Dream of Freedom

 1806, Medinipur, Eastern India.

A mockery of justice went on for a few hours. The judgement was written even before the trial began. The sentence was, "Death by hanging"-another joke.

Four strong men, carrying two thick ropes descended from two opposite ends of the giant Banyan tree. One end of both the ropes were tied to two thick branches of the tree. That's why they needed the hefty men. They pulled the ropes with great force, till the branches creaked due to the tension built up. The other end of the ropes awaited their destination, the ankles of the "convict". Eyewitnesses say, he did not flinch even a little when the pehlwaans fastened the ropes to his feet. Instead, he was heard reciting calmly a sloka from Bira Saptapadi. 

The branches swung- two mighty branches of an angry Banyan tree carrying with them a piece each of the bravest son of Utkala, Jayi Rajguru, the architect of the first martial uprising against the tyranny of the Gora.

Thus Odisha lost its independence to the treachery and gun powder of the foreign "Businessmen". 

Only to leave behind an angry Buxi Jagabandhu to raise his head in revolt during the 1817 Paika Bidroha. And what a rising it was!

Village folk, common farmers followed their enraged General, Buxi Jagabandhu into the first major armed rebellion against the British, which saw the systematic elimination of foreign control over many princely states in East India, even though for a brief period. The Gora didn't know what hit them. Their armed convoys were being attacked by tribals, common people wielding spears and swords. The time the Gora took to load their Bayonets was enough to make heads roll. 

The Paika sword flew in anger. Jayi Rajguru was avenged many times over. The scarlet water from the severed veins of the British mixed with the boiling crimson blood of the brave Paika. The scarlet evaporated.

1857 followed. 

Subhash happened.

Bhagat Singh smiled when the Gora delivered the sentence.

The "frocks" the Gora wore slowly began to wet, sometimes from sweat and sometime from urine. 

Beginning with the ferocity of the tribes of Odisa, the unmatched bravery of the Sikh men and even kids, the strategic ingenuousness of one man to raise an entire army right under the pink noses of the "businessmen"- the signs were ominous.

World wars happened. 

Gandhi struck the hammer too.

Had it not been for the shortsightedness of a few ambitious dynasty-oriented UK-educated Indian leaders, today the stories of Buxi Jagabandhu and Jayi Rajguru would be told in the valley of Quetta.

The shrewd master drew one last line before jumping onto his boat to his island of potatoes, a line that would continue to draw blood for generations to come. The blood of descendants of the very Sikh, Paika, Gurkha, Maratha, Rajput, Madrasi who shed their own to keep us free. 

Their dream came true, even if at a great cost. 

Now it is ours to keep alive.

Jai Hind!

 

Shakuntala Devi: Movie Review

What do you get when you try to squeeze a cut lemon inside out? Well, if you planned on using the juice, it just went kaput. While on the other hand, if you just wanted to soil your palm, you hit bull's eye.

Romance, personal liberty, family: each of them can be made into epics, with sequels. But taking them all and shoving them into the skins of powerful character actors will only give the audience indigestion. 

Shakuntala Devi, The Human Computer: reads the title of the movie. What would the casual viewer expect? A story of some unusually talented woman? Yes. And what does the viewer realise 120 minutes later? The computer was human too. But this is just the case of the common cine-goer, which the present generation is not. This lot is on the verge of making disruptive choices about the kind of movies it wants to watch; particularly when web-series offer a much more delightful menu to choose from.

The maths genius from Karnataka inspired many an engineer to read her numerous puzzle and numbers books for his/her interviews. Her awe inspiring rags-to-riches story fed aspirations of many a rural folk to chase their dreams in true earnest. For that is the Shakuntala Devi the nation, the world wants to know, or better still, needs to know. And therein lies the legend, the impeccable math wizard with her witty remarks and larger than life persona. 

But the director had other plans, it seems.

Different is the order of the day, after all. Even if it comes at the cost of sabotaging the image of a childhood hero for millions of students. 

