Death in Mumbai (13 page)

Ekta grew up watching endless hours of television and devouring tubs of ice cream while her father was busy shooting three shifts a day, and her mother stayed away either travelling with him or at kitty parties. She decided to make television serials. ‘I loved TV, it gave me great joy.' Her friend Ratna Rajiah wrote a plot outline, which her cousin Gattu (better known as Abhishek Kapoor, the director of the Farhan Akhtar starrer
Rock On
) would
direct. ‘Our pilot was called
Jeans ‘n' Josh
and I must confess that the title was the only colourful thing about it; the serial was a grim look at things like peer pressure, AIDS, bisexuality, parental hypocrisy. We wanted to be dark and meaningful,' she said, letting out an ironic little giggle. ‘It was our equivalent of a Madhur Bhandarkar movie, and both Gattu and I were very proud of it. But when we showed it to Ravina Raj Kohli at Star TV, she took one look at it and dismissed us, saying no channel would commission something so dark, and which dealt with suicide and all. “Give me something happy and family oriented,” she said. We were crushed. I remember getting out of the Star office and shaking my head to Gattu: “What's the world come to, I say!”'

But she imbibed Ravina Raj Kohli's instructions well. ‘I am not saying we are ashamed of what we do… We did create
Kyunki, Kanyadan, Kavyanjali, Kasautti
which have been about the urban middle class, but you are not my audience. You can go home and see
Desperate Housewives
just like I do.'

Her serials are a volatile mix of traditional Indian motifs, often featuring joint families with all their stereotypes, clashing modern values, and are as formulaic as a Bollywood film. When Peter Chernin, then COO of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp (which owns Star TV in India), came to Ekta's home for a meal he asked her what was wrong with one of their new launches, and why it wasn't doing well. ‘Even then I told him that his new channel was trying to be a niche channel, and that could never be profitable in India.'

A few years after this well-meaning advice, Star TV terminated their decade-long exclusive partnership with Ekta, axed three of her daily soaps, and divested their 25.99 per cent share in her company. Balaji Telefilms' stock went into a tailspin, sparking a shiver of excitement among Bollywood's obituary writers.

We met again on the day her company lost its arbitration case against Star TV. She had just emerged from a marathon meeting with her creative team, but was still smarting from the judgment. ‘I gave Star the best eight, nine years of my life, I took them at face value, but they f***** me over…'

‘Then again,' she lowered her pitch by a notch or two, ‘my Rahu mahadasha has begun, and I've been told my secret enemies will start to surface.'

I asked with curiosity: ‘For how long will the mahadasha go on?'

‘Eighteen years, man!'

Early propagators of astrology, the Babylonians and the Mayans would read chicken liver for as many as six thousand warning signs. The greater the fear of uncertainty, and the less assurance there is of certitude, leaves the diviner and the follower to try every possible form of propitiation.

Such was the case with Ekta, who wore a stone on every finger, even two on some. Over the many doors of the seven-storeyed Balaji House, horseshoes, clutches of fresh neon-green chillies and lemon are tied along with coconuts wrapped in an auspicious red, dangling like the breasts of a baboon. On Ekta's fifth floor domain as well as at her Juhu house the Gayatri mantra, sung in a fast-paced tinny-voice,
as if on a worn-out tape, plays round the clock working like a force field against any possible evil eyes.

A former employee clued me in, ‘Whenever you meet her, take a close look at her shoes.' The woman who could easily afford the latest Manolos and Louboutins only ever wore a pair of worn-out platform slip-ons, straps in tatters, with the clunky rubber heels roughened. ‘She considers them her lucky shoes and won't trade them for another pair.'

Not long after hearing this, I read an interview with Ekta in
Hindustan Times
in which, speaking about her shows on Colors, Ekta said her association with the channel would be fruitful, she knew, because when it's creative head first called she'd been in a puja, and as soon as their conversation ended a flower dropped from the head of the idol. It was, Ekta said, a divine seal of approval.

I sat in on one of her meetings, hoping to catch some of the action—it was rumoured that in fits of rage she threw slippers (the lucky ones?) at errant employees; but while I was there, she remained regrettably in control.

Of the ten serials that are in production at any given time, Ekta only looks after three—the rest are taken care of by associates—but she decides the look and casting for each of the shows. ‘I remember we shortlisted a girl for our serial
Kasturi
, but when I came back from out of town and saw the hoardings, I realized her face did not reflect the innocence demanded by the character. Overnight the
hoardings were brought down, a fake story about how pressure had made the actress ill was circulated in the media, and a new girl was found.'

Ekta talked from behind a presidential-size desk as Vikas showed her auditions of aspirants—this is what Neeraj Grover used to do at Balaji Telefilms. Also present were seven or eight young women, all under thirty. Ekta stared hard at the computer screen, and pressed the enter key with the speed and concentration of a tabla player beating a riff on the dagga. Though the air conditioner remote was lying next to her, she passed it to one of the girls every few minutes: ‘On karo… ab off karo. Switch it on… ab off…'

Mothers, sisters—‘kindly faces', buas and sisters-in-law—‘nice bitchy faces' were swiftly cast before trouble erupted. ‘Where's the father? The Marathi actor I asked you guys to locate, the one who looks like an older Ajay Devgn?' There was a shuffle of confusion, and Vikas pressed ahead trying to show her other options, but she refused to be appeased.

‘WHERE IS THE GUY I WANT?'

