Amul in Bollywood

An article on the start of the most enduring chapter in Indian advertising.

From the The Asian Age (1996)

"The moppet who put Amul on India's breakfast table

50 years after it was first launched, Amul's sale figures have jumped from 1000 tonnes a year in 1966 to over 25,000 tonnes a year in 1997. No other brand comes even close to it. All because a thumb-sized girl climbed on to the hoardings and put a spell on the masses.

Bombay: Summer of 1967. A Charni Road flat. Mrs. Sheela Mane, a 28-year-old housewife is out in the balcony drying clothes. From her second floor flat she can see her neighbours on the road. There are other people too. The crowd seems to be growing larger by the minute. Unable to curb her curiosity Sheela Mane hurries down to see what all the commotion is about. She expects the worst but can see no signs of an accident. It is her four-year-old who draws her attention to the hoarding that has come up overnight. "It was the first Amul hoarding that was put up in Mumbai," recalls Sheela Mane. "People loved it. I remember it was our favourite topic of discussion for the next one week! Everywhere we went somehow or the other the campaign always seemed to crop up in our conversation."

Call her the Friday to Friday star. Round eyed, chubby cheeked, winking at you, from strategically placed hoardings at many traffic lights. She is the Amul moppet everyone loves to love (including prickly votaries of the Shiv Sena and BJP). How often have we stopped, looked, chuckled at the Amul hoarding that casts her sometime as the coy, shy Madhuri, a bold sensuous Urmila or simply as herself, dressed in her little polka dotted dress and a red and white bow, holding out her favourite packet of butter.

For 30 odd years the Utterly Butterly girl has managed to keep her fan following intact. So much so that the ads are now ready to enter the Guinness Book of World Records for being the longest running campaign ever. The ultimate compliment to the butter came when a British company launched a butter and called it Utterly Butterly, last year.

It all began in 1966 when Sylvester daCunha, then the managing director of the advertising agency, ASP, clinched the account for Amul butter. The butter, which had been launched in 1945, had a staid, boring image, primarily because the earlier advertising agency which was in charge of the account preferred to stick to routine, corporate ads. In India, food was something one couldn't afford to fool around with. It had been taken too seriously, for too long. Sylvester daCunha decided it was time for a change of image. The year Sylvester daCunha took over the account, the country saw the birth of a campaign whose charm has endured fickle public opinion, gimmickry and all else. The Amul girl who lends herself so completely to Amul butter, created as a rival to the Polson butter girl. This one was sexy, village belle, clothed in a tantalising choli all but covering her upper regions. "Eustace Fernandez (the art director) and I decided that we needed a girl who would worm her way into a housewife's heart. And who better than a little girl?" says Sylvester daCunha. And so it came about that the famous Amul Moppet was born.

That October, lamp kiosks and the bus sites of the city were splashed with the moppet on a horse. The baseline simply said, Thoroughbread, Utterly Butterly Delicious Amul,. It was a matter of just a few hours before the daCunha office was ringing with calls. Not just adults, even children were calling up to say how much they had liked the ads. "The response was phenomenal," recalls Sylvester daCunha. "We knew our campaign was going to be successful."For the first one year the ads made statements of some kind or the other but they had not yet acquired the topical tone. In 1967, Sylvester decided that giving the ads a solid concept would give them extra mileage, more dum, so to say. It was a decision that would stand the daCunhas in good stead in the years to come.

In 1969, when the city first saw the beginning of the Hare Rama Hare Krishna movement, Sylvester daCunha, Mohammad Khan and Usha Bandarkar, then the creative team working on the Amul account came up with a clincher -- 'Hurry Amul, Hurry Hurry'. Bombay reacted to the ad with a fervour that was almost as devout as the Iskon fever.

That was the first of the many topical ads that were in the offing. From then on Amul began playing the role of a social observer. Over the years the campaign acquired that all important Amul touch.

India looked forward to Amul's evocative humour. If the Naxalite movement was the happening thing in Calcutta, Amul would be up there on the hoardings saying, "Bread without Amul Butter, cholbe na cholbe na (won't do, won't do). If there was an Indian Airlines strike Amul would be there again saying, Indian Airlines Won't Fly Without Amul.

