Sankrantiki Vastunnamu (Telugu Movie) – a breeze of fresh air

By

S. Prabhakar

At a time when every film, every hero right from the top  5 young Telugu heroes viz., Allu Arjun, Prabhas, Ram Charan, Jr. NTR and Mahesh Babu to old and senior stars like Chiranjivi, Ballayya, Pawan Kalyan and Nagarjuna and even relatively newcomers like Vijaya Devarakonda and Nikhil are in the race to sign mega-budget movies only to be released in multi-languages simultaneously on a PAN India basis, Venkatesh has chosen a different path of going for Telugu movie made at reasonable budget only for Telugu audience for release only in two Telugu states.   This is what top Tamil star Vijay does and his stand-alone Tamil movies make anything between 200-300 crores business which is good enough and he has not ventured a PAN India movie till now.   The heartening thing is that this small-budget movie which was released without much fanfare and 80 feet cut out of Venkatesh, turned out to be a sleeper hit collecting Rs. 160 cr in 4 days and piped at the post the much-hyped (almost for 3 years) Ram Charan Shankar cambo Game Changer and Ballyya `Daku Maharaj’ on a rate of return basis.

       

                                                                   

I always maintained that every Telugu movie or South Indian movie cannot be a PAN India movie and pumping in over RS. 500 crores is not justified.    A lot of compromises have to be made to make a Telugu/south Indian movie a PAN  India movie.   The nativity is lost, movies are not rooted in the local culture, customs, traditions, and attaires and the biggest casualties has been the comedy, which has been back bone of the Telugu industry for over 6 decades.   Heros, Heroins, villain roles can make over to suit all Indian audiences, but the brand of comedy that suits a Telugu or Tamil movie can never be acceptable in any other language, especially by Hindi, Bengali or Punjabi audiences and vice versa.   As a result in all the Telugu / Tamil PAN India movies, the producer directors have completely done away with comedy whether it is Robo, Bahubali I and II, RRR, Pushpa I and II at a time when most of the Telugu movies had at least half a dozen comedians and many comedians like Rao Gopal Rao, Kota, Brahmanandam, ML Narayana, Vennala Kishore, Rajendra Prasad, and Naresh enjoyed star status.  Comedy heroes like Rajendra Prasad and Allari Naresh might have acted in more than 100 movies as heroes in purely comedy movies.    For decades Brahmanandam was the topmost and highest-paid comedian and one of the very few comedians who was conferred Padma Shri.  

Coming to the movie, it is a simple light-hearted comedy movie minus logic or reasoning.   The story is wafer thin, a top IT giant CEO who is on a visit to AP, is kidnapped by a gang and demands the release of a dreaded criminal in exchange for his release.   CM is advised to take the services of ex-top cop Venkatesh who is peacefully settled in a village with his wife and four children in a big joint family in a picturesque Godavari district.  The responsibility to bring him on the board for this assignment was put on his ex-lover and high-ranking police officer Meenakshi Chaudhuri.    From then starts a roller coaster non-stop laugh riot, first the triangle between Venkatesh, his wife and ex-lover under the same roof, then the entire gang of Venkatesh, his wife, children, and lover all set out on a mad chase of getting the dreaded criminal out of the jail and from the uncompromising and honest jailer who does not listen to anyone including CM, then the dreaded criminal getting killed and the entire gang moving around with the dead man to make believe that he is alive and ultimately rescuing the CEO.  

Anil Ravipudi hits the Bull's eye again 

The lion's share for the success of the movie should go to Anil Ravipudi, who has written the story, screenplay, dialogues and directed the movie.   Anil has developed a reputation for churning out rip-roaring comedies with top stars, from Patas to F2 and F3 (both with Venkatesh), Sarileruneekevvaru with Mahesh Babu.  After a one-off departure to action movie Bhagawat Kesari with Ballaya, he has come back to the comedy genre and delivered an entertaining hit movie.   Though there is hardly any story, it is the racy screenplay and engaging nonstop comedy that makes the movie watchable.   He succeeded in extracting comedy from almost every actor whether there are comedians or not, whether it is father and co-brothers of Venkatesh, son, wife and ex-lover, the egoistic jailer so wonderfully played by Upendra Lamaye, and Sai Kumar as his assistant (who is famous for his baritone voice and top notch dubbing artist cum actor, whom his jailer boss teases as having weak voice), Naresh as hapless CM and Ganesh as Party President.

