To father, with (so much) love!

Maman or mommother died last night is arguably the bestknownloved opening sentence for a book in modern lit Almost chilling in its stoicism thus starts Albert Camuss The Outsider mdash introducing us to its narratorleadcharacter Meursault And thereby his bouts of absurdist existentialism that if you arent adult enough to handle could screw your brains in mysterious waysOf all why did I think of The Outsider LEstranger reading actor Parikshat Sahnis ode to his dad through the recently published memoir Nonconformist Memories Of My Father Balraj Sahni Maybe the fact that over a 260page account of his superstar father Parikshat 75 makes at best a passing mention maybe a line or two of his own mothers death he calls her by the nickname Dammoji delving not even into why or how she passed awayThis is strange although partly explained by the fact that Parikshat was never close to her In his early years he was raised at his grandparents house in Rawalpindi while his parents moved to London where Balraj briefly worked as radio announcer with the BBC The woman he calls Mummy is Balrajs second wifeThe recently released NonConformist Memories Of My Father Balraj Sahni by Parikshat Sahni Given how poor our documentation of people and times from any era is Balrajs life is already quite wellarchived in comparison For one he was a writer himself Having mastered in English literature from Lahores elite Government College he wrote in Punjabi upon the insistence of his mentor Rabindranath Tagore who felt literature is best embraced in the language of ones birth He did leave behind his autobiography Meri Gair Jazbaati Diary My Unsentimental Diary Also his brother the legendary Hindi writer Bhisham Sahni wrote a book Balraj My Brother Pop Internet has most famously kept Balrajs writing relevant through a radical convocation speech he delivered at the Jawaharlal Nehru University JNU in 1972 which circulates on socialmedia every other day fetching newer fansBalraj 191373 was a sworn Nehruvian Marxist a stageactor and activist closely involved with the Indian Peoples Theatre Association IPTA who entered films only much later with the sort of gravitas and realism that had no parallels in its time mdash with films such as KA Abbass Dharti Ke Lal 1946 Bimal Roys Cannes winner Do Bigha Zameen 1953 or Hemen Guptas Kabuliwala 1961 that deserve topshelf space in annals of world cinema Yash Chopras Waqt 1965 and the song O Meri Zohra Jabeen of course continues to keep him alive in a world of chartbustersWhat is it about actor Parikshats account that draws you in in newer ways still The fact that he looks at his father from the distance of time mdash 46 years after death mdash primarily through the lens of a son There is much catharsisIt appears he didnt appreciate his father enough while growing under the shadow of such a colossal banyan treeParikshat in his own words at the books launch with Amitabh Bachchan called himself a brat like most starsons are Having graduated from Delhis St Stephens College he left for Russia to study film and returned to Bombay as a Russian misfit What follows is a unique sort of memoir that tells you as much about the author all writings do as the subjectIn part poignant and adorable the portrait that emerges of Balraj is of a softspoken freespirit who enjoyed nothing more than taking potshots at elites mdash sitting down with the Punjabi serverwaiter at a posh houseparty once in Delhi just so he could annoy the shit out of the snooty crowd around himOr a consummate naturelover who would drag Parikshat down to the choppy waters deep inside Juhus seafront with crowds gathered at the beach wondering if theyll survive the hightide while he hummed a song and asked the son to simply float or ride the tide rather than fight it He refused to take a boatmans help And they eventually came back to the shore He did this to teach the son an important lifelesson mdash that the tide always goes awayAs geographical memory what survives of Balraj is a street named after him in Juhu and a massive dilapidated haunted villa Ikraam near Hotel SunnSand that as Parikshat describes it ate up his family once they moved in mdash basically a series of deaths starting with the maid cook grandmother and eventually his sister Shabnam who committed suicide post depressionBalraj himself couldnt survive the pain of that last tragedy He devoted himself to work as necessary distraction This is when he shot M S Sathyus seminal Partition masterpiece Garm Hava 1973He was dubbing for the film at Rajkamal Studio when the director asked to finish the leftover portions the following day He insisted on finishing it in the same sittingI am tired of living in this stifling condition is the protagonist Mirza Saabs last line in Garm Hava Also the last line Balraj ever dubbedMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14 Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individuals and dont 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