Mayank Shekhar: Is coke becoming the new beer?

A serious mainstreaming of dope I could sense only in posh drawing rooms where the same collegiate types would gladly pass on the blunt at their homes along with beer or rum Representation picMy favourite scene from Asif Kapadiarsquos Amy 2015 the documentary on the death and times of rockstar Amy Winehouse is when the drugaddict Winehouse whorsquos been forced to go clean is crying backstage while her namersquos been announced as the winner of a Grammy award The tears rolling down her eyes arenrsquot because of happiness but complete despair as she mentions Whatrsquos the point of being sober at a moment like this you canrsquot even enjoy itIt is one of those rare public admissions of the wonderful rush and absolute joy that drugs offer even if momentarily to make them worth the side effect lifelong addictionMy own dim view on the subject which was quite in line with the popular one got formed as a kid in the late lsquo80s watching a frightening antidrugs collegecampus show on Doordarshan called Subah with the shot of the actor Salim Ghouse who until a Google search I thought was Naveen Andrews fighting imaginary demons with knives in his hand staggering into the sea from the beach grim expression on his face pupils of the eyes dilated It was a scary and depressing sight He was high on drugs with all sorts of substances clubbed into one generic term and you knew you just had to just stay away from it all your lifeThat is until like everyone else I got to college and stepped into my neighboursrsquo rooms floating in a purple haze slight psychedelic lighting alternate rock on the speakers and marijuana being swiftly stuffed into Rizlas by ldquoroll scholarsrdquo diligently at work sitting in mattresses on the floor They did it while concealing and advertising that factDope was stuff of urbane coolmdashsomething we saw in movies as well representing both sloth and rebellion and often pure existentialist humour Friday Trainspotting Lock Stock And Two Smoking Barrels etc No Bollywood movie post 2000 could aim at being dark and alternative without a shot of someone rolling a jointmdashalmost as the antidote to happy Yashraj heroes heroines in designer wear knocking back tequila shots with salt and lemon on lsquoamavas ki raat ka Valentinersquos Dayrsquo in Dil Toh Paagal Hai 1997A serious mainstreaming of dopemdashwhether hash charas or marijuana ganjamdashI could sense only in posh drawing rooms where the same collegiate types many of them several years my senior in corporate jobs with wives schoolgoing kids would gladly pass on the blunt at their homes along with beer or rum Merely the quality of dope was perhaps significantly bettermdashfor some reason always Malana CreamThis is when Irsquod left college and moved to Mumbai roughly around 200102 when the first tourist attraction for me was the Bandra ATM where actor Fardeen Khan had been caught buying coke It was a huge scandal We also revelled in exchanging judgmental stories about Bollywood and cricket stars who somebody or the other had watched or so they said snorting cocaine in bathrooms of exclusive nightclubs It seemed like such a big dealCut to 2017 What was the price of coke when Irsquod moved to Mumbai Around Rs 5000 per gram What is it now The same By purchasing power parity thatrsquos a drop in the rate to halfmdashif not far more I recently saw someone order a gram for Rs 2000 Must be dandruff not that anybody knows better But Irsquom sure the consumers were feeling something to insist on ordering another roundIs this Pablo Escobarrsquos Medellin Cartel lsquococainenomicsrsquo at work where the market is flushed with an unlimited supply of coke with retailers being allowed to fix prices as per demand Or is this plain investment in the future of a partydrug that by virtue of becoming almost as expensive as booze at a posh bar because the price of the latter has gone up exponentially offers much better value for money As a drug coke is anyway a lot closer to alcohol and unlike dope goes well with it if you only raised the attained confidence levels and Dutch courage to the power of 2Either way Irsquove hardly walked into a house party over the past couple of years without being offered coke on the platter And you see this at the movies inevitably Anurag Kashyaprsquos hero in Raman Raghav 20 pulls lines rather than rolling gareeb joints This isnrsquot cock in the snook at a Yashraj hero even as the latest one Ranveer in Befikre would rather polish sixpacks of beer with his loveinterestThe lsquonormalizingrsquo of the chemical substance is just as applicable to Karan Joharrsquos Ae Dil Hai Mushkil with Ranbir Anushka Look closely Nobody gets a drink in that film Everyone holds a bottle of water mixed with MDMA moving to EDM One certainly noticed a spike in consumers of meth after Breaking BadMost moved on from that drug soon thankfully But Irsquom just randomly observing and am sure cocaine is slowing turning into the new beer and itrsquos not a temporary Narcos effect Itrsquos just always there at the side or centre table with plates being warmed in the microwavemdashno more hidden stuff for few addicts who pooled inOnce these guys grow old Irsquom sure one of these mothers will tell their adult childrenrsquos friends to make sure they donrsquot leave before having some ldquoBeta tumhare liye plate garam karke rakha hairdquoOkay Maybe notMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14 Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycom