Dreaze and Amartya Sen.

Activism needs the same skill set as an entrepreneur as the buy in is needed. The product being a normative idea makes it a very challenging sell in comparison to a FMCG product. Let us have the humility and listen to these struggles as lessons to learn.

Note on Writing

Writing is very personal act for me. I let the stories stir me before I write them. It’s self expression, activism and performance all rolled into one bundle. There are inequities to be called out, inspiring tales to be narrated and conversations that need to be captured. Independent , fearless writing unlocks an energy which is catalytic. I shall write these tales of social change. ‪#‎writing‬

Why Mr Pai is Wrong?

The JNU+FTII+HCU episode is an attempt to reduce students as ’employees’ and ‘consumers’ and not nurture citizens who should understand and aspire for a better polity. Anyone with activist leanings is labelled as ‘non-employable’ borrowing from Mr Ratan Tata as his/her spirit needs to be subjugated to the majoratarian narrative in order to work. The contrarian spirit is essential for innovation. Make in India needs ‘ignited minds’ in the words of late President APJ Abdul Kalam.

This sentiment connects with the entirely bogus conversation on liberal arts majors being not market worthy and wasting taxpayer rupees/dollars. In the words of Mr Mohandas Pai in a NDTV article, activist students waste money and the subsidies are for education. According to Mr Pai students are supposed to treat their opportunity at JNU as a social elevator and train themselves to be call centre workers. Tax payer cash is not only the perogative of supposedly more productive STEM majors, who will be ‘Bangalored’ for fulfilling headcount for North American IT Outsourcing Project.

The average student at JNU would not be able to pay the fees at Manipal Education which he is chairman at. Kanhaiya, an aaganwadi workers son, was reading his PhD as Umar. JNU is very competitive to enter, and fortunately not the same as Manipal and as competitive as an IIT/IIM. Mr Ratan Tata, as per his logic should shut down TISS, one of the best social science institutions that bears the Tata brand. The positive from this episode is raised conciousness regarding nationalism and identity.

Questioning the status quo for the better is nationalism.

‪#‎Vemula‬ ‪#‎JNU‬

The Subtle Politics of Migration

Imperial conquests by the European countries especially Great Britain left an indelible imprint on the Asian Subcontinent. Bengal was the first territory won by the British in 1757 at the Battle of Plassey, almost a century prior to the mutiny. Millions perished in the 1943 Bengal Famine while food grains were diverted to the front lines in Europe during the war.

Post Colonial histories are different in the sense the theaters of suffering have shifted. Post independence countries of the Asian Subcontinent did not meet the aspirations of their populace, with the noted exception of Singapore which is an economic miracle.

Countries such as Bangladesh which won its independence in 1971 is a major manpower exporter along with Philippines, Indonesia and Nepal in this region. Migration at any cost occurs due to economic despair. The burning hunger to provide for the family drives the migrant to sell precious assets to render the economic cost of migration.

The migrant arrives in his host country with hopes and dreams, often to be shattered due the unfair information asymmetry between him and the recruiting ecosystem. The exploitation begins from his village, often perpetrated by his family friend or distant relative. The migrant is at the bottom rung of the social hierarchy in the host country. He is the ‘Subaltern’ in this context.

He was not born a worker, as his family is capable to pay his migration cost. He took on hard labor oriented work as he wanted to earn his daily bread. He can write, sing, act and draw as he is a talent like any other. The local activist sees him as resource for the ’cause’. His muted voice is co-opted in global advocacy themes. He does not understand the issue as his language skills are a barrier.

The academic converts his story into a case study and artiste groups are interested in performances which have an exotic element.

But where is the migrant in all these contexts? After all, He is the migrant who ‘can’t speak’ in a Spivakian vain.

Writing as a mode of Activism: Do the structures listen?

“I will tell you this, I may be dead, but my ideas will surely not die.”

