And Then One Day: A Memoir (8 page)

T
he euphoria of passing out of school didn’t take long to dissipate. As reward, Baba had gifted me my first wristwatch though not before reminding me that my constant praying was responsible for my success. I chuckled inwardly at how very gullible this god I was dealing with was. I was also reminded that Zaheer was already at the IIT though emulating his example, to my enormous relief, was not even considered. The Foreign Service, the IAS, the tea gardens, even an agricultural college were considered. Appearing for the National Defence Academy, where the other Z was, was discussed and, not without reluctance, I sent in an application. Zameer’s first homecoming from the NDA had been dazzling. With his height and good looks he had always cut an imposing figure anyway but that day, in cadet’s uniform and newly grown handlebars when he alighted from a first- class compartment and the cop standing around saluted him, he looked as grand as Mr Kendal making an entrance onstage. For a few brief fantasy moments, I was already in the NDA myself and was coming home to make such an impression. But I had, while in school, attended NCC camp a few times and slept in tents with other cadets, whose favourite pastime late at night was to tie one end of a long string on to a sleeping guy’s willy, then thread the string through the top of the tent to ‘fly kites’. Kicked awake sore-backed on freezing winter mornings to put on starched uniforms and go parading, we then lined up with our enamel mugs and plates (same mug for ablutions and drinking) to get some slop to eat and drink, and then till lunchtime were drilled some more. This life was definitely NOT for me. But I dutifully filled out the forms for the NDA, imagining myself looking spiffy in army uniform, waxed moustache and all. Z shortly informed me that though as cadets they spent a goodish amount of time learning to ride and sail and box and handle weapons and cycled from class to class, there was to be no escape from maths, that carrying a gun and looking cool was not all there was to it. I knew the only reason I wanted to go to the NDA was to look good in uniform; that thrill wouldn’t last a fortnight, and my endurance would give out even earlier I suspected. And then, Hell, I can wear all the uniforms I want to when I become an actor.

The prestigious St Stephen’s in Delhi was where I fancied I’d go but they didn’t bother to reply to my handwritten request for an application form; perhaps they couldn’t decipher my handwriting, I sometimes can’t myself. The only recourse was the institution in which two generations of my family had studied, the Aligarh Muslim University. Despite its imposing architecture and long history of noble intentions, this place has remained stuck in a time warp. Far from fulfilling its aims of helping create generation after generation of educated enlightened Muslims to contribute to the growth of the community and to integrate with the rest of the country, it has stayed a hotbed of communal conservatism if not downright fundamentalism. There still are strict codes of dress and protocol, though not necessarily of civility and ethical behaviour.

Besides, in Aligarh undergraduate classes were not co-ed so I really did not want to go there. I once again tried persuading Baba to let me dump the sciences and do literature instead, but he was already warning me that as a doctor I would have to check my short fuse. So, consoling myself that I could probably make a great impact white-coated and stethoscoped, striding busily down a corridor issuing curt instructions to my assistants, I applied for the sciences only to be rejected for my poor percentage. I had been assured AMU rejected no one! At his wits’ end, Baba took me back to Meerut with him and with a minimum of fuss, and the help of a first cousin, an influential lawyer there, I got into ‘NAS’ college, known as ‘Nanak Chand’ for some no doubt very good reason which I didn’t have the time to uncover; my stay there did not last long. NAS had no hostel so Baba had me lodge with his paternal uncle Masoom Ali Shah who owned a sprawling bungalow in the cantonment. A retired Deputy Collector like my father, he was universally known as Dipti saab. When he died my father assumed the mantle of Dipti saab in Sardhana.

I was given an unused room near the porch for which, if I remember right, rent was charged. I was expected to clean it up and make it liveable. Ah bliss! My own place, a stone’s throw from Palace Cinema. I had my freedom now, which I then went on to thoroughly misuse. Dada Dipti’s bungalow and its grounds were huge enough to accommodate an army. There were three other families lodging in various sections of the mansion, and I spent some time with those of my age group, but none had the passion for cinema that I did, nor did any of them play cricket. The NAS college cricket team asked me to try out in the nets, but never having played at college level I blithely went in to bat without wearing a box, got hit where it mattered most and didn’t make the greatest impression. I was to give cricket a very wide berth for many years after that, and not only because of this batting debacle.

