For the love of AB

By vini.k on November 25, 2021

There are so many things we would like to say or rather ask our loved ones. The ones with us or even the ones departed. There are some unanswered questions in our life. These questions may or may not be answered. Now for all those who are thinking how long I will be stretching this whole thing about being answered and unanswered. Well to all of them of course I’m going to rant my questions anyway. These questions are directly imposed on my parents and my family. Something that I have planned to ask them in my own afterlife. So here it goes……

As my parents were of the time when the emergency was declared, when bell bottom was a style statement, where everyone acted revolutionary and were defying traditions, to the formation of a new nation Bangladesh. Amidst all this our first beloved super star Rajesh khanna was just getting replaced by the angry young man. Yes, you have guessed it right.Im am in fact talking about Amitabh Bachchan. But don’t worry I’m not going to sit here and write about his cinematic importance, significance or about his filmography. If you are interested , kindly google it.

My purpose of writing this article is to ask my parents certain questions associated with the superstar of the millenium. And trust me there is a backstory for all that I’m gonna ask. So here it goes.

While watching any movie of AB.sr (his name will be used several times during the course of me writing this article so using abbrevation AB.sr) my parents would always say “You know his first seven movies tanked at the box office. Now see where he has reached” I understood the fact hard work and success go hand in hand and that is something my parents would probably want me to know or understand. But every time while watching his movies that fact played like a snooze alarm.

Why?? You made your point but Why should his success feel like harassment to us???. In case we are watching a movie(of course you know whose) while having dinner. Their comment would be “Oh!!! He is ageing so gracefully, a vegetarian diet goes a long way”. So what you are trying to say is that people like me who are non-vegetarians don’t age gracefully.??? By the way my food habits are developed because of my parents and every one in my family is hardcore “maasahari” simply non-vegetarians.

Once we were told …me and my brother while listening to “mere angne tumhara kya kaam hai” from Lawaaris. ” You know ,this man was rejected by All India Radio because of his voice,now see how they are playing his song”. I don’t understand what was the purpose of this trivia.? I know most of the things my parents said you guys would already know, but you don’t know that this was told to us when satellite t.v was not exactly in fashion and a walkman was an equivalent of an android phone not in terms of functionality but just showing off. And google? What google?.

Now to further elaborate I would like to tell you that every time AB.sr dies in any of his movies my parents would go numb for hours. I remember one such incident very vividly,where we were watching the movie Shakti and it was the last scene where Dilip Kumar shoots him. Both of them share an emotional dialogue between them. Now most of you would say, yes it was kind of emotional….but wait here’s the twist to it, my parents would shed a tear because his character’s name was Vicky, which happens to be my brother’s name too. I still don’t get ….like why ???? It doesn’t make sense at all. It was not like papa had shot bhaiya…arrrrrghhh.

The best memory was while watching Mohabbatein . If you have seen the movie in the final act, AB.sr tries to apologize to Shahrukh Khan by touching his feet. My parents genuinely took offense to that. They went on “How dare they make him touch SRK’s feet? They don’t know he is a senior actor ? Such disrespect ? Shame on whoever wrote this scene”. They were so offended that they went on to boycott SRK’s movies for sometime. Mumma papa you know they were just acting and it was just a movie don’t you think you guys over reacted a bit?.

When Mr.Bachchan house was auctioned off after his ABCL debacle my parents behaved as if they were in crises….trust me I’m not making this up. My parents were joined in by my naani when she said ” I wish I could help him with my pension money” . Yes, your middle class salary and pension would have been of great help to him….like seriously. What were they thinking??

The weirdness does not stop there. My mother, being my mother in her college days, went on to imitate Mr.Bachchan’s hairstyle. For which she had to face the wrath of my naani who came down hard upon her. I mean literally with a broom and she wasn’t allowed to enter the house till some neighbours intervened…. Really mom I knew you were a tomboy in your younger days but this was far fetched. Don’t you think so?

Then when it comes to my brother he can’t be left out far behind, from imitating his baritone voice to playing his famous songs on his keyboard he has done it all .It was during durga puja that our society use to organize talent contest for children, where my brother wearing his cowboy hat and shorts sang “jumma chumma de de” from Hum and even won the first price.

Such was the effect this man had on my family. I will never understand why? Only they can answer .

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