The modern thinking Indian

The last World Cup broke a number of reputations. While the dismal performance of the Indian team turned away a number of people (including me) from being cricket fans to not being so interested in cricket, it also broke a number of taboos. The prime one was the breaking of the taboo of not criticizing Sachin. Sachin Tendulkar has been the god-like figure of the Indian cricket for the last decade and more, and without doubt, he has a been like a colossus on the Indian cricket scene. But, given the injuries that he has been facing, and the general slow-down in his performance has been noticed and commented upon a lot. In fact, his performance and public acclaim has been reduced to the extent that former cricketers such as Atul Wassan and Maninder Singh, not batsmen of any acclaim, have criticized Tendulkar as part of their job of commenting.
Over a period of time, even though Sachin was setting an incredible number of batting records, there were people who were carping about his abilities. And in the past 5 years, the criticism has only grown. He has been accused of not actually being able to deliver wins to India, and failing when he is most needed. And the latest person to make this accusation is none other than another great from Indian cricket, Kapil Dev:

"Every time people hope big things from Sachin Tendulkar but often it is only disappointment that we are left with. He is thought to be the backbone of the Indian team but many times he has not stood up to the ocassion," he said.
"Figures say that Sachin has not been able to perform uunder pressure. This will remain a blot in his career," Kapil Dev said.
"Sachin has big records to his name but until he wins matches for India in these conditions, people will raise fingers at him," Kapil said.

I can agree with Kapil to some extent. For a generation, Sachin has provided inspiration, but greats need to know when to gracefully bow out. After all, new blood can only come in when old blood makes its way out; even if that means admitting that a great has faded and should maybe make his exit rather than reach a stage where people ask for him to go out.
Of course, people will have multiple opinions on this, including ascribing ulterior motives to Kapil Dev for his utterances. After all, he is now trying to get people to join an alternative cricket league, and one way to do that is to create controversies.

Labels: Cricket, Fan, Responsibility

For a long time, Bollywood is the answer when one talks about the Indian film industry. In terms of news, awards, overseas markets, soft exports, number of movies, all of these, Bollywood (Hindi movie land) is the undoubted king. And then comes a sudden time when all this is in doubt. The sudden and fast rise of the latest Rajnikant Tamil movie, 'Sivaji: The Boss' has shown that there are other language movie industries in India that carry their own weight. All the things that I talked about in the beginning of this post are still true, but this movie carries its own facts with it, some of which challenge the dominance of the Hindi film industry.
Consider the following facts about the movie:
- It is the most expensive Indian movie, costing around 95 crores to make. Now this is only $24 million, so is very small by US standards, but is fairly expensive by Indian standards
- Ticket sales are astronomical in India, with movies halls being booked for days on end
- Fan fervour is such that companies have booked halls for their employees on specific days
- The movie is making waves
outside Tamil Nadu, with releases in Mumbai, Karnataka, Delhi, Malaysia and other places such that fans are flocking
There are a number of Indian top notch heroes who would love to be in Rajnikanth's shoes. He is supposed to be charging much more than any Hindi film hero, more than Shahrukh or Amitabh Bachchan. In most cases (with the exception of 1-2 movies in the recent past), his name associated with a movie is enough to bring in crowds who book halls for days on end. He is almost a demi-god to his fans:

They broke pumpkins to ward off evil eyes, lit camphor to perform 'aarti' and bathed gigantic cut-outs of Rajnikant with hundreds of litres of milk. As crackers burst incessantly, the Tamil superstar's fans exhibited their joy by distributing sweets.
For the most expensive film ever made (Rs 95 crore) in the history of Indian cinema, Sivaji's first two days' bookings in just Chennai crossed Rs 3 crore. "It's a smash hit. With such response, it'll have a long run. Our investment will bring back good returns," said C T Valliapan, owner of Kamala Theatre. In Chennai, the film had a 16-screen opening. "We're housefull for the next 14 days," he said.

What is the difference between a Hindi film fan and a Tamil film fan ? This is a very subjective issue, and I invite comments from readers, but my own impression based on experiences in Chennai and outside Chennai are the following:
- Hindi film fans are also very dedicated, but somehow fail to have the same fervor as a Tamil movie fan.
- It's almost like a Tamil film fan can have their opinions (at least politically) run by their stars. As the reign of MGR, Jayalalitha and the power of opinions expressed by Rajnikanth shows, people are far more inclined to follow the commands of their film stars
- There are few Hindi film fans who will go to incredible efforts to reach their stars or watch their movies, the same as a Tamil movie fan would do (for example, when there were reports in the paper about how fans from Chennai flew to Delhi because they were not getting tickets in Chennai, it seemed very believable to me)
- The story goes that Rajnikanth's birthday is an incredible event in Chennai, and I have experienced this myself. On one particular birthday, I remember that people in the office talked about that all day, and in the evening were worried that celebrations in the street would hamper their trip home. I don't think that any film star of the Hindi film industry would excite such kinds of emotions.

Labels: Fan, Film, Politics, Star, Tamil