| Yes, Ahem, Maybe, Eh, Nnnoo
By Chetna Kapoor
Shout, shout. Get it all out.
Indians
have the most difficult time saying "No." Achievglobal,
one of the world's largest training companies is trying
to sensitize (or should we say desensitize) Indians
intending to work with Americans through their program
"Working with Westerners." At the top of their problems
for Indias is the Indian hiccup over the negative. Their
hesitancy in giving no for an answer would be interpreted
as lack of leadership quality in an American workplace.
Get it? No?
Pedal your way out of pollution. Brightly colored cycle
rickshaws from Nagpur will now grace the roads of London
to relieve the city of its pollution problem. Cycle
rickshaws are the most common mode of transport in all
parts of apna desh. They may not have the fancy model
names of their elite counterpart, the cars, nevertheless
they come in several models, each peculiar to the region
where they are made and used. Nagpur, which bagged the
U.K. order, is known for its most comfortably styled
rickshaws and has already been supplying them to Germany.
Bottled graveyard. Human body parts in bottles. Sounds
eerie. Hundreds of such bottles were recovered from
a site being dug for construction of a Guest House for
the Bangalore District Police. The site is located behind
Om Mahal. The authorities have a simple answer to this
gory discovery. The building earlier housed the forensic
science department. When this department shifted workers
buried the human parts in bottles as the Bangalore Corporation
refused to ferry human parts and incinerators were unavailable
at that time. That is not quite satisfctory to consipracy
buffs, who are spinning their own theories. Om Mahal
was acquired by the Indian Armed forces after Chinese
aggression in1962. It later housed the forensic science
department until it shifted in 1993. To cut a long story
short, this Mahal has six claimants from the Nepal Royal
family, including the ancestors of Devyani Rana. Who
is she? Well she is the one whose marriage to the crown
prince of Nepal apparently triggered the gruesome mass
murder. What connection the mystery finders want to
establish, we need to wait and watch.
Cloning, circa 3000 B.C. One needs to read the Adiparva
chapter of Mahabharata to learn that these discoveries
of science were known long before Western science moved
in. Gandhari had 100 sons. It is inconceivable for one
woman to conceive 100 children in one lifetime and that
too all males. All the 100 Kauravs were born of a single
embryo of Gandhari outside her body with each part fertilized
in a separate kund. So test tube babies, cloning, splitting
embryos and creating human babies outside the human
body was something known way back in the times of the
Mahabharata. A backtrack in science we may say.
Indian dreams. For many Indians the land of their dreams
is US of A. But for this group of Russian students from
Boarding School, Moscow, visiting India on a cultural
exchange programme, the land of their dreams is Hamara
India. Guess it all lies in the state of one's mind.
Raj Kapoor won the hearts of Russians, but this group
of students won over the hearts of Indians with their
command of Hindi and their dream of wanting to come
back to India as diplomats to strengthen the relationship
between the two countries.
Lalloo Yadav hits the jackpot. No, Lallooji has not
won the bumper round of any of the innumerable game
shows on television. His innings on the silver screen
has yet to begin. Television lovers watched a trailer
of sorts of his presence on the screen when he featured
as a guest on the latest popular show on Zee, "Jeena
Isi Ka Naam Hai," along with his wife who blushed like
a 16 year old heroine of Bollywood screen when asked
by the host if Patiji had ever said to her "I love you."
Lallooji is gearing up for the marriage of his second
daughter to the son of an income tax commissioner. That's
the real jackpot. The folks of this village in Aurangabad
district of Bihar,to which the bridegroom belongs, have
every reason to rejoice too. Metalled roads are replacing
the katcha rastas, electrification is on at full speed,
telephone lines are being laid. After all Lallooji is
going there for the Tilak ceremony. Maybe seven more
villages in Bihar can hope for development of their
villages. After all Lallooji has seven more children
to marry off.
Devdas is toast. Devdas, may be the toast of the Cannes
film festival, but it is taking flax from purists. We
have already had two versions of this film in Hindi
with KL Sehgal and then Dilip Kumar portraying Devdas.
Neither film took the kind of libertt with this classic
story of Indian Literature as has Sanjay Leela Bhansali
with this Shahrukh Khan version. According to critics
what Bhansali has done is "sacrilege." Bhansali defends
himself saying he has his own fantasies. He has retained
the intensity of Bimal Roy's projection and added the
drama and energy of Raj Kapoor. Lovers of Hindi cinema
will remember a similar controversy had arisen over
Dev Anand's film Guide based on R K Narayan's novel.
They will also remember that despite the criticism the
movie was a runaway hit at the box-office. Bhansali
and Sharukh Khan are you listening.
Chor police. An honest policeman. His chor beta. Duty
battles with blood. Duty prevails in the end. The honest
to his profession father hands over his son to the police.
An oft repeated theme of a Bollywood film. However reel
life turned real life. A retired policeman's son has
been hoodwinking everyone for the last 14 years by posing
as a magistrate during the day and as a doctor of Naturopathy
and Acupuncture during the evenings. Vijay Singh Chauhan
has his office in the Tiz Hazari Court Complex close
to the Administration Department Commissi-oner's office.
The strategic location made it certain that he was never
short of clients requiring fake legal documents. For
his practice as a doctor he operated from his house-cum-clinic
in Northeast Delhi. He had been arrested earlier in
1988, but was back in business. Habits die hard. Presently
he is cooling his heels behind bars.
Politicians on the ramp. Politicians from Maharashtra
can perhaps do a better job than some of our models.
These fashion conscious politicians are regulars of
some of the best designer studios in town - Sheetal
Design studio, Gabana, Men's Modes, Yasmin Dressers,
Baboi's. Anil Deshmukh, the stylish Minister for Food
and Drug administration, reportedly has three houses
filled with clothes, changes clothes four times a day
and repoortedly employs people solely to looking after
his clothes. Murli Manohar Joshi on being nominated
Speaker of the Lok Sabha made two quick phone calls.
First was obviously to Bal Thackery and the second to
Men' Modes to place an order for his dress for the swearing-in-ceremony
the next morning. Kripa Shankar Singh, minister of state
for Home changes his stye of clothes every four months
and places a lot of importance on footwear. Gone are
the days when we identified politicians with their Gandhi
caps and khadi kurtas.
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