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I saw a hour-long travelogue by a Briton, Paul Merton, on Channel 5 of UK a couple of nights ago. It seemed nothing has changed between the two countries. The Britishers, if I may generalise on the basis of one silly programme, still think India is a country of cows-on-streets and snake charmers. Only, the illustrations have changed to monkeys catching monkeys in Delhi, a western-minded finishing school again in Delhi, and last but not the least, nude males who think they represent God and play their penises to the gallery, literally. That's the image of 21st century India Merton's travelogue introduces us to.
Extending the colonial spirit to the modern day are a bunch of Indians who, like the Raja Bahadurs and Sirs and other Bahadurs of the colonial era, are unflappable in their role as the brown psychopants.
I thought a travelogue means looking up new places and discovering what they store. But Merton tells us differently.
He is not even worth the ordinary Britishers who do the Golden Triangle - Jaipur-Agra-Delhi when they come to India. Merton was stuck in Delhi and only his phallic mind perhaps made him go to some place in Uttar Pradesh.
He shows us how in a Delhi colony monkeys are being driven away by bigger monkeys.
He then visists a finishing school in Delhi, run by the multi-lingual daughter of an ambassador. She had an accent more western than Merton. Should ask her how she got it. She teaches Merton to eat food the Indian style and caper of all capers, she aks him to sit cross-legged, 'the Indian way', on a chair! Yes, she actually shows how to sit in such a position on a chair. Kept wondering when was the las time I saw an Indian used to sitting like ethat in a chair. Of course, the Merton show!
If that wasn't brown catering to white, there was more. Merton had a person tagging along, someone called Ruchira Gupta who, I am told, was or is a journalist. She, I found, is a repository of half-truths and outdated gossip on Indian history: religious, social and cultural.
This lady did some tip-toed analysis during the monkey episode of the show, which I really didn't care to remember.
But she outshone herself when she went with Merton to Uttar Pradesh durng some kind of festival. Their focus was on the Nagas -- fake babas who sit in the nude and smoke charas or cannabis with impunity and never jailed for it.
Now these Nagas are no different from the monkeys who are trained to somersault and walk and dance and earn their trainers some coins on Indian streets.
The Nagas happily displayed their penises -- Merton's eyes bulged seeing them and the camera really went close -- and performed tricks like lifting weights with them. The 5,000-year-old Indian civilisation on full, naked display for a western travel show. Advani and the RSS-- where are you guys?
All this while, the Gupta lady was telling Merton about the Trimurthis and Shiva in particular. Shiva, she told him, is the 'god of arts' (eh! since when!!). She got one correctly...about him being the 'ardhanareeshwara'. Then came the tut-tut thing. She was talking something about 'orgasms', atrtributing them to the Lord. I dont want to go into the actual details for shaming my own Indian moorings.
This is 21st century India-- still a British Colony in the sense of the mindset of Indians and former British masters alike. Even Indian foreign policy is pro-Briton/Western. Democracy in India is a big fat joke-- India will always be a British Colony.
Extending the colonial spirit to the modern day are a bunch of Indians who, like the Raja Bahadurs and Sirs and other Bahadurs of the colonial era, are unflappable in their role as the brown psychopants.
I thought a travelogue means looking up new places and discovering what they store. But Merton tells us differently.
He is not even worth the ordinary Britishers who do the Golden Triangle - Jaipur-Agra-Delhi when they come to India. Merton was stuck in Delhi and only his phallic mind perhaps made him go to some place in Uttar Pradesh.
He shows us how in a Delhi colony monkeys are being driven away by bigger monkeys.
He then visists a finishing school in Delhi, run by the multi-lingual daughter of an ambassador. She had an accent more western than Merton. Should ask her how she got it. She teaches Merton to eat food the Indian style and caper of all capers, she aks him to sit cross-legged, 'the Indian way', on a chair! Yes, she actually shows how to sit in such a position on a chair. Kept wondering when was the las time I saw an Indian used to sitting like ethat in a chair. Of course, the Merton show!
If that wasn't brown catering to white, there was more. Merton had a person tagging along, someone called Ruchira Gupta who, I am told, was or is a journalist. She, I found, is a repository of half-truths and outdated gossip on Indian history: religious, social and cultural.
This lady did some tip-toed analysis during the monkey episode of the show, which I really didn't care to remember.
But she outshone herself when she went with Merton to Uttar Pradesh durng some kind of festival. Their focus was on the Nagas -- fake babas who sit in the nude and smoke charas or cannabis with impunity and never jailed for it.
Now these Nagas are no different from the monkeys who are trained to somersault and walk and dance and earn their trainers some coins on Indian streets.
The Nagas happily displayed their penises -- Merton's eyes bulged seeing them and the camera really went close -- and performed tricks like lifting weights with them. The 5,000-year-old Indian civilisation on full, naked display for a western travel show. Advani and the RSS-- where are you guys?
All this while, the Gupta lady was telling Merton about the Trimurthis and Shiva in particular. Shiva, she told him, is the 'god of arts' (eh! since when!!). She got one correctly...about him being the 'ardhanareeshwara'. Then came the tut-tut thing. She was talking something about 'orgasms', atrtributing them to the Lord. I dont want to go into the actual details for shaming my own Indian moorings.
This is 21st century India-- still a British Colony in the sense of the mindset of Indians and former British masters alike. Even Indian foreign policy is pro-Briton/Western. Democracy in India is a big fat joke-- India will always be a British Colony.
Maybe for you, not any place I've been to though. 
