Santosh, the first paragraph alone had me in splits.
Why is it that Indian movies in all cities are shown in the crappiest part of town? And awful theaters too I’ve resolved to watch Indian movies only on DVD from now on..

the first paragraph alone had me in splits.

Glad u liked it

Why is it that Indian movies in all cities are shown in the crappiest part of town?

The movie tickets were $5. I guess cost comes before safety for us desis. Just speaking for myself but I would’ve rather paid $8 or even $10 to watch a movie in a better theater in a safer area.

Santosh,
You beat me to it - I had planned a nice review of Jodha Akbar .Yes, I actually liked the movie.No ,I am not ashamed of it

man the movie was long asssed .. and i caught it at regal cinemas up in nu jarsey .. and to my surprise, they did have an actual intermission when all the desi uncles lined up to get popcorn n nachos cheej .. i thot raza murad would have voiced the opening lines better than the big bee ..

only if it was 40 mins shorter .. but then its gowariker ..

Runa,
I’m ambivalent about the movie. Shorten the movie, cut the songs and the tears and I might’ve actually liked it. As for a review, feel free to do one on your own. I’m sure our reviewing ishtyles are vastly different.

desigooner,
I agree on the length. I thought it was at least 1 hr too long. I also think they should’ve used Naseeruddin Shah for the voice over. But I guess Big B gave them a discount because of his D-I-L.

This was a riot.

I love the broken english dialect.

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Santosh says the Muslims “screwed the glorious nation”.
What nation in 1011? Was there one?

Just poverty stricken masses, huts and shacks and a few rajas here and there.
There was no culture to speak of - no archtecture, no gardens, fine arts or records. It’s the Muslims who brought all this and in the process civilised the natives.

Has anyone read “Babur Nama – Journal of Emperor Babur”?
Edited by Dilip Hiro [Penguin, pg 385, price: Rs 350]

The founder of the Mughal Empire in India was Babar and his autobio, Babarnama is rated among the finest account by a great conqueror. He started it in the very year 1494 CE when he was 12.
The writings describes the royal comforts, military campaigns, the hardships of his travels or the joys of merry-making. Written in Turkish, Babarnama is a fascinating record of the triumphs and tragedies of its author which transcended personal particulars to become a unique historical document of Central Asia, Afghanistan and India. Sadly the Hindus kept no records.

In 1525, at the age of 42, Zahiruddin Muhammed Babur –prince, emperor, founder of the Mughal dynasty – made his 5th and last expedition to Hindustan from Kabul.
He did not like his new domain. The climate– the heat and the ‘pestilential’ winds -oppressed him.
Babar had multiple talents – as architect and two-planner; calligrapher; musician; dedicated gardener; battlefield strategist.
His first sight of Hindustan moved him to lyricism as “another world, other birds and other customs of class and hordes. We were amazed…”
There is much mention of morning draughts of wine and the eating of majoun, an opium confection. When he was ill, he believed he could cure himself by writing poetry; during one illness (bowel inflammation with fever and chills), he composed 52 lines a day for 15 days.

But he is most often quoted for the best-known passage in the Babarama:
“Hindustan is a country of few charms. Its people have no good looks. Of social intercourse, paying and receiving visits, there is none; of genius and capacity none; of manners none; in handicraft and work of form or symmetry, method or quality none; no good horses, no good dogs, no grapes, musk-melons or first-rate fruits; no ice or cold water; no good bread or cooked food in bazaars; no hot baths; no colleges; no torches, candles or candlesticks.”

So good old Hindustan was a pretty backward place - nothing glorious about it. So let’s not get carried away by emotion. Let’s be grateful.

Santosh says the Muslims “screwed the glorious nation”.

The “Mard Tangewala” man voice at the beginning of the movie says that, I only parachute phrase. Why you get carried away by emotional?

Btw,
Some Muslim invaders raped and pillaged, some gave us gardens and cold water, some did both. If you’re saying that we would’ve never gotten these if not for the invaders, you’re simply speculating on history.

