m a n u s c r y p t s

Amit Varma

‘My friend Sancho’ is the debut novel of Amit Varma, made famous by the blog ‘India Uncut’, which incidentally, is given quite a few plugs in the book. A blogger’s work – that explains why i picked it up.
The book revolves around Abir, a journalist on the crime beat, who happens to be around during a police shootout, when he was only expecting to cover a routine arrest. It gets more complicated when he is asked to do a story on the victim, which leads to his friendship with Muneeza (Sancho), the victim’s daughter, who is sure that her father was innocent, and is unaware that Abir was present at the scene.
Whether the book delivers or not depends on what you expect out of it. If you are looking for profundity that would make you contemplate the vagaries of the universe, you’d be better off looking elsewhere. But if you’re just looking for a light read, and a protagonist whom you’d find easy to relate to (net surfing, wise cracking guy who is still not sure what to do with his life) then you wouldn’t mind this book.
I did expect the humour quotient to be higher than delivered, but it’s still not bad. The lizard, though it only has a ’special appearance’ is entertaining. I also quite liked the way the story ended.

Pinki Virani

This is the best ‘Bombay’ book i’ve ever read. It shows us a view of Bombay through the images of characters that even non residents will identify as belonging to Bombay – the actor, the bhai, the encounter cop, the politician, and so on. Pinki Virani obviously feels for Bombay, and reflects the myriad range of a Bombayite’s emotions now – anger, frustration, cynicism all stemming from Bombay’s change from then to now
What’s wonderful about the book is that it stays true to the title and takes you on a journey in time – to how a place or a road came to be called so, and the societal changes that time has brought about there. It also has some incisive takes on the machinations that has transformed Bombay into what it is now.
Long before Mumbai there was Bombay, and i can identify a lot with the difference it makes to the people who have seen the change, even though i don’t live there. This book easily gets into my all time favourites.

I recently read a book on Bombay by Pinki Virani, and have promptly classified it under my all time favourites list. The book, by sheer virtue of tone and content, appealed to me, but on a personal level, it gave me some answers on my quite recently acquired unfavourable stance on Mumbai. Since this is a subject of my chat ‘wars’ with many Mumbai friends, let me say that this is a very considered personal view, and based on subjective experiences. And like subjective experiences go, it may have led to creation or reinforcing of stereotypes that may have further colored my view of the city. So, don’t mind.

I used to love Bombay. Right from the 2.5 days of train journey that took me there. The two months of stay there were enjoyed – Shivaji Park was a common destination across the years, the other location shifted from Anushakti Nagar (BARC Township) to Peddar Road to Malabar Hill. I still remember the second hand comics store in Anushakti nagar – Spiderman, Superman, Batman etc – the entities that captured my imagination in my school days, I have bought quite a few from there; the long walks around Shivaji Park, and the temple which gave away those white sugary balls ; the hunt for fancy ‘name slip stickers’, which would adorn my school books and draw envious stares from my classmates in Cochin, who couldn’t get it there; the eagerly awaited trips to Akbarallys; the South indian hotel (Anand/Arya Bhavan) in Matunga whose waiters my sis later scandalised by asking for Maggi noodles, and finally, the ‘oh, its over’ feeling when we started the journey home, from VT.

Yes, Bombay of those days remains a sweet memory. My last 2 month stay was in 1993, when it was still Bombay. Barring occasional 1-2 day trips, we stopped seeing each other since then, and somewhere down the line i started to cringe when I had to make official trips to the city. I dont know if its Mumbai that spoiled the affectionate awe that I had for Bombay, but maybe that’s just romanticism.

Cities change, as do people. I am tolerant of pride, whether it be in people or cities, my irritation starts when pride turns to arrogance. Arrogance that brings with it an unhealthy disrespect for anything that’s not associated with the city. Yes, every city is special, but that does not mean it should take away from other cities… they are special in their own way. And that goes for people too.

When a person like me, whose only associations with the city are from the holidays spent there, can feel a change, i can imagine, how, at least some Bombayites feel about the transformation their city has undergone. The author says a lot with just the title – ‘Once was Bombay’. I agree.

until next time, just some city zen….