Monday, October 26, 2015

Maggi Wapsi

Courtesy - Google images

The Bombay High Court on Thursday set aside the countrywide ban on nine variants of Nestle’s Maggi instant noodles, saying the national food regulator had acted in an “arbitrary” manner and not followed the “principles of natural justice” while banning the product.

The residents of Hungristan are dusting cobwebs from their kitchen pots and pans, nervously clicking gas-lighters, hovering near their gas-stoves, their stomachs rumbling in anticipation. Their favourite, sweetheart of millions, Maggiwati is returning after a long vanwas.

Though it’s been only a few months since she went missing, but it feels like a lifetime. Unable to bear the trauma of waking up hungry on those lonely nights, and no simmering Maggiwati to cuddle up to, Dharmendra had taken to writing angst filled poetry. His composition – My life is an empty bartan

                     baby jaan, you are my dhakkan, 
                     ajaa hila de mera chammach, is now a superhit Honey Singh number, providing succour to unhappy souls guzzling beer at happy hours.

When Sunny, Bunny, Chavanni first heard this song at Maaji Bar, they promptly burst into tears. Something they hadn’t done in decades. Maggiwati was their pole of support through hours of harrowing traffic, snarling drivers and cacophonous symphony of horns. All they had to do was get back home alive and she’d be waiting for them lying coiled in her aromatic glory, waiting to be devoured.

She was simple unlike most women. All it needed was just two minutes to reduce her to a gooey mass of deliciousness. Okay, it took more than two, maybe 10. But once you fell for her easy charms, she became a lifetime obsession. Try as you might, you could never let go of her. In fact, you locked her in your cupboard, hid her in your drawers and sometimes under the bed. She was the answer to every hungry hosteller’s prayer seeking succour from the tyranny of mess food, the brightest thing at a girl’s pyjama party. She reminded her fans, her passionate lovers, her lifelong devotees of Ma kaa pyaar – unconditional, uncomplicated, a little unhealthy and filled with calories.

Maybe this is what made her so charming – the sin factor. Her bad girl appeal made her all the more desirable. The more your parents told you to stay away from her, the more you lusted for her.

Monday, October 12, 2015

An Open Letter by an Aggrieved Bhains

Also published on Huffington Post India
Clicked by my dear husband

Dear Gais and their children,

We’ve always known that our steaks are low compared to our fair-skinned sisters, the holy Gai. For centuries we have been subjected to unfair treatment simply by virtue of our skin colour. Yet, nobody even bothered to ask us how it felt to be treated like a piece of beefcake. Not a single feminist organisation came to our rescue or raised slogans on our behalf. If Cow is your Maa, doesn’t that make us your aunty? Is this how the world’s greatest culture that gave the world Cowmasutra, treats its aunties!

Is being born dark such a great sin that you’ll focus only at our inner boti and harbour unholy thoughts about us! We’ve suffered the indignities heaped on us with silence. We tolerated the blatant racism that even our shit is subjected to. Despite grazing at the same garbage bins and munching on the same plastic bags and bottles, cowdung is venerated and our shit gets equated to bullshit your elected representatives try to pass off as wisdom!

And now shit has hit the hoof.

Things have come to such a low for us that even the lowly goat has started getting more respect than us. Bhainsbehens association of India (BHAI) was far from amoosed when Union Minister Giriraj Singh equated goats and cows to Ma-behens of Indian mankind. In fact, few of our behens are feeling suicidal and considering storing mutton dressed as beef in their refrigerator.

What about us? Do we mean nothing to you? Does your heart not tremble when you don’t lynch men for daring to treat us as their lunch!

Dear children of cows, you are committing a grave mistake by pitting BHAI against GAI. We will no longer take it lying down. We shall rise on all fours and like Arvind Grazeliwal start a raita phelao andolan.

I don’t mean to brag. Rahul Gandhi has shown keen interest in having fodder with us. He’s also masticating on the possibility of empowering our lot. It is learnt from reliable sources that he’s arranging Jupiter's escape velocity for our upliftment.

Asha Bhainsle, spokesperson of BHAI has been contacted by none other than Arnab Gaiswami to appear on his show to debate on - Is Bhains the General Category of the Animal Caste system – The Nation Wants to Know! Or worse, are we the weaker sex!