It is 1938. In remote village in Bhelpur, the village mukhiya is angry and he gives a speech that we have to find out who translated the Mythili libaaz of inheritance in a twisted manner to Lord Boyle and Lord Simon in English. Yes , after three days, they find a new Indian Civil Service (ICS) recruit who was posted in Kenya earlier had translated all this in a twisted manner. The Mukhiya was furious to learn that Vikram Roop, the ICS had done this twisted translation. The villagers with the Mukhiya plan their action. They go to the learned Daulatram to show this and what action could be taken. The twisted translation had made them loose most of their land and they had become paupers. Slowly they plan. Daulatram comes with a smelly obnoxious idea. Why not make Lord Boyle, Lord Simon and Vikram Roop wear only a langot and dip them in a pit full of excreta. ” Excreta !!! Excreta !!! shouts the Mukhiya to Daulatram. Daulatram responds ” Sirf unko excreta yanike goo me doobana hai aur phir upar keechna hai. Unko maloom hona chaiye ke hamara goo karne ki jagah aur udhar ka samne wale sara zameen ko lekar, hamahe kitna parashani pahuchayi”.

The villagers of Bhelpur unite and when all unite there is success. The day of the dip arrives. The entire village watches the three wearing a langot and being dipped in pit of excreta. The Mukhiya is jubilant at this. He keeps on shouting ” Excreta!!! Excreta!!! and the villagers shout in chorus in their own way. The chorus resounds ” Excreta!! Excreta!!! as the three are lifted up and dipped back into the pit of excreta for number of times.

I also shout ” Excreta !!! Excreta!! and with joy fall off my bed in my sleep. The cleaner who was cleaning my hotel room, (it was early morning) was a bit confused. First he smiled and then he asked me ” Are you doing some excreta analysis” I said “No” getting up from the floor. The cleaner said ” It is all shit now , no more excreta” He inquired whether I was hurt. Fortunately the joy of the dream , made me only scream , as I feel on my fleshy portion.

I did not talk to him much, but inquired with him as to whether he was doing a part time cleaning job. Yes he said , I studied upto intermediate in college and then hard times came , I had to do a correspondence course with this cleaning job to support.

I knew in 1938 , shit had not arrived. I brushed my teeth and had coffee and then looked at the mirror and said to myself ” You have a script now , just expand it”

It is some days now after the dream, but just see how in the subconscious , I am still unhappy. I leave it to some good script writer to expand on this and write a full fledged story. Go ahead readers, the sky is the limit if you are not bothered about the credit.

1) The poverty and neglect in Mumbai are a bit overdone in the movie. ..Now that India is projecting a less miserable, more modern and confident image of itself, this movie revives the Mother-Teresa image of India as the ultimate in material and human misery and in heartless exploitation of fellow human beings. If you have seen the movie, you will have noticed that, as French India-watcher François Gautier puts it, “Slumdog literally defecates on India from the first frame”.

2) The book’s protagonist is a transreligious pan-Indian kid, Rama Mohammed Thomas (the commonest names for Hindus, Muslims c.q. Indian Christians), abandoned as an infant in a church by his mother, whose religion remains unknown. The movie turns him into a Muslim kid, Jamal, orphaned by a Hindu mob killing his mother in a pogrom in the name of Rama. The insertion of a quiz question about “the weapon with which the Hindu god Rama is depicted” (a total non-starter as quiz question in India, because everybody knows the answer: a bow) and Jamal’s memory of seeing a boy with hate-filled eyes enacting Rama-with-bow at the start of the anti-Muslim pogrom, serve to give body to the mediatic fiction of India as a land where an overbearing Hindu majority terrorizes hapless fearful minorities.

The effect is to drive the nail deeper into the coffin of Hinduism’s former reputation for tolerance and confirm its newly crafted image as hateful and a threat to non-Hindus.

…That is how Western interests like to imagine India, among other reasons because it justifies their anti-India position in the Cold War (as during the Bangladesh war of 1971) and its support to Pakistan even now. It also allows them to take a pro-Muslim stand and to depict Muslims as victims rather than terrorists, which looks progressive in the West’s internal multiculturalism debate. For the US, pro-Muslim positions in South Asia (like in the Balkans or in the question of Turkey’s EU accession) serve to appease Muslim anger at the American support to Israel in the Palestinian question.

…3) Jamal is handed to the police for torture on the pretext that he must have cheated, for how else could a “slumdog” know all the answers? In the book, this is done by an American visiting India in connection with the legal rights to the quiz format. In the movie, it is done by the Indian quiz master, who comes across as a lurid incarnation of the well-to-do Indians’ smug and callous mistreatment of their poorer fellow-countrymen. Likewise, the movie’s American tourists in Agra are an incarnation of sanity and benevolence contrasting with the barbarity of the ambient Indian society. This is a throwback to colonial-age stereotypes about India as a backward society in dire need of benevolent Western intervention.

…but a mutilated fiction of Vikas Swaroops Q & A , SDM showing Hindus in bad light was allowed. Why must the producers want the GOI’s permission to shoot a true story, when SDM , full of lies about Santan Dharma was allowed to shoot in India. They can create the sets overseas and have actors from UK or USA. There are many NRI’s who can play Nehru. What a travesity of justice? Have the producers lost their guts?

Prior to the Babur Masjid demolition, over 300 temples were destroyed in Kashmir between 1985-89 by Islamic terrorists. However, Hindus didn’t seek vengeance with Kashmir as the excuse

…Hindus were protesting against a profound symbol of Islam imperialism along with the thousands of other sites where flourishing temples were replaced by mosques. Why cannot Muslims voluntarily return those sites…is it some Islamic commandment?

The author does not justify the excesses committed by Hindu zealots. He seems to protest against the portrayal of Hindus as the unprovoked perpetrators of violence. Also, why this paean for Bangladeshi Muslims who are known to have collectively violated Hindu human rights..

Can it be denied that sections of Muslims with highest growth rates and recalcitrance to modern education especially amongst their women, are holding the development of India hostage to medieval dogma….

*** NOTE by MODERATOR ***

Pl. be restrained in your comments.

Pl. post comments on relevant thread(s) only. You can search for a relevant post by using the “Search” box at the top (right-hand side) or by searching through the “Categories” drop down menu at the bottom (right-hand side-bar).