Entitled

 

Entitled

We watched Ramin Bahrani’s ‘White Tiger’ two weeks ago and thought it was a great watch, especially the protagonist, played by young actor Adarsh Gourav who was impressionable and Priyanka Chopra and Rajkumar Rao, as expected from them, gave a solid all-round performance. The story based upon Arvind Adiga’s novel tells the story of a boy from a backward caste in Bihar and his experiences in the class-conscious Indian societal structure. The bottom line of the story is that the lowest rung of Indian society is destined for a lifetime of servitude since they have been bought up believing that their very existence is dependent on the largesse of the people they serve. Servants are so deferential to their masters, that sometimes all aspects of their lives, their children’s lives, and their grand children’s lives are dictated by the whims of their masters.

Being born poor is a curse, rather than anywhere in the world, but more so in India, where centuries of caste, race, and religious politics adds additional layers of dominance to those above or higher in the food chain. Having grown up in a city, I was not exposed to the full extent of the subjugation of the poor in the society, but there was ample evidence of peoples entitled behavior towards those economically lower than them like the domestic help, drivers, watchmen, hawkers or just about any perceived to be poor and needy. The watchman in society was treated like the personal errand boy of most society members, more so of those in the managing committee of the society or the general secretary or chairman. It’s like servitude is so inbred in this strata of society, that they meekly obey whatever is ordered of them. Very rarely do you find employers treating their employees as equals or even accord them a minimum of respect. Children learn at a very young age that it’s OK to abuse or be rude to those less fortunate than them economically, be it the domestic help at home, drivers, hawkers, and others in their ecosystem. Even when someone’s car breaks down on the road, the owner of the car thinks nothing to order those pedestrians around, who may appear far less affluent to push their car, and then drive away nonchalantly after the car starts.

Our apartment building, growing up, bordering the two-storied bungalow of some lawyer. The lawyer and his family lived on the second floor and the first floor was rented out to other tenants. Next to the bungalow were several tin shacks, where the servants who worked at the lawyer’s house, their driver, the maali (gardener), and others lived. These tin shacks bordered our society wall and every time we played clicked and someone hit the ball over the wall it would land across the wall in the middle of these shacks. As children, we’d brazenly walk into the homes of these folks to retrieve the cricket ball, without even paying much attention to the inhabitants or their protests. It was as if these people simply didn’t even exist. The residents of these houses most times wouldn’t complain about us walking into their houses while they could be in the middle of sleeping, cooking, changing or whatever else people normally do. Nor did we bother to ask if it was OK for us to go fetch the cricket ball. It was as if it was our right to trample any shred of privacy these people had, to get what we wanted. Now that I think about this, it certainly seems bizarre behavior by a bunch of callous, unrefined teens.

The poor certainly exist in India, in large numbers, they are just not very visible to classes above them. My experiences are from limited exposure that growing up in a metro like Bombay. Imagine how much worse it is in the villages where there are layers of caste, religion and feudal hierarchies that permeate all aspects of daily life. That’s really the national shame.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6571548/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0