So, the movie begins rather shakily with Shakuntala Devi's daughter suing her mother for causing her financial damage. That would set the feminist lobby talking from the very first scene. Then the movie swings back in time to a village in Karnataka in British India, where the little Shakuntala is shown solving numerical problems way ahead of her age. Her merit draws attention at the local and then national level. He father's constant show-mongering results in a childhood spent in the commerce of numbers. While this does keep the family going, it fosters the growth of a fiercely independent woman who doesn't take very kindly any encroachment upon personal liberty. She shoots an admirer in the ear on one such occasion. 

So, the protagonist lands up in London to escape her past. It is here that with some initial struggle, she makes it to the big universities, not as a student, but a performer of mathematical tricks. This gives her bread and name. Her mother writes to her from India, not to inquire about her well-being but to ask her to resume the supply of  much needed money. This infuriates the already headstrong lady even more and she takes up the show-business full time with some help from local admirers in the UK. 

She piles up the pounds in quick time, hops from country to country helping herself to a sizable fortune. She finds love in a typical yes-man, who fits the description of a feminist fetish. The IAS officer falls to her charms and agrees to marry her when she proposes. They have a daughter, which didn't prevent the mother from flying away abroad to conduct numerous shows. Meanwhile, the money-meter keeps turning and she forgets her daughter for a while- until Daddy becomes the first word the little one utters. This sets off the insecurity in the mother and she flies back to the IAS officer's home and out, snatching the baby from her doting father's arms- and life, for a decade hence.  

Meanwhile, the hatred for her own parents back in the countryside continues unabated. There is also the occasional sprinkling of the math show, to keep things in sync with the film's title. 

The little girl grows up just like her mother, travelling from one show to other, longing to go to school, missing her dad sorely and in a continuous search for the mother she wanted Shakuuntala Devi to become. The father comes to know of her misery from her letters and arranges a rare meeting with the mother. The parents, after some arm-twisting by the father, agree that she needs to go to school. The girl grows up hating the mother even more when she goes to a boarding school and is denied any meeting with her father. This goes on till she, now a woman, puts her foot down to marry the man she loves, much to the pleasure of both the parents.

Now, that is a narration a viewer can relate to. But the director doesn't like good old story-telling. So the plot yo-yos from the 1930s to the early 2000s, to the 1950s to the 1990s, from every decade in the 1900s to every other decade of the 1900s. Meanwhile, the viewer has completely lost track of the "Human Computer" part of the protagonist and is instead, looking at a horrible mother, a dominating wife, and a genius-but-selfish celeb. 

Now, where is the mathematical wonder-woman the viewer had read about on the internet before watching the movie? Where is the famous astrologer, politician and author we all knew? Somewhere in the fillers in the form of the maths shows, I guess. Because that is ultimately what the movie achieves in the end- systematic assassination of the miracle character- Shakuntala Devi.

The editing needs special mention since people watching the movie are sent on repeat time travel trips throughout its length. The songs help in making it a 120 minute affair and the costumes and screenplay scream out loud: women-only. While Balan's other movies too had a feminist shade, those characters had mettle in the form of range of acting, vibrancy of emotions and adequate melodrama. The actors fit into their roles very well, but the cohesion of them all fails to build the image of a family, or families in the mind of the viewer. The chemistry between the actors looks, at best, well-rehearsed. Nothing more.

The movie might as well have been titled "Shakuntala Devi- Behind the Human Computer".

An investment of two hours would have to be made after much thought, especially when entertainment is fast approaching the home-space and not vise versa.

Web-series Review: Jamtara- Season-1

One evening in the monsoon of 2016. 

I persuaded, pleaded and paid for a colleague to accompany me to watch Budhia Singh: Born to Run.

End of show- colleague in tears and my heart swelling with pride. I had made the right choice. The trip back home on my two-wheeler was hell, as it was pouring like crazy and the roads of Banaras(...ahem), but neither of us complained. An evening well spent.

Manoj Bajpai and Tilottama Shome had stolen the show in Budhia. But as I had mentioned in my 

review of the movie, these seasoned actors performed with a certain degree of restraint. My heart said, the Soumendra Padhi I know since our Jeypore days might now have evolved into a fine director with an eye for detail and perfection, but the lover of unfettered acting in me said 'justice denied by a margin'.