– Saro-Wiwa, Ogoni-Nigerian Writer speaking to the tribunal that sent him to the gallows

I grew up in the milieu of post liberalization middle class India and the diaspora in the Gulf resembling a similar socio-economic sentiment, which held the socialist ideals in great contempt as the economic ideals then were of the emerging Asian Tigers. The downfall of Calcutta from an industrial powerhouse to a pale former shadow, due to the policies of Left Activism such as ‘Hartals’ (Public Strikes) and a poor work culture; framed activism, and speaking for the margins pretty passé. I grew up in a household filled with Marx and Engels and ‘Das Capital’ being a prominent feature in our house library in Navi Mumbai. We did not have fancy couture furniture, but we surely had Marx.

Activism was framed in the 1990’s Star News and India Today fed discourse as a relic of pasts economic sins. Activism was the forte of the chic ‘jholawala’ the well-heeled latte drinking intellectual usually a product of the famed Jawaharlal Nehru University, Presidency or a Tata Institute of Social Sciences with an Oxbridge or Ivy League degree. The other extreme was the grassroots activist working in the rural hinterland in India, with demonstrable sympathies towards the left. This was ‘India Unbound’ in the words of Philosopher-CEO Gurcharan Das, as the IT/Engineering Major-MBA combo educated urbane Indian was out to seek his pot of gold (Humanities Majors in India simply do not make the mention even). The Infosys-HCL success story was shamelessly circulated a number of times.

The poor, marginalised Indian was not sexy enough for primetime news. ‘India Shining’ failure ushered in Left supported socialist politics of the Congress for a decade. More than secular progressive politics, graft and slow development dominated the discourse. It was known as the ‘missed decade’ by the TV Studio commentators. This was the decade that supposedly would have brought India in touching distance of China. We had a ‘Harvard Man’ in office, in the words of the most influential global justice activist and writer of our generation Arundhati Roy. Yet, unbridled greed filled orgy of graft derailed a government which had some good social welfare programs on ground such as MNREGA and Public Health initiatives which this Modi regime is dismantling in favour of private sector involvement, as Dalal Street dons wield influence rather than the aganwadi worker in rural Ratnagiri. Activists of all color as represented by the corporate media as road blocks towards the utopia of late capitalism. People displaced and killed by riots or by mega projects are simply footnotes in a report, gathering dust in a ‘sarkari’ office.

No one will scream ‘The Nation Wants to Know’ for the invisible Indian who cannot buy a share for a blue chip. Activism is not aspirational, the 42 inch flat screen TV in the living room is.

******

Activism and writing are connected with the common bond of language. The limitations of language is the limits of our imagination in the words of Wittgenstein.

The English educated elite dominate structures of power. I am one of them. English is not a language in India, but a ‘Class’. English has the appeal of connecting the average middle class Indian to the global circuit of capitalism. The IIT’s and IIM’s have their content taught in English and not in the vernacular languages. English bequeathed by our former colonial masters, has helped the South Asian diaspora to be enormously successful. We have had a rich literary tradition of Indian writing in English. Chetan Bhagat, the enormously commercial writer in English, has brought ‘Ingris’ to the first generated educated in India. He has democratized reading in English to the masses, however pop culture it might be.

But, the chasm between India and ‘Bharat’ is accentuated by the access to the English Language as well. English perpetuates an elitism driven by language, and removes the Lutyens Delhi elite from the conversation on the ground in Satara or Purulia. There is a positive in knowing English as it gives the writer the access to engage the world.

How many vernacular translations do we read?

English has enabled us to converse with global commercial and political elite and sometimes challenge them. Access to the language has been us the cultural resources to challenge dominant thought processes of the times. Aruna Roy, Yogendra Yadav, Harsh Mander and Medha Patkar all speak in English to engage with the wider world with the stories of struggle and resistance and build solidarity with the movements of the global south. Many an underground Naxalite leader has been known to be well-versed in English. Power is reinforced and circulated through the language, and writers have used this weapon to challenge the present, in the hope of a better future.

Does the knowledge of English alienate the urban Indian from having the consciousness of the marginalised?

