Paison ki paathshala

Here's my review of SRK's Paanchvi Pass for which the Mirror 'forgot' to carry my byeline. :(

In keeping with the great Indian reality television tradition, yet another international show has been adapted (read copied) for the desi audiences. ‘Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain?’ is based on the hit US show, ‘Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?’ Just as the title, the rules, the format, the setting, it’s all been borrowed (speak of cheating in class). The only novel element is Teacher Shah Rukh Khan, but more on that later.

The format

Paanchvi Pass (conveniently called PP by the convent educated) is a game show in which contestants compete for big bucks by attempting to answer questions taken from primary school class materials. Each contestant is presented with the chance to win up to Rs 5 crores by answering 11 questions taken from textbooks of first to fifth class. The contestant is presented with 10 subject cards, which she/he may answer in the order of her/his choice. Each correct answer moves the contestant higher up the moolah pyramid. If a contestant answers all 10 questions correctly, she/he is given a chance to answer an 11th question for Rs 5 crores.

And to make sure the ‘students’ don’t make complete fools of themselves, there are the usual lifelines called ‘cheats’. These cheats are classmates, which is a group of children seated on stage who answer the same questions as the contestant. Every two questions, a new classmate joins the contestant and becomes her/his teammate for those two questions. The contestant can use her/his cheats at any time during the first 10 questions.

Does it work?

It should in theory, given the deadly prize to be won (five crores is a new high for Indian television), and the apparent ease of winning the dosh when all you have to do is answer bachon ke sawaal. Compared to KBC, where, after a point, the questions used to get blisteringly tough. And I say in theory because the timing of PP’s launch could not have been more inappropriate. Whether the raunchy cheerleaders survive or not, the Indian audiences are all sold over the IPL matches, and the head-on clash could prove hurtful for the game show. I would be surprised if PP scores even half the TRPs the KBC shows notched up, despite the many dangling juicy carrots.

Sexy teacher

Which is perhaps why the channel (Star Plus) has roped in crowd puller SRK to play teacher, so if all else fails, there’s always the Badshah’s charisma to fall back on. Am afraid the star may not prove to be such a strong magnet on this occasion. Simply because when he hosted KBC 3, Shah Rukh was returning to television after nearly two decades, and there was huge curiosity amongst the audiences. These days, King Khan has totally hijacked Indian television programming, and much like Rakhi Sawant, is all over the place, either dishing out cute one liners at busy conclaves, or selling assorted products, or hawking his flicks or, yup, promoting his T20 club. The mystique is blown, and we are tired of the SRK overkill. So while in the first episode of PP the jeans-clad cool teacher did all he could to keep the excitement going, including flashing the legendary dimples and connecting fabulously with the kids, what I was more interested in was the on-going Mohali match.

I may not have scored many marks in my fifth grade, but am tez enough on my remote control. PP will have do a lot of homework if it wants a shining report card in that all important subject called TRPmatics.

Needed: young editors

I was amused to watch one of the nation’s most respected editors, Vinod Mehta, trash the new IPL cricket tamasha as the death of the longer form of the game, and ‘pure’ cricket as we know it. Speaking on a news channel chat show, Mehta pointed out that the BCCI, which is duty bound to maintain and nurture the game, is determined to take it down the tube.

Now, Mehta is a fine editor, but his views on the T20 games (which I am sure will find resonance with all the old-world editors), tells us how out of sync some of these exalted gents are with the young new India. Rather than sounding the death knell of the test matches, these peppy edited versions will not just revive interest in the sport, indeed they will save the game from certain demise.

Cos the truth is the new gen just does not have either the time or the inclination to sit through five bloody days of a single match (note the abysmal attendance in the stadia), and even paying undivided attention to a one-day match has become a tall ask. What T20 has done is to bring the otherwise long and winded sport to be on par with football and other popular games, in terms of the demands of time it makes on you. With each match over in three hours, suddenly, cricket will find a whole new bunch of fans, AND get the defectors back. And perhaps make it palatable even to non-cricketing nations like the US.

I have not yet watched IPL’s matches (they flag off tonight), but am one hundred per cent sure they will be a huge hit, especially with young adults and kids. And the raunchy pom pom girls and the festive atmosphere will add the dose of entertainment the game badly needs... poor Ms Mandira Bedi can only bring that much to the table with her noodle straps.

As for the test matches, they are certain to die in the coming future. So then why not let the sport live on, I ask.

Anyway, the larger point I’m making is that we constantly demand younger leaders in politics and other professions. Perhaps the time has come to expect the same of the media; very clearly, the oldies in the newsrooms are struggling to connect with the new India, its mindset and its attitude. No wonder both news weeklies, Outlook and India Today, have become immensely unreadable of late. Hope the bada money bag media proprietors are reading in!

“Let them attack me with stones, I am not budging!”

Here’s the interview I did last week with Bachchan for the Mirror. Some of you missed it and asked if I could post it here.
Incidentally, Bachchan is angry and hurt at the same time; one has to feel sorry for him in this instance. Where he invests his money and time is his right, and clearly no one can be tragetted on these grounds. Although he didn’t admit to it directly, the truth is, the actor is paying heavy for his maha celebrity hood. And his ordeal is not over yet, methinks much like a section of the Muslim community is compelled to do in this nation, he will have to keep proving, through actions and deeds, he cares for Mumbai. What a bummer!

