At The Edge

Superman of Malegaon!

2009-10-24T11:07:00.000+05:30

(Complete film at the end of the post)

11/26/08

video link (Update: Upholder had to remove the video because of:
a copyright claim by NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation). But I found a trailer and a clip. Read on)

Hindu Muslim Sikh E'sai Sab ke Dil Ka pyara
Superman! Malegaon ka Superman

SUPERMEN OF MALEGAON

Directed by Faiza Ahmed Khan
A documentary partly produced by KBS (Korean Broadcasting System) and NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation) .

The documentary is about the making of a movie called "Malegaon ka Superman' directed by Shaikh Nasir.

It tells the fascinating story of a ragtag crew of people from Malegaon (in Nashik district of Indian state of Maharashtra) who set out to make a 'Superman meets Bollywood' kind of flick in their own town on a shoestring budget.

The above clip is their final product. The rest of the documentary covering the making has also been uploaded but sadly it has a Japanese voice over.

The director of the film, Faiza Ahmed Khan, has done an brilliant job! She has managed to capture all the flavors, trials and inspirations of the tiny film industry of Malegoan that specializes in spoofs made for the local film market.This year it won jury award for best documentary feature at the Asiatica Film Mediale, Italy's annual Asian film festival.

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20th May 2009
Update.

Finally someone uploaded a trailer. Check it out:

video link

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Update 12/09/09
Here's a clip from the documentary:

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Sptember 19, 2009

Here' s really great trailer of the film 'Supermen of Malegaon'

video link

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October 23,2009

The film is being screened at 11th Osian's Cinefan film festival in Delhi.

The complete film has been hosted at the Youtube channel of AlJazeeraEnglish. Enjoy!
Part 1

video link

Part 2

video link

How to be a Super Hero

2009-10-24T11:39:00.000+05:30

alternatively titled: 'What to do if nothing else works?'

Ride a horse -single handed, ride a bike on a high wire - let your hair blow into the wind, play with knives ( and springs!), do trapeze, break that wall with your head, and when you have completely lost it, be a 'chiddi maar' - killer of birds. So now you are a Super Hero.ClapCalpClap.

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Image: A page from Pratishodh ki Jwala (fire of revenge, Raj Comics), the first of Super Commando dhruva. dhruva started in Circus just like 'Robin - The Boy Wonder'. Parents get killed and so on. After many successful adventures he ended up playing 'Robin' to Nagraj.

Baital Pachisi Under Pressure

2009-10-24T20:44:00.000+05:30

video link

Video: Television series "Vikram Aur Betaal" (1988) from Ramanand Sagar
Music: "Under Pressure" (1981) by Queen and David Bowie

Baital Pachisi: Twenty-five Tales of a Baital

2009-10-24T21:57:00.004+05:30

The Baital-Pachisi, or Twenty-five Tales of a Baital is the history of a huge Bat, Vampire, or Evil Spirit which inhabited and animated dead bodies. It is an old, and thoroughly Hindu, Legend composed in Sanskrit, and is the germ which culminated in the Arabian Nights, and which inspired the "Golden Ass" of Apuleius, Boccacio's "Decamerone," the "Pentamerone," and all that class of facetious fictitious literature.

The story turns chiefly on a great king named Vikram, the King Arthur of the East, who in pursuance of his promise to a Jogi or Magician, brings to him the Baital (Vampire), who is hanging on a tree. The difficulties King Vikram and his son have in bringing the Vampire into the presence of the Jogi are truly laughable; and on this thread is strung a series of Hindu fairy stories, which contain much interesting information on Indian customs and manners. It also alludes to that state, which induces Hindu devotees to allow themselves to be buried alive, and to appear dead for weeks or months, and then to return to life again; a curious state of mesmeric catalepsy, into which they work themselves by concentrating the mind and abstaining from food[...]

- Isabel Burton, in preface to her husband Richard R. Burton's translation of Baital-Pachisi titled 'Vikram and The Vampire'.

Baital-Pachisi is generally attributed to 8th-century Sanskrit sage Bhavabhuti who wrote 'Vetala-panchvimshati'. Kalhana, the 12th century Kashmiri historian, places Bhavabhuti in the entourage of the King Yashovarman of Kanauj, who was defeated by Lalitaditya, King of Kashmir, in 736 AD. Vikram of the tale is supposed to be Vikramaditya (102 BCE to 15 CE) the a legendary king of Ujjain.

Baital-Pachisi was also a part (ninth section of twelfth book ) of 11th century AD (between 1063 and 1081 AD+) mammoth Sanskrit text Katha Sarit Sagara 'Ocean of the streams of narrative' by a Kashmiri poet-scholar named Somadeva. Somadeva in turn had found the stories in Brhat Katha or Vrihat Katha ('Long Story' 'Tale-Epic') a still more ancient (6th century AD and earlier* and now lost) work in Paisaci language (often translated as 'Language of Blood sucking Ghouls') by one Gunadhya who in turn may have based his stories on still more ancient sources. In Brhat Katha:

An introductory story presumptively describes the life and adventures of Udayana, a king of Vatsa, and those of his wives Vasavadatta and Padmavati and the birth of his son Naravahanadatta. Then the main story describes the adventures of Naravahanadatta, how he gets a large number of wives and how he becomes the lord of Vidyadharas-half-divine beings, who participate in prosperity and adversity of man more than another divinities do. *

A Sanskrit translation* of Brhat Katha became Katha Sarit Sagara.

