Author Archives: amardeep

Review: Panjabi MC’s “Indian Timing”

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When I used to DJ parties here and there in the early and mid-2000s, I always had a quandary: what can you possibly play after “Mundian to Bach Ke”? It was such a floor-filling crowd-pleaser, and there was almost nothing that could come after it that kept up the energy. Granted, there were variations of the same song that lesser producers and remixers had started putting out, but no other Bhangra track quite compared. “Mundian to Bach Ke” was a singularity.

Perhaps it’s been a problem for the person who produced the song himself: how do you follow a monster hit?

After Panjabi MC became briefly huge in 2003, he went a little quiet. There was the re-release in 2004 of an album called “Desi” [from 2002], and then a studio album in 2005 (“Steel Bangle”) that was mostly recycled filler, to satisfy an earlier contract with Moviebox Records (see Sajit’s SM review here).

“Indian Timing,” which was finally released this spring on Itunes after many delays, is finally, nearly all new material, with very little filler. It’s also an actual album, unlike much of what is released by Brit-Asian producers these days (in the era of piracy and digital downloading, there is a greater emphasis on singles). In terms of the sound, PMC stays true to the combination he’s famous for — big hip hop beats with lively Punjabi bhangra vocals.

For people downloading selectively from Itunes, I would suggest starting with “Can’t Stop Us,” “Kee Lagda,” and “Punjabi Soldiers.” All are upbeat Punjabi songs over hip hop beats, with vocals by Manjit Jelhi. Pretty much any of those three would be good to follow “Mundian to Bach Ke” on a dance-floor.

Fans of Bollywood might also like PMC’s electro version of “I am a Disco Dancer,” which is somewhat of an anomaly on the record. Continue reading →

Violence at the Gurdwara: A Reflection

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Reading about the violence at a Sikh Gurdwara in Vienna, Austria, last weekend, and now the subsequent, extremely dangerous riots in Punjab, leaves me feeling sad though not particularly surprised.

In Austria, the violence occurred at a Gurdwara founded by members of a sect called Dera Sach Khand, a group I hadn’t heard of before this incident occurred; they are followers of Ravidas, a religious teacher from roughly the same period as official Sikhism’s founder, Guru Nanak. Ravidas was from the Chamar caste, and as I understand it most Ravidasias in Punjab today are from that caste as well. (Wikipedia describes their places of worship as “Gurdeheras” rather than “Gurdwaras,” so perhaps it might be more accurate to say that the violence at the temple in Vienna took place at a Ravidasi Gurdehera, rather than a Sikh Gurdwara.)

It is not clear to me how many followers they have, though I have read estimates that Punjab has a disproportionately high Dalit population (nearly 30%), and it is possible that some of those rioting in places like Jalandhar are not specifically followers of this sect, but rather Dalits who are rioting against what they perceive as caste violence. (See pictures at the BBC)

There is also a second, properly orthodox Sikh Gurdwara in Vienna, which has been described as being controlled by hardliners who support the idea of an independent Sikh homeland (Khalistan).

Details from the news reports have been sketchy. I do not know in very much detail how the hostility between these two groups reached this level, though I can imagine a narrative that led to these events, based on what I’ve seen here in the U.S. Continue reading →

Guest Blogger: Nilanjana Bhattacharjya

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Since several of our “main” bloggers are off enjoying the fruits of summer (Ciao! you know who you are…), we thought we would keep things moving here in the Bunker with another guest blogger, Nilanjana Bhattacharjya. Nilanjana is an ethnomusicologist who teaches at Colorado College. She is also an avid Twitterer, for those of you for whom that means anything. And for the academics in the house, Nilanjana has an essay in a recent collection called Global Bollywood: Travels of Hindi Song and Dance, which she co-wrote with another friend of mine, on the inner workings of the commercial Indian film music industry as it operates within India, as well as how it is repackaged as it “travels” in the diaspora. Despite the focus on film and music, Nilanjana has lots of interests, including an interest in subcontinental politics — so expect a diverse array of posts. Continue reading →

Another War Within: Swat and Buner

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Sometimes you do get what you want. The U.S. government had been strongly pressuring Pakistan to take direct military action against the Taliban, which had come to dominate in some non-border areas, including areas not far in miles from Peshawar and Islamabad.

As a result, the Pakistan Army has mobilized formidable power against the militants in the Buner and Swat districts. Both are in the NWFP province, but neither are border areas. In the fighting thus far, estimates are that about 1000 militants have already been killed. No one has an estimate of the number of civilians killed because, as usual, the press are banned from the area.

