5 Films That Changed My Life

Reviewing May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss now is like reviewing a Karan Johar film on Saturday. Half the world and their barbers have already seen/read it. In any case, I realised that my impartiality as a reviewer is under cloud for having gone to the same college as the author. When I tried to defend the book with a friend (who found it 'crass'! What did he expect? Om Jai Jagdish Hare?), he stopped me by saying, "You can hear no ill of your junior."
Stung by such advance criticism, I have decided not to do a review but a reprise of my favourite chapter from the book (with shades of my second fav chapter thrown in, for good measure). Arnab talks about the five films that made him who he is.
Well, these are mine...

Dharam Veer
The biggest disservice that one can do to the memory of Manmohan Desai is to call him a formula-driven entertainer. It can't get any further from truth. His films - under its veneer of entertainment and convoluted formulae - hid deep undertones of deviant sexuality.
And there can't be a better example than Dharam Veer.
Bondage. S&M. Cross-dressing. Trans-gender role-playing. You name it and you get it. A surprisingly advanced film for its times, it even lifted the veil off homosexuality at a time it was considered taboo.
The homosexuality has been described in considerable detail here. The hero tied up in a dungeon almost naked and the heroine whipping him is not something ordinary filmmakers have depicted easily. The second hero's frilly ribbon-laced satin shirt (that looks like a blouse), arousal of horses to perform beyond potential, taming of wild women - *shudder*
A few weeks back, my wife walked in when Dharam Veer was on. She took one disbelieving look at the screen and asked, "Dharmendra in mini skirt. Zeenat in pants. What kind of film is this?"
Yes, really - what kind of film is this?

Awwal Number
I have written about this film several times already. Once, as a sports film. Then, as an Aamir Khan film. But still, I cannot get over the stupendous campiness of the film that had Aamir Khan blowing kisses and hitting sixes intermittently.
It had Pariskhit Sahni as a national selector, wearing a sleeveless t-shirt. It had the fantastic "Yeh hain cricket! Howzzat!" song, performed on screen by Dev Anand and Aditya Pancholi - that made mincemeat of all rhymes and meters but is quite crappily memorable nevertheless. It had an Indian team, who looked like truck drivers and the eleven (or thereabouts) faces changed in every scene. It had Australian cricketers looking exactly like the Indian ones. It had terrorists. It had vamps. It had a helicopter flying over a stadium to bomb it while a cricket match was on.
It also had an ex-cricketer, a Chairman of selectors and a Police Commissioner. The last three named was actually one person, who was also the director and producer of the film. You will never know the meaning of multi-tasking if you don't watch Awwal Number.

Dalaal
Mithun Chakraborty is like Shakespeare. Millions of followers have intensely studied him for centuries (okay, okay - decades, you pedants!) but they are still finding newer and more interesting stuff. Like Shakespeare, obscure canons are being discovered.
In between the flourish of Kanti Shah and his ambitious tackling of global issues, there have been directors who have spread the gospel in a low-key yet effective manner. Dalaal - in Bengali - is one such effort. Directed by Partho Ghosh (of 100 Days fame), the film is a scathing indictment of flesh trade and human trafficking in present day India.
My memory fails me when I try to remember the circumstances in which I ended up seeing this film in my mother tongue but it remains crystal clear when it comes to the scenes. And iconic songs.
And of course, there is the gem of a dialogue - "Ami duto jinish shojjho kortey parina. Ek, amar gramer apamaan. Aar, amar gamchhar apamaan." (Two things of mine can't be defiled. My village. And my towel.)
Yes, yes, I know - a gamchha is not a towel. Just watch the film.

Aankhen
Rarely, very rarely do we come across a work of art that changes us physically. People have joked that lifting War and Peace (or for that matter, A Suitable Boy) has built muscles. But those were just jokes.
Aankhen is that kind of art for me. With three double-roles, three heroines, two Chief Ministers, two water-drenched songs, one monkey and one leather-clad vamp, it expanded my bladder capacity substantially - since I could not tear myself away from the film even for a leak!
With the voluminous Shilpa Shirodkar entreating Govinda to 'come to her home' since her 'doors' and 'backyards' were free and elaborate plastic surgeries being executed to create lookalikes of CMs, I almost stopped breathing. I think I watched this film after a drinking session at a cheap-and-cheerful joint called Green Palace and the intense pressure on my bladder and brain for 180 minutes has made me a better - and sturdier - person.