Santosh, like many emotion-driven Indians, you are not able to offer a fitting response to what I said. You just try to stray away from the main point and mutter something inconsequntial. The point at issue is that Hindustan was a grimy and grotty until the invaders came - whether the Mughals or the British. And the horror is - it is still largely grimy and squalid today.

Look at India’s urban centres today - the pervasive poverty, the ramshackle structures, the chaos, the lack of drainage and sanitation. It’s OK for the business class to chant about the 8% growth rate but a third of Indians earn less than a $1 a day and three-quarters less than $2 a day.

Everything in India tends to be sub-standard (apart from a few like Infosys, WIPRO or TCS). In a global survey of universities done a couple of years, British & US universities were in the top 10, East Asians like Hong Kong, Soeul, Singapore, Beijing were in the top 20 while not a single Indian appeared in the top 200!!
In another survey, reported in the NYT, they admitted that India produces thousands of engineers. But barely 1 in 4 are employable.
So quality always evades the Indians. Or look at the Bolly moviews - silly melodramas most of them. No wonder they fail to get Oscars or Palm d’Or whereas the Chinese and Koerans have won several.

The solution? India needs more invaders - this time invite the Chinese, Koreans and Japanese to instruct the Indians on quality of institutions, infrastructure etc.

Santosh, like many emotion-driven Indians, you are not able to offer a fitting response to what I said.

Au contraire, I think you’re so enamored by anything non-Indian you’re just nitpicking.

You just try to stray away from the main point and mutter something inconsequntial

Coming from someone who hijacked a movie review thread. Pot meet kettle.

And the horror is - it is still largely grimy and squalid today.

I think you’re confusing socio-economic poverty for cultural poverty. If the economic status of the same people improved would they still live in squalor? I think not.

It’s OK for the business class to chant about the 8% growth rate but a third of Indians earn less than a $1 a day and three-quarters less than $2 a day.

So what do you suggest we do? Go back to socialism or even worse, communism?

Everything in India tends to be sub-standard

Generalize much.

(apart from a few like Infosys, WIPRO or TCS).

Since you’re so enamored by them, quick, name the top Chinese companies without googling it.

In a global survey of universities done a couple of years, British & US universities were in the top 10, East Asians like Hong Kong, Soeul, Singapore, Beijing were in the top 20 while not a single Indian appeared in the top 200!!

Surely you could provide us with a link to that article or some kind of proof.

In another survey, reported in the NYT, they admitted that India produces thousands of engineers. But barely 1 in 4 are employable.

In another separate survey, you mean.I actually agree with that finding, but was that a comparative study or just once concentrated on India? If it was comparative how does India compare to the rest of the world?
All it shows is that the engineering education system which is mostly handled by the government is broken.

Or look at the Bolly moviews - silly melodramas most of them. No wonder they fail to get Oscars or Palm d’Or whereas the Chinese and Koerans have won several.

Again I agree with you on the point that the quality of our movies need to be improved. But winning an Oscar is not always indicative of the quality of a movie. Crouching Tiger won an Oscar for crying out loud. Often its the hype more than the substance. Besides the movie the Indian government sends to the Oscar are not necessarily the best Indian movie. Indian movies can sure do with an infusion of variety, that is the only thing we agree on. Everything else seems to be generalized to fit your POV.

The solution? India needs more invaders - this time invite the Chinese, Koreans and Japanese to instruct the Indians on quality of institutions, infrastructure etc.

Oh wait, Is the World flat? Anyone? Anyone?

Look you make some good points on the problems facing India. All I’m saying that it is incredibly presumptuous of you to speculate on history the way you are.

I live in London and the British are forever displaying Chinese art and culture in their museums and national Library (such as the terracota army, their art & design creations, their new Manhua Comics genre (expected to challenge japanese manga, etc))
The Brits are in awe of the Chinese - they fuss about the Chinese New Year, whereas Indian events are dismissed as humdrum and devoid of intellectual stimulus.

