She walks in made-up beauty
By Saurabh Malik
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Nov 23 — Packaged beauties — the drugstore complexioned mannequins with forged airs — are on the move.

Provocative eyes tainted with blue contact lenses adore the bleached fair visage in the mirror as the 'knocker' sweeps the impressive lashes with champagne shade mascara.

Reposing on a plastic chair in Panjab University's coffee house, she brushes golden moisturising powder, lightly. Brightened up, she slips the reflector back in the duffel bag. The second-year student is all 'made up' for her routine tryst with English literature.

In Top-of-the-Pop days on Doordarshan in the 80s, Burgundy 'lippers' and metallic black nail enamels were for songbirds, later for VJs on MTV and Channel V. "For collegiates beauty was in simplicity," feels Ritu Kochhar, the director of a national fashion designing institute. "Real make-up was for marriages or for the married."

Henna was applied by pretty damsels often. But not always for that brown tinge in dark hair. Week after week glove-guarded hands gently rubbed the herb for camouflaging the glaring testimony of dwindling youth.

"Otherwise it was just red or maroon lipsticks. At the most roose-dabbing for all those missionless afternoon strolls on the geri route," recalls ex-captain Rajneesh Talwar, owner of a card and gift shop on the Panjab University campus.

Not today. Golden streaks gush out from among the silky brown tresses as ammonia-free hair colour modernises smalltown-girl Sandhya into new millennium's 'earth angel' with inviting looks. Purple eye shadow mixes passion with her counterfeit charms.

"I love flirting with purple," asserts the second-year undergraduate. "Simply irresistible is how I look with the rich tones of the shade on my well-defined lips. I wear these in high gloss for the dramatic evening look. For the day looks, I go in for matte texture."

Friend Romila uses eye shadows in mauves and gold. For lipsticks shouldering red, earthy brown and bashful pink are her hot favourites. As a finishing touch, she sweeps a little bit of woodrose onto her cheeks.

She also drives to the saloon twice a month for getting 'few strands from the front and the back separated and then brushed with hydrogen peroxide'.

"Experiments are welcome," reveals Tanvi, running a beauty parlour in Sector 18. "Often you have girls toying with the idea of getting the hair cut close into the scalp at the back and spiked slightly at the top."

Little surprising that daddy's earnings go not in purchasing leather handbags, chiffon and raw silk salwar kameezes, waist-length beads or even course books, but in acquiring lip rouges and foundation creams.

Ruchika of Panjab University pulls out Rs 250 from her wallet for every stick of transfer resistant 'won't-kiss-off' lipstick in chocolate and coffee hues. Her nail enamel costs Rs 85 and eye shadow Rs 225. For her 21st birthday, she made her 'guy' gift water-tight mascara. Not expensive, costing just Rs 125.

"Assertion of individuality, brazen display of boldness, it is," declares young sociologist Geetanjali Kapoor. "The look is unconventional. It is daring. Old taboos have no meaning — is the message."

Obsession with cosmetics is dangerous, warn psychologists. Harmful to the skin initially, damaging to the psyche ultimately — is how they describe the aftermath.

Psychologist Susmita Ghosh infers, "Preoccupation with body as a means to impress, assert and compete, with the aid of artificial cosmetics, has a deviating effect on one's true personality. The exhibitionist tendency forces an unrealistic demand on one's looks, appearance, eventually proving to be frustrating. Instead of giving confidence, the desperation to look more gorgeous than one really is, or can be, is harmful to a person's self esteem."

She explains, "It is one's values, good qualities — the character — which lends substance and beauty, not the stunning colours of nails or the price tag on shoes or the dress."

Even doctors warn against prolonged use of cosmetics. "The statutory warning — excessive use is injurious to skin — is missing on luring packages," says a skin specialist. "Some cosmetics, banned abroad, popular here, contain harmful ingredients but the companies do not talk about these under the cover of trade secrets' plea."

""Everyday we receive patients with skin-related problems, including irritation and discolouration due to indiscriminate use of cosmetics. The reason is not hard to see. Prolonged use of any drug develops resistance. We do not have safe alternatives in India like non-allergic or hypo-allergic skin creams," says the specialist.

Monkey rescue home planned
By Varinder Singh
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Nov 23 — Faced with a problem of surplus stock of wild animals, particularly monkeys of different closed down zoos in the state, the Punjab Wildlife Department has proposed to set up a monkey rescue home at a vacant space adjoining the Deer Park at Neelon in Ludhiana district.

As the Central Zoo Authority has closed down mini zoos in Sangrur, Amritsar, Bathinda, Ludhiana, Khatkar Kalan and the local mini zoo at the Punjab Raj Bhavan here, the department was facing the problem of accommodating animals, particularly monkeys, in the already overcrowded Chatt Bir Zoo. What has complicated the problem was that the department had recently seized a number of illegal zoos operating in different parts of the state, including the one run by a saint in Gurdwara Mehdiana in district Ludhiana.

A maximum number of these animals were monkeys, most of which were either rowdy or injured, creating nuisance for the officials as well as people. The department has in its custody nearly 100 such animals, most of which, in the absence of a proper place have been kept at the zoos from where they had been captured.

At present the department has no place, except the Chatt Bir Zoo, where these animals could be kept or treated. The department felt that the problem could be solved to a great extent only if a rescue centre was set up in the state for which the Neelon Deer Park was the best place for its central location.

The department, in a letter to the Central Zoo Authority, has suggested that at least four enclosures, each of these having a capacity of housing 15 to 20 animals should be set up at the place, besides constructing a boundary wall. The department has also sought to purchase a tranquillising gun for controlling rowdy simians. The entire project involves an expenditure of Rs 9 lakh. The centre will be managed by the existing staff of the park.

According to Mr Gurmeet Singh, Director, Punjab Wildlife, the Central Zoo Authority has assured to provide a grant towards the project and an authority team comprising Mr P.K. Singh, its member-Secretary, has already inspected the proposed place where the centre was to be set up.

"The centre will be of great help as the population of monkeys would be checked by sterilising the captured ones," he said. Mr Gurmeet Singh said the animals would not be used for public display and the purpose of the exercise was to keep them in natural environs till their natural death.

Home gardening tips

* Beware, the cold has set in. Shift your ornamental plants to protection.

* Provide protection to newly-planted evergreen fruit plants against cold.

* Protect seedlings of brinjal, tomato, chilli and capsicum from the cold.

* Harvest grapefruit and sweet orange. These are ready by now.

* Harvest haldi, adrak and shakarkandi.

* While irrigating chrysanthemum with hose pipe, avoid spraying water on blooms.

* Watch rose buds for aphids. Control by spraying rigor or malathion at one ml to a litre of water.

— Satish Narula