so there could be a person who dresses up well you know I know a lot of people who dress up well uh and at the same time I I know myself who doesn't like dressing up unless there is something but you get into this film industry at what point did you feel that message which was not falling into the Norms of the industry like I I played a mother very very early in my life that kind of finished my chances off okay finished there's no way in hell did you regret at some point of time shouldn't have done that no at that point of time shefali at the age she was at the time she was she thought it was right there's no point looking back and saying I find it a waste of time that's how you get with life too yeah so tell me when you um when you're done with these kind of roles and because most of them are emotionally draining and you can't probably just switch off so when you come home do you how do you how do you


come home do you how do you how do you unwind what do you do like to uh to just leave that behind and be you know when I'm doing something I am very obsessed with it I love it so I'll come home I'll have a shower I remember when you were doing DC uh after I packed up in the car I would text the first ad and say give me my scenes for the give me the scenes that we're going to do tomorrow uh of course I'd refer to only my script like on set I say don't give me sights I don't want sites because I'll only refer to my script because it has all those notes Etc but I would come back shower I mean if I was in Bombay if I'm doing something else I come back I shower I have dinner with my family it's not like I won't have a conversation but then I go back into okay doesn't just it doesn't just mean the scenes I'm doing tomorrow it means where have I started to lead up


tomorrow it means where have I started to lead up to this hmm you know so almost the entire script but it's not done sequentially you know no it's not no that's why you need to keep referring back and forth is that like is there a dissonance like you're doing something which is end and then you're doing something big no not uh if for me uh what I do is I you know like before exams used to make that little parchy just uh bullet points so in a film you can remember a two-hour film okay a film script when you're doing a show yeah like Delhi crime or human it's eight hours of film how do you remember it yeah but then I make bullet points after every episode it's done very scientifically I do it because I want to refer to the back of it okay you know where where did I leave it to come to this scene okay so yeah I mean that's it works for me so um the Prime Minister said that you know he told his uh his party


said that you know he told his uh his party and he said that do not make these kind of lose comments on films and things like that now where that comes from is it comes from all the trolling that's happening with the Bombay film industry um and everything is now becoming something a controversial topic whether it's the color of a song it is the uh whether it's something is vulgar not vulgar sanskari not sanskari uh everything has to be politically correct some feel that this is because course correction was needed and some feel that this is the time that we are living in where everything comes under scrutiny what's your take I think everything you do comes under scrutiny uh course correction is needed but we live in a democratic country everyone has a right to express uh Cinema is supposed to be taking from society or giving back to society yes there may be certain things and any form of art you know there may be certain things that you don't agree with what you like


things that you don't agree with what you like I may not like a book a painting but that doesn't make that piece of art terrible so what I can do is say I think I don't like it I don't like it but to say it is bad so it's terrible but it has a right to exist it but who decides it's terrible what I mean to say is that if I don't like it and I I think it's terrible so big deal don't watch it yeah yeah that way I mean it is exactly like this yeah you know because I may not like it but Others May love it yeah and you can't scrutinize and fight about everything you've got to pick your battles yeah I just feel we lose you know then the importance or the seriousness of actually raising a point goes down in the drain because you're picking points on everything yeah and it's also causing these Rifts uh in families among friends where you know you don't want to say something you don't want


you don't want to say something you don't want to be associated with something that's what is happening where people are just especially those who are in the Limelight are scared of being misquoted or of being typified do you feel that among your colleagues and all that that media because we're scared I honestly am not very close to my colleagues okay I have very very few friends to say so in the industry uh I have been after DC we got into this whole promotion bit actually and then got into this promotion but I never knew what it was before that and uh I've seen many people talk you know and there are some I totally admire like I admire Vidya yeah because she's very vocal she is herself yes she's not making a point she's not trying to say Gathering she is just herself yeah but there is a niceness of her which comes across yeah it's the same with you I don't think you realize it but you are also come across as a very honest


you are also come across as a very honest person who says what she believes in so you know I think then there is a mutual respect yeah you understand what I'm saying if I'm gonna sit on my high horse and make a statement because I have the privilege of camera to catch it then anyone's going to get offended and say you know then what let's give it back but if there is a genuinity and a niceness to what you're saying then people are going to be like point of view they're going to be more lenient I feel I just feel so and also like Vidya I've seen ranveer he is himself yeah he's just himself yeah a little over the top but that's his style but he is not pretending yeah he's genuinely like that yeah he is so warm he's so boisterous he's so expressive you know I remember meeting ranveer after we did and we met at an award function He Has Lifted Me Up On Stage that is ranveer he


Me Up On Stage that is ranveer he didn't do it for effect you know that is who he is and then there are somebody is there are people who can be extremely measured which is also what I respect yeah you know like there are times when I'm going to go for an interview uh and of course my husband's given up on me on that one but he says please you know and I have like a lot of times he's a very private person he's he's a very um sorted he's from the brain I'm from the heart you know he's sorted he's calmed he evaluates it's he's very uh that kind of a measured person I am like but I've also understood like and move on and move on it's really move on yeah and uh but I I had an experience when I said something and it was taken out of context and it hurt people at home oh you know where I felt fine I feel like this it was taken out of context and it's going to hurt people


out of context and it's going to hurt people I'm not going to do this I have to be conscious to not do it yeah you know I can explain to my children they'll understand Mom said it's no big deal but I can't expect my parents or my in-laws or the elders in my family to go with this stride it's not fair yeah yeah and so tell me does uh you know does criticism trolling does it hurt because you know we we journalists get it too and I've interviewed several journalists and um they said that yeah was it fun to be trolled no to to interview yeah somebody from the same field that is so cool it is and usually it never used to happen no journalist didn't interview journalists yeah right because um I'm still I I mean actually if I think of it I I don't remember no it never used to happen so now and they even if it happened it was regarding an incident what do you have to say about uh like I said


do you have to say about uh like I said Putin visit or right Boris or whatever you know like Obama visits what do you have to say about this Riot or that Riot and you know it was like that but here we were talking about our lives and uh discussing things which like we cover an incident we forget about the incident and then we move to the next incident we criticized by people that you're not there's no consistency you forgot that you know whether it was the upahar cinema right so many times she calls me up and she said you are one of the few who continued to report on that but you've done this wrong so correct it you know and then I correct it what time it was yeah the family calls me up and we do that and it that has gone back almost what 28 years or something like that so if we were talking to each other many of us like get trolled and because everybody says have a thick skin is it possible it's not possible Right it


skin is it possible it's not possible Right it hurts um well honestly I have to I have I feel blessed because I get a lot of love appreciation and respect yes there are going to be people who don't like you but then TK um yeah I mean you don't like me fair enough it's your choice also when people who matter to me have a point of view I will take it seriously but if I'm going to sit and take every single person's point of view and debate it then I'm silly I'm wasting my time and energy and I cut like you know we discussed earlier art is very subjective yeah what you may like I may not and you're absolutely entitled to your opinion I can't let it like put me to sleep when we criticize you for a role or they criticize the way you you essayed it or they the the look that you had your your short your tall your thin your fat you all those things though they don't hurt you when those


those things though they don't hurt you when those come out um very rarely I get it so I'm blessed but uh finally I have to fall back on my director and my vision that is where the film started that is where it ended if my director is happy with what I did the way I looked the way I did a scene or said a line or didn't say a line then I've done my job yeah because it's his story it's our story you're entitled to what you feel about it you don't like it fair enough because actresses are subjected women actors are subjected to a whole lot of how you look I mean Vidya Balan said this I think it was Vidya Balan who said this also that when she put on uh wait for that uh one role that she did and after that it was always this that oh my God look at the way she looks she's overweight and look at the way she dresses nothing that she would do if she would wear anything other than a


would do if she would wear anything other than a sari she came in for a lot of reflex yeah yeah right so it's the the amount of energy expended on how a woman looks uh continues to dog women actors I agree also it's the pressure you know of what is beautiful and that's been going on for a hundred years I mean supermodels are anorexic yeah now we're talking about you know uh beautifully endowed women as models otherwise it was always thin tall Fair straight hair now everyone can't be genetically blessed you know I'm not and not even tall I'm told that there were some actresses who were made to you know stand at a lower level while Romancing the hero who is made to stand on a pedestal because the heroes were not as tall are you serious yes so it's funny so the shot would be the kind I've seen it also in fact where the shot would be and I found it ridiculous that's very funny yeah it's just but it's so amazing that


yeah it's just but it's so amazing that how how difficult is it to accept forget about wearing elevator shoes imagine shooting in a particular manner where the woman looks taller and she is yeah if women are subjected to so much of scrutiny imagine the man's self-worth that he's yeah and did this image of what is Right visually the man is taller than the woman yeah you know but the beautiful woman minus the man is tall and like you said even men are put through that scrutiny yeah oh you're not Beyond five seven yeah you know so it's all the time and it should have moved after the 70s it should have oh no 90s kind of highlighted it no yeah everything was beautiful yeah yeah everything was beautiful the man was he didn't cry he fought he saved the woman uh she was the one who needed this damn cell in distress she needed rescuing yeah he took care of the family he took care of um is that kind of a film was to come to you


