Pratishtha Pandya

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She finished her dinner but decided not to go to the television set, like she did every day. The children had demanded vegetables in Schezwan sauce with rice tonight. The vegetable vendor did not have any red or yellow capsicums this morning. “Mandi bandh kar diya, madam. Lockdown to hai hi, upar se curfew. Sabzi kahanse layen? Ye sub bhi abhi khet se le ke aate hai [The market is closed, madam. Where to get vegetables in this lockdown, and now curfew? All these I get from the farms],” he lamented when she complained about the same old sabzi he had brought on his cart.He had gone on for a while after that about life’s trials, but she had stopped listening. Her mind was on the creativity that would be needed to cook the evening meal as per demand. At the end of the day she was happy with her idea of coke with the Chinese-Thai gravy that kept the kids quiet. But she was not happy watching television these days.She detested the news channels the most. The same images play again and again on the screen. Poor people without water in slums, safai karamcharis without protective gear, and worse – millions of hungry migrant labourers stranded half-way from home, or stuck in cities, dying without medical care and food, some committing suicide, and many protesting, demanding, rioting on the streets.How long can one watch a spectacle of termites gone berserk? She goes back to WhatsApp, where friends in a group are showing off newfound culinary skills. She puts a picture of her own, from the dinner table. In another group, people are sharing videos of dolphins frolicking in the sea near Breach Candy club in Mumbai, flamingos in Navi Mumbai, the Malabar civet roaming on the roads in Kozhikode, Sambar deer in Chandigarh. Suddenly she sees a row of red ants crawling up her mobile phone…

Red Ants Tiny red ants  came out from a little colony  near the bottom right corner of the doorframe of the kitchen walking in one straight line going upwards first then left and then down and then a straight line again across the kitchen platform marching in single file one after the other like a disciplined lot of labourers.They came every time when Ma dropped some sugar or if there was a dead cockroach on the kitchen floor. She found the sight of these ants pulling each grain or an entire carcass away walking back in the same disciplined fashion nauseous. She would scream her head off until mother came running to her rescue.Today as if to settle scores they invaded her house She wonders how in the middle of the night, like a nightmare, they were there innumerable red ants inside her house. no lines no order no discipline They came out entire colonies like they used to when mother put some Gammaxene powder on the nest mounds-- frantic, agitated, struggling to breathe they invade her home.  She quickly sweeps them out of the living room out into the garden and shuts the door tight. But just then they surface Millions at a time from behind the windowsill from the space underneath the door that can hardly be seen from the cracks in the doorframe from the little keyhole of the main door from the holes of the bathroom drains from the gaps in the white cement Between the tiles of the floor from behind the switchboard from the moist crevices in the walls from the hollowness of the cables from the darkness of the cupboards from the emptiness under the bed traumatised colonies of ants overflow looking for their homes Broken, destroyed, devastated searching for their lives crushed between someone’s fingers suffocating beneath someone’s feet hungry colonies thirsty colonies angry colonies colonies of red bites gasping for breath colonies of red ants.  – Translated by the author from her original poem in Gujarati.Audio: Sudhanva Deshpande is an actor and director with Jana Natya Manch, and an editor with LeftWord Books.

The migrant march of red ants under lockdown

ಲಾಕ್‌ಡೌನ್ ನಲ್ಲಿ ‘ಮಹಾ’ವಲಸೆ ಹೊರಟ ಕೆಂಪು ಇರುವೆಗಳು

লকডাউনের কালবেলায় লাল পিঁপড়ের পরিযান

लॉकडाऊनमध्ये कष्टकरी लाल मुंग्यांची चढाई

তলাবন্ধত আমৰলিৰ দৰে প্ৰব্ৰজনকাৰীৰ পদযাত্ৰা

लॉकडाउन में मार्च करतीं लाल चींटियां

لاک ڈاؤن میں مہاجر چیونٹیوں کی ہجرت

ଲକ୍‌ଡାଉନ୍‌ରେ‌ ‌ନାଲି‌ ‌ପିମ୍ପୁଡ଼ିର‌ ‌ଧାର‌ ‌ଭଳି‌ ‌ପ୍ରବାସୀଙ୍କ‌ ‌ଯାତ୍ରା‌

લૉકડાઉનમાં શ્રમજીવી લાલ કીડીઓનું સરઘસ

தலைப்பு: ஊரடங்கில் சிவப்பு எறும்புகளின் புலம்பெயரும் அணிவகுப்பு

Ahmedabad

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Younger, media-saturated generations are growing up knowing little about their country, but a lot about the elites of a few metros and towns. For a narrowly-owned, commercially-driven media, the dumbing down of a nation is part of standard operating procedure. The last available data of the Centre for Media Studies (CMS, Delhi) show us that reports from New Delhi account for 66 per cent of news on the front pages of major dailies. The CMS data also found that just about 0.24 per cent of front page news came out of rural India. The TV channels are not much better.PARI exists to change that.We are a non-profit organisation. We publish under creative commons, and do not charge readers a subscription fee or put-up advertisements. Nothing is behind a paywall and we are completely free-to-access by anyone. We guard our independence and receive no direct grants from governments and corporations, nor any funding that could dictate our content. So, we are dependent on volunteer labour, donations from individuals, foundations and institutions that see value in independent and free media.PARI is changing the way Indian journalism reports and documents the rural.India is more than the elite of a few metros and towns. We report on rural lives and livelihoods, languages, communities, migrants and more. We need your help to pull off this most ambitious of Indian journalistic endeavours. The scale of this effort costs money. Donate generously - and spread the word about PARI.&nbsp;

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The migrant march of red ants under lockdown

How long can one watch hungry migrant labourers stranded half-way from their villages when there is Chinese-Thai dinner waiting to be prepared at home? A poem that tears into indifference and inequality

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