BOR CHORAS AND MY GRANDMOTHER !

My Granny finds it a little difficult to walk and breathe and work as much due to her age but she called me and other grandsons like every year because today is 'bor choras', ..... first chauth after Rakhi according to Hindu calendar....well I don't know about this,....this is what I tried to remember.I asked her why she does this , as I have asked her on several other occasions when she does a particular ritual and her answer has been...."mere sasural mein meri saas ye karti thin isliye main aaj tak kar rahi hoon bas....." 

At this age she is a mother , mother in law, grandmother and great grandmother but it is so beautiful to see that bahu still alive in her , the commitment that her heart made almost 70 years back to her new family she accepted is undeterred , for her sense of responsibility on the behalf of the members of her sasural who are no more in this world.... for a khandaan with all new generation that doesn't even know or expect any ritual from her , she takes all the initiative when she has to take a lot of effort to move much... remembers, arranges , invites and does the ritual with the limited strength she has , on a lighter note she says she does this ritual for sons as she does for girls on Rakhi feeling , for poor guys there is no occasion where they get any gift ,so she calls us just after Rakhi.... so we are given a hundred rupee note and a coconut , she puts a teeka on our forehead and blesses us loudly ,  iski rakhsha karna shiv baba ....... I can't help admiring her quietly ,when she tells us which hand to accept that coconut with , which direction to face while taking it , her honesty , her dedication for the family she entered as a bahu and her sense of responsibility seems like a myth....if you don't witness it . ......my mother kept following all rituals after my dad passed away for a year just because she felt this is what is done in her sasural ....when no one ever saw what she was doing ..... 

Want to make it clear to ladies I am not advocating women must follow these rituals ,they have every right to ignore them, I am specifically talking about these women for whom becoming a bahu was a much bigger and life changing commitment than just a marriage......It gives me goosebumps whenever I see grandmaa with so much respect keeping alive everything she saw her mother in law doing ......some may call it being conservative I call it khaandaniyat..... khaandaniyat ka paise aur rituals se bhi zyada discipline aur sense of belongingness se taalluk hai and these women are an institution, I sometimes feel the love and respect of a woman for her sasural is what truly makes her head of the family one day .....because this honest commitment is what makes her that deserving and great ....every year on this occasion I realise , to be a bahu is really greater than we could ever see in a movie or tv channel...... saas bahu is an out of this world phenomenon, that keeps this world rolling.

All busy... we leave one by one after taking that coconut back to work and she silently lies down again with a satisfaction that she could successfully keep alive the legacy and tradition of her sasural.....

If maa behens are enjoying maa behen gaalis , do you think men would ever want to be decent ?

Almost all my female co actors and friends are here on Facebook in my friends list ...... and today on a social platform I can very confidently (no more proudly) say that never ever till date in so many years of my career and life have I ever abused or cracked an indecent joke in front of any female co star or female friend..... it was a decorum that my mother taught me .... maa behen gaalis have a meaning that is like humiliating every woman your mothers and your sisters too... ( NOTE : If till here anybody is feeling I am trying to be a saint they can stop reading it now :) ), there is a protocol that men have to follow when ladies are around ,I believed....and this is the respect women tend to demand on the net all the time in all their shared posts..... now I see the same ladies laughing the loudest on maa behen gaalis and non veg jokes in any stand up comedy event, where performers openly use foul words and cheap jokes to a surprising change that female standup comedians in between their acts have also started using abusive words just to make people laugh ....besides the long list of women who fight for such events and claim that they did not find anything wrong with them to women who themselves abuse with their male friends which is very obviously to make interaction easy and feel comfortable in their company.... I feel begaani shaadi mein bekaar hi abdullah deewana ha ha .....I really feel so disappointed that I completely misunderstood the definition of respect and decorum for so many years, what I was taught doesn't hold true now ,I am just talking about myself here , just sharing the late realisation ....I have become so primitive in my approach it seems ...... just because one AIB on Youtube got away with it ....now there is a line of followers / jokers who feel they have found a way to succeed aping their over hyped role models by overdoing it, I feel together it will take them a lifetime to become a Kapil sharma or Raju shrivastav who can still make people roll on the floor laughing. with a decorum which suits a child or an 80 year old ...... they have range ..... and some prove they are good enough to be enclosed in a club of 'dying to be different' drunk self proclaimed liberals....When I see someone on stage using foul language in their act, I feel , it just shows how desperate they are to somehow manage to make something work either by shock or verbal violence ....desperate to be remembered ....I don't know but I am still very uncomfortable in such a place ....it hurts.... and yes an actor is saying that who has spent a major part of his life being in the most so called hep and cool and flamboyant and flashy and in and liberal profession and lifestyle .... I am not saying this out of ignorance ... I have seen more than many others.....staying away from my house for several years for work has at least made me wise enough to not feel that people enjoying it have any reason to stop it ....they have a different mindset , just that I really feel so lonely and silly surviving on beliefs that seem so pretentious today ..... it might be cool for everybody else but talking cheap can never be funny for me , ek indecent word in a public gathering by a performer aur mera mood off.... believe you me I am not proud of what I go through , in fact I find people so lucky who can abuse openly on any media without any inhibition of their parents and sisters and teachers and still are so unapologetic about it , may be they feel so liberated but ab jo bhi seekha hai badon se wo jaane mein mere jaise kuchh ajeeb logon ka ek janam nikal jata hai....main cool cool dude nahin ban paya shayad ..... log bahut aage nikal gaye hain , hum jaise shayad peechhe reh jaen par chalo jahan bhi pahunch jaen , itminaan kar lenge.