Somadeva's stories from Katha Sarit Sagara started when:

[...] no less a person than the deity Siva, who, it is said, related them in private conversation with his wife, Parvati, for her entertainment. One of the attendants of the god, Pushpadanta, took the liberty of listening, and he repeated them, under the seal of secrecy, to his wife, Jaya, a sort of lady's maid to the goddess. What woman, says the author, can restrain her tongue ? Jaya takes an opportunity of intimating to her mistress that she is acquainted with the stories narrated by Siva, to the great mortification of Parvati, who had flattered herself that they had been communicated to her alone. She accordingly complains to Siva of his having deceived her, and he vindicates himself by discovering the truth. Parvati thereupon pronounces an imprecation upon Pushpadanta, condemning him to be born upon the earth as a man; and she sentences his friend Malyavan, who had ventured to intercede for him, to a like destination. The infliction of this punishment is a not uncommon fate of the subordinate divinities of the Hindus, when they incur the displeasure of the Dii majores, or even of holy sages. The degradation, however, endures only for a season, and terminates upon the occurrence of some preannounced catastrophe. On the present occasion, Parvati tells the culprits that they shall resume their celestial condition when Pushpadanta, encountering a Yaksh, a follower of Kuvera, the god of wealth, " doom'd for a certain time to walk the earth," as a Pisacha or goblin, shall recollect his own former state, and shall repeat to the Pisacha the stories he overheard from Siva; and when Malyavan, falling in with the Pisacha, shall hear from him again the stories that his friend Pushpadanta had narrated. The recitation of the stories forms also the limit of the Yaksha's sojourn amongst mortals. This machinery is of course exclusively Hindu.

The two demigods, Pushpadanta and Malyavan, are born as two Brahmans, named Vararuchi and Gunadhya, and their adventures as mortals constitute the subject of several tales. Some of these possess much local interest: we have in them literary anecdotes relating to celebrated works and authors, as to Panini the grammarian ; notices of historical persons and events, as of the accession of Chandragupta or Sandrocoptus; and traditions of the origin of celebrated places, as of that of Palibothra already alluded to. The circumstances of these narratives are marvellous, it is true, and are not to be received as facts. In the absence of all authentic history and biography, however, they are not without interest, and perhaps not without value; and in the place in which they are found they are evidence of the early date at which popular belief assented to legends still current.

We find also in this portion of the work various incidents and tales which are of wide dissemination. One of the best told stories in the whole work occurs here. Upakosa, the wife of Vararuchi, becomes, during the absence of her husband, the object of the addresses of the king's family priest, the commander of the guards, the prince's tutor, and her husband's banker. She makes assignations with them all: each as he arrives is quickly followed by his successor, and is secreted only to be finally exposed and punished. The story is the same in all essential respects as that of the Lady of Cairo and her four gallants, in Scott's additional Arabian Nights; and that of the merchant's wife and her suitors in the tale of the king, his favourite, 'and the seven vizirs, translated by the same orientalist. It is also that of Arouya in the Persian tales; and it is also found as a Fabliau, that of Constant du Hamel, or ' la dame qui attrapa un Pretre, un Prevot et un Forestier,' (Fabl. de Le Grand, iv. p. 246); and it is worthy of remark, that the Fabliau alone agrees with the Hindu original in the mode of putting the suitors out of the way, by hiding them in baskets and disrobing them under the plea of a bath.

There is in this part of the work some very curious matter, the purport of which it is not easy to conjecture, unless it conceal an intimation that the stories are of inferior, if not of foreign origin. Malyavan, or Gunadhya, in consequence of a dispute with a rival Brahman, forgoes the use of the Sanscrit, Prakrit and Desya, or vernacular languages. He afterwards learns the Paisachi language, or that of the goblins, which enables him to receive the narrations as they are told him by the metamorphosed Yaksha or Pisacha. Possibly the author thought some contrivance necessary to explain how the Pisacha should be intelligible to the Brahman, and nothing more is meant than meets the eye; but a hypothesis might be framed upon it, that the stories were translations, whence made, it would not be easy to explain, unless we call in Pehlevi, a language extinct or disused before the Katha Sarit Sagara was compiled. However this may be, Gunadhya having heard the stories, extending to seven hundred thousand stanzas, wrote them with his blood, for there was no ink in the forest. He then offered the work to Satavahana, king of Pratishthana, who rejected it with abhorrence, on which the author kindled a fire in the forest, and reading it aloud, to the great edification of spirits and goblins, and birds and beasts, he burned it leaf by leaf as he finished the perusal. The news of this proceeding at last reached the king, and he repented of what he had done, and repaired to Gunadhya to solicit the gift of the work. The sage consented to present the king with the hundred thousand verses that had not yet been consigned to the flames. Satavahana took it to his capital, and having received an explanation of it from two of Gunadhya's disciples, he translated it from the language of the Pisachas. Satavahana, as king of Pratishthana, it may be observed, is identifiable with the Salivahana, whose reign, A.d. 78, forms an epoch in the ordinary chronology of the Hindus. It would seem as if tradition ascribed to him the patronage of this class of composition, and there is nothing very improbable in the supposition that the golden age of Indian fabling dates about the commencement of the Christian era.+

(King Bhartri Hari also makes an appearance in one of the 25 stories from Vetala-panchvimshati)

An interesting point to note is that in Kashmirian Vetalapanchavirhsati of Somadeva's version of Brhat Katha, the hero, the King is called 'Trivikramasena, the son of Vikramasena' ** but still refers to the semi-legendary Vikrama or Vikramaditya of Jain tradition.

A 1960s (?) Kashmiri production of Baital Pachisi for Radio Kashmir retained the name 'Trivikramasena'.
'Wan Raaz Trivikramasen, Answer King Trivikramasen,' Baital would needles the king into answering his trick questions.

For the late 1980s popular Indian television series 'Vikram aur Betaal', its makers, used the narrative of Somadeva.