There are stories about the butter that people like to relate over cups of tea. "For over 10 years I have been collecting Amul ads. I especially like the ads on the backs of the butter packets, "says Mrs. Sumona Varma. What does she do with these ads? "I have made an album of them to amuse my grandchildren," she laughs. "They are almost part of our culture, aren't they? My grandchildren are already beginning to realise that these ads are not just a source of amusement. They make them aware of what is happening around them."

Despite some of the negative reactions that the ads have got, DaCunhas have made it a policy not to play it safe. There are numerous ads that are risque in tone.

"We had the option of being sweet and playing it safe, or making an impact. A fine balance had to be struck. We have a campaign that is strong enough to make a statement. I didn't want the hoardings to be pleasant or tame. They have to say something," says Rahul daCunha.

"We ran a couple of ads that created quite a furore," says Sylvester daCunha. "The Indian Airlines one really angered the authorities. They said if they didn't take down the ads they would stop supplying Amul butter on the plane. So ultimately we discontinued the ad," he says laughing. Then there was the time when the Amul girl was shown wearing the Gandhi cap. The high command came down heavy on that one. The Gandhi cap was a symbol of independence, they couldn't have anyone not taking that seriously. So despite their reluctance the hoardings were wiped clean. "Then there was an ad during the Ganpati festival which said, Ganpati Bappa More Ghya (Ganpati Bappa take more). The Shiv Sena people said that if we didn't do something about removing the ad they would come and destroy our office. It is surprising how vigilant the political forces are in this country. Even when the Enron ads (Enr On Or Off) were running, Rebecca Mark wrote to us saying how much she liked them." There were other instances too. Heroine Addiction, Amul's little joke on Hussain had the artist ringing the daCunhas up to request them for a blow up of the ad. "He said that he had seen the hoarding while passing through a small district in UP. He said he had asked his assistant to take a photograph of himself with the ad because he had found it so funny," says Rahul daCunha in amused tones. Indians do have a sense of humour, afterall.

From the Sixties to the Nineties, the Amul ads have come a long way. While most people agree that the Amul ads were at their peak in the Eighties they still maintain that the Amul ads continue to tease a laughter out of them.

Where does Amul's magic actually lie? Many believe that the charm lies in the catchy lines. That we laugh because the humour is what anybody would enjoy. They don't pander to your nationality or certain sentiments. It is pure and simple, everyday fun."

Amul has often had a special connection with the film industry. A collection of some of the brilliant Amul adverts over the years -

Cheers!

Abhishek.

The Case Of The Missing Servant by Tarquin Hall: Book review

Tarquin Hall's first foray into fiction is a fine attempt by any standards. As a journo based in South Asia for much of the 90s, his study and insight into Indian society and custom is thorough and the reader is rarely suspicious of the writer's distinctly non-Indian roots. His marriage to an Indian-American of Punjabi upbringing also helped immensely, I would imagine, as Hall's characterization, setting and insight are positively flawless. He successfully manages to put the pizzazz back in the detective genre.

Hall's detective Vish Puri, is eminently likeable, as most Punjabis are, being typically rotund, jovial and fiercely proud of his culture and heritage, evidenced by his blind faith in his guru Chanakya and his bible, the peerless 'Arthashastra'. He believes the Holmes' of the world to be nothing more than dilettantes and upstarts, who copied Chanakya's principles in their method but never gave any credit to the source. He lives in an upper middle class neighborhood with his wife, Rumpi, his 4 daughters and his mother Mummy-ji. Suitably, he also carries the nickname 'Chubby'. He heads up Most Private Investigators ('Confidentiality is our watchword') and carries out mainly pre-marriage investigations, as most detectives in India do. But when he is called in to investigate the mysterious disappearance of a maid servant from a reputable lawyer's bungalow, things get pretty interesting. Using his vast network of informants as well as his able associates, the wonderfully nicknamed Flush, Tubelight and Facecream, he moves from clue to clue, from west to the east of the country, and from suspect to suspect, until the truth is finally out. In the mix is Mummy-ji, a budding detective in her own right, who despite being an irritant to Puri in his investigations, is sniffing out the culprit in her own little mystery. This subplot is actually a master-stroke in terms of plot handling and enhances the reading experience, giving the reader a perfect little distraction, a breather if you will, from Puri's own relentless case file.

