Photojournale Network Community

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In August of 2010, Bangalore witnessed the tragic death of over 40 inmates at the “Beggar’s Home” on Magadi Road. The home was overcrowded with an estimated 2500 inmates squeezed into infrastructure that was meant to accommodate about 500 people. Reports indicate that contaminated food served (ironically) on Independence Day, triggered the incident. Five months later and the Beggar’s Home has been sanitised. The number of inmates is somewhere in the vicinity of 300. The walls are freshly painted, the floors look clean but there still remains a vacant stare in the eyes of the inmates.

The incident in August turned the spotlight onto the issue of how the state is criminalising poverty. The Karnataka Prohibition Of Beggary Act, 1975[1] makes begging a crime. What’s written between the lines of the act is that poverty is a crime, particularly if you are in state of absolute poverty. The sentence for the crime of poverty is custodialisation (read as jail sentence). There is a process laid out in the law to make the arrest and pass sentence. In actual practice the process is followed superficially. Most inmates can’t defend themselves either because they can’t speak the language or do not understand what is happening to them. For example, there are innumerable cases of people having been picked for “looking poor”.

Inmates that the journalist met and spoke to come not only from parts of rural Karnataka but also from areas such as Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odissa, Bihar, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. There is a common thread of destitution and poverty in their journey lines. It’s not laziness that they are being punished for, it’s their poverty. Many of these inmates are mentally challenged and are being pushed over the brink by the process of custodialisation and being jailed like a criminal. What they need is a facilitative health care program and not a jail sentence.

There is an urgent need to stop incarcerating people only because they are poor and in a state of destitution. Proscriptive Laws that criminalise poverty need to be replaced by voluntary and rehabilitative policies that empower people out of poverty. We need to look deeper at complex root causes such as inequitable economic models and historical oppression through the caste system.

If we breed poverty, we have to deal with – not hide it in a jail cell. The aesthetic sensibilities of “shining India” can not come at the cost of somebody else’s right to freedom and dignity.

This photo essay is shot on the streets of Bangalore and during two visits to the Beggar’s Home in Decemeber 2010 and January 2011.

Please note: There are no portraits in this essay. The reasoning is that since these people are already being traumatized by society and have no particular identity, wrongly giving them an identity would harm their dignity and go against the principles of the project at this point in time.

[1]The Karnataka Prohibition Of Beggary Act, 1975

Biography

Ayush’s influence in photography took birth at a very young age. He grew up feeding his eyes on images from magazines like the National Geographic, Reader’s Digest, Time, Life and others, in which every picture was a story in itself. Not knowing the full impact that the pictures would have, was a boon in itself. It saved him from going through the intricacies of the “opinion” of judging one against the other. Everything was up for grabs.
On a holiday with his family in 1993, shooting on film on a Kodak K10, he took pictures of two things, among many, monkeys along Pushkar lake and the Humayun’s Tomb in Delhi. But it was not the pictures themselves that made the impact on him. It was the sheer thrill of the lingering excitement of seeing the final result on print and the feeling of reliving that moment in his mind and heart. The light, sounds, scents of something that’s history, and a very personal one. To him, photography is something that is private. His individuality is derived from it and his photographs in turn are consequential of this. He believes that any form of art has a very important role to play in fostering a sense of understanding between people in a very direct and unadulterated manner. And photography to him, is the most immediate.

• Freelancing since 2002
• August 2007 to June 2009 – Lecturer in Photography and Digital Imaging at National Institute of Creative Communication (NICC), Bangalore.

Key Projects and Assignments

• Coverage of the Tsunami in coastal Tamil Nadu [2004]
• “Pictures that speak” for the Dalit Foundation. Created a photo-library on Dalit movements, occupations and customs. [2005]
• “Born with Cerebral Palsy” – A project on the lives of children affected by cerebral palsy. [2008]
• ‘Bangalore Bar Culture’ – A small photographic narrative on Bangalore’s age old under belly, the local bars. [2009]
• “Namma Metro” A photo essay on the impact of the Metro Rail construction project in Bangalore (unpublished). [2010]
• Compiling a photo essay for PUCL, (People’s Union of Civil Liberties), about Bangalore ‘Beggar’s Home’ to raise awareness on the need to decriminalize poverty. [Phase I completed in 2010]
• Multiple editorial assignments for Femina magazine. [2002 – 2010]

Exhibitions

• “Unforgettable – The First Pictures” was held in 2003 in Bangalore.
• A participant in a group exhibition sponsored by Bangalore Rotary Club in 2004

Recognition

2007 ‘Honorable Mention’ at the first ever PX3 Prix De La Photographie competition, Paris, for the series on the Tsunami disaster of Dec 2004.