Lobbying for social change, unfortunately needs the lexicon of resistance, and English is unfortunately the Lingua Franca for achieving this end. Ambedkar encouraged his followers to learn English as a tool to beat caste oppression. The language of the ruling class is not oppressive and emancipatory at the same time as it depends on the context. The subaltern who are erased from the mainstream discourse, often are erased due to the inability of communicating in the language of power. Writers although guilty of the ‘politics of representation’ in text, lend a voice to the silenced and this is the essence of activism; speaking up when all others are muted.

*******

Writing as a form of activism enables the helpless soul to speak to the structures of power, even if it does not listen. Rob Nixon in his seminal environmental justice work ‘Slow Violence’ writes

“In one of his final letters from detention, Saro-Wiwa assured his friend, the novelist William Boyd: “There’s no doubt that my idea will succeed in time, but I’ll have to bear the pain of the moment. . . . the most important thing for me is that I’ve used my talents as a writer to enable the Ogoni people to confront their tormentors. I was not able to do it as a politician or a businessman. My writing did it. . . . I think I have the moral victory.” “

Saro-Wiwa used his writing as a strategic tool to voice out the oppression that his Ogoni micro minority faced in the oil rich delta region in Nigeria. The oppressors were the state and multinational companies in his words. He faced the gallows as he used his writing as a tool for activism. The gallows did not silence his ideas of fermenting resistance. Silencing a writers voice, amplifies his message, and this creates the resistance he ultimately wishes to generate against the military dictatorship and the transnational oil corporation bed fellows, which have laid the delta region polluted and bereft of its natural ecosystem. Saro-Wiwa utilized his writing to force the structures to listen to him. Activism needed guts, which he had in ample measure. His death brought the focus on the oppression, which was the ultimate oppression in it itself.

His writing succeeded. Arundhati Roy in our times speaks against the ‘Upper Caste Hindu Corporate State’ that is India and sometimes speaks to Ed Snowden in Moscow regarding the Anti Imperialism Project, which she has so successfully written and spoken earlier. Her voice brings the global lens on anti-minority and anti-poor projects in India in a space where it is a rare flicker of hope.

Writing becomes impactful with guts. Activism is all about guts and intellect, hence writing and activism are good bed fellows.

Conversations with Cabbies: Social Policy Insights

Cabbies or Auto rickshaw drivers from Mumbai to Singapore are the most politically aware and erudite socio-political commentators that one can find as they truly have their ears to the heartbeat of the communities they drive in and unfortunately they are the most undervalued group in the urban ecosystem.

The point of contact/interface between infrastructure and transport policy, local law and order and the community, the entrepreneurial cabbie is a business on wheels. The chatty cabbie is usually interested in a good conversation and passing on his contact details (old school business development ) at least in India and the Gulf, in order to source for a long term ‘Bhada’ or a ride-rent in Mumbai Taxi wala lingo so that he does not have to seek out the retail costumer.

The well informed cabbie with tabs on the pulse on the ground is usually the person with the accurate grapevine regarding illicit activities, election trends or everyday activities in an area. I wonder sometimes, why does not the transport and urban planners of the world, not elicit feedback from these smart men regarding traffic density and other cues while designing, evaluating and planning urban infrastructure. Well, they are a tribe that are highly adaptable as any transport policy change and business model disruption (Think Uber and Radio Cabs) impacts these folks the hardest. The radio cabs have crippled the traditional Black and Yellow Cab (the legendary Kala-Peela) service that is unionized to a former shadow of past, a past where they ruled the roads of Mumbai. Or maybe the Mumbai Taxi wala did not change to the wind of the times. The newer radio cabs are more comfortable than the older ones.

About two years back, I had written two inspiring conversations with two cabbies and one auto rickshaw driver in Mumbai, regarding developmental politics and education as a social elevator. One of the Taxi Uncles I interviewed had a son who went to IIT Kanpur and then IIM Ahmedabad, and ran a private cab service, in addition to driving one himself.

