The real story of our times

Apropos Barack Obama being forced to repeat his presidential oath the morning after because of a fumble by the chief justice the day earlier, some critics I read likened it to drinking curdled milk. There are, of course, several sterling virtues of consuming milk in such altered state as any Indian housemaker would vouch for, so perhaps the mix-up during the oath-taking was not all for the bad.

Indeed, the time lag between the two oaths could have been a chastening experience for the new president: that the most powerful man on this planet was as vulnerable to slip-ups as anybody else is a lesson best learnt early, for time is likely to be Obama’s biggest obstacle if the colossal expectations vested in him are an indication.

By becoming the first coloured president of the United States, Obama has overturned the prejudices of centuries; now he is expected to work bigger miracles in which, as a colleague pointed out, walking on water, parting an ocean or resurrecting a corpse may only be par for the course.

To name just a few, he has to rebuild America’s economy, redefine his adversaries before he resumes the fight on terror started by his predecessors, spearhead the environmental protection of this planet, establish a global power grid in which tensions are lowered not raised, restore sanity on this planet.

A mere mix-up in taking the oath is not quite such a disaster, therefore. In any case, every new president of the United States utters the same thing before taking office.

Ultimately, as the experience with George W Bush has shown, it is deeds more than words that matter. What Obama does from here is going to be the real story of our times, not the gaffe that preceded his entry into the Oval office.

Objections to the depiction of crime, grime, excreta — underbelly of Mumbai if you will — preceding the release of Slumdog Millionaire reminded me of the brouhaha over a film made by ad-man Prahlad Kakkar for Mid-Day 15 years ago, during my tenure with that paper.

For the 15th anniversary celebrations, Mid-day commissioned six or seven film-makers to make a two-minute film on what they considered was quintessentially Bombay. I forget now what the other films showed, but Kakkar shot various homeless people attending to the call of nature along the railway tracks of the city. The camerawork was candid, the editing crisp, and the title of the film as evocative as it was provocative: Bumbay.

There were some murmurs of disapproval when the films were aired at a function at the Hanging Gardens, but these were soon dissipated by the brilliance of Kakkar’s concept and craft: In a two-minute allegory in which he showed plenty of bums and agonized faces, he had held up a mirror to the disdain with which this city treats so many lakhs of its less privileged denizens.

Slumdog Millionaire, I discovered after seeing it last week, is not even an allegory about Mumbai, which is why I found the controversies surrounding it both specious and silly. It is a marvelous film with a crackling script, great characterization, superb acting/music/camerawork and brilliantly directed by Danny Boyle: for my money, one of the finest films I have seen in a long, long time.

The only real connection I can make with Kakkar’s film now is that the underbelly of Mumbai remains pretty much the same as it was 15 years ago. Why this should be so is, of course, an altogether different story.

And finally, my weekly dose of good cheer was completed after reading this anecdote about the late England fast bowler Freddie Trueman.  

 ‘Fiery’ Fred, as Trueman was known, had a whiplash tongue, and a bawdy sense of humour that had obviously emerged from the deepest mines of Yorkshire where he had begun life as a collier. In one match, much to his chagrin, he found his England colleague letting a ball go through his legs and conceding a boundary.

“I should have kept them closed,’’ confessed the shame-faced fielder to bowler Trueman, blowing smoke from his ears. “Aye,’’ was the purported reply. “And so should your mother.’’

 Of course, all said and done, cricket still remains a gentleman’s game.