2008 ‘Honorable Mention’ at the PX3 Prix De La Photographie competition, Paris, for the series on the Pushkar Fair, Rajasthan.

2009 Was one of the top ten short-listed photographers of the Redux Scholarship for the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop, Manali, India.

Ayush Ranka

Don’t Breathe | Inside the un reserved general compartments of Indian Railways

The apparition of these faces in the crowd,
Petals on a wet, black bough -In a Station of the Metro.

Unforgettable as an expression of a poetic experience of the highest order. The inexorable spell of these two lines by Ezra Pound weighs upon me whenever I catch sight of a typically Indian scene crammed with people. The lines recycle themselves into visuals as I scratch around for the right frame to showcase my perception of the Indian reality. Particularly when my camera chances upon the mess one finds so frequently in the unreserved general compartments of a railway carriage.

It is needless to remind ourselves that the lines have nothing characteristically Indian about them. Ostensibly, though, they depict the crowd in a station of the Metro. The pen-picture of the ‘ Petals on a wet, black bough’ speaks clearly of a different clime. ‘ The apparition of these faces in the crowd’ of the first line, on the other hand, keeps haunting you even as you try to escape.

Travel the length of the country. Board a train, thrust your way through the crowd to some messy corner of a general compartment and you start loosing your identity. One can safely predict a traumatic journey to the destination of absolute facelessness.

What the series seeks to capture is the chaos of a sick, thick throng gasping of air. It takes you straight into the heart of the muddle and the mess. It makes you listen to the muffled voice of individuality.

Ruthlessly robbed of your right to breathe, you are already there, sharing with the hapless masses the unbearable tightness of being—bearing with them the full burden of an inescapable Indian experience.

Ronny Sen

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Durga Puja, the most happening festival in West Bengal and especially in Kolkata, can be sensed with its spurt of fanfare on all the five days of the Durga Puja festival. The city of Kolkata enlivens during the five days of Durga Puja, starting from the day of Bodhon on Maha-Shashti (6^th day) and ending up with the immersion of clay idols in the river Ganges on the evening of Dashami (10^th day). This autumnal festival popularly known as Sharodotsav, recalls the power of female Shakti symbolized by the Goddess Durga who slays Mahishasura (Demon) to re-establish peace and sanctity on earth again. Bengalis all over the world during these days of Durga Puja rejoice to their heart’s content reconnecting with friends and relatives. The famous community Pujas of Kolkata began celebrating Durga Puja since the beginning or the middle of the 20th century and have since been applauded for their creative themes and exquisite skill. The five festive Puja days are spent welcoming Goddess Durga.

Sashti, the sixth lunar day when Goddess Durga is welcomed with much fanfare and gusto. ‘Bodhon’ is a ritual when Goddess Durga is unveiled.

Saptami features the first day of Durga Puja; commencement of rituals; predawn bathing of ‘ Kola Bou‘.

Ashtami the most important day of Durga Puja celebrates Durga’s victory over Mahishasur. Devotees recite the mantras and offer flowers to Devi Durga and pray for her blessings. Durga Chalisa are a set of 40 mantras in four quartets sung in the praise of Goddess Durga. Rituals of animal sacrifices are now substituted with pumpkin, cucumber or  banana.

Nabami commences with ‘ Sandhi Puja ‘, an integral and important part of Durga Puja. It is performed at the juncture of the 8th and 9th lunar day. Sandhi puja lasts from the last 24 minutes of Ashtami till the first 24 minutes of Nabami. During this juncture  (the “Sandhikhan“), Durga is worshipped in her Chamunda form. Devi Durga killed, Chando and Mundo, the two demons at “Sandhikhan” and thus acquired the name of “Chamunda”. Goddess Durga is offered food which is later distributed among the devotees.
Dashami is the day when Goddess Durga accompanied by her children sets out for Kailash, her husband’s abode. With a heavy heart the Bengalis immerse the clay idol of Durga in the sacred Ganges bidding her goodbye and earnestly waiting to see her again the next year. “Sindur Khela” is a major event of Dashami. Married women apply vermillion to each other and greet each other with sweets. It is in the evening when Goddess Durga is immersed.

Durga Puja is a festival is more of a socio-cultural celebration that tends to renew kinship with friends and relatives

A short Bio

Jayati Saha(1968, Kolkata), a senior partner in a law firm, is a self taught photographer based out of Kolkata, India. She specializes in portraits but has interests in photojournalism also. Her work has been widely appreciated in various group exhibitions including those at the Academy of Fine Arts, Kolkata, India and has been used as tutorial material.  Jayati’s first solo exhibition is scheduled in December, 2010 at the Indian Council of Cultural Relations.