Saagar
You know you have started to grow up, when you start recognising heroines in films. And usually, there is a specific point which you can look back upon as your first childhood crush. For me, Saagar was that film and Dimple Kapadia that heroine.
Before people get scandalised completely, let me hasten to add that I saw the film some time after its release and not as the 11-year old I was when it came out.
Kamalhaasan's Tamil-infested Hindi, Rishi Kapoor's chubby goodness, RD Burman's scintillating score just paled into insignificance as Dimple took her early morning swim in the shimmering black swimsuit and emerged from the sea in her full glory. Add to that a song in a red chiffon saree that clung to her body then and to my mind ever since, you have hormonal dynamite.
There hasn't been a more impactful heroine in Hindi film history.

Ever.

So, those are my five films.
You have to read MIHYAP for the five films that turned a Computer Engineer called Arnab Ray into a Global Dementor called GreatBong. But, is that all that there is to the book?
Well, Arnab writes honestly and vividly. And he writes about topics that are very dear - and close - to me. But then, I have read several books like that.
What sets MIHYAP apart and what I am really grateful to Arnab for is the fact that he is unapologetic about growing up in Calcutta and in the 1990s. He has actually made my adolescent world cool. What more could I have asked for?

For Citizenship in an Obsolete Monarchy

(Published on 20th March, 2010, in Zeitgeist, The New Indian Express)

Having spent five years begging anyone who visits London to bring him Madras Filter Coffee powder, sneaking free rides between the Kenton and Wembley Central tube stations (where the ticket machines are broken) and moonlighting at half a dozen places outside his day job, a friend of mine is now ready to take the British citizenship test. Speaking to him after his “permanent residence”, or the more official but less welcoming “indefinite leave to remain” was granted, I told him he really needn’t have gone to all the trouble – all he had to do was offend religious sentiments back home.

“Really, how difficult is it to paint a couple of nude Goddesses? Or bestiality in unlikely positions?” I asked.



“But see, I don’t want citizenship in Qatar. I’d have to offend minority religious sentiments to get British citizenship, and then I’d have a fatwa on my head!” he protested, “God knows I don’t want Salman Rushdie’s life!”



“Hmm…or Taslima Nasrin’s,” I had to concede he had a point. “But is Qatar out of the question? You know, you could cheat on tax in India for years and they probably won’t be able to try you at all!”



“Maybe I should visit and see how I like life in the Emirates,” he said, thoughtfully, “and, of course, the media would be speaking up for me and defending secularism and all…”



“Tempting, isn’t it?”



After I hung up, I conjured up visions of people asking me to comment on my friend’s self-imposed exile, were he to turn out a semi-Cubist work that was offensive enough for him to win citizenship in an absolute monarchy, if not in an obsolete one. I’ve always wanted to know someone who got away with criminal cases by coolly renouncing his Indian citizenship.



I could cite the “Picasso of India”, Mr. Husain, as a precedent for my friend, and wax poetic about how we should hang our heads in shame for having lost such a great talent – I’m reasonably sure my friend can make good cartoons of nudity and bestiality. But, of course, in his secular drive, he must make sure he doesn’t offend religions that don’t have a Pantheon. I wouldn’t want his works to get banned/ semi-banned like those of Dan Brown, Rushdie and Nasrin.



It’s a pity the other Polytheistic religions – the Greek, Roman and Egyptian ones – have been wiped out, or he could have been more innovative and chosen to target those. I wonder if desecration of the Aboriginal, Maori or Native American religions would evoke the same call for a defence of the poor, dear, innocent artist. Do the big, bad Hindu Fundamentalists have counterparts in those cultures? Unfortunately, I don’t think so – I’ve read too many reports on ‘ethnic’ families being separated and the pieces assimilated into the dominant culture for me to hope there are baddie organisations there. So it looks like my friend will have to stick to drawing Goddesses mating with their vahanas, or cheating on their husbands with asuras, and of freedom fighters at nudist parties with Nazi dictators. Of course, he will have to check on plagiarism laws in Qatar.