THE LIKE ADDICTION

I am sure our future generations will remember this phase of Facebook and Twitter as an absurd era of immense addiction of our generation which completely got dependent on money making websites and virtual applications for self worth , emotional needs, friendships , adulation , importance , liking , bonding , exhibition , propagation and existence , where fake pictures replaced real humans and an unknown list of names was like real accumulation of prestige and power .... where intelligent designers of Facebook placed some psychological triggers on some buttons, like followers , friends , add friend ,Home ,like and status and at the click of a button one got a virtual high of getting something that takes a lifetime to achieve ..... everybody was virtually placed in the centre of the universe, with a crowd of names and random faces hovering around them, designed to make them believe they are too desirable , they have been discovered and they have arrived, a virtual emulation of stardom was innovated....

This site made everybody feel how it feels to be the centre of attention... without the effort of becoming one, to be followed, to be liked to be seen, to be heard, even a step ahead where you can delete the response you don't like and highlight and pin what gave you virtual joy and then go a step further and design an impression that you are so liked .... reality is ... people like to be heard more than being able to say ...... young girls have accumulated lakhs of FANS and subscribers by wearing the most inappropriate attitude (clothes I won't say else there would be a debate again) with a personal channel of gestures and body play and lakhs of men buzzing around to see them freak out or dance in a box and they felt they became stars without parents even understanding what is going on, they are happy because the daughter is claiming that Youtube has sent a letter of monetization (payment) for her talent ...... from a time when parents would take back the picture of their daughter if the marriage did not materialize to an era where uncountable men have subscribed to watch how good your daughter looks after taking a shower or in the swimming pool or cracking adult jokes dancing in her most comfortable dress, that child is made to feel her worth by the number of subscribers not by the skill that is supposed to be learnt , acquired or mastered.....boys like idiots scrolling fake faces all day long , themselves hiding behind fake names, fishing for girls believing they would trap some by their fake virtual presentation....liking became virtual , impressing became virtual and proposals became virtual so accepting became virtual , flirting and romance became virtual and breakups too not even realizing the worth of time and emotions they invested in the entire process that sometimes lasts for years...... in every house there is this outlet now and window opens for everyone .... 

Every couple wants the entire world to know that they have wished each other birthday, that they love each other, every son/daughter wants the entire world to know that they love their parents, people have to tell the world that their relationship is complicated when no one is asking , now everybody wants everyone to know which airport they are at and which mountain they are sitting on and feeling the breeze and want to show all unknown friends that they are celebrating something with their known friends, which restaurant they are sitting in and which cold drink they are sipping ....we have all gone nuts , become such jokers.......why this reassurance of our presence is so important...?.. We in a public place can't get our eyes off the phone , while watching movies , eating , exercising or in parks.......sitting among nature we are watching nature videos and in playgrounds we are playing videos games .........It is discourteous and hurtful when we keep checking phones when talking to someone but our bodies and minds have got badly programmed.We have become comic helpless addicts.....