Another appreciable thing about this movie and Anil is that though it features a top senior actor like Venakatesh, both Aishwarya Rajesh and Meenakshi Chaudhuri have an equal role and there is hardly any scene where Ventakesh is there and either of them or both of them were not there.    It is so refreshing compared to the minuscule screen time Kaira Advani got in Game Changer just to do song and dance scenes.  At a time when senior heroes on the wrong side of their 60s trying to do action scenes and still project macho image, Venkatesh is so sportive to accept a role, where after accepting the tough assignment of bring back a kidnapped CEO from a dreaded criminal, he was shown to have cramps all over the body, sprains his back trying to pick up something fallen from chair, cannot climb one floor without panting for breath and long forgotten shooting.  He is in his comic elements like in Malleswari, F2 and F3.  Aishwarya got the role of her lifetime and she did an excellent job as a jealous and possessive wife, Meenakshi is good as a cop but her comedy was bland compared to other actors.    The child actor who did Venkatesh's son stole the thunder from many seniors but I have a serious reservation in Director making the child artist mouth expletives in a couple of scenes, but thankfully though it is repeated a few times in the movie the dialogues were masked by background music.    This type of dialogues are not expected in a movie which can be termed a family-oriented comedy movie that too from a Child artists

After a long time, we had a movie whose music and songs had become super hit before the release of the movie.   Bheems Ceciroleo music and refreshing singing by Raman Gogula and Madhupriya have contributed to the success of the movie in a big way.   Godari gattumeeda Ramachilakave and Gobbiyallo Gobbiyallo were chart bursters.    Raman is the same music director who scored music and sang for many movies of Pawan Kalyan over a couple of decades back.

Dil Raju gamble pays off

Dil Raju is king of the distribution of movies in both Telugu states and is counted one of the biggest producers now.    With Game Changer he completed 50 movies as a producer.   He is so prolific dare devil producer that he not only produced the Rs. 500 crores Game Changer and medium budget Sankrantiki Vastunnamu but released both in the Sankranti season just 4 days apart, and add `Daku Maharaj’ to it and distributed all the 3 top Telugu releases in this Sankranti season and how difficult it must have been distributing screens to his own 3 movies.    That is how he bets, one had he produces mega-budget masala movies like Varasudu and Game Changer and on the other hand small budget but very successful movies like Shatamanam Bhavati and Balagam.   Once again he hit bull’s eye by medium budget Sankratiki Vastunnamu while burnt fingers with Game Changer

I hope, the grand success of Sankrantiki Vastunnamu despite stiff competition from Game Changer and Daku Maharaj in Telugu and a few more movies in other languages during Sankranti season, and get good number of screens in both Telugu states, will start a new trend and give assurance to the Telugu producers that small and medium-budget movies with Telugu nativity, a family dramas and comedies and made exclusively for Telugu audience will be well received by the audience.  Every producer need not make all compromises, or changeovers to tailor their movies for a PAN India release.   Going by rate of return, movies like Sankrantiki Vastunnam may prove to be a safer bet compared to a Game Changer. 

Strongly recommended to have a hearty laugh if you do not tax your minds for logic or reasoning.   Other language audiences may have to wait for its OTT release dubbed in other languages.

 

S. Prabhakar

18.1.2025

 

Does L&T Chairman know that his employees do more important work at home than staring at their spouse at Home

                                                                                      

By

S. Prabhakar

The L&T Chairman and Managing Director,  Mr. S N Subrahmayan, is caught in `the eye of the storm’ by his `foot in mouth’ statement' that `I am sorry that I am not able to make you work on Sundays’.  Speaking at a corporate event,  he advocated a 90-hour working week and urged the employees to consider working on Sundays. What has really triggered a backlash in social media in an unprecedented manner is his bizarre statement `What do you do sitting at Home?’  `How long can you stare at your wife?   How long can wives stare at their husbands,? Get to the office and start working.”

Such a misogynistic statement coming from L&T C&MD, which position was held dignifiedly for over two decades by Mr. Naik, is extremely indignified and bad in taste, to say the least and doesn’t behove the respectable position he is holding.

Does long working hours translate into higher productivity

Definitely not, but unfortunately we find many middle-level managers in many corporates, and now a couple of top guns like Mr. Narayana Murthy and Mr. Subhramanyan feel so.  Not only employees at all levels are expected to work for long hours, much beyond the designated working hours, but those who sit late and work on holidays from the office or home are treated to be more sincere, hard-working and making better contributions for the growth of the company and to the nation (going by the statement released by L&T).   Many times, gender inequality and gender discrimination also creep in as female employees who are married and who have children are not treated at par with their male colleagues only because of their inability to sit late and put in longer hours as expected by organisations like L&T.  

It is not uncommon in organisations whose managers and owners believe in long working hours, that employees are relaxed and laid back during working hours as they know that in any case they will be expected to sit late beyond office hours and they will be called on Sundays and holidays and working during this extra hours gets better recognition and reward.    An organisation loses in many ways in such situations, they end up paying more than what they should, and the smart and quality performers leave the organisation due to lack of recognition and reward as they lag in the race for putting up long hours of work.  

Does Indian really work less?