that kind of a film was to come to you you'd say no immediately uh where I had to do nothing yeah besides look pretty yeah because what did I go there and do look pretty but that is my hair makeup styling uh doing so that's why it didn't come and what is pretty huh you know what is pretty Vidya looked like hers like that character in dirty picture yeah I've done a film called once again you know which is and I think Tara is beautiful yeah she's not wearing makeup she's wearing crumpled cotton sarees she has her hair tied in a Judah but that's who the character is and she's beautiful in her place I mean if you ask me to pick between Tara and Nila Mera I would pick Tara any day but maybe it's also because I am like that yeah you know for me dressing up is a huge effort it's a huge effort okay and recently with the promotions and all that so it was like a culture shock for me


that so it was like a culture shock for me I was like earlier I have I wear jeans and shirt that's it and earlier though I used to have a uniform I would wear jeans white shirt or white that was the end of the story some people have started calling me a style Diva and I laugh the loudest but if you see me otherwise I'm in pajamas and tone t-shirts I'm in kaftans at home and that I'm very comfortable I'm not trying to make a point here yeah I'm very comfortable but I cannot deny what my team has bought to the table okay you know when they look earlier they would never think of me as Glam huh but now they do so now when uh we trying to end the conversation I still want to ask you about the other thing which uh is talked about a lot because you are you've come from totally an outsider you're not you're not somebody who is Born Into the industry uh you're acting with a whole bunch of people


uh you're acting with a whole bunch of people uh you know who whose dad uncle aunt everybody has been in the industry and this accusation of nepo kids um it's real I think it's not fair but we never talk about that there are a lot of families whether a doctors in generations and their child has chosen to be a doctor we don't talk about that you know uh my skin doctor for example it was always the senior dog and then his kids are also following the same uh specialty so now they're a part of that clinic and they all together work we never pick that up um it's one of my charger has a bookstore which has gone down into the family we never talk about that now how well it does depends on the person who's taking over it the same goes for work if my son today wants to be an actor and I have the ability to give him that platform why won't I but then after the first second film he's gonna have to do it on


second film he's gonna have to do it on himself yeah and how good he is so I think it's really unfair um yeah I I get what you're saying uh but what about the accusation that this there's a clique which will not allow a non-connected I I don't like the word term nepo kid but a non-connected person to rise that they will ensure that uski picture [Music] release now see that is a whole business politically political business strategy manipulation all of that and yes there are people I mean I'm not justifying it yeah I'm not justifying it I believe you have no right to put anyone down I have no right to put anyone down on this set right now I do not they are doing their job it is at par at equal I mean honestly if if anyone messed up this won't be as sure you know as smooth and fairly important absolutely so I do not agree in putting anyone down give them that new chance yes but then there are a lot


that new chance yes but then there are a lot of directors who do not come from this industry who who are Outsiders but they have their actors again who've come from outside and say you know we have a comfortable zone of working yeah and they'll yeah so does that mean that is a click yeah but again yes there is a click you work very early in your career with Manoj bashpai and all who were total Outsiders like you you know and not even from the city they came from Bihar and you know from uttar Pradesh and places like that you worked with them so was there a kinship among you guys that we are The Outsiders I never thought of it like that okay there was a kinship okay and you have that with all you all those who you work with absolutely if you can't have fun on a set okay what's the point I'd be miserable if I went to a set where there was negativity or there wasn't camaraderie and his job is it to bring that


camaraderie and his job is it to bring that about is it actors or is it the director every individuals purely okay and everyone is a part of it okay everyone of the entire filmmaking process absolutely absolutely and do you pick only those kind of places where that comfort factor is there because if it's if it's not that's not your work Zone but you know you don't figure it yes that is what I would choose and I've been lucky but if you have worked with let's say a newcomer or you haven't worked with a director or an actor How will I know unless I'm there yeah and then it's just like okay nobody's ruled about Themis Nobody Does that uh okay we are not best friends but take care okay as far as we're gelling as far as we have chemistry as characters as far as we can communicate and as far as we all come from the same thinking that filmmaking is a much bigger thing than just yourself then we're on the same page okay last question


then we're on the same page okay last question I have to ask you this that uh mental health it's my favorite question with everybody who's in the creative field that to keep yourself mentally healthy uh how important is it for you as a creative person and uh what would you say to youngsters getting into this high stress uh and I say high stress simply because your output has to be quite a bit out here and it has to be creative so what do you what would you recommend to youngsters uh unfortunately it's not just for Creative people but for everybody it probably comes into the Highlight because we are in Limelight uh it is as important or probably more than your physical health no as important uh asking for help acknowledging that there is a problem or something as simple as problem hair and I can't handle this on my own so asking for help and I mean professional help you know I'm hoping that at least today we're moving away from the fact that we it was looked down upon yeah it was silly


it was looked down upon yeah it was silly it's absolutely silly I mean if you have a skin allergy you go to a dermat right yeah so if you have something you can't sort out in your head then it's only fine to go to somebody who you trust who you respect who makes sense and it's extremely important and not running a person down when they're talking about a problem yeah if somebody is saying you know I'm feeling really low just have a coffee have a piece of chocolate let's go out for dinner it might help yeah for all you know that is the solution but if it's consistent then you need to acknowledge okay listen there is somebody is reaching out yeah the moment you rubbish it then you've put a wall against that person so that person can't even reach out yeah and to believe do you think it's time that people like you uh Vidya Balan and Nina Gupta and the others who have faced um who have faced that Autumn at times


faced um who have faced that Autumn at times of not getting films uh or I won't use the word rejection because that's that's harsh but rejection also would you Mentor younger uh it's is it time to Mentor younger girls or younger men also uh to explain that rejection is a part and parcel of the creative process uh I don't think there is a guidebook to life I can say it but I can say it today with age and experience what 16 or 20 year old will feel will feel and I can give all the Gyan in the world but until that person realizes it on his or her own it's not going to ring through but you know there is the fact that I am here today you know when people call me an inspiration I don't know what they're inspired about but I think it's a belief okay some years ago if you saw a 45 if you thought a 45 plus year old woman was going to come into her peak in her career and start leading it would


her peak in her career and start leading it would be it would have been laughed upon but she's doing it you know over there is doing it on energy is doing it and there are so many actors who are doing it so many actors and actresses so it's it is reassuring it is reassuring and you know recently um one of my nieces uh she's a 20-something kid and I got nominated in best actress for one of the big award functions of one of big Awards and um and there are all the top a-listers in that and I got nominated for best actress for Darlings and she said do you know what this means to so many girls that you got put into otherwise it would have been supporting actors supporting yeah but just the fact that they have no option but to recognize you it means so much that you don't have to be conventionally beautiful you don't necessarily only have to be young you don't have to do what is expected of you all the time you can make


is expected of you all the time you can make your own you can be your own person and you can create a space for yourself and there is ample space for a lot of people yeah so just by living the life that you have led becomes uh somewhat of uh an inspiration and uh understanding that it's not the end of the world if you don't get a film or if an actor is not marrying you the reason I'm saying that is because of the suicides that one is hearing and it's heartbreaking to see young girls uh you know their lives just ending in their 20s just because yeah that pressure and that's why I'm saying that mental health and taking care of it and talking to people is extremely important extremely we have not given it enough due even as parents one needs to read absolutely that just because your kids are laughing around and absolutely yeah absolutely I mean I I believed everything was fine and there was a patch that I couldn't handle it you know I was


patch that I couldn't handle it you know I was just realizing that I was becoming a bitter person I was not uppity Etc there were a lot of changes happening around me and I chose to see someone and I still see the same person because what I would do earlier is if I'm feeling down I'll go and see somebody yeah today I go and meet him because everything is good in the world and you can I just came to say hello to you you know which is great and when he started treating me he said it very clearly I don't want you to be dependent on me yeah I cannot change your thinking I can just be a sounding board to you you have to reach that point and your family is supportive when you do this like well honestly even if they want they didn't have an option I love that but I have that space yeah I have that luxury of space to decide what I am doing not a lot of people have it yeah and I really wish we created


people have it yeah and I really wish we created that environment where it's okay to not be okay yeah oh my God yes yes thank you so much for speaking your mind speaking so clearly and being such an inspiration to young actors wishing you all the success thank you you too absolutely my pleasure thank you for watching or listening in to this edition of ani podcast with Smitha prakash do like or subscribe on whichever Channel you have seen this or heard this namaste click here to watch the previous episodes foreign [Music]