It’s only natural, then, that the freethinking individuals of our country will pen or emote vehement defences of my friend’s right to freedom of expression. There might be the minor inconvenience of having his bachelor pad vandalised, but his mother will be a relieved woman if someone were to get rid of his junk for him.



I do hope the idea of hurting Hindu sentiments for the greater good strikes Mr. Rushdie (of whom I’m a big fan), so the ‘secularists’ can ensure a safe passage for him throughout the world. But our writers seem rather slow on the uptake – the brainwave hasn’t yet hit Mr. Tharoor (though he came close, with ‘holy cows’). He’s only offended linguistic sentiments so far – what say, oh interlocutor?

Bollywood in polite company

I spent a very nice evening today at something called Penguin Spring Fever (sounds like flu!), which had a Bollywood Quiz.
Now, I am very scared about discussing Bollywood in polite company since my enthusiasm for the subject makes me feel a little plebeian in front of gentry. Quizzes on Bollywood is something I steer clear of (unless Nilendu is involved) because the average Bollywood knowledge is so poor that 'What is the full form of DDLJ' is a legitimate question in most of them.

This quiz was a lot better though still so easy that the winner was decided not on the basis of who answered the most but who missed the least!
Of the approx 55 questions asked (15 prelims + 40 finals), I did not know the answer to 7 questions. Usually in Calcutta quizzes, the equation was the exact reverse. I used to feel good if I managed to know/guess 4-5 answers in an 8-round quiz!

One great realisation of the evening was my Bollywood Reflex hadn't withered away in disuse. I answered at quite a few questions purely on instinct, without really remembering/knowing the answer. For example, a song from Har Dil Jo Pyar Karega (of which I was required to identify the hero) evoked a reflex action of imagining Salman's slightly-crouching-feet-steady-top-half-swaying dance movements.
You hear the opening strains of a song and a chain of thought starts. Marching song. Army film. Electronic orchestration. Not old film. Many voices. LOC: Kargil. People get happy over simple things in life. That I executed this kind of chain 2-3 times during the evening was quite satisfying.

Also, I realised that - exactly like 'a little knowledge' - too much knowledge is also a dangerous thing.
After playing the LOC: Kargil song, the quiz-master asked which world record this particular song held. I, immediately, went into the cast, crew and location of the film and felt pleased when I answered, "It has been filmed at the highest altitude". But realised soon after that I was being too ambitious and silly. There is no way on earth a world record can be made on the number of singers or location of shooting. It is too damn difficult. The LOC song held the simplest record. At 12 minutes, it is the longest song ever.

For the information of all well-wishers, I finished a joint second (among four finalists) and was awarded 1500 bucks worth of books and a crown (literally) by Bob Christo. I picked up Sea of Poppies (by Amitav Ghosh) and Memory's Gold (an anthology on Calcutta, edited by Amit Chaudhuri).

For the information of obsessive, compulsive trivia buffs, here are other five questions that I missed.

1. This one was such a sitter, because my brain froze and I stopped thinking. Apart from Baazigar, Kuch Kuch Hota Hain, Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham and My Name is Khan, which is the only other movie in which Kajol and Shahrukh have acted together (as the lead pair)?

2. To whom is the 'Ram' in Ram Teri Ganga Maili referring to?
Hint: Rajiv Kapoor's name in the film was Narendra / Naren.

3. In Mohabbatein, Amitabh is shown reciting the Gayatri mantra. This seemingly positive scene evoked the wrath of right-wing activists, who asked for a ban on the film. What was the fuss all about?

4. Which young exponent of classical and fusion music composed the music for Mujhse Dosti Karoge? (audio clue)

5. Two hit films have opened with a scene of playing cricket. One was K3G, where Hrithik Roshan hit a six off the last ball of the match. Which was the other film?

That's it, then. Will post the answers in a couple of days.

Of Love, Sin, Innocence and Memories

PART ONE: THE MUSEUM

One could gather up anything and everything, with wit and acumen, out of a positive need to collect all objects connecting us to our most beloved, every aspect of their being, and even in the absense of a house, a proper museum, the poetry of our collection would be home enough for its objects.

