Sometimes lost. I think freedom and dignity enables us to really go beyond in our political imaginationbeyond just electoral politics. Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India: Vijayan The credit goes to my agent Lucy Cleland who suggested this title. It is the fragility of human lives that remains at the very center of the book. A: This geopolitical violence is not new, theres a long bloody, brutal history to thisa cyclical, ongoing and never-ending history. They are also essentially bureaucratic, judicial, and procedural acts of terror. Not everyone lived to see its promises. While Nehru was still declaring this victory, the slaughter began. In Midnight's Borders (Westland Publications, 2021), author and photographer Suchitra Vijayan travels the 9,000 miles of India's borders to understand what Partition did to individual lives and . Perhaps thats their victory. The Indian government bears some responsibility for this: Amid this brinkmanship between the two nuclear powers, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not address the nation directly. Chopra is popular because she satisfies a certain need for validationthe trope of brown representation where the mere act of being represented is seen as a singular virtue worth applauding. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. And what does this mean for on-ground communities, governments, armed forces, and other institutional stakeholders? ""The historical unity of the ruling classes is realized in the state." Antonio Gramsci" Could you comment on how much our present border security policies have changed in the last few years? Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, GQ, The Boston Review, The Hindu, and Foreign Policy, and she has appeared on NBC news. Suchitra Vijayan on Twitter: ""The historical unity of the ruling This is where I believe literary nonfiction becomes a powerful tool. She was part of a music band at PSG. A Barrister by training, she previously worked for the United Nations war crimes tribunals in Yugoslavia and Rwanda before co-founding the Resettlement Legal Aid Project in Cairo, which gives legal aid to . Midnight's Borders by Suchitra Vijayan - The Bangalore Review Invariably its the writer who is the protagonist. Vijayan: Let me start heregood writing is powerful and political. Q: You had to deal with a lot of ethical considerations as a writer and photographer, which echo throughout your and your fellow journalists work, as evaluated in your book. Now imagine how it would be for someone from a Dalit/Bahujan, Muslim, Adivasi, or working community to try to make inroads. In her15,000-kilometre journey, spread over seven years, Vijayan mulls over the meaning of freedom, belongingness in a land of imagined communities, created by territorial demarcations. We no longer ask if this will lead to a better society, if it will benefit the vast majority of those farthest away from power. Suchitra Vijayan, Newspapers in a Kashmiri home In August 2014 I travelled to the border town of Uri while researching my upcoming book, Borderlands. She was part of a music band at PSG. This is a tightrope that you walk so well. As a trained barrister, I used to believe in the concept of justicebut now I simply call this freedom and dignity. Not everyone rejoiced in these new freedoms. Is secularism a good thing? This is such an insidious conversation to have; this was even before Adani bought it. Firstpost - All Rights Reserved. At worst, its navel gazing peppered with white guilt, but always politically vacuous. Commentary Politics. Suchitra Vijayan. [4] She also worked as a dubbing artist for popular heroines like Shriya Saran and Lakshmi Rai.[5]. @suchitrav. I think this book will change the global conversation about India and shape what gets written in the future about India. [6], She wrote a short story, a graphic illustration of an episode in the life of a black peppercorn called Kuru-Milaku, called "The Runaway Peppercorn".[7]. The stories were a way to understand how people struggled and survived. Indias intellectual, journalistic, and literary landscape is profoundly problematic and alienating. Worse, we have been disciplined to accept injustice and inequality as given. Sharing borders with six countries and spanning a geography that extends from Pakistan to Myanmar, India is the worlds largest democracy and second most populous country. Who gets to shape these stories, what stories are chosen, what stories then are exiled? In terms of violence, there is also this tendency to photograph and display the bodies of marginalised communities when they experience violence. Vijayan began her journey in Kolkata. Instead, she shows the absurdity of the army apparatus that strives to comply with the narrative of patriotism. The book was called ``a genre- bending book of nonfictionmade of stories, encounters, vignettes, and photographsabout home, belonging, and displacement.