The entire group involuntarily moved back a step. Was I about to witness a famous Ekta blowout? Instead, she abruptly switched her tone and turned to me. ‘I got the idea for the film on Neeraj from something you said. General wisdom is that creative directors like him have no clout, they merely audition…but I got thinking, and it struck me that I get to see only what they choose to show me. They actually have the power to make or break someone's career. If my staff shows me the photograph of an actor just as I am leaving for home, getting into the car,
ninety per cent chances are I'll say okay. That's the time I am exhausted and not as hawk-eyed… This power and what they choose to do with it is what I want to explore in the film.'

She then got up, and with a gesture intended to be theatrical, pulled me into the corridor. ‘If you're doing a book on Neeraj Grover, you must speak to Smita Patil,' she said sotto voce. ‘She's a spook, man!'

Though Neeraj had quit working for Ekta Kapoor several months earlier, when he went missing Ekta got one of her colleagues to contact a clairvoyant for his whereabouts. It was a far more reliable source of information for her than any detective could offer. ‘I knew Neeraj was dead even before the police announced it. This woman had told us that his girlfriend, along with two other men, had killed him, and she also gave details of where his body could be found.'

Two days later she texted me the mobile number of her clairvoyant, Smita Patil.

The phone beeped, and Narendra Chanchal's ‘
Chalo bulawaa aaya hai, maata ne bulaya hai
'…rang in my ear. Mid-crescendo, Smita Patil cut him short and answered the phone. She had been a Goregaon girl who got her degree in textile designing from Sophia Polytechnic, and married an assistant geologist in ONGC. For several years she taught art in various schools, all the while nursing political ambitions. In 1999 she was jailed during a political agitation, and was featured in the
Bombay Times
as ‘Star of the Week'.

A devotee of Durga from her early days, she did the punishing nine-day nirjala vrat every Navratri to invoke
the goddess. ‘People started making fun of my bhakti so I prayed hard to Mata Rani, saying she needed to manifest herself and save me from such humiliation. In 2005, Mata Rani housed herself in my body and she has stayed on since, constantly showing her chamatkar.'

Every Tuesday at her home, which is right next to a teeming mall at Bhayander, she holds a durbar where Mata Rani—and here Smita Patil referred to herself in the third person—gives darshan seated on her high chair, doling out individual benedictions after the prayers. From healing invalids to blessing the childless, Mata Rani's bounty, she says, knows no limit.

‘In May last year one of my bhakts, a girl called Rasika, came in with her boyfriend Kushal who works at Balaji, he wanted to know the whereabouts of his friend Neeraj. I took one look at Neeraj's picture and said, “The boy is no more, his girlfriend and two men are responsible, and the body can be found near water.” Kushal told me no one would kidnap Neeraj, and that he didn't think that's what had happened. So I closed my eyes again and told him that Mata Rani had spoken and that the girlfriend should be taken to the CBI and she would confess.'

‘This Kushal called me one evening some days later and said, “Mata Rani, please switch on the TV. Whatever you said has come true.”' She has guided several celebrities in addition to Ekta, even telling a powerful Shiv Sena politician that he was going to die soon.

And, did he? It was impossible to resist the question.

‘Within three days of my informing him this, he had an accident and died.'

But it's not easy being Mata Rani, taking care of bhoot–balaayein, and dialoguing with the spirits. ‘If it's a shaitani shakti I have to counter, I suffer tremendously, my feet get crooked, I start yelling and then my body starts to get heavier and heavier. Mata Rani needs to be in a pure environment and you can imagine what that means in a filthy city like Mumbai… It's difficult to walk on roads, travel by train, I can't clean my house, wash utensils, normal life is not possible with Mata Rani constantly living in my body. The family life is affected too.' But her children, one of whom studies aeronautical engineering in Nashik while the other is in class XI, have come to accept the new presence in their mother's life.

‘My dream is to serve the people and have a temple built in Mata Rani's name at my residence, for that's where her shrine stood four hundred years ago, and which was later buried under rubble. Mata Rani needs to be brought out from under the earth and allowed to breathe.'

Superstitions and clinging to totems sit oddly with the woman I've been interviewing. Ekta is bright, humorous, and in possession of a combative streak. I mentioned this to a television insider who has dealt closely with Balaji Telefilms, and who agreed to speak provided I kept his identity concealed. ‘To understand the Ekta phenomenon,' he said chuckling quietly, ‘you must also know the father and the mother. Brand Ekta is the three of them operating as a unit.'

Shobha Kapoor, a former flight attendant, is the canny dowager whose business deals are as sharp as her diamonds. Her rough cuts are offset by Ekta's father. Jeetendra was India's original dancing star who, when thirty was thought of as middle age, famously endorsed a brand of virility capsules called ‘Thirty Plus'. ‘Jeetendra is charm and gentleness personified,' my informer explained.

The final member of the troika is Ekta, the unpredictable, superstitious diva with a famous temper, who creates amidst chaos. ‘The mother will play hardball with a channel in the morning, but blame Ekta's working style when executives complain of schedules going awry or tapes coming in late. If the channel ever suggests dropping a Balaji show that may be faring poorly, Jeetendra will take the executives out for a drink by the evening and get emotional and apologetic, saying: “You know just how eccentric Ekta is, all the shows are like her babies, I understand your problem but if you drop one of the shows, she may get upset, that in turn may affect her creativity, and impact the rest of the serials on the channel…”' The insider laughed, putting aside his masala chai. ‘It's a brilliant strategy.'