- from The Museum of Innocence, Orhan Pamuk

Maybe the words struck me because for the last three months, I have been trying to sort out cartons of memorabilia, stored in the corners of thirty-five rooms, and fit them into three cupboards and three trunks I've been given. Newspapers that carried reports on my favourite sports teams, stories scribbled in my schoolbooks when I was working on math problems simultaneously, a baby bed my little brother had once fit into, sun hats my middle brother and I had picked up when I was six, bills, posters, letters, fanmail, newspaper articles I had written, my degree certificates and marksheets, birthday cards, photographs, bookmarks I had made, brazen letters I had penned, doodlings I had worked on, supervised by my favourite aunt, gifts she had given me as a child, clothes my mother had stitched for me, the first pair of running shoes I had bought with my own money, my favourite fountain pen, toothbrushes and chess coins I'd played with as a child...all, alarmingly mixed up. Most, unearthed when I was looking for the clown my aunt gave me, the pen stand my brother bought me, some photographs I suspect have been stolen by a kleptomaniac former-friend and a notebook containing Salman Rushdie's autograph.

As I look at each of these pieces of my life, recalling the moments when they were the present and not memories, and arrange the diaries I've kept for the last twelve years, fitting in the slices of the compartments of time that have made me who I am, I wonder why I'm keeping these things. We are all Collectors of Memories, Curators of the Mueums that are Our Lives. In his book, Orhan Pamuk draws a distinction between the Proud Collectors and the Bashful Collectors. I suppose I'm the second. My diaries are tell-all conversations between me and my conscience, and I have no intention of letting anyone into them. Why, then, do we collect our own memories, drawing no distinction between what is important and what is not, filling in sporadic dots of an incomplete thread through our lives? Why do I have yearbooks from college, which I resented and blocked out from memory?

Are these souvenirs of an innocence we long to go back to? Do they remain in our lives to remind us of emotions long left behind - pleasure, happiness, indifference, distaste? Does some part of us not want to let go of the bad times, as much as it wants to cling on to the good? A lot of these physical manifestations of my memories were eaten away in termite attacks. Strangely, a bag full of handouts, pamphlets, posters, tickets and other trinkets from my days with a theatre group that I fell out with over money, was eaten away. Does something in nature want us to let go of the unpleasant? In throwing out the memories of the fragments we have dismissed from our lives, do we parallelly, in Sherlock Holmesian style, recover some important museum piece?

When I couldn't find something despite "looking everywhere", I decided to do this. Out went a grammatically incorrect declaration of love, presented to me on Elliot's Beach, to my abject horror, a few years ago. Out went a tacky diary with hearts all over it, that I couldn't bring myself to look at since it had been given to me, as my only Valentine's Day gift in history. Out went a painfully boring letter my mother and I had laughed over, detailing a (hopefully former) stalker's adventures at a relative's house in Australia. Out went pieces of chart paper, asking me to vote for three girls who were standing for Student's Union posts in my forgettable undergrad college. Out went a misspelt note from a classmate who was something the convent girls called "Chrisma" in a Christmas game.

Having finished the book a few hours ago, days after I began my cleaning-out operations, I think I know what spurred on the admittedly illogical belief that an unimportant memory cast out implies an important memory brought back. The fear that, like the Istanbullus Pamuk speaks of, my house could become a rubbish den of memories, stacked one on top of the other, in which nothing can be found. And so, to my mother's relief, I will continue weeding out the unnecessary in my personal Museum.

PART TWO: CULTURE CLASH

The subtext of The Museum of Innocence echoes the undertones of Pamuk's writing in general. The Sick Man of Europe vs. the Prince of Asia - a Turkey stuck between the Republic and the Ottoman, between the Sorbonne-educated and the pashas, between the intellectual, European aspirations of the populace and the personal, moral values they strive to shed. How important is virginity? What are people's pretences about it? How much does society matter? The nouveau riche, the old families who have lost their fortune, the poor cousins who want to be inducted into society and the bindings of class are themes that are familiar to everyone in a developing country, eager to lose all its traditional hang-ups in its aspiration to modernity, only to recreate cheap imitations of heritage in a bid to preserve the old.

PART THREE: LOVE

If you have patience, and put yourself in God's hands, there is no heart you cannot win, no fortress you cannot capture - isn't that so?

