caa demonstrations

Attended two rallies yesterday.

At azad maidan to talk to some protestors. Met some young people ( students), and some elderly people ( could have been students of jnu, but since this is mumbai, I knew they weren't). Asked them what issue they were protesting against, and as expected, they had no clue. They seemed happy shouting slogans. (some had seen my 5 seconds role in dabhang 3, so they took selfies with me). I call this picnic activism.

Also attended the rally at August kranti maidan. Declined invitations to come and sit in the front and sat at the back with the crowd. Talked to a few people. Even they didn't seem to know exactly what they were supporting. ( took selfies with me, inspite of having seen me in movies).

Gave interviews to scores of people who recorded on their moblle phones. And then to all the TV channels, who were looking to talk to only familiar faces. Next to me was a learned professor, next was a law student, I asked the channels to talk to them but even media just wants known faces. That's such a shame. 

This is the gist of my observations.

1) taking out rallies is futile. Everyone supporting or opposing ( more so if you are opposing) must study the issue, talk to knowledgeable people, find out legality, morality etc by doing a deeper study. Just joining demonstrations, holding placards made by someone else and shouting slogans is not enough. That's picnic activism.

2) government should have sense to communicate to everybody rather than just passing laws. In advertising we do pre and post research before launching an ad campaign. Here you are dealing with major issues.

3) media should realize that celebrities are not knowledgeable in everything. Film stars and directors are mostly ignorant about things which are out of their fields. So talk to educationists, lawyers, people who study these issues. Don't take quotes from idiots like Arundhati Roy who say things for self publicity and make sub-juvenile , childish h statements like lie in your forms and say your names are ranga an billa ( criminals who were convicted for kidnap and murders of innocent young siblings  in delhi). Ignore her. There are millions of sensible people in this country, you don't need hair brained idiots to comment on serious national issues.

People like anurag kashyap are small time directors, they know how to make films ( if at all). When he publicly calls a democratically elected p m of the country, deaf, dumb, Nazi and then says that this government is fascist and intolerant, he forgets that if it really was intolerant and fascist, he would be in jail  by now, at best. So don't talk to them just because they are known faces.

3) I am not fully supporting caa. I think as swargiya balasaheb thakreay had said 20 years ago, we are a poor, developing country. We have a large section of people who are under poverty line, we have problems of basic needs like food, water, shelter and jobs for our existing citizens. Our farmers are committing suicides. We can't afford  the luxury of humanitarianism towards additional refugees. In crores. We shouldn't take anyone, Hindus, Muslims or any other religions. First provide for  our existing  citizens and then show humanitarian magnanimity.

All in all an evening we'll spent. 

satyadev dubey

satyadev dubey died. i never worked with him , but many of my actors , harish patel , vihang nayak , mohan bhandari , and some friends like ambarish puri , came from his stable , so to say . i had difficulties , initially , to break them into my kind of theatre . where you pause when audience laughs , and don't treat them like a fourth wall, as dubey had taught them . for dubey theatre was god , to me audience is . two extremes and yet we got along well . to my surprise , he loved bottoms up .said it had more experiments in it than most experimental theatres had . he saw all versions of bottoms up . liked them ( he was frank enough to say it if he didn't ) . i saw some of his plays . didn't understand them , didn't like them (wasn't frank enough to tell him ) . but always admired his conviction and commitment to theatre . there are not many like him . hats off dubeyji !. he will be happy in heaven , when he meets a few people like him . he never needed a big audience , just a few like-minded people ,and a few like me , who didn't understand his plays but understood him .

maharashtra politics

A lot of people have been asking me about my take on what's happening in maharashtra politics. 

We need to take a step back and take an overview of our state politics and leaders. 

I was a huge admirer of balasaheb thackeray and was quite close to him. I used to meet him quite frequently , every year  at the celebration of , what we called ,his punarjanmadiwas ( the day he had his by pass surgery), and othereise at matoshree. I used to be amazed at the sway he held over the masses without stepping out of his house for so many years. ( i dont know of any other leader who could do that year after year).

I have seen udhhav as a reluctant politician, who grew tremendously as an astute politician and managed ,quite successfully ,to fill the huge shoes of balasaheb and steer shiv sena successfully to victory in  elections after elections  ,in spite of desertions of many stalwarts. 

I have known raj for many years and used to regularly have the most delicious breakfast at his house when i was helping him in preparing the photobiography of balasheb .i still think that after modi ,he is one of the best contemporary orators i have heard. 

I have seen aditya since he was a young boy ( he used to love my red toyota high lux surf car and always used to say he wanted a car like that  ) i have seen him grow extremly well ,through his university days and now plunging into active pilitics at state level. He is young, ,intellegent ,well spoken and should do well .

As a well wisher , i sincerely feel that shiv sena shouldnt straightaway catapult him into the cm s chair .( thats the same mistake sonia gandhi has made with rahul  .putting him straight on top without letting him learn the ropes ). Aditya should be given a smaller ministry ,so he learns how to handle the opposition ,the politics and power games within his own party and coalition parties ,the tight rope walk with the beurocracy which is quite a task, and then with that experience in hand ,get into bigger things. 

I worked very closely with shri pruthviraj chauhan when he was a cm. Used to have meetings with him regularly at varsha. He is an extremely intelligent and well educated politician. A submarine expert from the u s etc. Extremely hard working ( would work till 2 am every night ),and a very pleasant personality. Half his tome went in warding off effirts to dislodge him by his own party leaders. 

Shri sushilkumar shinde ,i have known for many years and know that his life story is what legends are made of. Rising from nothing to hold some of the highest posts in the country ,with sheer determination and hard work . Extremely pleasant and with amazing organisational skills. ( he came for one of my plays and said he had also done lead roles in marathi plays, in his younger days.) 

Suddenly the media is projecting sharad pawar as a larger than life political leader in maharashtra. And we need to apply a bit of logic here .

He has been in state and national politics for nearly 50 years. He started his ncp ,because he refused to accept Sonia gandhi ,a foreigner according to him at that time ,as a leader .( Thats the NATIONALISTIC in the N of ncp ),but soon enough he ate a humble pie and worked under her and her party at national and state levels. 

As far as maharashtra goes ,he has been a multi time chief minister and headed other ministiries for nearly forty years. 

In 1980 when bjp had some 10 or 15 seats ,his party had 55 seats. Today when bjp has 105 seats ,ncp has managed just one extra seat at 56 .

One seat extra after 40 years. That doesnt speak well of any giant state leadership.

So lets think logically  and not get swayed by media hypes. 

