Most universities feel obliged to felicitate you though I feel this is not necessary but it has become a formality where ever you go.
Flowers, trophies, TV shooting over it is time for lunch and then time to drive to the airport.
@bhawanasomaaya
The process of question answers is the most interesting session of the day. How the students introduce themselves, how they pose their questions reflects a lot about the university and their teachers as to how they have been trained.
Most of them are reluctant to initiate the QA session, they are always shy to be the first one to ask the question but once somebody takes the lead, the other students muster confidence and ask you questions about cinema, reporting, writing and other mediums related to media.
I counter question them often because in their answers I am seeking what young India is thinking.
@bhawanasomaaaya
I never turn down an opportunity to interact with the students because they fill me with an energy I cannot find anywhere else.
Time and again I am invited by universities to deliver motivation talk in some city or the other and always I find that the students have more to offer me than the other way round. 
They listen intently and have a fund of questions, about themselves, their lives and how to go about it. These are questions that cannot be answered by parents or by friends and have to be addressed to professionals.
Some of them write to me and stay in touch, some have worked as my interns and some, have become my friends and all this is possible because I agreed to deliver a lecture to the university.
@bhawanasomaaya
The Jagran Lake University is a long drive from the Bhopal Airport and by the time I reach the guest house it is almost dark. The campus is deserted but the attendant is waiting to serve me dinner if I am hungry. I am not, so after a tall glass of milk I go to sleep.
In the morning I am greeted by the volunteer and explained my schedule for the day which seems like a long day ahead.
Post breakfast I am escorted to the C Block of the campus and introduced to the faculty.
There are many faces and many handshakes but at the moment we have to rush for the reason I’m here, my talk with the students.
@bhawanasomaaya
Film: 102 Not Out
Release: 04 May 2018
Director: Umesh Shukla
Writer: Saumya Joshi
Music: Salim–Sulaiman
75 year old Babulal Vakharia/ Rishi Kapoor sets an alarm before getting under the shower because a second longer than 15 minutes in water gives him pneumonia. Babulal has posters warning him to shut off the geyser inside the bathroom and outside the door because he has burst a geyser in the past and believes in precautions.
He has a fixed time to visit the doctor, fixed time to water the plants, fixed time to watch television and fixed time to fall asleep wrapped in his 60 year old shawl purchased from Kashmir when he was 10 years old.
Babulal’s father Datatrey Vakharia/ Amitabh Bachchan is 102 years old and keen to break the record of the oldest man surviving in the world. He walks alone, travels freely in a rickshaw and revels in celebrations.
They live under the same roof but have their allotted separate corners. They have separate refrigerators while senior Vakharia stores delicious deserts in his fridge, junior stores boiled vegetables in his. They have separate TV sets, the senior relishes Chaplin and Discovery on his latest model while junior watches Health & Yoga on his outdate box.
There are many ways to interpret this film. You can describe it as a father –son love story or a father-son hate story. You can call it a story of relationship or a story of life.
The demerit of the film is that it is restricted to three characters and one location, Shanti Nivas, so not exactly a cinematic experience. The climax is over the top and one misses echoes and images of more activity in the household.
The merits include the plot, the characters, message, music, duration and the performances.
As Dheeraj, Jimmit Trivedi matches the comic timing of both Kapoor and Bachchan with an amazing ease.
Rishi Kapoor embraces the rather grumpy Babulal without vanity and without inhibition.
As the toothless, balding super active Dattatrey Vakharia Amitabh Bachchan mixes anger with hurt and touches your heart.
Kapoor and Bachchan together have over the last four decades done several films but 102 Not Out is easily the most significant one as they make you laugh, weep and reflect on life.
102 Not Out is an inspiration for all the senior citizens and I recommend it as family viewing.
I rate 102 Not Out with 3 stars.
My new book Keshava: A Magnificent Obsession is now listed on Amazon. For pre-order click here: https://amzn.to/2vogOtk
@bhawanasomaaya
Book: Nayak
Publisher: Harper & Collins
Ratings 4/5
Must buy for Satyajit Ray Fans
The best thing about technology is that it encourages experimentation. We have heard about novels being adapted as screenplays, also heard about how a special skill is required to visualize a film which is entirely different from novel writing. Now, filmmaker Satyajit Ray’s erstwhile son Sandip Ray and Harper Collins do the reverse. Almost 50 years after the release of Ray’s popular film Nayak bring out a novelization of Ray’s brilliant original screenplay by prominent author/ translator/ critic Bhaskar Chattopadhyay.
