A Collision of Contradictions

There is a strange collision of contradictions happening around us.

For, perhaps the first time since 1947, urban India is resurrecting hope from the ashes of fear. The candle is in transition from being synonymous with power cuts to romantic dinners to silent, tearful protests. Young India is coming of age, they say. From vacuousness to vigilance.

We’re seeing the death of an unnamed young woman give life to a second freedom movement that has engulfed even the most sceptic Indian. Suddenly, ‘rape’ is not just a shameful, four-letter word that tears apart lives; it is the very vocal rallying cry for all of society.

In this paradoxical point in time, parents who had hoped a child named Ram Singh would live up to the name of the god he had been given, cannot fathom how he chose, instead, to do just the opposite. He became a Ravana. There are two significant moments in the naming of a newborn: first, when his name is thought of and, then, when he is actually named – all in the illusionary hope that he will be what is called.

And there are two defining moments when a life is lost: first, when Death punctuates existence with the finality of a full-stop; and then when the physical remains are consigned to flames. Another set of parents, who had named and reared so lovingly their child, watch in disbelief how she goes out of this world and makes it to every conceivable form of media that exists: she is both famous and unknown. Unprecedented but true.

There are policemen, often corrupted and corpulent, but now driven to action and accountability. Once feared and interrogative, they are now faced with questions that will change their future – for they are seeing power slip out of their hands. When you take away their batons, tear gas, barricades and water cannons, you will see dread on their bewildered faces: the uniform is just a mask and the façade is now exposed. Strange, it is, that a political party once at the forefront of the non-violence freedom movement had its back to the Lutyens’ walls of Delhi, armed against its own electorate. Such is the dilemma of democracy. And such is the demonstrably galvanising power of truly social media.

And, finally, the men who plundered her await their own – almost certain – death. Men who, like beasts, ripped apart a loving couple with the brutality of drunken lust. And whose fall into instant insanity will now lead to prolonged legal logic as an inevitable drama plays itself out.

So many contradictions created in just a couple of weeks. So many years of frustration manifested into fury.

But, amidst all the questions that remain unanswered, of this one is certain: the second sex will now be the first.

Be not proud, Death. For, you gave birth to Nirbhaya. 

 

 

 

“Sexy hogi toh…”

A college student gets off her father’s car and walks purposefully towards the Metro station, blissfully unaware that every auto driver standing alongside has turned to give her the once over. Her father can only grimace from a distance and pray that his daughter will return home unscathed.

A young lady waits outside a market, talking on her phone. Two policemen gawk at her unmindful of the chaos behind them as a motorcyclist hits a rickshaw. She knows she is being watched but can do nothing to avoid the stare of the very men who are meant to protect her.

Not too far away, three female friends emerge from a pub and are ogled at by every man in the mall – from the security guard to the parking attendant.

None of this is new. None of this is initiated by the clothes the women wear. None of it is restricted to just one city.

But all of it happens.

And it was brought to life outside the South Extension Market in Delhi last Saturday. I was waiting, impatient as usual, for the driver of a car to reverse his way out of an anarchic parking lot when a phrase caught my ear: “Sexy hogi toh nahin chalegi…”

That’s right. A male voice saying “if she’s sexy, then she won’t do.” I whipped around to see a stud in his late 20s, leaning against a car, drawling into a cell-phone. He would have been a driver or another blue-collar worker but was oozing arrogance in his attitude. For all I know, he must have willingly suspended disbelief while watching Vidya or Vicky and then connected their two recent hits in a warped way.

And he continued: “…agar khandan badhane wali hogi, ghar sambhalne wali hogi toh batana.” That is, “if she can carry forward the family (bear children) and manage the house, then tell me.”

You don’t have to be Sherlock to figure out that he was discussing a matrimonial relationship – either for himself or someone close to him (a brother perhaps). I was too stunned by his words to even take a photograph and couldn’t hang around to hear the rest of his conversation but, clearly, he epitomised the kind of man who would lust after a lady in public and then demand a demure, ghoonghat-covered wife in private.

Janus? Or just your average Indian male?

