SIGHT & SOUND
The Mahajan serial
Amita Malik

That real life can often beat TV serials hollow has been evident over the last few weeks. Not even Ekta Kapoor could have done better. Controversial but charming politician shot by brother as he sits at home reading a newspaper. Cause generally known, but not official. Assassin goes to jail, awaits trial. Politician’s son allegedly does drugs in his late father’s official bungalow and so does his mentor, his late father’s trusted secretary. Secretary dies, son saved in the nick of time.

Posh hospital, used to VIP escapees, allegedly covers up. A number of drug peddlers, including Africans and a handsome Kashmiri boy, arrested and all sorts of delectable secrets and skeletons tumble out like the high and mighty rolling up a drug in a Rs 500 note like a cigarette for sheer style. As I said, it cannot get better.

Bollywood is bound to get this ready-made plot, complete with script and dialogue on board in no time. In fact, this film will be a splendid antithesis to Rang de Basanti and had Aamir Khan not been such a moralist, he might have done it as a sequel to Rang de Basanti. As for Ekta, I think she will still find saas-bahu more enduring than bhai-beta. No wonder we are the biggest film industry in the world. Only one catch. Now will the dances come in, even if the songs can be worked in?

As for TV, they have never had it so good. If Siddharta Pandey got the three-friends confession scoop for NDTV, a charming young Ms Mirza from the CNN-IBN got us a fascinating peep into the world of Page Three drug-takers, complete with one-line quotes from those high on heroin, cocaine and the lot. She balanced it with a touching (I mean this as a compliment) take on a former drug addict who revealed how he got de-addicted (the person’s face was not shown, mercifully).

This tape should be shown again and again as an eye-opener to others. TV also did splendid investigative stories and interviews and Aaj Tak had that dramatic moment when Sahil did a public confession in its Srinagar studio (his Mumbai lawyer later said it was all untrue and they would retract the statement).

Other confessions and denials flowed thick and fast but one of the highlights of the Mahajan serial should be the summons to six doctors of this posh hospital to the Tughlaq Road thana to be grilled. The Hippocratic oath, it seems, is still in existence although one sometimes has doubts.

The splendid double century by Wasim Jaffer lifted the spirits of Indian cricket fans and one is grateful to Star News for giving us the touching inside story of how this Mumbai lad, whose family lives in a one-room chawl in a Mumbai suburb, made it to the top. Jaffer’s father is a bus driver in Best in Mumbai. He loved cricket and wanted his two sons to become cricketers. But on a salary of Rs 450 a month, as the boys were growing up, family finances were so low that it was decided that only the younger boy, Wasim, could be given a proper bat and training.

The father continued to drive a bus, the older brother plied a three-wheeler and his mother made achaar to supplement the family income. His family just has been the proudest of all. And it says something for Indian cricket that a ticket collector’s son (Kaif), a mullah’s son (Irfan) and a bus driver’s son, no matter how adverse their circumstances, can still make it to the top. We are proud of these boys and would like to congratulate their parents.

Luckily, the conflict between cricket and tennis has been solved, as we requested last week, and while Ten Sports continues to cover the West Indies Tests, Zee Sports is giving us the French Tennis Open.

We could however do without the bright chatter from the studio jockeys who even interrupted the Hewitt-Nadal match to assure us they would cover the Indian participation. As the Indians are almost all out, we would rather see Federer, Nadal and Co., thanks very much.