Akshay, Aamir, Awards: A Dilemma

Last night a breaking news simultaneously bombarded across all the News Channels. “Akshay refused to accept the Star Screen award for the best actor in popular category”. It was said that he was miffed at it not being given to Aamir. Here’s the catch. Aamir don’t attend such award ceremonies as a policy. Would announcing Aamir the winner take the sheen away from the ceremony, given his absence? To some extend, yes. Now what can Star Screen do? I recollect similar dilemma during the time of Gadar and Lagaan. Their resounding success was of so sheer velocity that no award ceremony dare give it to some other movie or some other star. Since Sunny and Aamir both boycott these populist awards, what happened? The award functions looked pale and just a formality. This brings us to the current discussion, Was Star Screen right in not giving award to the deserving, Aamir? Well, answer might not be as simple.

One solution might be to stop nominating them. Make it a policy statement. In the past a lot many award functions have done so, including Oscars. This might in turn end up lending them, a much needed credibility.

So why haven’t they done it already? Most of the award functions are organized by private media houses who need the stars for promotional purposes. Consider a scenario, “Aamir Khan not been considered for Star Screen awards”. Given the size of egos in Bollywood, Aamir (or his well wishers), might take it as an insult. This would open the floodgates, open war b/w camps (already there are no less). No media house wants to end up at the point of no return. So they try and maintain cordial relations. Not attending the award lends the star, a high moral ground. Not being openly considered might be taken as an outright insult. The truth today is that stars such as Aamir are more powerful than any particular media house. Hence they are nominated year after year, should they ever change their mind.

भूली बिसरी यादें

कहाँ-कहाँ से पकड़ से लाये,

कैसे करतब करवाने को|

बंद कर दिए एक पिंजरे मैं,

आपस मैं खोपड़ टकराने को|

तीन मोर और दो थी मोरनी,

नई-नई पहचान हुई|

पग-पग कर थी राह जोड़नी,

कच्चा था धागा टूटी थी सुई|

प्यार था उमड़ा जिन बातों पर,

वो बातें कड़वी याद हुईं|

एक हाथ से ताली नहीं बजती,

कहावत ये साकार हुई|

मोर-मोरनी लड़े औ झगडे,

अपनों का नाम खराब किया|

होते हैं जीवन में लाखों लफड़े,

पर हाय ये विष क्यों सबने पिया|

नजरें मिला पाओगे अब तुम,

दर्पण मैं अपने आप से क्या|

गिर कर भी उठ पाओगे क्या,

नजरों मैं अपने आप के तुम|

भगवान् इन्हें सदबुद्धि देना,

आगें करतब कुछ ऐसा करें|

सब देखें और गुणगान करें,

कि मोर-मोरनी हों तो ऐसे,

और सभी का ये सम्मान करें|

Satyam, Rice, Hayden and me

Last few days have been quite eventful. Satyam went bust, UNSC voted for ceasefire in Gaza strip, Hayden retired and I lost a kilo or something. All events, huge on their own.

Satyam Fiasco

It might sound a bit harsh but frankly speaking I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams that a person from down South could pull off such a scam. Admit it; South Indians are considered quiet naïve by us North Indians. We think they lack the shrewdness needed for such an occasion. For us from the North such things are nothing new, as one of my gujju friend rightly exclaimed, “This will go down as one of the few financial frauds in which no gujju is involved.” Going by the examples of Ketan Parekh and Harshad Mehta, this didn’t come to me as news. Let me admit it, People from South, I have been wrong till now. You guys are not so naïve after all and have full capabilities of performing such a scam and can take us guys from UP, Bihar or the Gujju stronghold, head on. Also there is a need for a personal apology to all my South Indian friends for my considering them naïve and at times un-sansarik. Sorry Manda, Vamsee, Ajay and company. I have been so very wrong.

UNSC vote on Israel

This was another case of male chauvinism post the master and slave poster of Singh is King in which Katrina was sitting on the floor with Akshay as King on the throne. Poor Condoleezza prepared and arranged this whole resolution and Bush, the master made just a call and she had to abstain from voting, being left thoroughly embarrassed. We can be quite sure such an embarrassment would not have been meted out to a male Secretary of State. Die Die feminism, long live male supremacy.

Hayden retired

At last God you granted my wish. I so love you God that I can even give you my dear cell phone, if you ask me right now. Finally someone, other that an Indian player, got not so great a farewell and had to be thrown out of the squad before retiring into oblivion. It used to pain me lot, seeing Kapil Dev, Azharuddin, Ganguly, Kumble etc carrying on painfully, admist calls for their retirement. Whereas Gilchrist, McGrath, Warne chose to retire at their peak. Damn you Australia, now.

I lost a kilo

This has been the story of my life. Losing few, Gaining lot. Still these are one of the few losses,  I love to enjoy.

Cricket: A generation lost

How many times does it happen that you read an article that makes you emotional. I read this article on Cricinfo recently and it really made me feel like crying. How true the article was about the Ganguly, Kumble, Sachin, Dravid, the Fab4. How they made cricket to intertwine with our lives and made us avid cricket fans. The article talks about the vacuum in the life of an entire generation which had grown up watching the maestros.

I feel like an ungrateful having wanted Ganguly, Sachin, Dravid retire at various times. How much we wanted them all to retire after Sri Lanka series. To see two of them leave, its sinking feeling deep down. I don’t have strength to see Dravid retire now, form or not. They were like the founders of the religion. Dhoni’s, Sehwag’s, Gambhir’s are true worthy, but they are just the followers of that religion. Mere mortals. Consider what match fixing did to Pakistan team. Their stocks nose-dived. Had it not been for Sachin, Dravid, Ganguly, Kumble, Indian criket would have taken very hard to rise from the abyss. Salute to you guys. I will miss them a lot. I have somehow digested loss of Ganguly and Kumble but I am not sure I would want to watch Test cricket sans Sachin and Dravid.

