Does Kamal Haasan Deserve This?

As published in Tehelka

Twelve hours was enough for veteran actor Kamal Haasan to lose all hope (or whatever was left of it) in India’s political structures. Last night, the Madras High Court had lifted the ban by the Tamil Nadu government on Hassan’s film Vishwaroopam. However, in the morning, police halted screening across Chennai.

Frustrated and fed up, Haasan held a press conference in Chennai this morning where he said, “If there is no secular state in India, I would go overseas. I think Tamil Nadu wants me out.”

There was a depressing sense of déjà vu both for the citizens of this country and Kamal Haasan when he recalled M F Husain’s exit from the country after the painter’s freedom of experssion was trampled upon. Certain Hindu groups protested against Husain’s nude paintings of a certain Hindu goddess.

Hassan’s frustration was evident on his face when he said that he had pledged all his property on this film and had nothing more to lose, he would leave the country freely.

The 58-year-old Padma Shri awardee has starred in the largest number of films submitted by India in contest for the Academy Award, for Best Foreign Language Film.

Indian democracy started it’s descent towards intolerance when Prof Ashis Nandy’s comments were stifled under the garb of being divisive a few days ago, and reached the peak today when Haasan’s film is being used as a political tool.

What right does the government of Tamil Nadu have to stall a film when the Censor Board has given it a go ahead? What right do they have to stop the screening when the courts have given it a clean chit? What is the politics behind the fringe Muslim groups that have claimed that the movie is offensive? How long will artists have to suffer in the hands of politicians?

In 1989, the landmark Supreme Court judgment in the S. Rangarajan v/s P. Jagajivan Ram case held “freedom of expression cannot be suppressed on account of threat of demonstrations and processions and threat of violence”. The Tamil Nadu Government was not only being severely intolerant but also unconstitutional in deciding to impose a ban on the film.

Haasan said in the press conference that he thinks in Tamil, writes in Tamil and that his poems are in Tamil. If Kamal Hassan is forced to move out of the state in the quest for his uncompromising freedom of expression, the citizens of Tamil Nadu will face a loss they will never make up for.

Dabangg 2: Crass, Idiotic and Senseless

As published in Express Tribune

Reading that Dabangg 2 had made close to Rs150 crore in less than 14 days perked up my interest. After all, I wondered, what would it take for a film to become one of the highest grossing Bollywood films of all times?

With enormous curiosity and an absolutely open mind (I haven’t seen its prequel, Dabangg.) I marched into a near-packed theatre armed with a bucket of popcorn.

The first kidnapping sequence reminded me of senseless south Indian action films which are omnipresent on movie channels these days.

The mindless violence and a desperate attempt at comedy already began to irritate my sensitive taste. I concluded long before the film ended that Dabangg 2 was crass, idiotic and senseless. I couldn’t believe the amount of money AK Productions had made by putting out a product that is way lower than substandard.

But, what does this say about the audience?

No sooner had I made my conclusion than I realised that I was trying to put the wrong lid on the bottle. The film was just perfect in its place. I was the wrong audience for it.

The film is for Salman Khan fans; they want to see him beat up the bad men, romance the heroine and have emotional encounters with other character actors.

Dabangg 2 is Salman Khan and Salman Khan is Dabangg 2.

There is no room for a director, a screenplay writer, a story writer or a dialogue writer in the entire project. No one would care about whether Salman’s dialogue made sense, as long as it was said in a characteristic Salman type of way. No one would care about the twists and turns the story would take (there is no story line, to begin with!) as long as Salman was in it. And, no one would care about the authenticity or plausibility of the plot because Salman was the only reality!

Of course, not to forget the ever important presence of “item songs” so our Salman bhai can take a break from his fights.

Most songs that adorn this title are an insult to poetry and are the worst form of sleaze.

Dabangg 2 is a tight slap across the faces of those Bollywood film makers who claimed that Indian audiences (at large) are mature enough to accept and adore intelligent movies with a well-thought out story line and decent dialogues.

This film is a clear indication of what the audiences want. In an era where audiences rule and filmmakers want to give them what they want, most of the money in the industry will surely go into making such films in the future.

I might be a prude, bordering on being a snob. Well, then that is who I am.

People like me hope and pray silently that films that are made for us are given as much financial resources (while I feel my Rs180 was wasted on Dabangg 2.)

Here’s a call for attention to our minority community of avid film watchers – we need intelligent and entertaining films! 

