Author: The Metrognome

Categories
Achieve

Why this man wins photography awards every year

Photojournalist Mandar Deodhar talks about his best work and clicking NSG commandos during a snack break in the 26/11 operations.
by Vrushali Lad | vrushali@themetrognome.in

Mandar Deodhar (40) wins an award every year. The Principal Photographer with India Today magazine, a Sion resident, recently bagged the Picture Of The Year prize at the National Press Photo Contest by the Media Foundation of India (MFI), for his stunning capture of a man who rushed atop a roof to spray water onto the burning mass of shops in Sara-Sahara near Manish Market, in September this year. Mandar’s picture took overall top honours and secured a third prize in the Spot News category as well.

It’s safe to say that when it comes to an eye for detail and an unerring instinct for what makes a stunning picture, Mandar is one of the best in the business.

Speaking to The Metrognome, Mandar says, “Getting the perfect picture is a matter of luck and timing. Prior to this award (by the MFI), I have won five awards in Mumbai for my photographs. Each frame has had something to say – there’s a lot of emotion in the subject, a sense of urgency, and each picture told its own story.”

There’s an interesting back story to the picture that won Mandar the first prize and Rs 75,000 in the MFI contest (see left). “The fire took place at about 2.00 am. I was not on call at that time. In fact, I was at home and sleeping. At that time, I was deputed to cover the West Indies tour of India, so going to work the next morning, I stopped when I found that the JJ Flyover was blocked and there were still signs of fire.”

Mandar decided to snoop around a bit and found a tall building that overlooked the affected spot. “I was just taking random shots; the firemen were reluctant to douse the fire in that area because of the intense heat. Suddenly, a man grabbed a running fire hose and clambered over a roof. He was a shopkeeper trying to douse the flames and save whatever he could of the shops. I quickly captured him sitting on the roof with the fire hose in his hands.” Ordinarily, Mandar takes the time to get to know his subjects and the story before he starts clicking, but in cases like this one, there sometimes isn’t enough time. “You just have to trust your instinct and get your camera out,” he says. “You must judge in a split second that you are looking at a momentous situation, and that you need to photograph it before the moment passes.”

In his long career as a news photographer – he started freelancing for The Times of India supplement Dombivali-Kalyan + in 1997, then variously worked with Marathi daily Lokmat, Hindi daily Navbharat, the Bombay Times, Mid Day and now India Today since 2007 – he has great stories to tell of his experiences on the field and what he has learnt from his favourite photographs. But he is very fond of the 26/11 Nariman House pictures he took of  the commando operations, or specifically, of the moment a ceasefire was declared.

“I was one of three lucky photographers to be very near the Nariman House while the commando operation was in full swing,” he remembers. “There was gunfire all around, and we could see the terrorists in the building. But at around 2.00 pm, a ceasefire was announced, and a neighbouring wada pavwallah was summoned to feed the commandos. I took pictures of the battle-hardened commandos sitting on the staircase, with bullet holes in the walls around them, and relishing the wada pavs and the sudden break in activity.” That image won Mandar the award for Best Picture from the Press Club, Mumbai, last year.

Both times, Mandar was not even supposed to be on duty – during the 26/11 fracas, he was on sick leave but was summoned to work on Day 3. “In an area of conflict, your first instinct is to get the best picture you possibly can,” he says. “There is no time to think of your personal safety, whether you’ll get caught or thrashed or killed. Your instincts for self-preservation do kick in – for example, I never flash my camera in front of an angry mob; I walked past the Sara Sahara area before taking the picture of the shopkeeper on the roof, because the area is very notorious and the shops were illegal – but you have to be dedicated to your job first. I am alert enough to save myself if needed, but I won’t leave till I’ve got a picture.”

He adds that good judgement comes with experience. “You understand how to click unobtrusively, which angles would serve your shot best, how to be sensitive when taking pictures of accident scenes and riots. Fortunately, I have never yet had to face a hostile crowd or somebody threatening to break my camera,” he grins.

(Pictures courtesy MFI and Mandar Deodhar)

Categories
Watch

Stunning pictures that won prizes

The Media Foundation of India’s (MFI) second National Press Photo Contest had some real stunners from over 6,500 entries received.
by The Diarist | thediarist@themetrognome.in

We attended the awards ceremony for the Media Foundation of India (MFI) and Yes Bank’s National Press Photo Contest at the Nehru Centre, Worli, yesterday. And the event was awesome! There were some truly stunning photographs in five categories – General News, Spot News, Daily Life, Art and Culture, Sports and Photo Story – and the press fraternity cheered madly as each award recipient made his way to the stage.

Chief Minister of Maharashtra officiated as the chief guest at the event.