I still can’t get over that “sexy hogi toh nahin chalegi…”!

And then there were words…

When Swapan sms’d me to ask if I would review his book, I readily agreed. And then, I procrastinated for reasons too complicated to explain.

Swapan is now a neighbour but has been a friend, colleague and competitor for almost two and a half decades; so, I have known him in more ways than one. And yet, I was surprised to learn that he had failed once in school.

Now, several weeks after carrying the little book around (it’s size, and much more besides, reminds me of The Little Prince that I was gifted in college) I sat myself down to review it. Actually, you can’t read This is all I have to say…you race through it and, before you realise it, you’ve reached the end. Which, I guess, is how it’s meant to be. So, you return to it to nibble on its maxims and, if they seem familiar, it’s only because they’re all (well, almost all) so very apt.

Swapan Seth's Book Debut

Swapan Seth’s style has always been pithy. And this book is very Twitterish: it’s alliterative from the start (“An assortment of angsts. A cauldron of concerns.”) aphoristic, crisp and often clichéd. But, as we’ve always been told in advertising, clichés invariably work. Advertising runs not just in Swapan’s veins but also through his pen (or iPad or whatever digital device he used while writing this 95-pager) and its impact shows in everything about the book. It’s been written to a brief; with a sharply defined core target audience (his two sons) and a larger – yet niche – set of folks in mind; its positioning is unique (which may also be a bit of an issue because conventional booksellers won’t know which shelf to stock it in) and it’s exquisitely designed by Bonita Vaz-Shimray whose use of a wonderfully-named font, MrsEaves, adds to the crunchiness of the words…. like almonds in muesli. I do feel, however, that towards the second half of the book, the designer got carried away and readability does become an issue. But packaging is essential for any creative person who secretly worries that his ideas may not otherwise be expressed as well as they were originally envisaged.

There are gems tucked away in this book: “Parenting is a relay race.” And almost the entire chapter on love: “One day you will find love. Or rather love will find you” are among my favourite lines. If, in any book or film, you can find even one line that you relate to instantly, consider yourself as having received more than what you paid for the book (Rs 195 in this case). I found some sections reminding me of others that I had read (the chapter on Friends brought back memories of Desiderata, for instance) but even if Swapan has been inspired by all that he has read (and his appetite for words is XXL) there is nothing wrong. James Webb Young, an early 20th century practitioner of advertising said that ideas are nothing but an original combination of old elements. And Ms Rowling is known to have written that words allow us to create magic like nothing else can… this book comes close to it.

There are, however, some things I would have done differently.

The title, for instance, seems to eliminate the possibility of another book – and that would be a shame. If this is really all Swapan has to say, I’d be surprised. I find the front and back covers trying too hard to impress the reader that some well-known folks have endorsed the book: not really required, my friend. I have a knack for finding typos and would like to meet the editor in Roli Books who let several slip through her pencil. Most of all, I would have liked to see the names of people who played a role in Swapan’s life instead of their being relegated to pronouns: a teacher and his first client as an entrepreneur are the only ones named.

The book is dedicated to his sons with a line “May love be the ampersand between the two of you” and perhaps that’s why I love the book: the ampersand is a delightful but undervalued character that connects almost everything epigrammatically. And I tend to overuse the word “and”… often violating the most fundamental tenet of Wren & Martin.

But, for now, this is all I have to say and you should go find the book. You don’t have to be a lover, a husband, a copywriter or even a parent to enjoy snacking on Swapan’s words… bon appetit!

Forgetting to Remember

There is something weird happening to the way we remember things. And the way we forget them.

In a digitally-driven world, almost everything we upload/share/email/blog post…whatever, is cached somewhere without any expiry date and floats around in ghostly cyber-space waiting to be touched again by a human being. Unlike the history of earlier times – captured through folklore, twisted by kings and triumphant tribes or exiled forever when a storyteller died – it’s almost as though we’re all in a mad hurry to record every stupidly trivial detail of our lives via 140 characters or silly status updates.