My only worry is that even if bjp and shiv sena finally form the government, next five years are going to be more acrimonious that the last five years. 

And thats worrisome for our maharashtra. 

Jrd hoarding and garware

A friend sent me a famous  Koli song and that brought back a pleasant memory.

Years ago JRD TATA had created history again  by flying solo to repeat his historic flight .

I had written a AMUL BUTTER hoarding that showed JRD flying like superman in the cape and superman pose and the Amul butter babies dressed like Parsee kids looking up in amazement and  the line was ...

ITS A BIRD,  ITS A PLANE..NO ITS AAPRO SUPERMAN.

UT'TATA'RLY  BUT'TATA'RLY DELICIOUS.
AMUL

I got a call from Mr Tatas office asking for a print ( I sent him three ).

And then we got a strange call .from the marketing director of Garware nylons ,asking for the name of the person who wrote that hoarding.
Having been told ,I received a huge cake in the evening with a handwritten note by mr Garware saying , ' hats off to your creativity.that line made my day .this is a token of my appreciation.'

I wrote back saying that cake wasn't necessary,just that line in appreciation was more than enough .and sent him a print of the hoarding .

Next day again I got a call from their office asking if I would be interested in handling their advertising.  we ,of course, jumped at it .   went and took a brief for their nylon fishing nets.

It was a new challenge because we had never handled this product category .the campaign was to be in Marathi.
I went walking in the Koli settlements and observed how they talked , got a list of Koli Marathi books , read and re read them and created a four ad campaign. I don't remember all the ads ,but sort of  remember one.

It showed an old , blushing mother in law  ( watched fondly from the back by her husband ) telling her young daughter in law ,

" Ani te larat malaa matsyagandha Rani mhanle ki Mee lajena choor whayche. " ( When HE romantically called me matsyagandha Rani ,I use to blush and blush )

The copy went on to say that * when I got married ,we didn't have too much money but my husband had confidence and faith in Garware nets. ....and how he worked hard  and how he got me new gold necklace for Diwali ...etc '

It ended on a baseline

GARWARE NYLON NETS

KOLYACHYA MANGATA EVDHI MAJBOOT AND KOLNISARKHI LAVCHIC .( Strong like a Koli's wrist ,and supple like a koleen.)

That campaign won every award in its category.

Amul butter to fishing nets.. it was so much fun all the way.

Republic Day float

Watching the Republic Day parade always fills me with great pride.

It also reminded me of something funny  that happened years ago. That year the Maharashtra government decided to get some outsiders to conceptualize and design the Republic Day float of Maharashtra. The ministry of culture called me and said they hsve chosen two people, alec padumsee and me and two themes for the float. Cricket and films. And they had given the first choice to alec to choose, and he had chosen cricket so I was given films.
I didnt know where to get information on the history of films but luckily I was on a committee to help the national association for the blind and dilip kumar was on the same committee and  I used to meet him. He suggested that I get all the info from the archives of v. Shantarams rajkamal studios.
Now the float has two parts. The jeep or the cabin and the trailer. I conceptualised a design wherein the front cabin had a huge cut out of a lavani dancer in a classical pose of holding the pallu with both hands above her head and as it  turned it showed a smita patilish figure matching that form with a modern maharashtrian girl holding a computer printout.
And the main trailer had a giant film reel with each frame having a live tableaux of films through the ages actually acted out by performers. And like a normal film reel on a table , it would move on two fixed axis.

We made a design, made a model as per the central government requirements and sent it to Delhi for the approval of the Committee. I think sheila dixit, manishankar iyer etc were on the committee.
They approved the design with two changes. 1- make the film reel a double decker. So more tableauxs can be added and make the film reel  move in a figure of 8.
I thought both were ridiculous suggestions. A film print doesnt come in a double decker version and it's physically not possible for a film to move in a figure of 8.
So I refused and made the final model exactly the way I had conceptualized it. Thinking they won't have the time for more discussions or more designs and will have to accept it. And sent it.
I was wrong.
Everyones egos must have got hurt so  they rejected it since it  didn't follow their suggestions.

I didn't have the heart to follow it through and see what they had done for the Maharashtra float or if they didn't even  have one from Maharashtra that year.

Strange but true.

hang them high .

THE FOLLOWING IS NOT A STATEMENT , THESE ARE SOME QUESTIONS . 

my blood boiled when i read about the molestation of innocent girls by some depraved scum in bengaluru . such incidents seem to growing in our country and no one seems to have an idea about how to prevent such incidents . more policing is not a solution because no state has a large enough police force to patrol every street and every bylane . 

that brings me to three questions . 

1 - years ago , on a national television debate , i had recommended strictest punishment to those who rape and molest . catching them , putting them behind bars for a while and then adding  more cases for the already overburdened judiciary , is not the solution , i had said . we need to flog such scum in public , tie them to a pole in a prominent town square and let people spit on them , beat them with chappals , photograph them, chemically castrate them , brand their foreheads and let them go . or better still cut off their arms or legs , to start with, i had said . 

  and the other panelists recoiled in horror . thats so barbaric they said , its so islamic sharia - type regressive they said . i said , in my mind , god forgive them , they don't know their history well . its not just barbaric sharia law . during shivaji's rule , if any rapist was caught , his arms and legs used to be chopped off . for bigger crimes , their heads would be crushed under an elephants foot , or they would be flung off a cliff from takmak tekdi . that was a just punishment  . it put fear in the hearts of others and they dared not look at a woman in a lecherous way . and thats what we need today  . horrible fear of such severe punishment . and if its barabaric , so be it .

2- i saw the television interview of abu asim azmi . i have no love lost for him , but when i read his quotes the next day in the media , i was appalled . they were carefully selected sensational sentences . not one of the reports mentioned that he had begun his interview by saying these rowdies should be severely punished , hang them , he had said . not one paper quoted that . of course he had added that  even girls should take precautions . precautions of who they are out with , how they are dressed etc . ( i personally believe that women can dress as they want , go out with who they want , at a time of their choice , they can smoke , drink , do drugs . and its fine with me . whats good for the guys is good for the girls . thats my sincere personal view ) but i agree with mr azmi , that they should take precautions . please remember that when such incidents happen , all kinds of people make all kinds of statements offering  solutions to prevent them . they may be regressive , archaic , stupid , insane but they are sincere in their intent . these are solutions being offered from their points of view . the solutions may be regressive , the intentions are not bad. they are yet another thought in a scenario where nobody has a solution to offer . 

and the only argument i have heard time and again , against these ' regressive ' thought processes , is don't ask the girls to change their clothes  , let the guys change their' mindset ' . 