it's really important to put the South China Sea in that Global context it is if you like everyone's business it's so vital to International connectivity to Maritime trade countries both from Southeast Asia as well as China would like to push for intensifying the code of conduct negotiations however we've heard that before most recently in 2020 and nothing has come of that in 1990s when the U.S visible from Philippines they take the mysterious if you develop an economic dependence on China then you're in trouble uh in the long run whether that's Australia or whether that's countries elsewhere in the world China's narrative that it is the United States and its warships or other Naval powers that are destabilizing the region those are us keeping helping to keep keep the South China Sea um open Japan possess the Counter-Strike capability and India possessive storage capability China cannot ignore other two sides at the same time foreign welcome to another edition of ani podcast with Smitha prakash this is a special edition which is being recorded at


this is a special edition which is being recorded at the rice Cena dialogue held in March 2023 in New Delhi our topic today is about an issue that could turn into a global flash point the South China Sea Quagmire principles or compromise China is in conflict with its Maritime neighbors and there is an impasse which can negatively impact all of Asia before I introduce the guests here's a short explainer the South China Sea is one of the busiest waterways it has several small islands and the disputes are over the claims made by China Philippines Malaysia Vietnam Taiwan and Brunei over these waterways that date back almost 70 years the disputes have affected Maritime trade as well as bilateral relations between these two countries the U.S is also involved in this dispute as it has Maritime security interests in this region what is India's interest in this dispute were where 55 percent of India's trade passes through the Straits of Malacca which opens into the South China Sea over to the experts we


into the South China Sea over to the experts we have today Dr Lynn Quark Shangri-La dialogue senior fellow for Asia Pacific security at The International Institute for strategic studies Singapore she's got a stellar academic career Lynn Quark is a visiting professor at Georgetown University School of Foreign Service and has held fellowships at Yale law school Harvard Law School Harvard Kennedy School and nus Singapore Dr satoru nagao non-resident fellow at the Hudson Institute USA satoru nagao has held numerous research positions in diplomatic and political field he's also been a security Analyst at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Professor Rory Metcalf professor and head of National Security College Anu Australia he has three decades of experience across diplomacy and intelligence analysis Academia and journalism he's a serving board member member of the national foundation for australia-china relations at the Anu cyber Institute and an Australian representative on the asean regional Forum register of experts and eminent persons Dr Kwok I'll


of experts and eminent persons Dr Kwok I'll begin with you is it possible for China to break the current impasse in the South China dispute the covet years have not seen China showing any signs of accommodation so do you think that this impasse can stop now well I'm thank you first of all for having me on this show um on your question I'm not entirely confident in fact I'm not confident at all that the impasse can be broken there's been recent talks about how countries both from Southeast Asia as well as China would like to push for intensifying the code of conduct negotiations however we've heard that before most recently in 2020 and nothing has come of that and of course if you have to if we think about it these code of conduct negotiations have been in the making for some two decades now with very little to show for um I think there are several things that stand in the way of concluding a meaningful code of conduct which will help to if not break


code of conduct which will help to if not break the impulse but at least to reduce the impulse you know things like the scope of application of the code of conduct um you know whether it should apply to the entirety of the South China Sea is China with one so only in areas of dispute um you know the sort of dispute resolution mechanism whether it should merely be bilateral negotiations with China or parties would have um ability to have course to the mandatory dispute resolution mechanisms and the United the United Nations convention and the law of the sea so there are these stumbling blocks to concluding a meaningful code of conduct that said I think China has every reason to seek to help to reduce tensions um with its neighbors not given that its composition with the United States is fast heating up so I think it makes sense if I were China I would be seeking to reduce tensions with my neighbors especially since those tensions have allowed the United States to forge stronger ties with even erstwell with countries


to forge stronger ties with even erstwell with countries like Vietnam with whom it for two decades worth of a war so um I I think you know if China were thinking strategically about its position in the region it would certainly be seeking to break this impasse and stronger ties with its neighbors and even recharge relationships which had you know stagnated like say maybe with Philippines I'm going going to come to you uh Dr nagao you've studied and written about the role of quad and the closed ties between India and Japan um with regards especially to expansionist China why is there no coordinated strategy among Asian countries to resolve the South China dispute to discharge China's territory expansions we need to check the pattern of China's territory expansion there are three features firstly they ignore the international rule for example what happened in East China Sea is the example before the 1970s they haven't claimed uh island of Japan is their territory so since 1971 they realized how important and they start to say


they realized how important and they start to say they said claimed this is a territory but this is ridiculous view from the international law and secondary is when they find the power vacuum they try to steal it so for example what happened in South Genesis is the 1950s when France visual from this region they take the hakos para Sera Iran in 1970s when U.S research another half of the parasail island taken by China and in 80s it went Soviet troops withdraw from Vietnam the they take the sixth speech of the spiritually around in 1990s when the U.S withdraw from Philippines they take the Mischief leave so they are safe they when they find the power vacuum the spirit military balance has changed the spirit that is a pattern and the sad pattern is their effort is including economic effort to other aspect not only the military that is another effort so be a real right one example so to deter China stereo expansion on how to do that and yesterday their budget is increasing


to do that and yesterday their budget is increasing very high so to maintain military bonds we should increase self-defense budget that's true but China is Rich not easy so that's why another method is needed that's why quad that we can point it out to the China's expansion in South Tennessee if the class before country corporate China need to divide their budget the maruti direction against Japan against India against the Southeast Asian countries because corporations Support Services a countries by using the cloud framework and so that's why to maintain military balance built from the budget this Corporation is effective so China cannot move even in the South China seeks we cooperate enough that's why kuat in the South China Sea issue is combined long explanation thank you very much okay so that's kind of revolutionary or should I say that would make China more uh wary or even Russia more wary about you know have the quad getting military connotations uh Professor Metcalf I come to you you know Australia is seen as a kind of a middle


know Australia is seen as a kind of a middle power in uh and an ally of the US which has interests in South China see can it risk a conflict with China and um will it engage more for conflict resolution now uh especially with the quad as uh you know was said that the court has strategic interests now so will it become more uh involved in conflict resolution solution Luke thank you uh and I think that Australia's role like so many other powers in the world is one of a stakeholder in the security and stability of the South China Sea I think it's really important to put the South China Sea in that Global context it is if you like everyone's business it's so vital to International connectivity to Maritime trade Global Commons fisheries and also as a a laboratory if you like as to whether multiple Nations can resolve essentially territorial differences and I will come back to answer about Australia but just to note that um you know there are some there are some green shoots some positive signs


some there are some green shoots some positive signs look at Indonesia and Vietnam for example essentially agreeing uh on the demarcation of their EU said boundaries recently so there are law-based solutions if players and of course the big player being China were ever willing to actually count Nance where Australia comes into the picture is you're right as a stakeholder as an ally of the United States but also as an independent power in the indo-pacific and I guess I believe our government's trying to do multiple things here on the one hand you know we're asserting our rights as uh if you like a power that that um relies on the South China Sea for our own economy so rights of overflight Transit freedom of navigation are of great interest to Australia even if we're not doing traditional you know or conventional funnels but our air force does Maritime surveillance there as we've done for 30 or 40 years and we are interested in a strategic balance an equilibrium in the region uh where China can't be


equilibrium in the region uh where China can't be coercive or assertive at the expense of others but we're also interested in preventing escalation and I think that I I wouldn't necessarily call it conflict resolution because we're a long long way from that but Australia like so many other powers now has an interest in ensuring that on the one hand uh aggressive action is deterred but that in doing that we're not further destabilizing the situation so therefore there's a lot of talk now of guard rails of confidence building measures of risk reduction measures the code of conduct may not be the solution there because as we've heard it's moved at a glacial pace and and China has almost sought to weaponize those negotiations in ways that exclude legitimate Global stakeholders in the South China Sea from actually being in the South China Sea but there is I think A Renewed interest now in using for example Regional fora Regional groupings to set some standards to reduce the risks of conflict and escalation there and


reduce the risks of conflict and escalation there and that's something that I would encourage India for example to take a closer interest in um it's particularly irked of that Australia about August and uh it sees that it's born out of a cold war mentality uh some of the politicians are even making veiled threats uh against Australia um what is the perception in Australia is China viewed as a threatening power at all or does trades surmount everything else there are so many answers to that question there's so many questions embedded there um because I think the the long story of the australia-china relationship just as China's relations with many other powers over the past decade has been that uh you can't separate the economics and the security of the economics and the strategy if you develop an economic dependence on China then you're in trouble uh in the long run whether that's Australia or whether that's countries elsewhere in the world uh you mentioned the um the technology sharing Arrangement that's been uh labeled orcas but


sharing Arrangement that's been uh labeled orcas but that's really just one piece of a much larger Regional puzzle of balance so orcas is essentially Australia working with two very trusted Partners to build uh Stronger capabilities so that a stronger Australia can be a stronger partner to others in the region the fact that we're now considering building uh the kinds of submarines that China already has all over the South China Sea so don't forget that in a sense Australia like others you know whether it's India or Japan or others it's literally trying to catch up and balance and protect our interests of course that's lurking China because it's it's reinforcing the realization in Beijing that it can't dominate the region so it's going to play a very aggressive campaign of disinformation to suggest that somehow those reacting to China's military modernization are the destabilizers whereas the truth is precisely the other way around and to conclude on that point where the current Australian government is going I think is a relationship of