Surely not.  Various studies have shown that Indian employees work for longer hours and under a very stressful and toxic atmosphere.   Added to the long working hours in major cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad 2-3 hours in travelling to and fro to office bracing huge traffic jams and pollution.  

In most countries, the working hours per week are decreasing giving more stress to higher productivity.   The following are some of the countries with the shortest weekly working hours

Name of                            No. of hours 

the country                        per week            

Netherlands                              30

Denmark                                  33

Norway                                    34

Germany                                  34

Austria                                      35

Belgium                                    35

Finland                                      35

Ireland                                       35

Switzerland                                36

 

Many companies in countries like Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Denmark, Canada, France, Germany, Iceland and Ireland have gone for 4 days a week

In India, the labour legislation prescribes a 48-hour working week which most of the corporates follow, though many factories in small cities and unorganised sectors flout these labour legislations.   The IT industry and Construction industry, to which L&T belong, are infamous for making the employees slog for long hours round the clock in very punishing and odd work schedules to suit the global clients.  

                                                                                                                  

Even at 48 hours per week, Indian employees work more than the employees in the top 10 longest working week countries:

Name of the country        No. of hours 

                                           per week

Colombia                                47

Turkey                                    46

Maxico                                   45

Costorica                               45

Chile                                      43

Portugal                                 40

Isreal                                     40

USA                                      39

Latvia                                   39

Slovak Republic                  39

 

The backlash

Mr. Subrahmanyan's statement specially the part `staring at spouse’ has received the sharpest criticism in recent times.  Right from L&T employees, common people to industry leaders have reacted to it and most of them are critical of what he said and suggested a balance between the demands of an organisation and work-life balance.  

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·        RPG Enterprises Chairman Harsh Goenka expressed his disapproval on X, stating, “90 hours a week? Why not rename Sunday to 'Sun-duty' and make 'day off' a mythical concept?   He criticised the concept of a 90-hour workweek, warning of the dangers of burnout. “We need to work hard and smart, but turning work into a perpetual office shift isn’t the answer”

·       Anand Mahindra said  “long work hours - is in the wrong direction because it emphasises on quantity of working hours”.   My point is we have to focus on the quality of work, not on the quantity of work.    "What output are you doing even if it's 10 hours? You can change the world in 10 hours."   In a way he had a huge swipe on Mr. Subrahmanyan when he said wittily  “ My wife is wonderful, I love staring at her”

·       Rajiv Bajaj, MD, Bajaj Auto said “Number of hours of work doesn’t matter, quality of work does. We need a kinder, gentler world more than ever before.”

      TMC MP Mahua Moitra urged SN Subrahmanyan to ‘get a life’ “Danish engineers Larsen & Toubro founded L&T in 1938. Today Denmark ranks 3rd globally in work life balance, 9th in GDP/capita & averages 34 hrs worked/week.

·       Priyanka Chaturvedi, Shivsena MP, wrote on X, “Besides being misogynistic, this statement reeks of wanting to be the new age slave drivers of India.”

·       Richa Singh, Co-founder and CEO – Yourdost   “The narrative that longer hours automatically translate to greater success is not just outdated—it's dangerous,” 

·       Deepika Padukone said, “it's shocking to see people in such senior positions make such statements.” 

      The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) said Mr. Subrahmanyan’s statement was similar to the “satanic statement” earlier made by the Infosys founder N.R. Narayana Murthy, urging an increase in working hours to 70 hours per week through statutory measures. “It seems that there is a rogue competition among the corporate messiahs to rinse the blood and sweat of Indian workers

Taking Family responsibility is beyond `staring at spouse’

Every employee, apart from his job/professional responsibilities has family and family responsibilities to discharge which are equally important as office duties.  Ask any average employee including L&T employees, whatever they do and most importantly whatever they earn is more for the family than for themselves.   A Happy family and growing up children are great motivators for any person to do well in every walk of life including at the workplace.  

It was reported that in the financial year 2023-24, Mr. Subrahmanyan earned ₹51 crore,   This figure is 534 times higher than L&T’s median employee salary, which stood at ₹9.55 lakh in the same period.   With this salary, Mr. Subramanyan could engage dozens of domestic helps to take care of many of the household chores and tutors to take care of the education of his children.    However the majority of the L&T employees may not be able to afford domestic helps and high cost tutors and would like to rush back home to help their spouse and children and take great pleasure in it.   So Mr. Subrahmanian should be conscious of the fact that his employees have much more than `staring at their wife’ after going back home or staying at home on a Sunday.  