AND THAT BRINGS ME TO MY MOST BAFFLING QUESTION .

3- how do you go about changing the mindset of these demented scum ? nobody till date has given me a logical answer .  " hum kapde nahi badlenge , unko apne vichar badalneko bolo" sounds very nice , woman -empowering statement on tv . but how do you do that . by educating them to respect women , they say . does that mean that till now their parents , their school teachers , their college professors ( if they are that educated ) have taught them to disrespect women ? and now some new kind of education system is going to change that overnight , or even in the long run ? how many families have been truly able to change the mindset of their own sons or daughters ? honestly ? i have spent over twenty five years in the communications business . and i know how difficult it is to , forget changing mindset of an identified consumer segment , its near impossible to shift their brand preferences. even after spending millions of rupees . (  amul chocolates , inspite of being superior , could not get people to stop saying ' doh cadbury lana " when they wanted chocolates . inspite of years of efforts , aimed at an identified consumer segment . 

so how do you change the mindset of an unknown mob , in an unknown geographical location  ? 

 when a mr azmi , with all his idiosyncrasies , says take precautions ,whats wrong . don't we lock our valuables or cars as precautions ? we don't say let the thieves change their mindset . why is that always seen as demeaning to women ? and not treating them on par with men ? here's a man expressing concern. you may not agree with the sentiment , but do you you have an alternative  logical solution ? 

i have not yet met anyone who has . my solution is barbaric punishment . but i am honestly looking for an alternative solution . 

AND THATSWHY ITS A QUESTION , NOT A STATEMENT .          

Shivaji statue

yesterday two television channels called me to get my reacrtion to the shivaji memorial to be built in the sea .

i told them that , like every marathee child , i have been weaned on the stories of valour and conquests of the great warrior king . it was a staple diet fed by my aai . years later the great shivshahir babasaheb purandare and the government asked me do , in english , his magnum opus JANATA RAJAA with a three storied set , 350 actors , live horses and elephants i wrote  the entire three and a half hour play and recorded it with some of the biggest actors / voices in marathi and hindi . during the making of the play , i had a chance of interacting with the legendary babasaheb and heard so many stories of new aspects of shivaji maharaj as a king , warrior , social reformer , that i became an even bigger admirer .

AND YET , I DONT AGREE THAT A MEMORIAL NEEDS TO BE BUILT IN THE SEA.

i am not saying that 3600 crores should be spent on schools and hospitals or farmers , because in reality that never happens .

but A -if you want to honour shivaji as the greatest historical figure of maharashtra ,then  that money can be spent on repairing and authentically restoring all the forts that are in a neglected and decrepit condition . have  audio visuals and light and sound shows of what happened at those forts . live tableaus of his battles , his childhood , his coronation , his adventures can be created to showcase his greatness . small models to show his invention of the guerrilla warfare . to show the daring adventure of hirkani to reach her child ,  pawan khind and baji prabhu  etc , where these things  actually happened .
i shot for a film , mee shivaji raje bhosle boltoy,  at pratap gad , and saw how badly the fort was maintained . and i thought , what we have done for the film to show afzal khans arrogance and his destruction by maharaj and jiva mahala can be recreated with permanent life size moving statues at the very spot , and it will be so inspirational .  ( i had seen in singapore , a place called Dang dynasty village , which had recreated the chinese history and tourists used to throng there . and they didn't have 10 % of what we can show . )

and B - the world has messed with the nature for long enough . why disturb the sea and the marine life to create a picnic spot round the corner .
lets put shivaji maharaj in the hearts and imagination of the children , who may not have grandparents or mothers , the way we had , to tell them the awe inspiring stories . lets take them to the depth of maharashtra and heights of the forts to show them history  on its very soil . statues don't do that .

this is my honest opinion .

just another rape ?

the recent rape in delhi has awakened the nation ( it will of course go to sleep or on a vacation during the elections ) . a lot of suggestions on how the rapists should be treated , how to prevent such rapes etc are doing the rounds . 

i was amongst the first , maybe 4 years ago , when on a national tv channel i had recommended that all rapists should be castrated , and everyone including the anchor  recoiled in horror ( anchors always recoil in horror if you say something that doesnt agree with them ). how can you say something so barbaric ? this is like islamic justice in the middle east , how can we , as a civilised society ,  even suggest that ? etc . and i was summarily shut off . 

people seem to have got wiser  since then . but now they are going to the other extreme . death penalty . instant death penalty . castration . the chorus increases .if anyone even feebly tries to classify a rape , he is hounded . rape is rape , they are told . but we must realize that legally for punishment rape is not rape . like murder is not murder , world over . in the u.s. there is murder of the first degree and murder of the second degree . in india there is murder and there is culpable homicide . similarly rape is not rape . 

there is rape with brutal violence by many men ( like the delhi one ) , there is rape by one man ( and even without brutality ,rape is always violent . rape is a crime of violence not  sex ) . then there is date rape ( where things go out of hand with a familiar person ) then there is marital rape . and then there is rape in retrospect ( like some starlets suing film directors for rape lasting for six months or more . thats the most absurd rape . by that logic every divorced woman can sue her ex husband . )

and in the punishment for rape , too , there needs to be some logic . 

firstly , in spite of all the fast track courts , the culprit has to be first convicted . the police have to meticulously build a case proving that he is guilty . then , after conviction the courts have to judge which category the rape falls in ( law does not take into account emotions of protestors ) . and if death penalty is awarded then ( unless we change the entire legal process only for rapists ) , he will have a right to appeal to higher courts , and if high court confirms the death penalty , it automatically ( even without the convicts effort )goes to the supreme court and then to the president for clemency then to the home department for advice and back to the president and then in the queue with others . so if we want fast justice , castration with additional branding of the word " rapist " on his forehead is better . ( permanent humiliation is always better than death , even as a deterrent. ) 

and then lastly , how to prevent rapes ? brain dead suggestions like removing dark films are too dumb to comment on . deterrent is the best solution , fear of law works the best . i dont know how that can happen , but i dont feel inferior in my ignorance , because nobody knows .but lets not condemn suggestions from people who want to help . they may sound regressive to all of us urban elite , but they may have a local , small town relevance . if a person says that little girls shouldnt wear skirts as uniform , he may have a locally relevant view . lot of girls dont know how to sit and they may be exposing themselves to perverts . we dont know in our ivory towers . " hum kapde nahin badlenge , aap soch badlo " sounds great as a slogan . but i have spent over 25 years in communications business and i know that changing mindsets takes decades of education ( and thats in educated urbanites ) . are we going to wait till the mind set changes after 40 years and people learn to respect women . and till then watch little girls getting raped because " soch nahin badli " ? lets get real , rhetoric doesnt solve problems . 

i am a great champion of not only equality but of superiority of women . and i have proved that time and again through my advertising campaigns and interactions with people . but as a student of sociology and anthropology , i know that dress codes differ in different societies . so if someone in a small town says girls should cover themselves , or if a principal in a college asks students not to wear tight t shirts or low slung jeans , lets not hound them as sexist regressive .they are trying to help in their own way , in a way they feel may help . they are on the side of the women , not against them . 

personally i feel , women should dress as they please . but then why dont i see girls in two piece bikinis at the wankhede stadium or at kotla , watching a cricket match ? i see similarly dressed women in Australia or new zealand watching cricket . 