Australian government is going I think is a relationship of stabilizing ties with China but not walking back on any of the national security measures we've taken to protect our interests as a sovereign power and that includes developing uh substantial Naval capabilities such as through orcas uh Lynn I'm going to come back to you you're in you know um you're based in Singapore so not technically so close to the South China Sea problem but you know you've been watching the the whole quad uh fracas which happened here in New Delhi uh the foreign ministers meeting uh apparently the South China Sea did come up for discussion and the statement is indicative that the members kept reiterating that quad is not a military Alliance but Russia doesn't believe in that China of course will not believe that um and there are strong overtones about China you know the whole thing that they're saying we strongly support I'm quoting we strongly support the principles of Freedom rule of law sovereignty territorial Integrity peaceful settlement of


law sovereignty territorial Integrity peaceful settlement of disputes without resorting to a threat or use of force freedom of navigation overflight oppose any unilateral attempt to change the status quo all of which are essential to the peace stability prosperity of the indo-pacific region and Beyond these are all uh veiled uh you know may not be threats but signaling to China isn't it yes I think the short answer to your question is yes um I think there are implicit availed criticisms of China's behavior in the South China Sea in that statement um you know you you mentioned um the quad earlier and how it's perceived in the region I think the first point to note is that whereas when we first start um in the when the indo-pacific concept or strategy first emerged you know a few years ago countries in Southeast Asia were very hesitant to kind of go on board with that concept because they're worried about what China might think what it might mean for asean ETC um come the quad when that came


asean ETC um come the quad when that came along I think you saw countries um in a sense being more accepting of alternative I guess Frameworks or architectures or overlapping architectures for helping to manage disputes in the region or you know the balance the power in the region so for instance Singapore it said that the quad was to be welcomed if it if it brought greater peace and stability to the region and if it you know complemented asean's role in the region as well um and you had the Philippines foreign minister then um who talked about the quad um being welcomed because you know frankly um asean didn't didn't seem able of on its own managing the Region's problems and the Region's problems are many um it's it's China's behavior in the South China Sea the sort of um you know objections to valid assertions of Rights navigational rights and freedoms um that you highlighted in the statement it's you know the implicit threat or use of force to resolve those disputes um


or use of force to resolve those disputes um and it's it's encroachments upon the exclusive economic zones of various Coastal states in the South surrounding the South China Sea which really is the bread and butter or the fish and oil and gas which helps sustain the livelihoods of in many case is very poor Southeast Asian countries so so yes those statements uh that statement was in fact a veiled criticism of China's Behavior but um I think going beyond that I think we also need to think a little bit about how you know other countries might be contributing to instability in the region I I don't buy China's narrative that it is the United States and its warships or other Naval powers that are destabilizing the region by its warships I think those are us keeping helping to keep keep the South China Sea um open um by asserting lawful navigational rights and freedoms but I think there are certain acts that perhaps could be avoided you know like painting the current um geopolitical


you know like painting the current um geopolitical competition between the United States and China as having an ideological basis I don't think that necessarily helps improve the situation because it introduces more problems into the a ready mounting list of problems that the United States and China already face speaking of Warships like why has the U.S Navy sent Nimitz um it's one of the oldest nuclear part uh ships what combat value can it bring you know I think the us as well as other Naval Powers France um for instance or even other European Towers Australia Etc I mean they sent um various Naval vessels into the region perhaps sometimes to demonstrate um strength and resolve but also there's a symbolic value to these various um uh deployments I think it's very important um that the us as well as others sent Naval vessels to the region to highlight that they are merely asserting lawful rights and that are vested under the United Nations convention and the law of the sea when they apply the


and the law of the sea when they apply the um the the Waters of the South China Sea and um I think you know we shouldn't always be thinking about military might and and what you know a specific asset brings to the table in terms of military might we must also think about what it means the Optics but symbolically so when Europe or the middle Powers sent vessels to the region to support or promote the rules-based order I think that sends a strong message it sends the message that it isn't just about you as China competition what's at stake here isn't you know U.S China competition and the U.S seeking to dominate the region over China but it's also about just you know we're concerned about the rules-based order we're concerned about what happens in the region we're concerned that you know if there are disputes that's fine but let's have the disputes um resolved or managed in accordance to international law the guardrails that um before we mentioned earlier right


the guardrails that um before we mentioned earlier right uh Dr nagar I'm going to come to you um the Philippines is in talks to possibly include Australia and Japan um in Sea patrols with the US so one question on that and the second question is that you know the countries in the immediate vicinity of China they face similar kind of threat but I'm gonna I asked you this even in the beginning why is there no coordinated system to deal like a coordinated security system you talked about increasing military budgets but there needs to be more than that to secure these regions don't you feel coaster coordination is best but all these countries are so voluntary country independent country so they have their attitudes they have their strategy so coordination is a very tough job in this case of course United should show the leadership in this region for a long time haven't spoke system is a main system to maintain the balance haban spoke means that United States is Central and based on the bilateral Alliance and


is Central and based on the bilateral Alliance and between the U.S and Japan U.S and Australia U.S and the Philippine bilateral basis Alliance consists the whole security system in this case all of the information gets at the United States but Japan Philippines do not share the information Japan also really do not share the information even if they arrived of the United States so so in this case if the coordination moved we should establish in this case U.S lead or of the activity but United States need to deal with many issues in the world now so in this case they need to deal with Russia ukrana or they need to deal with the Middle East so the under such kind of situations United States asked to arise should share more security but in this region and Japan tried to reply Philippine tried to reply it so coordination has just started so under such situations this coordination has is improving but under process not established like a NATO because they have the wrong history but we do not have the wrong


the wrong history but we do not have the wrong history in this region in the indo-pacific that's why that coordination hasn't happened but improving that is my answer to your question I think right do you think that there is a hesitation in that that we don't want to become a NATO uh NATO because you can compare as a geographical area the nature of the European in America based Maps Europe is very so it is more easy to coordinate but in the Pacific very very big so in this case in this case the coordination is a very very big tough job so of course if we can establish this Asian NATO it will be a very effective way to deter China that's true China has uh China's era is only one North Korea the 3D base arrives on North Korea and Russia and the Pakistan they will be the partner but not United United States side 52 arise evenings will only count 30 pesos right and so coordination itself is very difficult but achieves some part of it not China


difficult but achieves some part of it not China the United States has achieved and this number of the coordination is decisive factor in the last three competition in the past the World War One the 32 buses four decided to win and World War II the 54 passes 54 wing and the cold war between US and Soviet in 54 wing and the 26 rules so in this case this number is very big important so that's why you are right the coordination of the many country is very important but because of this many countries it is not easy to active that's what happens so Rory I'm going to come back to you uh you know is this this Hub and spoke and bilateral uh security uh uh mechanisms uh will that work or is there possibility of a new indo-pacific security initiative coming up in the near future well I think I'd I'd reinforce the assessments of my colleagues on the panel here about the complexity of the regional security architecture there's no one-size-fits-all there's no uh


architecture there's no one-size-fits-all there's no uh there's no Regional NATO nor is the region going to solve all of its problems purely through the the well-meaning multilateralism of of asean or Asian Centric institutions there's I guess a multi-layered solution here or at least a multi-layered way of managing a strategic problem and the Strategic problem is at one level ensuring that coercion uh doesn't succeed that that might does not make right but also that stability can be maintained in the process The Hub and spokes model where the United States was the center of a system of bilateral alliances it still exists but it's evolving and we're now seeing of course the spokes being connected so a web Arrangement the quad obviously is is important and that but also the trilaterals Australia Japan the United States you know Australia Japan India Japan India the United States you can go on uh we're even doing things now with the French or with the Indonesians as well and so all of that I see essentially as


well and so all of that I see essentially as adjuncts to or supports to the um you know the alliance based system that is where deterrence resides deterrence against China resides through the U.S and its bilateral alliances but to manage stability so deterrence in the bilateral alliances soft balancing through the mini laterals um you know the three and the four-sided polygons but then stability can be reinforced through the multilateral and multi-polar nature of the region so you know the asean regional Forum the East Asia Summit all of these institutions that so far have underperformed and so far have not lived up to their promise but actually have strategic stability confidence building preventive diplomacy written into their mandates mandates which actually China accepted once upon a time we don't need to create a whole new indo-pacific security architecture and that may say sound a little strange coming from someone who's a strong advocate of the indo-pacific as a strategic system but of course a one-size-fits-all that brings in