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+"At the close of it, the author, Somadeva, states that he compiled it at the desire of Suryavati, a dowager queen of Kashmir, for the amusement and instruction of her grandson, Harsha Deva, whilst under her guardianship. Harsha Deva reigned, as Professor Brockhaus mentions, about A.d. 1125; but the Chronicles of Kashmir, the Raja Tarangini, give us more exactly the time. Harsha Deva was, according to Somadeva's genealogy of him, the son of Kalasa, the son of Ananta, the son of Sangrama, kings of Kashmir in succession. The Raja Tarangini has the same series of descents, and both authorities designate Suryavati as the wife of Ananta, mother of Kalasa and grandmother of Harsha. The period assigned for the joint reigns of Harsha's three predecessors in the RajaTarangini is seventysix years. Abulfazl has the same names ; but in Gladwin's translation of the Ayin Akberi, the aggregate of the three reigns is but thirty-one years. The MSS. of the work are however, in the chronological tables which they contain, exceedingly incorrect. Didda Rani, the predecessor of Sangrama, died A.D..1025 (Asiatic Researches, vol. xv. p. 80), and seventy-six years added to this places Harsha's accession A.d. 1101. According to the Kashmir Chronicle, however, Suryavaii burnt herself with her husband Ananta's dead body eight years before, or in A.d. 1093. The compilation of the Katha Sarit Sagara must have preceded this event by some few years, so that we cannot be far wrong in assigning it to about A.d. 1088, to which therefore we fix the most modern limit of all the stories found in the compilation. The Katha Sarit Sagara then, considered in itself, and still more especially as the representative of a still earlier composition, the Vrihat Katha, is the oldest extant assemblage of tales, except the Hindu original, and the first translation of the Kalila and Dimna [ Panchatantra], and it is therefore indispensable to the history of fiction to determine what it contains."

-The British and foreign review: or, European quarterly journal, Volume 11,1840. Offers a concise account of Katha Sarit Sagara.

*
History of Indian literature by Moriz Winternitz, Subhadra Jha, Volume 3, Page 348. Ksemendra's Brhatkathamanjari, 'Bud (of the tree) of the Brhatkatha)' from around 1037AD, written about 30 years prior to Somadeva's Katha Sarit Sagara was another Kashmirian version of Brhat katha. Only other version survives (in part) in Nepalese work Brhatkatha-Slokasangraha by Buddhasvamin.

** The ocean of story, being C.H. Tawney's translation of Somadeva's Katha sarit sagara (or Ocean of streams of story) (1924) [Read at Archive.org]

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You may also like to read:
Vikram and The Vampire by Sir Richard R. Burton
Classic Hindu Tales of Adventure, Magic, and Romance
Edited by his Wife Isabel Burton [1870]
and also
Twenty-five stories of a demon
By Duncan Forbes, Ghulam Mohammad (Munshi.), 1868
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Image: Classic 'Vikram Betal' image from of Chandamama, January 1982 [Check out the archives of Chandamama]

Bullet Gandhi Guru Farrell Hanuman

2009-10-25T18:08:00.002+05:30

"Can a Bullet skip on water like a rock can"

Yes. But only under a certain condition: You have to be walking on water at a pace of 3 miles per hour.

"Curse of maa kali on gandhi family"

Assuming this one is about the Gandhi family. The curse is:You will rule India.

"guru dutt+colin farrell+hanuman"

Had it been '-' we would have got a tail at the end. But not sure about summation.

Chinese are commie, Chinese are coming, Chinese come in.

2009-10-27T22:43:00.000+05:30

Once in a while I get an opportunity to rub the fact into the face of my Indian friends that I am a Kashmiri. The conversation usually ends with, 'Yeah Yeah so why didn't you seek asylum in Amreka while you had the chance?'

Only a week ago we read about: "Chinese Embassy in Delhi is issuing separate visas to Indian passport holders from Indian-administered Kashmir. Instead of stamping the passport with a visa, as is the norm with Indian citizens, Kashmiri students and businessmen traveling to China have had their visas stamped on a separate paper stapled to the passport. [News Link, Asia Times]

That make me wanna go, 'Only with a passport! Only with a passport!' like Chaplin's 'communist' boy.

Rubs the fact into the face. Today was one such day. The front page of morning paper carried the news that 'Made in China' globes sold in India depict Jammu&Kashmir as a separate country. [News Link, Hindustan Times].

The horror, The horror!, they are being sold "for as little as Rs 100 a piece."

Local police adds, 'The Wongpin behind this racket remains elesive.'

These Chinese globes very conveniently put Aksai Chin in China and unconventionally throws POK with the independent entity wedged between Indian, China, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Should Pakistan also be protesting or are they too busy to notice? Aren't we supposed to be busy too, with our 'War within'...with the Naxals and other red Indians.

Sly Chinese they never miss a chance to belittle India and not always by littling the Indian landmass.

Take the case of their films. In a scene from God of Gamblers(1989) Chow Yun-Fa says 'Go back to India," to a fringe Indian (so naturally snobbish) character in the film. Chinese must think of Indians as brutes, uncivilized. Chinese and their chopsticks. In The Bride With White Hair (1993, a Wuxia film from Hong Kong) the depraved followers of a devilish cult, the bad guys of the film, among other things like dancing bare to drum beat ( dancer's skin turning a shade of coffee), looting and plundering, are shown eating rice with their two hands, taking delight in licking elbows. You might ask, 'So?' So, it was Fa-hien or Hiuen Tsang who first took note of Indian habit of licking arms while eating.

If the audacity of globe, hostility of passport and ridicule of Indians in Chinese films did not send you into war frenzy (I hope it did not), try this -

Women for war.

Marching smartly in close order drill, students at women's college Delhi close ranks behind their government. They enrolled in India's National Cadet Corps and still will learn communications, nursing and map reading. They also will knit woolen clothing for soldiers

LIFE Magazine November 16, 1962

And I hope even this does not work. Every time I read these Chinese stories in Indian media (and this globe thing is frontpage news), I am reminded of Vijay seeking Baap ka Badla from Kancha Cheena in Agneepath (1990). Agneepath, Agneepath, Agneepath. Chinese are coming, Chinese are coming, Chinese are coming.