NAS did nothing for me except for nearly getting my brains beaten out by half a dozen guys after a brawl with the resident ‘dada’ and that, cycling there every morning, I manfully eyed all the girls heading to Raghunath Girls’ College nearby, and I spent all my pocket money, and a not insubstantial portion of the fees I was supposed to be depositing in the college, on movies at Palace Cinema. Palace, now standing abandoned, probably being fought over by various claimants, had, I discovered, been a swimming pool in the British days, which explained why the inside always felt clammy. Later converted into a cinema with the gradient of its floor remaining as it was, it served perfectly for various ‘classes’ of ticket-pricing, the shallowest part of the ‘pool’ being the balcony. Only American and British movies showed there, and every three days there was a change of bill. I gorged on each one. The movie virus had fully entered my bloodstream, was proliferating and raging through my system.

I don’t know when the idea of going to Bombay first occurred to me but one day I remembered JR had a girlfriend in Bombay, SM, whose father was a character actor. My naivety said that anyone connected to films should be able to get me a job of some kind there, any job at all, I didn’t mean to be picky right away. I started corresponding with her when I had the time to spare from drawing posters of imaginary films starring myself, and by and by confessed my dreams to her and asked if she thought I should come to Bombay. She was not dismissive of the idea, assured me her father ‘would do his best’ for me, and even offered to host me during my stay. Reeling at her generosity, I used up another biggish chunk of my college fees to book a berth for a month hence on the Dehradun Express which went direct from there to Bombay, picking up passengers in Meerut. My watch and bicycle I decided to sell along with my books and most of my warm clothes, which I wouldn’t need—it was never cold in Bombay. The grand total, about five hundred rupees, would be more than enough to see me through the few days in Bombay before I would probably be rolling in it, dining fancy and signing autographs. I was heading to Bombay to stay in a REAL living actor’s home and he was going to ‘do his best’ for me, I was going to be famous. What could possibly go wrong? I hadn’t yet heard of Mr Murphy and his law.

They were at Bombay Central station to receive me, bless their souls: she, her brother and a cousin Yusuf with whom I later spent most of my time. I think I also expected a limousine to pull up and drive me to their, I imagined, palatial abode, I assumed all film actors lived luxurious lives. There was no limousine but there was tea and ‘keema pao’ in an Irani restaurant, my first taste of Bombay’s gastronomical wonders, then into what I was informed was a ‘local’ train going to Bandra where I knew she stayed. In the taxi ride from Bandra station I rubbernecked till Mehboob Studios was completely out of sight; my dreams seemed to be materializing with a rapidity even I hadn’t anticipated. We drove up gorgeous Mount Mary, I saw the Arabian Sea for the first time, and alighted in the porch of a not unimpressive bungalow, smaller than Masoom Villa but a bungalow! ‘You’ll be staying here,’ I was informed. I was still searching for the words to voice my admiration for her house and my gratitude for letting me stay when a middle-aged lady, her aunt, emerged and was introduced as the owner. I couldn’t believe my luck. If this was just the aunt’s house, my imagination failed me as to what her own house must be like. Aunt ushered me in, not without many misgivings, as I learnt later, which would prove to be completely justified. Innocently imagining I was on a short visit, this good soul had been prevailed upon to host me for the ‘week or two’ that I was supposed to stay, never once suspecting that I had no intention of leaving. SM didn’t bat an eyelid when I said as much to her, just suggested I take a stroll by the sea, which I did; and after having some difficulty deciding which bungalow on Mount Mary I should buy some day, I returned to find myself the subject of a stormy family conference.

News of my intentions, or lack of them, had been shared, and there were concerned looks all around. Her father, the actor gentleman, eyeballed me with authoritative curiosity and delivered his considered opinion that at sixteen I was not young enough to be a child actor and not old enough to play grown-up parts. I furiously quoted the film
Dosti,
a recent hit which had starred two boys my age; he mumbled something about ‘lack of face’ which I didn’t quite catch. He promised to cast me as something in the film he was directing but that wouldn’t be for some time; meanwhile I should go home and he would talk to my father when the time came. As far as he was concerned that ended the matter; but in a tone of arrogant entitlement, which still appalls me when I remember it, I made it clear I was staying. He lapsed into silence, sighing heavily. SM stayed inscrutable through this exchange and didn’t let on one bit. To her everlasting credit I have to say that through this time, almost a month, she never once mentioned even obliquely the acute embarrassment I had caused her by imposing on her entire family, and burdening them with feeding and feeling responsible for me. She never once suggested it was time for me to hit the road, and of course it never occurred to me. In about a month, Aunt’s patience was exhausted but I was still not asked to leave. A story about the house being demolished had to be invented and I was asked to please look for an alternative.

