Abhijit Mukherjee could just become India’s latest comedian. But only if he is able to explain his brand of humor; no one seemed to have got what he really meant yesterday. He clearly has the mien of a comedian, being able to keep a contrite, weepish face while repeating to mechanical precision “I have withdrawn the statements. I have apolozised” (spelling mistake intended!). Whoever saw this on TV last night would surely have laughed his guts out.
No one understood what he really meant by Dented and Painted. Trust me, he did not mean what all of us are thinking. What he really meant was “Dainty and Panted”. You see, dainty means “delicate and pretty”. And Indian women are delicate and pretty! That’s why he preceded this by saying “pretty pretty”. But no one understood him. And then, he followed it with “giving interviews on TV”, thus appreciating how pretty our ladies look on TV! He was being nice to you, ladies, not insulting! And by panted, what he really meant was that women wore pants! These panted women come on TV to give interviews. Now you understand?! You don’t? There is a reason for that. You see, his father and sister may have a good grasp over the language the colonialists left behind; but he is a true blue, orthodox, chauvinistic, desi, son of India’s soil, whose language and mindset is Indian, not phoren. The problem is only with his language!
Again, no one understood what he meant by Pink Spring. A quick google search on pink will tell you that Pink stands for “youthful, fun and exciting” and unlike Red, Pink means “sensual and passionate without being too aggressive”. Now you understand?! He was all praise for our women demonstraters! Of course, the other meaning of the word pink is “healthy”. What he meant was this movement is good for the health of the country!
And when he said “walking on the streets” and “going to discotheques”….no one understood the real power behind what he said. He didn’t say these two things in two different sentences. He said it in the same sentence, juxtaposing the two thoughts. That’s the key to understanding what he meant. He was appreciating how tough our women are. They protest in the morning and as if that is not enough, they also go to discos in the evening! How many people can work this hard???! His reference to their children was also in the same context. Just imagine. Walking the streets, having children and then going to the disco in the evening. It’s a tough life! Abhijit Mukherjee was full of appreciation for you, ladies! Now its your fault that you can’t understand him!
Maybe he did mean Dented and Painted after all. Women protest during the day, have kids on the side, and go to discos in the night. Hence they are dented (by the sheer hard work!) and painted (the rigors of the job I say!)!! Tch Tch….and you thought he was being a misogynist???
But if Abhijit Mukherjee is funny, our news channels are no less. One of my friends yesterday called news channels “Horror Entertainment Channels”! That’s a fab description, especially if one goes by the kind of anchors most of these channels have. They are all macho men, all of them. Superman, Spiderman, Hanuman and Batman all rolled into one (Damn. There is sexism even in our superheroes….why do we only have superheroes….why not superheroines??)! Our anchors also have solid brains to boot. And also a solid point of view on everything. That’s why they are able to separate the good from the bad. It is this god-gifted capability of theirs – where would the country go if they weren’t there?! – that they showed Abhijit Mukherjee his place, but they let the future savior of the nation – one Narendra Modi – go scot free for his remarks against Sunanda Panicker (Shashi Tharoor’s wife)! Or his comment on the impoverished women of his state….that they are very actually beauty conscious! Why they didn’t even demand an apology from him. It is this ability to differentiate between the good and the bad that makes our news anchor such an important part of the 4th estate.
What was also funny yesterday was the way Arnab Goswami of Times Now was shut up by Rahul Narvekar of the Shiv Sena. Arnab was pressing Rahul on some comment that Uddhav Thackeray had made about women. But Rahul was in no mood to take it. He attacked Arnab essentially saying that media sensationalized matters and then dropped them when enough juice had been extracted. A very correct observation. But then Arnab had himself solicited trouble. He made the mistake of attacking a non-Congress politician. He should have stuck to what he is best at. Mocking Abhijit Mukherjee as he sat there like a lamb in front of a tiger (him). Anyone who watches Times Now knows that if Arnab is ever vulnerable, it is in front of non-Congress politicians. Does anyone remember his squeamish interview of Bal Thackeray’s? Suddenly, he loses his debating skills. Suddenly, he is willing to listen. Suddenly, he is unable to cut the speaker’s sentences in the middle of his talk. Poor panelists can’t even quit the show in protest like Jayalalitha did yesterday at the NDC when her speech was cut short!
NDTV’s Nidhi also found herself in quite a spot yesterday. She started the show full of fire and brimstone. But after the usual men-bashing (well deserved yesterday thanks to Mr. Abhijit Mukherjee), she turned her attention to Bollywood. What she wanted to hear was that Bollywood portrayed women negatively….blah blah blah. You should have seen the sudden turn of mood on the show. All the panelists – Sharmila Tagore, Divya Dutta and Shobhaa De – suddenly flipped, coming to Bollywood’s defence! After all, how could they snap at the hand that feeds them?! Sharmila’s daughter in law is one of the hottest item girls, and Divya Dutta is dying to land a similar role! Poor Nidhi had no idea whether to come or go!
The real truth is that there is a clear divide between Bharat and India on the position of women. Abhijit Mukherjee was clearly addressing his rural constituency, which will vote him back to power because of what he said yesterday. Unfortunately, our Horror Entertainment Channels (HECs) are national. So they will mock and deride people like Abhijit. Brings me back to the point I have always made. That it is our society that needs to be reformed. We need social reforms along with economic reforms. But do we have any reformers out there at all?
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