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Time of India
6 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Justice Seema Aunty
Bachi Karkaria's Erratica and its cheeky sign-off character, Alec Smart, have had a growing league of followers since 1994 when the column began in the Metropolis on Saturday. It now appears on the Edit Page of the Times of India, every Thursday. It takes a sly dig at whatever has inflated political/celebrity egos, and got public knickers in a twist that week. It makes you chuckle, think and marvel at the elasticity of the English language. It is a shooting-from-the-lip advice column to the lovelorn and otherwise torn, telling them to stop cribbing and start living -- all in her her branded pithy, witty style. LESS ... MORE Patch-making, Supreme Court style The mandap too often turns into a fractious mandi. Unsavoury, but not unexpected because in Indian terminology, 'market' usually comes after 'marriage'. The Big Fat Desi Shaadi is often followed by Big Fat Messy Sequel, which is why both are the staple of big and small screens. This may or may not be the 'Kyunki' behind feisty Smriti Irani returning to the avatar that made her role model of saas and bahu alike. Not that her later stomping ground was really different. Politics makes as strange bedfellows as do faulty horoscopes, and many netas go in for divorce, and stick with their new party provided it keeps them in the bungalows to which they want to be accustomed. So it was only a matter of time before lofty Supreme Court began functioning like lowly family court. It happened thrice last Friday, the judges sounding more like life-honed Chandrika chachi, or standard-issue Agony Aunt. In one, they ticked off an Indian ambassador who carelessly acquired two wives. The second involved a decorated IAF pilot — veteran of Balakot bombing — and his wife who were strafing each other ; the Bench soothingly told them to reconcile, saying, 'You are not enemies.' The third hit a target more obdurate than cross-border terrorism. It dealt with the major cause of joint-family fracture: monster-in-law. In my Mumbai Mirror 'Giving Gyan' column, I constantly had to mollify desperate wives for whom 'The Other Woman' was not some sassy siren but scheming saas. Most Indian men being Mama's boys – and mamas using every ploy to keep them so – the son chooses to maintain the peace by siding with her. He says: 'After all, so much Ma has suffered for me. Besides, she won't be among us for long, no?' The first reasoning is so unmindful of the bahu's suffering that — finally fed up — she's the one who fulfils the second. Justices BV Nagarathna and KV Viswanathan admirably counselled this 'dutiful son' to hear out his wife's POV, and respect her feelings as well. Honourable SC judges won't have to return home to face the hellish fury of a mother-in-law scorned. But Justice Nagarathna repeated the sensitivity she advised last February while reinstating two callously dismissed women judicial officers in MP. Such a desirable change from patriarchal bilge spewed from more backward benches. *** Alec Smart said: '14K males among 26,234L illegit recipients of Ladki Bahin funds. Vote a way to disburse welfare!' Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
Time of India
24-07-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
Strawberries and scholarship
Bachi Karkaria's Erratica and its cheeky sign-off character, Alec Smart, have had a growing league of followers since 1994 when the column began in the Metropolis on Saturday. It now appears on the Edit Page of the Times of India, every Thursday. It takes a sly dig at whatever has inflated political/celebrity egos, and got public knickers in a twist that week. It makes you chuckle, think and marvel at the elasticity of the English language. It is a shooting-from-the-lip advice column to the lovelorn and otherwise torn, telling them to stop cribbing and start living -- all in her her branded pithy, witty style. LESS ... MORE India and Iran converge again in Cambridge The temptation was strawberries, but I savoured learning's creamy layer. In 1998, I'd interviewed Richard Blurton — yes with an 'l' – when, as director of British Museum's South Asian section, he'd brought 'The Enduring Image' exhibition to Mumbai. We reconnected 26 years later, at Malavika Banerjee's 'Kalam' in Bhubaneswar, where he presented his latest tome, India: A History in Objects. On my recent trip to London, he said, 'Do come to the Ancient India and Iran Trust (AIIT) garden party in Cambridge. There'll be plenty of strawberries, cream and bubbly.' He