Tag Archives: pop culture

Why India Survives

Two incidents in my apartment complex resulted in a lot of debate related to religion and language in India:

1. Religion – It was discovered that two maidservants who identified themselves with Hindu names were actually Muslims. The residents’ association banned these individuals from the complex since their integrity was now in question. Debate:

Did the maidservants choose to identify themselves as Hindus because they were finding it difficult to find jobs otherwise? If this was the reason, were they justified in passing themselves off as Hindus?
Did their religion have anything to them being banned?

2. Language – Some residents expressed frustration that some of the apartment staff (security, reception, etc.) spoke only the local language, “Kannad”. Someone suggested that all staff should know Hindi, the national language of India. There were a couple of quick responses – a) it is Kannada, not “Kannad” and, b) Hindi is the official language of India, not the national language. Debate:

Shouldn’t Hindi speaking people living in non-Hindi speaking places try to learn the local language?
How do we solve the communication issues across India? There were three options that came up during this incident – English, Hindi and Sign Language!

I am sure debates like these happen all across India every day. I think our community was lucky that this debate was civil (keeping my fingers crossed). I realize not every community is this lucky. I am only reassured by the text in one of my favorite books on India, “India After Gandhi” by Ramachandra Guha. To anyone who has ever wondered why India stays united, I suggest they read at least the prologue and epilogue of this book. The prologue is titled “The Unnatural Nation” and frames the paradox and challenges that define India. The epilogue is titled “Why India Survives”. For the most part, Guha steers clear of a definitive answer to this question. But in the last line of the book, he offers this:

So long as the constitution is not amended beyond recognition, so long as elections are held regularly and fairly and the ethos of secularism broadly prevails, so long as citizens speak and write in the language of their choosing, so long as there is an integrated market and a moderately efficient civil service and army, and – lest I forget – so long as Hindi films are watched and their songs sung, India will survive.

Go out there, catch the latest Bollywood movie, sing the hits and help India survive.

Why everyone likes music

Music is perhaps the pastime that needs the least attention and effort from us. Look at the most common ways in which we listen to music:

While reading a book
While surfing the net
On TV
In a movie
In theater or a show with music
In a party or celebration
In a restaurant, pub, bar
While praying
While exercising
While commuting or traveling
While working
In a concert
Listening to music and doing nothing else

Except #13, none of these ways of listening to music needs our full attention. #12 and #13 are the only cases where music is the primary focus. In every other case, music is either enhancing another experience or helping us go through an experience we do not enjoy.

Who wouldn’t like something that is so pleasurable and unobtrusive? However, what makes music popular also poses a challenge. How does music really engage its listeners when they are distracted most of the times it is being played?

Jugaad vs Dishonesty

Jugaad is a vital element of Indian entrepreneurship. Depending on whom you ask, you get different definitions of jugaad. Improvisation. Making do. Resourcefulness. I like Ratan Tata’s definition of “frugal innovation” because jugaad arises from constraints, scarcity and competition. Tata Nano might be tacky to some but there is no denying the ingenuity involved in building world’s cheapest car. Confronted by limited budget, mouthshut.com came up with the strategy of using auto rickshaws for advertising. There are many such admirable examples of jugaad. However, at times, dishonest acts are justified, even glorified, as being in the spirit of jugaad.

Here is another way to look at it. Everything isn’t black or white, right or wrong – sometimes there shades of gray. It’s just that the gray area is very narrow for the honest and very broad for the corrupt. Many acts that appear black to the honest appear gray to the corrupt (my attempt at a schematic below). Jugaad is one of the labels the corrupt use to stretch the gray band. (Other labels used for this purpose are “Ends justify means” and variations of the word “Shrewd”.)

Let us hand out applause for jugaad after careful consideration. We do not want to encourage disguised dishonesty.

We will not touch your junk

Indians aren’t private people. We are conditioned by years of living in joint families or crowded communities, a throng of relatives visiting us or calling us over, and lots and lots of people all around us everywhere we go. So while, Americans demonstrate outrage at being patted down (and by the way, not even the most creative marketing professional could come up with “Don’t touch my junk” for a slogan for privacy activists) and countries worldwide debate about privacy issues in Facebook, we don’t bat an eyelid.

