Thappad: No mere slap

Since "Thappad" is now on Amazon Prime, got down to watching it. So, had already built my own pre-viewing impressions, basis reviews and tweets I had seen earlier and the tons of other media coverage the movie received.

Very well crafted and directed by Anubhav Sinha - the plot explores a whole set of people around the protagonist - men and women who touch her life, and that makes it all the more real and compelling.

Tapsee Pannu essays the role of chirpy Amrita, (Ammu as she is fondly called), who is content to be a homemaker to a very ambitious, successful Vikram, who is on the verge of a big promotion that would take him to London, wife in tow. Ammu's set upper middle class Delhi life comes crashing apart when the loving Vikram loses his cool over last minute office politics during a celebratory house party - and in misdirected rage, ends up delivering a thunderous slap on his wife's face, in full view of friends and family. That is it. The story begins from here. A shocked Ammu begins to question the marriage and her emotional investment of many years.

The film raises pertinent questions:

Could a mere slap become the cause for a stable marriage to end? Was Amrita making too big a deal about it? Shouldn't she just accept this as part of a relationship and move on?

To be honest, I had the same feeling persisting in my head throughout the film - but something was adding up in Amrita's favor all along. And that was, her husband's abject lack of remorse post the incident. Vikram is certainly not a bad guy - but his blissfully ignoring her anguish over the tingling public slap, and continued self absorption over the office politics and his own frustration - that is the underlying premise of "Thappad". It is not about domestic violence at all - but, about entitlement and taking things for granted. And that certainly adds up to the protagonist losing love and respect for her husband - the man around whom her life revolved for several years. Had he apologized even once with feeling, Amrita would have had no reason to question her marriage so much - forgiveness would have come in early and there would have been no story to talk about, but the apology does come, but towards the end, when the marriage is on its death bed.

It would be good for viewers to watch the movie, divorced of Tapsee Pannu's political beliefs etc - I saw a lot of tweets lambasting her as a liberal, anti-this-that, and a woman who advocates divorce through this movie. To give her the benefit of doubt, there is no divorce advocacy, per se - she has delivered a nuanced performance alongside the rest of the supporting cast.

I would recommend - watch this as a movie and honestly evaluate the situation in the reverse. If it were Vikram to be slapped in a fit of misdirected rage by Ammu, let us accept that she would have been branded as a woman with "a fiery temper and behavioral and anger issues". There would have been no justification for this unimaginable behavior at all. How could someone afford to slap her husband, even accidentally? Not too many of us, not even women,would accept it too well, and would hasten to brand the woman, as "hasty, nasty and full of attitude". I suspect a reverse "Thappad" script would have delved deep into the guilt conscience of the woman over her one-time act, more than anything else. That too, is the underlying message - our conditioning of several generations that can subconsciously accept some behaviors and not others.

In all, "Thappad" sends out a signal that questions these mindsets - there is no room for disrespect - of either gender. No one takes anyone for granted, even in a loving relationship. Accept, apologize or even better, do not commit an act you would be ashamed of, later.

Psychology Note #1 Narcissism and its Entourage: The Personality Disorders

Have you ever wondered that you are dealing with a very difficult person? Or, you are witnessing someone around you deal with a massive tantrum thrower or abuser? That they are putting in all the effort in pleasing the person, pandering to his/her ego, massaging it and comforting it? That it is a one-way street in the relationship?

Have you ever wondered that you are constantly second guessing whether you are going to be found fault at, criticized maliciously in private and in public for little or no fault of yours? That you will be the victim of someone's vicious temper, anytime, any day? Or, as mentioned earlier, you are witness to something on these lines happening to a person around you?

Have you ever felt you are or someone you know is being made to feel like an angry, wicked person who is going insane?

Look no further - you are not dealing with a mere control freak - these symptomatic behaviors have a clear name  and it is called narcissism (a rip off of the Greek mythological character, Narcissus) which is at a base level - about someone who loves himself or herself to an obnoxious level, to the extent of seeing no one else in context. The person in question could be anyone you know - a parent, a caregiver, a colleague, a sibling, an associate, a friend, spouse - just about anybody.