Now selecting a life partner has become all the more difficult , there are options and options in the form of a whatsapp list , .....the day you fight with one , you block him in the application, not in the mind ....message 20 other people feeling you have OPTIONS and it is never true ....people are confused because , now virtual distractions never give you time to miss or value someone or feel a void .... people are so happy that they have OPTIONS to move on till they realize , a smiley, those forwarded shayaris, a good morning , a kiss emoticon didn't mean a thing...... now denying an emotion is as easy as disputing the meaning of an emoticon...

There are more entertainers now than viewers , people on Youtube are dying to make everything sensational , even deaths, accidents and unoriginal or false news to be able to get viewers .....such a madness to have likes and viewers .....I also find myself in this rat race now ..... every concept of practice, learning , education and experience of several years has gone down the drain, no one wants to work to prove themselves to experts everyone wants to accumulate unknown general mob, everybody has been given a wall and one account to impersonate a star instantly and everybody has got addicted to again and again experience the virtual feeling of being wanted, being liked , being heard.Crores of people are everyday getting up in the morning and first checking how many people liked and acknowledged their presence in this world , and that has become the basis of all their self worth and gratification ..... one word and one button that fueled every human's immense hidden desire and became the biggest reason for the success of Facebook was the LIKE button ....... it worked ......what a behavioural , psychological and social epidemic ... story of a race which tried to prove it was happening and was having fun but got more lonely and dissatisfied because their entire inner peace and joy got dependent on a virtual source that depended on others.They had lost the ability to be 'Liked' by themselves.Story of a race that kept searching life in a device, like an about to go extinct tribe searching for water in a desert, it seems like a destructive involuntary pattern......Our future generations would laugh ....I hope they do ........ 

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Darshan Dave visual poetry 2 .... to zindagi aasaan ho jae

Philosophy - ए - संक्रांति

संक्रांति है और सारा आकाश खाली पड़ा है  ,
बच्चों को अब आसमान चाहिये , जो पतंग से काफी बड़ा है ,

बड़े लोगों की कॉलोनी है हमारी , हरदम सुन्न रहती है ,
पता नहीं अब क्यों धूप निकलती है , क्यों हवा बहती है ,

'वो काटा' चिल्लाना pseudo middle class के लिए cool नहीं,
बड़े बनते लोगों के बच्चों का पतंग लूटना माक़ूल नहीं ,

अब अपार्टमेंट की एक मात्र छत पर
टीवी और नेट वालों की अमानत पड़ी है ,
जिनकी छतें जुड़ी हैं ,
वहाँ अजनबियत बड़ी है ,

घरों में कूद कर जाने की , मिलने की आदत ही नहीं रही सबसे ,
ख़ुद को LIKE करने वालों की लिस्ट बढ़ा रहा हूँ जबसे।

यार अब ये धूप वो नहीं जो पहले निकलती थी ,
हमारे छतों पे चढ़ने के बाद , घर से चलती थी ,

ऊँचे पेड़ों में उलझी पतंगें सुलझाना
ज़िन्दगी का पहला सबक़ बन जाता था ,

पुराने छप्पर पर रेंगता बच्चा
पतंग के लिए धूल में सन जाता था ,

अब विडियो गेम खेल रहा होता है ,
पतंग उड़ाने का भी गेम होगा ज़रूर
सो आपकी आँखों के सामने रहेगा
पर बचपन से कोसों दूर ,

अब बहुत बूढ़े बच्चों की फसल
ऊंची छतों पर नज़रबंद दिखती है,
पकौड़ियाँ फ़ीनी पड़ोस में नहीं बँटतीं
जो बचती हैं कभी फिकती हैं।

मुफ्त मिलने वाली खुशियाँ UNCOOL हो गयी हैं ,
धूप , खुशबू , हवाएं , साहित्य में सो गई हैं ,

rain , rock climbing, snowfall , थीम पार्क में हो रही है ,
डिस्को की लाइट्स में हमारी धूप खो रही है।