Entrepreneurial cabbies cab earn more than hand to mouth as one Taxi Uncle in Singapore quipped because of the various peak hour, midnight and city area surcharges, but for that a cabbie has to drive for twelve to fourteen hours a day. Older cabbies can’t earn that much as it does not physically permit them to drive that long hours. In Singapore, driving a cab is often a post retirement job (or when you are out of work to pay the bills), and it takes time for the Uncle to learn the ropes, as I recently met a Taxi Uncle who retired a few months back. Recently, a wise 62 year old ex-business owner Taxi Uncle a few days back discussed Singaporean resilience over the next 50 years in the ride back to Clementi from the central part of the island city:

“Singapore money very strong; Hospitals also run like company. All Indonesian Chinese go to Mount Elizabeth Hospital. Got lot of money. Mount Elizabeth Hospital aka MEH is also called the ‘Most Expensive Hospital’. Singapore General Hospital or Super Good Hospital and Tan Tock Seng Hospital as ‘Ticket to Heaven’ Hospital.”

The cost of Healthcare and Living is an undercurrent in the conversations here. A lot of educated folks drive cabs in both cities, which give an insight in to the kind of elitism which excludes people from white collared work. A similar emotion is articulated even in Mumbai. Human experiences have a universal connect concerning survival and aspirations. The same socio-economic strata often migrate overseas to do blue collared labour in the Middle East and South East Asia. A fortunate few drive cabs in Dubai and New York, if they can find visa sponsorship.

I have had the most interesting conversations about the September 11^th Singapore Elections with Taxi Uncles. I am always asked where I am from and what do I do here, and do I plan to settle down here. An important concern of the times we reside in, I understand.

Someone should do an ethnographic study of the taxi driver community. It will surely lead to some interesting insights. I love the music they play in the cab. Once a taxi driver Punjabi aunty was playing the latest Bollywood tracks, and I felt emotionally transported as if I was in Delhi.

With the era of driverless cars dawning in the next few years, will a huge swathe of people already disenfranchised by the service economy lose their jobs? A point to ponder upon indeed.

Mobile, Mustafa and the Migrant in Singapore: Side-notes from the Globalization Narrative

It was a crowded Sunday evening (as usual) in Singapore’s Little India area at one of the major bus stops perpendicular to the iconic Mustafa Centre on Syed Alwi Lane, the retail cathedral of the South Asian Migrant, which is also an organizing node for social interactions on the weekly off for the migrant worker. Evening was receding into the night, the bus stop was getting crowded by the minute with migrant workers from Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh in India and Bangladesh as the sense that their precious Sunday has flown away and the early morning commute on Monday morning dawning on them. The motley cacophony of these different linguistic sounds define the ethos of the area, and which without any doubt is very South Asian. It is a lively part of the city, which may be too lively for my Singaporean friends who try to avoid the area on weekends due to the crowd and some taxi uncles have often complained to me regarding the sheer disregard that the migrants have of traffic regulations as the crowd often spills on the street. One taxi uncle of Indian decent once quipped: “This is not India, in Singapore you have to follow rules”. May be the impact of the Little India Riots a few years back is still fresh in the consciousness of people and hence there are (recently imposed) restrictions on drinking liquor across the Little India area in Singapore on weekends after a certain time in the evening in the interests of maintaining public order.

These hundreds of thousands of migrant workers build and maintain Singapore’s global infrastructure such as the Marina Bay Sands, Public Housing Estates, Hospitals and Universities. But these workers stay far away from the city centre where they live in dormitories on the outskirts of the city-state near the Malaysia border. These dormitories are on the lines of integrated, self-contained townships some with even a cinema hall, screening South Asian Films at a subsidized cost. Not all the dormitories are that fancy though, with cramped accommodation being a defining characteristic. But, the Sunday ritual of traveling to the Little India area for the South Asian Migrant is a sacrosanct affair, and no matter the distance and the time required, the migrant will make it the Little India area to catch up with friends and buy their weekly provisions. It takes almost two hours one way on public transport to reach the Little India area from Tuas Industrial area on the fringes where the dormitories are located.