What the hell do I care? I will seek asylum in Amreka.

Why I loved Geocities

2009-10-28T17:28:00.001+05:30

You might have heard about Yahoo shutting down Geocities. Yahoo acquired it in January 1999 and after 15 (10 of them under Yahoo) years of hosting all kind of pages (a lot of them having funky .gif images hammering in 'Under construction' messages and in between they offered most arcane information about most obscure topics ) they finally shut down the service on 26th October 2009.
Around 7+ million public web pages and 8+ million images (according to Google), gone leaving internet with lot of dead links and broken images (thanks to hotlinking) and 404s.

On 26th I spent some time randomly browsing through (and saving) some Geocities sites, stumbled across this 'sean connery on moon' image and remembered what a delight these pages used to be. In pre-blog days (and in some cases even in clatter of blogs) it obviously had some of the most labored upon user generated online content, labour not just of working with HTML and creating all those gif files.

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Projects that salvaged some of the data from Geocities:

Indira Jaap in Mazdoor Zindabaad (1976)

2009-10-29T21:39:00.000+05:30

After the death of their poor mazdoor parents, young Bhola and Munni find themselves homeless, hungry and on the street. But then a kindly roadside gola (ice-candy) seller Kamla (Parveen Babi ) takes them in.

A staple bollywood affair.

But then, Mazdoor Zindabaad is a film from year 1976, the middle year of Emergency, and there is not one moment in this magnus opus of sycophancy that lets the audience forget the great leader, her twenty points and her's son's five points. It was written directed and produced made by some guy named Naresh Kumar.He went on to make a film called Sone Ka Dil Lohe Ke Haath (1978) or 'Golden Heart-Iron Hand', a Chinese Kungfu film sounding title that some people would still use to describe Indira Gandhi.

(Humble offering) 'Mazdoor Zindabaad' doesn't try to describe the great leader, it just sings praises of her great plans. And how?

Kamla takes the bother-sister duo under her (and symbolically under Indira's) wings. She tells them soon poor shall get their share, have no fear Indira is here, poverty will be history, stand on your own feet, but first, have you heard about Indira's 20 point list?

Almost every scene featuring Parveen Babi ends with a synopsis from Indiraji's great program. Kamla when she is not threatening hoarders with wrath of Indira, just likes to listen to radio, and the radio always talks about Indira's proverty project. Then she likes to repeat it to anyone who would listen.

Inspired, Bhola becomes a balloon seller and his little sister Munni becomes a foot and leg masseuse for an old lady. All normal. And this goes on throughout the film even though the requisite twists and turns. Kamla gets married to an idealistic government electrician who loves to work (Randhir Kapoor) and has move to another city when he gets transferred to another city. Kids decide they are happy alone in the city and don't go with her. Then the brother sister get separated, sister ends up in a rich family. And the stupid twists and turns and guest appearances. Dharmendra appears in a guest 'staged' item song crowing about 'Great things are about to come'.

Nothing about this film is right and this can be said about most Bollywood films but after watching this pathetic propaganda film, one gets a vivid picture of the stiffening political environment of Emergency days. There are a number of films made during that era which make a passing reference to the political environment of the time but nothing like this. Nothing like this. This must be what great leaders of great countries dream their beloved subjects would remember their great legacy by.

cover, Jab Jab Phool Khile (1965)

2009-10-30T21:07:00.000+05:30

'Romance of Kashmir' painted on the cover of a vinyl for Jab Jab Phool Khile (1965)

Salvaged from a now dead Geocities site.

Sanjuro, Blood Bath

2009-10-31T21:13:00.001+05:30

Getting stabbed by Sanjuro Tsubaki (Toshiro Mifune) in iconic scene from Akira Kurosawa's 1962 film 'Sanjuro'.
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Previously: Toshiro Mifune, Rashomon, Animals

Waheeda Rehman, face

2009-10-31T21:33:00.000+05:30

from a dead Geocities site

from a previous post about Bees Saal Baad (1962)

Dilli Baoli, 1870. Jumping Wells at Delhi. Still.

2009-11-03T18:14:00.000+05:30

Jumping Wells at Delhi, Frontispiece of 'Letters from India and Kashmir' by J. Duguid, 1870. The illustration is by Mr. H.R. Robertson, and engraved by Mr. W.J. Palmer, principally from the writer's Sketches.

At the Kutub, and near Delhi, there are wells of various sizes, but on an average twenty yards square, surrounded by brick walls sixty feet high, of which forty are above the surface of the water. For a backsheesh men and boys - old men down to young boys - collected on the parapet, leap one after another into the air and descend in all kinds of positions. A moment, however, before they touch the water they quickly bring their feet together and their arms over their heads, pointed upwards, so that they enter the water in a reversed attitude to that of a header. The sensation caused by the sight of these men, with their arms and legs outspread and their features distorted by wild grimaces as they leap from the walls, surpasses any produced by Blondin or Leotard, and could only be equalled by them if they added a tumble to their usual performances. A small backsheesk is sufficient to induce them to perform, but you are afterwards pursued to some distance by askings for more. And this' leads to a word on the wide-spread use of the word " backsheesh." Where its line of demarcation crosses Europe to the north is not clearly ascertained, but in the south it runs eastward by southern Austria to the Italian frontier. In the west you have a medley of " una limosna por el amor de Dios;" " datenii qualchier cosa;" "baiocchi, baiocchi;" "quelque chose pour boire," "pour boire" peremptory; "summut to drink your honour's health;" "remember the waiter, chambermaid, boots ; " in short, endless variations on the well-known theme. But Hungary, Servia, Turkey, Greece, Syria, Egypt, Arabia, and in a broad wave the East, acknowledge one word common to all, amidst their confusion of tongues the mighty "Backsheesh." The sight of an Englishman at once evokes the unquiet spirit of this potentate, which cannot be laid until the Giaour departs. The word, used also by the North American Indians, proves incontestably a common origin between them and their Asiatic brethren.