but of course a one-size-fits-all that brings in all of the small countries of the region is going to be incredibly unwieldy it's the mini laterals like the quad that can provide the glue that connects the other parts of the system you know the qualities I think as we heard in this conference at Racine are a lighthouse I call it a kind of an island of trust and we've got to keep expanding that island of trust you know the quad engaging with other partners in development and capacity building and all the while keeping open the door for communication with China because in many ways there's nothing that there's nothing that's sort of accommodating or surrendering about having a a relationship of dialogue with China it's actually trying to persuade China that all of these other diplomatic arrangements are there for a stability that is actually I think going back to your point then in China's interest um so let's keep that message so what is the red line that that could make uh things difficult


the red line that that could make uh things difficult for China I would suppose they were to if the military drills that they're doing right now with Taiwan if they cross over if that happens then what because is is that a plan B right now what you're seeing is this um loosely held uh Hub and spoke model but what happens if there is some kind of a direct conflict then what happens so you're taking us to a a very Grim place here but you know after the Ukrainian situation you have to have that yeah no I'll answer the question I mean it is the it is the quick question what happens when you know literally the balloon goes up yeah uh in in you know in the in in the ugliest way possible uh well I wouldn't in that context I wouldn't call Hub and spokes loose I mean the uh the US Japan Alliance the US Australia Alliance they are serious alliances uh with mutual obligations and although I think it's difficult


mutual obligations and although I think it's difficult to speculate about what the deterrent balance or response would actually look like in a Taiwan conflict it would be formidable and the whole point of course is to ensure that the conflict doesn't happen in the first place so I would argue that um a U.S led strategic response to whether it's a Taiwan crisis whether it's an East China Sea conflict whether it's a South China Sea conflict you know there are so many flash points I mean there's and then of course we haven't talked about India China as well um that's one vital part of the deterrent puzzle but I think what isn't really well understood yeah he is what an immediate Global crisis a Taiwan conflict would be just as the Ukraine war Russia's aggression against Ukraine precipitated a global crisis even more so I think in the case of Taiwan you know so many countries would have to shut down their economic relations with China overnight which would be catastrophic


relations with China overnight which would be catastrophic for China and the global economy if we can weaponize that message ahead of time and that's a message to every Global stakeholder it's a message to Europe it's a message to to India and to others then I think we actually stand a chance of preventing that disaster you speak of in the first place right Lynn I'm going to come to you you know at the Munich security conference earlier this year the Indian external affairs minister said and I'll quote him for 45 years there was peace there was stable border management and then no military he's talking about India China and then no military casualties On the Border since 1975. that changed because we had agreements with China not to bring military forces to the border which is the line of actual control that we have and the Chinese violated those agreements he went on to stay say that the state of the Border will determine the state of the relationship and uh so how does the world see the


relationship and uh so how does the world see the India China border conflict we talked about Taiwan with Rory how does the world see the India China border conflict is it as concerned as it is with the Taiwan situation or with the maritime conflicts which are going on China's Maritime conflicts in East Asia and the South China Sea I think the suggestion in your question is a correct there's a correct one namely that the concern about the India China border dispute is less in the region um than it is say over the South China Sea um uh dispute give in Taiwan of course given I guess the geographical you just feel a bit more geographically distant from the India um China dispute that said I think it is a very important dispute um in so far as if it is resolved by force that undermines um the UN Charter against the use of force and more broadly undermined international law and so I think just as I have very strongly advocated that all countries should be


have very strongly advocated that all countries should be concerned about the Russian invasion of Ukraine I would similarly say that all countries should be concerned that the dispute over the Indian China border I think that too should be resolved in accordance with international law and countries should be concerned about that as well you know who owns what where I think that's less important so in the South China Sea my concern is less over the territorial dispute because countries can argue perhaps by showing evidence that you know one or another has a better claim over these features in this these land features in the South China Sea what concerns me there is that the maritime domain where there are clear principles under the United Nations convention and the law of the sea that has to be clearly delimited or attributed or Sovereign rights given under the convention so you know the adherence to the rule of laws that part of it is very important so perhaps countries you know do not need to take a position on who


know do not need to take a position on who has a better claim on the disputed border but they do need to take a strong position that you know international law should be upheld and there should be no use of force on that border Dr nagao I'm going to come to you final questions the same question which I asked how does the world and how does Japan see the India China conflict the Border conflict want that and the second question is you know since the wars Japan's military budget um it it hasn't increased so much as we saw now uh I think 836 billion is what the military budget is for the next fiscal it seems to indicate to us that Japan is is preparing for some kind of a conflict so tell us how that happens because you said military budgets I'm going to go back to that early point that you made that military budgets have to be stepped up in this region if we have to be pragmatic about the conditions that we have right now


pragmatic about the conditions that we have right now in Asia yeah that is a very good question I think um I repeat it research how to maintain military balance is the main point of the county China Stars that's true so how dividing the China's budget in the morality direction is a good way if Japan possess the Counter-Strike capability and India possesses the storage capability China cannot ignore the two sides at the same time Australia I will possess a submarine based cruise missile capability and so in this case China cannot ignore the attack from Australia even if the submarine is located far from China so that's why the cloud will work to maintain military balance if they possess the strike capability with the United States and all of the whole country will process the strike capability but at the same time to deter China's Invasion to Taiwan or China's expansion and territory in the South China Sea indeed other aspects is also needed for example [Music] something like that because other countries will not react it so that's why


because other countries will not react it so that's why we should not rely on the trade with China should diverse or we should not rely on China anyway in this case data is also needed that's why TPP the ipf this kind of the economic framework you suggest or Japan tried to indeed character tpps not American project no Japan despite America said first time and another method is also the international status of Taiwan in Taiwan is independent country yes no one doubted indeed but China said this is not so we need to write their status in this case it looks like when the China in Bay Taiwan in this case everyone see this is Invasion this is a violation of the international in this case many countries support Taiwan so China expects such kind situation and gave up to invade that is the ideal situation for us um and China's Invasion so in this case the contribution of the India is very important and the Japan in Japan why they focusing on National Security strategy now is because there is a


on National Security strategy now is because there is a possibility the situation will appear the China can invade Taiwan soon that's why we must be tight we cannot ignore Taiwan if the uh China start to embed if the Japan will not allow the United States to support Taiwan automatically China can win in Taiwan we think that's why Japan cannot escape from the situation we need to support us we need to support Taiwan so that's why the Taiwan crisis is emerging we must do something we must do something but in this case India's role is also very important in this when we check the India's diplomatic activity to what I want indeed India is rising taiwan's status in internal stage the data started in 1995 to start to start re-established a development condition with Taiwan uh informal and the two since the 2008 when we checked a public document of India that we cannot find any word of the one China policy so so India's in the survivors foreign minister he pointed out in 2014 if China asked


he pointed out in 2014 if China asked India to adamito and China policy Asia China should accept one India policy and this means China gave up and accepted this is in this territory so that is the right thing because yes India's crime is a legal one right one that's why so India's right but in this case India's activity activity to Taiwan rise intensive status of Taiwan and prevent China's Invasion to a Taiwan I think so that's why India's role is very important I think I should stop it wrong explanation no that's right uh Rory I'm going to come to you uh one the same thing you know which we discussed how does the world view the India China conflict which uh you mentioned early the second one is that you know uh asean region you mentioned the asean region now for almost 10 years whenever I would go to cover the asean uh Meats I would always see that you know there's this consensus actually that that America that erosion of America's strength in the asean region had


erosion of America's strength in the asean region had started taking place in the india-pacific region uh and the Dynamics of you know I think America got involved with their own issues they were not paying attention to what was happening in the indo-pacific that kind of changed with quad to some extent and uh you know with uh with President Trump um China kind of capitalized on that that ignoring that America did correct me if I'm wrong on this is it too late now uh for the American involvement has the horse left now there's no point bolting the door good questions there's a lot they look on on the uh the India China relationship um I think it's it is important that the International Community focuses much more on this I think the uh really the violence uh in Golan Valley in 2020 was a very very bracing moment internationally the the dockland uh incident in 2017 likewise and speaking personally I would like to see more countries really openly um recognizing uh I guess that India has uh


um recognizing uh I guess that India has uh has really been the target of quite an aggressive position by China on on the border and and supporting India more more openly now I don't think that the quad is going to turn magically into a military Alliance I don't think you're going to see and I don't think India want you know direct Military Support if you like the front line on on the disputed Border in Himalayas but there's all kinds of indirect support that the court and other partners should be giving to India at every stage of this dispute whether it's in uh you know whether whether it's in capability whether it's in intelligence whether it's diplomatically and likewise I think that's they're the kinds of expectations we would place on India if there were crises in in East Asia going to your question about asean and and really the broader region and the American role here you know I think that the um the death of America as a decisive power in the indo-pacific has been


