A Foetus, Unpublished and Indignant (April, 2004)

Dear Editor,
It is raining sunshine outside, and my words demand their place under the sun, or rather in our relatively unsung TERI times. Thus scrounged hard for a template to cut and paste my thoughts. For there are few takers for the transient state between two set patterns; if there has to be a change, it must be for another method, another format. Unpredictability, in any temporal feature is passe; these are times when the little grey cells of Hercule Poirot celebrate order with a vengeance. Hence if the following characters in Times New Roman seem to be meandering spontaneously, make no mistakes; they have been contrived enough to touch upon the issues decided in a TERI times meeting when all the planets were differently positioned, the flowers were a shade brighter or duller and the people attending the meeting were in a different mindset as they are right now reading this. This masking is amply reflected in the font, for these are times new to my prior endeavors of prose, and indeed when I am in Rome, I would rather be a Roman. Delhi has been most kind in dispensing with my leisure time in recent times, after I am through with TERI’s work for the day, or the night- and none has been more gratifying than the delight called Maqbool. Music director Vishal Bharadwaj’s second venture after the much acclaimed Makdee has brought in a fresh breath of air in the Indian filmdom replete with singing aliens and acrobatic yet terminal heart patients. Such cinematic emissions (ignored alike by the Supreme Court and the Kyoto Protocol) of feel-good candyfloss have been abated in the recent times thanks to a new breed of directors, and Maqbool seems to be a icing of sorts. The Bard has been invoked previously in Bimal Roy’s Do Dooni Chaar or Gulzar’s Angoor, but the Latin original Menaechmi being fabulous in the coincidences of the narratives, Comedy of Errors lent itself more readily to Indianisation. Thus this adaption of Macbeth in the context of the underworld is commendable indeed, for the one-to-one mapping of the complexities of the characters in the tragedy on celluloid is no mean feat. The histrionics were personally a foregone affair, as Vishal pulled on board a cast that boasts of theatre and film heavyweights, including the two all-time titans, Naseeruddin Shah and Om Puri, as the irrepressible Indian version of the Witches. They were exquisite as usual, but Pankaj Kapur, took the cake, even the cherry and maybe left the plates for Irfan Khan and Tabu to gloat over. And to be fair, they did their job amply.
And how can I mention leisure time without a reference to the largest religious community in India? The cricket lovers…and why not! After all the game has penetrated the plebian fantasies and parents are visiting saloons to curl their child’s hair, before the visit to the nearest coaching centre for three year olds. Even political news gets a headline like NDA-420 for no loss, Italy 123 all out in the dailies. After getting a surprise in the Tests and none in the ODIs Down Under, the cricket lovers have their palate anticipating what is being billed as the Mother of all Battles. And by the time this goes to print, and I know it will not, we would know which way the scales are reverse swinging. For now, can reflect merely what the Captains are growling to each through the hands of scribes-‘Beware of the Ides of March!’ Sufficient mischief from Pandora, let the box be closed for the month.