Notes From the Field : Chikungunya

Notes From the Field

- Nishant Ratnakar

Date: Monday, 11th May, 2009.

Place: D J Halli near Bangalore.

At a locality known as Moulana Compound:

"Have any health officials visited your locality since the outbreak?"

"No Sir. You are the first outsider to have stepped in here since we noticed the disease in our Compound"

That was the reply given to me by a resident of Moulana Compound at D J halli, Bangalore. Residents of this locality that houses around 60 to 70 families, say that at least one person in every house here shows symptoms of Chikungunya disease. "My four children also have developed Chikungunya" , says Waheeda who herself is recovering from Chikungunya. The families here live in typical matchbox like houses with most of them dependent on daily wages. Salaam, an auto driver, has not been able to earn his livelihood for over 8 days since he was affected by the disease. Most people including Salaam in entire D J Halli seem to be complaining about severe joint pains and high fever. Their mobility is restricted due to the joint pains.

Across DJ Halli:

"Any idea how Chikungunya spreads?"

"Sir, I think it spreads through air. See, it quickly spreads among relatives in the house and neighbors."

"Sir, there has been mixing of sewage and drinking water since longtime in our area. People are getting infected by drinking this contaminated water. Look, the color of water in this tumbler is almost grey."

"We don't know."

"I don't know."

"I saw on TV about disease spreading through pork in America. But we don't eat that meat."

It was a pity to know that most people on the streets of D J Halli have no clue about Chikungunya. The carrier of the virus that causes this disease is a mosquito. Very few people I met at DJ Halli actually were aware about it. As I walked along the main roads and gullies around DJ Halli looking for people showing symptoms of Chikungunya, I could spot stagnant water pools - the breeding ground for mosquitoes - almost everywhere. Nothing seems to have been done with regards to creating awareness about civic issue in these areas. The authorities have denied (at least when I was covering the story) the outbreak of Chikungunya in DJ Halli and have blame private doctors for creating what they termed as 'exaggerated news' about outbreak. The truth can only be revealed by time. But, if not Chikungunya, there is something spreading here. Everyone is showing same symptoms : High fever and severe joint pains.

At a local hospital near D J Halli:

A woman was being administered IV fluids. Her doctor says, "The blood tests revealed that her platelet count was low. This confirmed an infection and symptoms are of Chikungunya. the actual confirmatory tests of Chikungunya costs around 1500 rupees in any of the city labs. But, most people arriving here including this patient are not in a position to spend so much. Hence, based on the symptoms, the doctors start the treatment. The cost of medicine for the entire duration of treatment is also slightly expensive. Also, Chikungunya patient needs to rest a lot for speedy recovery. But some of the patients here are breadwinners of the family and are daily wage workers. So you can understand the situation I hope?"

I guess 'Right to good health' isn't covered under any of the fundamental rights provided by Indian constitution. But, don't the Directive principles of the State say that state should work towards reducing economic inequality as well as inequalities in status and opportunities. Sixty plus years since India became a free nation. how much have we achieved in reducing inequalities in access to health care? Do our political parties have this as a priority or even have a reference to this in their respective election manifestos?

To Amma

Taarammaiyya, Thandu Thorammaiyya
Doorada Baanige yerida chandrana,
Taarammaiyya, Thandu Thorammaiyya

Nine of Amma's (my maternal grandmother was fondly called as Amma by everyone who knew her) children and few of her fortunate grandchildren (including me) have spent their cradle years listening to this Kannada lullaby every night before being rocked into a sound sleep.

Amma passed away last Sunday morning, after half a decade of battling the problems of aging. Amma was in her early nineties. Over the years, she had lost her memory, vision and strength, and had been confined to her bed and chair till her last day. Though our family has been bereaved of a loved one, it should be noted that Amma's sufferings have come to an end. She didn't deserve this phase in life where she had lost her independence and right to a life with dignity. My fond recollections of her, dates back to the time when I visited our village every year during the summer holidays. This was the time when there used to be plenty of cattle, hen, dogs and cats in our farm. Images of her walking in the farm with a fistful of grains and calling out to the hens and chickens, "Baa.. baa.." , never seem to fade from my memory.