a decisive power in the indo-pacific has been prematurely announced many times and I think now is another of those occasions uh I think what the Biden Administration is demonstrating is that America is back in a comprehensive way and importantly it's not only in a military sense it's also improving from a low base if you like geoeconomic engagement but it's improving it and of course there's a big base if you think about private sector American Investment in the region which is massive so we need to somehow mobilize that for the strategic competition America will stay in my view in the indo-pacific the United States is serious about competing with China it cannot compete with China without playing a strategic role in the world's pivotal region and I think both sides of American politics Now understand that so the friends of the United States and allies we just have to help shape and moderate that role in ways that support stability as well as deterrence and there's a role there for asean


deterrence and there's a role there for asean I think the asean institutions that we speak of there while they may underperform in some ways have maintained levels of dialogue levels of internal balance and stability within asean and really now is the time for those institutions and leaders within those institutions to step up and send concerted messages to China that it can't dominate this multi-polar region right thank you so much gentlemen thank you Dr Lynn thank you so much for explaining this very complex uh issue about the South China conflict thank you so much thank you so much thanks thank you thank you for watching or listening into this episode of a i podcast with Smitha prakash at the raisina dialogue namaste click here to watch the previous episodes [Music]


when a member of their Community assassinated gandhiji What followed was also wrong and it's never talked about which is this massive rioting against the maharashtrian Brahman Community saw workers brother Narayan was dragged out of his house and stoned to death the revolutionaries remember are modernists after Independence the revolutionaries were deliberately pushed out of the National Power structure the single most important event that led to Indian freedom is the naval Revolt it is unnecessarily foisted on the uh Indian Muslim most of them are descendants of Indians not of turkey Invaders mughals did try to make their way back and Babar is absolutely clear why he came to India he came for the gold he says so himself Dyer was actually given a sarupa in in the Golden Temple now that is bad in itself but when you go there you realize that the jallianwala bagh and the golden temple are 300 meters apart idea of khalistani movement interestingly even today comes from exactly those same


movement interestingly even today comes from exactly those same gurudwaras that had been infiltrated with Hawkinson 100 years ago the BBC program that was recently done very controversial one what is interestingly that much of this is actually done by people of Indian ethnic origin India is a rising power and so many of the deep State and corporate and geostrategic interests um will want to trip us Namaste Jain welcome to another edition of ani podcast with Smitha prakash today my guest is noted historian and Economist Sanjeev sanyal Sanjeev is very active on social media and he's a hot favorite at litfest where he talks about Indian history its biases which he says are nehruvian Colonial and Marxist in nature his critics say that he placed a majoritarian biases but there is no doubting his scholarship he's the recipient of the Eisenhower Fellowship named young Global Leader by the world economic forum and adjunct fellow at The Institute of policy studies at the nus Singapore fellow at the


policy studies at the nus Singapore fellow at the Royal geographical Society London visiting scholar at the Oxford University and because Sanjeev sanyal is member of the economic advisory Council to the prime minister of India and help prepare six editions of the economic Survey of India there will be a few questions on the state of the Indian economy but first about his book revolutionaries the other story of how India won its freedom Sanjeev thank you so much for coming on the podcast you've done a whole lot of TV interviews about your book um you know I had on the podcast Jay said Deepak and Vikram sampath who spoke about how Indian history was one-sided now most of us the only source of history as such was that what we read in school textbooks and now all of you are coming out a whole bunch of you are coming out authors um telling us that our history narrative narration which was there in our textbooks was one-sided was colored and you're coming out with these stories


was colored and you're coming out with these stories making us rethink that you know why weren't we told about all this earlier why was our history so colored so biased so first of all thank you very much Smitha for having me on your show um why did I write the book uh well it's a multiple uh factors yeah obviously one part of it of course as many people have guessed many of the characters on the book are directly related to me so I had some interest in those characters I knew some of them incidentally many of them lived into the 1980s but I think the real thrust of why I went into this is somehow the story of India's Freedom struggle never quite added up and yes you did hear you know there was a you know netaji did this and bhagat Singh did that kind of thing the odd um anecdote but you always got the impression that never quite added up to anything so at some point in time I began to investigate it myself I'm


time I began to investigate it myself I'm a curious sort of Chap and a completely different story began to emerge out of that um as I said it's coincidental that I am also related to some of these people and they told me anecdotes but I never quite made sense of them till I really read this began researching this book so um you do mention about the sanyal family you put photographs also in the book um and like they said you say that they spoke to you many of us but not when your children you know like grown-ups telling you that oh we did this oh we did that and this is what your uncle was don't pursue it further but something must have motivated you that no I've got to you know go dig deeper into this because it's so well researched you've gone to libraries you've actually gone to those locations you've been to the jail cells some of the things that you write about the torture in the jails and all it's


the torture in the jails and all it's very it's very moving it's very disturbing even and the number of things uh you know like the plots that you talk about uh in fact there are many times where somebody came late you know they were supposed to escape and then I wonder if if only we had cell phones in those times sending location okay this is where I'm going to be and just have pick me up and I will escape in so many things that happened that went wrong wrong so tell me when did you decide that okay these distortions were there uh somewhere there are gaps as you say when did you decide okay I'm going to pursue this so I didn't consciously think about this start with do you remember that before I began researching this I was already writing books so I had already written a bunch of books and at some point in time just out of curiosity I was also reading some of the uh these characters I some of these incidents are mentioned even in


characters I some of these incidents are mentioned even in uh ocean of churn for example not in detail but I mentioned them along the way so at some point I had gathered enough material that a picture began to emerge for example um I began to get a bandage even sachindra sanyas by autobiography into English it's not yet been published it will come out hopefully end of this year but in the very preface of that he says I'm the reason I'm writing this book because I feel that uh a few chapters of Indian history uh will otherwise not be truthfully written so there is this premonition he already has that the story of the Revolutionary somehow uh you know swept under the carpet and or Mr presented and he felt that he had to write his own testimony and so when I read that it felt like oh my God uh he's almost speaking to me uh saying that you you know you need to go out there and write our story uh and you you've written about


and write our story uh and you you've written about both sides of your family yes uh in a part of the freedom struggle tell us about that so um both sides of my mother's and father's family were in the freedom struggle both of them uh related to the uh revolutionary the armed struggle part of the freedom struggle so my father's family they're Bengali but they had settled in Varanasi uh in the late 18th century there's still a neighborhood there called Bengali Tola and they were very famous Vedic Scholars and over time they intermarried with a wider community of sanyas and lahiris and others who settled in that area you may even have heard of Lahiri Masha who gave modern kriya yoga it's modern form he is a great great great grand Uncle of mine so so they were they were living there and what they did was interestingly they ran a Vedic school and an attached akara and as I tell you in the book this network of akadas across


you in the book this network of akadas across India really became the driving force of the initial and some of the I.E the Revolutionary movement so uh just a small explainer to uh guests who liver our listeners who live abroad what is in Akada and uh how how what was the connection with anushilan so akadas are essentially gymnasiums you can call them but they are quasi-religious gymnasium so they're not secular places you hang out there and just do weights they were they have existed since ancient times in India these networks were very important to resistance to foreign invasions in the past whether it's the Turks the mughals the Europeans and so on and they had been basically defanged in the course of the 19th century by the British um and sort of taken away from the Quasi religious military role and increasingly sort of secularized into uh sort of the gymnasiums of sports clubs what srirobindo does is he he just he he understands that this


does is he he just he he understands that this is what's happening this is the this is the turn of the 19th or 20th century first decade of the night of the 20th century and he says that let's convert or sort of revive this network and use it to fight the British and so akadas are called different names in different parts of the country north India it's uh it's called akara but for example in the southern tip of India it's called akaladi or an Assam it's called so there is a network of these across India and has already always existed uh young men Sometimes women as well went into three zakaras and you know they still exist in in more traditional parts of our cities and and Villages more like an artistic form in many places right like yeah but it was not history directly the artistic thing it was a real place to learn real martial arts for War and the reason we despite these uh hundreds of years of foreign occupation there was always some


hundreds of years of foreign occupation there was always some resistance going on had a lot to do with these akadas okay and the connection with anushilan samiti anushul and samiti basically is this is the name by which by the way the revolutionaries call themselves and why do they call themselves a strange name because Anisha and samithi literally means the discipline committee that's because this is all this is actually a network of these akharas where these young men Sometimes women as well would basically meet each other and these revolutionary ideas would spread so this is what the Revolutionary movement called itself anushilan samiti and of course my family were involved in this akharas both so this is my father's family as I said in the Varanasi they're running Bengali Tula which means it's basically a Bengali school they're still a Bengali Tola into college there set up by my family and attached to that there were these akharas which they also ran so this is one branch of the family