In every corporate, you have a bunch of people at every level, especially in the management cadre,  who boast themselves of as being `workaholics’ and may spend 70 hours or 90 hours and more than that and quite possibly they may be on a fast track in their progress to top positions.   But that should be a matter of choice left to the employees, depending on their family composition, the support they get the way they would like to manage their family responsibilities.    What works for someone like Mr. Subhramanyan or such a breed of people may not work for all the employees across the board and it is too much to expect it from all the employees.  Majority of the employees would be happy giving their best during the normal working hours and be happy with normal progress at the work place.     Any effort to implement such long working hours may prove to be counterproductive and damage the wonderful brand of L&T, which has already become but of jokes and memes on social media                                                                                 

               
                                                                          

Work-life balance

Research shows that long working hours lead to burnout, decreased productivity, and serious mental health challenges.  Overworking increases the risk of cardiovascular diseases and stroke, as well as affecting mental health. The physical and mental strain of the overworked people can start from acute physiological responses such as fatigue, stress, impaired sleep, and unhealthy lifestyle changes in response to the stress.  As per the Joint Estimates of the Work-related Burden of Disease and Injury (WHO/ILO Joint Estimates), report of WHO and the International Labour Organization (ILO), 488 million people worldwide had long working hours, and more than 7,45,000 people died in 2016 from heart disease and stroke related to working more than 55 hours per week. These figures make long working hours one of the biggest occupational health hazards.   As against this if our industry leaders Mr. Narayana Murthy and Mr. Subhramanyan prescribe 70 hours and 90 hours per week is extremely harmful to the well-being of the employees.    Recently a 26-year-old young CA of EY died due to cardiac arrest within 4 months of joining the job which was attributed to work-related stress due to additional work during non-office times.   Many young entrepreneurs have died in their late 30s or early 40s due to cardiac arrest. 

Work-life balance is a key part of a healthy and productive work environment.  These days most corporates strive hard and make sincere efforts to motivate their employees to maintain a work-life balance so that their productivity increases and they make qualitative contributions.   Not only Government offices but most of the corporates have gone in for five days a week as against L&T which is still working six days a week.   But strangely the L&T C&MD is not finding it enough and aspiring to become the first Indian company that works a seven-days-and 90 hours a week.   

These are some of the benefits that can be derived from maintaining a good work-life balance:

·       Maintaining good mental health

·       Improves physical health

·       Ability to manage work-related stress

·       Increases productivity

·       Improves relationships

·       Improves creativity

·       Becomes well well-rounded personality

·       Greater job satisfaction

·       Becomes more successful

 

The firefighting exercise by L& T

Though no further statement has come from the C&MD of L&T, the company has made some firefighting efforts.   In a statement released the company tried to defend what their C&MD said, that it reflects the company's larger vision for nation-building.   “At L&T, nation-building is at the core of our mandate. For over eight decades, we have been shaping India's infrastructure, industries, and technological capabilities. We believe this is India’s decade, a time demanding collective dedication and effort to drive progress and realise our shared vision of becoming a developed nation.  The company clarified that Subrahmanyan’s comments were intended to emphasise that “extraordinary outcomes require extraordinary effort” and reaffirmed its commitment to fostering a culture driven by “passion, purpose, and performance.”

That may not cut much ace as a country's development is not directly proportion to the number of hours its people put at their workplace.    That is demonstrated by the number of working hours per week the top 4 world economies have

Name of the country      No. of hours 

                                          per week

USA                                     39

China                                   40

Germany                             34

Japan                                   40

So whatever targets the present Government has made to make India the world's 3rd richest economy and L&T reaffirmation to this nation-building exercise, increasing the number of working hours per week to 70 as suggested by Mr Narayana Murthy of Infosys or 90 hours by L&T C&MD, Mr Subrahmanyam is not the only solution.  

So, Mr. Chairman, `Live and Let Live’ and let us not break our grand family system in India.

                     ***                                                        ***                                               ***

S Prabhakar

14th January, 2025

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How long will bowlers be given a raw deal?       

                                                                                                                              

The sudden (not shocking for me, at least) retirement announcement by Ashwin in the midst of a series in Australia has brought into the spotlight the raw deal given by successive Coaches,  Captains, the Selection Committee, and the BCCI to the bowlers in general and Ashwin in particular for the last 3-4 years.    

Even before Ashwin's father went public, an average cricket follower could make out that the sudden retirement announcement by Ashwin, the world premium spin bowler, had come due to frustration with the humiliating way he had been treated by captains like Virat and Rohi, coaches like Shastri, Rahul and Ghambir and the Selection Committee.  

Why the difference yardsticks?

Though batters and bowlers play equally important roles in a cricket team's success, from time immemorial, different yardsticks have been applied to batters and bowlers' selections for a series first and then picking them up in the final eleven to play any match.