When it comes to Amma and my photography, I think I was quite late in picking up my camera. By the time I began to indulge in photojournalism and documentary photography, Amma had passed her graceful years and had slipped in to a life in oblivion.

Couple of years back I visited Amma and Ajja's (grandpa) home with a SLR camera loaded with a black and white film. I was seeing Amma after a longtime and she had shrunk in size by then. With her memory caught in a time warp, she had lost touch with day-to-day happenings. Her eyes were giving away too. She could barely make out who or what was in front of her. Sometimes she used to speak about her father and her childhood home. And she had expressed her desire to meet her father, who was no-more. It was heartbreaking to see her in such a situation. But even in this condition, her motherly instincts were still strong. If she was eating something, say a banana, and if she could make out a figure moving around in the room, she would promptly offer a piece of whatever was on the plate to the person in the room.

Most of the times when left alone, she would get into a cycle of singing prayers. A prayer would be followed by her joining hands and bowing to the almighty. And this cycle would continue until somebody interrupted and diverted her attention. It was during one of those prayer sessions by the window, I stepped into the room with my camera. By then I had clicked portraits off Ajja and others in the house. But seeing Amma in the viewfinder, I somehow couldn't shoot her picture. The face of Amma one has in their minds is from her healthier and jovial days. I was stuck in a dilemma. I began to wonder if it would be rude of me to document her in this state. But, I had to have Amma's picture in my album. So, in that moment of dilemma I framed a silhouette of what Amma did the most in her later years...... pray. A prayer in her own world.

A year spent behind the lens

October 12th, 2007

October 13th 2006, that's one Friday which I'll never forget in my life. A year later, I see that today happens to be a small milestone for me. I will be completing one year of my life as a 'photojournalist'. Last year on that fateful Friday I bid farewell to the Corporate world and IT industry. And on the very next day I began my tryst with serious photojournalism. As the days progressed, my bank balance began to recede, my patience swung like a pendulum (my dad's patience... don't even ask about it!). There were nights I couldn't sleep. On the positive side, my confidence increased slowly as time went by.

My experiments with camera taught me something new every time when I had to shell out money in getting negatives developed, scanned and printed. Oh, I forgot to tell you something! I never had a DSLR camera then(Even today I don't really own one. My company has given a beauty for me to use). I had borrowed my friend's(Srikar) Film SLR to practice the craft. I swapped his Canon SLR with my Fuji digital camera for few days, which finally stretched to few months. Then, for a while I got Obi's(another friend ) Canon 350D to do some minor assignments.

Those days, I spent my time on the streets of Bangalore shooting life around it. I am grateful to the narrow lanes and alleys of Shivajinagar,Avenue road, and the timeless Russel market, and not to forget my hometown Kaup, which have let me indulge completely in the art of photography. Three hundred and sixty five days later, after shooting for NGOs, online magazines, in-flight magazines and few portraits, I have come to be part of a newspaper ( Bangalore Mirror). I have been a press photographer for last eight months.

When I look back I see that I have travelled quite a distance in a short while. Last month, I got to cover my first major Cricket assignment. I actually covered the India - Australia ODI (One Day International) match held at Bangalore:-) [Can you believe it?]. Next day , I saw my photographs in the lead sports page of our newspaper. Oh boy, what a feeling it was to be watching a cricket match(for free!) from the boundary lines, capturing the action in camera and then tirelessly editing pictures, captioning them and mailing them back to the desk on a laptop with WiFi Internet access. You had to be there to know exactly what it felt like. Next day, I got a pat on my back from many people for the pictures I had made during the match(I'll blog them shortly). I am looking forward for more of sports assignments. How many of you gave me a chance that I'd be handling such an assignment with in a year of having started my life from scratch? To be frank, I myself had no clue that I'd reach this milestone in a short time.

