Sunday ka Funda

The only thing that will be remembered about my enemies after they’re dead are the nasty things I’ve said about them.

- Camille Paglia

I envy paranoids; they actually feel people are paying attention to them.

- Susan Sontag

Whenever we see two or more feminists we assume they will warmly cuddle up, echo each other's thoughts. This is not how it works, or even should. Not just feminism, no ideology should be trapped in one narrow path.

This clip I came across would appear like a cat fight that everyone so loves, but men can be snarky too. As I watched it — initially with a smile, I might add — it struck me that the more important aspect here was competitiveness. Usually, it is healthy. But, as the screen went dark, it left me with some disappointment. How can two people who are well-known and have their own following refuse to acknowledge each other, or in one case pretend the other does not even exist?

Couples DO consciously uncouple

If you have not walked down that street, stop spraying near every lamppost. Those commenting on how others decide to term their personal lives is the stuff of gossip, and does not in any way express the concern for relationships they claim to uphold.

The phrase under the scanner, and that caused sniggers, is 'conscious uncoupling', used by Hollywood actress Gwyneth Paltrow and her musician husband Chris Martin after a decade of marriage. It was a joint statement, but Paltrow has had to bear the brunt of "sickly self-serving twaddle". This should tell us something about the stupendously 'unconscious' lives making lobotomised decisions that are holding forth.

Parting is never easy. In intimate relationships, you have to reclaim yourself. You do seek euphemisms, because it has to do with how you project your life from past to future. You feel like shit even if you are the one to opt out. You feel like shit even if you knew it was coming. You feel like shit when you stand bare and look for warts because you must have screwed it up. You feel like shit as vultures view your vulnerability with binoculars.

You have to look the voyeurs in the eye, with their happy shared-diaper duties, joint-account couplings, looking for your availability, your blotches. You feel like shit. But you have other things to do, even if the relationship was your priority, and not just because you were given the keys to the kingdom in a barter. You may not even have a signed piece of paper. You just have your dignity.

You may not utter the D word or mention the breakup for months, years.

Gwyneth and Chris had to announce it because their lives are public, and they did so gracefully:

"...we have come to the conclusion that while we love each other very much we will remain separate. We are, however, and always will be a family, and in many ways we are closer than we have ever been. We are parents first and foremost, to two incredibly wonderful children and we ask for their and our space and privacy to be respected at this difficult time. We have always conducted our relationship privately, and we hope that as we consciously uncouple and coparent, we will be able to continue in the same manner."

For anyone to assume that only celebrities have to deal with verbal issues to break the news reveals ignorance. On legitimised kingsize beds, in denial about their compromised existence based on mortgages and suspicions camouflaged as concern, they do you.

Take this from Jan Moir in Daily Times:

"An irony-free chunk of classic Paltrow pretentiousness, it made them sound like two camels detaching from a desert train in search of tastier macro-biotic foliage...Like a pair of tights who suddenly find out that they were stockings all along. Being ‘consciously uncoupled’ certainly made breaking up the family home and ‘co-parenting’ nine-year-old Apple and Moses, seven, seem like something holistic and pure; an experience you’d order at a wellbeing spa, along with the coffee enema."

Besides the use of terrible metaphors (unless she has an organic acquaintance with camels), this bilge will not fathom that It is holistic to be conscious when you make a life-changing decision. Being free from dithering is pure.

It is pure when you don't live on dregs of how you are measured. It is holistic and pure to not be stuck in a groove of a fake smile and the warmth of nostalgia for what you were when you are. It is pure when you are fair to the roads you travel through, not just the moss that's gathered around you.

When you decide to uncouple, you can't just 'unconsciously' walk away into the sunset.

© Farzana Versey

Sunday ka Funda

"No, you can't lose a broken heart..."

You can. There are takers for shards...to recycle, perhaps, to want to bleed, to find some sheen in those pieces. But, more importantly, this is for those of us who do not think things out, who are upfront, and who finally do ourselves in...


"Take a walk
Think it over
While strolling neath the moon
Don't say things in December
You'll regret in June

Weigh your remarks
Before you speak
Or you may be sorry soon,
Don't be erratic
Be diplomatic
To keep your heart's in tune

Cruel harsh words
Often spoken
Will upset your applecart
So don't lose your head...
Cus, you can't lose a broken heart..."