added, 'You'll meet its new Chair, Almut Hintze.' Wow! Being appointed Zarthoshty Brothers Professor of Zoroastrianism at London's SOAS had till then been the latest recognition of her long scholarship; she belonged to the august lineage of non-Zoroastrians dedicated to the study of my 3,000 year-old faith. And there she was in person – and so personable. In a very English way, a patron's generous bequest was exclusively meant for this garden at 23 Brooklands Avenue. It had come along with the house bought by Sir Harold Bailey, Cambridge Professor of Sanskrit and the other four founding Trustees who had dug as deep into the study of South and Southeast Asia — some physically too, having doubled as archaeologists. The Trust was established in 1978 to 'promote the study of prehistory, archaeology, art history and ancient languages of South & Southeast Asia, Central Asia and Iran –but it has gone beyond. If journalism is history 'To go', scholarship is history 'on the slow'. My goosebumps rose as I padded through rooms bringing alive Zoroastrianism's lifelong researchers such as Mary Boyce and John Hinnells. Their personal libraries were among AIIT's precious trove of 30,000 volumes and 20,000 records. All being safely digitised. The Bridget Allchin Archive included photographs of everything displayed in the Kabul Museum in the early 1950s; priceless because it was trashed in Afghan's civil war. India Room's mantelpiece displayed a celebrated quartet of Burmese bronze figurines from another founding-Trustee collection, that of the Dutch van Lohuizen couple, Joan and Jan. It captured men cracking open a coconut, playing a flute, and two, 17 cm high, engrossed in the rattan-ball game of chinlone, which I learnt was deeply embedded in Burmese cultural history. A month later Richard was to address London bankers. Whhyy? He explained. 'In today's world anyone operating internationally is at a disadvantage without an understanding of the fundamentals on which South Asian society is built. This is increasingly important since more and more people of South Asian origin, especially Indian, are at the summit of commercial, financial, academic and political activity; this understanding we try to deliver at the British Museum.' Good to hear authoritative, non-bigoted lips proclaim our past and present greatness. *** Alec Smart said: 'Train blasts: Was justice derailed?' Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
Time of India
17-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Coco-colonialism
Bachi Karkaria's Erratica and its cheeky sign-off character, Alec Smart, have had a growing league of followers since 1994 when the column began in the Metropolis on Saturday. It now appears on the Edit Page of the Times of India, every Thursday. It takes a sly dig at whatever has inflated political/celebrity egos, and got public knickers in a twist that week. It makes you chuckle, think and marvel at the elasticity of the English language. It is a shooting-from-the-lip advice column to the lovelorn and otherwise torn, telling them to stop cribbing and start living -- all in her her branded pithy, witty style. LESS ... MORE London is going nuts over 'nariyal' Oxford Street isn't yet redolent with aromas of simmering aviyal, albeit close enough. Goodbye, Coca-colonialism's. Hello, coco-colonialism. London is being blitzed by coconut milk, water, oil, fresh/desiccated/compacted kernel. From tabloid, tube and bus, I'm bombarded with ads ordering 'Convert to Coconut'. It isn't baptism by fiery kari, but by cool tetrapack. Downing packaged nariyal paani is not a patch on slurping from the real thing, even if easier to wield. It's already caught on among India's sipping classes. Here, the little blue and white cartons are drink du jour not only coz Britain – indeed all exited-from Europe – is in the throes of a throat (and grass)-parching Indian summer. It's a wider conquest. The unrelenting ad's baseline says, 'It's not a cult'. The udder distaste for milk from nature-intended sources led to such substitutes as soya, oat, almond, apple…Coconut conversion, however, goes beyond Veganism & Co. Its messaging cashes in on the greatest, latest massage: 'gut health'. This is the silver bullet; sure-fire seduction; certain path to nirvana, physical, mental, psychological, yea, even social. As always, We knew it first. Remember the ancient eastern wisdom of a healthy morning evacuation? Here, 'potty' is ensured via pot of 'Coconut Yog'. That's yoghurt, not Guruji Iyengar. The ad promises 'ALL YOUR PROBLEMS WILL BE SOLVED. If your problems are exclusively