Table Manners

32

Tweet

Arundhati Roy's book, Power Politics, uses the delectable imagery of how it increasingly appears Indians are being rounded up and loaded into two convoys of trucks - the tiny one moving towards a glittering destination and the large one, comprising of the unsung, hurtling towards darkness and then disappearing.

Award ceremonies are widely criticized for egging on only the mini-convoy. For celebrating those who glitter and are considered glamorous. For feting fluff and frivolity.

So when you have an awards night where the underdog, the unsung and the simple is celebrated and put under arc-lights, you would expect a certain solemnity in the air. You would expect the invitees to feel privileged to be a part of a celebration where status and power - the two heaviest loads being carried by the mini-convoy - have been offloaded.

But Delhi is different. It's a city whose air contains highly noxious and intoxicating fumes of power whose constant inhalation cripples egalitarian thinking. Those afflicted by it even fail to recognize the enormity of simple human achievements.

Little wonder that many amongst the crush of audience which turned up for the CNN-IBN Indian of the Year awards night [Watch Video], perhaps, failed to notice the occasion was celebrating simplicity. It was honouring those who helped us smile and be comfortable. Who gave us hope, a sense that by their work those traveling on board the larger convoy are at least being noticed and acknowledged.

They did not notice, for instance, that the awardees were those who were successful not because of the system, but inspite of it. Who inspired us not because of their glam quotient or sense of importance, but because they delivered by being honest, credible, faceless and disciplined.

So, if an RK Laxman was honoured for making us smile everyday for 60 years and by encapsulating in a single column box what many of us have been feeling for decades, provided rare emotionally cathartic moments to us, a Sreedharan was put on a pedestal for showing how integrity and discipline can move mountains. That our everyday lives became better and happier was a welcome byproduct, worthy enough to be applauded en masse without worrying which table you were clapping from.

But then we are talking about certain countrymen (especially Delhiites) who judge and confirm their participation in such a celebration by the table number they have been allotted. Some, who unfortunately have inhaled more noxious power fumes than others, consider a double digit allocation as a mark of shrinking stature, not a good enough place to applaud selfless service from. They need a pedestal, a prominent place, even to applaud selfless and faceless work.

Another matter, that even in the reviled entertainment category which is often stamped with the sobriquet of fluff and frivolity, the CNN-IBN Indian of the Year grand finale was celebrating the creators of a thought that teaches us the triumph of the unseen, the underdog, the unheralded and the ordinary.

It didn't matter to the table-number conscious lot that one of the "important tables" (as described by those who have inhaled too much those noxious power fumes) was occupied by five Indians who have rendered faceless public service without expecting anything in return.

From a Kousalya, a truck driver's HIV positive wife who fought the affliction, society and her fate, to work for betterment of others like her, to Dr Oscar Rebello, who is trying to ensure Goa stays what its called - a paradise. From Anand Kumar and Abhayanand, who are helping the under-privileged to actualize their dreams of becoming top-notch technocrats, to Dr Sharan Patil who provided the medical miracle of the year, they were all there, unseen.

They even failed to notice that a majority of the hall, comprising of those not affected by the fumes, stood up and applauded the lot when they were asked to speak. How there weren't many in the hall whose eyes didn't turn moist when the man who made the nation smile and laugh each morning, broke down and wept profusely while accepting his award from Dr APJ Abdul Kalam. An immensely poignant and emotional moment.

Strangely, it was also a therapeutic moment. For you could clearly see the effect of the power fumes waning a bit. So, some of those who had been grumbling their way through the evening because the turnout was so unprecedented and hence couldn't get the hallowed table, suddenly politely and uncomplainingly waded through the same crowd to speak to Laxman. To tell him how much his work meant to them. How they were honoured just to meet him, to see him in blood and flesh.

For us at CNN-IBN, this was the real moment. A meaningful and satisfying facet of the awards night, where for many of the power conscious, the table number didn't matter any more. What mattered more was applauding a Laxman, a Sreedharan, a Vishwanathan Anand, a Shimit and a Jaideep. Of realizing there was a critical need to applaud and glorify many who were not actors and cricketers.

It was satisfying we were able to show them a bit of the unheralded India. Maybe next time CNN-IBN will have an even better award ceremony. Maybe, next time we can all come together and take them on a ride on-board the larger convoy of trucks that Arundhati wrote about.

Just to allow them to have a longer, more meaningful look at it. Without worrying about the table they are seated on.