In random order, a few of the award-winning entries and honourable mentions:

 

To know more about these photographs, and to see all the winners, click here

 

 

Categories
Guest writer

Mumbai SAys ‘I do’

India is increasingly wanting to get married in South Africa – and Mumbai wants to get married there the most.
by Richard Holt

We probably receive about 10 to 15 Indian enquiries for South African weddings per year, and the majority of these would be from Mumbai. However, not all these are from Indians living in India, but from Indian couples living around the world. The enquiries include multicultural weddings, where one of the couple is Indian.  They can be for either smaller intimate celebrations (with the couple only, or a few close relatives) that combine the wedding with a honeymoon in SA, or for larger grandiose destination weddings. Our largest in the latter category has been for 180 guests from all over the world.

All of our Indian couples definitely have an ‘international’ presence – most of them now reside outside of India, but insist on bringing some part of India into the celebration. Very often, couples are looking for something more exotic, adventurous and different than a traditional home-based wedding, although whilst getting married abroad, they still tend to incorporate traditional elements into their wedding celebrations.

Many factors can affect people’s desire for a destination wedding and sometimes, family dynamics can play a big part. We find that generally, our destination wedding couples are a little bit older and they pay for the wedding themselves, rather than relying on family. This gives them more flexibility of choice. In addition, because there is such a large Indian population in South Africa, there are also large Indian influences on the culture there too. For example, Indian couples who don’t want to venture too far from tradition can easily acquire Indian-influenced food choices or fuse their food with South African elements.

The growth of multiculturalism is a big influence on weddings, where couples from different countries and cultures choose a different destination to accommodate both parties’ backgrounds. This reason alone is responsible for a large proportion of our destination weddings, and we have married off several Indians who are getting married to people from different countries and religions. Combining the wedding and honeymoon celebrations also plays a big factor, and in this regard, southern Africa offers huge advantages.

There is no doubt that culturally, Indians negotiate much more than other cultures around pricing and specific details in the wedding planning process. There seems to be a real focus on attention to detail and being involved at all levels of the process. Incorporating Indian wedding trends is also very important for Indian couples.

Richard Holt is Group CEO of Concepts Collection, one of the leading wedding planners in South Africa. The firm has managed over 400 weddings in SA.

(Featured image courtesy taugamelodge.co.za)

Categories
Big story

Mumbai responds well to digitisation call

But some cable operators say the quality of set top boxes is inferior, prompting them to replace several units daily.
by The Editors | editor@themetrognome.in

The plan to digitise the four metros of the country – Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai – is aggressively underway, with Mumbai showing the most amount of conversions from analog to digital TV. We quote a survey released by Television Street Maps for MxMIndia, which states that Mumbai has achieved about 86 per cent digitisation, as against Delhi (45 per cent), Kolkata (53 per cent) and Chennai (49 per cent). (See the article here.)

Speaking to The Metrognome, Ganesh Naidu, President of the Cable Operators and Distributors Association (CODA) said, “Mumbai has responded well to the digitisation call. The government has also aggressively driven home the point, with frequent ads on TV and in the newspapers. Naturally, nobody wants to be deprived of their favourite programmes, so people are installing the set top boxes in large numbers.”

He added that some people, however, were waiting for the October 31 deadline. “We have heard of orders for set top boxes being placed for October 31 itself, and not before – since each box costs more than Rs 1,000, people in the slum pockets, especially, are waiting for their salaries to come so that they can install the units,” he said.

Inferior quality?

A few local cable operators we spoke to told us, on condition of anonymity, that the set top boxes being installed were of an inferior quality. “We have been installing the boxes, then going back after two days to replace them with another one. Many customers are complaining that they cannot see certain channels and that the box just ‘hangs’ after a few minutes of use,” a Borivli-based operator said.

Another added, “Even though the October 31 deadline has been repeatedly flashed across the media, several consumers are still careless about getting a set top box. We have personally called up so many of our old customers and asked them to get the unit installed, but they casually say that we can come and do it on October 31, and there is no need to do it before the deadline. What they don’t realise is that we are taking orders to the tune of 50 set top boxes a day, and it is increasing daily. Once there is a confirmed order, we can give the customer a definite date for installation, as per our schedule.”

(Picture courtesy: smehorizon.sulekha.com)

 

Categories
Learn

A Superman even in death

Shafique Shaikh, the ‘Superman’ in ‘Malegaon ka Superman’, is the new poster boy for the Voice of Tobacco Victims campaign.
by The Diarist | thediarist@themetrognome.in

Some people inspire even in death. Shafique Shaikh (28), the actor who got rave reviews for his entertaining portrayal of Superman in the film Malegaon Ka Superman, died an untimely death last year after a battle with mouth cancer. However, he is now the poster boy for the ongoing Voice of Tobacco Victims, a country-wide campaign by doctors and victims of oral cancer caused by chewing tobacco.