`` Her essays, photographs, and interviews have appeared in The Washington Post, GQ, The Nation, The Boston Review, Foreign Policy, Lit Hub, Rumpus, Electric literature, NPR, NBC, and BBC. [2] She became known as Rj Suchi, with her popular morning show Hello Chennai. To repurpose an old sayingall infamy is now good virality. Then my agent said, Suchitra, you know, I think youre hiding behind your academic language. Also read: Whose Stories Are Told In Indian History? NYU Gallatin School of Individualized Study. Modi met with senior police officers and ordered them not to intervene as violence raged. Suchitra is a sought-after performer at corporate and other such stage shows. None of this helps in telling richer, more textured stories. This income helps us keep the magazine alive. We removed an image just before the printing to make sure the person was protected. But your book lays bare how differently India's borders are guarded from southern Bengal to the Line of Control. More from this author , Tags: Aruni Kashyap, Asian American, bollywood, Brahmanism, caste system, democracy, Hindu, Hinduism, Hinduphobia, Hindutva, immigrants, immigration, India, Indian American, Indian American literature, Leni Riefenstahl, Midnight's Borders, Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India, model minority, Modi, Narendra Damodardas Modi, Narendra Modi, neoliberalism, photographs, photography, Polis Project, Politics, Priyanka Chopra, south asian, South Asian American, South Asian diaspora, Stan Swamy, Suchitra Vijayan, travel writing, Filed Under: Features & Reviews, Rumpus Original. Vijayan: A writers responsibility above all is to speak the truth and make sense of our social worlds. Born and raised in Madras, India, she is the author of the critically acclaimed book Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India (Melville House, New York). When fencing began, he became trapped in a no-mans land, his marriage to a girl from Bangladesh ended with each being stranded on either side and he never got out of the cycle of debt and struggle, finally losing the ability to dream. The pandemic showed us that crises and recurrent disasters that annihilate our lives are here to stay. She has a sister named, Sunitha. I now think twice about calling friends, worried if this might put them at risk. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. When I left him (the first time), I had a one-year-old daughter. With the phone armed with a camera, everyone is a photographer; we are all witnesses. Abrogation Of Article 370 Jammu And Kashmir Statehood, BSF foils another Pakistan plot, shoots down drone in Punjab's Amritsar, Light on weight, heavy on damage: India will be able to hit deep inside Pakistan with THIS ultralightweight howitzer, Put issues related to border in 'proper place', work for its early normalisation: Chinese FM Qin to Jaishankar, In Midnight's Borders, Suchitra Vijayan meditates on belongingness, freedom and political implications of territorial demarcations. As an attorney, she previously worked for the United Nations war crimes tribunals in Yugoslavia and Rwanda before co-founding the Resettlement Legal Aid Project in Cairo, which gives legal aid to Iraqi refugees. She lucidly explains the complicated history of the McMahon Line, how the India-China border is the result of a fabrication perpetuated by the British colonial administration. How "The Family Man" champions the carceral security state. I kept detailed audio notes that I recorded each night when I traveled. All too often, the Indian media portrays Kashmiris as terrorists or human shields, not as a community seeking self-determination. Midnights Borders , Suchitra Vijayan includes a photo of the pillar, which becomes a cricket stump for boys on either side of the border most days. How do you think the media ought to responsibly report on peoples lives and experiences? Looking Beyond the Lines: Suchitra Vijayan's "Midnight's Borders" Perhaps there are lessons to learn from that. Book reviews and author interviews with a Southern focus. Suchitra Vijayan - KeyWiki She studied Law, Political Science and International Relations, and was trained as a Barrister-at-Law and called to Bar at the Honourable Society of Inner Temple. A place to read, on the Internet. I want to clarify that what I witnessed or the violence inflicted on my father is not the same as what over eight million Kashmiris have endured. Her YouTube channel 'Suchislife' has all her updated work. No one can write a book alone. Suchitra Vijayan was born and raised in Madras, India. Especially when you can be charged with sedition for a tweet or arrested for the crime of committing comedy while being Muslim. Suchitra Vijayan > Faculty > People > NYU Gallatin Its a hard book to name, and I kept going back and forth. What do words like democracy, freedom, and citizenship mean? Later on she moved to Coimbatore for her MBA from PSG Institute of Management. One feedback I often got was that I had to put more of myself in this book. Its feudal, entitled, and cannibalistic. Suchitra Vijayan is a barrister at law and the author of Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India. Why do you think India has gotten away with this so far? Also, a book is an act of community; it has many midwives. And our language helps us imagine a vision that is truly just, beautiful and ethical. In addition, she is an award- winning photographer, the founder, and executive director of the Polis Project, a hybrid research and journalism organization. What is the function of seeing and documenting? I dont think theres just one emotion that drives a writer to finish writing. Parts of Pakistan have already been consumed by the water. Suchitra - Wikipedia While that incident had a profound impact on me, my politics, how I think about violence, its relationship to justice, or the lack of it, this is not the same kind of violence Kashmiris have been subjugated to. This is a challenging task for the writer. Suchitra Vijayan