Kasab Coverage In The Indian Media

As Published in the Express Tribune

Unlike the Pakistani media that reported the hanging of Ajmal Kasab sparingly, the Indian media featured the story very prominently all day yesterday. I can vouch for the fact that for Indian television and online journalists it was a busy field day. Literally, all angles of the story were covered – the actual hanging, the mercy petition, 26/11 survivors, 26/11 martyrs and the Kasab’s last wish.

One of the reasons that got many elders in UP and Delhi to watch television news was the invincible dumbing down spirit that India TV, a 24 hour Hindi news channel, exhibits time and again. They were true to their reputation yesterday as well, in an attempt to explain to the Indian public the nuances of hanging a terrorist they said, in a hurried toe, “Faasi ke waqt Kasab bhi maujood” – a piece of information that an average Indian was quite unaware of and was very hungrily seeking!

The English channels, catering to the intelligentsia, were only slightly more measured in their theatrics. Times Now had a 2-minute promo that called Kasab a “butcher” more than 4 times! As much as we all agree that Kasab was a terrorist who came to the country to kill people in cold blood, there is little need to rekindle the wounds of the victims of the dreaded night of November 26^th.

Now that my usual amount of criticism has been meted out, I want to go on record to say that yesterday was a day when I also saw some good, balanced reporting done. There will always be channels that went overboard, reporters that got emotional and reportage that were opinions. But, an overall picture of the reporting done on Kasab’s hanging was better than the usual jingoistic, loud reporting.

Even as many in the media began sounding triumphant, there were people whose heads were placed firmly on their shoulders. Kafila, an well-known team blog, carried a piece on how a Mumbai terror attack victim sympathises with Kasab - sensible and level headed commentary on why people like Kasab are made and why shouldn’t lose sight of the other side.

On rediff.com, independent journalist, Shivam Vij, asked, “Rejoice, fellow Indians. Ajmal Kasab [ Images ] has been hanged. But please excuse me, I am not joining you. Your cheering and hooting and hurrahs feel like a medieval lynch mob celebrating the death of the sinner and not the sin. 'Barbaric' is the word that comes to mind.

This isn't merely about the morality or aesthetic of capital punishment. I want to ask you: What did we just achieve? Ten terrorists had come to kill and be killed, to cause maximum damage of the sort that they surely knew they'd be killed. Nine of them were killed in direct encounter. Did we hail their deaths? Do we say their deaths were justice? So if we killed Ajmal Kasab four years later -- 'with due process' -- what exactly have we achieved?”

Several senior journalists congratulated him on the piece and several others were concerned about the impact that this would have on the India-Pakistan relations.

And, the social media was rife with several journalists showing their frustration about the Pakistani establishment, but to their credit they targeted their anger towards only the authority. Divya senior journalist with NDTV said “And can Pakistan stop looking away? Such pathetic leadership really.... I feel sorry for the common man there.”

I am not sure it was a triumph of the Indian state by killing a man they had in captivity, but it surely was a triumph of Indian media for the way they handled the story.

Barfi! - A sweet cine-treat for all

As Published in Express Tribune

For someone who had not seen the rushes, Barfi! was a pleasant surprise. When I walked into the theatre I was unaware that I was about to watch a film where the lead actor had a speech and hearing impairment, and that the lead actress was autistic.

About ten minutes into the film, when the audience is told that Barfi, Ranbir Kapoor’s character in the film, had severe impairments, I braced myself to watch another emotive movie that would leave me crying profusely and feeling sorry for the differently-abled.

Until the end, I kept waiting for that moment.

The film manages to constantly put a smile on your face and gently sprinkles bouts of laughter in several scenes.

Director Anurag Basu had proven that he understands the myriad complexity of human emotions when he made Life In A Metro in 2007; with Barfi!, he has gone a step further.

Barfi had all the reasons to be a traditional Bollywood tragic hero – his mother died at birth, he’s poor and penniless through his youthful days and is left brokenhearted by a rich girl. However, Barfi is different and so is Jhilmil, Priyanka Chopra’s character, an autistic child who is loveless and companion-less for most of her screen life.

Attempting to carefully understand the lives and needs of autistic and differently-abled people, Basu has pulled his lead characters out of their traditional roles in a cry-fest.

Ranbir Kapoor is not only the current hot-favourite among the girls, but has also been consistent in getting critics’ accolades. This is another such performance which can bag a huge chunk of the awards next year.

