saaransh1

Many years ago when Javed Akhtar along with Shabana Azmi was touring the country to present the stage adaptation of Shaukat Azmi’s book Kaifi Aur Main, I had asked him at a press meet if the Ganga Jamni tehzeeb he represented so beautifully would fade away after him along with a few remaining voices that fused two cultures of thought seamlessly. He had vehemently disagreed and said that there was a generation waiting in the wings to do what he and the progressive Urdu poets had done.

As I watched his Rajya Sabha speech, I welled up when he emotionally recited this couplet, “Chaman mein ikhtilat-e- rangoboo se baat banti hai/ hum hi hum hain to kya hum hain tum hi tum ho to kya tum ho.” That an optimist like him had to remind himself and us of the simple fact that culture is about confluence and not dominance of a majoritarian belief system, was painful. But then the optimist in him fought back as he pointed that the roots of janatantra, of democracy are too deep and too strong to be shaken.

On a different note, Anupam Kher keeps popping up on my social media timeline. Critiquing poets and writers for returning state favours and rewards. Comparing dissenters and critics of intolerance to elitist, rich and famous champagne glass clinkers because he is ofcourse neither rich nor famous. Nor has he possibly ever drunk champagne. Or ever learnt to spell names like Kalburgi and Dabholkar and Pansare who were middle class men without the sheltering bubble that protects men like Mr Kher and were killed in cold blood because they asked too many questions.

Nor has he possibly ever walked into an institution like the JNU to gauge the average economic standing of the students there. He also possibly does not know that Umar Khalid, a JNU scholar now incarcerated for the slogans he did not raise and other unsubstantiated charges that amount to sedition, no less,  was really offered a stint at Yale ( unlike our minister of human resources) but turned it down to research the grassroot India that never makes news.

He also does not know possibly that Nivedita Menon, a mentor and teacher and another dissenter in the line of social media fire chose to turn down opportunities to teach in foreign universities so she could stay in India. Has Mr Kher ever turned down any opportunity or reward or award because his conscience and integrity did not approve? We all know the answer to that one.

But yes, the Umars and Nivedita Menons won’t fit into Mr Kher’s idea of nationalism that begins and ends with a slogan like, “Bharat Mata ki Jai.” Like a filmmaker I know (she also returned her national award, by the way) said, “Bharat sounds more like a father’s name rather than a mother’s.”

It can’t really be champagne but what is Anupam Kher drinking? He can’t even remember the year when Emergency was declared or that his roots can be traced back to Simla, not Srinagar but suddenly he wants to be the nation’s moral science school teacher? Oh, the irony. One of my favourite films of all time, is Saraansh, where Mr Kher played BV Pradhan, an idealistic rationalist/nationalist (not unlike a Kalburgi) who takes on a political figurehead to save an unwed mother. He faces the kind of persecution that he now believes does not exist in our society. He is threatened, stalked, bullied till he breaks into the office of a powerful minister and cries, “There is no hope for this country.”

And the minister who turns out to be his student, eyeballs him and says, “There is hope.”
From BV Pradhan to the man who says he is happy being the chamcha of the Pradhan Mantri..yes, the irony. Maybe he is thinking that if an unsuccessful actor can head FTII and a leading lady of a successful soap opera can head education, he with all his sterling achievements can go very far too. To quote him from a show he anchored, “Kuch Bhi Ho Sakta Hai.”  

Also  ironical is the fact that he was also a part of Rang De Basanti, a film about students intolerant of corruption at the highest places. A film that we hail as pathbreaking because it sparked a certain kind of proactive idealism in the youth who wanted to change things for the better because they loved their country. Today, somehow, if a student talks about changing the nation for the better with another kind of a freedom movement, he will possibly be beaten by a few lawyers and hauled away to be reformed in a jail cell.

This is what Javed saab in his speech was warning us about. This imposition of a one size fits all patriotism that discourages the questioning spirit. The next time, Mr Kher wants to define nationalism for us all, he should make time to meet Soni Sori, an Adivasi school teacher turned political leader in Sameli village of Dantewada in south Bastar, Chhattisgarh who has been persecuted for years for standing up for tribal rights. And who continues the good fight despite repeated attacks. Despite being given electric shocks and suffering sexual violence in police stations. She is not part of the one dimensional elitist, power mongering universe that Mr Kher inhabits but is fighting for India like a fierce mother would for her children. There is an analogy here if he would care to see. A slogan waiting to be chanted. Though something tells me that he won’t bother to go too deeply into the matter. It is not convenient to think too much about these matters. Or to do something more substantial for your country than just playing patriot games on Twitter.  

Reema Moudgil is the editor and co-founder of Unboxed Writers, the author of Perfect Eight, the editor of  Chicken Soup for the Soul-Indian Women, a  translator who recently interpreted  Dominican poet Josefina Baez’s book Comrade Bliss Ain’t Playing in Hindi, an  RJ  and an artist who has exhibited her work in India and the US and is now retailing some of her art at http://paintcollar.com/reema. She won an award for her writing/book from the Public Relations Council of India in association with Bangalore University, has written for a host of national and international magazines since 1994 on cinema, theatre, music, art, architecture and more. She hopes to travel more and to grow more dimensions as a person. And to be restful, and alive in equal measure.