I really enjoy the atmospherics and the cultural milieu of spending Sunday in the alleys of Little India perching my self next to Khana Basmati, a prominent Bangladeshi Restaurant frequented by migrants, as I observe deep fried and oily snacks (Bhajiyya in Hindi or Tele Bhaja in Bengali) being sold as hot cakes. The fried snacks however brutally unhealthy are lukewarm but remind me of street food in Mumbai/Kolkata. Hence, on a Sunday late evening a crowd of workers converged on the bus stop.

The Bus number 66 came; I was pushed and shoved without any regard for the orderly etiquette of the queue in Singapore, which reminded me of my days in a bus stop in South Asia certainly. The workers probably were panicking to grab a seat on the bus, as their journey back to the dormitory would take a while. The bus was theoretically a spacious, double decker one, but with hardly space to breathe, let alone breathe. In this rather limited space, my South Indian looking neighbor took out his android phone and started reading the news on Dina Malar website, a prominent Tamil News Paper in India. Within my eyesight as well, I saw a Bangladeshi man reading news on Prothom Alo Online, the premier Bengali Language Daily in Dhaka. I saw a few others too reading news on the phone during my thirty-minute bus ride with my South Asian compatriots. The migrant keeps in touch with the daily developments in his home country due the smart phone and the reasonably priced high-speed 4G data connectivity in Singapore. Almost every migrant carries a smart phone now a days, resonating with the actions of Syrian refugees in Europe who will hold on to their smart phones at any cost, as it is their last connection to their old lives.

Migration is a development resulting out of poor employment opportunities in their home markets and slightly better pay in manpower importing countries such as Singapore. The feeling on being connected with their families on Skype on their phones (such as one I saw on the bus) or reading the news of their native districts back home, surely make the burden of being a migrant more bearable. I am a second-generation economic migrant with my wife in India and parents in Oman, and do understand the sentiment very well.

An Artsy Sunday Afternoon

Today was an usual Sunday Afternoon. I woke up late, grabbed lunch at my local kopitiam mamak stall out of sheer hunger having skipped dinner last evening. The lunch plate is modelled on the banana leaf, on which ‘Sapaad’ or the lunch spread is served upon in southern India. The plate however, was a melamine one, and the fish curry and the fried fish was bleeding colourful. The gravy was on the rice, just as I like it. The fried papad was crunchy.

The Anna or elder brother (as i address him) who runs the Indian Muslim Mamak stall at the Block near to where I reside at Sunset Way, was over keen and served an additional portion of chicken which was not needed honestly. I had this meal with my favourite ginger tea and the Sunday Straits Times, eagerly checking whether I missed any story online, which is there in print.

After a late lunch, i took a cab to avoid the heat to Little India to a space which doubles up as the office of the only Bengali Newspaper in Singapore; Banglar Kantha and the Cultural Space for Migrants- Dibashram, which translates roughly translates to as the day shelter for migrants. The Editor in Chief of the Newspaper Mr. AKM Mohsin, is a community pioneer, leading many cultural initiatives for the Bangladeshi Migrant Worker Community in Singapore.

So, i walked up to his office located at a strategic intersection on Rowell Road in Little India area, located above a popular Indian Restaurant where I drink tea whenever I drop by this area. Mr. Mohsin had not arrived yet, so i wait for him while a couple of migrant workers play the harmonium and sing folk music loudly, all while i read Amit Chaudhuri’s ‘Calcutta’. Quite a combination and a prelude to the latter half of the day.

Mr. Mohsin walks in with Mr. Dewan Mizan, an art teacher and performing artist from Dhaka visiting the region on an exhibition tour. The artiste and a couple of 12004150_10207133714128919_7409693190157143696_n others huddle up as they put together an exhibition of his sketches. The windows of the space converted in to an impromptu art gallery looked unique in a sultry afternoon

The plan was to perform art while a small skit was being performed by Bangladeshi Poets touching upon pressing issues faced by the Bangladeshi migrant. The Poets, enacted the skit in flesh and blood, with the flair of a professional, hardly revealing that they are battle hardened construction site engineers to boot. The emotional flair of oratory indicates a duality, typical of the migrant, who straddles multiple existences with ease.