The book, while being generally amusing and light hearted, is also serious in the issues it lays bare. Apart from being detective fiction, it is also in part a social commentary on the dichotomy of modern India, much like some of the issues explored in Adiga's dark 'The White Tiger'. A good read on the whole and Puri proves to be a worthy successor to the likes of Bandyopadhyay's Byomkesh Bakshi, Ray's Prodosh Mitter and Keating's Inspector Ghote. The Indian detective is alive and well and Puri should have many more cases to solve. I can already see a few film adaptations in the offing.

My only quibble with the text is the constant and unnecessary use of Indian English by the characters, which ceases to be funny after about the first 50 pages. In any event, I look forward to Hall's next, 'The Case Of The Man Who Died Laughing'. Don't skip this. It's great fun.

Cheers!

Abhishek

Kambhakkt Ishq

Oh dear!

Kambhakkt Ishq is not so much a film as it is a series of amateurish, silly and sometimes asinine gags, loosely connected with something like a story-line. It will probably make the producer a ton of cash, but otherwise will do nothing for Akshay Kumar's and Kareena Kapoor's careers. While Kumar's turn in film after film gets evermore predictable, Kareena's career may have actually taken a step backward with this monstrosity.

Set in Hollywood, the film tells the 'tale', if one may call it, of the hate-hate relationship of the film's protagonists, Viraj (Kumar), a Hollywood stuntman, and Bebo (Kareena) an aspiring surgeon who moonlights as a 'supermodel'(no less). Predictably, this egoistic gender war ends with the pair falling head over heels in love and getting married. In the mix is one of the worst sidekicks ever in Vindoo Dara Singh, a mysterious 'sue-er', Keswani, who bears no connection with the goings-on whatsoever, played by Javed Jaffrey, a caring Dolly aunty (Kirron Kher), whose sole purpose for the few moments that she shows up, is to convince Bebo that marriage is a good idea and a deaf doctor, played by Boman Irani, who really had no business being in such a film. Oh, and the supporting pair of Aftab Sivdasani and Amrita Arora have nothing much to do other than look adequately sad as they stand back and watch the film's lead pair destroy their marriage as result of their ego trip.

And the gags, well, the less said about them, the better. We last saw 'the surgeon leaving his watch behind in the patient's stomach' gag in Jaspal Bhatti's Flop Show years ago. While it was funny as a 15 minute sketch, played out superbly by the deadpan Bhatti, here it is almost half the plot. No prizes of guessing that it gets boring really fast. The dialogue mainly consists of swearing, mouthing bad english lines and screaming 'Bhai'. The music is insipid and unimpressive.

This film is more of a 'golden turkey', than a 'golden baby', something Denise Richards wants to produce with Viraj. Seriously, who approved the dialogues?!? Even His Royal Akki-ness and Diva Kareena can't save this one. It was fun watching Stallone spout hindi dialogue though. Never thought I'd see the day.

1.5/5

Cheers!

Abhishek

New York

A film about discrimination in the USA in the aftermath of 9/11, New York has its heart in the right place, but is led down by a flawed screenplay and clunky dialogue. In short, it could have been a much better film.

The movie starts with an FBI agent (Irfan Khan) detaining an Indian Muslim, Omar (Neil Nitin Mukesh), now working in America, on suspicion of terrorism. To clear his name, he is then asked to infiltrate his friends' (John Abraham and Katrina Kaif) home as the FBI has suspected them of being involved in running a terrorist sleeper cell for a while. The film tells the tale of the three friends in flashback... how they met, all the fun times, the love won and lost. Omar loses the love of Maya (Kaif) to Samir (Abraham) and then 9/11 happens. Samir is forcibly detained and tortured for 9 months and is lucky to be one the 4 to be released on grounds of lack of evidence. He is understandably disillusioned and thus begins his downward spiral into the world of revenge, jihadis and terror. Do his friend and wife succeed in stopping him? That's where the film's climax culminates.