- from The Museum of Innocence, Orhan Pamuk

In interviews in 2007, Orhan Pamuk said the book would explore the question "What is love?" How does it feel to suddenly meet The One when one has decided to settle down to an exemplary life, a convenient one? In the book, Kemal Bey describes every shade of emotion  he goes through in trying to balance his love and life, in trying to understand his attachment to the two women he is cheating on, in choosing one path only to regret it, ruining lives in the process, and because he let go of one crucial moment, revisiting it over the next eight years, trying to scramble back on a path he realised he wanted only when the other turned out to be a dead end.

It makes me wonder whether, when one gets what one wanted all one's life, the pain of waiting for it is sweetened in memory. Is love like a job application or a creative skills contest, when the anxiety of waiting for the results morphs, in our minds, into the anticipation of joy when news of victory comes through? Does one tire of waiting, to the point where s/he doesn't want the person s/he has been waiting for, when the person is finally ready? Is love all about telling oneself to be patient, while waiting? Can the mistakes of a few moments, the separation of a few months, cause eight years of pain, of working towards a way to be together even after reunion?

Maybe Orhan Pamuk's skill lies in that, even while speaking from one point of view, he manages to make one pity and resent everyone in the story. One sees where Kemal, his fiancee Sibel, his lover Fusun, her mother Nesibe and his mother Vecihe Hanim, are coming from. Things they do seem fair and unfair. You sympathise with them, while empathising with the other side.

THE VERDICT:

Would the book, excruciatingly slow as it is in parts, inducing disbelief in the Pamuk-lover that it was indeed Orhan Bey who wrote this, prompting him or her to perhaps blame the translator, have been finishable had it been written by a less-renowned writer? Or maybe it is Orhan Bey's inimitable style, which finds fluidity even in translation, and even in the specificity of the first person singular, reminds Everyman and Everywoman of his or her own story, that makes it enjoyable in retrospective, if not in reading itself.

My Favourite Music Videos

My sister and I spent many Thursday mornings (when our schools had the weekly off) recording movie trailers off All India Radio. "Oh Krishna, you are the greatest musician of this world / Bansuri se tune prem dhun sunaya, mohana" from Meera Ka Mohan or Harish Bhimani's dulcet voice saying, "Meet mere man ke, Tips cassette ban ke (pause) aap ke ghar aanewala hain" was something we looked forward to. For no other reason but lack of choice!
Apart from having to survive the T-Series holocaust, the other big problem was having to visualise the lead players as the songs anonymously played out and the musicians named. I remember my sister aggressively dissing the song, "Kash koi ladka mujhe pyar karta" and then realising that it starred her heartthrob Aamir Khan.

So, when cable TV came to India, we were one of the early adopters - welcoming it with a red carpet bigger than the IPL's and becoming ardent viewers of MTV from the word go. After years of audio, we just loved music videos!
Therefore, putting together a list of my favourite music videos is something I should have done long ago except that it never struck me.
A recent request on Twitter for the best videos of 2009 got me thinking and made me come up with the loveliest videos of all time.
Great music - check. Fantastic visuals - check. Lovely memories - check.
Here are 10 of my favourites. Where are yours?

I will start with an obscure one.
Sukhwinder Singh songs are nothing without a thumping beat and some lilting vocals. The song - Aa mujhe chhnoo le - was all of that and Malaika Arora looking like a million dollars. Shot as a crime caper, the video has a wooden-looking hero and Malaika escaping a mafia gang across some exotic locales. And if that was not enough (and it really wasn't!), you had Malaika in a sizzling dance as well. Don't take my word for it. Watch it!

Bombay Vikings came with their repertoire of English lyrics (simple ones, thankfully!) set to the tune of popular Hindi tunes and quickly became a rage. Their first - Kya soorat hain - was a superhit thanks to the catchy words, evergreen tune and Prabhudeva's brother!
My favorite, however, is Mona Re - set to the tune of O mere sona re sona re from Teesri Manzil, though at a slower tempo. It played to a hilarious video about a muscular Lothario, a fatso and a pedantic wimp stuck in the lift with a beauty. Their silent fanstasies and one-upmanship play out with crazy subtitles. And the song isn't too bad either!