In the meanwhile, there are now 1.5 million civilians who have fled those areas now living in relief camps, according to estimates from the UNHCR:

The announcement of further aid came as the Office of Antonio Guterres, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), announced that the number of registered refugees since May 2 had reached 1,454,377.

A statement from UNHCR said that “humanitarian workers were struggling to keep up with the size and speed of the displacement”.

Guterres told reporters on Sunday, “It’s like trying to catch something that’s moving ahead of us because the number of people on the move every day is so big and the response is never enough.” “Leaving this population without the support they need – with such massive numbers – could constitute an enormous destabilizing factor”, he said.

UNHCR’s chief spokesperson, Ron Redmond, said on Tuesday, “We haven’t seen anything so big and so fast in years.” (link)

And when they say, “We haven’t seen anything so big and so fast in years,” they mean 15 years, to be exact. As I understand it, the last time a displacement of this magnitude happened was 1994, in Rwanda. Continue reading →

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Indian Election Results: Bring on the links [Updated]

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The Indian election results have been pouring in, with the Congress/UPA government set to return to power for another five years. Here is the New York Times’ story; apparently, this is the first time since Nehru that an Indian political party has served out the full five years, and then been reelected to power.

I wanted to give readers a chance to share information and suggest sites that are gathering results in various parts of the country. I am especially curious to see what happens with Shashi Tharoor in Trivandrum (I blogged about him a few weeks ago), and of course the political landscape as a whole. As of 1:00 am EDT, the UPA is up over the NDA/BJP around 220-150 [update: the final number for the UPA will be something more like 259]. The UPA is going to stay in, and even consolidate its power — which means, greater independence from the Left. Manmohan Singh is likely to remain Prime Minister for awhile, and perhaps it’s going to be curtains for L.K. Advani’s Prime Ministerial aspirations.

I was watching IBN live here.

The NDTV VoteMap is pretty nice, though it would be better if there were a way to see who held a given state or a given district earlier.

On Twitter, the tag seems to be #indiavotes09. The stream is moving very quickly. There is something called Tweetgrid, which lets you see feeds for six Twitter keywords at once.

Shashi Tharoor has his own Twitter feed: ShashiTharoor. As of now, he is up by 30,000 votes, with more than half of the votes counted.

The BBC’s live results are pretty good. As of this writing, Varun Gandhi (the communal one, from Sanjay’s wing of the family) is leading, and Mayawati’s BSP is losing. In Kerala, the left is likely to decline dramatically from 2004. The Communists are in decline in West Bengal too, presumably in payback for their handling of Nandigram. Lalu Prasad Yadav, who had earlier decided to pull support from Congress, is now admitting it was a mistake, as his RJD party ended up losing seats.

Via Ultrabrown, Bloomberg has a story, with Congress leaders using “Jai Ho” as a victory chant. Also via Ultrabrown, Mayawati is going to lock up victorious BSP candidates, to prevent them from being picked off by other parties. It’s a typical Mayawati thing to do, and presumably illegal — though that’s never stopped her before.

Please suggest any sites with data and analysis that you would recommend. Continue reading →

Sri Lanka: An Alternate Tamil Point of View

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Via a friend on Facebook, I came across the following interview with Tamil Canadian journalist Ignatius Sellah, on CBC. It’s interesting to hear his perspective, and also to see pictures from the recent protests in Toronto:

While the Sri Lankan government is hardly innocent of committing human rights violations, at the current moment the overwhelming evidence from refugees who have escaped the war zone suggests that the LTTE has been holding them hostage. If so, they are more at fault than the Government of Sri Lanka for what is happening to the civilians.

The protesters in Toronto and London may be voicing legitimate concerns about the condition of civilians in the war zone and in the internment centers outside of the war zone. But when they wave LTTE flags, use children as a buffer against the police (in a strange echo of how the real LTTE operate), and talk about genocide, I think they are acting irresponsibly. (Not that her opinion matters all that much — she’s a musician — but I think M.I.A., who has been throwing around the word “genocide” as well lately in her public statements, has also been irresponsible in using that word.)

It’s natural that the people shouting loudest are getting the most attention, but it would be ideal if the media covering these diasporic protests would also represent alternate (i.e., moderate, non-LTTE) points of view. There are plenty of people out there who have real and legitimate grievances regarding the treatment of Tamils in Sri Lanka over the years, who stop well short of supporting this senseless war. Are there other non-LTTE Tamil SL voices you would recommend? Continue reading →

Anjulie: “Boom”

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Readers might like Guyanese-Canadian singer Anjulie (full name, Anjulie Persaud, which might be a variation on… “Anjali Prasad”):

Anjulie | Boom from Concord Music Group on Vimeo.