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Fascination continues.
Sam Miller in his 'Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity' (2008) recalls meeting a man, his guide at the Agarsen ki Baoli near Jantar Mantar, who, it turned out, was once famously photographed jumping into the well by Raghu Rai.

Sandhya, 'Umad ghumad kar' in Do Aankhen Barah Haath

2009-11-06T13:13:00.001+05:30

nanhee nanhee boondaniyo ki khanan khanan'khan khang'ree
bajatee aayee, bajatee aayee dekho bhayee barkha dulhaniya barkha dulhaniya
chhuk chhuk chhuk chhuk chaiyya, aaja daru toray gal bhainya
aaj daru toray gal bhainya, chhuk chaiyya
mai toh nachu tere sang sang sainya, ho sainya, ho sainya
savan ka sandesa lekar niklee apnay ghar se
jo koyee iskay pyar ko tarsay vahee navelee barse
kare kare kare kare badarva kee jhanan jhanan jhan jhanjharee
bajatee aayee hai dekho bhayee barkha dulhaniya barkha dulhaniya

- rain song 'Umad ghumad kar' from Do Aankhen Barah Haath (1957).

And then there is saiyan jhoothon ka bada sartaj nikla.

Her bow runs on single string of a sarangi. My lover turned out to be the king of liars. She sings. A little toy drum follows her. Tied to her trailing pallu. All her movements are playful exaggerations - nakhra. Thugs, louts watch. She is a toy seller.

When I was a kid, I actually had that toy fiddle and the drum.

Last moments of Netaji by P. N. Oak

2009-11-07T13:06:00.001+05:30

"It was a strange sight at Taihoku airport near Taiwan on the morning of August 18, 1945. Hot steam emanated from the body of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. Clad in tight woolen riding breeches, tight belt, his body was blistered by hot oil from the plane that had crashed minutes ago. Strewn around Netaji were jewels, ornaments, gold and pearls donated by Indian for the independence struggle, which he was carrying with him on his way to Japan. Netaji struggled throughout the day and finally passed away at 10.30 p.m. on Aug, 18, 1945 and was cremated by the Japanese at Taiwan itself."

from Hindustan Times, August 17, 1997. One of the rare instances in which P. N. Oak (March 2, 1917 - December 4, 2007) refuted and not propagated a 'crackpot' theory. In this particular case the theory was: 'Netaji is alive. He became a Sadhu, a hermit.'

Oak created this vivid scene based on an account apparently offered to him by Colonel Habibur Rehman who was with Bose when he died. At that time Oak was working as a director and commentator at Free India Radio which had daily broadcasts from Saigon. Oak also served as the lieutenant ADC and private secretary to General Jagannath Bhosle who was appointed the chief-of-staff by Bose.

Oak started his career, in 1941, with the British Army working for Ordnance Department of the British Indian Army in Pune for eight months and was then transferred to Singapore. But when in February 1942 the Japanese defeated the British forces in Singapore he joined INA.

But it was the vocation that P. N. Oak chose in the later years that made him a famous man, at least in certain circles. He told stories. He had theories. A medium found him.

With the arrival of internet came the wild theories of an old man named P. N. Oak - the man who, among many other things, wrote: World Vedic Heritage: A History of Histories: Presenting a Unique Unified Field Theory of History that from the Beginning of Time the World Practised Vedic and Spoke Sanskrit ( first published in 1984). Hindus across the wide breadth of this country realized everything (and not just Maths) is Vedic; Taj, Qutub, Italy, Sicily, Vatican, Kaaba, Pope, Mohammed. Maybe even Karim's of Nizamuddin. Maybe even Karim and Nizamuddin. Everything is Hindu.

They read things, Islam=ishalayam: "temple of God", shared, talked around and it became street knowledge, even children knew it. Kaaba is Shiv Lingam. Oak's parallel Hindu world theories, for a brief moment, led Hindus to gasp in collective pride. Also, if turn of brow and a frown could kill, it would have killed thousands. Look what the world did to us. What they did to us. Look what they took from us.

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sita sings the barsaat

2009-11-08T09:49:00.000+05:30

video link

Video: Nina Paley's awesome Sita Sings the Blues.
Audio: 'Patli kamar hai' from Barsaat (1949). Music by Shankar-Jaikishan.

Inhi logon ne / These People

2009-11-09T13:47:00.000+05:30

On the last strains of the song, the camera moves up and away from spinning Sahibjaan and pans in on the background - roofs, other spinning girls, tawaifs of other Kothas.

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'le leena dupatta mera'

I have often wondered about this. Majrooh Sultanpuri used the word 'le leena' while the common usage would have it as ' le liya'. Is this Braj?

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Choreography for the song was by Lachchu Maharaj. Meena Kumari was ill and in a lot of physical pain while shooting this film (and this film was in shooting for the longest time) but there are only few scenes in which you can tell.

Previously:
Making of Pakeezah

Shat Putra Vati Bhava and may all of them find a Vadhu

2009-11-16T20:06:00.003+05:30

Traditional Hindu blessing for women 'Shat Putra Vati Bhava' (May you have hundred sons) also comes in a (lesser used) variation that promises eight sons - 'Ashta- Putravati Bhava' - eight being a 'good' number for Hindus. Not good enough. If we are counting on blessings alone, the old 'blessings' need an upgrade - a beta version, fast.

