Remembrance

There is a propensity in people, especially in the upmarket Indian urban hip and happening crowd, to look down upon those who cannot speak English in a proper manner or have a certain diction in their speech. For these ‘dudes’ and ‘dudettes’, anyone who is not fluent in English is not smart or intelligent enough to be ‘acceptable’ in their social circle. I know a lot of these snobbish prigs, as my work demands me to meet some of them on a regular basis. These people are almost everywhere, upmarket bars, restaurants, swanky offices. For them, people from hinterlands or small towns are being defined by their accents and they never shy away from being blatantly racist about it too. They make fun of such people, and often on their faces. Do they ever question themselves, ask themselves, what good is their so-called convent education if they are not even able to respect someone’s basic characteristic. But, I guess not, they are the truest examples of – Angreez chale gaye aulaad pich...

Brides in India are supposed to bring loads and loads and loads of dowry. That’s the truth of the entire country – be it the hinterland Bharat or the upwardly mobile India. A girl is still a liability, and boy an asset. And yes, we don’t believe in family planning, unless we are lucky enough to have sons during the first few attempts. To hell with Beti Bachao Beti Padhao! We are here to raise a generation of girls who are taught to remain in their ‘ maryada ’ and boys trained to become MCPs. Now imagine such a heavy dosage theme turned into an entertaining movie. Did I hear impossible? With Badrinath Ki Dulhania, that’s exactly what newbie director Shashank Khaitan made possible. In its outer packaging, this rom-com looks fun and entertaining, but the deeper themes of dowry, gender inequality, women emancipation, sexism, interweaved in the movie portray the condition of the society we still live in. It is in this very ‘progressive’ India the protagonist Vaidehi (another ...

Wonder why Indian consumers never ask these questions? Why these never cross the mind of any self-appointed tech-guru or auto-critic? Why the Government as usual remain inert towards these issues? Why as people of this country, we never question our own motives? Why not probe ourselves: Why am I paying double the amount of money for buying the same phone that my western counterparts can buy for dime-a-dozen? Plus, why am I also not complaining about half the features that do not run on my mobile, restricting access because of my country of residence? What makes us not blink an eye for shelling out half a lakh to buy a smartphone on EMI but turns us into stingy Scrooge and grumpy Grinch while buying vegetables from saabzi walas , haggling for auto fares, protesting against hike in school fees? Why are the auto majors dumping their outdated oil guzzling machines in India and the Indian consumers lapping them by willingly paying a premium? Why we never think of the next petrol price h...