No such brakes in Jamtara. Episode after episode as the story unfolds, the actors are allowed to go bombastic. No holds barred dialogues, body language that liberates and magnifies the scope of acting,  costume that fits right in, background score that invites anticipation, camerawork that gives away the director's blind faith in the ability of the cast- all of it makes for some worthwhile viewing. 

Cinematography needs special mention because this is one web series that doesn't bank on big names or sex(so far!)- just the story and acting. Padhi's money is on the actors and I am glad they have proved him right on every count. Close angle shots leave plenty of room for actors to display their full range and painfully long takes meant that everyone had been a good student on location.

Story-wise, the plot isn't brand new, but the treatment is not your usual run of the mill kind. Caste divisions have not been treated as an undercurrent, but worn on the sleeve, right from the first episode. That scarcity is the mother of all evil shouts out loud in your face the moment you look at Bhojpuri speaking teens making calls to metro-based "clients" or when the plain-looking village tutor negotiates her own price tag. Bold would be an understatement for what Padhi strives to portray through Jamtara. Mahabharat has been strategically wedged between critical scenes. And the characters who quote from the epic remind me of the Laughing Hyenas from Lion King, cunning and hilarious rolled into one. 

Shortcomings?

Personally, a disturbingly predictable trend seems to be manifesting into the directorial profile of Padhi. He is good, perhaps even great, with beginnings but not so much with the endings. Anurag Kashyap won't be what he is had Faizal Khan survived.

P.S: Don't worry about the rushes Som, do what the Artist in you says.

Times and Hope

When little we saw, everything held us in awe.

The Gulmohar in monsoon, the caterpillar's cocoon. 

The passenger adjacent, the ants nascent, 

The hills afar, and bottles ajar.

Now we know so much anew, surprises are yet so few.

The bells disturb, colors are a different hue. 

The rain pesters, and summer gives a dark view.

What use is such sanity and growing up,
That teaches us, rise and suit up.
That there is just today to work,
That yesterday was a Tuk-tuk, but tomorrow will be a Merc.

An ode to the Instant-mix generation!

One Race to Wipe them All

They set out, riding on creatures, to conquer the unknown and unseen, of which they had only heard of from not-so-reliable eyes and ears. 

Humped, there were numerous; 

fast there were many; 

of the herding type, a few. 

They rode by the night, for the day was unforgiving. They ate a few, drank from the many and numerous- and not just meat or milk.

They crossed deserts, for that was home; 

they waded through rivers; for that was not ever done. 

Then they met mountains, of rock and stone; 

they had seen before only dune that shone. 

Most of the few perished; much of many were eaten. But few of the numerous made it through tough terrain. Thus they marched on with the many left. Most died on the rocks, while the rest were crestfallen from herculean efforts. The mountains asked too much and only the best made it to the land of heaven that lay beyond. They met strange folk, none of whom had seen such strangers as them. 

With some, they shook hands, 

but off most, they took heads. 

The strange folk but naturally resisted, sometimes with fruition, but mostly in vain; for these people knew not of such ferocity as was meted by the men of sand and sun. 

What drove them on was not of import, 

What ensued became stuff of lore. 

Much of what followed was of beauty. 

But even more, of gore. 

The strange folk they met had weak arms but very large hearts. Heaven embraced people who raped it and they called it home forever. By some act of providence, the gory stopped and a lasting truce prevailed, a very uneasy one.

Heaven had just finished nursing its wounds when more visitors arrived. They did not have to fight mountains, for their route was maritime and the munition they possessed was only for defense. Harmless, they proclaimed themselves. Heaven believed, for they were few and came floating on the great seas in their huge vessels. How could they possibly harm us, thought the new natives of heaven. Thus came the vessel-men along with their fare. Only, they weren't fair inside.

Conniving men to the core, they traded in nothing, 

for their mother taught just killing and thieving. 

Cold were their hearts, and warmth was what they found in the arms of the new occupants. The old wept tears of blood, watching the bully tenant hand over the keys to the robber. 

Spice, cotton, silk and emerald they hoard. 

Upon helpless women, much they whored. 

