Seeing Things

Mankind has a lot to thank Mahatama Gandhi but I have my own, special reason to thank him for. In 2000, I won a couple of beauty pageant titles. Miss Chennai being the grandest of them all. Would you believe it if I told you that Mahatma Gandhi had a role to play in my first ever win of a beauty contest? Well, those were the days when the notorious bandit Veerappan was still alive and causing havoc in the areas in and around the forests of Tamilnadu , Kerala and Karnataka . 2000 was the year he had kidnapped Kannada actor, Dr. Rajkumar . When the local beauty pageant, Miss Adayar was being held in Chennai, the actor was still being held hostage somewhere in the dense forests where Veerapan had established his lair. The question posed to me was ,"f you were sent, by the government, as a mercenary to Veerapan's camp in an attempt to free RajKumar , how would you go about it?" A little heavy for a mere beauty pageant contestant, don't you think? But luckily for me...

As I sat surfing channels idly few days ago, I stopped at a visual I didn't want to believe. It was news of a man (of Indian origin) making a mockery of Mahatma Gandhi. Yes the news stated that the video had created a national outrage and that the maker was asked to make a public apology. But it worried me nonetheless. There are too many people in our country today who are ignorant (or have forgotten what they learnt in history lessons in school) about India's struggle for freedom. They don't know that this lanky, bald old man was named the "father of the nation”. Even if they did their limited minds don't feel curious as to why a weak-looking old man with scanty clothes would be given such a huge status. It worried me that such people may actually find this video extremely funny. They may watch it repeatedly and laugh repeatedly. That aside, here's the lensewiping part: I exclaimed to my friends that I could shoot Gautham Prasad (the guy who made the film) dea...