also ran so this is one branch of the family and this Branch included people like Sachin the Nathaniel of course Very famously but many of his cousins Brothers the whole family were involved in this movement and some of them are mentioned in the book yeah some of them are hint too I I actually didn't mention everybody because then it would begin sounding too much like a family history um so that's my father's family and they were then thrown out of Varanasi and all their properties were confiscated around about 1927 by the British by the British as a result of the um the kakori conspiracy sent off to kalapani for the second time to Cellular jail to Cellular jail but um what happens is that my branch of the family ends up in uh what is now prior garage but then and of course there is a link to um what happens then uh in allahabad as well it becomes a hub of uh revolutionary activity can you also talk about the the that it was so


you also talk about the the that it was so traumatic that nobody ever from the sanyal family lived in Varanasi again or something like that to them no it was not so much dramatic we've just thrown out so we didn't have anywhere to go back to so nothing okay but it that whole process when he was sent to Cellular jail was difficult absolutely difficult because everybody's just uprooted to throw down and then different people made their way another Branch went off to gorakhpur by the way so and so on and so in some sense uh that family then sort of dispersed this one part I'm going to come to this which I had taken out and you know it he says nonetheless sanyal's main concern was to find I'm reading it out uh nonetheless sanyal's main concern was to find a way to free the remaining political prisoners from yes so then he goes and he says he met with Madan mohal malviya gave him a patient hearing but didn't offer


gave him a patient hearing but didn't offer any concrete he gets disappointed sanyal gets disappointed then he goes to meet jawala nehru in gorakhpur after hearing him out nehru commented quote at a time when we are planning to go to jail you want us to help others come out of prison this comment stunned sanyal and then he goes to Lala he met la la offers unconditional support so here was your ancestor who is going Pillar To Post trying to get people out of cellular jail because he had experienced it whereas the others who were the moderate so-called moderates they hadn't experienced that trauma absolutely so Sachin sanyal basically he you know he's my grand Uncle not my grandfather he comes back from cellular jail he is then one of the things he wants to do is to free all those people back that he's left behind by the way he describes how he felt somewhat guilty of being actually freed yeah the survivor's gift yeah


being actually freed yeah the survivor's gift yeah so survivor's guilt and he comes back and he's trying to explain to people that look Cellular's jail is not like any other jail they are literally torturing people on a daily basis to break them they're working them to Deaths they are electrocuting them they're just behaving atrociously with them this is not like being sent off to the luxury wing of 90 jail or something like that where you have books and books and you can listen to parrots yes and you know or play badminton and other things this is a serious Place uh where you get tortured on a daily basis and then he suddenly realizes that nobody quite gets this that you know cellular jail is is a totally different uh ball game as a prison and so he's trying in that passage he's trying to basically incite some sort of a movement to try and free all these other people uh but nobody seems to listening to it finally in 1920 goes to


to listening to it finally in 1920 goes to the nagpur session and where he is able to yeah uh sort of uh make a call for freeing some of them and not particularly successfully because I think savarkar it takes several more years for savarkar to be allowed to return to the mainland many more years before he's actually freed yeah and so on so that savarkar uh what you write about savarkar is also very moving the torture that he faced and all I mean so many have written about uh you know what about savarkar's life but every time I read something it it's a new facet to the man anyway we spoke about your dad's side of the family let's go to the mom's side of the family now so my mom's side of the family my mother's father's family interestingly their sort of uh they were the the surname is chakravarti and my great great grandfather uh was a gentleman called mohini Mohan chakravarti Mohan chakravarti is a revolt


Mohan chakravarti is a revolt against the British was actually to set up a cotton mill and in in this is following East Pakistan this is now in Bangladesh uh in a place called kushtia uh it was it was at one stage one of the largest Mills uh cotton Mills in Asia called mohini Mills how is it a rebellion it was a rebellion because he actually set it up um as a part of the uh attempt to create indigenous Industries uh following the 1905 uh uh swadeshi andolan now why I want to make this point is quite interesting is you see the word swadeshi has ended up being utilized as uh later on by gandhiji to as some sort of a return to the past to a pre-modern uh Utopia but the original idea of sudeshi was actually to be modern rapid modernization and so there were many uh Indians but specifically bengalis who went out there and began to sort of attempt to create new modern uh Indian Enterprises so mohini


to create new modern uh Indian Enterprises so mohini Mills was an attempt to do exactly that and he was very very successful it's a different matter it fell on the wrong side of the border and then so this is another interpretation of certain Concepts yes that that had a very linear explanation as far like you said about swadeshi that it was we were told in our history texts in schools was that it was this go back to the Simplicity of wearing unstitched cloth and weaving your own uh cloth but it wasn't that absolutely no it's exactly the opposite opposite because the original proponents of this line of thought by the way they all linked to the Revolutionary movement because the revolutionaries remember are modernists uh they are not attempting to go back to uh feudal India and the old ability or whatever it is they're entirely about moving forward to a Democratic Republic and they're all about modernizing a savarkar or SRI aurobindo or you Sachin Sanya they're all modernizers


or you Sachin Sanya they're all modernizers and so this too is a form of rebellion and then there is also my mother's mother's family which is even more closely linked to this whole thing is my great grandfather nalin akshasanyal and his brother anadi kanta sanyal they were members of the anushul and samiti and then specifically because my mother's mother's family ah they were okay so this chakravarti and sanyal yes and they're not related they just have the same surname okay uh and he they came from Nadia by the way um so uh there is a there's a village there still called so they came from that Village and the village boys and they they were academically good so ended up in Kolkata and uh [Music] got involved in an attempt to take out the Kolkata intelligence the police intelligence service led by a gentleman called tegart and so they carried out a bunch of assassinations and anadi kanta got captured he was beaten to death in


kanta got captured he was beaten to death in wrongpool jail and then died from his injuries uh nalinaksha of course carried on for some time being a part of bhagatin's uh juganthar group and then later on he would be brought into the Congress by c ardas um but he always had this sort of uh linkages through to the revolutionaries and that's why he eventually also became very close to netaji because netaji also had that sort of tilt so the the book has a whole lot of this thing you know these conversations and these linkages that you talk about um in an era where they were communication was so hard it was so hard because there were no cell phones and there were no telephones um so of course uh all that was in there and then the intelligence network of the British absolutely you talk about how you know everything there were informers collaborators who who just informed the breadth and then those guys were sent off to Cellular jail it was like oh okay they're


to Cellular jail it was like oh okay they're going if they were lucky they were otherwise hang the front dead hanged and shot dead yeah that part is very disturbing to know that there were these collaborators and I can sense uh you know reading it that there's come another book coming on these collaborators so tell me about that when you were researching it did you did it come as a shock to you it came as a shock to me when I was reading it but when you were researching it it didn't come as a shock I mean as I said I grew up in an environment where some of this stuff was always murmured around so uh and so you know I would be told that so and so person may be a great guy now but this is his real history so that kind of thing so you know I had I always had that kind of murmurings around me but what I have done here is as politely as possible mentioned a few of them do remember that many of


mentioned a few of them do remember that many of them and their descendants are still leading uh lights of our current Elite so I didn't want to unnecessarily provoke that as and and sort of take the conversation too far in that direction and they become controversial for a different reason uh but you know fact of the matter is that after Independence the revolutionaries were deliberately uh pushed out of the national uh past structures narratives and everything so I have to come back to what you're saying what you're saying is that the revolutionaries their contribution was erased and the collaborators they are still part of the elite in India now absolutely okay elaborate please so what the interesting thing is India becomes independent uh it becomes independent because of a number of uh sort of efforts it included various branches of the Congress Congress was not just a monolithic party even the revolutionaries were inside the Congress in many places and of course the Revolutionary movement there are many other movements as well but at the time of


many other movements as well but at the time of Independence however the revolutionaries first of all did not have any senior leaders all the senior leaders had been killed or had died for very variety of reasons or gone missing as in the case of netaji in addition to that remember what happens to them the two provinces that provided the most revolutionaries Punjab and Bengal actually get partitioned uh Lahore very important Hub of revolutionary activity Dhaka and East Bengal so all these revolutionaries far from thinking about grabbing par in Delhi are you know sadly homeless so they're rushing around their properties are being taken the women are being raped their houses are being burned down so they have completely different concerns and then one branch of the uh congress party ultimately consolidates power which is the nehruvian branch and in the 1950s they I have to say and this this is not just about you know the human uh sort of uh thing about trying to increase the importance of your own


thing about trying to increase the importance of your own contributions uh the neruvians go out of their way to actually Wipe Out the memory of other branches of resistance to the British particularly the revolutionaries so for example the cellular jail was almost entirely pulled down it's or the bits that you see today are just two radials the rest was pulled down and even these two radials were almost pulled down uh just in order to remove all systematically remove all places of importance and memorials to the revolutionaries but why they were not in they were not uh they were dead gone no but the movement was still there it involved hundreds of thousands of people I mean do remember the revolutionaries were capable of winning elections inside the Congress in the 1930s against the gandhians the gandhians were of course this moderate extremist bit yeah that's been going on for a long time yeah or so they could have uh the problem that they faced was they had no unifying force so they got