And then we live in fear, having forgotten what we said, where and when. But knowing full well that Google knows it all and will make your spur-of-the-moment slur available on demand for a potential employer or, worse, a suitor. Which is where a tool (drop.io) allowed you to put an expiry date on everything you shared in the cloud. It would have had immense value except that its owners went in for valuation and sold out to Facebook. Mover over Google, Facebook doesn’t want you to remember and retract.

But that’s not the weirdness I alluded to, above.

My worry is that we are now a generation of people (digital migrants and natives alike) who simply cannot remember many things that some of us did in the pre-mobile, pre-Google era… like birthdays and phone numbers. Wasn’t there a time when you could recall every phone number you frequently dialled straight off the top of your mind? How many can you remember today? Two, three, four perhaps and they’ll probably be of people you love. There may be the odd phone number or postal address from a decade ago that’s indelibly etched; but not too many, I’ll wager. Is it because we no longer actually dial (or punch in) a number? Or is it because we’ve handed over the responsibility of remembering to ever-growing memory chips that sit inside our mobile and computer hardware? Will we need an app soon to tell us who we’re fond of?

I have a crazy time remembering things I’d like to forget about. It’s worse if you forget the things you should remember.

Update (March 10): Even NYT agrees with me in a funny way 😉

Nothing

There are times when you need someone to do nothing with.

Someone to just be there. Not to speak with or listen to. Not to touch or be caressed by. No whiff, no whisper, no kiss, no comforting… Just nothing.

Nothing more, nothing less.

But it isn’t easy to do nothing. Programmed as we are to continuously engage in social activity, we look for films to watch, books to read, links to share, friends to hang out with, calories to burn, beer to guzzle, tweets to type and statuses to update…try nothing for a change.

Nothing is a noun, not a verb – so inaction is inbuilt. ‘Do nothing’ is a paradox.

That’s it for now. Nothing else.

The Future of History

There was a time when Egypt conjured up three stereotypical images: the Pyramids, the Great Sphinx and Mummies. But that was before the country jumped out of textbooks and was thrust on to news (and new) media that have succeeded in pushing back those enduring images and replacing them with those of angry young men confronting a strangely silent army on the streets of Cairo. Strong, soundless monuments have given way to volatile, vocal and violent mobs. And to vulture-like vicarious newsmen who wait for that defining moment of either a fall or a photo-opp that will turn a lensman into a legend. Suddenly, there is no sign of ancient Egypt: almost as though history has been shrouded by present-day flags and banners of protestors.

Clearly, a country known for its history stands at the threshold of a new, albeit uncertain, future. The problem with “a million mutinies” (as Sanjay quipped on Facebook) is that it has no single, unifying leader. So, while there is unanimity in demanding President Mubarak’s resignation and exile, there appears to be no one who is popular – or capable enough – to take charge of a country of 80 million people. It may be good to rebel and have a goal in mind but once that is achieved, what next? After the fall, a country needs someone to rise and take charge before anarchy takes over. The longest-serving president of Egypt brought, if nothing else, stability.

The dissent against him, however, is not new. It’s just that the manner and speed at which it has exploded that defies all logic at one level. In October last year, on a vacation, Egypt came across as a placid but simmering nation. People were, by and large, unhurried and our local tour operator, Mahmood, attributed it to the heat. Though with the kind of crowds one saw in Cairo and with petrol being cheaper than bottled water, there is no way that a car can hurry on its streets any way. Besides, the ubiquitous sheesha with its intoxicating agents, added to the languidness of the locals. I have tried calling Mahmood to check if he, his young wife and two children are well but his phone goes unanswered: I can only hope that he is busy (though there are no tourists around) and not part of the madness that seems to have swept Cairo. It was Mahmood who first let on that Mubarak had allowed things to slip (by that, he alluded to inflation) and that the forthcoming elections were sure to be a sham. He even joked about the President being a modern-day Pharoah, though far less benevolent. The Pharoahs were actually extremely forward thinking and had created a Nilometer that measured the level of water in the river that is Egypt’s lifeline (even today) before determining the rate of taxation on their people. Very high or very low levels of water indicated floods or famines and led to lower taxes that year – incredibly simple, incredibly people-friendly and way ahead of its time like so much else the ancient Egyptians did.