breakfast-based. Or dessert-based. Or curry-dollop-based. Or wanting-a-whole-coconut-in-each-pot-based.' Chicken tikka masala and king-sized samosa, ok, but no self-respecting desi visitor will cure home-food yearning with ersatz Ernakulam. Better to favour real curry, Mercifully this is no longer the pineapple-riddled atrocity once dished up in icky-sticky Bangladeshi dives. As a mark of my own upgrading, the only Bangladeshi I encountered was expertly shaking signature cocktails in a Portobello tapas bar – and called himself 'Jose'. Still, good to know that 'coconut' is now something more desirable than a WOG (Westernised Oriental Gentlemen) who was 'brown outside, white inside'. Even more satisfying is palms metaphorically swaying amidst oaks, more evidence of East and West mixing, and nixing colonial Mr Kipling. *** Alec Smart said: 'Tesla test-drives India.' Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
Time of India
10-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Water ways
Bachi Karkaria's Erratica and its cheeky sign-off character, Alec Smart, have had a growing league of followers since 1994 when the column began in the Metropolis on Saturday. It now appears on the Edit Page of the Times of India, every Thursday. It takes a sly dig at whatever has inflated political/celebrity egos, and got public knickers in a twist that week. It makes you chuckle, think and marvel at the elasticity of the English language. It is a shooting-from-the-lip advice column to the lovelorn and otherwise torn, telling them to stop cribbing and start living -- all in her her branded pithy, witty style. LESS ... MORE An exhibition to Thirst after Our 2018 TOI litfest and my recent volume for the tricentenary of Mumbai's mystical Parsi well were both titled Waternamah. This week I again immersed myself in the 'story of water'. 'Thirst' is the Wellcome Collection's latest London exhibition. Spread over Aridity, Rain, Glaciers, Surface Water and Ground Water, its historical artefacts, present-day videos and future scenarios show that freshwater is at the centre of a crisis that goes way beyond climate – indeed way back into antiquity. If WWIII was predicted to be over water, the oldest exhibit features the first recorded such war – a tablet on Sumerian epic, 'Gilgamesh and Aga' (composed around 2000 BC). King Aga enslaves the subjects of King Gilgamesh of Uruk to dig wells for his own city and, if refused, threatens to cut off Uruk's supply upstream on the Euphrates. Rivers have continued to be politicised by those who have the 'upper' hand. Unsurprisingly. Over 70 per cent of the earth's surface may be water but only three percent is fresh; two-thirds of it is locked in ice caps; and our cavalier disregard is perilously depleting what's available. Thirst isn't just physical. The text accompanying the first exhibit, Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica Narula and Shuddhabrata Sengupta/ Raqs Media Collective, tells us 'Across South Asian philosophy, the word is associated with craving, aspiration, longing and desire.' The exhibition keeps presenting their darker manifestation, shared loss, but also human resilience. All three coalesce in Gideon Mendel's wall-wide, ominously silent video, Deluge 2007-2024, looping images of people from five countries across continents struggling through waist-high waters. We see how nature strikes back, punishing human hubris in assuming divine rights to all Earth's resources. But nature sometimes benignly also gives back. We read how 'The Sinai peninsula saw unusual sustained rainfall during the pandemic after decades-long drought. Local wormwood, Artemisia Judaica flourished, and was found to treat the symptoms of the Covid variant, Omicron.' The same space showed how artist and wildcrafter Lofa Aziz introduced biomimicry, ethnobotany and citizen science to Bedouin youth who already had deep generational knowledge of their land, giving them new agency in preserving natural heritage. Our own efforts to save the Ganga could take heart from the 'sacred activism' ritual at the source of Beirut River last year. Individual fragile threads were braided into a strong 'prayer belt', symbolising the power-infused connection between individuals, communities and nature. Dare one hope that our own fragile Ganga-Jamuna culture could be thus revived? Indeed, 'Thirst' resonated with me in so many ways. The Raqs trio presenting third-century stepwells of Rajasthan and Delhi, 'their watermarks inscribing a history of thirst …carrying a memory of each step taken in search of freshwater'. Didn't it also etch