While I had first chanced upon this word in my late teens, thanks to my eclectic, well read elder sibling, my interest in and curiosity about this term led me to read up quite a bit only over the last year or so. The world of psychology dissects narcissism quite thoroughly and you get to understand the existence of  the ensuing narcissistic personality disorder, or "NPD", as it is known.

NPD is perhaps one of the world's oldest psychological anomalies, and has fascinated modern psychoanalysts in the 20th century, who went on to coin the term, and gave it its full definition.

Our interactions and experiences with narcissists fall into two broad categories: if you observe, you will be dealing with either an overt or a covert narcissist.

The overt narcissist is not difficult to identify, thanks to the obvious self aggrandizement that the person would exude.

The covert narcissist is the tougher one to identify.

A covert narcissist is as dangerous or more dangerous than the overt one - this character outwardly projects a great facade, but can go back and be terrible to very close ones, in particular, to a spouse.

After initially love bombing, they gradually lose interest and mentally drain the significant-other (SO) - by devaluing the person for their looks, their skills, among other things. This devaluation, more often than not, will not be very harsh on the face, but, will be consistent and systematic, and over a number of years, the other person starts believing in these criticisms. After all, a lie told a 100 times slowly tends to take the place of truth, doesn't it?  This practice of systematically making another person believe in the devaluation is famously called "gaslighting".

For the uninitiated, there is a famous 1944 Hollywood classic, "Gaslight", for your reference. Some of the scenes between the lead actors Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman (one of which I have shared here) are excellent references to what a covert narcissist can say to make his version sound authentic.



A covert narcissist plays the game in a Machiavellian manner, ensuring that his or her victim is part of a well crafted vilifaction campaign. Many a victim of such a campaign lose face in front of people, sometimes their own dear and near ones, since the covert narcissist would have already played the "victim", thus coloring the judgment of people around.

What piqued my interest as I kept reading was to understand the genesis of NPD. As I understand, the birth of the NPD begins very early in life - as early as 3-4 years of the person, and is generally caused by severe trauma such as abuse by a care-giver (a parent, step parent), or the death of a parent, trauma caused by being uprooted and abused by a care giver due to estrangement or death of parents. The grown-up narcissist becomes the mirror reflection of his childhood perpetrator/trauma. People with NPD generally are "empty shells" within themselves or so, psychoanalysts believe - with very little love and empathy to give to their near ones, since they have huge baggage of early experience which they carry into adult life.

Getting curious? For starters, Quora has some excellent references and answers around questions on narcissistic behavior. There are personality tests online that can give you a bird's eye view about yourself and the persons you are dealing with. Therapy from a good source is the ultimate solution, but when does a thief like to be called a thief? A narcissist can not be called out, unless the other person knows how to go about it, like a therapist.

So, the next time you are interacting with a very difficult person, you might want to step back a bit, and play psychologist in your own mind - what or who is he or she? You might land upon interesting answers that can help you to respond better, and not react. That is, if you wish to play doctor, doctor. It is best advised to leave a person with NPD to his or her own devices, and flee for your dear life, if you have the choice.

Of casteism, discourse, et al…

When I was watching the Netflix series, “Daughters of Destiny”, I walked into it with the back context that the protagonists, about four or five girls, were from the lowest castes in the social order, besides hailing from some of the poorest families. Their “saviour”, was Abraham George, an US returned corporate turned social entrepreneur, who started the Shanthi Bhavan School, on the outskirts of Bangalore. This was clearly a docu drama to higlight the "evil" of the caste system and set the premise for a Christian conversion agenda, my skeptical mind told me, as I ambled along the series.

As I continued to watch, my skepticism gave way to admiration – I would go to the extent to say whatever be George’s agenda or whatever be the motive of that skillfully crafted web series, if one individual has managed to transform the lives of children of so many underprivileged families, then he is a catalyst to social reform. Other assumptions and presumptions be damned.

