Mumbai Diary: Sunday Dossier

More power to protestsWe see turbocharged activism as the effort to save Patwardhan Park at Bandra West goes on The civic authorities have planned a car park underneath a part of this garden a move green warriors say will result in loss of this muchrelished space The pitched Patwardhan battle takes one back to 2016 when the first rumblings to take over Prabhadevirsquos Sane Guruji Udyan started This garden near Siddhivinayak Mandir has been taken over for the Siddhivinayak station on the Mumbai Metro III line from Colaba to Seepz Though there were some protests before trees started being hacked at the garden the protests certainly lacked muscle and the highprofile visibility that Patwardhan Park protests have had Today this garden is well and truly gone in Prabhadevi We hope to see better luck for BandraAlso Read Mumbai Diary Friday DossierFor the love of Ravi VarmaGanesh ShivaswamyAdvocate Ganesh Shivaswamy founder of a foundation which focuses on structuring the legacy of Raja Ravi Varma is ready to release his sixvolume book called Raja Ravi Varma An Everlasting Imprint on April 9 The writer had started writing in August 2018 and had aimed to release the book for Ravi Varmarsquos 175th birth anniversary on April 29 2023 ldquoIt is different as it takes Ravi Varma out of isolation and places him in the context of a larger happeningrdquo Shivaswamy says When asked why such a large exploration was necessary he adds ldquoThe world was and is changing but some legacies have been frozen in time A reassessment of the Ravi Varma legacy was essentialrdquoWhen umpire Aleem Dar had to face a nearfatal situationA 2007 image of Pakistani umpire Aleem Dar who has called it a day PICGETTY IMAGESPakistani umpire Aleem Dar who stepped down as an ICC Elite umpire the other day is happy to let someone else take his spot after spending 19 years on the international cricket road Through those years Aleem experienced many significant moments while officiating on the highest stage We reckon one of them would be about the time he was fortunate to duck a major injury to his face Aleem took quick evasive action to avoid a fierce uppish drive from the blade of Sachin Tendulkar in the India v Namibia 2003 World Cup match at Pietermaritzburg South Africa Believing that Aleem would consider this a very lucky escape this diarist who was covering the match tried getting in touch with Aleem over the phone Pietermaritzburg is not a big city but he tried at least seven to eight hotels that night to check where Aleem was put up When he finally got through Aleem admitted that he had indeed escaped death ldquoI could have been killed I got saved because of my good eyesight I still play cricket you know In my four years of umpiring at the international level this was the most powerful drive I ever sawrdquo he said Doubtless Aleem feels lucky to be alive and we wish him all the best in his retirementAn uncredited cameoJosy JosephJournalist and author Josy Joseph was in for a pleasant surprise recently when his book A Feast Of Vultures The Hidden Business of Democracy in India 2016 found a mention in the Hindi web series The Night Manager In the Anil KapoorAditya Roy Kapur starrer released on an OTT platform a senior intelligence officer played by Vikram Kapadia shows the book to his subordinate played by Joy Sengupta Kapadia goes on to draw a parallel with a story from the book to nail his juniorrsquos lie ldquoIt was like my friends Shridhar Raghavan and Sandeep Modi writers of the show winking at merdquo chuckles Joseph who only learned about it after a friend tagged him on Twitter He adds ldquoIt is actually quite interesting that a chapter in my book about Indian arms dealers which I wrote in 2016 was in many ways similar to what Le Carre wrote in his book in 1993 in terms of the way arms dealers enjoy the good life surround themselves with a trusted circle of friends use complex systems of payment and manipulate governmentsrdquo Le Carrersquos book of the same name was first adapted into a British web series in 2016 before the Hindi version this year