Letters from a daughter to her father:Week 5

Yet again a letter from Bitiya Rani came across me..what a coincidence for the fifth week in a row!

Dear Papa,

This week began with an exposure to the efforts taken by the police to “mainstream HIV in all districts”. A police uncle gave a detailed exposition on the police approach in this regard. After his dedicated effort, AIDS has been considerably popularized in all the districts and it is spreading steadily. Dushmanta Behra, the Oriya par excellence then expounded the 'Equitorial theory of AIDS' which states that the HIV virus travels along predetermined lines after keen observance of the latitudes & longitudes. He had correlation studies to prove his point regarding the preference exhibited by the virus.

Handling urban poor using the systems approach was the theme of the talk by the next uncle. This involved manhandling the urban poor using systems’ jargon. Our classmate Madan felt perfectly at home during this lecture and he carried forward the systems’ discussions in the mess over tea. It was an exhilarating experience for him as he finally found one of his kind.

Abhishek Dev, the humble farmer then talked to us on ruralisation of Chandigarh and his efforts to promote agriculture on the highways. Efforts to identify excess holding of highway land beyond land ceiling limits by the NHAI and distribution of the same to marginalized farmers in pursuance of land reforms was explained in detail. This will apparently bring about the second and third green revolution at a single stroke. This project is undertaken as directed by CRS, Mussoorie.

“Empowerment of Shabana” was a One Act play enacted in our school by small time stage actress S. Habana Assami aunty. She asked the organizer of the play to read out a list of all the plays she had done. She was very particular that all her galli plays be mentioned and also that the many tokens of appreciation she received from various gallis and mohallaas be prominently read out. The story of the play was based on game theory. The game was called ‘haughty-haughty’. The play turned out to be extremely parliamentary in nature.

Yet another play named “Employee Productivity, Motivation and Discipline (EPMD)” was enacted before us. This was an emotional melodrama and many onlookers had to use hydraulic pumps to control the outflow of tears. The story is based on macroeconomics and not on science fiction as was rumoured earlier in the day. Probably this is the first play to be made on macroeconomic theory. Lord Vyasan, the eminent economist was thrilled with this thought provoking economic drama.

The theme of the play revolves around the economic question, -whether free option is available or not? The award winning actress, Madhabiben Mohapatra, who plays a banker, puts this disturbing question to the chief protagonist, played by Aravind Swamy. The hero is an honest and upright Chartered Accountant with trade union background who firmly believed that free options were available and he loudly proclaims this before the cruel world. Thereafter the heroine bursts out in rage and walks out..straight to her Maikka. This free-option issue becomes a bone of contention between the Parivaars of the hero and heroine. Swords were soon drawn. This is the setting of the play.

Superstar of the nineties, Ashish Kumar, plays a character-role in this play. In a heated moment, he shouts at the hero with the Talwar drawn and ready. He enumerates what all the heroine had “…bank mein job, karodon ki daulat, naukar chaakar, motor car, chaar variety hair dye, do kuthe , theen bache aur do-theen degree. Tumhare paas kya hai..? Tum aakhir kaun ho?” Aravind Swamy, the hero delivers the punch dialogue “Mere paas Mess hai...”

[The question of “Tum aakhir kaun ho?” meanwhile stirred the sleeping Arthur from his slumber. This question had been asked by so many thinkers and philosophers and yet none got answers till date. The philosopher in Arthur had this question thrown to him for the first time. He decided to undertake a pilgrimage to St.Tavern’s Cathedral that very evening to ponder over this question.]

The highlight of this play was Bengali actress Pausumi Bandhopadhaya’s item number. (Special binoculars were supplied to the spectators on the back rows so that the tiny actress was visible on the stage.) At the climax, Madhabiben Mohapatra decides to leave the hero, with whom she had serious differences of economic theory. She then decides to adopt the item bomb shell and they lived happily every after.

ONGC, Reliance and ICICI Bank sponsored this play which had a social message.

An entrepreneur saw an opportunity to make a soap opera, “CC Bhi Kabhi OT Tha” (CBKOT) based on this play. The casting is still on and interested actors may contact Sri.Ashutosh, the reliable who believes in doing everything in the private. He has produced quite a few movies/tele-serials/plays privately; but they flopped basically because he insisted that everyone should watch the movie in private. He will have nothing to be done publicly. He says, “I just hate the public sector.” People may kindly contact him privately for casting purposes.

Meanwhile, Gopal Yo Yo, the classic playboy, the Casanova, was yet again attacked by a posse of non-vegetarian girls. This time he had a close shave. The first attack was late in the night at 11.00pm when he was getting into the bed after vegetarian meals. The females continued to torment him and tried to impress him through various non-vegetarian means. His DC cheated him and did not tell him to take precautionary measures during such interactions and associations. So needless to say, all get-togethers were without any precaution. The implications of these meetings will not be known immediately; only time will tell.

So Papa, that’s about this week. The school is getting wilder by the day and if all is okay I’ll mail you next week.

Love,

Bitiya Rani