Passionate About India

Uff! How vividly I remember that summer day – during the start of our summer vacations in class eleventh – when I went to watch this iconic film called QSQT. First day, first show. At the Paras cinema hall in South Delhi. All alone. Because of Juhi Chawla! Yes, only because of her, as I had become a fan of hers ever since she became Miss India! My friends had no such extra love for her and they refused to accompany me! I remember that the hall was as good as empty, with a handful of couples sitting far and wide! And what a film I enjoyed in the emptiness of that hall! For the next seven days, I kept going back to see the same movie with a different set of friends each time (with the last set of friends coming back repeatedly) as the crowds kept swelling. By the time we were watching the movie on the 8th day after buying tickets in ‘black’, QSQT was on its way to become one of the biggest blockbusters ever of Bollywood, and Aamir Khan one of the country’s biggest ever heartthrobs – at ...

In 1984, I was just 13 and way too young to know about a man called Yash Chopra. Having been brought up on just three films – The Sound of Music, My Fair Lady and Sholay (my brother, sister and I were allowed to watch the first two almost every Sunday if we wanted to, and Sholay whenever dad was in an exceptional mood!) – Mashaal was unbelievably only the second Hindi film we had been allowed to watch. Mashaal was like a cult classic! Dilip Kumar was like my father, high on principles and therefore always winning enemies; and those days, I was often made to feel like the vagabond that Anil Kapoor played in the movie. The film made me feel good, for, as Anil Kapoor changed and became a hero, I felt I also had a hero inside. My dad liked the movie not because he ever believed that he would have a role reversal in his life like Dilip Kumar had in the movie, but because watching such a role reversal at least made him happy somewhere deep inside, for very often, we all feel like hitting ba...