Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi - a review

I saw Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi recently with my family. The story and its subject has a mass appeal and after a long time we have a film that can be prescribed for family viewing. Pure and devoted love scores over an expressive love for the girl. The triumph of old indian values on the modern liberal ideas has always been appreciated by indian mass. It was this which had appealed the mass in Shah Rukh's Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge where an innocent lover was shown to have given more importance to the approval of the girl's father than of the girl herself. This again is a dramatic love story which would appeal to all irrespective of mass or class and has a potential of becoming a genuine hit in terms of number of views ( and not in terms of the amount of money generated through overseas shows where lesser views end up giving a better revenue). The song Haule Haule resonates with the viewer's feelings and is used in a great way to leave a longlasting impression. The surprisingly pleasing climax of the film earns it a huge repeat value. Much talked about criticism that how a wife could not recognise her husband is a multiplex-class hangover and this has never been an issue for us as long as the story and the subject is treated as per our liking.

Change Your Life

(Published in BRUNCH on page 4 of Dec 14, 2008 issue)

Do you want to wait for another terror 'After The Terror' ?

I read the sweet dish presented by Seema Goswami (Dec 7, Brunch, ‘After the terror’) and was really disturbed. This is what makes me fear about India’s future. When would this page3 people be shaken out of their dream-drunken state? Brittain is a tough state and Israel is even tougher, they do not see a terrorist’s religion, they do not analyse the consequence of a terrorist’s execution, they do not free terrorists in exchange of hostages and they do not feed media about story of a lady terrorist’s links before eliminating the terrorist. They enjoy a tough life. They never compromise on security. They become tougher with each terror attack. Change your life before enjoying it again. Life is not about enjoying for the heck of it, it is about enjoying with pride and security. It is not about eating out, indulging in alcohol and enjoying dream parties at a five star hotel. Insure that there is no more death of innocent life and there are only martyrs fighting the terrorism. Let us all be prepared to become martyrs if required and enjoy finishing terrorism. Everything else would follow and continue.

Response to-Lipstick on his collar (Shobha De, HT, December 6)

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A class was shown its face
The response by Shobha De (Lipstick on his collar - December 6, Hindustan Times) insured that Naqvi's remarks did not go waste. The author probably symbolyses the class at which Naqvi aimed to hit upon. Naqvi aimed his remarks on a class which is cutoff from the common people, cares only about self and not even for a joint family; worries more about own figure and measurements than the health and thinks that by paying unavoidable tax all its responsibilities towards the society is over. This class, talk only of its demands and rights, remind others of their duties and try to ignore its own duties in this process as far as possible. This page3 lifestyle was hit at by the recent Mumbai attack at Taj. A lifestyle, which the majority of us want to have, few get a glimpse of it and only very few actually live in it. In her article, actually she describes the details of her self-centered lifestyle which reconfirms this perception about this elite class. The common people which comprise the mass and not the class sympathises neither with the class represented by Shobha and nor the class represented by Naqvi. Mass clapped when a politician was cornered for changing his clothes thrice during Delhi blasts and also enjoyed when a class was shown its face while they were protesting. Mass of India wants the government to ruthlessly crush the terrorism without bothering about human rights of the terrorists and the likes of Afzals and much before some other agency actually takes up this cause and multiplies the fronts to tackle for the government.

Sponsored reaction to the Mumbai Attack

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When you pointed out that a politician changed his clothes thrice each time he appeared on television during Delhi blasts, you think it was blown to its exact proportion… and when a politician noticed that a protester found time for lipstick and powder you feel agitated and find the comment condemnable! This is the power of media. Media can make an issue out of a non issue. We ignore the fact that while media went on screaming from the rooftop that everybody is sick of the political system and the politicians after the Mumbai attack, Delhi elections noticed a higher turnout just after the blast and a more than decent turnout was observed in Rajasthan elections many days after the incident too.

We were shown how some policemen were killed because they were not having good quality bulletproofs (politician’s do not think of their security). But the policemen and the commandos had to request the media to abstain from covering the attack live after when their live coverage inadvertently appeared to have helped the terrorists initially. More than often after a terrorist attack media starts spreading that the city moves on with the same intensity (as if nothing happened!!). This is to put a point forward that the terrorist would not succeed in dampening our spirit (The city moves on…. kind of slogan). In the case of Gujarat (where the state became sensitive after a gruesome terror-like attack, got disturbed and responded by engaging itself in some unacceptable and unjust incidents) the same media tries to remind us of that forgettable incident time and again. Fortunately despite all their negative efforts, Gujarat has actually moved much ahead. We have seen Maya’s rise, Mulayam’s show and Modi’s triumphs despite all that was portrayed by the media. It is clear that media works on agenda. Media is unfortunately in the hands of those miniscule, page three kind of Indian intellects who get disturbed only when they see threat on to their own lifestyle. This page three kind of lifestyle that hardly bothers about the problems of the common majority, ignores all attacks on Godhra, Swami of Orissa, Delhi, Bangalore, and Mumbai train blasts. They never bother about others till you allow them to do whatever they want to do (in the name of freedom of expression and their human rights!!). Unfortunately for them, this Mumbai attack was on these selfish-lifestyled elite group also. That is why this time they are disturbed and want a response from people. But again they have already decided and fixed the kind of response that we are allowed to show. This time they do not want us to move ahead with the city life as if nothing had happened. Instead they want us to spill our anger against all politicians across the party line (so that the impact is less on the current government and negligible on the 'person' who is the sole in-charge of the government but very cleverly has not accepted a position in the government). Where the rest of India saw Pakistani’s behind the attack, suspected local support for that and wanted a change in the attitude of the current Government, this set of intellectual started finding faults in the statements of the opposition leaders. They are praising the army and NSG only to divert our attention (Barkha Datta has done many stories to prove that army's presence is the cause of terrorism in Kashmir). Praising army and the policemen and questioning the entire political system should have ideally lead their arguments in favour of a military rule but they are consciously avoiding this because a military rule goes against their lifestyle.

Conclusion

On 27th November 2008 Hindustan Times had a front page space for a JNU professor’s statement and a chart that tried to establish that actually terrorism is not an issue for the voters of Delhi assembly. Unfortunately at that moment our country was fighting the biggest terror attack which did not find a space because probably media went to sleep earlier than the attack surfaced in Mumbai. Our media and the central government thought that by coining the term ‘Hindu terrorism’ they have finished the issue of terrorism. In fact media along with the government is now actually unable to face their failure in establishing equivalence between two colours of terrorism. A real terrorist attack established the true colour of terrorism. One, where Kasab emphasizes that he has no regrets and thinks that he would be awarded with Jannat and the other where a number of narco-analysis tests have not been able to unfold a mystery. She now knows from inside that she might have earned approval from a vast majority for the way she reacted on terrorism on her own but would go to hell if she has done that at all. Media and the government were so busy on their agenda of proving the existence of the ‘other’ terrorism that many clues and vital intelligence intercepts of the true terrorism went unattended. God save this country from these media persons and this set of politicians for whom even a Mumbai attack is insufficient to make them realize the difference between terrorism and its reaction (in the prolonged absence of any action by the government). They also might have understood now that why terrorism (irrespective of their colour) should be ruthlessly crushed, why it should not get the media coverage and why cricket can not be entirely separated from politics.