आज सब पतंग की फोटो डालेंगे और फेसबुक पे एन्जॉय करेंगे ,
हम यूँ ही जीने के स्टेटस डालेंगे और बिना जीये मरेंगे ,

किसी बच्चे की स्क्रीन में गड़ी नज़रों को उड़ते लक्ष्य पे जमा दो ,
Philosophy -ए - संक्रांति समझ लेगा वो , उसे बस पतंग थमा दो।

                                                                                                   - दर्शन दवे
Please share if you liked 🙏

A VISIT TO MY MUSIC VIDEO LOCATIONS ONCE AGAIN ... :)

Hi all those friends who have watched my video..... emotional indulgence time :) .....every artist creates his own world for self indulgence , not for exhibition , later people may or may not acknowledge it but if that world is childlike and colourful to oneself ,nothing else matters as much, appreciation adds to it but lack of affirmation doesn't take away anything,although I am happy that you all liked it .....Last time after I made Desert Groove album for mom and shot a song in a shutdown factory ,I came to know , they are demolishing it , I had to go there once again ....alone.....with my camera and clicked every spot where I had shot the video .....it was a feeling of nostalgia and a gesture of gratitude towards the factory for becoming a beautiful part of my memory , that album is still there in my Facebook albums , today again , after releasing .... DIL TU HAI DEEWANA ....I happened to go to a couple of those locations all over again with a friend and it was like visiting my ancestral house ...

it is such a beautiful feeling to remember every tree,every wall , every stone that witnessed my shoot and I remember , moments with each one of them , where I stood, sat, jumped from,moved or placed our equipments on ,all greenery has disappeared, but I stood in the sun quietly admiring every bit of that place which was as if a no man's land,undefined or forgotten ,where when I first visited I placed hypothetical objects and characters. movements and equipment just in my mind and today , I can watch everything that I imagined in the music video, ....I had conceptualized to walk and sing in the whole song,it was tough for a small unit , how we achieved it after several days of trial and error on this terrain is another story , it is memorable too, but what a beautiful feeling it is to stand alone quietly being able to remember all the boys in the crew , who are again busy now with their jobs and studies, running around and our local helpers managing in the most difficult of locations and weather... on mountains and in ruins .... I can still hear the noise and shouting and laughters and the echo and then suddenly the noise mutes and I can again listen to the calm wind....

whenever I will pass by these locations in my life all these trees would wave 
and the ruin would smile back at me and shout heyyy Darshan , and if the
 ruin doesn't remain I will always tell my future generations , you see that ruin
 in DIL TU HAI DEEWANA SONG...?..that's where it was.... for me these remains
 would always remain.

चल यारा

चल यारा एक अच्छी सी ज़िन्दगी बनाते हैं ,

जो मैंने खोया , तूने चाहा , संग पाते हैं ,

पुराने गीत जो दफन हैं गले पन्नों में कब से ,

मौका दस्तूर हो ना हो , गुनगुनाते हैं ,

चल यारा एक अच्छी सी ज़िन्दगी बनाते हैं ...... 

बहुत उजाले बाँटे ग़ैरों की महफिलों में जलकर ,

अब थोड़ा खुदका भी घर जगमगाते हैं ,

गिले शिकवों का कबाड़ भर गया है घर में ,

इस दिवाली ढूंढो उन्हें , जलाते हैं ,

जूझे जागे जला किये , जिये नहीं , जीतेजी जी भर 

आ , मरने से पहले अब थोड़ा तो जी के आते हैं ,

 चल यारा एक अच्छी  सी ज़िन्दगी बनाते हैं .... 

जगह ढूंढा किये बुतों के शहर में अपनी ,

जिन अपनों को छोड़ा , उन्हें फिर बुलाते हैं ,

एक छत खरीदने में सुकून लुट गया पूरा ,

अब चल बाहर , बारिश में नहाते हैं ,

हम तो जागा किये सुबह की चिंता में बरसों ,

आ चलकर अब बच्चों को सुलाते हैं ,

चल यारा एक अच्छी सी ज़िन्दगी बनाते हैं..... 

                                                    - दर्शन दवे