While the 4-5 front-line batters select themselves and their places are permanently fixed as if they have put fevicol on their backs, it’s a musical chair as far as bowlers are concerned.  Any batter who has shown consistency for 3-4 years and became popular by performance on and off the field can consider his position permanent despite running into poor form for a very long time also.   They are given long rope test after test and series after series till they regain the form and hit a half-century or a century giving a sigh of relief more to the coach, and selectors than themselves and are given another 5-10 matches and it goes on and on.    A cursory glance at the career of Rishab Pant, and Virat records in the last 5 years can demonstrate this trend on the part of the Selection Committee, Coaches and Captains.  But it's not any new trend but it is an old-age practice, at least from 1975 onwards when I started following the game.  

Bowlers have to prove themselves all the time

As per the expectation of the Selection Committee, Coaches and Captains, bowlers have to prove themselves all the time and even the most premium bowlers are not assured of their place in the 15-member squad for a series or the final eleven.   So many factors like the reputation of the ground/pitch to be pace bowler or spin-friendly, the weather condition on the day of the match, the batting lineup of the opposition and their vulnerabilities, all these factors are taken into consideration to make even the world top premium bowler to sit out and warm the benches and accommodate and give another chance to a pedestrian batter to justify their selection and cement his position which is shaking badly. But no such consideration has ever been applied while considering a batter selection, like bouncy pitch, vulnerability of the batter against bouncers, fishing outside the off stump and dancing to the spinners.  

                                                                                              

                                                                                             

In mid-70s no one dared to think of dropping Gavaskar, Vishwanath or Vegsarkar despite whatever form they were in for a long period specially in the case of Vishwanath.    During the same period, there used to be tossing amongst Bedi, Chandra, Prasanna and Venkataraghavan and more specially the latter two – all those four world-class spinners would have walked into any team final eleven as the first choice.   Not to speak of Karsan Ghavri, Madan Lal, Binny who used to manage get a look at only after selectors and team management has finished packing the team with as many batters as possible.   You will be shocked to know when none of those bowlers or one of them found favours from the Team management, it was Gavaskar who used to bowl 2-3 three overs before spinners took over a 5-6 over old ball and bowled beautifully right throughout the innings.   This was a time and on those pitches when Australia, England opted for 4 front-line pacers and WI 5.     But team management at that time never thought it necessary for team-building to give a long and consistent run to the military medium-pace bowlers like Binny and Madan Lal to improve their skills and be a permanent feature like the batters.  

You fast forward to the early 2000 you have tock solid batting lineup comprising of likes of  Saurav, Sehwag, Rahul, Sachin, VVS and later Dhoni, and it was a crime even to think of dropping any of them for any reason except injury.   Even when Sachin had tennis elbow issues, it was left to him if he chose to play or not and he played many tests though he was not match fit fully.   During the same period, we had star bowlers and match winners in the form of Zaheer Khan, Kumble, Harbhajan, J Srinath, Ishant Sharma, and Umesh Yadav, and all of them were never assured of their place in the final eleven as that of the batters referred to above.   The present pack of batters with fevicals on their backs are Virat, Rohit, Pant, as against match winners bowler/all-rounders like Sami, Siraj, Kuldeep, Chahal, Jadeja and world best spinner Aswin who are forced to play musical chairs and the best sitting out for many matches/series. 

The shameful treatment meted out to Ashwin

In recent times the best thing to happen for Indian cricket after Kumble is Ashwin.  He is the best contemporary spinner, intelligent, attacking and wicket-taking spinner. In every parameter, the number of wickets taken, his strike rate, averages and the fast clip he took from 50 to 500 wickets is phenomenal and he was at par with Virat Kohli.   He was on the right course to break the record held by Kumble as the highest wickets taker and Warne record and might have just fallen short of Muralidharan’s record of 800 wickets.   Compared to Kumble, Warne and Murali, he is a far better batter and scored 6 test centuries which many players who played for India as batters in 30 – 40 tests have also not scored.    But for some strange reasons, he was never considered as an all-rounder but on the other hand whenever he was dropped and Jadeja was favoured for his all-around abilities were put forth as the reason. 

