My son today asked me what kind of a dog was a slum dog. He is 6 years old and I guess the hype has got to him too. I smiled and explained the concept to him. A person who leads a dogs life and lives in a slum...(and then thought to myself)...a person we meet everyday. At street crossings vending bootleg books or fresh graveyard flowers, at airports with trolley stands and markets with DVD portfolios, at restaurants with table swabs and chaiwallah stalls with grimy glasses.
As India steps out of a capitalist kennel it seems preened for a global dog show, then how can it expose its slumdogs to the world. We rant and rave about poverty pornographers. Poor Danny Boyle. He must be amused at a raving Bacchan and a giggling Barkha Dutt who seemed to almost gush over the sweet Dev Patel and his mosquito marne wali mom, or a Chaste Anil Kapoor who spoke of charity. The man made a movie but stirred a hornets nest amongst the glumdogs.
A friend of mine once told me our social conscience ends at our doorsteps. All semblance of hygiene and health leaves us as we set out. For the world outside is a slumdog world. Where we squeeze ourselves into the last second of a green light, when we slip the 50 rupee note to a traffic cop, when we break a cue to get ahead, where we bribe touts for passports and turn a blind eye to a wrapper thrown on the seat.
As long as we can push an electronic power window as a veil across this reality all is fine. Tu kaun main khamakha...(who are you and what do I care)...Beggars used to first moan and make faces, now they rattle your window or run a dirty cloth on your wind screen. They have found a way to invade your world. And a quick shoved 10 rupee note buys you a minute of peace till the next crossing. And the next invasion.
We the glumdogs lack a civic sense, we are all slumdogs, apathetic to our surroundings. Which have been pissed upon by politicians, bastardized by our bureaucrats and exploited by the establishment. Each year the same road is reconstructed, the same drain dug up, but as long as I can squeeze past it with a deft driver I am spared the need to step out, question, confront and take action. And spoil my schedule. I am so busy earning my next meal (albeit a five star one) that these things don't count. They will slip away into the slums they come from and hopefully be reborn as Gandhians someday or be relocated outside city or civil limits.
The truth is, slumdogs dont die. Slumdogs grow up in the shit and the squalor. As fetters corrode the flesh, persecution corrodes the mind. They live in such apathy that they learn only one code. The code to survive...the next day, the next riot, the anext raid, the next eviction. Whatever it may take. If a package needs delivery, the price is asked not the content. If a job needs to be done it must be done, or someone else will take it.
And this code makes them servants to a bigger dog. The three headed dog that guards the gate to Hades( allow me the mixing of genres and metaphors) . They find rabid causes to make them bark at. They mix a heady concoction of power, position and paisa. That is all they look for. There impotency is translated into a rage that can shake the universe. The slumdogs together can change the course of an election. A few dead in a booth capture makes no difference. they see death so often that they do not value life. And that gives them a strange power over the glumdogs. You and me who go about our humdrum existence. Complaining, complaining and criticizing, criticising and critiquing. We who blame the universe for our woes. We who have had a collar of class around our neck so long that even if its not there we feel a leash straining at us. A leash of propritey, of dignified behaviour, of things done and not done!! In a streetfight we always lose. In a manicured lawn, they find no entry. Adn so we mark our territories with grime and gore and gates and guards.
But between the dogs of India we despise the full moon night or a movie that shines a light upon us . And when it happens we collectively howl at the source, hoping the spotlight turns away and we can all go back to our own personal slums... secure in the anonymity, the apathy.
As India steps out of a capitalist kennel it seems preened for a global dog show, then how can it expose its slumdogs to the world. We rant and rave about poverty pornographers. Poor Danny Boyle. He must be amused at a raving Bacchan and a giggling Barkha Dutt who seemed to almost gush over the sweet Dev Patel and his mosquito marne wali mom, or a Chaste Anil Kapoor who spoke of charity. The man made a movie but stirred a hornets nest amongst the glumdogs.
A friend of mine once told me our social conscience ends at our doorsteps. All semblance of hygiene and health leaves us as we set out. For the world outside is a slumdog world. Where we squeeze ourselves into the last second of a green light, when we slip the 50 rupee note to a traffic cop, when we break a cue to get ahead, where we bribe touts for passports and turn a blind eye to a wrapper thrown on the seat.
As long as we can push an electronic power window as a veil across this reality all is fine. Tu kaun main khamakha...(who are you and what do I care)...Beggars used to first moan and make faces, now they rattle your window or run a dirty cloth on your wind screen. They have found a way to invade your world. And a quick shoved 10 rupee note buys you a minute of peace till the next crossing. And the next invasion.
We the glumdogs lack a civic sense, we are all slumdogs, apathetic to our surroundings. Which have been pissed upon by politicians, bastardized by our bureaucrats and exploited by the establishment. Each year the same road is reconstructed, the same drain dug up, but as long as I can squeeze past it with a deft driver I am spared the need to step out, question, confront and take action. And spoil my schedule. I am so busy earning my next meal (albeit a five star one) that these things don't count. They will slip away into the slums they come from and hopefully be reborn as Gandhians someday or be relocated outside city or civil limits.
The truth is, slumdogs dont die. Slumdogs grow up in the shit and the squalor. As fetters corrode the flesh, persecution corrodes the mind. They live in such apathy that they learn only one code. The code to survive...the next day, the next riot, the anext raid, the next eviction. Whatever it may take. If a package needs delivery, the price is asked not the content. If a job needs to be done it must be done, or someone else will take it.
And this code makes them servants to a bigger dog. The three headed dog that guards the gate to Hades( allow me the mixing of genres and metaphors) . They find rabid causes to make them bark at. They mix a heady concoction of power, position and paisa. That is all they look for. There impotency is translated into a rage that can shake the universe. The slumdogs together can change the course of an election. A few dead in a booth capture makes no difference. they see death so often that they do not value life. And that gives them a strange power over the glumdogs. You and me who go about our humdrum existence. Complaining, complaining and criticizing, criticising and critiquing. We who blame the universe for our woes. We who have had a collar of class around our neck so long that even if its not there we feel a leash straining at us. A leash of propritey, of dignified behaviour, of things done and not done!! In a streetfight we always lose. In a manicured lawn, they find no entry. Adn so we mark our territories with grime and gore and gates and guards.
But between the dogs of India we despise the full moon night or a movie that shines a light upon us . And when it happens we collectively howl at the source, hoping the spotlight turns away and we can all go back to our own personal slums... secure in the anonymity, the apathy.
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1 comment:
Loved ur article....
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