And so, Egypt was all about long, lazy, liquidy cruises on the Nile; treks around and into the Pyramids, crawling into empty tombs in the Valley of Kings, coffee at Khan-el-Khalili and the Mediterranean allure of Alexandria. In the course of covering geographical milestones, history was being experienced just as it should be on any voyage. A long time ago, in another avatar, working on a documentary film script for the Indian tea industry (with the ever-suave Kabir Bedi as the protagonist) I had written “Khazana toh khoj mein hai” i.e. in the journey lies the treasure. Egypt was just that.

Except for one niggling feeling that persisted: as a tourist, you never experienced the same sense of awe and pride from the locals in their historical treasures as we would perhaps do with our Taj Mahal and Red Fort and Gateway of India (Pinku-loves-Tinku graffiti, spitting and public urination being ignored for the moment). The locals who depended on tourism for a living were out to take you for a ride (there is no standard pricing for anything that one buys – including water or juice or colas) and were there to literally cash in on tourists. (Yes, yes, I can hear friends like RP Kumar and Vikas Mehta who have lived in Cairo exclaim “Just as we do in India!”) Even the museum in Tahrir Square, now the epicentre of dissent, was unkempt and disorderly and, having seen Nefertiti’s bust in Berlin and many Mummies in the museums of Paris and London, one didn’t want to pay extra for the Mummy Room here. Every ancient temple you visit will have a horde of shops and street-hawkers at the exit so that you are assaulted with cheap, unlikely-to-last souvenirs that kill the grandeur of long-standing edifices.

Why is it that the temptation of the transient takes precedence over more permanent things? Why is there such a hullaballoo about the banning of the Internet in Cairo when we should be worrying about where Egyptians are getting their food? Why gloat about the role of Twitter when schools and offices are shut and the entire country has ground to a halt? Have real priorities given way to the virtual? Is the medium taking over the message itself?

Perhaps this is the way it is meant to be. Perhaps Egypt has stood still for far too long and is now trying to rush ahead to meet an uncertain future. The dust – and there is plenty of it blowing in from the Sahara – will take time to settle and its chronicles will probably be written, and rewritten, several times in the next few weeks. But as long as its people realise that their tomorrow lies not in looking back and merely cheering about today’s face-off with an army that refuses to fight back (strange yet sane)…

History, as the cliché goes, will never be the same. Nor will Egypt.

Perhaps a leader will emerge from the marching millions and the Pyramids and Sphinx will come back on to your television screens soon.

Perhaps history will find its future again.

First Law of Rajnikant

Mohitoz’ Law #266

Rajnikant will henceforth be known as Rajnican.

Of Startups and Soccer

No one would dare call the Dutch football team a minnow. But nor did anyone expect five-time champions, Brazil, to get booted out in the quarters of this year’s FIFA World Cup.

To borrow an epithet from the more fashionable sport that seems to have caught most of India by the b*lls, such are the glorious uncertainties of football.

Did the Dutch play better? Did Brazil lose it when they had to send one of theirs off the field and play with a depleted team? Or was it just the foot of God yesterday which decreed that one South American team would go through to the semis while another wouldn’t?

It matters not, I say. What does strike me is that 11 well-oiled people – like the avenging Germans in their match versus England – will triumph if they play as though they have nothing to lose and everything to win in 90-odd minutes. Almost as a young startup would.

Startup? And soccer? Mohitoz is finally off his head, you say… a self-goal, you twitter.

But humour me and consider a startup as a team of footballers.

People who have come together with nothing but passion to bind them, a hunger to win and a goal in clear focus. Coached by VC-like gurus who celebrate and critique from the sidelines, pushed by established competitors who have ruled the field, egged on by a roaring crowd of prospective investors, every football team has the genes of a startup. Or so it should be vice-versa.