complicates and expands our understanding of the South Asian American experience, urging readers to consider stories that cast dark eyes at India, a strategic ally of many Western nations. Also read: Book Review: Looking Through Dalit Sahitya And Ambedkar. In Afghanistan, Kashmir, and India, from one dangerous conflict zone to another, she spoke with people, ate with them, and listened to their stories. She digs deep into colonial history to show how years of violence and consequential suffering has shaped these lives across generations. But who gets to speak for so many of us? It's a disorienting time when your library or what books you read can become evidence of sedition . Q: As you wrote this book, you dont hesitate to meditate on how your personal life bidirectionally impacted the book. Suchitra Vijayan I dont have apprehensions. I felt the same way when I would prepare legal petitions for my clients. Indian Foreign Secretary V.K. Love, passion, anger, the desire to make a point about something. The original vision of the book also has newspaper cuttings, and found maps. And yet, the research and the history never overpowers the flow of the narrative. Already a subscriber? Our borders had become a spectacle, and we the cheering mob, she says, as she calls for purging hatred for the sake of posterity. How did you achieve empathy in your writing, without the privileged lens that is common in journalistic canon? Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, GQ, The Boston Review, The Hindu, and Foreign Policy, and she has appeared on NBC news. Vijayan researches meticulously into official documents and conducts a series of interviews in an effort to uncover the murky truths behind the death of Hilal Ahmed Mir, a supposed militant killed by the military in an encounter in the disputed territory of Kashmir, or Felani Khatun, a 15-year-old girl who was shot when trying to cross the barbed wire at the porous India-Bangladesh border. I believe it can teach us to ask these questions again. This media blitzkrieg resulted in the erasure of two important political trends. Respond to our political present. One of the reasons I kept writing was of course all the people I met: their love and time and generosity. I almost never forget, I remember entire episodes or events since I was six years old. I had a very stable home to come back to. Sayantika Mandal is an Indian writer. For far too long, they and their progeny have held power to shape the political understanding of our social worlds. Suchitra Vijayan is an American writer, essayist, activist, and photographer working across oral history, state violence, and visual storytelling. Is that a probable solution? Travel to States like Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland in the Northeast which share borders with China and Myanmar required Inner Line Permits, BSF soldiers followed her everywhere on the West Bengal/ Bangladesh border, and in Kashmir she was summoned to meet the local inspector at Uri. Theyre screaming all the time, its just that we dont listen to them. Can any of theTIMEsubscribers who loved that cover tell us now whats happening in South Sudan today? Second, Indias transformation into a nuclear state and the Kargil War is another critical moment of change. We once asked these questions, even if there were no clear answers or consensus. They create cleavages of fear, xenophobia, and insecurity. On Feb. 14, an Indian paramilitary convoy was attacked. Suchitra Vijayan's new book, Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India, takes a deep look at such stories by prioritizing the experiences of the silenced victims as well as lesser-known accounts from victims of state violence. Conversations With Writers Braver Than Me, Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India, FUNNY WOMEN: Excerpts from George Eliots, Rumpus Original Poetry: Two Poems by John A. Nieves, RUMPUS POETRY BOOK CLUB EXCERPT: WHY I WRITE LOVE POETRY IN A BURNING WORLD by Katie Farris, The Freedom of Form & Re-Entering Myths: An interview with A.E. Vijayan is no stranger to stories of violence. In this podcast, Vijayan discusses with host Alex Woodson her 9,000-mile journey through India's borderlands, which formed the basis of the book, and she discusses the violent and continuing history of the 1947 partition, the stark differences and similarities along South Asia's various borders, and what "citizenship" mean in India in 2021 and How do you think your book contributes to the larger conversation about India? And were there any apprehensions since you began working on this book? " India's intellectual, journalistic, and literary landscape is profoundly problematic and alienating. At a time when right-wing nationalism is crescendoing in India and across the world, Suchitra Vijayans Midnights Borders raises pertinent questions about the very foundations of Indias nationalism the cartography of South Asian nation-states defined by arbitrary lines drawn hastily by the British colonial administration. She has sung in multiple languages including Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and Telugu. This is the age of erosion of citizenship rights, a kind of ongoing attrition against human rights, civil liberties, and in the case of India, an accelerated dilution of fundamental rights. Bigotry is also big business. Vijayan: Chopra and others like her are a reflection of how popular culture and virality inform discourse and shape