I think it is time we open our eyes and start worrying about our privacy. Here are some examples of how casual our attitude towards privacy is:

Railway reservation charts – Old but gold. If college kids can use the list to spot interesting “F”s (totally harmless, been there), so can criminals to spot easy targets (elderly, women traveling alone, etc.).
Sending sensitive information through book post – People are curious. A book post is an invitation for people to take a peek. India’s largest, public telecom carrier (oops, did I just give myself away?) sends my postpaid cell phone statement through book post (i.e., an open envelope). It has my name, address, cell phone number and all the calls I made or received last month neatly printed out for anyone who may be interested.
RTOs all over India provide an SMS “facility” to all and sundry. In Karnataka, if you send a license plate number via SMS to an RTO published number, you get back the owner’s name, engine and chassis numbers and the color, make and model of the car. I believe this is to assist people involved in “hit and run” cases. My question is – assist people in what? Delivering vigilante justice?
Retail shops routinely ask people to fill out detailed forms with all sorts of personal information. Of course, we could opt out but service personnel at these shops go after this information quite aggressively. On many occasions, I have been accosted by sales folks who open with “What’s your name?” even before they tell me what they are selling. I know many customers just capitulate under such pressure and tell all.

None of this seems to bother people. It is precisely this indifference that makes privacy issues even more important in India than elsewhere. It puts an even bigger onus on every business, every organization in India, to safeguard the privacy of individuals it deals with.

Discovery services deal with a very specific kind of personal information – people’s tastes. Mavrix’s music discovery service will be based on people’s taste in music. This information clearly is not as sensitive as someone’s address or credit card number, but we intend to treat it with just as much respect. We promise we will not touch your junk.

5 suggestions to recognize film music’s “extras”

Ever wondered who played the violin in Yeh Ab Aap Sochiye (Mere Sanam); the sitar in Deewana Hua Baadal (Kashmir Ki Kali); the harmonica in Ye Dosti (Sholay); the accordion in Har Dil Jo Pyar Karega (Sangam); the guitar in Ilaya Nila (Payanangal Mudivadhillai); or even who whistled in Hum Hain Rahi Pyar Ke (Nau Do Gyarah)? I researched and haven’t found any record yet. It appears that we have failed to recognize and give credit to hundreds of instrumentalists and other artistes who have contributed to film music over decades.

However, recent releases (not sure when the trend started), seem to be doing a very good job of giving credit to people involved in the creation of the music. Inserts are getting meatier and provide a lot of information, including the lyrics and credits for the musicians and the recording crew. Sharing credit is a no-brainer because all parties win. Contributors get recognized; creators (labels, producers, music directors) appear nice because everyone likes people who share credit publicly and visibly; consumers get information. Can anyone, who has seen “Om Shanti Om”, forget the credits for the movie? My esteem for Farah Khan went up several notches for giving the credits a human touch. In general, movie folks seem to do a better job at sharing credit than their music industry counterparts.

While the detailed inserts are welcome, I have the following suggestions to offer:

Standardize the nomenclature and format for sharing credits on the inserts, so that finding information becomes easy and intuitive.
Make the insert available in digital form.
Provide information on a per song basis.
Add an audio clip that gives credit to all contributors. When compared to inserts, audio clips would be more easily accessible, more closely associated with the music and less likely to be misplaced.
Throw in a “Making of the music” audio or video. Credit for individual contribution is nice but what people really love are stories of collaboration between the musicians. A great example is the “Making of Veer Zaara” CD.

The extra offerings should not come at extra cost. Instead, they should be provided as incentive to people who buy music, by using DRM type technology or providing online access based on a key/code provided during purchase.

Is Bollywood Overdose killing Indian music?

I love Bollywood music. It forms about 35% of my music collection, only because I follow four languages, like a number of genres and most importantly – I research and buy music I like and I buy a lot of it. Most Indians find it easy to just succumb to Bollywood Overdose (BO). Although regional music markets face the same onslaught from regional movies, I single out Bollywood simply because it is the largest producer of music in India and has pan India presence.