At the start of the movie, where Ranbir Kapoor is being chased by a policeman, played by Saurabh Shukla, Ranbir’s expression of youthful carelessness and joy comes alive on the screen. The scene is also shot wonderfully well with interesting camera angles, and contributes a great deal in building up the pace of the movie.

I felt, however, that Priyanka Chopra has overdone her bit. The worst criticism for an actor is when the audience can see the actor as being separate from the character, and that is exactly what Priyanka does in several scenes. Jhilmil is lost (or overdone) reminding the audience constantly that they are watching Priyanka Chopra’s pretence. The scene when Jhilmil is brought back home from ‘Muskaan’, a foster home for differently-abled people, exemplifies my point.

South Indian actress Illeana D’Cruz surely gets into the skin of her character named Shruti, who is also the narrator of the story. She is crafty, both at the romantic scenes and at the emotional ones.

More than once during the 180 minutes, the audience is caught sitting intently on the edge of their seats, predicting the character’s next move. Some of those moments are when Shruti holds the train ticket in her hand and is deciding whether to leave her life as a wife of a rich man behind; when Shurti hears Jhilmil scream out Barfi’s name and is in the dilemma of whether to convey that to Barfi, and the scene in which Jhilmil runs behind Barfi’s moving bus.

The music is exceptional and keeps in tone with the changing mood of the film. Music director Pritam does the trick again in getting the music just enough attention that is required. The songs do not take away attention from the scenes, neither are they too insignificant that they go unnoticed.

Barfi! is an enjoyable watch, mostly because it springs a surprise on the audience and let’s them carry a sweet, happy feeling back to their homes.

Thank you for letting me travel to Pakistan!

As Published in Express Tribune

Pakistan had always been a reality to me, unlike for some people who couldn’t believe that there was another nation carved out of the Indian subcontinent. But, for me, it was just another nation that existed before I was born.

In 2007, I chanced upon a scholarship to finish a part of my semester in Kinnaird College, Lahore.  Lahore fascinated me ever since. It was in Lahore that Sahir Ludhianvi (my favourite lyricist) spent his romantic years, where Jaun Eliya (my favourite poet) struggled through his life and Sa’adat Hasan Manto (my favouurite writer) passed away.

While my only fear was what the city would offer to a vegetarian, as I packed my bags to leave, my family and friends were very concerned for my physical safety.

Just days before I was to enter the alluring city, due to a spat between the heads of states of India and Pakistan, all visas (except diplomatic visas) were cancelled.  That was the closest I had come to experiencing Pakistan.

Three years later, another scholarship took me to the US, to complete my studies.  I had never thought that a scholarship that was funded by the governments of US and India, would bring me closer to Pakistan.

On the University of Colorado Boulder's beautiful, lush lawns, 25 students from across the world, who had been granted the same scholarship gathered and spoke in hushed tones about the upcoming introductory seminars.  From the corner of my eye, I caught one gentleman giving me a long, thoughtful look.  From the color of his skin, I could tell that he was from my part of the world, but his shy, almost withdrawn nature made me nervous about approaching him.

Finally, he came over and said, "I have wanted to say hi to you for a long time. You are from India, right?"  I answered edgily, "Yes, I am Raksha."  I extended my hand.  Under his beard was a smile and look of unmistakable intelligence.  "I am Bilal.  I am from Pakistan."  Soon, we realized that not only were we about to attend the same grad school, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, but that we would also be living in the same building!

That introduction was the beginning of a beautiful friendship and also the reason I forged many other precious friendships during my stay in the US.  Bilal introduced me to Sana, a bubbly Pakistani woman whose laughter resonates long after she has left the room.

As time passed and we settled into our routines (which involved going to school, working late and spending weekends catching up on sleep), we realized that our calendars allowed for spending time together.  On most days, the three of us dined together.  We visited Times Square and the Statue of Liberty, and ate tons and tons of 

South Asian food while chatting mostly in Hindustani.

It is interesting how certain situations and places can highlight different aspects of one's identity.  In New York, Sana, Bilal and I were no longer from the two warring nations.  We were students of Columbia University, who shared food, culture and language as opposed to several others from different parts of the world. 

When Sana called us each evening, Bilal and I immediately knew the agenda: we would order a large pizza with jalapeno peppers and pineapple, and sit on Sana’s bed listening to stories about her childhood.  We watched American and Pakistani sitcoms, and laughed well into the night.