the feminization of poverty? Like rivers flowing into a common ocean, we are bound in the global commonality of urban discord over water. In my first years in Bombay, in TOI's evening paper, 'Fight at Common Tap' vied only with 'Pydhonie Panwalla Stabs Paramour'. It's not very different today, even in parts where exorbitant tankers replace fractious faucet. Why, only India? The very day I visited 'Thirst', a London tabloid Phew!ed over the city being spared prolonged water shut-offs in 2027 thanks to last-minute funds for a reservoir. Not just with omnipresent monsoon waterlogging. Every coastal city can connect with the Malaysian fisherfolk despairing over catch-rich mangroves dying from the pollutants spewed by a nearby Chinese factory. Move over, mosquitoes. Humans are the vectors of water-related killers jeopardising not only our own existence but all life on the planet. 'Thirst' advises a strong gulp of restraint. *** Alec Smart said: 'Preamble says 'sovereign, socialist, secular'. How about 'sacrosanct'?' Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
Time of India
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
YourTube, MyTube
Bachi Karkaria's Erratica and its cheeky sign-off character, Alec Smart, have had a growing league of followers since 1994 when the column began in the Metropolis on Saturday. It now appears on the Edit Page of the Times of India, every Thursday. It takes a sly dig at whatever has inflated political/celebrity egos, and got public knickers in a twist that week. It makes you chuckle, think and marvel at the elasticity of the English language. It is a shooting-from-the-lip advice column to the lovelorn and otherwise torn, telling them to stop cribbing and start living -- all in her her branded pithy, witty style. LESS ... MORE Ticket to ride on the London Metro If Underground movements are your cuppa tea – or Matcha Latte – hop aboard. 'Mind the Gap between the train and the platform. This is the Jubilee Line to Stratford.' The canned announcer keeps up her reminder on every route and imminent stop. Try not to stare. The London Underground gives you a seatside view of Britain's multicultural reality. Plus summer tourist tsunami. In addition to surroundscape of the world's ethnicities, skin shades, body shapes, hair types, you get a Babel-grade surroundsound. TS Eliot updated to: 'In the compartment, women come and go, talking a polyglot lingo.' And, like across Britain, you are never 'far from the madding crowd' of Hardy local accents. As un-understandable. 'This is the Bakerloo Line to Elephant and Castle.' Try not to stare. Aided and abetted by current heatwave, less is more than an eyeful. Forget your Eng Lit (Hons) Keats, Shelley and whatever their words were worth. Barely-there shorts and tops have long been the 'cuckoo call of Spring'. Have a lark discreetly observing buttered skin on toasted legs. Or, more kosher-ly, marvel at the sartorial variety. Techie casual, banker formal, tourist classic to unclassifiable. Eliot again, 'Mornings, evenings, afternoons, I have measured out my train life in much more than Tee-spoons. Don't stare. Read your phone or free copy of 'Metro'. Or compartment ads for youthful cheeks and mature cheese. Or a pithy gem from Poems on the Underground. Or Transport For London's omnipresent safety signs, 'See It, Say It, Sorted' for suspicious movement, and the '61016' text to report sexual harassment. Or simply the caution to 'Carry water in hot weather.' 'This is the Circle Line via Tower Hill. The next stop is Sloane Square'. But no '90s Sloaney sashays aboard. Only tired Mum struggling with perambulator. Or tired tourist struggling with suitcase coz next stop is rail junction Victoria. Never seen is tired cliché of bowler-hatted toff with tightly furled brolly and copy of FT. Though, in this Ascot season, plenty of women in fancy frocks and fancier hats/ ascinators teetering on 'the District Line to Richmond' en route to National Rail. Mostly it's Eastbound, Westbound. 'Change here for the Whatever Line to Royal Albert Hall/ Museums/ Monument/Heathrow. The Underground is a spoked hub. Not 'Way Out', but way towards. As in 'Xanadu' (Coleridge poem not Newton-John song), we move 'Through caverns measureless to man,/ Down to' Platform 1/2/3/4. And await the resounding roar which will finally take us to the 'pleasure dome that Kubla Khan aka Lonely Planet did decree'. Or to an enticing business-op. Or, best of all, a catch-up with old friends. *** Alec Smart said: 'In political football, it's 'Bend it Like Hindi'.' Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