The campaign yesterday released its new public awareness poster, featuring Shafique in his best-remembered Superman avatar. The poster attacks the gutka lobby, which it says is upset with the ban on sale of gutka in 14 states in India, of which Maharashtra was the first to implement the ban. The poster (see pic) displays Shafique and identifies him as a victim of gutka addiction, and states that 6.5 crore Indians like the late actor are slowly becoming cancer patients.

Speaking to The Metrognome, Dr Prakash Gupta, of the Mumbai-based Healis Sekhsaria Institute for Public Health (which launched the campaign) and who is affiliated with Action Council Against Tobacco India, said, “In the film, Shafique was shown fighting tobacco, but in real life, he lost the battle to cancer. His story inspired us to take the campaign forward and let more people know that an individual like him was also lost to the evil of gutka. Gutka manufacturers are asking if it is fair to ban gutka in 14 states when other substances causing addiction are still being sold. We ask: is it fair that crores of Indians are losing their lives due to cancer caused by gutka?”

The campaign was initiated in May 2008, and is the brainchild of Dr Pankaj Chaturvedi, who is an associate professor at Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai. The campaign is driven by victims of tobacco themselves, who the campaign projects as the face of its initiatives. “Our most notable success has been in getting gutka sale banned in 14 Indian states. We made representations to all major Parliamentarians, Chief Ministers of several states, such important politicians as Sushma Swaraj, and several Cabinet Ministers. However, we plan to use this latest poster to strengthen the Tobacco Control Policy in India,” Dr Gupta explained.

Know more about The Voices of Tobacco Victims campaign here. As of now, over 30 renowned cancer surgeons, doctors, about 30 institutions and tobacco victims from all across the country are an active part of the campaign. 

(Featured image courtesy newsbeats.in. Poster courtesy Healis Sekhsaria Institute of Public Health, Mumbai)

 

Categories
Wellness

Coming soon: A park for birds

Ex-Mayor Dr Shubha Raul has planned a birds-only park in Dahisar. No humans will be allowed entry into the park.
by Vrushali Lad | vrushali@themetrognome.in

Given her background as a doctor of Ayurveda, and her fruitful stint as the city’s mayor from 2007 to 2009, Dr Shubha Raul is also lucky to be councillor of R North ward that has large pockets of greenery and naturally-occurring dense foliage. Combining her acumen as a doctor and the fact that there wasn’t a single bird park in the city, Dr Raul proposed a bird park on a plot of land in Dahisar, and the BMC agreed to her plan.

If all goes as per plan, the city will have its first birds-only park within a year.

Speaking to The Metrognome, Dr Raul explained how she hit upon the idea. “We developed the Geetanjali Garden in Dahisar, and there is a small plot of land behind it, measuring about 4,000 square metres. I noticed that it was lush with trees and bushes, and that a lot of birds would come there to build nests.” Luckily, the plot of land also got merged with the rest of the garden a few months ago, so Dr Raul decided to build a bird park on the green bit of land. “It seemed like a good idea because the vegetation required for the birds was already there. The place also has a sturdy compound wall, and we would close access to it.”

Explaining the need for such a park, she says, “It is a scientific fact that the chirping of birds has a calming effect on humans, especially those suffering from cardiac problems. Besides, we need to create as many green pockets for birds in the city as we possibly can, and you would be amazed at the sheer variety of birds one can spot over here. The birds are already familiar with the place, and we will be adding bamboo plants and other trees that provide the maximum shade and cover.”

Interestingly, people cannot access the park, but they can watch the birds from the perimeter of the park. “We will put up stout grilles over the existing compound wall, so that nobody can climb over the wall and disturb the birds. There will be a security man’s cabin; one guard will be appointed to see that nobody tries to break in even at night. Besides this, there will be secluded cage for birds that fall ill or are injured, where a vet can give them medical attention, and a designated water space.”

She has already got Rs 40 lakh sanctioned for the project, and the park will be readied in a phased manner. “Not much construction is required, apart from setting up the grilles. I am taking the opinion of experts from the BNHS as to the best way to prepare the park so that maximum numbers of birds can come there. These experts will also advise us on on how to provide nests for birds, and which kinds of trees and small potted plants to provide.” At the entrance, she says, will be a plaque explaining the concept of the park and its need, apart from a statue of a bird to signify that a bird park is in existence at the spot. Which bird will be put up there in statue form? “I’d like a flamingo,” Dr Raul grins.

(Featured image courtesy Clement Francis. Dr Raul picture courtesy article.wn.com)

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