Every time a classical musician sets foot in Bollywood or associated arenas, you can be reasonably sure of a magical period.
Sultan Khan debuted with Piya basanti and won our hearts. Chitra did the female vocals and was not left behind either. Set to a beautifully shot video in the hills and around a theme of terrorism, the song was just magical with his very unusual but magnetic voice. Encore, encore!

The first Pakistani to win our hearts was Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. And Lisa Ray deserves a lot of credit for bringing this about.
Aafreen aafreen is shot in the beautiful deserts of India and Nusrat-saab just lets himself loose as Ms Ray shimmers on the sands like a mirage. For two years of our b-school, every party HAD to play this song and we had to get on our knees and pay obeisance. It was mandatory.

Sometimes, an ordinary song just sticks to your mind for no apparent reason.
Aankhon mein tera chehra by Aryans is one such video. Is it the fresh combination of Shahid Kapur and Hrishita Bhatt? Is it the story of the underdog? Is it the soft-focus video? Or is it the slowly-growing-on-you melody? Don't know. Don't care.

Can I include a remix song in this list? Well - technically, I should not because this is supposed to be a list of non-fil music videos. Right?
But when I tell you that the song is Saame yeh kaun ayaa, you will have to give in because the video is totally removed from the milieu of the original song and yet it is so wonderfully grounded in Bollywood that you can't help but like it. After all, who doesn't want to see a long-haired hero win a disco competition and ride into the sunset with his beloved on a scooter?

Pradeep Sarkar made ad films to start with. But when he started making music videos, people started asking about him. And there is a distinct point in his career when the Euphoria boiled over!
The debut song of Euphoria - Dhoom pichuk dhoom - was one of the earliest pieces to have popularised the ghats of Benares in Bollywood and retained all the freshness of the Holy City. An amazingly catchy tune - along with a brilliant Bhatiali riff (by Shobha Mudgal?) - was the perfect soundtrack. And the lady on whom the video was shot - who was she?

How often do you have songs shot underwater? If you say Blue, I will kill you.
Silk Route first song was about drowing in your beloved's eyes - Dooba dooba rehta hoon aankhon mein teri - and the video had the entire band submerged in a picturesque lake. From a musical point of view, the song did not break any new ground.
Except that it gave us Mohit Chauhan. And that cannot be a bad thing!

Nor am I in the Vedas, Nor am I in Intoxicants / Nor am I the carefree deviant / Nor am I fire nor air / I know not what I am"
Rabbi Shergill sang the words of Bulla Shah, set to mesmerising music in which he asked who he was - Bulla ka jaana - and the entire nation was hooked. The words were difficult to understand but the video had the translations scribbled over the frames of everyday Bombay - which was one more beautiful touch to this beautiful song.

And finally - the last entry on this list is everybody's favourite song.
It wasn't in a film. Never on an album either. It was never commercially released and yet all of us remember the tunes, words and visuals almost exactly.
We did not realise how good it was, till we were shown how bad it could have been. Mile sur mera tumhara...

Zeus and Hera to Real People

(Published in Zeitgeist, The New Indian Express, on 13th March, 2010)




“This was my sweet, inconsolable, grief-stricken, beautiful sister! For a moment – and perhaps because I knew we were related, however slightly – her body, with its long limbs, fine bones and fragile shoulders, reminded me of my own.”

- The Museum of Innocence’, Orhan Pamuk

It’s the forbidden i-word. Maybe this is why Sam Shepard’s ‘Fool for Love’ ends with a standing ovation irrespective of individual performances… because the emotions outlined in the play form shadows in the minds of the audience. It is a story of tormented love, of a couple that can’t stay apart and can’t be together. They were first drawn to each other because they were alike – feisty, strong-willed, impulsive and passionate. But then they discovered why – they shared a father. Maybe their story fascinates us because it takes something to pursue a relationship with someone once you’ve discovered s/he is your half-sibling.

While folklore is rich with tragic stories of accidental incest – from Oedipus to Kullervo, from Electra to the 6th century Danish ruler Helga – hearing about two people aware of their blood ties indulging in incest shocks and horrifies all of us. We know the verdict if it involves sexual abuse, but what about two people willingly entering a forbidden relationship?