About Chinese companies & stuctures: heard of Lenova computers? Or the Olympic wonder structures being constructed? Or the latest Beijing airport terminal?

Let me quote what Lord Bhikku Parekh (who is also professor of political science) said recently in London (Nehru Centre on 6th Feb). He lamented the decline of India’s universities. He flatly declared: “I cannot think of any university in India where I could send one of my children or grandchildren.”
There is a lack of an intellectual tradition and culture of excellence. There is little high quality research output. Even for Sanskrit research, a foreign university like Chicago was in the forefront.

As a result of the mediocre standards, Parekh finds India’s educated middle classes are ‘intellectually superficial’, not given to reading serious literature; having difficulty understanding editorials, not fond of patronizing the Arts. As a substitute for their poverty of intellect, they indulge in vulgar displays of wealth.

So how bad are Indian higher institutions? Here are some quotes:
i) Of a global survey of universities conducted in 2006, US and British universities were in the top 10; East Asian universities like Beijing, Seoul, Hong Kong were in the top 20. Not a single Indian university appeared in the top 200. [I have misplaced the precise source, sorry]

ii) New York Times (Oct 17, 2006) published an article that India still produces plenty of engineers, nearly 400,000 a year at last count. But their competence has become the issue; only 1 in 4 is employable.

iii) Economic Times (June 29, 2007 on the quality of Indian research:
The Science Watch team of Thomson ISI, a global leader in providing access to essential information for researchers and scholars worldwide compared India with China:
“China published more than twice the number of papers as India’s. China had more than three times the number of the most cited 1% papers then India. Only 0.33 per cent of Indian papers could get into the one per cent of most cited papers, whereas for China and South Korea the figure was 0.52 per cent.
“Indian scientists need to do better quality research work and be provided with better facilities…”

A NATION UNDER SIEGE
The gross inequalities from India’s skewed development have generated a groundswell of anger and resentment among the masses, especially over the grab of their land by multinational companies and the plunder of mountain, river and forest resources. Aggrieved groups no longer suffer in silence and have taken up arms;
Parekh said that one quarter of India is now under some form of armed insurgency. The most organized group is the Maoists – members of the Communist Party, CPI (Maoist). They are active in at least 16 of the India’s 33 states. PM Manmohan Singh conceded in 2006 that the Maoists are “India’s biggest internal security threat”. To him, they are just terrorists.

Activist Arundati Roy offered a more realistic appraisal (the Hindu, 29Apr06):
“The Maoists are not terrorists. Taking land from the poor and calling it development is really pushing India to revolt; several states are on the verge of civil war - spearheaded by the Maoists who now control huge swathes of land in India. The Indian Government has learned nothing. It has tried repression in Kashmir, in Manipur, in Nagaland and has got nowhere. Now it’s ready to turn its army on its own people.
The Maoist phenomenon has arisen because democratic institutions have slammed the doors in their faces. The problem is social injustice; the solution must be social justice…”

India has a long way to go. Shouting about growth rate is not the answer.

Edsa,

You make some good points. I agree with the general points you make, but some of your numbers are way off.

- I agree, for one thing, that the latest world university rankings shows a couple of Chinese universities ahead of us. But Peking is not exactly in the top 20, but actually ranks between 203-304. The link is here. And this study is conducted by a Chinese university every year.

- But yes, Tsinghua University is ranked between 151-202 whereas IISc is 305-402. So it’s true that the Chinese are ahead of us. I also don’t know what the various factors are that they considered - but I am guessing we score poorly on infrastructure.

- In terms of actual research quality of the students, certainly these same Indian and Chinese students/researchers fare no different in the US. The one difference being that Indian researchers have the advantage of being much more proficient in English, which means they can articulate their points much better.

- It’s not 1 in 4 Indian engineers who are employable, it’s 7 out of 10. The issue here again is lack of proficiency in English, and lack of engineering skills due to poor quality of infrastructure.. But I’d also like to know what the comparable statistics are for Chinese engineers. Their English language skills are even worse than those of rural Indians.