▶ Billie Holiday - You Can't Lose a Broken Heart (HD) Officiel Seniors Musik 

Patriotism and the Sahara Parivar

A big business magnate gets jail time, aggrieved investors shout slogans against him, someone throws ink as he leaves the court. The Indian middle class, quick to find conscience keepers in any nook and cranny, will pat itself for justice delayed but not denied. They will applaud Indian democracy.

The default beneficiaries will be political parties. Look, they are likely to preen, we put the big man in Tihar Jail, he will have to sleep on the floor, eat prison food.

Subrata Roy has essentially done what big businesses in India do: withheld information and cheated investors. A report states:

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) says Sahara failed to comply with a 2012 court order to repay billions of dollars to investors. Sahara says it repaid most investors and that its remaining liability was less than the 5,120 crore rupees it deposited with SEBI.

Roy had evaded arrested, and when he was caught the cops took him to a forest guesthouse where he held court. This Tihar Jail stay until March 11, close to the general elections, will be a great showpiece for the idea of the 'power of politics'. Assisting it are the investors who shouted, "He is a thief, he has usurped people's hard-earned money", and then appeared Manoj Sharma, a Madhya Pradesh lawyer, who chucked black ink on Roy's face within the premises of the Supreme Court, an illegal and nicely acceptable anarchic act. He even managed to show his torso, and the inked words in Hindi scrawled on it: "Azaad Hindustani", the free Indian.

This was a moment.

Roy is also a huge celebrity magnet, partly because unlike many other industrialists he does not have lineage. He patronised and was patronised by the governments in power, Bollywood actors, cricketers. The nouveau riche.

Some of them even had a press conference a few days ago to support him, but had to stop mid-way. Former cricketer Kapil Dev in a letter to the media, which he said he was sharing "in the best interest of the people of the country", no less, wrote:

I came to know though TV channels that Saharasri has surrendered and is in police custody. I have known him as an extremely patriotic man who has done so much for the country. I wish that he comes out of this situation soon."

Patriotism is the key that opens many doors. Roy had mastered this art, and in some ways by calling his organisation a 'Parivar', family, he truly played into the emotions of the Indian psyche.

Our memories are short, though. At the height of the CWG scandal, he had issued huge advertisements in the newspapers titled ‘Commonwealth Games Emotional Appeal’. It was signed by ‘A Humble Citizen’. Himself. He used words like "pride", “respect and hope” and “our recent economic growth”.

This is the fantasy of the millionaires. The economic growth has not reached most citizens. In fact, humble people who are not sponsored by big men's logos.. Is this our “rich heritage”?

Roy had written:

“Due to this continuous and extensively negative coverage, we are creating a withdrawal feeling in thousands of organizers, 23000 volunteers, who are feeling totally demoralized and dejected. This would totally mar the successful conduct of the Commonwealth Games and give a bad image to our beloved country for all times to come.”

Clearly, here it was about self-image and well-being. Roy had a stake in IPL and iwas eyeing Liverpool. It is such grandiose efforts that make us believe we are global citizens by marketing our heritage, which has been taken over by those far removed from it.

It is rather shocking how Roy came forth on CWG and felt “the culprits most definitely need to be punished with all their misdeeds thoroughly investigated and all sorts of checks and audits duly conducted by going deep into the matters related to purchase, negotiations & payments etc. But if should all be done after our country's greatest ever sporting event is over. Of course, all the culprits should be severely punished, thereafter”.

This is a classic way of pushing the dirt under the carpet. These culprits will be the visible face of India.

It is no surprise that a businessman would think narrowly. Some of his supporters have shown concern for members of his Parivar and their wellbeing. Subrata Roy, even when down, remains in the Indian public imagination a benevolent patriarch, the head of the extended Indian family. By default, it is India. India Incorporated running India is not just about money gained and lost. It is about the gullibility and guile of the upwardly mobile middle class, the vote bank that dares not take its name.

It can be the victory even in downfall of many a corporate house of cards.

© Farzana Versey