What is BO? BO is the phenomenon of large sections of Indians being exposed to a handful of Bollywood songs and pretty much nothing else. It results in a populace with stunted musical taste or disinterest in music.

An entire system is responsible for BO – risk-averse Bollywood producers promoting the creation of music they believe will be hit, weary music directors who sell out to make a fast buck or suppress their creativity to play it safe, short-sighted music labels who abandon music lovers with discerning and/or niche taste and build businesses around a large market that is not very picky, a clueless media that refuses to acknowledge a creative world beyond Bollywood and lastly, Indian music listeners who either don’t have the time to explore and experiment or don’t care. (The Indian aversion to paying for music also figures somewhere here but that’s a topic for another day.) Ironically, Bollywood music not only overwhelms other music, it even cannibalizes itself. There are many Bollywood musical gems that do not reach many people simply because all the parties mentioned above don’t do enough to uncover them from the rubble.

An example of BO. I don’t know if you have listened to FM radio stations lately but the last I timed tuned in, I could almost anticipate the next song. What’s wrong with the RJs and radio stations? Can’t they play anything other than film music? Scratch that. Can’t they play anything other than “hit” film music? The other day a chirpy RJ ran an indipop special. She went on and on about how much she loved indipop, interviewed Dr Palash Sen to prove it and went on to play Bollywood staples! The poor doctor must have been squirming in his seat. Clarification, lady RJ – the “indi” in indipop stands not just for Indian but Independent.

Another example. What’s the point of Bollywood shows? Are our movie stars the best dancers in the country? Or is it their lip-syncing talent that brings in people in droves? I have nothing against people who attend these shows – I have many dear friends who do. I just wish that they display the same (if not more) enthusiasm for the talent of real dancers and real musicians.

Bollywood produces some very good music. However, I refuse to believe that it represents the entire creative prowess of a country with a billion people. Indian music lovers deserve more choice – more artistes, more genres, more musical styles.

Mallus and booze

True story. A group of friends are making plans to go out bar hopping. Someone asks the new guy in the group if he drinks. Pat comes the reply “What question are you asking, da? I am a Mallu!”.

The Mallus’ fondness for hooch is well-known. At dusk, after a hard days work, hordes of Malayalis descend upon one of two places to seek peace and ruminate on the meaning of life – places of worship or booze shops. The crowd in front of the booze shop easily distinguishes itself by its impeccable conduct. The only place in India I have seen people standing in a line and patiently waiting for their turn is at booze shops in Kerala.

Booze is an integral part of the Mallu pop culture. I can’t think of too many Malayalam movies that go without a scene involving booze. Everybody drinks – the hero, the sidekick, the character actors, the comedian, the villain, the vamp – almost everyone except the heroine, who protests feebly and pours dutifully. Drunks in public places are met with a disapproving shake of the head that is completely negated by the accompanying smile of an understanding adult regarding a naughty child. Talking about inebriation, if you are a visitor in Kerala and someone comments that you are fit, do not bother sucking up your breath, squaring your shoulders, pulling in your belly and thanking the kind soul through your clenched teeth (from all the effort going into appearing fit for a few fleeting moments). In Kerala, “fit” is a compliment reserved for individuals who, after consuming a few alcoholic beverages, proceed to use the swimming plus and then realize that there is no flush. Yes, “fit” equals drunk – only in Kerala!

While on this topic, it is worth talking about the Mallu’s style of drinking. Long before tequila shots chased by a wedge of lime and salt became popular in hip bars in India, the Mallu imbibed alcohol with the uniquely Indian chaser – achaar (spicy pickle). The ritual is as follows – a) Pour a large drink of your choice of booze into a glass, b) Pour water or soda. The Mallu is environmentally conscious and makes do with just a few drops. c) Take a deep breath, d) Gulp down the entire glass in one go, e) Touch a pickle with your middle finger, e) Lick it, and last but very important step f) Let your breath out with a loud “Aaahhhhhhhhhhhhh” from the bottom of your throat. Steps c) through f) need to be accomplished in about two seconds. Always a perfectionist, the Mallu repeats the ritual till the two-second limit is met.

[Note: Kerala has the highest per capita consumption of alcohol in India and a track record of alcohol abuse. That’s not funny.]