Today, months after graduation, there is a bond between us that goes beyond all barriers, in spite of the fact that we are separated by what some call the impermeable borders between India and Pakistan.

As I now plan a visit to Pakistan to meet Bilal’s newly wed wife and gang up with Sana for a hiking trip on the Margalla Hills, I hope some day the history will remain deeply buried and never return to haunt us. 

Judging Women, Eh?

As published in Tehelka

Every time you think the society couldn’t degenerate any further, there is an example that proves you wrong. Justice Bhaktavatsala, a Karnataka High Court judge, was one such example that came up this past week when he justified wife beating, reportedly in a matter-of-fact way.

However, the light at the end of the tunnel became brighter as all family court matters, including child custody and guardianship, was shifted from him to other judges by the end of the week. This came as a result of many online petitions and protests by Women’s Rights organisations.

That is not the end of the story. If anything, it is the beginning. When a qualified man speaks frustrating non-sense with effortless ease, it is sign that the society needs a serious revamp.

Addressing a woman in a marriage dispute case, Justice Bhaktavatsala had said, “Women suffer in all marriages.  You are married with two children, and know what it means to suffer as a woman. Yesterday, there was a techie couple who, reconciled for the sake of their child. Your husband is doing good business; he will take care of you. Why are you still talking about his beatings?” he said to a woman who had accused her husband of excessively beating her.

When I first heard about blatant gender bias in the Karnataka High Court, a part of me was in denial. I wanted to believe that Justice Bhaktavatsala’s blasphemous comments were an aberration.

But, no. Bhaktavatsala’s idea of justice includes several other gems of patronising, male chauvinistic thoughts. In August, the same judge told a young woman lawyer who was trying to argue in a marriage dispute case, “Family matters should be argued only by married people, not spinsters. You should only watch. Bachelors and spinsters watching family court proceedings will start thinking if there is any need to marry at all. Marriage is not like a public transport system. You better get married and you will get very good experience to argue such cases.”

Unfortunately for women, there are many in the rank and file of the judiciary who consider women subordinate to men, and as instruments meant to comfort and please men. The question here is of law versus justice. Can having stringent laws to protect Women’s Rights change outlooks and provide women with the justice they deserve? A well implemented law is more important than a law on paper. The Convocation on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), believes that Indian law ranks much higher than most countries when it comes to the issue of gender justice.

However, justice is a combination of enactment of laws responsive to the changing needs of time, their effective enforcement and their proactive interpretation and application. How can justice be strengthened if not by educating the dispensers of it? The Justice Bhaktavatsala incident is a wake up call for the Indian judicial system that it is not enough to merely have stringent laws, but also to genuinely educate the dispensers of justice so as to open their minds to the changing times.

When less qualified men make gender biased statements, we put it down to their lack of exposure and conveniently ignore them. Once, an auto-rickshaw driver had said to me, “poore kapde pehenegi to koi chhedega nahi, (you will not be teased if you are fully covered)” gaping at my jeans and cotton top. I had smiled at his perspective and disregarded it, knowing that saying anything will fall on deaf ears.

If things are as bad today, I can’t help but wonder how things would have been without decades of arduous Women’s Liberation movements across the civilised world. Or did they help at all? 

A Fondness For Fairness

As published in the Express Tribune 

While I sat lazing one Sunday morning, I received a frantic phone call from a friend, “my naani thinks I will never be married!” she yelled. “She says I am 28 years old, and dark complexioned to boot!” she exclaimed.

Fairness was central to the lives of our older generations (I keep asking why that was, to no answers!). Even long before the British arrived in the subcontinent, the fairer among the Indians were well received in social settings and marriage markets. I remember my grandmother referring to her grandmother as being “as white as snow” (and hence being immensely beautiful).  Therefore, the subcontinent is an easy target for the big cosmetic firms as they can further an existing cultural bias and lure prospective customers into buying fairness products. Advertisemts in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Pakistan compare little to the huge fairness market that India seems to posses.

There have been several commercials in India, over the decades, which have spoken about how young men desire women who are fair, and how fairness in women is a precondition to success. However, the ad that got the activists and social commentators up-in-arms was the one on vaginal fairness. The ad hit the screens early March, but the shock and distress that it caused to bloggers and columnists alike is such that the matter is still kept alive on the blogosphere and twitter. Adding insult to injury, the admaker justified it in one of his columns for a popular weekly: “The only reason I can offer for why people like fairness, is this: if you have two beautiful girls, one of them fair and the other dark, you see the fair girl’s features more clearly. This is because her complexion reflects more light.”