it. In her book, she makes her intention clear at the very beginning, claiming that this endeavor is not to give voice to the voiceless but to critique the nation-state, its violence, and the arbitrariness of territorial sovereignty. She acknowledges that a book in its limited scope cannot really encapsulate the entirety of this journey, and it will remain more of a scrapbook, a collection of images, texts, poetry, and maps. Listen to Season 3 on Apple, Spotify and Google podcasts. Author In Focus, Celebration, The Literary Journal. You need a community of people to support you. FII Media Private Limited | All rights reserved, "Imagine how it would be for someone coming from a Dalit/Bahujan, Muslim, Adivasi, working class background, who wants to come into thisit is especially difficult if youre a woman coming from these backgrounds. More Buying Choices 1,732.00 (16 Used & New offers) Audible Audiobook 0.00 Free with Audible trial 586.00 ( 9 ) Nonfiction, Travel, Fiction Member Since February 2021 edit data Suchitra Vijayan was born and raised in Madras, India. Vijayans lens not only captures the people but also the past through objects, such as the picture of Kotwali Gate, the remains of a medieval fort that serves as a border checkpoint rife with weeds and trees growing on it, symbolic of a state bent on rewriting history rather than preserving it. The black and white pictures accompanying the chapters add a thousand words more. A memorable, humane museum of forgotten stories that we must all read and remember. M, What experiences and lives unfold in these pages. Thoughbordersare conventionally recognised as real or artificial lines of spatial and political demarcation, there may also be an arbitrariness to them. They dont. During the initial search, the BSF troops recovered a black coloured drone - DJI Matrice (made in China), in partially damaged condition, lying near Dhussi Bundh near Shahjada village. 582.1K views. Midnights Borders perhaps also critiques the widely read body of work available as Indian English Writing (IWE), a literary canon that has so far told the story of India but seldom demonstrated social responsibility by acknowledging the atrocities India has committed silently within its borders. Say, for instance, do we need a James Nachtwey to fly to war-torn Bosnia? I havent spoken or celebrated with my friends in Kashmir or Assam. It is necessary to speak truth to power through our art. Suchitra tweets @suchitrav. Aruni Kashyap writes in English, and his native language Assamese. Vijayan: There is an elusive distance between the photographer and the photographed that cant be bridged. Suchitras account of her journeys across the undefinable and ever-shifting borders between India and its neighbours is gripping, frightening, faithful and beautiful. I think its the other way round, these communities have always been speaking, writing, documenting, teachingwe must simply listen rather than represent them in any way. I had to write and rewrite this book so many times. This is the backdrop against which we map how border practices and policies have played out in India. By Suchitra Vijayan, Why should I read it? Some people later chose not to be included because they feared repercussions, especially as the NRC process started playing out. Contributions for the charitable purposes ofThe Rumpus must be made payable to Fractured Atlas only and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. Gokhale claimed that it struck the biggest camp and that a large number of terrorists were killed. The act of recording and documenting cannot be divorced from the inherent question of power. [1], Suchitra joined Sify for a year, after graduating. Panitars division is as cruel as it is arbitrary: here, the houses on either side of one dusty lane occupy two neighbouring countries. Feminism In India is an award-winning digital intersectional feminist media organisation to learn, educate and develop a feminist sensibility among the youth. How long shall we continue to live this life of contradictions?". That was my starting point. A relatively small group of people runs it. There are two quotes I regularly use by Allan Sekula when I teach: "The making of a human likeness on film is a political act. What do you think the future holds? Suchitra Vijayan The public is sold a lie as the attack is framed as a gas leak. We live in a profoundly unequal society, where every day brings news of new devastation. "Fighting for justice and human rights in India is a long and lonely battle" Nishrin Jafri Hussain, the daughter of Ehsan Jafri (from 2019) Its about what people like me should do. 2:16. J.G.P. Even those among us who will speak of BLM will not openly challenge Hindutva or the RSS. Required fields are marked *. Last edited on 23 February 2023, at 09:35, Filmfare Award for Best Female Playback Singer Telugu, 2nd South Indian International Movie Awards, "Suchitra going through certain emotional condition: Husband Karthik on her tweets", "Will Trisha sound like Trisha in Mankatha? A consistent ethical framework within the media hasnt existed for a long time. Even as 70% of the border with Bangladesh has been fenced, "smugglers, drug couriers, human traffickers and cattle rustlers continue to cross to ply their. She entered the show on day 28 as a new contestant and was evicted on day 49. This means that, for the longest time, the depiction of violence and marginalised communities has been problematic. I was reading