And like most startups, the leader can be either aggressively upfront – a centre-forward – or a goalkeeper who defends and determines the course of play from a vantage point. In the former’s case, the startup CEO is the face of the company; the marketing and sales spearhead, so to say. He’s the one who leads by example, the strategist and the tactician, rolled into one dynamic ball of energy. And, in the latter – the goalie as CEO – he’s the man who prefers to stay out of the limelight but controls the quality of the product or service, looks for niches that can drive wedges into the competitor’s gameplan and relays it up the line to the men in front. And, when attacked, he’s the one who takes the pressure head on because there will be moments when startups stare at near failure as a wounded competitor strikes back: that’s when the goalkeeper keeps his eyes only on the ball and has a split second to separate debacle from defense, shame from pride.

Football, unlike cricket, calls for men of fervor, stamina and courage. It demands that you set aside long-term pleasures for quick wins born of agility. Every move up the field towards the other goal is akin to a battle in the sales arena, but a battle from which there is no rest. Regardless of whether you score or not, the team that wins will be the one who experiments and attacks unendingly. Startups, too, need endless reservoirs of adrenalin to keep them going because investors’ funds, like minutes on the referee’s watch, are limited.

Go watch a match before you decide to take the plunge to start something on your own. Do you have it in you to chart a course and yet be flexible to swerve and tackle and fall and get up and charge again towards the goal you swore to meet?

Eleven Dutchmen did it and sent half the world into mourning yesterday. Sure, they had Lady Luck as their 12th player as well but doesn’t every successful startup have her too?

Go kick a ball or two. Even if you don’t actually start up, you won’t end up any poorer either.

Law of Price Hikes

Mohitoz’ Law #262

A fuel price hike will happen on the day your tank is running low.

My Name Is Khichdi

Let’s get this straight.

The battle in Bombay (or Mumbai or whatever it is people want to call it) is not about a film. Or cricket. Or politics. Or Indianness.

It’s about money. About Lakshmi… irrespective of your religious beliefs.

Mr Khan needs a commercial hit because another Mr Khan showed that a trio of idiots could make more money than many other intelligent graduates.

He needs to remind India that his name is Khan. And, if you see him on TV, or are forced to read his retweets, you’ll realize he’s also reiterating his roots.

So is the maker of the film.

Not because they’re emotionally attached to Bombay or the film. But because they could get financially detached if the producers don’t recover their money.

It’s a good time to be a martyr, be it at a US airport or at one in UK: does it matter if body parts show up in x-ray scans (does size really matter?) though the authorities have rubbished this claim.

But Mr Khan is an honourable man. He claims he is here to entertain India and that’s exactly what he’s doing: with or without a regular release. Even if Bombayites don’t, the rest of India will see his film: don’t be surprised if all shows over the next weekend are sold out in other metros. And the Khaneratti go crazy trying to beat each other at status updates on F’book or Tweets. Suddenly, being the first to watch a film is more important than coming first in class or cracking a problem at work.

And, as though, we don’t have enough problems, our cops now have to guard movie halls. They’re more important than The Taj or the Gateway of India, it would seem. With strife of this kind, who needs the Taliban or the LeT: Pakistan is now trying to figure out what to do with its terrorists on the bench?

What’s worse is the complete khichdi between films, sports and politics. And commerce. There was a time when one sat in a dark hall, having suspended disbelief willingly to watch a character called Vijay beat the faeces out of evil-doers. Today, you can’t sit in the first three rows and probably have to carry your passport to get in anyway.

Is the film worth it – cinematically speaking? Is anyone even asking? Or will irrelevant hype give it four stars when the reviews are out tomorrow?

Somewhere, along the way, everyone’s lost the plot.

As for the roaring tiger, he’s clear: just because your name is Khan, it doesn’t mean you can.

And he seems to be thriving, unlike the ones in the real jungle. Pity.

Law of Shiv Sena

Mohitoz’ Law #240

Khan can’t.

His name may be Khan but, in Bombay, he can't (release his film, that is, without Shiv Sena's blessings)

Law of School Photographs

Mohitoz’ Law #239

(Contributed by Venu)

However lovable your son may be, you’ll invariably spend a few minutes looking for him in a class photo 🙂

Bananas in the Republic

Every Republic Day, India finds itself caught at the crossroads of celebration and self-crucification.