Terrorism Apologist: What does it really mean?

Recently I was having a discussion with my friends over Mumbai terror attacks. It started from Taj, moved over to the usual Pak bashing to Jehadi terrorism to the sensitive topic of role of Indian Muslims. One suggestion was a stern action against the terrorists wiping out each and every sleeper cell in the country. It supported a free hand to security agencies to do what needs to be done. It was countered by equally deft argumnet that not all Muslims are terrorists and that terrorism has no religion. No sooner was this statement made than there was an off-cut remark about us being terrorism-apologists. I was very much intrigued with the term terrorism-apologist. I tried to Google it out but it seemed to be a relatively new term and not much could be found. I found few articles in which this term was used. No exact definition was found though.

From the articles and reports in which it was used, lets try and find the real meaning of the term terrorism-apologist.

During war on Iraq too, this term “terrorism-apologist” was much in circulation in US. There was a professor at UT-San Antonio who was termed a “terrorism-apologist” in an article. My understanding of the term goes something like this, terrorism-apologists don’t try and justify the terror attacks as the term might suggest. It’s clearly not their intention. What they do is raise some social issues in the support of the terrorists. According to them, it’s we who have made them terrorists (coz agar hum naa hote, toh yeh terrorist bhi naa hote waala funda), so it’s we who are to apologize for making a terrorist out of them. Let’s be fair, they don’t defend and justify the work of terrorists, they try and defend the terrorists instead. They invoke the cause and effect theory as an argument.

To quote the professor from the said article, “It is rejection of U.S. and British policies in the Middle East, not Islam, that has promoted terrorism against America…95 percent of Middle Easterners are Muslims…it is only natural that those opposing the United States and Britain in the region would be Muslims. In India, they would have been Hindu; in Latin America or Northern Ireland, they would have been Catholic.”

Their arguments that, “Islam does not preach terrorism” and “Not all Muslims are terrorists” is well respected and not much disputed, but usually they tend to overdo themselves, create a ruckus thereby posing as a hindrance to the security forces.

I found once such example in India recently. A leading lady from Bollywood tried to connect terrorism with the poor and illiterate state of Muslims, “Injustice to Muslims is the foundation of terrorism”, she commented. To quote her further, “Do you know what percent of Islamic population is living below the poverty line? It’s 40%…There are certain segments of the society which have not got its due, whether you agree or not…When people are poor and have no where to go, they have no choice but to turn into radicals…”.

Ideally her views should have created mixed feelings. However given the backdrop of Mumbai attacks, there was an outrage against her comments and she needed to tender an apology. One may find her to be a terrorism-apologist. After all, Naxalism and Terrorism are two different phenomenons. Let’s not try and mix them. Those who mix them may be termed terrorism apologists.

Some say that this whole idea is nothing but a figment of imagination of the right wing people. But again the issue is open for contention. Maybe next up for discussion should be Naxalism v/s Terrosim for us to get a clear answer to our Holy Grail.

Where’s my Cell Phone?

This Monday I woke up on time. No problem with that, my alarm clock(s) takes care of it. Got dressed, checked my pockets as usual. ID card: Yes, Keys: Yes, Wallet: Yes. Okay, all set to go to the office. All seemed well but something was amiss, there was this inner feeling. “Its nothing”, I told myself. Let’s go. All through the way to office, I had this feeling that I was missing something, something crucial.

It was only when I reached the office and checked the time that the realization struck me. “Oh! God, I forgot my cell phone”. A lot of us would agree that despite us purchasing and using the cell phone, in reality it’s we who have become the salve of it. It’s my watch, I need to exchange messages now and then, I need to exchange missed calls, and I need to check mails. In short I need my cell phone more than anything.

Let’s discuss what happens when I forget my cell. I can’t check messages, I can’t check calls. There is always that feeling, who would have called? Could it be something important? It was not as if life couldn’t go on without cell phone, it’s just that it has become an important part of our life. It can be understood as the extension of our body which helps us connect via telepathy. It’s the same, if not equal to it. The feeling when I forget my cell phone can’t be explained in words. It has to be felt to understand. I love you, my cell phone. I love you so very much.

Bush Shoed: Why does nobody care?

The President of the world’s strongest democracy; the leader of the free world; one who could demolish the whole world. I am talking about none other than George Bush. Amidst the election campaign and following elections in US, it struck me how politically irrelevant Bush has become today. He has become a bit dormant of late. Gone are the animated speeches, war on terror talks and all those gimmicks. Republicans might have forced him to become mellow, keeping anti-Bush sentiments in mind.

His irrelevancy became all more relevant when an Iraqi reporter threw a shoe at him. I mean come on; a President being thrown a shoe at should/would have evoked sharp feelings among the people. I don’t see much of such reactions, at least neither in the news nor on the blogosphere. Americans seem to have moved on. For them Obama is their man Friday.

What struck me is the fallibility of human being. Some 6 years ago, who would have thought that anyone, leave alone a Muslim would be able to throw a shoe at the President of USA. I read in an article that throwing a shoe is the ultimate insult in the Arab world. Was this anger and insult against President of USA or George Bush? Would Obama also be subjected to the similar treat? Let’s wait and watch. A person, however powerful he may be, has a particular shelf life. This is the biggest strength of nature against us humans. Everyone die one day. Bush era is over in US, so much so that people don’t even care anymore if he is shoed at. At least, not much. As for rest of the world and also liberals among the United States, we can surmise the reaction as,“Usne kaam toh Joote khane waala hi kiya tha”.