Journalist-turned-Trinamul Rajya Sabha member Sagarika Ghose took on one of the toughest Bengali poems to translate as she pinned down the Narendra Modi government on Tuesday, calling it lost in its own fantasy land of all-is-well publicity disconnected from the plight of the common citizen.
Even Satyajit Ray had steered clear of translating the word amsatta – the mango candy bar-esque treat popular in Bengal, a variant of which is known as aam papad in the rest of India – when he had turned his father Sukumar Ray’s poem Bombagorer Raja into English.
The poem is from the seminal Abol Tabol, which the eminent academic Sukanta Chaudhuri – who had translated it – called “perhaps the most iconic Bengali book after Tagore’s Gitanjali”.
The poem in Bengali goes thus:
Keu ki jano sodai keno Bombagorer raja
Chhobir frame e bandhiye rakhe aamsotto bhaja?
Ranir mathai oshtoprohor keno balish bandha?
Pauruti te perek thoke keno ranir dada?
Ghose translated it as: “Why is it that the raja of Bombagor hangs mango pancakes in a painting? The queen wears a pillow on her head and the queen’s brother pins nails into slices of bread?”
She added, for the benefit of the assembled lawmakers, many of whom would not know Bengali: “This is a satirical poem, it shows a government disconnected from reality. The citizen is forced to become a mute spectator, mutely watching the government’s drama. This is exactly what this government is all about,” she said.
When Satyajit Ray had translated Bombagorer Raja, he had totally skirted the phrase amsatta bhaja and turned it into “chocolates”.
Chaudhuri, professor emeritus, Jadavpur University, had translated it as to “fry mango jelly and frame it with borders”.
While Ghose’s phrase for amsatta bhaja – mango pancakes – may not have the same bite, her attack on the Modi government was sharp as the talons of many of the creatures Sukumar Ray drew in Abol Tabol, published 102 years ago.
“This is a government disconnected from reality, this is a government that does not know how to tackle the catastrophe of unemployment. The crisis of price rise. It doesn’t know how to tackle the challenge of security in Manipur,” Ghose said.
She said that the ruling government was “not guided by our national motto - Satyameva Jayate or Let truth triumph”.
“Like the raja of Bombagor, this government lives in an imagined reality,” Ghose said.
“All it wants is media publicity and to set up a media narrative. This is precisely why India faces today an acute governance deficit,” she added.
Ghose lamented that the government resorted to “minimum governance and maximum publicity” after coming to power.
She cited the examples of the Mahakumbh stampede.
“I was a journalist, Sir. I covered the Kumbh Mela in 2004 and 2013. Much less hype. Much better crowd management,” she said.
“This time there has been this tragic stampede. More and more evidence is emerging. It’s not just one stampede. There are two stampedes, [and there] will be three stampedes,” she said.
According to the government, 30 people died and 60 people were injured at the Mahakumbh stampede in Prayagraj this year. An eyewitness in a documentary on the stampede by The Lallantop claimed that seven to eight tractors were required to carry the belongings and bodies of the deceased in the aftermath of the stampede.
Pointing it out, Ghose added: “Investigative journalists are reporting a far higher number of deaths than the government is telling us.”
“VIP culture at the Kumbh, reporters are saying, is responsible for this. VIPs drove up to the ghats in their cars. They made the public walk, routes were closed, common pilgrims had to wait and became restless. Swami Anand Swaroop, president of the Shankaracharya Parishad has raised these concerns as well,” she added.
“The government came to power saying it will end this VIP culture. Today, it is a government for the VIP, of the VIP, by the VIP,” added the 60-year-old.
She cited Bengal’s Gangasagar Mela. “One crore [people] come every year. Not a single incident. If a Kumbh Mela-type stampede happened in Bengal at the Gangasagar, god forbid what would have happened,” she said.
“There would have been dozens of fact-finding machines within 48 hours. Why is the BJP government reluctant to share the number of the deaths?”
Unemployment salvo
“Sir, Viksit Bharat – periodic labour survey has shown half of India’s workers are self-employed. The education testing service firm Wheebox says that there are three lakhs college graduates, [but] only half are employable,” she said.
“In 2023, only 32 per cent of working age women participated in the labour force. The government has utterly failed to provide quality education,” Ghose added.
She lamented that “Not a single Indian institute of higher education is ranked in The Times Higher Education World University Rankings of 2025” even though Banaras Hindu University, Bharathiar University, and IIT Guwahati had ranked in the 601-800 band in 2024.
“The Union government’s UGC draft regulations of 2025 savagely attacked the autonomy of universities and are a body blow to federalism,” said Ghose.
“The annual state of education report as said shows that half of class 3 students can’t read class 2 texts. Half of class 5 students can’t read class 2 texts,” she added.
She took a dig at the government's 'Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas' (development for everyone) slogan: “Today India is called the billionaire’s raj. The top 1 per cent controls 40 per cent of the national wealth, the bottom 50 per cent only have 3 per cent.”