It all starts off very well, with the three friends meeting in college and having a whale of a time. The first 40 minutes of the film are perhaps its best, and then on things start to get a tad tedious. The emotional connect with the audience is just not strong enough here, as is required to justify the victim's position. As American citizens, I would have expected Samir and Maya to show a tad more emotion when the 9/11 news broke. They just hugged and looked glum. Also, a better actor than Abraham would have been able to better emote alienation and intense anger during and after the months of detention. Samir's story is the the most important track of the film, but doesn't hook you at all. Its the frivolous bits that actually seem a lot more genuine.

Irfan is dependable as ever and as the conscience of the film, is saddled with the trickiest and worst dialogues, but carried them off bravely enough. Katrina Kaif finally gets to do more than sing songs and look phenomenally gorgeous. Here acts moderately well and of course, looks phenomenally gorgeous. Neil Nitin Mukesh's earnest turn is eye-catching, but the big disappointment is Abraham, who perhaps gets the most opportunity, but fails when it counts. He is natural as a carefree American college jock, but as an anguished and haunted individual, he isn't as convincing. The music of the film is passable. Kabir Khan's direction is good and every frame looks great. A really glossy body. But not enough soul.

2.5/5

Cheers!

Abhishek.

99

99 isn't the funniest film of the year, nor is it always 'pure fun' as the black and red posters of the film would have us believe. It is however a smart, warm and generally amusing piece of work in the crime caper genre and is worth a watch.
The film revolves around 2 small time scamsters, Sachin (Kunal Khemu) and Zaramud (Cyrus Broacha), who are forced to work with the endearingly phsychotic bookie AGM (Mahesh Manjerakar). When the bookie sends our boys out to Delhi to collect payment from a congenital cricket gambler Rahul (Boman Irani), things get interesting. The money is lost, then found, then lost again and then.. err..you guessed it.. found again. The last gambit involves the gambler and the 2 crooks teaming up against a big time cricket match fixer/bookie to recover the lost money. Thrown into the mix is the scene stealing Kuber (Amit Mistry), a small time Delhi bookie to whom Rahul owes money..(is there anyone in the film that he does not?), the pretty hotel receptionist Pooja (Soha Ali Khan), who wants to break out on her own, preferably to open her own coffee shop, much like Sachin, the disconsolate Mrs. Rahul (Simone Singh), who has walked out on her husband because of his compulsive gambling habit and the big boss of the cricket match fixing game, JC (Vinod Khanna), who desperately wants to beat Rahul at cards after having lost to him earlier.
Things take some time to pick up here, so don't expect a laugh riot from the word go. The first hour is spent etching out the characters and their motivations. Its towards the middle of the film that the real action starts with the boys reaching Delhi. Not to say that the film is beyond flaw. The romantic track involving Sachin and Pooja is totally unnecessary and slows down proceedings considerably. The music isn't phenomenal either, with only the song 'Delhi Destinty' being airplay worthy. Direction wise, the debutantes Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK are pretty good and the film is well shot, slick and well packaged. But its the actors that come up trumps here, with natural performances from Khemu, Irani, Mistry and Manjerakar. Khanna is functional while Khan is adequate. Broacha is perhaps the only weak link this ensemble, but shows significant promise in some scenes. One wonders why there was a need to further pad-up an already XXL Cyrus?

Time well spent, this film. Watch.

3/5

Cheers!
Abhishek.

