All about Eve

This Devi prefers her devta’s dad

When we hear regressive statements by so-called progressive women, here comes a story of a woman in a Bihar village. Lalita Devi is 25. Her husband left their home in Dhamiapatti village in Madhubani district to work in a factory in Gujarat. While he was away, she had an affair with her father-in-law.


When the guy returned and saw his pita and patni locked together, there was much hullabaloo. Instead of feeling chastised and doing what one would expect a village woman to do, she declared that she was leaving him and their children to marry her papa-in-law. She made the decision.


It is possible to make several moral comments here, but why?

Uma’s Umang

Remember how the RSS had objected to Uma Bharti’s friendship with their pracharak K. Govindacharya, reminding them about celibacy?


The lady was sharp enough to continue with the party, marketing herself as the bold sanyasin. Now that she has competition in Sadhvi Pragya – younger and a bike rider – she has promptly got her mentor to join hands with her.


Very cunning move. If she was serious about his contribution, she would not have waited just ten days before the Madhya Pradesh elections. They are opposing the BJP, and as Govindacharya said,

“It’s time the nationalist forces pitched in. The two major conglomerates in Indian politics (Congress and BJP) have become pro-rich, pro-minority and pro-foreign... There’s a political space vacant and that is one of the reasons for me to join active politics again.”

Does this mean that their organisation Rashtriya Swabhiman Andolan (RSA) will be pro-poor, pro-majority, pro-swadeshi? This would statistically amount to 80 per cent of the country. Clearly, the nation is interested in other things.


Their new slogan is:

“Jab milenge roti-Ram, tab hi banenge poore kaam (when we get food and Ram together, then our work will be complete). So far, political parties have either spoken of Ram or of ‘roti’ but none has spoken of both together.”

Super. Kapda and makaan don’t matter. After all Lord Ram spent time in the forest in a little hut.


Does food then mean picking black berries?

Her time to show the jerks

I hear literary agents are wooing Sarah Palin. I can also hear the tut-tuts doing the rounds with a sneer. Oh dear, she will cash in on this, they will say. Sure as hell she will, as she must.


If others can capitalise on her “blonde moment” and her banality, then so can she. Forget her politics, whatever it may be if it is at all, she has indeed led an interesting life that meandered towards the mundane to again catapult her to the limelight.


Chances of some academics pontificating on the ‘Sarah factor’ filling up tomes that will grace library shelves are possible. We already got glimpses of them in a slew of serious thesis-type articles. After all, they have done Barbie and Madonna with much fervour, so what will stop them from doing Sarah? They will peel her layer upon layer. It begs the question: does one invest so much in so little?


We have our reasons for understanding fluff. I am a great believer in analysing pop culture, and anything that fits into the genre – people, ideas, events – are grist for the writer’s mill.


She may do a whitewash job, she may play to the gallery, she may come up with a sob story, she may rant against the “jerks”. But it is her story and she has as much a right to tell it as anyone else.


People make millions just flashing stained skirts to show as achievement. Some get invited to pose for Playboy; others go on lecture tours and earn big bucks.


Sarah Palin’s may not be a great story but for the naysayers here’s a sop: You got Obama because she was so not on, right?

She flexes their muscles

BJP’s candidate from Jodhpur, Suryakanta Vyas, looks like the sort of woman you would see making dung cakes, not walking around with beefcakes. She has done just that. Roped in these bodybuilders to campaign for her. Since the party has a bare-bone manifesto, she is at least providing the meat.