 The shameful treatment of the most premium bowler Ashwin started under Virat Kohli's captaincy, and Ravi Shastri was at the helm as a Coach.    There was a time when Virat was all-conquering and racing in the chase to break Sachin’s records, most of them he did and the 100 hundreds looked to be within his reach.   Naturally, he has become the poster boy and darling of advt agencies.    For some strange reason, in Indian cricket when a player, mostly batters/captains reaches such an unassailable position they develop a sense of insecurity about losing that unassailable position by someone as talented as they are and contributing more than them.  Gavaskar had with Kapil, Dhoni had with Sehwag and Gambhir.    In the Indian scenario, though in popularity charts bowlers never succeed in being as popular as or more popular than the batters, Kohli started feeling a sense of insecurity with Ashwin being around.    Taking advantage of his being captain and the `you starch my back and I scratch your back’ understanding he has with team Coach Ravi Shastri, he started giving the cold shoulder to Ashwin, and to the shock of his fans, he was dropped from match after match and also not picked up in many series.   For me it was as bad as dropping Gavaskar, Sachin, Virat at their peak which of course is unthinkable.    It went on for such long time that for over 3 years, Virat was going pathetic form with centuries completely dried and after close to 3 years he scored a century and in tests, in the last 5 years he scored only 3 centuries.    So during this period if there is one who should give way to any other player including Ashwin it was Kohli but he was accommodated in every match and in every form and during the same period Ashiwn was made to sit on the bench in many tests and limited over games.   It has become so brazen that many ex-captains of India and other countries, writers, and commentators cried horse how a match-winning premium bowler like Aswin can be made to sit out.    Had he been playing for any other country, he would have been the first person whose name would be written in final 11 picked up to play any match specially a Test match.   But whatever is written and said, did not affect the captain, coach and the ecosystem created by them.    The fate and treatment of Ashwin has not changed in a big way under Rohit captaincy and Rahul as Coach.   Things improved a bit immediately after Gambhir took over as a Coach, but it looked like Rohit started to prevail over the Coach in recent times to accommodate the average performer like Virat, himself and his fav Jadeja.    Ashwin was pushed to a breaking point, and his not being picked in 2 matches in Australia and the upcoming England series has become the last straw on the camel's back to announce retirement amid an away series.   Every cricket follower, including PM of India, felt that he had a couple of years of cricket left in him.   If we take into consideration the number of matches Kohli has dropped Ashwin would have taken a minimum 100 wickets more than what he has taken and had he played for a couple of years more, he would have ended his career as the highest wicket-taker of India and the second highest wicket-taker in the World.   But unfortunately, that was not to be, and despite pathetic shows and averages in recent times Virat and Rohit keep blocking two seats in the final eleven.  

Cricket has been reduced to a batter game

When only test cricket was played, Batters and Bowlers had a level playing field.   The bowlers – both Pace bowlers and spinners – made the game as interesting and attractive as the batters.   For every Viv Richards, Lloyd, and Greenidge you have Andy Roberts, Holding, Garner and Marshal, for every Chappel brother, you have Thomas and Lillie, for every Gavaskar and Viswanath you have a Bedi, Chandra and Prasanna and Venkat and for every Miadad and Zaheer Abbas you have Imran and Sarfaraz.   I vividly remember the magical spin web cast by Bedi, Chandra, Prasanna and Venkat around top Australian bowlers in their backyard in 1977 series.   We should not forget that most innocuous-looking military medium bowlers like Mohinder, Madan and Binny have successfully defended a very modest total against the star-studded and destructive batting lineup of West Indies in the final of 1983 world cup win.  Who can forget Bumrah’s magical spell, which was ably supported by Arshdeep and Hardik when the World Cup final was all but lost?  

But over a period of time, specially after the advent of limited-over cricket in the form of 60/50 overs a side matches was first introduced by a disgruntled media mogul Carry Paker who failed to bag TV streaming rights from the Australian Cricket Board.   The limited overs matches caught the imagination of youth who need quick fixes and all of them always liked the bat dominating the ball and taking an aerial route popularised by greats like Sobbers, Tiger Pataudi, Viv Richards has become the norm of the game, especially in limited over matches.

The `Tamasha’ called IPL

As if 50 overs aside limited-over matches are not enough T20 matches have become popular – first among the test-playing countries, then came the Tamasha called IPL.    It has redefined the way cricket is played, marketed, revenue generated, and player put on auction and getting picked up at a vulgar price tag, much higher than what the respective Boards of different countries pay to their player for playing for the entire year, in just 45 days.   

Thanks to the tremendous efforts of Jag Mohan Dalmia, the tainted Lalit Modi and Srinivasan, the revenue generation of IPL for BCCI and to all franchise, players and support staff running into hundreds is phenomenal and way ahead of anyone’s imagination.    ICC has come under complete control of BCCI and happily plays a subordinate role, and the wish of BCCI and its President is a command to ICC.   With every player from every country permitted by BCCI to play in IPL matches (except Pakistan), happy to offer himself for auction and the Boards of all test-playing countries have no option but to bend their backs and keep the window of 45 days clear for IPL to avoid their player boycotting matches under their respective Boards, the way the WI players have done.  

