Archive for the 'Media' Category

The Dawat

[Opening bars of the Bhojpuri song: "Set kara di life he Baba Dhoni sangh hamaar ho" sung by a chorus of girls and Ravindra Jadeja]

Anchor: Welcome back to GBTV’s continual coverage of the Dhoni-Rawat marriage or as we call it The Dawat, perhaps the most significant media event after the Abhishek Bachchan-Aishwarya Rai marriage, which again was the most significant media event after the Lord Rama-Sita wedding. In light of the gravity of the occasion, we have in our studios,  cricket expert and part-time ramp model Rameez Sivaramakrishnan Lal, who has been our chief correspondent for all Dhoni-related news.

RSL: Thanks for having me here.

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Me Indian?

Going through Priya Ramani’s much-talked-about article in the Mint, I was quite a bit confused. [Link]

Recently I’ve become increasingly convinced that I’m not an Indian. After all, it is possible that someone did a baby switch at Breach Candy Hospital where I was born, or that my parents have carefully hidden the truth about me for 40 years.

Quick proof that I’m not Indian? I have no furious loyalties to the Baganapalli or Alphonso. In fact, I can think of at least six fruits that I prefer to the mango. I have never eaten an entire paan or a pot of mishti doi (though I have tried both) and I don’t spit in public or private (except for that one time I tried a meetha paan).

I don’t understand that other national obsession, cricket, either. White is not my favourite skin colour. I don’t read Chetan Bhagat or Paulo Coelho. I feel depressed every time I wear a salwar-kameez. No sir, I will not discuss my private life with a stranger on a train journey. And I don’t think I’ve ever begun a conversation with: “You’ve lost/gained so much weight!”

I don’t like (or understand) a single Indian soap currently on air. I never talk loudly to my maid, stockbroker or random friend during a movie. I always wait to let people exit an elevator before I enter. I don’t believe that Mumbai’s moviegoers should be forced to stand to attention every time they want to see Shrek (or anyone else) on the big screen. I don’t feel pride—only impatience that my popcorn’s getting cold—when I’m forced to listen to Lata/Asha do a slow-mo version of the national anthem before every single movie I watch in the city of my birth.

Is being “uncouth”, as manifested through acts of varying degrees of distastefulness (spitting, liking Paulo Coelho, remarking about other people’s weight), synonymous with being Indian, as if being one necessarily implies the other? If that be the case, Bullah ki jaana main kaun?

I love cricket, have a genuine appreciation for subaltern music videos of the “Eh Buchi bolo seal kaha tuthi” type and do not feel bad that my popcorn is getting cold when I am asked to make a gesture, however symbolic, in honor of those people who have made it possible for me to sit in an AC multiplex and enjoy a movie. Which possibly means I am Indian.

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Basu Calling Basu

[Link] Full URL: http://www.mid-day.com/entertainment/2010/jan/120110-shah-rukh-wishes-bipasha.htm (screenshot taken on Jan 12th around 11 am EST)

Today’s theorem: If your last name is Basu and you wear red, you can only be Bipasa Basu.

Get well soon.

[Update: Blogging infrequently due to final draft of book.]

The Howitzers Return

As the year comes to a close, it is time to give out the annual Howitzer Awards instituted by RTDM to recognize excellence in news reporting and honor all those inveterate media outlets who have brought to us news as it should be presented, in its pristine pure form, bereft of all sensationalism and falsehoods, presented with the help of beautiful rigid prose and aesthetic visuals.

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Lassie Come Home

I had tweeted this yesterday after Rajnish, a reader, sent me a reference to this Punjab Kesari story which I am sure you shall all agree can definitely be called disturbing.

Titled descriptively as “Nirlajj Ne Nashe Main Luti Kutiya Ki Izzat” this piece informed us of a horrific act of man-beast interaction that cannot be described in English, an act that led to the dog refusing to eat or drink and ending with the police assuring concerned citizens that the said kutiya will not be produced in court.

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