Did we miss the bus?

It might sound like a U –turn to many, but I think I need to reconsider my strong stand against Raj Thakre's views. And don’t get me wrong here, in no way do I support the vandalism and hooliganism that’s become his norm. No city can be held at ransom because somebody wants his views to be heard.

However yesterday I was viewing the ‘Devils Advocate’ and Shobha De the guest, was being grilled for being sympathetic to Raj Thakre’s views. It was an eye-opener of sorts. Sadly I had no answer to the few questions that she raised in the interview. The questions that were innate yet had a great impact and made me introspect and think.

I know that Raj Thakre’s comments or stand is with political interests, however there is somewhere a discord in the city’s daily mayhem that was being conveniently ignored by us till Raj Thakre’s violent outbursts shook us and made us sit up and take notice.

When Shobha De says, I don’t hear Marathi in Mumbai now, isn’t it sad that the state capital is loosing its local flavour? Mumbai can be the next Shanghai, but should that happen at the cost of our local essence? Maharashtra is known for its intellectual forerunners, but where are they today? Where are the street plays, the responsible journalism, the revolutionary thinkers, the protestors…. Where are the likes of Vijay Tendulkar (Gokhales and Kale’s). This certainly made me sit up and take notice. Isn’t it true that today these words are mere text-book connotations ?

As an industry why is the Marathi theater and cinema suffering? Is it that people don’t enjoy them? That can’t be true, otherwise movies like Saade Maade Teen and De Dhakka, (both with borrowed concepts from Hindi and English movies) couldn’t have been a superhit. Is it that people now don’t want stories with strong message or thought provoking issues? This cant be true either or plays like ‘Kusum Manohar Lele’ or movies like 'Dombivali fast' couldn’t have been running full house. Then what is the issue?

We as Marathi speaking people need to introspect a few things. Is speaking in Marathi demeaning? Or is it that it doesn’t fit in the current definition of an upwardly mobile crowd? Do we need to hide or shy away from simple things like our language or culture so that we could fit in the current genre of hip n happening crowd? And this is same for all metro cities in varying degrees. We are a multi-lingual, multi-cultural, diverse nation. That is our identity. Why shy away from our own identity? Knowing two or three languages is no big deal in our country, then suddenly why have we turned into chauvinists who believe they can only speak in English? Is it necessary to settle in places like California or New York before you start becoming the flag bearers of Marathi and then make special efforts to join the Maharashtra Mandal etc?

The media who have been following this issue of non-marathis have just been fanning the news to sensationalize the issue and spread panic thereby aggrevating the situation. I have witnessed the flimy news covering tactics of these media channels. The Bangalore blasts where low intensity crude bombs exploded around 2 months back were presented in such an unruly manner that I had calls streaming in all day checking our safety when it did not demand such kind of blown up coverage.

I think its not an issue of outsiders settling in Mumbai or any other Metro city but it is upon us as individuals to realise and draw a line between thoughtful change and listless aping. It cant be the issue of outsiders as we have been migrating to different states for a long time, however then it was natural to follow the principal of ' When in Rome do as the Romans do'. I had many so called outsider friends, but when in Pune they all knew and spoke Marathi, respected others sentiments and participated in local festivals. Their culture and tradition was preserved in their homes and we inturn respected their sentiments and their festivals. I dont think there would be many Maharastrians who dont know 'Onam' or the Gujrathi 'Thepla' and 'Khandavi' or the 'Idli' & 'Dosa' and vice- versa.

The media for sensationalizing all news without having a barometer to check the intensity and present facts, the common man for trying to ape the West to the extent of losing their individuality, the politicians for politicizing every issue and the theater and entertainment industry for not doing its bit to create awareness and providing the viewers with thought provoking messages, we all have somewhere missed the bus and need to seriously reconsider our stands.

Its really sad when people make statements like, ‘We are happy to stay here as this area is populated by Maharashtrians (read Marathi speaking)’ while staying in Mumbai, the capital of Maharashtra!

Journey of India…. Where to?

The other day I was watching an episode of Story of India on Discovery. An engrossing, informative and very well researched series; it was also enlightening for me, in many aspects.

It attempted to answer questions like ‘How did the Harappan civilization end?’ What made the Indus change its course? And even some seemingly bizarre questions like ‘Did Mahabharata actually happen?’ or What do Rigvedas actually tell you? It was very well researched and logically presented hence engrossing. Though it’s a pity that with a million dollar media industry thriving in India, it took a foreign channel like Discovery to come up with this concept, I must applaud the effort and the novelty with which it was presented.

‘India’ usually brings up images of rustic life, holy rituals, pilgrimage centers, festivities, elephants, population, malnourished children, low per capita income and more recently BPO and IT sectors. Quite frankly, I was bored of seeing the same old concepts redundantly being packaged in a different cover and put forth as authentic Indian story.

Discovery has mastered the art of looking sideways at a seemingly redundant topic and that’s the beauty about this series. The presentation hardly varies with a foreign presenter taking the viewers across the streets of these places and divulging ancient stories while attempting to answer the many myths that surround them.

It traces the Journey of India… literally! The last episode had been on the Dravidian culture and this time it was the existence… peek and then extinction of Harappa and Mohenjodaro civilization. It was the largest civilization in existence then with flourishing business in trade, cattle rearing and agriculture. This was surely enlightening. Apart from the fact that they were very advanced and had many sophisticated mechanisms like drainage systems for the whole village in place what’s amazing is that even today in rural India, most of the blue-print is followed exactly the way it was then. They even traced the Aryans origin to Central Asia, near Turkmenistan. They even traced an archeological site with mostly similar layouts and civilization!

By the end of this series I realized one thing strongly. Our ancestors were more democratic and logical thinkers than we are today! I mean they exchanged culture and ideology or thinking easily, learned from each other and helped the other evolve in the process, they were seemingly more tolerant to settlers from far away country and ended up having a rich and vibrant tapestry dotted with amalgamated wisdom.

Today we are either ashamed of claiming the same knowledge that was the root of a prosperous India in the ancient times or are plain ignorant. What is worse is that people who do know a little about it have suddenly assumed the position of flag –bearers of Indian civilization and are vandalizing and resorting to hooliganism in the name of civilization and customs.

There is so much to learn and know in this country - the thought itself leaves me overwhelmed. However series like these restore a faith that probably these mark the beginning of an informed research of that lost knowledge.