Colonels, the general
Noises about a “colonels’ coup” in Pakistan may be overstated. But Pakistan’s army chief, Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, is undoubtedly under pressure from within and without. The arrangement that Kayani had worked out after taking over from Pervez Musharraf in 2007 brought the military power-without-responsibility. Over time, his claims about non-interference with the civilian government were eclipsed by the visible influence Kayani began to exercise. Most importantly, as army chief, Kayani made himself indispensable to the United States in its war against the Taliban in Afghanistan. Pumping in at least $2 billion a year as military aid, it is that relationship with the US that has now cornered Kayani. The increasingly radicalised, anti-American middle and lower ranks have come out in open criticism of the general, unheard of in as hierarchical an organisation as the Pakistan army, after the May 2 raid that killed Osama bin Laden. So much so, that reports emerged of Kayani having to battle for his survival, as the elite Corps Commanders pressed for a tougher line against the US.
While a “colonels’ coup” may yet be unlikely, Kayani finds himself pressed on the one hand by the US, with US-Pakistan ties at their lowest in years. On the other, the ranks and mid-level have turned the heat on. Indeed, with these soldiers’ deep resentment of fighting who they believe are their fellow Pakistanis and the humiliations of the May 2 raid and the terrorist attack on the PNS Mehran base, Kayani has had to distance himself from Washington. But how far the US is going to let him get away without losing its plot in Af-Pak will determine how secure the disgruntled officers are going to let Kayani feel. Kayani and Pakistan find themselves between a rock and a hard place. Although he manoeuvred regional geopolitics to Pakistan’s advantage, Delhi knows the game will become much more dangerous if the Pakistan army drops out of the tribal battlegrounds, makes full peace with the militants and concentrates all its attention on its eastern border.
It’s still upma
Fusion food’s home is never home. It begins, always, in that other land where memories are sharp and ingredients scarce. Like that supremely skewed stew of Britain — the curry. Even William Makepeace Thackeray wrote an ode to the packaged wonder that made the dish possible, along with “Epping butter”: “She pops the meat into the savoury stew/ With curry-powder table-spoonfuls three/ And milk a pint (the richest that may be).” But it is in New York that Indian food, like Japanese and Italian and Thai cuisine, has had wild incarnations. Naans arrive in pumpernickel-caper flavour, garam masala truffle becomes dessert and a Mumbai-born chef wins the latest season of Top Chef Masters with an upma.Floyd Cardoz of the nouvelle
Indian restaurant Tabla in NYC and two other finalists had to make a three-course meal. And the first had to be inspired by a childhood memory. Cardoz, not surprisingly, remembered the upma that he snacked after school and, surprisingly, decided to toy with a dish that could be perturbingly muted in its flavours. But Cardoz’s upma is not the everyday easy breakfast of south Indian homes; he made a semolina polenta flavoured with coconut milk and kokum and topped with sauteed wild mushrooms.
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