Today, as I woke up early, I was wondering how would I celebrate tomorrow. But, as unpredictable a day in the life of a photojournalist can get, I had something wonderful in store for me. I had to visit Bannerghatta Biological Park's Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre(WRRC) on an assignment. The story was to cover the WRRC's first attempt to breed a Tigres with a wild tiger to bring in its wild genes to give birth to healthy offspring. This was a successful attempt. Today, Manasa the tigress has three healthy cubs. It was a beauty to photograph the Tiger cubs. And, finally came the moment when I decided to hold one of the cubs. I picked this little one (too heavy to be called little one) and it felt like carrying a two year old kid. I never thought I'd kiss a Tiger's forehead. But, Yippee! it was too cute for me not to do it. Here, I share one of the photographs which I clicked on this shoot along with a picture of me carrying the cub(thank Niranjan for photographing me). I love my job. I feel I have the best job in this world (apart from the Zoo keepers at WRRC who are doing some great work)

I thank everyone who has been part of this journey of mine as a photographer. I thank my family and all the old friends who have stood by me and have supported me as I went about doing what I liked the most. Many thanks to all the photographers who I've met along the way and who have not hesitated to share with me a lot of valuable information and experience. And finally, I thank all the people in the field of journalism, whom I got to meet at some point of the time or the other; they have made my life really exciting, either by contributing to my growth as a photojournalist or by just having been part my life. I've made few friends, I've lost few, went bankrupt for a while, faced tough times but I've come through. And, I dream of going the long way. I've made a promise to myself long back. I shall live up to it.
Good night.

No Indians allowed. Only foreigners

I and couple of my friends undertook a trip to Pondicherry to spend our Ugadi weekend in this coastal holiday destination. It was a road trip which was decided on the spur of the moment with the intention to break free from the rush of the stressful life we lead in Bangalore city. Hence, our accommodation at 'Pondi' (the slang used by the young city crowd to refer to this holiday destination which was a former French colony) was not reserved in advance. After a long road trip and a frustrating, futile search for a suitable sea facing hotel in the main town of Pondi we decided to take our chance and find a beach cottage or shack along the East Coast Road (ECR) which connects Pondicherry to Mahabalipuram.

After twenty minutes on ECR we reached a stretch of highway running adjacent to the sea shore lined with shacks and cottages. We stopped our car and walked down to sandy beach to book our stay at the popular Aurovile Waves resort. Also, it had been nine long hours since our last meal and we were very hungry. We were told that the cottages at the Waves were fully occupied and maybe we could try our luck at Muthu's resort which was adjacent to it. With hungry stomachs, we prodded our way under the afternoon sun towards Muthu's in the direction given to us by the lady who was at the Waves.

In front of us was a stretch of beach filled mainly with foreigners. And there was a rope running from the road towards the waters separating that part of the beach from the stretch of the coast opposite the Aurovile Waves. It seemed like some sort of demarcation and there was a board with a message written in Tamil. None of us knew Tamil and we walked towards the other side of the rope. At that moment we heard whistles from a nearby shack. There were two men in Security uniform and a hefty man who resembled like some of the bouncers in Bangalore Pubs. All the three men were Indians. They made signs which indicated us to keep away from this stretch of Beach. Confused, we decided to walk up to them and find out what was the issue.

"What is the problem?"

"You can't come to this part of the beach"

"Why?(Still confused)"

"No Indians allowed here. Only Foreigners".

"What!(Shocked)." "But we want to look for accommodation here."

"No accommodation."

"(Still recovering from the shock)Okay. But we are very hungry and have traveled a long way from Bangalore. We will have lunch here."

"No lunch served here. Only Snack Bar."

"Okay, fine. We will have snacks then."

"Don't enter from here. Come from the back entrance facing towards the road."

"Why? we'll enter from here"

"No, you can't! Enter from the other side."

At this point, we felt humiliated and walked out of that place. It was shocking to receive such a treatment in India for the simple reason of being an Indian. It is high time we stopped pointing fingers at the West for racial discrimination we are subjected to in foreign countries. We ourselves are discriminating our own people based on race.