Chivalry was not their writ, of civility they knew little,

In the realm of white, brutes ruled with morality brittle. 

Prosperity was in heaven, for it knew six seasons.

A dozen shades, a hundred tongues, a thousand occasions,
All celebrated for wise old reasons.

The brigands knew just one color and a narrow vision. Thus, they rejoiced their time in the Eden of the innocent. When the wise gave them counsel, they bought these noble souls with promises of better days. 

The wise returned to relate to the old. 

That culture was waste,

that pride is in only yellow gold.

Heaven was elsewhere too. Natives of this other heaven took good care of it and nourished themselves with what it had to give. Alas, vessels reached their shores in haste! The bountiful realm was laid waste with blood and fur of the sons and daughters. The mindless  then planted the seeds, of alien herbs and capital. 

They dug the earth and drew from rock, black oil.

From whence grew industry, upon which sons of today toil. 

Robbers of here and thieves of there, 

were all but brothers,

Their mother thus ordained, that plunders they shall share.

So were bought, sons of the black, sisters of the yellow,

Mattered little, if she'd seen too many winters, or was just a little fellow.

Fathers of the brown were sold.
Mothers of the black were sold.

Sisters, young and old,
wherever there was oil, crop or gold.

Yet they call us today, with their science bold, 

"What have we not, and what hath ye, O' third world?"

Of God they speak, but well do we know,

That all they loved was blood on snow.

Altruism now, is their best show. 

Like it or not, but they see hatred grow.

We seek not vengeance, only fair play. 

Alas, mother earth, it is you who has to pay.

What they did, how do I say,

Colors are your doing, mother,

to engulf you, end of the day.

Bahubali-2- The Conclusion- Movie Review

Rajamouli, I feel for you, 

So many sub-plots and splinters, yet just three hours to pack them all in!

I am a teacher. When the course runs behind schedule, every one in our profession enters panic mode. The classes that are taken towards the end of a term are more often just patch-work, usually covering only what's required and not what's of value. Students too, of all ages and levels, take this as an emergency pill and gulp it down with magnanimity. For the current system of education, this pill is not bitter, but even sweet. In systems more pragmatic and value-based, these short bursts of knowledge dissemination would form matters of severe scrutiny.

But that's just education; entertainment is an entirely different phenomenon, you might say, Mr. Rajamouli. From where I see, you are not running for the Academy or even Nationals; so perhaps you are right. But to call cinema entirely different, I disagree. What students experience and what a viewer watches are not very unlike. In fact, the stakes are way higher in cinema because here the span of attention demanded gets amplified 3-4 times, thus requiring a delivery that's compelling enough to hold on to the viewers' senses.

This you have done, and how! 

Be it the raging cattle, or the humongous elephant carved along the river, the display of super-human strength by the central characters or innovative intrusion tactics in battle, grandeur has been your forte throughout: and understandably so. Without these spell-binding moments, the three-hour sit would be just another period fiction. The drama, the politics in monarchical settings , the heart-wrenching scenes of grief and the cosmetic episode of romance are all finely woven in for the viewer to get lost. And get lost, they will. Visuals and acting have been top notch from the entire cast. For some time to come, Prabhas, Sathyaraj and Rana Daggubatti might have to either take a sabbatical from acting or act like a De Niro to break the moulds they have conjured up for themselves through the Bahubali franchise. The characters have come alive through these men and women on the screen, this much I concede. 

Another factor contributing to the rushes- social media- has also been catered to very deftly. The Kattappa-Bahubali twain has been built in amazing fashion and finally consummated with the death of Bahubali Senior. The much awaited answer is revealed without much aplomb, and justice is done to the story. Screenplay is outstanding, art-direction has a global appeal and the graphics are advanced, to say the least. 

Having said all that, the plot of Bahubali, still cries for purchase. If Amarendra Bahubali has been brought to life, Mahendra Bahubali has been disproportionately given a subdued role. If Anushka takes charge of screen time, Tamanna has quietly languished back-stage. If Bahubali has been avenged in style, Shiva's foster parents have been kept under shadows- in all, there are flashes (in fact, a 3 hour long flash!) of unfulfilled roles and loopholes in the film. This is not unlike what students experience at the end of the term; they realise that they have learned all, yet they can't keep a finger on which is which. There is just too much pressure on their minds to stay focused. 