Amitabh Bachchan has so far remained silent over the accusations that have been hurled at him by Raj Thackeray and his party. That the movie star’s loyalties remain with his home state, Uttar Pradesh, and that he has never shown much interest in his so-called karmabhoomi, Mumbai. But clearly, he has been quietly hurting even as the charges got hurled thick and fast, as did some empty beer bottles inside ABCL’s office.

Last night, as Bachchan prepared to travel overseas for a film shoot, he finally broke his silence and spoke emotionally on all the attacks on his reputation and integrity, and on being labelled an outsider in a city he’s spent a lifetime in. “I am not an outsider by any stretch of imagination. This land is my land as much as it is of every other citizen of our beloved country. I came to Mumbai in 1968 to pursue a vocation. I did not need a visa to come here. I have made this city my home for the last 40 years. I bought my first car here, and my own house. I met and married my wife in this city and both my children were born here. Both my children were married in this city from that same house. My two grand children were born in this city. My father and my mother spent their last years in Mumbai and died here. They were put to flames here and their ashes have mingled with the earth of this city. This city gave me name and fame beyond anything that I may have deserved or hoped for. I am not leaving this city and going anywhere. Let them chuck a thousand bottles. Let them burn my effigies and conduct morchas in front of my house. Let them blacken my film posters and stop the screening of my films. Let them attack me with stones and laathis or whatever else is there in their arsenal. Let them abuse me in the print and electronic media. Let them implicate me in false cases. I am not budging!”

To make matters worse for Bachchan, the Sena mouthpiece, Saamna, recently ran a report which compared him with Rajnikanth in the context of the Hogenekkal controversy, suggesting that while Rajni sided with his ‘karmabhoomi’, Tamil Nadu, while speaking out against his ‘janmabhoomi’ Karnataka, the same attitude is not seen when it comes to Bollywood stars. But Bal Thackeray’s later retraction of this report seems to have assuaged the star to an extent. “I feel honoured that I have a friend in Rajnikanth and even more honoured that, despite my insignificance, I am brought into comparison with him. Bala Saheb has been a father figure to us and shall remain so, ever. In my growing up years my parents taught me that 'when elders speak, the young listen quietly'. I quietly accept whatever my elder or his outfit has expressed.”

I am not up for scrutiny!

However, what remains to be seen is if the accusations will compel the actor to deliberately alienate himself from doing things for UP, and will see him participate in social work in Maharashtra. Bachchan vehemently denies this is going to happen. “Accusations and insinuations are not going to make me change the course of my conscience. I shall do what I want to do and what I feel needs to be done; whether it is in Maharashtra or UP or Bihar or Punjab or Bengal or Tamil Nadu or any part of the country. The people of this country have loved and given unbounded affection to my family and me. I am equal in the eyes of the entire nation and no one should stipulate what I must do or not. My sense of fairness and fortitude is not up for scrutiny. Every individual in a free society has the freedom of expression and speech. And I honour and respect that. But those that question me and my deeds or non deeds, need to know a simple fact: I am a public figure, not a public official. I am not a democratically elected representative of the people, neither do I hold any Government public office. I am answerable ONLY to the three C's... courts, constitution and conscience. Nothing and no one shall find a place, even remotely, into these honourable portals. People have the right to question me, as they do and must. But they do not have the right to demand proof for any activity of mine, particularly when they themselves are not eligible for such a misguided, heedless and a totally inappropriate task.”

Finally, why does Bachchan believe he’s been singled out for the attack on migrants from the north, why has he become the poster boy of communal hatred when he did not even apply for this ‘job’. The semi-philosophical answer is laced with hurt and sadness. “Sometimes in life, situations demand the proverbial 'whipping horse'. And there are a few 'chosen' people in this country that fit that bill.”

Honk! Honk!

There are many harebrained ideas our babus come up with now and then (to prove they actually have a mind that works). And the latest joke played out on us was the maha stupid NO HONKING DAY.

And I find the idea pretty juvenile for two reasons. One, such glorious ‘days’ don’t work ever, we all know exactly what we do on Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day and Mistress’s Day, apart from making the Archies’ folks and the local flower vendor richer: zilch. So even if the odd sod went less horny on that one day, he was back being to his trigger happy self the very next morn.

But the bigger reason I say it shan’t work is this: the problem isn’t that we desis like to blow our own horns (that’s just another manifestation of a deeper issue). The problem is we Indians are basically uncivil people, we aren’t brought up to be sensitive to our environs and fellow citizens. We give a shit if any deed of ours causes inconvenience to the guy next door. So we piss and spit on the streets with impunity (and I am certainly not talking here of the have-nots), we break queues with gay abandon, we cause structural changes in our apartments (thus endangering the entire building), we burn loud crackers in the middle of the night, and yes, we blow our horns to make sure we have the right of way, I could simply go on.

Only yesterday, a group of convent school kids in uniform simply trotted past me in the McDonald’s queue without a sign of apology or remorse. It did not even occur to them they were behaving in a deeply uncivilised manner. And you can well imagine what these students will do when they grow up.

So the point is we have a cultural problem here, a genetic fault in our DNA, and it ain’t gonna be corrected in many generations, leave alone a single day.

Today, I am investing in a really shrill horn for my car, the one lorry drivers use on national highways. And I will blow the bastard trying to overtake me away from my sight.