Uncommon man

an english daily is doing a feature tom on r k laxmans common man . they wanted me to write a piece on what the common man means to me . here goes .

The un-common man .

It's strange that India’s most endearing common man was conceived, created ,brought to life, and sustained for decades by India's most uncommon man. R.k. laxman .

The one living legend  who went beyond being india’s best-ever cartoonist and became an iconic creative genius  whose prolific creations surpassed standards of excellence on a daily basis .

To create the common man , to draw him in the way he dressed , ln the way he looked , in the way he behaved was great art . to make him forever mute was  pure genius . in his muteness was captured the very essence of a common man . a helpless , mute spectator , un noticedly camouflaged in the background , watching with speechless bewilderment the life enfolding around him .

and doing just that . watching .

not participating , not commenting , not complaining , not changing ….. just watching . and that’s what made this common man and his creator so uncommon . and so identifiable and so endearing.

Poets ,painters ,  playwrights , novelists , filmmakers have it easy .they are required to get flashes of creative brilliance when they feel like it , when they desire to create . with long gaps of hibernation . they don’t need to get great ideas everyday . they are not required to create on demand ,on a daily basis . this common man was as regular as the sunrise , and as dazzling .

‘you said it ‘ even in its most literal sense was ‘you ‘ saying it . the common man never said anything , he just heard . he was silently omnipresent . existing with his sound of silence . everything that makes a cartoon character interesting , change of clothes , change of expressions , change of attitude , was denied to him , and in this denial , he was given a personality that everybody empathized with .

he didn’t represent a particular community , or a socio-economic segment , or a political point of view -he represented them all . every reader saw in him a reflection of his own frustration with the life around him . he spoke for , or rather didn’t speak for , all of us .

to me , this common man meant a constant reminder of the limitation of my own creativity . a constant humbling presence . as an advertising person ,who wrote the topical amul butter hoardings for many years , I was aware of the pressures of writing topically relevant messages every week or so , of reaching out to millions with just a few words and hoping they would appreciate it everytime . but then I had help , help of colours , help of cute characters who changed clothes , who changed  expressions , help of  the comforting knowledge that one week it could just be a pun on a word , that’s all and nothing more . and more importantly I had the help of brilliant illustrators , who could magically bring that little amul girl and boy alive . I had to just write the line . not draw the visual . and I had to do it once a week , or sometimes ,if a good thought didn’t  occur in time , then take a few days more . and it was a heady feeling to reach out and touch so many people so regularly .and being appreciated and applauded for doing that .  a feeling that could easily have gone to my head . but thankfully , there was this gigantic presence , which did way better creative topicality on a DAILY  basis . to see a man who thought of the lines AND  drew the pictures AND  did that every day AND with the excellence that you couldn’t even dream of achieving in many lifetimes . the common man and his creator was gods way of pointing out to me how insignificant my creativity was and giving me a constant daily reminder lest I forgot .

as a playright who wrote topical plays , and satires that changed at every show , again this uncommon pair , of the creator and his creation , were , to me , a constant yardstick against which I measured my  own feeble attempts . there again , I had help . I had to just write the lines . again I had help . help of some of the best actors India has to offer , to make those words work . it was team work . I wasn’t a one man orchestra , like mr laxman has always been . one man everything .

I know , I gush . I gush more than many other admirers would . but that’s because I have worked in that zone . I am aware that taking on something that requires you to do something topical is like riding a tiger . you cant get off , you cant let off . through health and sickness , through happiness and despair , through flowing ideas and writers blocks , you’ve got to deliver . with demanding regularity and hopefully with some level of excellence .

And that’s where the common man and his uncommon creator work as an inspiration . to show you that its doable . it can be done . the way Olympic athletes show you what human body is capable of doing . to show you that these are the stars , and if you get inspired and try and reach for the stars , you can at least hope to reach the top of a tree .

And I have the great fortune of knowing The man . of interacting with him many times . and that’s where I am luckier than most . I have seen from close quarters how this mind works . how when the highest level of intelligence is combined with the most acute sense of observation , what magic can be created .

Once he dropped it in at my office on his way to work .now our Zen office was , and still remains, albeit in memory , the most brilliantly creative interior ever created ( why be humble when you don’t have to ) we had trees , a talking mainah , golden macaws , a dog , monkeys ( and not just the ones on our payroll ) piranhas that swam under your feet etc . and this man came , sat for a cup of tea . and when he was leaving ,was spotted by somebody from our studio and the whole office rushed to meet him and take his autograph . someone asked him if he could give us an impression of our office .and this dapper little genius , asked for a paper and pen and standing there at the receptionist’s table and without pausing to think , or look around , drew on that paper the kind of details that we didn’t know existed in our office . and as we watched awestruck , we realized why the that mute little common man speaks so much . because he observes so much more than all of us do . in marathi we have a saying “ je na dekhe ravi , te dekhe kavi ‘ ( what the sun cant see , a poet can ) .

And that , to me , is the secret of the common man .

I will always be thankful to mr laxman for giving me the common man .