With media and telecasting rights going as high as over 40 thousand crores and a huge amount at stake, there is a huge pressure to make IPL colourful, entertaining, thrilling, and reducing cricket to a tamasha at mega proportions.   As in the case of 50-over matches, in T20, everyone wants to have a high-scoring match, and the batter butchering the bowlers hitting sixes and four all the time reducing the bowlers like Bowling machines.   The entire game has become non-sophisticated, non-traditional, and rustic and every rule was skewed against the bowlers and in favour of batters.    The bowlers are still expected to tell the umpire from which side of the wicket he is bowling and by which arm he is bowling but the batter is not under any obligation to bat with the hand and side he is talking the guard and switch sides after the bowler bowls the ball, thus making a mockery of the field set by the captain and the bowler.   The batters are allowed to continuously move in the crease before, at the time of release of the ball by the bowling thus distracting the bowlers and the margin for declaring wides and no balls is heavily stacked against the bowlers.    Going by what batters are doing, why not allow bowlers to switch the ball from one hand to the other and bowl with whichever hand he is comfortable bowling and also allow bowlers to dodge the bowlers the way batters keep moving in the crease and go for reverse sweeps and switch hits and hitting over the head.    There is a limit of the number of overs a bowler can bowl 12 in case of 50 overs and 4 in case of T20 but there is no such restrictions for a batter, in some matches, the opener has carried his bat through.   Why not put the same restriction on the batter that he has to retire after playing 24 balls or allow a bowler who is in good form to bowl 10 overs (the maximum that can be bowled from one side) at the discretion of the captain? 

Commercialisation of the Game    

With the phenomenal money generation by IPL/BCCL, the game and the players have been commercialised to the core.   For the first time, starting with Sachin, huge efforts have started to develop players as brands and the celebrity management agencies cropped up in a big way.   Mark Mascarenhas was a pioneer who managed Sachin brand for many years and the one who got him the first Rs. 100 crores brand endorsement, a figure never heard before.    These professional agencies do whatever it takes to keep the brand value of their client players  high and, amongst other things, ensure that their clients are picked up in the final eleven so that their brand value does not get affected.    That is what justifies Kohli still figuring in the final 11 of a test team, despite below par 30 plus average for a premier batter like him for one or two but five long years.   Unfortunately, premium bowlers like Ashwin and Bumrah are never the darling of Advt agencies and axe has always fallen on someone like Ashwin and I will not be surprised if at some future point of time, it happens to the other most valuable player of Indian cricket Boom Boom Bumrah to accommodate some favourite child Pant. 

Despite the raw deal given, Ashin you are a true champion player and a decent and thorough gentleman.  A glorious chapter will be written on you in India's cricket history and people talk in equal measure about what you have achieved with ball and bat and what you could have achieved, but for the dirty politics.  

Have a glorious post retired life. 

S. Prabhakar

21.12.2024

 

 

`NATU NATU NAILS IT’ – BAGS FIRST OSCAR FOR BEST ORIGINAL SONG

Today is an historic day for Telugu/Indian cinema, `Natu Natu’ song from RRR becomes the first Indian movie to wins Oscar for `Best original song’.   It’s a `double dhamaka’ for India as `Elephant Whispers’ has won Oscar for best documentary short movie.   Its is a cute movie on relationship between orphan elephant and the kind-hearted who bring them up.  

What worked for Natu Natu

Unlike movies of the rest of the world specially Hollywood, songs and dances are the integral and most attractive part of Indian cinema taking the story telling forward.   With most of the top Telugu stars being good dancers lot of importance is given to songs and are mounted lavishly bettering movie after movie.    The following factors have come together in right proportion to make Natu Natu such a sensation hit and a raze:

i.                     The original and rustic lyrics by Chandra Bose

ii.                   The original and native music by Keeravani.  

iii.                 The energetic singing by young and new singers Kaala Bhairava and Rahul Sipligunj

iv.                 Fantastic choreography by Prem Rakshith

v.                   Sensational, synchronised and most energetic dancing by Jr. NTR and Ram Charan who looked like mirror image of each other.

vi.                 The importance of the song in the movie, in a way the win over colonial swollen heads and Komaram Bheem with the help of his friend winning the heart of Jenny

vii.                DVV Danayya, the producer of the movie, who liberally opened his cash chest for Rajamouli and giving him complete freedom  

viii.              Kartikeya pushing the idea of the song and Rajmouli conceiving the song the way it came on the screen.  Like in all aspect of his film making, he extracted the best out of his team of Choreographer, actors and not letting anyone go till they delivered what he has in mind.   It was reported that he took some 60 retakes till he got perfect synchronisation by both top stars Jr. NTR and Ram Charan which was really difficult task considering that both the actors had their own different styles of dancing with huge fan base.

The Originality:

Many times we find songs being copied/inspired/adopted from some other song/source whether Indian or Western, classical or hip hop.  But the best part of `Natu Natu’ is that both the lyrics and the music are absolutely original and rooted in Indianness .  Since the heros were to give back the brant Britishers for the insult in trying to throw them out, they had to present an absolute Indian original song with Indian beats.   Chandra Bose and Keeravani have succeeded in doing so.  Few of the words used in the song. 

Natu – Naitivity

Pollamgattu Dummulona – Dust of the fields

Potlagitta – Raging Bull

Poleramma Jataralo -  the village fare of `Poleramma’

Kirruseppu – village foot ware which makes creaking sound 

Karrasamu – Stick fight

Errajonna rotte – Bread made of maize

 

The entire song goes on in the same lines.   These rustic and earthy lyrics was supported by fantastic music which starts slowly and builds up tempo to final climax without using any western or modern beats.  