"A United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) study in 2007 said even if the sex ratio at birth were to remain at the ‘normal’ level of 950 girls per 1,000 boys until 2030, India is likely to have a female deficit of 25 million by 2030 in the marriageable age group of 20-49. More realistic studies that have factored in a limited and even further decline in the ratio have suggested the deficit could be anywhere between 29 and 34 million."

- from a fine feature article 'The Lost Girls' by Shreyasi Singh for Japan based current-affairs magazine The Diplomat. [Got the link via an email from Jason Miks, editor for the magazine.]

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Young Manorama, 1945

2009-11-17T01:06:00.000+05:30

Manorama in Mujhe Jeene Do (1963). Probably the most famous eyebrows in Indian Cinema. Her arched eyebrows and puffed, caked cheeks from 'Seeta aur Geeta' are things of legend.

Manorama was half-Irish and her real name was Erin Isaac Daniel. She started working in films in 1920s and appeared on screen regularly right till 1980s. In the 90s she did a cameo in Mahesh Bhaty's Junoon (1992) and in 2005 she had a small role in Deepa Mehta’s Water. Thus she had a release in every decade starting 1920s and ending with 2010. A no small feat. Manorama passed away on 15 February 2008.

Manorama in a photograph published in year 1945 in Telugu film journal Roopavani. Found it in the archives of Centre for the Study of Culture and Society

Chacha Nehru (and Chachi)

2009-11-13T13:54:00.001+05:30

Jawaharlal Nehru and Kamla Nehru in their wedding dress.

There is something strange going on at Doordarshan. On the occasion of Nehru's birthday, which is celebrated in India as 'Children's Day', they showed Sai Paranjape's Bhago Boot (2001). True to the old time-tested tradition of Doordarshan, that's all well and fine. I used to enjoy these kid movies shown religiously (often repeated) on this particular day . But this year, thanks to the digitalization and restoration of old archives, the film was preceded with a special presentation - an old reel having Chacha Nehru talking to a group of Kids about need for Children's cinema whose 'best judge should be children'. Between the clicks of camera, you could see the old man entertaining the kids with his famous talking skills. Rapt audience, which included his grandchildren - young Rajiv Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi, he told the kids that American films are sometimes good but often they have too much violence, he doesn't like that, there's already too much of that in his life. And then at the end he cracked a joke about Sanjay's idea of fun - smearing ink on other people.

Old Pears Soap Ad

2009-11-19T18:33:00.001+05:30

Probably from the 60s.

'Some complexions just never grow up! Pears keeps your skin young, innocent. Pears...the original glycerine Soap. ' Agency: Lintas

Gandhi‎ by Taya Zinkin , 1965

2009-11-21T01:46:00.003+05:30

"Gandhi landed in Bombay just in time for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. He was extremely loyal to Britain. British rule in India was not perfect but it did India much good. He took part in the celebrations, proudly singing ""God Save the Queen", and waving the Union Jack."

- opening lines of Chapter 8 titled 'To India and Back'. Gandhi was visiting India after his first trip to South Africa where he had already started defending the 'Coolies'. After a short stay he sailed back to South Africa, this time with family. On reaching Durban, after not being allowed to get off the ship for days and with whites demanding that he be deported back, bravely walks out with an English friend but gets mobbed, passes out and is saved by the wife of a white Inspector of Police who takes him to her house. The crowd soon descends on the house asking that Gandhi be handed over to them. Realizing that the situation can get riotous, Gandhi put on the uniform of a policeman and walked out of the back door while the owner of the house, the Police Inspector - certain Mr. Alexander, to distract the crowd sang a little song of his own invention:

"Hang old Gandhi

on the sour apple tree."

Frenchwoman Taya Zinkin (1918-2003) was the Manchester Guardian correspondent in India (Bombay) in 1950s. She went on to write many books on India including one titled 'Britain and India, requiem for Empire' (1964), co-authored by her husband Maurice Zinkin, an ex-ICS officer. Interestingly in 1947, Maurice Zinkin as Deputy Secretary at the Ministry of Finance in Delhi, on being challenged by a journalist to prove that Pakistan could survive Partition, produced a paper titled 'The Viability of Pakistan'. Even though he had first cleared this paper with his Hindu superior, the paper cost him £500 off his pension because Mohammed Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, used it to bargain with Nehru. He was soon asked to retire prematurely but stayed on for another couple of months, without pay, to help the government of India handle the Partition riots.

British values.

Surprisingly you get to read a lot about it in this breezy biography of Gandhi also. Apart from an occasional waving of Union Jack, at times Gandhi gets painted as the last real Englishman alive in India who wanted the British to regain their sense of Justice. Somewhere in the book, even words of a 'great' Englishman are invoked:

Gokhale shared Gandhi's admiration for British values and his belief that British rule was good for India. Both of them wanted to see India free, one day in the future. Both of them had no doubt that British would set India free as soon as she was ready for it. Thomas Macaulay, a great Englishman, had expressed their own feelings in his famous Minute on Education, half a century before, when he wrote,
"To have found a great people sunk in the lowest depths of slavery and superstition, to have so ruled them as to have made them desirous and capable of all the privileges of citizens, would indeed be a title of glory all our own. The sceptre may pass away from us...But there is an empire exempt from all natural causes of decay. Those triumphs are the pacific triumphs of reason over barbarism; that empire is the imperishable empire of our arts and morals our literature and our laws."
Gandhi was the first to admit that Macaulay was right when he spoke of the depths of slavery and superstition to which India has sunk.

And so according to this biography, Gandhi was the gifted one who accorded this last great 'triumph' to Britain who were only waiting for the day to come. Gandhi becomes one of Macaulay's Children. Indeed we learn that growing up in India, Gandhi's knowledge of his Hindu religion was only superficially, most of it mixed up with the ritualism of his pious mother. He was to discover Hinduism only later in England when through a vegetarian club he met two Englishmen who (shocked that Gandhi hadn't read Gita) gave him "Song Celestial" - Sir Edwin Arnold's English translation of Gita.