Having said this, I agree that India has a long way to go. So does China. If India is dirty and there is pervasive poverty, so has China. There is a huge difference between quality of life in urban and rural China.

But we should not benchmark ourselves against China, we should benchmark ourselves against the best. As I said, there is certainly room for improvement.

As I said, you make some good points (even if your numbers are way off), but you completely lose all credibility when you go on to make statements like “India needs to be invaded again”.

Edsa,
I also wonder why you could not find that ranking link when I could it instantly - maybe because you realized that the actual rankings don’t support your claim?

Chinese culture, IMO, it’s so great that it flourishes to this day despite the Maoists, certainly not because of them. I think Indian and Chinese cultures have a lot to offer and learn from each other.

As for your love for Maoists and feeble attempt to quote Arundhati Roy:

Taking land from the poor and calling it development ………

I’m sorry but I had to laugh out loud when I read that.
Have you ever heard of a place named Nandigram where a communist government did what? Anyone? Anyone? Where were your beloved Maoists then?

As for calling the Maoists terrorists, that is one thing I’ll agree with Manmohan Singh on.

Just to sum up your arguments - you live in Britain, where the most popular food is chicken tikka masala, and apparently they like Chinese culture (can’t blame them for that). So the silver bullet, in your opinion, is for communist China to invade India to educate the primitives there on Chinese culture, so Brits can like Indian culture again. And your random statistics prove just that.

We primitives get it now. The sad part about your posts is that you made some really good points on the need to overhaul the engineering education system in India and similar topics until you lost me with some outlandish remarks. Now if you will excuse us, we primitives have a movie to discuss. So, did you watch Jodhaa Akbar? How would you rate the movie?

Lekhni, I am glad you entered the discussion.
I find you objective and coherent compared with our friend Santosh.
I honestly misplaced the reference I quoted on global university survey. It was conducted in Europe or US, I think. Anyway, Lekhni, I am obliged to you for citing another source but as you see even there Indian universities are nowhere to be found.
Let me reassure that I am not out to knock India just for the heck of it. What’s the point?

What bothers me is focus on the Indian fondness for the trivial rather than the substantive, seen on desi sites. Then there is the sloppy argument, muddled or illogical flow of ideas, unsupported or emotional assertions. Indians do tend to be swayed by emotion - in contrast emotion or irrationality annoys the educated European. That’s why Indians tend to bore. They have difficulty explaining their history, culture or religion without losing the central thread and getting carried away.

Note how eager Santosh is to get back to the Akbar movie - I agree I deflected from the original theme because Santosh’s remark that “Muslims screwed the glorious nation” had to be challenged. Thereafter, the discussion moved on to more fundamental issues.
I bumped into UBER DESI recently and I wish they would have room for serious discussion on the hard issues.

By the way, I did watch Akbar - for 2 hours up to the interval. That was enough for me - I got the drift. The film is technically impressive, especially the battle scenes. But it is essentially a children’s fairy tale, that has taken historical liberties. And as usual for Bolly, no complex plot nor intellectual stimulation.

I think Akbar deserves to be remembered for his statesmanship, tolerance, fondness for discourse, promotion of culture - Amartya Sen’s book “Argumentative Indian” has high praise for Akbar.
But the Bolly folks will not be able to do him justice - they focus is on the trivial and emotional. They have no room for the intellect.

They have difficulty explaining their history, culture or religion without losing the central thread and getting carried away.

I wonder if that’s because reducing such issues to a central thread is too simplistic anyway - what’s the central thread of a culture? “We respect our elders” or “We believe in family values”?

And isn’t the central thread of every religion the same - there is a God and we should believe?

Honestly, people spend entire lifetimes understanding Hinduism, understanding Indian culture. How can anyone explain it so easily?

On movies- I haven’t seen Jodhaa Akbar yet, but if you like intellectual stimulation, you are watching the wrong genre entirely. In general, all the hits are “commercial” movies made for the mass market. You will probably like Bollywood’s “art movies” better.

Or even in commercial movies, try watching “Manorama Six Feet Under”.

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