A quick Kolkata trip and some lost treasures

Kolkata for a week is never enough, but this trip was somehow satisfying. The parents are in the process of moving house and there was a bit of excitement there...what with setting up the new place and all, buying some furniture, helping set up the completed portions, choosing the curtains, lighting etc. Also managed to finally tick off some long standing to-dos. But the big surprise lay elsewhere. In an old store room, locked up in a tattered suitcase. My parent's entire LP record collection. Almost all of them in good condition! Just touching the vibrant full colour packing covers brought back wonderful memories of lazy afternoons in Kanpur/Madras/ Calcutta spent listening and trying to memorise some of these very songs. A really interesting mix of music there...given dad's passion for old film music and mom's more western tilt. Some of the records I can remember from the 70 odd that I found are:

western/pop/fusion

1. Tom Jones - She's a lady

2. Usha Iyer - Scotch and Soda, Love Story and others

3. Neil Diamond - The best of

4. Paul Anka - The best of

5. Boney M - The best of

6. Pink Floyd - Piper at the gates of dawn

7. James Last - Trumpet a go-go

8. Yehudi Menuhin/ Ravi Shanker - Improvisations /East meets west 3

9. Nancy Sinatra - These boots are meant for walking - original 1966 release edition

hindi/bengali

1. Satte pe Satta

2. Piya ka ghar

3. Salil Chowdhury and the Calcutta Youth Choir - Modern bengali songs

4. Anand

5. An evening with Mohd. Rafi

6. Bade Ghulam Ali Khan - Legends

7. Lata Mangeshkar - Classical evening

Here are some pics.

Now all I need to do is find a record player. Any ideas where?

Cheers!

Abhishek.

Kolkata Knight Riders - How deep is the sea of tears?

The Kolkata Knight Riders' woes in the IPL 2009 season continue. Mr. Murphy is vindicated and whatever could have possibly gone wrong, has gone wrong. The failed Multiple-captaincy (or, the get rid of Ganguly) theory, Ganguly's ouster from captaincy and the subsequent public backlash, the pathetic fielding standard, new captain Brendan McCullum's woeful form, the Fake IPL Player's stinging and salacious blog, authentic or not, and now the racist allegations. Theres enough there to fill in a dozen HR case studies! And its turned the captain, who till a few weeks ago was in top form, into a mournful, gibbering wreck. To his credit, though, he's put up a brave face and carried on manfully. This must feel like the longest 6 weeks in his professional career. 
This from a team that had everything going for it, on paper. An owner capable of generating mass hysteria with a juggernaut-like PR machine, the largest brand value amongst the IPL teams, one of the largest and most imposing stadiums in world cricket as it's home base, the most passionate home crowd already steeped in club culture and some fantastic ODI cricketers in Gayle, McCullum, Ponting, Sharma and Hussey. 
But lets not dwell on what has been a disastrous outing for the men in black and gold. Here are a few things Joy Bhattacharya and Co. can consider going forward: 

1) Change the kit: The black and gold ain't cutting it anymore. See what the Deccan Chargers have achieved with a smart revamp of their 2009 kit. From bottom placed no hopers last season to serious contenders this time around. SRK can get his good mate Manish Malhotra to come up with something suitably jazzy as the 2010 season approaches. 

2) Get rid of the existing coaching staff: Buchanan and Co. have been an unmitigated disaster. KKR needs a behind-the- scenes kind of coach, and not a superstar primadonna we have right now. When you have strong personalities like Ganguly and Ponting already in the squad, you need someone with the tact, subtlety and diplomatic skills of an Indian civil servant, and not a laptop toting, overbearing, de Bono quoting professor with all the subtlety of a brass band. Didn't we learn from the Chappel/Ganguly episode? Where's someone like John Wright or Gary Kirsten when you need them? I quite agree with Warne's theory of not needing coaches at top level, especially for a slam bang 6 week tourney like the IPL. One doesn't need active coaching at this level, but someone who can help get the best out of the squad, help strategise and motivate. And what's with having more support staff than players? Cut the staff size down to 4-5 max. And get a good mix of foreign and local staff. 