And to god for giving me mr laxman .

creative freedom

alman rushdie controversy has erupted again . heard ex solicitor general soli sorabjee saying how no right is absolute and how creative people can't create things that cause hurt to a community or a religion .
i agree . for too long have the creative writers , painters , poets believed that they are not bound by any social responsibility , and they can create what they want and feelings be damned . surprisingly people who support the freedom to create , have never created anything , they just love the idea of creative freedom for others . i feel having an intelligent opposing view is fine but you can't denigrate religeous books , figures , gods or even godmen ( although most of the last lot need to be condemned ) . in law we say " your fundamental right to swing your arm as you wish , ends where the other man's cheek begins . " i don't think rushdie is right if he has insulted the prophet , i don't think hussain was right in depicting nude hindu goddesses . being creative doesn't mean you are above the society you live in .

and here i am putting my money where my mouth is . my play bottoms up , got many admirers during its record breaking run , but i had a skit which was a satire on cheating slimming centers and it ended by showing slides of malnourished refugees from ethiopia as satisfied members . a single gentleman met me at the end of the show and politely told me that , that hurt . no protests by angry mobs ,or vested political interests , just one polite hurt man . but i told him , if it hurt him , i will remove it in the next show and i did.
. another of my plays , monkey business had a song making fun of jain food , a lady doctor from bandra wrote me a letter saying she enjoyed the show as did the audience that day , but felt hurt at the fun poked at jain food , i dropped the song and sent her complimentary tickets for the next show . these were not mass protests , nor media frenzy but to me every member of the society who sees my work is god . if they don't like what i write they can go jump , but if my writing hurts them and if i can ( even at a lot of trouble and expense ) change it , i would , and i did .
any creative work by greats like rushdie or hussain or by small fries like me , have to respect peoples feelings .if you want them to buy it , read it , see it , you can't hurt them and cock a snook at them .

just not cricket .

are we crazy ? getting ready to denounce and lynch the indian cricketers ? its a game damn it , no matter how passionately you feel about the game , its still a game . you don't win every time , and thats why its fun to watch .its the uncertainty of not knowing who will play how and who will win . thank god we only play cricket which only a handful of other countries play and our probablity of winning is higher , and not football ,which almost the whole world plays.

these are a good bunch of guys who play the best game they can , they win sometimes , lose sometimes . lets not make their temples when they win , and burn their effigies and houses when they lose . they are not irresponsible , you are .
you want to find someone to blame ? blame the bcci , which fixes 365 matches in a year , treating these players like machines ( even machines have metal fatigue , damn it ) , or blame the media for whipping up your emotions 200 times in a day , or blame yourself for believing that you have a right to this yo-yo reactions because you are so passionate about the game ( sachin never promised you that he will score a hundred hundreds ? ) as my friend sunil gawaskar once said , most of us haven't even played galli cricket to know how it is psychologically and physically , to be out there day after day and play the best in the world .

come on year , give them a break . unless of course , you have never faltered and fallen flat occasionally in your professional or personal lives .( it will be intersting to ask your wife , won't it ? )

Satyadev dubey

satyadev dubey died. 

i never worked with him , but many of my actors , harish patel , vihang nayak , mohan bhandari , and some friends like ambarish puri , came from his stable , so to say . i had difficulties , initially , to break them into my kind of theatre . where you pause when audience laughs , and don't treat them like a fourth wall, as dubey had taught them .

 for dubey theatre was god , to me audience is . two extremes 

and yet we got along well . to my surprise , he loved bottoms up .said it had more experiments in it than most experimental theatres had . he saw all versions of bottoms up . liked them ( he was frank enough to say it if he didn't ) . i saw some of his plays . didn't understand them , didn't like them (wasn't frank enough to tell him ) . but always admired his conviction and commitment to theatre . there are not many like him . hats off dubeyji !. he will be happy in heaven , when he meets a few people like him . he never needed a big audience , just a few like-minded people ,and a few like me , who didn't understand his plays but understood him .

up in smoke

" har fikr ko dhueme udata chala gaya " Is a great song and has been hailed as a romantic philosophy of dev anand's life .  looked at it holistically, it is great. The trouble is people take it literally and romanticise smoking.  an old friend, pratap sharma ,  who passed away last week,  suffered from lung infection of such severe nature that he had to carry a contraption with oxygen supply in his pocket. He once told me, “ bharat ,  with all your communications and persuasive skills, please try and convince people not to smoke . I am a living example of bad effects of smoking"

 having done  advertising campaigns for the Indian Cancer Society for many years, I have always been aware of the harmful effects of smoking. I'm also aware of  the fact that smokers cannot be dissuaded from smoking in spite of their being aware of the harm  it does. You tell  a smoker that smoking is slow poisoning, and he says so who's in a hurry.

 The cigarette lobby is extremely strong  the world over and all the  attempts to curtail smoking have always been resisted in every country. But in spite of all these pressures, many countries have been coming down heavily on smoking in public places etc. many countries have legislated to put scary cancer pictures on cigarette packs to dissuade people from smoking. But most smokers are either too weak or too dumb or too misled by the impression that smoking makes them look like studs (and/or whatever the female version of studs is ). And therefore unless they are forced to not smoke, which I have seen happening  only when they have had to go through bypass surgeries or cancer treatments, they tend to disregard all good advice.

A shining corporate example of how to get people to stop smoking , is Godrej .  at their vikroli plant ,  anybody who wishes to smoke, regardless of seniority, has to get out of his office, get into his car, drive out of the complex, park  on the side of the  highway and smoke.  I know more people who have given up smoking rather than giving up working at Godrej .

that brings us to films .

The tobacco industry has long capitalized on the ability of the entertainment industry to create, reinforce, and normalize messages. The invaluable marketing advantage this creates for the tobacco companies has allowed them to overcome legislative restrictions on cigarette advertising since the late 1960s. In movies and on television, celebrities facilitate the normalization of cigarette smoking by increasing the perception that the behavior is commonplace and integral to everyday life. Capitalizing on this power, tobacco companies have frequently paid producers and actors to feature their cigarette brands. In Superman II, for instance, Phillip Morris paid $40,000 for the Marlboro brand name to appear some 40 times in the film. 


in india , one constantly hears some dumb reactions from the film folk who -


a - say banning smoking scenes infringes on their right of freedom . ( this is as inane as fanatic groups beating up girls and saying they have a right to freedom of action that they deem fit . ridiculous !! in law we say " your fundamental right  to swing your arm ends where the other man's cheek begins " ) 


b- we can't depict real characters if we don't show them smoking on screen . can we show Churchill without a cigar , they ask . (  no , you can't . but when was the last time they made a film on Churchill ? ) 


c- just because a star smokes on screen , it doesn't mean that the youth will ape them and start smoking . ( if that was true  then why do advertisers pay them crores to show them drinking / wearing / driving their products ?. a superstar's obligation to the people who made them superstars doesn't end by photo ops with the downtrodden . they have to ,  as a serious social responsibility , ensure that they don't do anything wrong on screen or in life in front of their fans , that will inspire people to do wrong things . ) 