Post watching this, a lot of questions which keep coming to my mind, resurfaced.

For some years now, many among the privileged castes in this country want to desperately believe that Brahmins and others from the traditionally privileged castes are now being marginalized, that they are being bashed, thrashed, and mercilessly called out for things done by their ancestors. And with the political climate of "pseudo secularism" thrown in, this set of people are deeply angry and unhappy.

While some of their grievances are true, and I do not discount those, I do believe casteism was taken to its deepest nadir in the last few centuries, when the privileged, particularly the Brahmin community, refused to even look at people from the lower castes. There is an infamous parable I have heard about a great grandfather of mine, who would stop eating and walk away from his lunch if he so much as heard the voice of the village tanner from outside. What sort of arrogance and entitlement was that? And why are we planning to forget any of it now? It should serve us as a reminder of an inglorious past - whenever we choose to cry hoarse.

In my 20s and my 30s, I never wanted to be an apologist. I used to abhor the fact that I was having to tell enraged, resentful people I knew that I was not responsible for the excesses of my forefathers. And that I owed no apology to anyone. But now, my views have undergone a fair amount of churn, and I choose to state my view a little differently than before.

My submission is this, and I have been saying this quite frequently to those who do not choose to see: Any social transition is going to bring its share of fair and unfair to all people. There will be a lot of muck that comes forth - 4 of the biggest upheavals in modern history of race (white vs black), gender (man vs woman), caste (privileged vs backward castes in Hindu society) and sexuality (hetero vs same sex) have thrown up the vomit that was buried deep in our underbelly. The narrative has moved or is moving rapidly from the first party to the second in each case, so there will be rage, accusations, counter narratives, slander (justified and otherwise) that will become a part of discourse. Why can we not be objective about this? Each one perceives the truth as he or she has seen and heard it. For every one person who is objective or rational, or data driven, there will be 99 who will be emotional and biased. And so be it.

It will be that we will tend to bucket all discourse and give it names.

When a person from a "privileged" caste speaks up against casteism, he will be labelled liberal or apologist, and when he doesn’t, he will be called casteist.

“The Daughters of Destiny” - at first sight, comes off as the ordinary story of 4 girls moving in and out of their lives, taking video bytes of the principal characters in the docu-drama, including family members. But, what really holds the narrative is the girls and their stories – the dramatic and extraordinary transformation they would have otherwise not been able to get access to, if they hadn’t landed in the place they finally came to be in. The docu drama patiently traces their metamorphosis in first, second and third person narratives over a number of years.

Among the many strong moments, I recall one of the girls poignantly making a remark, and in clear English, “It is simply unacceptable for people to look down upon another human being. I cannot bear to think I was born in a situation where my people have been looked down upon for centuries. I want to change all of it.” A moving statement - it was a teenager, who was asking very genuinely to be treated as a human. In a sense, she was declaring her fundamental right, and she had been empowered with the right skills to make such a matter-of-fact but powerful statement. It is as simple as that. And so be it. Why should we have a problem with her assertion? 

The twistedness of narrative in this day and age is not alien to me. So, if someone were to ask me, "Is casteism dead?", I would explain with a counter, "Has corruption been eradicated from our system?"

 I will not bother to explain myself repeatedly to naysayers of the caste debate, who want to live in constant denial or to the virulent "Brahmin" bashers who are in a tearing hurry to reach their fallacy of an idyllic "caste-free" world. The truth is far more complex. And we are in 2020, mind you - it is just too difficult a time in history for us to say who the victor is, and who the victim.

Kaaga Ka Munder Pe Bolna: The Film Music Connection

My Musings on the phrase, "Kaaga Ka Munder Be Bolna", and its deep rooted connection with Hindi Film Music!





Its references to earlier songs, from songstress Suraiya's croon from the 1947 hit, "Parwana" - my memories go back to Radio Ceylon and childhood!





And then, the reference to the double blockbuster, "Hum Aapke Hain Kaun" - Maayini Maayi Munder Pe Tere" - straight from the teen years (1994)