3) Create a city bond among the squad: What do the foreign players actually know about Kolkata apart from its hotel rooms, the Eden Gardens and the social service opportunities it presents? Lets get them a little more entrenched, I say. The local players could educate the likes of Ponting, Gayle, McCullum, Hussey and Hodge about the city, its culture and sporting history (glorious when it comes to football, nothing much to write home about as far as cricket is concerned). They could try something like a student exchange program, where the local boys could host the overseas pros in the city for a week/fortnight. Tough when you consider the international cricket calendar, but might help the overseas boys bond a bit more with the franchise. This could help ease whaterver alleged racial/communal tensions that exist between players from different nationalities. Compulsory community work at Nirmal Hridoy should be made a must for all players as payback to the fans for such a horrendous 2009 season. 

4) Invest in local talent: KKR doesn't suffer from lack of quality overseas talent. Its the lack of decent Indian/Bengal cricketers that's letting them down. Invest in getting back Bengal troopers Manoj Tiwary and Shreevats Goswami. With the ICL cricketers soon returning to the mainstream fold, there is the talented Abhishek Jhunjhunwala and the utilitarian Rohan Gavaskar to chose from as well. Cheteshwar Pujara, Tiwary(should they get their hands on him), Saha and Shukla should be given ample scope. Agarkar, Chopra, Bangar,Taibu, Akhtar, Hafeez and Henriques should have their contracts cancelled (Most of them should not have been contracted in the first place). The aim should be for a lean, well oiled and performing squad and not the 50 strong batallion they have now. The extra cash could also help...theres a recession on, by the way. 

5) Strong leadership: Should Ganguly play in the next edition, he should be made captain with McCullum as deputy. He is a strong individual who can galvanize the team and make things happen. Should he give up cricket altogether, in disgust, after this car wreck that was 2009, Ponting is probably the best man for the job. While his tactical skills aren't the best in the world, at least he looks the part. We're tired of seeing a haunted and desolate McCullum match after match. 

6) Tone down the hype: You'd be forgiven for believing that the KKR outfit was topping the league tables, given the amount of hype surrounding the team. Lets tone it down chaps. Empty vessels and all that. Keep things quiet for the next year and focus on the cricket. Robbie Williams sings when he's winning. So should you. 

Cheers!

Abhishek.

Calcutta - Nostalgia/Romance

Calcutta time again...found this article on Calcutta and how young romance bloomed in its 'good ol' days' in 60s and 70s. A stark difference from how things work today. Achingly penned by Jyotirmoy, from the website India Mike. Read the original content here.