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iGoogle

iGooglefelt very proud of himanshu roy and others in the mumbai police force . the way they cracked the j dey

murder case is amazing .

when mr sivanandan was the d.g. maharashtra , he had introduced me to mr roy, mr seven bharti and other senior officers . mr rakesh maria ( who had cracked the mumbai bomb blast case ) i had known from before . and all these guys came through as being more professional , more capable and more knowledgable than most guys i have met in the highest echelons of private sector corporate world .

time and again our police force has proved that they are on par with the best in the world , and somehow we only remember them for the bad eggs in the force . come on guys , give credit where its due . you and i are not half as efficient as these guys .

take a bow , mumbai police !!!

corruption as a hindi film

i suddenly realized , why i couldn't get myself to support baba ramdev .

his movement was suddenly , unlike anna hazare's fast , unfolding like a bollywood film . long , verbose speeches , then closed door meetings with senior congress ministers . where neither party com out transparently about which demands were accepted and which were still unsolved issues . then both sides call each other names like  good old bollywood  dialogues . ( " i am katti with kapil sibal , will never talk to him in my life ." " ramdev  is a thug" . etc etc ) then a midnight swoop by the police , baba jumping off the stage , changing into a ladies salwar kurta , hiding his beard with a dupatta , then caught ( i was waiting for a song to happen " baba badman hua , darling tere  liye type " , then he is bundled off in a waiting plane to haridwar , then he comes out with statements about how the government brutalized women and children ( in spite of not a single omni present  television camera capturing anything like that ) then more bollywood style dialogues " madam sonia gandhi is an italian , not born in this soil , so she doesn't have any feelings for indian women and children ( with voice choking at that stage  in a way that would put shah rukh to shame ) and this is just the interval . rest is yet to come .
then laloo parsed yadav jumping in with statements that only he can make " this baba has nri supporters , so why don't they sit outside the gates of THE swiss bank and do fast unto death  and get them to hand over illegal money etc )  then bjp , then bahen mayawati , then mulayam singh , all adding their two bits worth of dialogues .

i would still like to support him , because he is against corruption ,

 and aim still hesitating . sigh !!

corruption bandwagon

corruption , or actually anti-corruption is a good bandwagon to jump onto .

This is not to belittle  any efforts against corruption. today's India is so steeped in corruption, at every conceivable level, that any person standing up against corruption is a much-needed and welcome move .

 when anna hazare  went on a fast against corruption, the very simplicity of the man and his track record was so appealing that everybody from young to old  thronged to support him. his agitation also had a single focus about the lokpal bill . he had also proved his mettle by spearheading , successfully , the RTI bill.  he wasn't a great, fiery orator  nor did he have a  ready-made following from another vocation.

And that brings us to ramdev baba .  leaving aside my basic skepticism that people in Saffron  clothes  are sanyasis  who are supposed to have renounced the world and all the worldly matters including politics and corruption and have gone beyond to seek spiritual enlightenment. And ramdev baba  is not even  a spiritual leader. He, like, sri sri ravishankar , is at best a pranayam and yoga teacher .  I have never understood how educated people from all walks of life fail to make this distinction and start treating these people like saintly god-men .  and fall at their feet asking them for  spiritual advice.  its a lot like asking your  gym instructor/ trainer the  meaning of  atharva ved or  after life .

 yesterday on television I heard sri  sri  very smugly declaring that he will not answer certain questions because it would cause an international upheaval because of his following  across the world.very non sanyasi talk .   and the more I see ramdev baba ,  in spite of my urge to support everybody who is standing up against corruption, there's something that holds me back.  he is  a complete contrast to anna .  he is more like a digvijay singh or some other crony  mouthpiece of a political party .  a bit  too smooth , a bit too flashy , a bit too filmy .

 and that's what saddens me.  I want to support everybody who is fighting against corruption, because I firmly believe that our political system and politicians have failed to do so.  And maybe  we have to look at, common  people/aam aadmi /civil society  to take up this fight.

 and yet I hesitate to support ramdev  baba .  I wonder why.
 as far as I am concerned, he has done both good and bad to our  society.
 he has popularised yoga and pranayam through  television very successful. he  has made phrases like kapalbhati , and anulom-vilom  household words across our country and maybe amongst the Indian  diaspora  across the world.  and that's good.  what's bad a is , / yoga/pranayam ,  from what little I know, do not work like'  one size fits all'.  it has to be taught taking into account individual needs, individual  goals and has to be tailor-made differently for each person. So thousands of people following one form of yoga or pranayam is  going against the basic principle of the discipline .

 and in spite of all this, I wish I could get to support him, just because he is against corruption . 

terrorism as a religion .

these days the only thing that brings different religions together  is their support for terrorists.

inspite of the oft repeated cliche that terrorists have no religion , nobody seems to really believe in that .

thats why political parties are scared to hang a convicted terrorist because he is a muslim , and they are scared of alienating muslim voters . and sikh politicians clammer in support of clemency for a terrorist because he is a sikh . and hindu politicians support some two-bit sadhwi involved in terrorist activities because she is a hindu . they even malign and hound an upright , professional police officer who was doing his duty in arresting and prosecuting her . ( till he dies of course , then they put up his photographs and garland them at street corners .

i mean , come on . a terrorist is a terrorist . if the due process of law has been followed and if the highest court in the country has passed a judgement , then hang the bloody guys and gals , regardless of which religion they belong to . or otherwise stop this sham of a legal process through trial courts , high courts and supreme court , stop wasting  public money and time of the learned judiciary , and make a straight clemency petition to the president at the very beginning  and let that person decide . why go through this legal charade ?

in a play of mine called 'just another rape ' , a raped school teacher , who is made to run around seeking justice , which is finally denied to her , cries in frustration and says " may be those people in the middle east are better , they hang their rapists summarily . and we call them barbaric , and ourselves civil ? "

if we don't do this , then our legal process will finally become like the wwe or the ipl , ongoing spectacle that  gives fodder to the media to keep masticating ( that means chewing , in case  you didn't know ) and waste of a lot of money , time and resources that can be utilized better elsewhere .

come on people , a terrorist is a terrorist is a terrorist .

mnc ( cont )

this is just an addendum .