Mythology is not short of instances of this either – the Greek pantheon was the product of a union between the siblings Zeus and Hera, their son Hermes seduced his jealous brother Apollo, and the Egyptian Gods Osiris and Isis, and the Norse Gods Freyr and Freyja, were sibling-spouses. But then, there are real people, people we know, who are attracted to their own blood relatives. A former schoolmate of mine had a ten-year-long affair with his cousin, which ended at the family’s insistence. A friend’s uncle was ostracised for marrying his mother’s sister’s daughter. They chose not to have children for fear of birth defects, but decided societal norms would not get in the way of their relationship.

Is it only societal norms that tell us which relationships are allowed? Is a blood tie just another factor like caste, religion and gender? Do we unconsciously control whom we are attracted to? Does knowing someone is a relative ensure your feelings are platonic? Do some people stifle the physical chemistry they share for this reason? Or are the people involved in incest rebels, choosing to break barriers simply because they exist? Anita, a woman in her mid-forties, believes “harmless” crushes within the family are common, and says she and her sister fancied one of their cousins until he got married. “We would never have acted on it,” she says, “it was just timepass. There’s something wrong with people who act on it.”

Roland Littlewood, a Professor of Anthropology and Psychiatry at University College London, identifies “eroticisation of the young” as a cause for incest, saying “the notion of ‘adolescence’ [marks] a recognition of sexually mature but socially immature adults.” (Littlewood, 'Pathologies of the West: an Anthropology of Mental Illness in Europe and America'). A resident of Chennai, Janaki, who is now in her sixties, agrees and says boys and girls in the 10 – 18 age group shouldn’t be allowed to mingle at weddings. “The occasion stirs feelings you can’t control,” she says, “and easy access is a catalyst. When we were kids, our mothers would keep an eye on everyone in that age group, especially the older ones.”

Does the difference lie between feeling and acting, or acceptance and denial of the feeling, or feeling and not feeling at all? Another dimension comes into play in the case of what Littlewood identifies as ‘post-adoption incest’ or ‘genetic sexual attraction’. Some people raised by foster families were found to be uncontrollably attracted to their biological relatives when a reunion was arranged. While some experts attribute GSA to a need to identify with someone who resembles oneself physically or in personality, others see it as a manifestation of a need to ‘connect’ in some way. They say proximity to one’s biological family in early age resolves this into attachment rather than erotic interest, whereas it causes confusion and misinterpretation if the reunion happens in adulthood.

While intellectual debates ponder over the blurry line between sexual attraction and emotional bonding, Western countries have witnessed many cases asking for the abolition of incest laws. A German sibling couple (who met as adults) have had four children in a bid to have a family of their own, as each child was given into foster care. In India, where such subjects are considered too uncomfortable to discuss, chances are that there are more people suffering in silence, torn between guilt and inclination. Counselling centres abroad report that many cases of incest can morph into more conventional relationships after therapy. But will we see similar aid in India, where talk of incest is brushed under the carpet as taboo?

* Some names have been changed

Not Quite Cricket

(Published in Zeitgeist, The New Indian Express, dated 6th March, 2010)

“So, you very nearly snatched defeat from the jaws of victory…,” Ravi Shastri looks down at Dhoni.

“Oh, it’s all thanks to the boys. They really came together for this,” Dhoni grins.

“And this, you think, is representative of the country,” I smirk to my brother.

Half an hour earlier, I had been all excited about finally watching a good game of cricket, and laughing as the South African tail enders took the Indian bowlers and fielders to task, while one of my brothers was fretting about the country’s reputation going for a toss, and another was cursing himself for choosing cricket over Liverpool vs. Manchester City. At some point, both of them had found a common enemy in me, for my purported lack of patriotism.

What I don’t get is why, while most of the country can’t name more than five freedom fighters or three Olympic medallists or two Nobel laureates or one Oscar winner from India, these eleven men are considered representative of the country’s goals, dreams and global standing. More so, when they go around slapping each other, getting away with swearing at the opposition, refusing to wear numbers on their shirts because of superstitions, calling Sachin back from personal emergencies to rescue the team, stripping at Lord’s and likely spending more time endorsing brands than at fielding practice.