was they had no unifying force so they got scattered across from the left to the right uh the Communists on the left to the RSS on the right and and many many branches of the Congress themselves so what happens is that the nehruvian branch of the uh Congress essentially comes to power and they need allies and who are their allies are the existing power structure made up of the collaborators they so suddenly the same people say uh the Imperial Police Service officers who were ordering firings against uh Freedom Fighters suddenly they are the people who actually get promoted up when the British leave in fact in many cases the British don't even leave so it's up to 1950 they become part of the Civil Service you meet they were part of the Civil Service in many cases to start with the Imperial Civil Service was mostly made up of Indians by by the 1930s and 1940s yeah uh same as the Imperial Police Service that ordered firing in Mumbai uh during the naval Revolt uh were


in Mumbai uh during the naval Revolt uh were mostly Indians uh and and all the contractors and others who were part of the uh British establishment they actually were beneficiaries when the British left because they all got promoted up yeah and you talk about that you put pictures also of that Naval reward not many people know I incidentally um trivia but I was born there in Navy nagar and and nobody tells you nobody tells you that the single most important event that led to Indian freedom is the naval Revolt of 1946 there is a very small memorial to it and it's only 19 in 2022 that the Navy actually celebrated it uh with a flotilla with a float in Republic Day yeah so what happens is that the collaborator class do you remember that the at Independence they are panicking because in every other country like in Indonesia and other countries they are usually evicted out of the power structure naturally they were the people who were drained the swamp yeah drain the swamp


were drained the swamp yeah drain the swamp but in India what happens in the name of continuity and maybe one can say there was some need for continuity but what happens is they are allowed to continue and in fact they get promoted because as I said as the British leave and and also the British don't always leave uh till 1958 the naval Chief is British that's why even after Independence um the Navy Navy flag continue to have the cross-ups in charge so these things continue so those past structures continue and of course they have already they are they are incumbents in many ways and they they know English uh the the so they have also the links with uh outside world as well so as you say there was no truth commission there was no incommission there's nothing so these guys continue in fact they go out of their way to push out people who are um not from the ilk so the intellectual class the first two generations of intellectual class in India or the elite other than some people


class in India or the elite other than some people may from the nehruvian Congress to be fair the nehruvian Congress had contributed to the to the freedom struggle but other than them the the the hangars are around just shift from collaborating with the British to collaborating with the new nehruvian Elite but the nehruvian elite is of course just one branch of the Congress it's very small so the rest of the elite actually come is drawn from the new Elite is actually drawn from this collaborator class have the Garden Way fizzled out or do you use no they're all they were they are still around in many ways they are they are still around uh it it requires uh just uh very little scratch the surface scratch the surface a little bit of Googling will tell you the ancestry of many of these people so it's okay uh so uh we leave that for your next book Sanji but you know you were talking about how the revolutionaries kind of melted away uh because their properties went


kind of melted away uh because their properties went away with the partition you know there's not much of documentation about the trauma that happened with the East Pakistan there's a lot about the West Punjab and the East Punjab Division and the trauma that happened there but not much of literature which is there or popular films and things made on that but there was that too you talked about how they had uh you know the trauma the the in your epilogue you know I read about the PTSD part uh post-traumatic stress disorder many of them had and there was this one part where which I'm just going to read out some parts of it where you talked about um the Maharashtra and brahmana Community yes was assassinated then it Unleashed a wave of mob violence against the Brahmin Community across Maharashtra estimates vary but thousands of homes and businesses were burnt down and hundreds were killed you know when I read this uh Sanjeev I asked several friends of mine and all


I asked several friends of mine and all did you know this many of them are married to maharashtrians many of them you know have I come from Bombay we've lived among nobody knew about it it's not because they were ill-informed or anything it's just that it wasn't there in the school text so then it's also also what happens just with Partition family they'll tell you partition families tend to say very little about the moment of partition because it's such a major trauma too they very often don't tell their children what they went through very clearly or very passingly they will mention it because they want to wipe it out of them yes so the same thing happened with the Maharashtra and brahmins another community that provided a lot of revolutionaries incidentally yeah uh and um when a member of their Community assassinated gandhiji and I'm not condoning any way that was the right thing it was a wrong thing to have done but What followed was also wrong and it's never talked


What followed was also wrong and it's never talked about which is this massive rioting against the Maharashtra and Brahman community where um as I said hundreds were killed thousands of homes businesses Etc were burnt down um some workers brother Narayan was dragged out of his house and stoned to death I mean eventually died it was a congress mob it was and this is why it is important he says that uh a large mob of congress party workers turned up at the home of Narayan Rao savarkar dragged him out in the streets they beat and stoned him mercilessly before leaving him in a pool of blood and then he said and then you write about how they went looking for vinayak savarkar at his house in the other this is dead by others also but it's it's still you know disturbing where he was staying with his wife yamuna and son vishwas on the first floor as the mob stormed into the ground floor they were delayed long enough by a


ground floor they were delayed long enough by a couple of supporters to allow the police to arrive this likely saved the family from meeting the same fate as Narayan Rao and then you write about PTSD and having suffered years of torture in prison and then partitioned many former revolutionaries suffer from what we today call post-traumatic stress disorder and then you write about now I want you to I mean this was of course that he was so severely tortured in cellular jail that he almost lost his mind uh he talks about repeated electrocutions and when those electrocutions were happening he was thinking about Leela yes so I'll tell you the story now tell me the story about Leela because it is heartbreaking was the expert bomb maker in the first generation of the anushul and samiti and after the alipur bum case um 1909 1910 he sent off to kalapani now as I told you cellular jail wasn't just any old jail it was designed to break people and


old jail it was designed to break people and there were hundreds of these revolutionaries and they were systematically put Through Torture mental and physical now after several years they obviously Alaska that's Health broke down and he was severely ill at some point in time running high fever and he simply refused to run the oil mill which was one of the ways they would force physical labor on them and so the jail Warden and his accomplices you know said no he's just putting on an act uh which is odd you could always tell if somebody is running high fever anyway so they drag him off and they begin to electrocute him the time to a chair and they are electrocuting him and he's screaming and the rest of the jail can hear him screaming and by the way this is deliberate because he's being made an example of right so it's not like the the British want to hide this they want the rest of the prisoners to hear and and he keeps through


the prisoners to hear and and he keeps through the electrocution he keeps collapsing so they wait for him to revive and again put him through this and eventually he loses his mind from after days and days of going through electrocution he loses his mind the other prisoners by the way go on hunger strike and so on and so finally when the news of all of this begins to leak out the British authorities decide okay we let him off but he's lost his mind so they send him off to um to Madras now Chennai to a mental Asylum to uh recover but it takes many many years to recover now why while he's doing all of this do remember what is happening what is keeping him sane the image of Lila so who is Leela Leela was his college sweetheart who is the daughter of bipinpal another very famous leader so he's the pal of the Lal Bal and was his classmate and they were engaged to get married when he was arrested on the


to get married when he was arrested on the alipur jail case and so throughout all this torture he sees this drifting image of Leela in front of him and that's what sort of keep that's the only thing that keeps him going through these years of uh first torture in jail then this electrocution this this period of mental instability and all of that and so he comes out after many many years when he recovers enough and goes looking for Leela and of course he finds that which year are we talking about we are talking now most Independence no no they are still well in the independence maybe okay maybe in the early 1920s so he goes off looking for uh Lila and Lila of course had waited for him for many years but he had gone off to Cellular jail no Communications she was unaware of all the tortures he went through she was unaware what happened to him afterwards and so after waiting for many years she then decided maybe she had


waiting for many years she then decided maybe she had died or whatever and she had married somebody else and was living in Bombay now Mumbai so um Alaska that is obviously you know sad but what can he do so he sort of drifts back and he you know he still rejoins the Revolutionary movement after all of this gets arrested does various things and then at the time of Independence uh and partition he's living in his village in East Bengal in East Pakistan and he becomes a refugee so when he sort of becomes a refugee and he moves to uh now Independent India somebody tells him that Leela is now a widow and is paralyzed from waist down so he hunts her down in Bombay and finds a takes him with her to a Sam silchar where his family or he sets up his home new home and marries her and then looks after her till she dies wow So eventually he did marry her what a love story right I mean absolutely and you


what a love story right I mean absolutely and you could not have made this up yeah I mean if if I did this in a movie it it people think it's just not believable but this is a true story I know so I you know in the beginning of the book uh when you mention him and you said that more about their love later so I was like where is this going to come in and then it comes right at the epilogue it was very touching uh there's also the story of Bina Das tell us about that before I go to kamaka tomorrow Bina Das was uh one of the daughters of uh Benny madhav Das but who was by the way the teacher of netaji uh and one of the reasons you went in the nationalistic uh sort of Stream So now bidad incidentally used to practice uh shooting in what is now Hindustan Park area in Bali in Kolkata with my great grand mom that's Daniel's wife and they is to shoot regularly and and then once this