having posted the blog about  mnc yesterday , i didn't really want to add anything on the subject . but then i saw this outdoor campaign of sunsilk condioner/shampoo and i was amazed that companies like levers continue doing it with such impunity . and gullible consumers continue to fall or it .[ there was an old advertising adage that consumer is not a fool , she is your wife . ( then of course , somebody later modified that to say ' consumer is a fool  BECAUSE she is your wife ) ]

this campaign said " sunsilk challenge ! it makes your hair 2x softer in just 7 days . ". wow , what more can i ask for ( means not me personally , i don't have hair ) , till i read the small print in the same hoarding . it said " scientifically tested against non-conditioner shampoo ". aha !!! , comparing apples and oranges ? of course sunsilk will make your hair two times softer than NON -CONDITIONER shampoos .
why not go whole hog and say sunsilk makes your hair 16x softer ( compared to sand or charcoal or cement ) . this is funnier than anything i can write as a joke in bottoms up .
 i stand humbled !

another example of ethics that i had forgotten to mention .
mr sylvester dacunha , the founder chairman of dacunha  associates, who gave me my break in advertising and with whom i had the privilege of  sharing 15 years of  my advertising career ,  ( forgive him , he knew not what he did ) had a strict principle . ' tobacco is harmful to people and  we will never handle a tobacco advertising account ' . no matter how profitable it maybe , no matter how badly the agency needs the billing ,  we will not handle it . i have not met too many advertising people with this courage of conviction ( i myself don't have it ) .
sylvester dacunha had it.

multi national cheaters ( cont )

( there was some problem and only half blog got posted last time .)

.....mr darbari seth , once said that there were two types of  big  multinational corporates . thieves and dacoits . hindustan lever , he said were both . what they sell as premier products in india , they will not be allowed to sell in any western country . they sell sub-standard  products by creating attractive scientific sounding words and phrases which consumers don't understand and so believe completely . because  you only doubt what you understand . if you collect all the claims and slogans of levers products over the years and publish them as a book , it will be the biggest best-seller in the fiction category .  take the case of their annapurna salt . they happily claimed that , because its iodized it will improve your childs brain power , memory and resultantly he will do better in school . in one parliamentary word , its bullshit . salt is iodized because in some hilly parts of the country , peoples normal diet is deficient in iodine which causes goitre , thats all . those little traces of iodine in annapurna did not improve anything in your child;s brain . the only thing it improved was levers profitability .

their recent surf campaign is very honest though , 'dag achhey hotey hain ' , is right . but achhey hotey hain not for your clothes but for levers bottom line . nirma was so so much more honest and so much more cheap  ( or economical , as we are taught to say in advertising ) . but then levers is such a big international company , who would believe that they would lie blatantly .

take kellogs . they had an uphill task in india . to replace traditional indian breakfast with corn flakes . and they have done it quite successfully . so if they had to tell a few lies on the way , does it really matter ? . iron - shakti is , to say the least ,  the height of exaggeration . the little bit of iron in your bowlful of cornflakes does not sharpen your memory , your general knowledge or your intelligence . it only improves kellogs profits .

similarly eating nothing but two bowls of k cornflakes for two weeks ,  does not give your wife a slim , sexy , curvaceous figure of a bollywood starlet . the only figure it improves , is the one in kellogs balance sheet .

but then these are big multinationals , supposedly run by cream of professional managers . how can we distrust  them ? they are above your cheap indian baniya /marwadi / sindhi mentality , aren't they ?

in law we have a doctrine of ' buyer beware '.

follow that . 

Multi National Cheaters

Indians , like a majority of people from a large part of the non-Western world , haven't lost that white- skin- sahibs- are -superior complex . it extends to this deep-rooted belief that they are better than us , that foreign companies are more honest , hugely more ethical and far more trustworthy .

nothing , absolutely nothing can be further from the truth .
 i am  not saying this out of some great sense of patriotism , or a great desire  to knock everything foreign.
 I have had this great fortune of  working with some of the most honest and upright people and companies  in India, and they are all Indians.
a few  Scenarios.
 when  amul was Launching India's first milkshakes, we had found out that the most popular flavors were strawberry and chocolate. when dr kurien  was told about this, his instant reaction was “I have access to your chocolate  throughout the year, but don't have access to real strawberries. and I will not launch an artificial strawberry flavor, no matter how successful it will become".  so we launched chocolate and ilaichi  flavors. ethics  winning over profit.

 When Mr r.k. krishnakumar  was the managing director of tata tea ,  in a  presentation of a  media plan for a new campaign of tata tea ,  he was told that although getting spots on mahabharat (  which at that time was the most popular, must–watch program on Indian television) was extremely difficult, we will  manage with our contacts in doordarshan .  his immediate reaction was, if there is any underhand dealing or bribery involved in getting those spots, then he is not interested. not only that but if he ever found out that we had resorted to some such dealings, he will sack the agency regardless of how much he liked the creative work produced.
  ethics  winning over profit.
 when we were launching India's first iodized salt, tata salt , mr darbari seth ,  but then chairman of tata chemicals said , "  while  we're doing this campaign to sell packaged salt, we have to release a campaign to educate people that the usage of  salt  should be minimized in their cooking, because too much salt is bad for the  health .  as a responsible corporate citizen, we owe it to the people. Imagine India's biggest salt company telling people to eat less salt .
 ethics  winning over  profit.

 while  working on a new advertising campaign for vice vajradanti , i pointed out to  mr gajanan pendharkar , the chairman of vicco ,  that as a regular  user of his toothpaste, I find that sometimes the paste is too watery and  can something be done about that.  his instant response was the consistency of the paste depends on the water content in the bark of one of the ingredients, and it will  always differ from batch to batch. And he will not add anything artificial to get uniform consistency. In fact he went ahead to advise me that in every advertising created for this company, strict attention  should be given to being honest and not claim anything that the product does not have or deliver. When the price  of  sandalwood oil  became so high that the entire pricing of vicco  turmeric and sandalwood  cream would go haywire unless he switched to using artificial sandalwood essence  ,  he chose to launch a cream without Sandalwood oil and proudly called it so.
 ethics  winning over profit.

 now let's look at some of the biggest international names in business. mr darbari seth 

akala chalo re

 at first I didn't know how to start a blog. Then a kind friend helped me out. And now after a week of blogging I have suddenly realized that all the people I know from my e-mail list are as ignorant about how to follow a blog and comment on it as i was . As a result I have no followers of my blog. so following gurudev thakur 's advice  " akala chalo re , akala chalo " , i blog alone .

Some years ago, a  knowledgeable friend had  commented on how India  used to be, not one big country, but many big, small, and smaller independent states which fought wars with each other/  married into each other's royal families/ and generally formed a  loosely  hanging around Federation. And then British, for their own  administrative convenience, managed to almost cobble them together in a sort of a nation.