But the good news is- and this is where cinema is so different a phenomenon- people, in general, will lap up the visual treat and bear with the little inadequacies of story telling to the extent of negligence.

Jai Mahishmati!

P.S: Gold doesn't float on water.

Rudimentary and Corrupt

Image Courtesy- www.images.google.com

Drops of sweat raced down his sideburns towards his neck as the man in front of him in the queue bent over to deposit the application form he had been holding for a good two hours since morning. The processing clerk on the other side of the grilled counter smiled as he got a view of Shreyas when the man in front of him had bent over to shove the application form over to the bored government employee.

Shreyas too smiled back, the clerk was a colleague, junior, but colleague, nonetheless. 

"What are you doing in the line, boss? You could have sent the papers through Manjhi or Savita." queried the puzzled clerk, even as he carefully entered the details of the application form submitted by the man in front of Shreyas.

"It's fine. I have taken a day off." Shreyas replied quickly wiping out the sweat droplets, that had now reached his neck.

"Sir, you are too young to apply for your own child. Running an errand, I see." the clerk said peering over Shreyas' application as he now stood directly in front of the counter.

"Hmm. I am yet to marry, let me know if you have a suitable bride for me in mind." he tried to play it down. Although he had completed his PhD two years ago, he was only twenty-six, besides the fact that he had never done a favour this big for anyone in his life.

It was the month of May, a time when most government colleges solicit applications from prospective candidates for filling up vacancies. 

One morning, a couple of months back, Shreyas had woken up to a crowd of eight people knocking loudly on the rickety old wooden door of his usually deserted government quarters. He stayed alone and had fallen in love with the solitude his fifty-year old clay-tile roof quarters accorded to him. All of the faces that his semi-open eyes met that morning were unknown, so they widened up suddenly. 

"Yes?"

"Ram Narayan ji, from Jaunpur sends his regards to Shreyas baba. He has sent these as a small token of his appreciation from his own orchards in the hope that they will supplement Shreyas baba's health in the same way they have enriched his own." the giant of a man, with a voice as sweet as a maiden's, replied in a way only possible if one were to learn the script by-heart.

"Bade papa....All of this...for me?? Are you...." although Shreyas was no more sleepy, his mind had lost coordination with his eyes, because of the menagerie of fruits, vegetables, sweets, even chicken that were rushed in by people who gleefully carried them in baskets, heavy baskets, placed over their heads. Smiles on their faces haunted away whatever sleep was left in his eyes.

"I am the village head-man of Kishangarh, on the other side of Ganga ji. Ram Narayan ji asked me not to disturb your Sunday. So I came early. I will return next Sunday with some local delicacies that are only prepared in Kishangarh. Hope you find our fruits sweet. Ahoy! Come on, people. Get on board, let babuji enjoy his sleep." his voice was more assertive and definitely more hoarse towards the end as he hailed his people to get on the SUV parked outside his quarters gate.

His bed squeaked as Shreyas sat down with a thump in disbelief. Slowly, he regained his senses and recollected the source of the events that morning. 

During the Holi vacations a week ago, he had visited his paternal uncle who lived in Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh. It was nearly five in the morning when the state-run bus halted near Ram Narayan's ancestral building. Shreyas got down from the bus and turned around to wave at the girl he had befriended on the way. The driver changed gears and the bus grunted away- the smile on Shreyas' face fading slowly in sync with the diminishing visibility of the girl's face in the bus window. The loud clanking of cymbals drew his attention away from the bus and towards the huge palatial house of his uncle.  Unlike his colony in Delhi, which wore a deserted look on Sundays till 9 in the morning, the little town, it seemed, had woken up hours earlier. The occupants of that house were out and about their chores after a long night's sleep. The horizon was beginning to brighten up, but the sky was still mostly engulfed in darkness. Birds dotted the dark, blue velvet as they set out on their daily quests. 

