Thursday, February 03, 2005

Going through a BombScare

Good Day!!

How is to be through a BOMB SCARE..??? have you ever been through it?? or even thought of it?? I hope most of the people would have just seen it in Movies and TV...:-)... I have actually been through it.

It was the summer of hatred in Bangalore,Karnataka, when regionalism was conspicous in the air. It was 2004 June and I was new to bangalore by about 6 months...with a very scant knowledge of Kannada. Bangalore being the youngest metropolis in India has a high percentage of outside popluation and naturally other language movies like Hindi and Tamil obviously fared well than Kannada movies....which were a far cry from the professional aproach of tamil and hindi cinema.. The kannada film producers saw an oppurtunity and raised hue and cry about the supposedly step-motherly treatment given to kannada movies by the theatre owners and insisted the government that non-kannada movies be banned for a seven week ban from the date of their original release...a so called moratorium...this sparked a huge protest from the theatre owners in Bangalore...leading a few theatres shutting down...there was tension in the air where ever the non kannada movies played and it was visible...

This being the situation, there was this remake of the now famous MunnaiBhai MBBS in tamil with KamalHaasan in the lead role and I was very curious to watch this hilarious flick after seeing the effortless rendering by Sanjay Dutt...So my friend and me went to a theatre which was in the old bangalore area....we got the tickets..I was the first to get the tickets for that show..I was quite happy infact looking forward to that movie..as it was close to three months since I saw a tamil movie in theatre....That was the first day of the movie and first show of that film in the theatre for that day and they were cleaning the theatre and I was hoping they would open the door gates atleast 30 mins before the show...but the wait continued till fifteen minutes after the slated time of the show...but no signs of neither the management opening the show nor informing us of what is happening and I was getting wild as usual when I am not informed of what I should be...:-)....

Another 15 minutes and then comes the slightest hint and I find a couple of Police Officers, Inspectors I guess... coming in their famed Yellow bikes...another beeline of 4 officers come in another 15 minutes and I am kind of taking grasp of the situation trying to relate things in space!!!!....and then comes the final pointer a sniffer dog is planted into the scene and there creeps in panic in the faces of the anxious people..and the buzz word spreads and as we are trained in such sequences..through a spate of movies..;-)...we guess that there should have been a bomb threat call and hence the delay in the show....And as ever we were able to relate this incident to the 7 week moratorium for non kannada movies..more so because this broke the convention and was released before the moratorium ended.....

Me and my friend were in a catch 22 situation of whether we should stay on to see the movie or escape from the scene!!!...were not exactly sure as to what to do.....we wanted to buy time...bought it..and finally..after another 30 mins...the security gates were opened and people were let in after the police cleared the place of any bomb..:-)

But I was not exactly convinced..(being a person who will not get convinced of any matter unless I check it for myself..)..but still the temptation and passion for movies pulled me right into the theatre.

Into the movie deeply engrossed was I, but then there was a lateral thought line about the hoax call....how could one get rid of that??? The split personality ( if I can use that word now!!) in me trotted out...one wanting to see the movie completely..the other to run away as soon as possible...and move away from the threat...

But then a third thought process intruded and reminded me that Danger was there in every minute of life...what if the Bus I go after this meets with an accident??? or any thing unexpected that can happen???..what not ..all these negative thoughts were playing their part one after the other..in no particular order...again and again..though I was completely impressed with the way the movie was made..laughed my way out of the theatre. I could have moved out of the theatre immediately after the hoax call was informed..but then there is no thrill in living such a life and I wouldn't have been richer with this rare experience....but then there was alluring danger which I was ready to part with...but by the end of the movie..I learnt a very good lesson that Danger Lies in Every Walk of Life...in every minute...It is upto how we look at it and how much of importance we give to be bothering about it!! Keep doing what you feel is right..be true to your heart and leave the rest to the ubiquitous.


Rajesh


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Rajesh,

I guess you had taken the incident to your heart and had confused yourself, rather enjoying the movie.

For those who don't know me, Iam Santhosh Sudarsanan, his classmate for 4 years in engineering and one of his friends.

Buddy, how can you ever forget those days in Coimbatore when we had bombs ruining our city.Just few kilometres away from our home....the communal riots that happened after Selvaraj was murdered.

To a person who had lived all through this...I should ask Did a hoax call kindled your thoughts, so were the thoughts lying Numb when all this were happening to your hometown.

I should say, then you were in the safehands...your parents.

I still remember the night December 5, 1998.Being a NSS member, I was there in the Coimbatore Railway Station for checking the baggages of passengers.Decenber 6, being the babri Masjid demolition day...We were enjoying it(Taking unussually a long time in checking the bag good liking girls).

Just when everything seemed fine, there was a call to all the hand held walkie talkie of Police alerting about the Bomb in the station).Even before I could come to reality, the power went off.

Even when all these were happening..I was cursing my self for choosing to be here.There was no time for repent..it was just time for action.And we obeyed what ever we were told.
After few minutes, we were told that there was nothing to worry and we continued the routine checking, though this time we did it with full heart..no more girl stuff.:-)

I always used to say and I still say "Life is all about making Choices and spend time in making the right Choice".Once we had picked the right Choice there is no looking back.

Santhosh.S