a lot of Pessoa when I was in Afghanistan, so another placeholder title was 'Maps/Lines/Cartographies of Disquiet', inspired by the Book of Disquiet. He drops and picks up his kids from school, pines for his old job and is concerned about the newly-formed government in Pakistanall the while trying to salvage his crumbling marriage. Perhaps that offers some protection? Similarly, motherhood changed me; it radicalised me. The interview has been paraphrased and condensed for clarity, at the interviewers discretion. I want to flag two essays where I engage with this in an in-depth manner, Disaster Ruins Everything, on my work in Haiti, and what it means to photograph disaster, especially when it is Brown and Black bodies. That, perhaps, is the only way to avoid further destruction in the region. Finally, Indias current transformation, the aggressive posturing of an aspiring ethno-nationalist state, will have dire consequences for the people and the region. Acted as the General Manager for a day and motivated employees to work for the same purpose to reinforce team . Yes, Chopra does take a huge share of attention, but the real danger is how people like her whitewash Hindutva, and now increasingly co-opt the language of Hinduphobia to counter any critique of Hindutva. But the number of anonymous sources willing to disclose classified and conflicting information to reporters who cited them without corroboration points to a serious crisis in how information is reported to the public. Always. Vijayan: I wasnt trying to write a hybrid book; I was trying to tell the stories I encountered as a way to think about the moral and political realities of our lives. Includes previously unreleased investigation under #JackStraw. We perform rituals of freedom in a right-less societywe dont ask if the rules, laws, and policies that are put in place are fair, just, right or equitable. Do you think the future is borderless? This idea of responsibility gets obfuscated in many ways. Rumpus: The book utilizes more than one medium: photography, narrative nonfiction, journalism. Get your Rumpus merch in our online store. This article was published more than4 years ago. In India, that arbitrariness can be seen in how differently we perceive landboundaries with multiple sovereign nations. Speculation and conjecture were repeated ad infinitum, and several journalists even took to Twitter to encourage the Indian army. We cant continue to see this in neo-liberal terms like stakeholder. I think the usage of this kind of language is ineffectual; its emptied of imagination. Over the span of seven years, Suchitra Vijayan interviewed scores of individuals, jotted countless notes, snapped hundreds of photographs, and altogether made herself witness to the manifold absurdities (and atrocities) of who gets to say where one nation ends and another begins. [8] On 7 March 2017, she applied for divorce. This means that the capacity to see does not automatically become the capacity for action. Its been a little over a week since the book came out, and every day this week, I have woken up to emails, messages, and DMs from readers. Sometimes they are no more, but your storytelling is so invigorating that the reader doesnt forget them. As Sari Begum's story [in the book] illustrates, 'A life where the violence of the border is not at the fence, or in the trenches, but at the center of 'their' and our 'universe'. Pushback is such a benign word, isnt it? A British lawyer, Cyril Radcliffe set foot in India for the first time in July, 1947 to draw the borders and completed the task within seven weeks, engendering communal riots, a heavily militarized border, four wars and seven decades of violence and hatred between the two countries. Suchitra Vijayans new book, Midnights Borders: A Peoples History of Modern India, takes a deep look at such stories by prioritizing the experiences of the silenced victims as well as lesser-known accounts from victims of state violence. Find him on Twitter at @AruniKashyap. She also embodies the upwardly mobile, privileged sections of the diaspora. Vasundhara Sirnate Drennan is director of research at the Polis Project. In Afghanistan, Kashmir, and India, from one dangerous conflict zone to another, she spoke with people, ate with them, and listened to their stories. It took me 8 years to write the book. When your investigations in Kashmir came to an end, what changes did you observe in your 'grammar of dissent'? Whose Stories Are Told In Indian History? We're back with our flagship podcast 'Intersectional FeminismDesi Style!' Stallings, Rumpus Original Fiction: The Litany of Invisible Things. Is photographing a woman, who was gang-raped by the Sudanese army and put on the cover of TIMEpractically naked, able to stop the war? [1] Career [ edit] It was not going to be easy as she quickly found out. I had to cut those out, as my editor felt this might not work. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, GQ, The Boston Review, The Hindu, and Foreign Policy, and she has appeared on NBC news. Propaganda and poison work in far more sophisticated ways. I have never lived under military occupation, curfew, or a looming threat of violence. Firstly, when we talk about violence, we often talk about it only as communal violence, as if both communities have equal strength and power. Her writing has appeared in The Citron Review, Dukool Magazine, Cerebration, Feminism in India, Times of India (Spellbound edition), and others.