A modern all-Indian fantasy tale

Once upon a time, there was a country named Paradise. It had an ancient history, was once the richest country in the world and was freed from evil oppressors by a revolutionary who channeled ancient principles to unite all citizens to a cohesive non-violent unit that the colonial power had no answer to. 

However, not all was well of late. There was trouble in Paradise. Once the colonial powers left, the government that the Paradisans created was slowly but steadily taken over by evil aliens. The aliens looked, spoke and acted exactly the same as the honest, upright Paradisans. In fact, they were identical to the Paradisans in all aspects but one. They were corrupt!!! However, some aliens purported to be representatives of the paradisans and regularly contested elections against one another, just so people have the illusion of choice.

While the Paradisans lived a life that was a mix of idealism and pragmatism, their honesty was never questionable. They never lied, they never faked expenses to avail tax benefits, they never possessed any black money (they always sold houses without taking any black money), they never overcharged customers or hoarded goods in short supply, they never paid bribes to policemen to be let off with a smaller fine than the just punishment for their traffic violations.

Meanwhile, the aliens had eaten much of the innards of the Paradise public life and had lost all fear of being punished for their actions. The aliens siphoned off huge sums of money to foreign lands, making the Paradisans poor and miserable. The honest Paradisans were distraught and outraged, but there was nothing they could do about the bad aliens that were controlling their life. They felt that the aliens just took over from the departing colonial powers and they had never enjoyed freedom at all. Their hopes and dreams were crushed by aliens (even though the aliens were a microscopic proportion of the numbers of Paradisans). Paradise was unraveling before their very eyes.

Then one fine summer morning, a white knight came riding from the horizon. He was accompanied by a band of decorated knights in rainbow cloaks. All the knights were Paradisans of unquestionable integrity (like all the other Paradisans). In fact, so unquestionable that questioning the integrity of any of them would forever taint the credentials of the person asking the questions. The white knight had with him a sheet of paper. The sheet of paper was the deliverance Paradisans had been waiting for. The sheet of paper was also one of unquestionable intent. Questioning its intent, pointing to logical flaws and logistic impossibilities would turn the questioner into an alien.

The knights and the aliens battled long and hard. The battle reached epic proportions, and every Paradisan was directly backing the knights by burning hydrocarbons to cause illumination and by recording missed calls on communication devices. The knights channeled the energies and ancient principles used by the revolutionary (mentioned before) in letter and spirit. Long story short, Knights 1, Aliens 0. The age of the aliens had passed. It was a new dawn.

After the victory, the knights set about implementing the instructions in the sheet of paper. They recruited the services of 20,000 of the honest incorruptible Paradisans to find the aliens hiding in Parliament and government buildings and hang them. The knights and the legion of 20000 (their pals) also set about to get back the wealth of Paradise that the aliens had looted. Turns out, it was easier than it seemed. All the white knight had to do was skip a few meals for a few days and the dragon hoarding all the wealth got scared and returned all the money to the pals. The pals used all this money to develop Paradise, and also handed out the money back to the honest Paradisans by means of credits to their bank accounts.  The elections were now contested only by honest Paradisans and not aliens.

Also, the air was cleaner, the sun rose from the west and Paradisans lifespans were now doubled. All was well. It's just another day in paradise.

Aarection

So there's this Indian movie "Aarakshan" (reservation), apparently about the reservation system in Indian colleges, that has been raising quite some hackles of late. A few politicians have banned the movie from playing in cinemas in their states, ostensibly to prevent social unrest, but actually to showcase themselves as protectors of the backwards' causes, for obvious electoral reasons. The stage was set for a debate on whether reserving 50% of the seats in higher education (and elite institutions) in favor of socially backward classes would achieve equality of opportunity and correct historic wrongs apparently committed by my ancestors against yours, or if that agenda has been hijacked by populist politicians (reservations were supposed to last for just 10 years post independence) who are willfully destroying the Indian education system by creating an entitlement system, lowering standards, ignoring merit, wasting scarce resources and driving wedges between youth of different sections of society. Aarakshan had an opportunity to look into all aspects of reservation.

But, ‎Aarakshan is not about reservation. It is about Hitler+Anna (Hazard)+Eddard (Stark) fighting against.. errr... coaching centers.

Plot outline

The plot was a refresher course on how most Indian movies have a  meandering incoherent weak plot punctuated with needless songs, hamming and bad-guys-that-look-obviously-evil-thus-preventing-confusion-and-divided-loyalties. So, Amitabh is this superhero in the field of education, principal of a college, with everyone falling at his feet, ruling his kingdom with an iron fist and principles. Then reservation arguments last 10 minutes. Misquoted by media due to a tutorial villain, he loses his job. He loses his house to the same villain, who has opened a coaching center in the very house of our superman, just to spite him. After much victimization, our superman finally fights tutorials by providing free tuitions in a cowshed and destroys the evil coaching center guy. The end. They should've named it "Super Tabela" or "Aaarrrrgh". However, "Aarakshan" will lead to more publicity. Hence the name.

Comic relief

Sudden song-dance routines in the first half, some random love story (so that we can have the aforementioned songs), a phone call from Cornell with a number starting +9122 (the dialing code for Mumbai in India), very clean slums, a hotel that doubles up as a residence presumably having very low tariffs ... errrr.... etc

Climax

A 30 minute Tian'anmen square meets 300 (Battle of thermopylae) standoff .... The coaching center villain (who teaches like millions of students and has investments of like 12 lac crore INR but is threatened by a one-man free operation) has used his influence to get the government to repossess its own land which was being used for the free tuition center. They break open the gate with heavy machinery to find all cowshed school students (all brave 800 of them) and Amitabh's ragtag bunch of educators (Superman, a dalit, a rich boy, a brahmin and a woman, but no muslim #OUTRAGE). Then the guy with the demolition machinery leaves his vehicle to join the 800, creating an instant hero. The scene brought a tear to many an eye. Mainly because of the ten dollar ticket price...

Product placement

So this Indian Plywood manufacturer gets a word in as a special mention. The transformation of a cowshed into an open air gurukul was apparently helped by them. They also get screen time in the climax shots as a big advertisement hoarding in the background.

Final word

I'd rate the movie a 3 on 10. All 3 points for the unintentional humor. Watch it if you can get a decent torrented version. :-P

Silver lining

Reservation enters public discourse. It is blasphemy to suggest that undeserved handouts should be up for debate. The entire Indian political system is based on handing out unmonitored ineffective placebo handouts to the idiot classes in return for their votes.

Note

I am strongly against reservation. The solution of the claimed historic wrongs to weaker sections of society is better primary education and increased number of quality seats and infrastructure in higher education. It is not easy, but we've been sleeping for 60+ years while the system rotted. The fix has to be long term, and would probably take a couple of decades if we work in full earnest. Helicoptering in disadvantaged classes into higher education is painful for the teachers, for the weaker students themselves and for the other students. However, it is the way to fake short term progress, and given the Indian IQ of 80, can easily distract crowds till the next circus starts. The proponents of reservation want the benefits in perpetuity - children and grandchildren of the no-longer-oppressed are also entitled to the benefits. Well, if even an advantageous playing field cannot "uplift" the backward castes, the reservation system does not address the original intent, 'innit? All this could've been debated in the movie.

But Aarection is not about reservation.