On Linking Road was an unemployed actors’ hangout, Pamposh Restaurant, home to thousands of nascent dreams and as many dashed hopes. Successful stars were glimpsed whizzing past in their limousines while the not-so-successful ones preened on the sidewalk or ‘measured out their lives’ in cups of cutting chai. I was now actually hanging around with this crowd. My money had long run out but SM, even while turning increasingly preoccupied, kept supplying me with basic needs. The kindness of strangers sometimes got me the odd cup of tea in Pamposh. Meals were at her house, which was on Linking Road as well. When I went there for the first time I learnt why I hadn’t been invited to stay. It was one room the six of them lived in with, those days, Cousin visiting as well. I would be given food on a little tray and would eat in the tiny porch outside their apartment, amidst now not-so-gentle reminders from her family that I should either move my ass to get work or go home. A ceremonious exit from the Mount Mary bungalow being imminent, Cousin had helped me find a place to sleep in, a large hall in Madanpura, the heart of the city, a fleapit by any standards. This hall in the daytime served as a cottage industry, manufacturing zari embroidery. For ten rupees a month each, about thirty of us there had been given pigeonholes to keep our things, and fixed spots to sleep in at night. By nine every morning we had to clear out whether or not we had anywhere else to go. I, of course, had: Bandra and Pamposh. Through the month and more that I lived in this Madanpura zari factory, I travelled ticketless on the local train at least twice every day and never once was I apprehended. Cousin had shown me a back route out of Bandra station and I discovered one at Bombay Central station on my own. There can be no further evidence of the fact that my guardian angel was on extra alert all this time.

I find it hard, to this day, to explain or even understand the peculiar apathy that overtook me then, and stayed with me for a long time after; apathy towards my future, towards my empty stomach, towards any chance of employment, towards my traumatized parents. My only attempts at initiative were as a result of SM and her family’s goading. I was taken by one of her old man’s hangers-on (in Bombay even smalltime actors have hangers-on) to a beautifully situated restaurant called Bartorelli’s with the sea on one side and the racecourse on the other, where he knew the manager. The plan was to try to get me a steward’s job. I wondered if stewards got tips, and secretly wished for a waiter’s job instead. Of course the manager was no longer the manager and so that plan came to naught and they were not in need of waiters at the moment. And getting a waiter’s job wasn’t by any means going to be the cinch I had imagined; you had to work your way up from washing dishes, were supposed not only to know the menu backwards but also the details of every item in it. But in Bartorelli’s I saw a film star in close- up for the first time and when hanger-on said hello to him, I was impressed because he received an acknowledgement. I was of course very far from learning that you don’t have to know film stars to say hello to them, and most of them invariably and automatically respond.

The other token attempt at moving my ass was brought on by Cousin who one day came at me waving a ragged newspaper ad stating ‘Bellboys wanted at the Taj Mahal Hotel’, the requirements were eighteen to twenty-five years of age, a high-school degree, good personality and knowledge of English. Salary Rs 200 per month. I thought I could fudge the age and, not having looked in a mirror at the pathetic apparition I had become, felt more than adequately equipped with the other two qualifications. A passport-size photo was to accompany the application. Cousin, bless him, produced the two rupees needed for this expensive operation and I painstakingly wrote out the application in longhand, attached the two photos, caught the train to Churchgate and walked to the Taj to get the employment I knew was mine. It was a sure thing, I mused, all one needed was the ability to carry luggage. I could do that, besides I was a high-school graduate, I spoke English and of course my personality was stunning. By the time I got to the magnificent front entrance, my knees began to give way and the gigantic doorman was distinctly unwelcoming. It was an eternity until I buttonholed someone milder looking, and was informed it was around through the back entrance to the personnel office that I was supposed to go. I submitted the application to a somewhat perplexed guy sitting at a desk and left, quite certain I wouldn’t look at all silly in a pillbox cap and uniform, at least there was Jerry Lewis to think of. And then—a full stomach, fat tips from millionaires and, inevitably, being spotted by a really perceptive film-maker one day. I never learnt how good I’d be at this job either, because by the time they responded to my application, and something tells me they didn’t, my sojourn in the city was coming to an end and so the Taj missed employing the best bellboy that money could buy.