The Hindu Business Line : Three wise men visit Mumbai

Three Nobel laureates came to Mumbai from among the clutch of Nobel prize-winners and statesmen who attended the international conference in Delhi on Mahatma Gandhi's satyagraha movement.

The trio came, spoke and conquered the hearts of Mumbaikars starting with the Dalai Lama, whose first public lecture since his hospitalisation in 2003 attracted large numbers of the city's glitterati.

Next, the Bangladeshi economist Muhammad Yunus and former Polish president Lech Walesa addressed the city's movers and shakers at meetings hosted by the Bombay Chamber of Commerce, the Indo-Polish Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the All India Association of Industries.

Gandhi Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu made an impassioned plea for Tibet's freedom, which greatly pleased the Tibetan community (and predictably drew flak from the Chinese here).

Says award-winning poet Tenzin Tsundue, "The Archbishop's support comment is most gratifying. But politics has its own course to pass through. India did the rub-off act quickly after his speech."

Chalti ka naam gaadi

Timeless classics: Vintage cars line up for their day in Mumbai's sun.

Culture-vultures have never had it so good. The 9th Kala Ghoda Arts Festival (KGAF) is upon us; choc a block with the visual arts, dance, music, theatre, cinema, literature, lectures, seminars and workshops, heritage walks, etc, most of which are held on Rampart Row or Kersi Dubash Marg, with the entire precinct becoming a vibrant street mela; special events for children are held in the Museum Garden, while some others have expanded beyond the Kala Ghoda crescent. The success of the KGAF encouraged the setting up of other arts and cultural festivals such as the Bandra Festival, the Khotachiwadi Festival, the just-concluded Mumbai Festival, and the upcoming Kitab Festival. By which time Vintage & Classic Car Club of India's annual Rally & Motorcycle Fiesta would have also been flagged off in Mumbai.

I've been counting the gaadis: five each from the stables of press baron Vivek Goenka and Vijay Mallya, two Rolls-Royces from Ramesh Thakkar's collection; Zaheer Vakil's impeccably preserved Buicks, Jaguars and Rovers.

Mumbai Samachar proprietor Hormusji Cama also participated. In the motorcycles segment, the oldest till date is VCCCI chairman Nitin Dossa's 1911 Triumph, while the oldest car is Peter Travasso's 1919 Fiat.

"You must ask our wives about the maintenance," smiled Dossa in response to my query.

Other beauties included Yohan Poonawalla's Rolls-Royce Phantom 3, a convertible marquee formerly owned by the Maharaja of Kota.

And oh, there was the cute Beetle too, whose provenance can be traced to Adolf Hitler who called it the Volkswagen (people's car) Jawohl — the Fuehrer had the right ideas about cars; if only he'd learnt to tolerate subalterns as much as he adored automobiles.

Preserving ethnic culture

I first met Dr Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy and Dr Amy Catlin Jairazbhoy, both Professors in the Department of Ethnomusicology, UCLA, at the first of Max Mueller Bhavan Director (retd) Dr Georg Lechner's exciting East West Encounters at the NCPA.

The Jairazbhoys have been visiting India frequently since then; they conducted the Heras Institute's 30th annual Historians' Workshop on "Researching and Documenting India's Folk Performing Arts" recently.

Like their mentor, the late Dutch anthropologist Arnold Bake, the Jairazbhoys have devoted a good part of their lives to this largely undocumented area.

Jairazbhoy is a Mumbaikar whose family was divided during the Partition. He went to the UK and US. When his mother migrated to Pakistan, their splendid ancestral house was acquired by the government. The Jairazbhoys bequeathed their Rolls Royce to a trusted family retainer.

The Jairazbhoy Manor is now used for film shoots, while the sprawling compound which houses the Films Division, among other government offices, has served as the venue of some great parties. Jairazbhoy smiles sadly when asked if he has tried getting it back; after all, if Salman Rushdie could succeed, why shouldn't he?

Eco documentaries

ECOMOVE International, a network of international environmental film festivals, in co-operation with the Bombay Natural History Society and Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai, has compiled a series of outstanding Indian, German and international documentaries which address environmental issues and their global causes. Did you know India's water bottling industry clocks an annual worth of approximately Rs 1,800 crore?

One documentary directed by Sanjay Barnela/Vasant Saberwal travelled from Delhi to Indore and from Mumbai to Chennai to explore the politics and economics of urban water supplies. In each city they came across the same solution — the construction of large projects to bring water from distant rivers to various cities.

Surplus - Terrorised Into Being Consumers is a documentary on consumerism and globalisation. Director Erik Gandini presented the issue from an emotional rather than a factual perspective.

Filmed over the course of three years in the US, India, China, Italy, Sweden, Hungary, Canada and Cuba, his film includes controversial statements such as George W. Bush's famous "shopping" speech calling for a war on terrorism which deters the nation from being scared of consuming. Fidel Castro responding with hymns to the anti-consumer and advertising-free island of Cuba. And Steve Ballmer jumping around the stage like a rock-star while stating that the computer will lead to peace on earth by "bringing people together".

Also involved in Surplus is John Zerzan, a controversial philosopher who urges property damage. "We are terrorised into being consumers... Taking to the streets is not violence. Sitting at home smoking dope and watching MTV, and then going and getting a job... To me, that is violence," says Zerzan.