"One of the unique features of the mid level eateries of Kolkata was the “Cabins”. Basically these were cubicles along the wall with curtains or swing doors. Some four or five people could sit at a table in these cabins. During the evenings families dined in these and those would like to have their tipple in privacy would choose these, New Cathay in Esplanade was one such. On the days when the horse races took place you could find great scholars of numerology, astrology, equestrian biology and all such sorts pouring over sacred literature & frantically doing a series of extremely complicated mathematical calculations. In the evening you found the same people most of them drinking to get over some financial misfortune and a very few drinking to celebrate the gains.
During the slack hours of the afternoon courting couples mostly students would enter the scene. The waiter would lead them to a cabin & take the princely order of two cups of tea & a plate of finger chips(French fries were unknown)
After some time of delicious intimacy if by any chance you happened to look at the curtain you found a pair of feet under it. And if you didn’t have the chance & the tea was getting too cold or he was too tired waiting on his feet for you to see it, the waiter would transmit a signal via a very discreet cough. He would deliver the stuff & get away & wont come back to show his feet for a long time probably would doze off to a slumber induced by the monotonous sound emitted by the antique ceiling fan.
Basanta Cabin near the Hedua on the Cornwallish street was known for the congenial atmosphere provided by the kind & friendly owner. He had over the years seen some great romances blooming there & attended many a marriages that followed the courtships at his establishment. The words like dating, seeing, didn’t arrive. People fell in what is called in the local lingo as “Prem”, intense love. You became brave, honest, compassionate & so sure of life. “Otho mein jawab ane do, kamshini pe sharab, Oh Khuda tera Khudai palat dunga..”(Let words come to my lips & blush to my beloved, Oh God I will change the way you lord)
There were no pubs or discs and no going on a drive. So you went for a walk in the Botanical gardens & ate peanuts, or took a boat ride near the Strands. The boatmen would row to a buoy, tie the boat & disappear on the other side of the boat leaving you alone. After the predetermined time they would noisily take up their oars & the helmsman would again come back to his position on the side you had been seating. You went there after if finance permitted to the Gay Restaurant (Gay meant happy & just that) and sat with ice creams looking at the big ships sailing by. On some days you would go to the sprawling Maidan(after metro construction a fraction of it remains) & sit down under one of the magnificent old trees. There would be hordes of goats grazing around. Some of the chai wallas would buy some fresh goat milk which the young caretakers sold on the sly. One of them would come and squat very close to you. Public property so you cant do any thing except buy tea from him & he will go away. No sooner had he left a vendor of Shar e botrish bhaja( vendor of a concoction that had thirty two & half ingredients) would appear. As the dusk fell & the birds flew back over the dome of Victoria Memorial you walked back to Chowringhee & went to Anadi Cabin. After a Moglai Parotha & tea you took the tram this way & she took the bus that way.
For having some entertainment together you went to the Rabindra Sadan on the morning of the birthday of Tagore. You waited for Chinmoy Chattopadhya to sing the wonderful love songs by Tagore & wish you could sing like him & what a cooing would that be! You wept at the prospect of an imaginary separation when Hemanata Mukherjee sang Jakhon Porbey na more payer chinha ei bat e(When you don’t find my foot marks any more..)
When you had progressed further you took the suburban train or a bus from Esplanade early morning & went to Diamond Harbour where the Ganaga meets the sea. You walked miles on the embankment with the salty air ruffling your hairs & sat down while the gentle waves lapped at your feet. Ate rice & egg curry at the tourist canteen & bought Jai Nagorer moa( a fragrant ball of puffed rice cooked in the jaggery made from juice sapped from date palm trees) & shared them while returning back to Kolkata.
All this went on when the city was plagued with acute shortage of food & every other essential commodities, baby food had did the vanishing act. Soon the cries of “Bel phuler mala nebe go”(Would you buy a garland of fresh Jasmine) or Chai baraf kulpi baraf( Do you want kulfis) in the lanes at night gave away to shouts like “Chalbe na chalbe na manbo na manbo na” Thousands came out with radical political views & soon the worst & the biggest armed political warfare started. Streets were deserted after dusk. Thousands of bright young men laid down their lives, bombs were being made at every nook & corner often the hands of the makers were blown off accidently. Indigenous R&D produced “Pipe guns” Not a single family was to be found who hadn’t lost a near & dear one. Para military police unleashed unprecedented brutality.
Love left the city. “Sat mahaler swarnapurir nibhlo hajar bati”(The thousand lights of the majestic seven floored mansion went off one by one”
After a long period of darkness from the bloody mud of the city & mangled flesh & abandoned bones rose great writers like Samaresh Bose, Shanker, Sunil Ganguly, Joy Goswami & others. Little magazines appeared, some disillusioned men in a small house in Behala started writing the lyrics of Mohiner Ghora guli(Mohin’s horses, the first folk rock band of Bengal) A very very tall man pawned his wife’s jewels to make films that would stun the world.
Love again returned to soothe the tormented souls but that’s another story."

Now is as good a time as any

A lot of 9 to 5-ers I know have chosen these turbulent times to start something on their own despite the nay sayers. While good times lulled us into a false sense of well being and success, the big bad economic bust-up we find ourselves in the middle of right now, has reinforced a feeling of dread. What is today a comfortable existence may just as easily vanish tomorrow. Job losses and lower incomes are a reality and one way that I have seen some people deal with it is to start a small venture of their own, a plan B if you will, something they always wanted to do but never found the time to take up.