This definitely was the worst, but not the first time I had experienced racial discrimination. In the past, I had faced a similar issue in Goa, which coincidentally is also another beach holiday destination drawing lot of foreign tourists and is also a former European colony. And incidents of such racial discrimination are experienced by other Indian domestic travelers too. Ryan Lobo, a documentary photographer writes in his blog( http://www.ryanlobo.blogspot.com/ ) about such a local racial discrimination he was subjected to in his place of birth, Goa. In a restaurant, when he questioned the waiter for overpricing a meal, the waiter shot back at his taxi driver telling him not to bring Indians as they only want to serve foreigners.

It is hurting to know that such incidents are happening in some of the most famous holiday destinations of our country. It is understandable that foreign tourists constitute a Major income for the people involved in hospitality business in these places. But should that translate to contempt for your countrymen?

I only hope that the sign board with a message written in Tamil on that sandy beach off the ECR did not translate to "Indians and dogs not allowed". Such a sign are memories from the pre-Indian independence era and let it remain so. Touch wood!

Me, my solitude and Raju's 350D - Part 2

Its been nearly two weeks of probation period at VT. Me and Raju's camera (canon 350 D) did get to see some amount of life in Bangalore which was previously unknown to us. From Page 1 to Page 3 we have got to see a great deal of Bangalore. Sometimes boring stories and sometimes stories which reaffirms faith in the work I have set about doing, they all seem to be part of the game.

The two days I spent about covering the Tibetan Uprising day events have enhanced my confidence a great deal. I was surrounded by photographers who were working for agencies like Reuters,AP,PTI and AFP. It felt great to know that I was trying to capture in frames the story which they were interested too. I knew the event had a worldwide significance. For the first time I was given an opportunity to compare my work with the agencies worldwide. Well, its a different issue that the equipments they had at their disposal were technically far more superior than my buddy, the canon 350D. But hey! who cares? Me and 350D accepted the challenge gracefully. It was natural that I went back home and compared my work with theirs which was updated on the agencies' websites. And I am being frank, I was impressed with my work on the Tibetan story which was done on 350D. This was a boost for me. Someday I'll definitely make it to one of the agencies.

But as the story goes, only one image made it to print from those 2 days:-(. Now, for the first time I got an insight into the business of newspapers. There were local issues and advertisements which needed space. Tibetan struggle somehow didn't fit the scheme of Bangalore centric newspaper.I had to kiss this fact. I had shot some page3 kinda pictures on the same day. They made it in large numbers. Something new about professional modern day journalism I had learned.

Life goes on; So I moved on from Rakshita's Mehendi ceremony payasam to buffets at Star hotels of Bangalore while covering events and press meets. A trip to IIMB and freezing the future corporate czars of India, listening to a Tibetan hero who one day I know shall be the leader of modern independent Tibet(if Tibet's destiny has independence in it), meeting visionaries of Karnataka state and then attempting an undercover operation in Bangalore subways where prostitution was rampant; it surely has been a great ride so far. I have come to know my limitations as well as my buddy 350D's. But we have to learn to live with our limitations and make the most of it. And yeah, my probation at VT has nearly come to an end and I am waiting to hear from the Resident Editor on my future here. I have a feeling that I have done well. I hope they tell me soon. I have to return Raju's 350D and buy mine soon.

Retrospecting through the last few months, I have come to realise that I am walking with huge weight on my shoulders. No, its not Raju's camera bag:-). The weight I am referring to is of the expectations and dreams. I have realized that I am not just in a process of trying to realize my dreams. I am in fact trying to realize a million dreams. I was not alone, there are a large number of people who were and still are caught in a life they are not really keen on leading. But they do not want to risk an adventure to change things. I decided to break free and yeah I know, my decision had shocked many people. I can hear the words "Your son needs counselling I guess" still ringing in my ears. People who could draw similarities between their lives and mine have regularly been in touch with me. They are hoping I succeed in whatever I have set about doing. They are trying to realize their dreams of breaking free and reaching the pinnacle through me. And my friend, that is a huge pressure situation here. But I seem to love it.

I know that if all shall go well,
I'll be a legend walking with applause.
And if fate shall have its way,
I'll still be a martyr of my own cause.
-Nishant Ratnakar