The long journey to Oscars

It may not be a walk in the park for Natu Natu but the huge hype created for the last 3 months or so specially in US made things easy for it.    The rousing reception the song got in US theatres with people dancing on the stage in theatres as has been done in single screen theatres in Telugu States, the song winning Golden Globe award and many more American Critics’ Awards all worked in its favour.   Even when the song was announced and performed by the singers and US dancers at the awards function it got a standing ovation which is not so common.

The Royal Snub by I&B Ministry

The passage of Natu Natu to Oscar was anything but smooth and almost a nonstarter.  At the cost of being blamed for triggering regional divide, as always happens I&B Ministry didn’t have a real hard look at the southern movies when it comes to Padma Award or sending it to Oscars.    Despite stupendous success neither Bahubali nor RRR were sent to Oscars as official entries in any category.    Both movies deserved to be the official Indian entry in the categories for Best movie, Best Director, Best visual effects beside Best Original Song for Natu Natu in RRR.   The I&B Ministry has given a royal snub to RRR.  But once the Oscar is won everyone including I&B Minister and PM is jumping into congratulate the RRR to make India proud which their Ministry almost denied.   They should first bother to check what is wrong with I&B Ministry.  

Anyone in the position of Rajamouli would have felt disappointed and let it go.   But the team of Rajaouli and his talented son Kartikeeya who was the line producer of RRR did not get disheartened and started to work their way to Oscars.   First, they applied in `for your consideration in general category’ Then they organised the screening of RRR in Oscar approved theatres and simultaneously created the right kind of buzz through TV chat shows in various American Channels and interacting with audience in theatres by the Director Rajamouli, two leading stars Jr NTR and Ram Charan who camped for a long time in US despite their busy schedules.  They spent huge amount of time, efforts and money to promote not only their movie and song but brand India.   

As a prelude to Oscars Natu Natu which faced the toughest competition from top stars like lady Gaga has created history by winning Golden Globe Award for Best Original song.    This has made the RRR team feel that they are in with a very good chance to win Oscar and then came the good news of its being nominated for Oscars.   Thus Natu Natu has become the first Indian entry to make it to nomination stage coming through `for your consideration general category’ and ultimately won the Oscar, - first in the 80 years history of Telugu film industry.   In a way it is a tight slap on the face of Committee of Duds appointed by I&B Ministry who did everything to ensure that India would not have got Oscars.

M M Keeravani : It is ultimate glory to the highly talented and sober Telugu music director MM Keeravani.   Though he is not as prolific as other leading music directors in Telugu, Tamil and Hindi in which he scores music with different names `Marakathamani’ and `MM Kreem’, his music has always been unique, special and original.   Besides tunes for the songs, his Background Music has always been outstanding.    It is taken to dizzy heights first in Bahabali I & II and then RRR.   Many of the larger than life scenes of Bahubali were brought to life by the fabulous back ground score of  Keeravani,    I always had the feeling that it is music directors like Keeravani and Illayaraja (another hugely talented music director and my all-time favourite) who could bring international laurels to India.

Rajamouli’s Magic

Anything said in the praise of Rajamouli becomes repetitive but in this moment of glory I cannot help but salute this unparallel talent called Rajamouli.    First he broke industrial records in Telugu taking movies to such massive and unbelievable heights movie after movie starting from Magadheera.   His spending large time with his father on building the story, conceiving each and every frame, constructing massive sets, extensive use of special effects and spending highly disproportionate time on postproduction to bring out a product never seen before in India cinema.    The Telugu market being small (not more than Rs. 100 crores at the max during pre-Bahubali era) he set his eyes on an unprecedented PAN India release of Telugu movie and had producers backing and came out with historic and record breaking Bahubali franchise.    While Bahubali became a sensational PAN India blockbuster, with RRR he built a Global brand and market for Telugu/Indian movies.   Apart from winning many critics’ awards as director of RRR, he got special praise from top Hollywood big wigs including Spielberg and Cameron who indicated their interest to collaborate with him.    Now any movie which he makes hereafter will not only be a PAN India movie but a global movie.    He has already announced his next venture with Telugu heart throb Mahesh Babu, a jungle action adventure which suits international audience.    With that I am sure that Rajamouli is going to do another first – The First Telugu/Indian Global movie.  

Till then let us celebrate the success of Natu Natu and keep grooving to the wonderful tune while I&B Ministry figures out why their team could not see what the world could see and appreciate so generously. 

A Big Thanks to Keeravani and Rajamouli for not only producing such a sensational song Natu Natu but for all the special efforts made in promoting the song and brand India .   

 

S. Prabhakar

13.3.2023