This year’s been no different: while we’re trying to say that the world’s largest republic is still sexy at sixty, we’re also asking whether we’ve been honest to the very idea of being the republic our founding fathers wanted us to be. All in the same page of the broadsheets and in the same capsules of prime-time news. Almost predictably, the same opinion-makers appear, by turn, to be questioned by M/s Roy, Chandra, Dutt, Goswami and Sardesai.

They say the same thing but with shades of wit and vitriol that vary depending on the character of the TV channel they’re on. Split screen. Split persona.

The question, however, is not what we’ve achieved or haven’t achieved. That’s a debate done to death.

The dilemma I face is of a republic that’s at odds with the Internet.

Internet? Now, where did that come from, you ask! He’s off his clicker – or whatever they call the old rocker these days, you mutter!

But, here’s where I come from.

On a Tuesday, last week, almost 25% of advertising and marketing professionals from a range of industries and cities, in their early-mid 30s couldn’t recognise the Twitter logo. This is not hearsay but the truth: I ran the poll as part of the Advanced Program in Digital Marketing I run at NIIT Imperia which the IAMAI certifies. It amazed me at first, but then I consoled myself saying these 70 people were here to learn because they did not know. Simple.

Cut to Friday. The venue is The Shri Ram School at Vasant Vihar. The audience: approximately100 students of class 5 – age 10 or 11 years old – and a few of their teachers. Unlike the Tuesday session, my mandate here is exactly the opposite: dissuade these children from Facebook, etc and caution them of the perils of the Internet.

(If I go schizophrenic someday, you’ll know why.)

Surprise, surprise: all of the kids recognise the Twitter logo! They’re not on it – not yet anyway – but they know. (A dozen of them, however, did admit to being on Facebook and to having fudged their ages to bypass the site’s rules.)

Does this mean that people who should know a brand like Twitter don’t and those who needn’t, do?

Does it mean that obsolescence will hit this generation harder and faster? I’d like to go back to another batch of Class 5 next year and see if they’re already on Twitter.

Or does it mean that digitally-savvy kids will be self-taught and courses like the one we now run will be redundant?

You’ll say that I state the obvious. Which may be true, but parts of a nation are gearing up to show off their military might tomorrow morning and others are cursing this extravaganza that closed the foggy airspace over Delhi for days, thus delaying their delayed flights even further. Others are wondering how a former Pakistani Air Force Chief could find his way into a Government-sponsored ad while yet others are scratching their heads trying to calculate the cost of those ads and what they could’ve fetched the girl child who was meant to benefit that day (if not every day).

I am reminded of the 1999-remake of Inherit the Wind (the Jack Lemmon & George C Scott version) where Matthew Brady says: “ I do not think about things I do not think about.”

Instead, I tell myself, that there is a power up there somewhere who knows what He’s doing in collaboration with Darwin himself.

And, hopefully in our own way, we will all evolve. Eventually.

Law of Busts

Mohitoz’ Law #215

For women whose cups runneth over, it’s happy hours in Singapore.

The OverEasy Nightclub in Singapore offers women discounts on their drinks depending on the size of their cups (Photo courtesy: The Electric New Paper)

Law of Madhya Pradesh

Mohitoz’ Law #211

Tourists are welcome to an entire temple devoted to sex, but condom ads and lingerie displays are not.

Second Law of Beer

Mohitoz’ Law #208

Heineken will also refresh the tarts other beers cannot reach.

Once promoted as the beer which 'refreshes the parts that other beers cannot reach'...

Second Law of Facebook

Mohitoz’ Law #207

Colours of the lingerie posted as status updates on Facebook will evoke a tit-for-tat response.

First Law of Kissing

Mohitoz’ Law # 204

Kissing someone goodbye at an airport is a national security threat.

However, you may wish to learn this before you board your next flight:

Dating Humor:
How To Kiss Someone Passionately

First Law of Auto Expo

Mohitoz’ Law #202

Small cars, smaller skirts…same old oglers.

Law of 3 Idiots

Mohitoz’ Law #196

Only an idiot would write away his rights.