Elsewhere in the book, she write:

The Gandhi who founded Phoenix [the farm in Durban that he started after reading Ruskin's Unto This Last, again a gift from an Englishman] was a loyal supporter of the British, as his article in Indian Opinion [the weekly magazine that he started in Johannesburg, later run by his son Manilal] show. He kept pointing out that British deserved to be admired. Why did England conquer India? he asked his readers. By sheer courage and merit. Indians should emulate the British not only in their courage, but also in their cleanliness.

Later as things started heating up in South Africa, we are told that "The Viceroy of India- the representative of the King Emperor - made a famous speech defending the satyagrahis, praising Gandhi[...]"

The book, obliviously meant for British readers, turns out to be more about Gandhi's happy relation with British than just a biography of Gandhi. Gandhi's relation with fellow Indians is hardly dealt with. Even someone like Nehru is mentioned only fleetingly.

But in all this luxurious talk about British values, Taya Zinkin also offers a very interesting take on 'Great Indian Mutiny' of 1857 and the Caste system ( about latter, she even wrote a book, 'Caste today'‎ 1962). Explaining Gandhi's position on caste reforms, she quotes him saying: "Social reform can only take place from within, and it requires freedom." Driven by his personal experience, Gandhi believed that the sin of the Hindus could only be driven out by the Hindus themselves. Government intervention could lead to a counter revolution. Taya Zinkin adds the Mutiny context to it:

"He was indeed right. In the past, the Mutiny had broken out not so much because Indian soldiers were issued with cartridges greased with pork and beef fat - both of which they considered polluting - but because the British had interfered with age-old Hindu customs, like the killing of baby daughters and human sacrifice to the Goddess Kali; and because they had introduced changes in the laws of inheritance."

In early 1950s Nehru had to face a stiff Hindu opposition to the proposed Hindu Code Law. Even Rajendra Prasad, a man hand-picked by Gandhi, the then President of India, was also concerned enough to claim, 'new concepts and new ideas...are not foreign to Hindu Law but may cause disruption in every family.' When the Hindu nationalists asked Nehru why didn't he dare come up with something similar for Muslims, relying on Gandhian thought, the Nehruvian answer according to his biographer Sarvepalli Gopal (Jawaharlal Nehru, volume 3) was that Nehru:

"in defiance of logic, refused to consider alterations in Muslim personal law on matters of monogamy and inheritance so as to place all Indian women on a par. There should be no impression of the Hindu majority forcing anything, however justified, on the Muslim minority and changes would only be enacted when the Muslims wanted them"

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Illustration from the book by Robert Hales.
Photograph on the cover of the book has Mahatma Gandhi laughing with his two grand-daughters Abha and Manu at Birla House in New Delhi. September, 1947. "

Choli pay nazariya jaye

2009-11-22T19:08:00.000+05:30

The courtier is perturbed by what he hears. What type of a song is this. Vulgar. He asks the girl singing the song to explain.

It a good kind of song. It's a love song of Radha-Krishan. Listen. Radha says to her friend:

More angana mein aye aali, main chaal chalun matwali
angana mein aye aali
Jab aanchal hamra pakday, Hum has has unsay Jhagday
Choli pay nazariya jaye, mori chunari lipat mosay
jaye

' Bas! Bas! You will destroy the truth of daughter-in-laws and daughters of Mithila. Choli pay...uff!'

Courtier walks away fuming. Mocking him, the girl continues singing. Courtier listens some more.

Woh aur Bhay, morey paihya paray, Kahay mano baat hamari
Woh aur Bhay, morey paihya paray, Kahay mano baat hamari
Main aah baro mukh pher kahu, Main aah baro mukh pher kahu
Nahi manugi baat tihari, Nahi manugi baat tihari
Nahi manugi baat tihari
Nahi manugi baat tihari

Courtier walks out saying, 'Now I know. Now I know. Now I know why our women sing this song '
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The song-scene, sung and enacted by Kanan Devi [watch it here], is from year 1937 film Vidyapati by Debaki Bose.

The film is based on the life of poet Vidyapati (1360-1440AD) and was written by famous Bengali poet Nazrul Islam who for a brief period was also associated with the medium of cinema. [Vidyapati had a special appeal among Bengalis. Read about it Here]

The song was based on a work by Vidyapati and according to someone involved with the film, the wording song had to changed a bit (apparently on his suggestion) because the real line was an even more of a shocker. Cinema man, Kidar Sharma (1910 - 1999), in his autobiography 'The one and lonely Kidar Sharma' (2002) writes that instead of the suggestive bit about choli, the actual line was: "Kachuwa dharat jub piyara" (when my lover hold my breast). Too much even for the present day cinema. So the line was covered with a bodice.

This old 'naughty' song was referenced by film critic Iqbal Masud in his memoir 'Dream Merchants, Politicians & Partition: Memoirs of an Indian Muslim' (1997) as he had quoted the song in a (in what must have been an otherwise mundane) TV debate triggered by controversy surrounding the song 'Choli ke peeche kya hai' (What is there behind the bodice) from film Khalnayak (1993). He remembered watching the film in Mangalore as a teenage boy in 1937, gasping in the theater just like most of the audience at the use of line 'Choli pay nazariya Jaye'. The film fascinated him and introduced him to the 'Hindu culture' which till then, he admits, was an alien entity. He also recalls mentioning the film, years later, to Satyajit Ray. Ray's reaction was characteristic - 'A rotten film'. Masud explained his reaction as, 'For him as a philosophical Hindu in the broadest sense, the 'Hinduism' of Vidyapati was crude alphabet.'

