PYAASA - PATRIOTISM

Days back, during a casual online hit chat, I and my recently introduced lady friend came to the extremely relevant to our contemporary times, now oft-trodden pasture of Patriotism. I am an Indian and live in Mumbai,(my dear friend resides in a foreign land) and so it wasn't long before Bollywood movies were invited into the virtual dialogue.I'm still feeling bad because I guess I startled her big time by replying, "Pyaasa", when she asked what were my favourite movies on Patriotism.

During any interaction of mine about country, pride, patriotism, idealism. (etc..you know the drill) elements of loud (and empty) rhetoric and jingoism frequently rush in fast which soon make it center-stage, pushing the actual topic off it. I'm trying hard and am hopeful that soon I'll fully realize the futility, the futility of playing host to vices like these,) and grandstanding should follow Content, and not precede it.

I'm disappointed that I couldn't succeed at least this time as the nonsuspectingly poor lady showed strong expressions, of shock and disbelief. Since then I am trying hard and since morning I've been doing that only. It's a tedious job - making a refreshed list which should contain national flags, wars and sacrifices and soldiers and firepower and bazookas and car pert-bombings..
Certainly not "Pyaasa'.

Old habits die hard. I am a bit disconcerted, so here I am once again having a problem in problematic times, searching an answer. Pleading for Help as always. This problem compels me to go back in time so that I remember a few things.

I was 9 years old. Our recently purchased television was in a wooden cabinet, which had a wooden double-door entry. Movies shown on Door Darshan on Saturday afternoon, had a crowd of curious audience, overawed and revelling in the magic monochrome melody that came out pof it..

One Saturday afternoon, it was 'Pyaasa'. Ma was visibly excited and happy, ready to watch an old favourite, and songs that perhaps used to make her reminisce of her emotions during her teen years...(she was frank about that trait with me in privacy). I didn't feel very deep though. But yes, what classics used to be composed in Hindi movies! The gems were immortalized - as we see around us today. Sometime during the movie, I went out to answer nature's loud call. On my way back, nature silenced for now, I was still outside the room when I heard a song coming out of the TV.   
It was Mohammed Raft's voice, lipped by Guru Dutt, his soulful eyes and his thin yet prominent and deep furrows that looked over frowned brows, eyes that were fatigued and sad, trying to hide an intense fire that raged on till his death. still don't know. At that age I could understand Hindi to an extent that could cover day to day demands of survival. I hadn't  understood many sequences in the movie, particularly why sad expressions persisted even after the saddening causes were taken care of (I was completely ignorant about complexities of the human mind, of  things fine and nuanced, if unchecked would  result in complications.) 

" KAHA HAIN,
JISSE NAAZ HAIN HIND PAR,
WOH KAHA HAIN,
KAHA HAIN
KAHA HAIN.......?....."

I still have goosebumps. It was an overwhelming wave of previously unthinkable courage, of Hope  that told me that there are many things of interest outside the world of books, paint brushes, cricket and school. It told me that one day I have to think deeply which shall direct the script of every day of the life I'll live.

Patriotism is not meant to be instilled in times of war and bloodshed. It is already there during Creation, it is there when a child is born, so that it can identify it as an intended suggestion already put so that no war and bloodshed take place. 

THE WOMAN ; ARTH, THE MEANING

Simply posting the YouTube link of a favourite song on Facebook is not a self consuming action. It can still start to tell its story that one could read afresh every time. 

Movie : Arth
Song : Tum itna Kyun Muskura Rahe Ho (Jagjit Singh)
Poet : KAIFI AZMI
Immediate relevance - Facebook timeline : Only Yesterday.."..

Jin zakhmo ko waqt bhar chala hain,Tum kyu unhe chhed ja rahe ho.
Ban jayenge zeher peete peete,Yeh ashq Jo peete ja rahe ho,
Kya haal hain, kya dikha rahe hoKya gham hain jisko chhupa rahe ho.."

It's been 30 years since Arth?? I don't believe it! Raj Kiran, with his just-taken-a-shower wet back-brushed hair (?hair gel),the pristine-white kurta,the regular-fit pair of denims (Wrangler !!),those soulful soft eyes that had respect, empathy, shelter & security,and a smile that couldn't have broadened or apposed his lips one breadth of a hair..

A simply plain white fresh life in a little cozy den with minimal furniture, was all there..a genuine shoulder too to rest upon - it was there for Puja/ Shabana Azmi.
End of misery.

To start afresh.

Puja - The Woman controlled Pain.

And she controlled, as Raj glanced upon a bunch of papers she clutched tightly, documents with stamps and seals and signatures and oaths and dates, - all from of the Book of Scriptures of Law - the ink marks told the society that Justice has been delivered. The parasite weeds have been severed from the Male Psyche that has grown up learning that at times woman can be looked upon as parasites.

And she controll she did, as Raj set aside all scriptures and went on serenading, lipping these lovely, lively lines in gentle melody. Another male psyche was promising her the warmth of security, the warmth from a flaming, lonely candle. The candle had warmth, and it had light to show her the Proper Path to Fulfillment. A new life was there for The Woman in that solitary candle and these words..

And she couldn't. But Pain of a woman, that which arises from hurt of a wounded psyche, just for being a Woman, didn't spill over to roll down feminine cheeks as had been for the last 2,000 years. Instead they formed pearly crystal beads weighing down mildly on her eyelashes. Her eyes, those hurt eyes didn't blink...

I was a 14-year old 'man' then. That night there was no pain inside me-the pain for being a Man, rather would-be-s'day Man. But tears rolled down my masculine cheeks.

Long after the song was over, Puja chose her own path. And long after the song has been over, some of us still continue to gush over it.

Next day in school, the boys & girls gushed along with me as I joined the chat over the movie that been on TV yesterday night in the "adult slot". We all gushed over the songs, and the performances of Smita Patil and Shabana Azmi. We tried to discover Mahesh Bhat too, as we went about trying to get the lyrics that I would memorize.

I did. And I remember them now too. All of us - the boys & girls of a certain class of South Point High School remember now too.

What I didn't reveal was tears rolling down masculine cheeks. No way!

Puja chose her own path as Raj bid her well. This time she would be her own guide. Good that she chose what the 80s didn't expect - Her Own Life of Freedom. She took her maid's daughter with her, the maid who had killed her husband for b brazen adultory.

I think the country learnt too what I, in my mid teens, learnt. I learnt that Woman was not a commodity as surroundings and women themselves in it projected, and the newspapers, mainstream cinema, film magazines, the models in Visual media. Woman was another human being, 'equal' to me by birth.

Nice memories eh?

But was I the only boy who didn't reveal "tears"? Well they would know!