It was surreal to experience the power of art, transform the ambience in an instant and bring out everyday issues in a silence shattering way.This initiative by Mr. Mohsin and Banglar Kantha/Bangladesh Centre Singapore/Dibashram is to be applauded as the event indeed was special.

I was on the introductory panel for the exhibition opening, explaining to the non Bengali speaking visitors in English. I believe though art transcends language, and the friends who did not understand Bangla, understood the vibe if not the precise content matter of the conversations.

Globalization has many downsides, but the confluence of migration narratives in an art form, certainly made my Sunday afternoon richer.

Conversations at Thirty Six Thousand Feet

Last weekend i flew to Kolkata for a break. It was a not very usual Friday evening and I was really charged up as I was meeting a real special person and compounded by the fact that I had not taken a break in a year’s time. It was a comfortable emergency exit seat with adequate leg room in a tidy Singapore Airlines flight. The pre-recorded Bengali announcement was in ‘sadhu basha’ or Victorian era Bengali which drew a smirk from NRI type Calcutta bongs who are more used to watching urbane ‘antel’ Srijit or Anjan Dutt cinema.

I thought that the almost four hour flight from Singapore to Kolkata would be an endless eager and excited journey in anticipation, which it anyway was. I had a few flutters in my stomach after a rather crazy week. But it was pleasantly punctuated with an abrupt focus group discussion, which organically started with my immediate next door neighbor across the not so wide aisle asking me ‘It is an interesting book’?’ (I had picked up a super pricey , but uber cool Monocle Good Business Guide at the Duty Free Book Shop). Then a brief conversation started off from what we do for a living and we figured out that I am a full-time Policy Researcher and the gentleman was a top shot IT Honcho who studied Aerospace Engineering at IIT Kharagpur but had worked in IT since the late 1990’s in India, Singapore, Thailand and the United States in core Information Technology. He had worked on building and re-building tech delivery platforms of ObamaCare and he recollected the painful ordeal of fixing a messed up system. As he was presently working at a financial services major now, he said that the challenge is not there but he has a semblance of a work-life balance. Yup, he traded in the fun for a happier wife.

The IT honchos window seat neighbor was a sustainability architect working on building smart cities in India based at a premier urban planning firm. He also happened to be from my same alma mater at graduate school. The chilled out dude was heading out to Kolkata to get engaged to his long time partner. The fact that she studied at a local school in India and logged on a 2x salary compared to him as she is aha! again in Fintech, seemed to be a point of concern (Indian men will be Indian men).

The conversation revolved around from how there is no proper Healthcare access for the Middle America to how Decision Science is all about predictive analytic and that current day programming is about optimization of the equation influencing the curve, and doing manual calculations faster. Machine Learning, Public Health and Energy Efficient Buildings over Jim Beam and Red Label with diet coke and ginger ale at 40k feet proved that Bengalis can have ‘adda’ or a discussion; anywhere and anytime.

The IT Guy shared some real words of leadership wisdom with the two of us. He told us that focusing on what the organization needs, will help us to grow better rather than obsessing over details. Corporate leaders grow by focusing on priorities and making money is not bad, were real take aways from the discussion.

The icing to this rather splendid discussion was rather dashing Delhi based Air Stewardess in a smashing Serong Kebaya who joined us (with a particular interest in exploring what was I reading) and discussed Farhan and Zoya Akhtar films , writing and good reads for a good 25 minutes before landing in Kolkata. I am not very used to attention from Air Stewardesses although I have been a frequent flier as a consultant for many years.

Human beings have an innate need to talk and if the conversations are as cool as this, the better it is. Of course, an expensive full service airline ticket would not ensure this peculiar experience all the time.