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Iqbal Masud's 'Dream merchants, politicians, and partition'‎

2009-11-11T14:07:00.003+05:30

Dream Merchants, Politicians & Partition: Memoirs of an Indian Muslim (1997, Harper Collins, Pages: 152; Rs:95) by Iqbal Masud

Born F G Jilani in late 1920s into a South Indian Muslim family, his father a officer in education department under British government and his mother a burqa wearing Khilafat activist puritan Muslim woman, the contradictions, as he recounts it, were present in his life from the very beginning. The memoir starts in early thirties with an eight year old Iqbal Masud, seated between his burqa clad mother and aunt, in the balcony of a theatre, and him almost managing to catch Sulochana and Dinshaw Billimoria kiss on the screen ( in year 1935 talkie film 'Anarkali'). But the scene, at the last moment, gets censored out as his aunt clamps her hand down upon his eager eyes.

F G Jilani became critic-writer Iqbal Masud - Iqbal for his favorite poet and Masud his urf , a name 'adopted for various administrative and self-preservatory reason (the Emergency)' after the literary talents of this book reading, cinema watching Income tax officer were mentioned by Anil Dharker, the sub-editor of a popular girlie magazine Debonair (even Atal Behari Vajpayee 'kept it under his pillow'), to Editor Vinod Mehta who wanted the magazine to be a bit more Playboy like and have 'some semblance of respectability'.

Thus was born Iqbal Masud who, in the (fore)words of Vinod Mehta, could in a 700-word film review manage to 'combine Godard, Mrinal Sen, Indira Gandhi and Madhuri Dixit - beginning naturally, with a few lines from Auden.' A feat that could perhaps only be matched by his contemporary T.G. Vaidyanathan. Sample this - his review of a film called Professor Pyarelal (1981), whose opening scene had Dharmendra and Hema Malini dancing along Thames in London, started with these line by Edund Spenser: 'Sweet Thames, flow swiftly till I end my song'.

Iqbal Masud was not just a good Income Tax officer, he was also one of India's finest film critics and he was also an Indian Muslim. In his own words this book is not a chronicle, not an autobiography but just memoirs. But it is a slim book and it only offers glimpses. For a generation that doesn't know his era, these are memorable glimpses indeed. How he discovered brilliance of Indian Cinema with Ashok Kumar in 'Kismet' (1944) and 'Hindu culture', the other culture, through 'Vidyapati' (1937). He writes about relative calm of South India (and Indian Cinema of the time) with regard to Partition. Mentions watching 'Roshoman' (1950), Third Man (1949), 'Sorry, Wrong Number' (1948), 'Awara' (1951), 'Aah' (1953), 'Aag' (1948) in theater with his 'forward' (which meant 'convent educated, non-purdah' ) wife. He writes about the decline of Indian cinema with the death of Guru Dutt. Discovering culture of Middle East after a stint as United Nations recommended Tax Advisor to the Noth Yemen Government. Making friends with people like Satyajit Ray and Devika Rani. The promise of Indian New Wave. How he introduced Guru Dutt to French people and how it led India to re-discover the cinema of Guru Dutt.* In between he talks about the dark Emergency years. How he was shocked when he heard a progressive man like Ali Sardar Jafri say, ' Mera naam hai Ali Sardar Jafri. Main hoon shar-i-inquailab/Main kahta hoon emergency Harf-i-Haq hai' (My name is Ali Sardar Jafri/I am the poet of the revolution/I say Emergency is the Word of Truth). He was surprised at the big switch. And at the end he does talk about his own big switch - the switch from liberal Left to a 'fundamentalist'. A switch which surprised many of his friends. Why he played a crucial part in getting Salman Rushdie's 'The Satanic Verses' banned in India and how this left leaning man was rattled by the violent Bombay of early nineties. In his own words, 'You could not dream that Hindutva would capture millions in the Nineties. That was the evidence both of our idealism and of our limited vision. We had come from pasts more traditional than that of the 'Kar Sevaks' of today. The leftists of the Forties left behind their pasts by intellectual effort. Today's cultural nationalism is the result of a refusal to make the effort to face up to the twenty-first century.'

* Started with Iqbal Masud writing an incredible piece on Guru Dutt for Illustrated Weekly of India (dated 27-11-1983) when Pratish Nandy was the editor. You can read it here at cscsarchive.org. Also read some other old articles by Iqbal Masud at cscsarchive.org.

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10th November 2009

I thought I will get to never lay my hands on this little book again. I first read it a couple of years ago (previously mentioned in a post about Guru Dutt and French fame ) after borrowing it from a cousin brother who (after futilely trying to procure a copy online) bought it second hand from Daryaganj Sunday Market for rupees 10 or 20. It was nothing less than a prized possession. I remember returning the book back even though I didn't want to because he has a knack for loosing books. Sure enough, a couple of months later he asked me return back the book. I told myself, 'The book is gone.' I reminded him the sequence and the circumstances under which I returned it. He looked for it in his book shelves and boxes , dusting old books all along. Couldn't find it. Again asked me for the book. I told him I have returned it, maybe I shouldn't have. This went on for a couple of years, we would remember Iqbal Masud and the book and how it was lost. Then suddenly last month, out of the blue, he told me, 'I found the book.' It turned out that he had lend the book to friend who had since moved to Poona. So the book was with his friend all this time at Poona. 'Get it back! Get it back! All right!' That was my first response. A couple of weeks later I was back with me. I haven't decided if I will return it back this time.
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Face The Indian Heroines

2009-10-27T16:42:00.002+05:30

Created this collage of Heroines mostly using various Vintage Indian film posters (most of them hand painted) found in the incredible Picasa gallery of Praful.

Update:
Here's the link for this image in size 5120px × 3956px, 3504KB.

Download now

Enjoy!

Saree Falls

2009-11-30T01:18:00.001+05:30

and Manju Falls.

Picked it off from the street.