One such acquaintance, 30 year old Nirmal Mohanty*, an IT professional with a big US bank, decided last year that he was fed up of being constantly worried if he was going to get the boot like 14 other of his team mates at work. He, along with a couple of his co-workers, have set up a fledgling start-up which is in the process of developing and testing ERP software aimed specifically at SMEs. He devotes time to this on weekends and says that since he set up his small little venture, he's felt significantly better about himself and the future, ie. his feeling of well being has improved dramatically. He quotes financial radio host Clark Howard, “This is an extraordinary time for entrepreneurs. There’s no better time to start a business than during a recession. Think about it: There’s a surplus of vacant office, retail and commercial space that can be had for below-market value. Ditto for high-quality labor.”

Another friend, a banker in Kolkata, 26 year old and single Supratim Adhikary*, has taken up his passion for travel and photography with renewed vigour. When he lost his job with his previous employer, he used his retrenchment money to invest in a high end camera and hit the road. He travelled to places he always wanted to go to but couldn't due to his work pressures. Varanasi, Hrishikesh and Rajasthan provided him with great picture taking opportunities. On his return he sent some of his pictures to some photography related magazines in both India and abroad. His pictures have since been displayed in various magazines and publications like Asian Photography etc. "It opened up another revenue stream for me. The money wasn't great, but it was a huge morale boost. Also, it was incredibly empowering to finally be able to travel and indulge in photography, something I was really passionate about. Its sad that it needed a job loss for me to realise this. I will never give this up again" he says. He has since found another banking job and has also enrolled himself in a long distance photography diploma. Investing in oneself perhaps pays the best dividends.

I suppose there are many lessons that one can take away from all this. These gloomy times, times of worry and anxiety are perhaps the best time to take some time out and invest in something that we always wanted to do. As we've seen, it can be time and money well spent. It is as good a time to follow that passion, that activity which you always wanted to pursue. It not only serves to uplift you mentally as you finally end up doing something that you enjoy immensely, but it can also help to open up an extra income stream to supplement your existing earnings. And what better way to move ahead than by marrying both passion and profession? So what are you waiting for?

Cheers,
Abhishek.

*Names have been changed

Brave or Foolish?

The great Indian electoral tamasha is well and truly underway. And in a couple of months time, we will have a new government at the helm in New Delhi... (or the same one, again). A cursory visit to CNN IBN's website last week brought my attention to an interesting story. Challenging BJP's LK Advani himself, on home turf, in Gandhinagar, is former dancer, actress and activist, Mallika Sarabhai. Also, from Trivandram, we have the articulate, cosmopolitan and former UN official, Shashi Tharoor. Rajdeep Sardesai, on the channel, called this, rather sarcastically, the so-called rise of the urban, English-speaking neta. He seemed to believe that while this made for a good story and all that, these neophytes had nil chance of actually winning at the hustings. Hence their efforts in this regard would end up being nothing more than interesting day time news fodder.

I reckon Sardesai might have been a tad uncharitable to both Tharoor and Sarabhai. The current political scenario is already replete with examples of young, educated, professional, articulate albeit second generation politicians, ie, the Abdullahs, Pilots, Gandhis, Scindias et all. It is perhaps rarer to see urban, educated professionals, who after making a name for themselves globally in their chosen fields, opt to give up their flourishing careers and get their hands dirty, so to speak, in the muck that is Indian politics, and therein lies the heart of the matter. They have chosen not to be armchair participants in India's destiny. They intend to use their expertise to make a change in the India they see around them, and that is laudable. Take Tharoor's case. One of the most passionate Indophiles I know (as well as an alumnus of my high school in Calcutta), his writings on India and being Indian have influenced me a great deal. He has risen to the top of the UN in an exceedingly short span of time. Imagine what a person like him could accomplish in Government. An effort in the right direction this is indeed, as India needs bright, educated and clean professionals in politics. Outsiders we may brand them, but it is this breed that we need now more than ever, if we are to build on the momentum of India fulfilling her destiny. They might well lose the election, more Sarabhai than Tharoor, but this is a start and hopefully they have already set an example for others to follow. In a small way, the cleansing of the political system has begun. So go forth Mallika, and continue your 'Satyagraha against the politics of hate'.

PS - Here's a link to an interview with Tharoor, about his life and work, from the archives of UC Berkeley(Conversations with history series). It's an hour long but a very interesting watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aoR8fp6SNg