What do you think? I hear shades of Morcheeba and Esthero in both the vocals and the production, though this song is clearly a bit more commercial than either of those downtempo/indie favorites. I also can’t help but think of Apache Indian’s song, “Boom Shack-a-Lak” (1993), though Anjulie flips it around slightly: “Boom Shalaka Laka,” which makes the phrase more mellow. I take it this is coming from a real slang expression in the Caribbean, but now I wonder about its origins.

More on Anjulie: her album (titled “Boom”) is set to drop on Starbucks’ house label, Hear Music, this summer — which means you may well be hearing this song the next time you’re sipping a Caramel Macchiato. Also, she is on Twitter. [Thanks, Bookworm, for the tip] Continue reading →

Aziz is Funny

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Aziz Ansari’s show, Parks and Recreation (earlier SM post), may or may not end up surviving very long (who knows?), but with appearances like the following eight minutes on Jimmy Kimmel last week, it may not matter. Ansari is clearly paving the way for a nice career in Hollywood:

In the clip above, I love the way Ansari handles the “where are you from?” question. His audience is completely in on the joke; he doesn’t ever have to break his deadpan assertion that he’s clearly a “good ol’ boy” from South Carolina. He’s not shying away from his “difference” from other comedians and actors, but he’s not making it the center of his shtick either. Notice that, despite his obviously Muslim name, he doesn’t feel a need to bring any of that stuff up, and as a result, for the most part nobody else brings it up either (except perhaps, when he’s accused of starting a “Jihad” against IMAX…).

And it seems to me that he basically connects on every little anecdote or bit he comes up with in this eight minutes. If he’s always this good, he will soon be a fixture on the late night shows. Continue reading →

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Please, Shekhar, Make It Stop

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Shekhar Kapur has made the worst advertisement ever, for Schweppes. It stars Nicole Kidman, Arjun Rampal, Rubina Ali (the little girl from Slumdog Millionaire), the Lake Palace at Udaipur, and a thick, dripping heap of tacky, pseudo-sensual, Orientalist ambience. I think it’s sort of meant to be ironic, but the irony doesn’t really work:

What is the thing you hate most about it? I’d like to compile a complete list and send it to the man.

I used to really admire Shekhar Kapur, for Masoom, The Bandit Queen and for the first Elizabeth. More recently, I started to think something something had gone wrong when my wife and I wasted one of our rare babysitter nights to go see the half-baked Elizabeth: The Golden Age. Now, after watching this ad, I think I’ll abstain from Shekhar Kapur (and probably also Schweppes) entirely. Continue reading →

Northern Sri Lanka: Humanitarian Questions

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displaced sri lankans nyt photo small.jpg
(Photo by Pedro Ugarte/Getty Images)

It looks like the conflict in northern Sri Lanka is nearing its endpoint, judging from various news reports this week. There have been pressures on the Sri Lankan government to call a cease-fire, to allow humanitarian efforts to move forward, but the government has rejected that call.

Reuters has a helpful FAQ on the basics of the humanitarian situation in northern Sri Lanka:

HOW MANY ARE TRAPPED?

That is a subject of great debate and confusion. The International Committee of the Red Cross has said it is less than 50,000, while the United Nations has said up to that number are in danger. Sri Lanka’s government estimates between 10,000 and 20,000. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) say it is 160,000. Diplomats say the number is immaterial with so many in harm’s way, and a host of nations have pushed for a humanitarian truce. The civilians are in a tiny strip of northern coast with the ocean to the east and a lagoon to the west, measuring no more than 5 square km (2 sq miles), according to the military.

HOW MANY HAVE BEEN KILLED AND WOUNDED?

A U.N. working document, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters, said 6,432 civilians had been killed and 13,946 wounded in fighting since the end of January. A U.N. spokesman declined to comment on it. The government has consistently called casualty figures inflated to serve LTTE propaganda purposes, and the government and the rebels blame each other for killing civilians. Getting accurate information is nearly impossible, since very few people inside the war zone can be said to be free of rebel influence and few independent observers have been permitted in.

HOW MANY HAVE ESCAPED?

Early this week, the military said it had registered more than 113,000 since an exodus began a week earlier when troops punched through an earthen barrier the Tigers erected to block entry and exit. The government says more than 200,000 have left since the beginning of the year. Doctors treating the wounded pouring out said they suffered from horrific injuries from shelling and gunfire. (link)

From my point of view, the situation of the 200,000 displaced people who have escaped the “no fire zone” is probably the most urgent issue, and it is also clearly something that the international community can be directly involved in.

The UNHCR seems to be the relief agency that is mentioned most often in the articles I’ve been reading; if you’re concerned about the situation of these displaced civilians, as I am, you might want to donate something here. Continue reading →