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Journalism of Courage
The Great Bombay Bazaar
His family migrated to the US in 1977. He was 14 and heartbroken. Remembers roaming the streets of New York, with his chum Ashish, singing sad songs from Hindi films!
Suketu Mehta says dramatically, quot;I felt Bombay was cut out of me like an organ from my body.quot;
Strong words, but they underline what he is doing here now. And they explain his insatiable appetite for Bombay. An appetite that hasn8217;t ceased to amaze me yet.
He is a prizewinning writer and journalist. Writes about human beings at the foot of history8217;. His words, honest.
He arrived in India armed with a hefty advance Time sez so, to write and research a non-fiction book about Bombay, early in 8217;98.
I met him when he first got here. He struck me as a regular, conventional sort of chap. Bright? Well, he said he was writing a book, fiction, a first person ? account of an unborn foetus. I did not know what to make of that! Now it is on hold. Cute, boyish face, sort of boringly quiet, even shy was how Ipegged him. Was I wrong! Conventional? Shy? In the short span he has been here, he has increased his collection of people in Bombay from a bare handful to zillions.
Suketu8217;s People8217;, as I8217;ve dubbed them, range from odd-bod characters and assorted low life, to the eminent and socially acceptable. From hit men to dancing bar girls, from scribes to those gracing the pages of magazines.He started out not knowing what he was looking for. He just followed my nose8217;. His research, coupled with his perceptiveness, gives him a knowledge of Bombay few Bombaiyyas have.
Drawn to people with complexity of character. He finds the people of Bombay8217;s high society8217; considerably less interesting than the low life8217;. He tends to seek them out.
Perhaps, he is exploring all those areas of life that fascinated him as a child. The underworld, the film industry, the migrant from a village who comes to Bombay looking for his pot of gold. And to find out, as he has, that they are not so different from him after all.
He tellsme about a young man from Bihar who ran away from home at 18, to follow his dream to be a poet. He got to a station, found a train ready to leave for Delhi, lots of space available for sitting. Then came this train for Bombay and suddenly he saw people thronging towards it. Tremendous excitement and noise generated by the crowd, Bombay, Bombay8217;, a chant seemed to reverberate. So the Bihari thought, that if all those people are going to Bombay, and look so enthused, they must know something! He got on. Penniless. Got a job at a bookshop, at VT.
Suketu and the Bihari8217;s lives could not be more dissimilar. But they are friends. One comes from NY, resources at his command. For the other, daily existence is a struggle. Basic needs like the use of toilet or a bath are not a given. Life on the streets is tough. Yet the Bihari8217;s belief in his own writing, his quest, his raison d8217;etre echo Suketu8217;s own.
I am touched by that. And it tells me something about Suketu. The fact that he is so comfortable across thedivide. I refer to our society which is so class-ridden. Often folk do not know how to reach out, if they tried. And the Bihari is not an isolated example. Eisshan, pronounced Ishan8217;, has struggled in the film industry for years after chucking up a lucrative job in the Gulf. Shooting at last, for his first film, a modestly-budgeted mythological about a goddess called Shakumbari Devi8217;. The young hero states, quot;It8217;s going to be THE hit of 8217;99.quot; Pauses . quot;In fact, the hit of the millennium.quot; He is serious. OK, so you haven8217;t heard of her? Yet.
Sharad Gandhi is 27. He came to Bombay five years ago, from a little district in Gujarat.
Sharad Gandhi was 12 when his quest for an alternative language started. Borne from the simple question in his mind, How did primitive humans communicate without a verbal language?8217; While most kids his age were probably fooling around, Sharad was busy inventing a language for two hands. Evolved it to one hand. Now it is no hands.
Inventor of the Facial Communication Language.He has created an entire new language which deploys only facial muscles and ears. Be it Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi or English, including graphics and punctuation, he is bang on. He has taught the language to his nephew Bharat, who writes as Sharad communicates. No hocus pocus, nor magic. Pure science.Think of the potential this language has. For cops, the army, the physically challenged or the men in space. But Sharad8217;s quest hasn8217;t ended. He is trying to develop a language of only eyeballs! It is almost ready.
I have seen him in action, and trust me he blows your mind! I picture him as a little boy sitting in a little village in Gujarat, with the sophistication of thought and incredible talent, plus the will to create a pathbreaking new language. It humbles me. My worry is, how does this language get the acknowledgment it deserves? Today the only way he gets to spread it is as a performance art. That is sacrilege. Already in the Limca Book of Records, the Guinness Book of Records has interviewed himrecently, he hopes to make it.
