50 saal baad
Sea breeze can be very soothing or so I found out the last time I was on the Worli sea face. The place was full of couples in various stages of trying to know each other. From those who sat a feet apart, to those who held hands, to those who were necking and kissing and finally to those who were doing everything that was possible in a public place. Talking was incidental to the entire exercise ( no pun intended).
As I walked on the promenade, I found myself mumbling a few lines from the old Mukesh song, “Main pal do pal ka shayar hoon”. This 1976 song, made me think about, what statisticians would call, two mutually exclusive events, which happened 50 years apart and had a deep connect.
The first was a scene from the 1957 movie, Pyasa and the second a news item I read in the Times of India, a couple of months of back. For those who haven’t seen Pyasa, it is a story of a poet named Vijay, played by Guru Dutt.
Vijay leaves home since he does not get along with his elder brothers. One day while walking on the street, he runs into his mother, who insists that they go home and she feed her. At home he realises that his brothers have sold the notebooks in which he wrote all his poetry to the raddiwalla, for a few annas more.
He runs out of the house immediately and goes to the raddiwalla. That guy tells him that a woman has taken his notebooks. As the movie progresses he runs into that movie and finally does manage to get the notebooks.
Now that brings me to the second event. Of all the crap people accuse Times of India (TOI) of carrying, once in a while they do carry some good news items. TOI had done this story about the house of Bollywood lyricist Sahir Ludhianvi being sold. Well nothing great here, Sahir died in 1980, due to excessive drinking. The report mentioned that all of Sahir’s books of poetry and notebooks in which he wrote poetry were sold off as raddi. So many years of work, sold for a few rupees more.
Real life is different from reel life. Sahir wasn’t as lucky as Vijay was. And he probably did see it coming. The lines I was mumbling were “ Kal koi mujhko yaad kare, kyon koi mujhko yaad kare, musroof zamaana mere leeye, kyon waqt apna barbaad kare”.
( The other thing common between the two events is the fact that all the poetry that Vijay said in the movie Pyasaa was written by Sahir)
As I walked on the promenade, I found myself mumbling a few lines from the old Mukesh song, “Main pal do pal ka shayar hoon”. This 1976 song, made me think about, what statisticians would call, two mutually exclusive events, which happened 50 years apart and had a deep connect.
The first was a scene from the 1957 movie, Pyasa and the second a news item I read in the Times of India, a couple of months of back. For those who haven’t seen Pyasa, it is a story of a poet named Vijay, played by Guru Dutt.
Vijay leaves home since he does not get along with his elder brothers. One day while walking on the street, he runs into his mother, who insists that they go home and she feed her. At home he realises that his brothers have sold the notebooks in which he wrote all his poetry to the raddiwalla, for a few annas more.
He runs out of the house immediately and goes to the raddiwalla. That guy tells him that a woman has taken his notebooks. As the movie progresses he runs into that movie and finally does manage to get the notebooks.
Now that brings me to the second event. Of all the crap people accuse Times of India (TOI) of carrying, once in a while they do carry some good news items. TOI had done this story about the house of Bollywood lyricist Sahir Ludhianvi being sold. Well nothing great here, Sahir died in 1980, due to excessive drinking. The report mentioned that all of Sahir’s books of poetry and notebooks in which he wrote poetry were sold off as raddi. So many years of work, sold for a few rupees more.
Real life is different from reel life. Sahir wasn’t as lucky as Vijay was. And he probably did see it coming. The lines I was mumbling were “ Kal koi mujhko yaad kare, kyon koi mujhko yaad kare, musroof zamaana mere leeye, kyon waqt apna barbaad kare”.
( The other thing common between the two events is the fact that all the poetry that Vijay said in the movie Pyasaa was written by Sahir)
posted by Vivek at 10:10 PM
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