You’re allowed to remain neutral and want to watch ‘a good game’ as long as it’s football, tennis or basketball. But cricket – oh no, it’s practically the national sport, and you’re supposed to make a show of your patriotism. To hear Indians speak of the 1983 Prudential World Cup, a tourist might well be forgiven for thinking it is the country’s sole achievement in team sport. I wonder how many people know the Indian hockey team remained unbeaten in the Olympics for twenty-eight years, and has won more gold medals than any other national team. And yet, the Hockey World Cup being held in India is endorsed by a model-turned-actress rather than its team members.

At what point of time and why, did a game that nine (or is it eleven now?) countries officially play, become the focal point of national sentiment? Why was the IPL auction such a diplomatic disaster? Would three Pakistani players being auctioned off successfully have resulted in an exchange of bouquets between New Delhi and Islamabad, and the peaceful resolution of the Kashmir issue? When Indians are being attacked in Australia and diplomats from that country are urging us not to see it as a race-related issue, should our biggest concern be whether Australian cricketers want to play in India?

If the Indian cricket team’s performance is to be considered the parameter of the country’s capabilities, maybe our taxes should be diverted entirely to their salaries, ground maintenance and the other key areas of Indian cricket. This would leave the corporates free to sponsor road-building, flyover construction, natural-disaster-related rehabilitation programmes across the world, and most importantly, diplomatic dialogue.

Think of the enormous potential this holds! If the foreign secretaries of India, and the enemy countries we are surrounded by, were under contract to, say Sahara or Pepsi, and could expect bonuses for a definite result, had rankings to fight for and had trophies to win for not making faux pas, would we have to waste so much newsprint reporting ineffective talks? Most importantly, the politicians taking part in the austerity drive wouldn’t have to fight with airline employees for free upgrades. They could sigh, shrug and say, “what to do? An austerity drive is in direct contention with LG’s motto, and it would be flouting our contract norms…”

Random Thoughts of a Fermented Mind

Just came back from the book launch of May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss.
Buy it NOW! I was reading it at the traffic lights on the drive back and chuckling to myself.

Probably for the first time in the elite portals of India Habitat Centre, names of films like Zalzala (Kimi Katkar, Shatrughan Sinha), Zehreelay (Chunky Pandey, Juhi Chawla), Loha and - but, of course - Gunda were bandied about and the audience lapped it up.
Nilanjana Roy moderated a lively conversation between three of India's best read bloggers - Jai Arjun Singh, Sidin Vadukut and the book's author - Arnab Ray. Jai Arjun talked about how a reader (hopefully infrequent) of his blog claimed that his son was the proof of a rocking sex life. Sidin explained how he has been suspected of being a North Indian and has been asked to do unspeakable things to dogs. And Arnab held forth on how only Mithun Chakraborty can be a coolie in an airport.
My only regret of the evening was that none of the panelists - including the author - pronounced the name of the book as it has been spelt out!

Ahem... and now for a bit of self promotion.

After a really bad day at work yesterday, I was hoping that I will make up by wrestling with my son once I got home. I did not realise my day would get made so brilliantly till I stumbled upon this interview with GreatBong. By all metrics and standards, Random Thoughts of a Demented Mind is the most popular Indian blog. Therefore, GB counting Calcutta Chromosome as one of his five favourite blogs was so gratifying that I had to re-read it to believe it. I was reminded of a Gavaskar interview in India Today, in which he praised Atul Bedade to the skies!

A thought: Is Random the most often used word in blog titles? Is there a scientific way of finding out?

Going on to another random subject - of things getting lost & found in translation.
A friend SMSed me a while back – “How would you translate the spirit of this line in English – Rishtey mein toh hum tumhare baap hote hain. Naam hain Shahehshah.” I invoked the combined spirits of Chuck Norris and the dubbed Kung-fu films to come up with – “I f***ed your mom, you a**hole. Call me Dad. Or call me Shahenshah.” Any better suggestions?

Talking of subtitles, I flew Air India (Indian Airlines of my childhood and still retaining most of the hostesses from my childhood days) and was rewarded with a subtitled version of Love Aaj Kal as the in-flight movie. The subtitles were evocative (“The day has blossomed like a flower” for Ajj din chadheya), to say the least and I was quite enjoying matching them to the lyrics. But nothing had prepared me for Chor Bazaari. The black marketing of stolen glances is a habit I have now given up… Now hear the real words!

Now, that's the subject for Arnab's next book!