That Sunday, sitting on his cot, in his quarters, Shreyas fast-forwarded his flash recall to the courtyard scene in his uncle's house.

"Shrey beta, you know what it took to get you into New Delhi University, the Registrar of Varanasi Holy University, no less. He had taken personal interest in getting your application processed, which of course, entailed blocking 130 other applicants, allowing only those who had a name besides their own written on the envelope. He took interest because, he owed me one and you are my own baccha. What I did to earn that favour is stuff of folklore now, I won't go about bragging to my own nephew. What I do intend to tell you is that your father and I had been through some very rough times in the past. We were young and reckless, blood that flowed in our veins then had more fire and less hemoglobin. Although back in our time, physical abuse wasn't too grave a crime, pride was still at stake and the head-man of Kishangarh, where the incident had happened, knew this. He let us off, on a promise of quid pro quo. We had since been in his debt. He never called. We had taken for granted that the deed was done and dusted. But, Prabhu Ram has his own ways of settling scores. His son, himself a grandfather, is now the village head-man. This Holi, only two days ago, we received word from him reminding us of the promise. This head-man, Kanhaiyya Lal, has an imbecile of a grand-son, a couple of years elder to you. He is married, twice, no less! He has three children from two wives, but no income of his own. Word of your appointment in NDU reached his ears, and the imbecile turned out to be quite a sticky bastard. He went to Delhi and dug out all the slush from the files of your interview and decided it was time to call the favour in. What favour, the bastard had the balls to summon me! 

I am old now, not enough fire running in these old diabetic veins anymore. I had to yield. I promised him that you would do whatever it takes to help the nincompoop get a job. What coincidence! There was an ongoing recruitment process at your university at the same time. So I called up your father to send you here urgently. I could have called you myself. But Kanhaiyya Lal insisted on seeing you. He has a grand-daughter too, you see. I hear- and pardon my language- she can breathe life into the dead just by walking past the bodies. Speaking of the dead, she has been at the center of two skirmishes in Kihsangarh and one little incident here, in Jaunpur. The toll her beauty has taken amounts to about a score, thus far. You obviously understand what I mean, don't you?"

"Uncle. Seems like Ganga ji is getting polluted by not just the factories, but also the people thriving on her banks. Fine, tell me what to do." Shreyas said, shrugging his shoulders.

"Oh, no no. You are my own baccha. What is there to do! Nothing at all. You don't have to bat an eyelid. Everything has been arranged, you see. You, well.....you just have to say, you know this bastard..that he is your candidate. You have to say this just at the right time at the right place and to the right people. Is that too much I ask from you?"

"Too much or too little, I am not marrying any Kishangarh reject. I can say this to Kanhaiyya if you need me to." this time Shreyas hissed back.

"See? The same fire, same blood after all! I will take care of that. Don't you bother your young head with it. What was it you said about your bus to Delhi then, five in the evening today, yes?"

"Yeah. I'll be off today."

Shreyas fell on his back on the bed. His mobile phone flew off the mattress and fell on the floor with a sharp thud. He didn't care. His experience in favours was, well, a naught. But he realised, that to get a village discard a job in a Central University was a tall order, to get it in NDU, an impossibility. Towards that end, only an insider referral would create a small window, big enough to get him a driver's job, the Vice Chancellor's driver, no less! Fortunately, the village imbecile had been a rich one, had driven around in many cars and SUVs, and had a driver's license too. Shreyas tried to calm himself down. He closed his eyes.

"Sir, sir. Your candidate is here." the clerk's large spectacles appeared in a blur as Shreyas opened his eyes. 

It was noon now. He had napped after filing Ranvijay's application, superscribing with a fluorescent highlighter his own name along with a prefix at the top of the form. The processing clerk, an old hand, had obviously taken note and quickly forwarded it ahead of the others. In fact, he knew the coding system so well that the other applicants who had turned up for the interview had only thought it to be routine. The deal was settled in minutes. The clerk got richer by almost a lakh and the panelists, by a million each.

Ranvijay got the job. He didn't bother searching for Shreyas. He knew, they were now even. 

Shreyas took a transfer to Sikkim two years later. He knew, nobody applied there.