Why am I still not angry with him?

I understand the psychology of a capitalistic society which thrives on selling useless products to the masses. Such ads hold up a mirror to our society, the adman and the like are only feeding on the fodder that the society provides them with. Our responsibility as a generation that has inherited a deep-rooted bias, is to ensure that colour of the skin becomes nothing more than that – the colour of the skin, a biological factor that differs from race to race. The minute we link it with societal structures like caste and class, bifurcations of superiority and inferiority seep in.

While I was a student in New York, during our usual coffee table talks, a White American friend whispered into my ear, “I hear men these days want women looking fair all over! I have stopped wearing a bikini to the beach!” she half-giggled.

This caught me by surprise as I had thought that people in the West wanted a sexy layer of tan on their bodies. After a little bit of searching around, I found, just like all capitalist-consumer products, virginal whiteness is also a borrowed concept. The US has had virginal and anal whitening creams for a few years now, and researchers are now looking at their possible health risks.   

Considering virginal whitening creams have just been introduced in India, I guess, we know what to expect next.

Boys Just Can't be Girls

As published in the Express Tribune


Sitting alone in a train compartment, I waited for my co-passengers to arrive. Like several people, I enjoy being a silent observer of those around me and particularly on a long journey that I was about to undertake, I figured, it was a fine pastime.


A lady, not more than 35 years of age, struggled her way into my compartment carrying a rather heavy child in her left arm and balancing a huge suitcase in her right. Her hair undone, sweat rolling down her forehead, her eyes showed relief that she made it in time. On reaching her spot that was in front of mine, she threw her suitcase on the floor and her child on the berth. Turning her back to me, “Bubbly!” she yelled in full volume.


Before long, a pretty girl of about 8 years, appeared from nowhere. The girl was wearing a pair of lose fitting blue jeans pants, had her hair cut very short. Her eyes looked like what authors of fairy tales would describe as those of princesses – shiny, black, enchanting. She seemed to be quite true to her name. No sooner had she reached her mother and brother than she began to speak in an animated way, “ma, I saw this man outside wearing the same shirt as Guddu bhaiyya.”


Her mother nodded and busily began making space for the three of them.


“When I was entering the train na? I smelt the worst of smells! Ma, I will not use those bathrooms for anything!!”


The suitcase went below the seat, and the other young child of about 6 years was placed near the window.


“Ma… when we reach…” she began again, as if it were her duty to fill her mother in on everything she experienced.


“Shut up, Bubbly! Will you?”


Bubbly winced and shut up.


Over the next 36 hours that we journeyed together, I observed the three of them closely. They were a typical upper middle class family, the children went to reputed schools in New Delhi I learnt, the mother was well educated herself and taught them well – no disturbing others, no making noises while chewing food, be nice to the other sibling etc. Whether it was Bubbly or her brother, they were being taught the same morals and the same good conduct was expected of them.


I was smiling at myself looking a very pleasant family, until Bubbly threw another of her incessant questions at her mother, “Ma, Sunaina’s younger sister wears Sunaina’s old frocks, why can’t Chotu wear my old frocks?” This seemingly innocent question is actually a firm slap on our alleged gender neural society.


That is when I did a mental recap of everything the mother had “taught” in the past few hours.


“Bubbly, be brave, go upto the upper berth by yourself! How will you face life if you are such a coward?”


“Bubbly feed your brother while I eat. You should always be loving siblings.”


“Bubbly, come on, share your toy car with your brother, he is not interested in those dolls.”


Our society has come a long way in gender justice, but we have learnt subtle ways of discrimination. While we are proud of bringing up our daughters like our sons, we still haven’t learnt to bring up our sons like our daughters.


While we encourage our ‘Bubbly’s to be dressed in a pair of pants, keep their hair short, show interest in toy cars; it is looked down upon if our ‘Chotu’s wear a frock, played with dolls and had a natural shy, ‘docile’ nature.


I wonder if we could just let a child nurture its natural traits, grow up in families that are consciously aware of the social constructs and will strive to keep their kids immune from it. Urban women are under twice the stress as the yester years, because the society expects a dual role (that of a man and a woman) from them under the garb of moving towards “true empowerment”.


As if voicing my thoughts, the mother said, “Bubbly, we should always learn to adjust, beta. Never expect that from others, in this case, your brother.”