Every election in the recent past keeps making one aware of how from being one homogenous  country since our independence, we are again heading towards progressive fragmentation into smaller states. a significant   number of new  states have been  formed in the last 20 years or so. And with the demand for independent telangana , gorkhaland , vidharba etc , the fragmentation will further continue.

 The power of regional leaders and regional parties in swaying elections after elections is a solid testimony to this. in our democracy the concept of a two party, or at the most a three party, system seems to be fast fading. Congress did not win Assam. gogoi did .  Congress did not win poschim bangla. mamata bannerjee did .  Congress did not lose Tamil Nadu.  dmk did .

 and this story will continue in all the elections to come in the future.  may be at some point of time we need to examine if we need a new form of democracy, where we vote  for individual leaders rather than parties ,both at state levels and at the centre.  but  then that's a long drawn debate.

 but talking of the  elections that just got over yesterday, the most significant factor, is the victory of mamata bannerjee .  not only because she won so decisively, not only  because she  won against a firmly entrenched adversary ,  but because she is the first woman leader who represented woman–power in the true sense of the word. She is the first, and so far the only, woman leader who is not there because she's somebody's daughter/ wife/ daughter-in-law/ girlfriend or  companion (or  to use a more politically correct word, protege )  of some powerful  man. She's there because of herself. And that's a huge statement. No lady leader in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka or  Bangladesh can claim that honor. Take a bow mamata didi . !!

thats the good news .and that it happened in poshchim bangla ,  which worships a woman deity  more than any other part of the country  ,is a true  feather in the cap  of that state.

now the bad news .  the most worrisome fact of such landslide victories is the unreasonable expectations that go with it. that's where , what I call '  the Obama syndrome'  comes into play.  you can do a bloody good job but the dissonance between what  people expected and what you deliver always pulls you down.  and that's a scary thought.
Here's hoping that she manages well  the tightrope walking between being populist and being progressive .  not just for herself  but for paschim bangla . and for india .
amen . 

Against terrorism

Some years ago, I had written and directed the play 'purush '  which was about a fight of a young schoolteacher who is raped by a politician. When things get tough for her to fight against power and money she turns to her Dalit boyfriend, who is always actively involved in taking up causes for the Dalit downtrodden. When he refuses to help her in  her fight because she is a Brahmin,  she turns on him like a tigress and says “I now realize, that you are not against injustice, you are only against injustice done to your people".

 While watching all the media coverage about how Indian government should now petition America to put pressure on Pakistan to get dawood ibrahim kaskar . or  launch a strike against him the way they did to get Osama bin Laden .
 and I said how naive can we get. America is not against terrorism or terrorists. it's against acts of terrorism  against Americans . They would spend billions of dollars and sanction huge manpower to avenge acts of terrorism against their people and their land. and rightly so. the American government owes its foremost responsibility to the American people and not to the world at large.(  unless of course it involves oil, money  or other form of materialistic profit.  but then that is being overly cynical. )

 but the point that emerges from all these actions of the Western superpowers, is, why create these ' bhasmasurs  '?  any follower of modern history is well aware that  these so-called evil creatures are created by them because it suits their purpose at that point of time. idi amin 'dada '  Was regarded by his British superiors as an iconic figure with tremendous leadership qualities that could help uganda (  till  one-day he flexed his muscles and thumbed  his nose at the white masters. And then he suddenly became this cannibal monster.) Saddam Hussein was promoted, trained, funded by America when it suited them to use him against a belligerent iran of ayatollah khomeini .  just weeks before his invasion of kuwait (  which historically was a part of Iraq,till  the British decided to hive it off  for their own personal reasons) he was seen hobnobbing with the American Secretary of State/ Defence Secretary or somesuch in baghdad.  now the ex-Satan incarnate Osama bin laden was  promoted, funded, trained and otherwise amply supported by the Americans because he was fighting against the Russians in afganistan , and he was a good weapon to promote underground to do their own dirty work on the ground.

 all these guys, and many others only became evil  when they continued to do the same thing but now against their previous Masters.  same people. same actions. different perspective.  as is said'  one man's terrorist, is another man's martyr.'

 or as Hitler once said “history is always written from the point of view of the Victor'.

 it always was like this. and will always will be. 

i recently participated in a star tv seminar on maharashtra in 2020 . top politicians , top journalists , actors , singers ......and me . lots of impressive statistics floating around about the bright prospects of maharashtra . i said , we know there are three types of lies " lies, damn lies , and statistics " . ( iam quite brave on tv seminars ).I said  rather than self-congratulatory statements about  how Maharashtra is the greatest state in the country, we need to do a SWOT analysis to effectively take the state forward.
 Furthermore, there are two aspects to this. Maharashtra going forward, and maharashtrians going forward. Mutually exhaustive. Maharashtra  will continue to prosper, with or  in spite of maharashtrians. Since this was a function for a marathi  channel, I said let's restrict ourselves to how maharashtrians  will go forward. maharashtrians believe, and rightly so, that we have some of the greatest writers/ and poets/ fine artists/ playwrights/ filmmakers etc .  but then so do Tamil Nadu, kerala , gujarat  and most other states in India. and each state happily lives in, what in Sanskrit is  called,' cupa manduka vrutti' . as long as people in your own state and in your own language know the gems  that we possess, who gives it damn if anybody  else outside your state knows about them or not. all states believe this .  All except Bengal. Today if a ravindrnath thakur or a vivekananda or a ramakrishna  is a household name across India and across the world, it's because Bengal took them  beyond the confines of the state boundary and their own  language. this is not to doubt their greatness,  it is to point out how other states and other languages also had more or less similar great people that are not even heard of outside their states. this is where we need to break the umbilical cord of our mother tongue and take  our great literature,  great writers et al to  the rest of India, in a language that they understand.  how many of us have made the efforts to read gurudev thakur's 's gitanjali in bengai ( p.l. deshpande did .  and how many amongst you, who are non-maharashtrians,  know  who p.l. deshpande is ) .

 case rests .

If we leave our america inspired prejudices aside for a while and impassionately look at osama bin laden' s face, isn't it the most pious, spiritual face exuding great inner calm? Don't jump.look without pre conceived notions and knowledge of who and what he was.now see his face.more serene and spiritual than most, in fact, all our so called godmen and gurus.right.they look more like terrorists and evil guys.
Strange but true.
In.

got up this morning and heard that the worlds greatest terrorist , responsible for the death of thousands of innocent men ,women and children across the world , a man who thumbed his nose at the world and did as he pleased , is finally dead . and i said rip george bush. but it turned out it was a much lesser guy .