Everybody knows that Satyajit Ray was one of the greatest film-makers of his time. His first film Pather Panchali (1955) won an award at the Cannes Film Festival and over the next forty years, he made a number of films, many of which went on to be acknowledged as all-time classics. He was awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1999 and is the only Indian to have received the Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement delivered at his home in Kolkatta.
He was a multi-talented artist, he sketched and was a prolific writer on cinema, Our Films Their Films, Speaking of Films, Deep Focus, Satyajit Ray’s Ravi Shankar, and The Pather Panchali Sketchbook are some of his books.
For those who have not seen Nayak, it tells the story of matinee idol Arindam Mukherjee/ Uttam Kumar on his way from Calcutta to Delhi to receive a national award. In the restaurant car of the train, he encounters Aditi Sengupta/ Sharmila Tagore, who edits Adhunika, a magazine for modern women.
Aditi is not star-struck but decides to interview Arindam to gain more subscribers for her magazine and during the long conversation, which unfolds over the next twenty-four hours on train, Arindam slowly sheds his public persona and reveals his insecurities and haunting regrets, as a result Aditi also transforms from the cynical journalist to a confidant of the superstar.
Author Bhaskar Chattopadhyay recreates imageries from the unforgettable film and travels you through the highs and the lows of the characters engrossing you in his skillful narrative. It is not easy adapting the master’s screenplay into fiction but Chattopadhyay is a devoted fan of the filmmaker and well versed with his work which includes a translation of anthology 14: Stories That Inspired Satyajit Ray and also Ray’s original novels like Patang, Penumbra and Here Falls the Shadow.
If you have watched Nayak you have to read this book and if you have not watched Nayak all the more reason for reading this book. By the way, the cover image is based on the booklet designed by Satyajit Ray.
If there is one thing Bachchan enjoys even more than acting is singing. The first time he lent his voice as playback was for a song ‘Mere Paas Aao…’ from Mr Natwarlal (1979) ever since more and more filmmakers have asked him to sing in their films. ‘Neela Aasman So Gaya…’ and ‘Rang Barse…’ from Silsila (1981), later he sang ‘Mere Angne Mein..’ from Laawaris (1981) and ‘Main Yahan Tu Wahan…’ from Baghban (2003) recently he rendered tracks like ‘Ekla Cholo Re…’ from Kahaani (2012) and ‘Piddly Si Baatein…’ from Shamitabh (2015) in recent years.
Now, in his upcoming film 102 Not Out, directed by Umesh Shukla, Bachchan has created the track Badumbaaa and sung it along with his co-actor Rishi Kapoor. Now we hear that Bachchan has sung a new rendition of the timeless classic, ‘Waqt Ne Kiya Kya Haseen Sitam…’, from the movie Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959). The song was arranged by Rohan Utpat and Vinayak K Salvi.
There is so much to learn from the unstoppable Bachchan, he is productive every moment of his day and every phase of his career.
@bhawanasomaaya
Every year on this special day Big FM honors a special candidate. Last year it was director of Sairat Nagraj Manjule who made headlines not just all over the country but also abroad. When Nagrat was at our office he confessed that it was his dream to work with Amitabh Bachchan and probably he will soon.
This year we honor writer, filmmaker, singer, dancer, actor Sachi Pilgaonkar. He arrived at our office in his traditional kurta and was more than happy to be bestowed with a paghdi and presented a sword in the hand. That was a cue for the musicians to start the dholak and for the energetic ones to come on the floor and dance.
Big FM was happy to present Sachin Pilgaonkar with the Maharashtra Icon of The Year and Sachin shared that Maharashtra has been instrumental in shaping his career and life. Now it was time for the moment everybody was waiting for, cutting of the big white cake and Sachin made sure that he fed a piece of the cake to everybody including the dholak team.
My new book Keshava: A Magnificent Obsession is now listed on Amazon. For pre-order click here: https://amzn.to/2vogOtk
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