MARK TWAIN FAMOUSLY QUIPPED that he never allowed his education to interfere with his learning. One doesn’t know the exact context in which he put out this quip but he has uttered a fundamental and eternal truth, something which deeply resonates with India.
This sacred land has been a learning civilisation and was the world’s premier seat of learning for centuries, as the sad ruins of Nalanda continue to remind us. In essence, among all civilisations, it was only India that placed learning on a divine pedestal.
Sadly, in the contemporary era, a unidimensional view of education has reduced it merely to academics. However, what education was meant to do and should do is to impart and inculcate values, celebrate our ethos and our distinct cultural richness.
Fast forward to the present continuous. The favourite trend and/or trick among the urban woke crowd is to deride this profound view of education as “Sanskari,” used pejoratively. Since when did sanskar become something to be ashamed of or frowned upon? The roots of this devaluation can perhaps be traced back to these key aspects which make any person: upbringing or family environment, schooling atmosphere, and the company of friends and peers. The overall impact all these have in the formative years of a person should not be underestimated.
Given the irreversible revulsion that has snowballed against Bollywood denizens for their appalling sense of entitlement, their complete silence on core issues that afflict India — their own country — which has given them so much, and their total insulation from reality, it would be pertinent to examine this dismal tribe in some detail.
The onscreen “emancipation” of the leading ladies of Bollywood (“heroines” in popular parlance) that began in the 1990s essentially boiled down to being footloose and fancy free either in real life or onscreen or both. In the Indian cultural milieu spread over centuries, women have always been held in high and even reverential esteem for all that they have done and continue to do. This includes cultural stalwarts like Ahalya Bai Holkar and Rani Laksmi Bai to modern day icons like P T Usha, Tessy Thomas, Dipa Karmarkar, Hima Das etc. The contrast can’t be worse or more horrifying when we notice the complete deracination of these Bollywood “heroines” over the last two decades.
The greater concern emanating from this deracination is that there is a large young woke population that gets influenced by these heroines and then ape their conduct in real life, and the downward spiral just gets worse and worse.
At the root of this deracination lie two aspects. The first begins with the schooling environment of these “heroines.” A healthy schooling atmosphere produces a rooted persona who has imbibed the culture and values enshrined over centuries in the Sanatana mould because they have stood the test of time in spite of multiple onslaughts throughout history, and this battle continues even today. Sadly, we have attackers within and they’re only multiplying. The second aspect in this context is the Fauji Brat fraternity, a species that began to flood Bollywood beginning with the mid-1990s.
Neha Dhupia perhaps epitomised this deracination when she publicly chided a contestant on a reality show claiming that if his girlfriend is having a fling with five partners at the same time, it is her choice. And Neha Dhupia is not alone in this. There is a pattern that can be traced right back to their education (or the lack of it) which has zero cultural moorings and is bereft of the rooted value system that is largely now confined to the middle class.
Neha Dhupia studied at Naval Public school and Jesus and Mary College.
Gul Panag studied at Lawrence.
Lara Dutta at St. Xaviers.
Shruti Hassan at St. Andrews.
Priyanka Chopra at La Martiniere.
Sushmita Sen at St. Anns.
And the garnishing is Kareena Kapoor who unsurprisingly is a school drop-out with no completed education.
This is broadly the CV of Bollywood “heroines.” But the worse is yet to come.
Deepika Padukone, born to the illustrious, modest and grounded badminton legend Prakash Padukone, seamlessly merged with the worst scum of Bollywood. She was an active participant in that infamous Karan Johar drug party video which went viral. Deepika actually symbolises and proves the aforementioned point about a proper cultural education. By all counts, her upbringing would have been rooted. But then she studied at Sophia’s school and Mount Carmel College, Bangalore.
When we return to Kareena Kapoor, we’re completely unsurprised that she had no qualms naming her first son Taimur – the barbaric Islamic invader who massacred Hindus on an industrial scale and took pride in displaying their skulls.
Or consider Amrita Arora (sister of Malaika Arora) who married Shakeel Ladak and named her sons Azaan and Rayaan. This easy surrendering of one’s religion of birth is the direct consequence of a deracinated upbringing and a thorough absence of value-based education.
Then we have Harnaz Sandhu (Miss Universe) who displayed her utter lack of depth when she waded into the Hijab issue saying, “let the girls do as they choose.” This was her open declaration of how little she understood of who we are as a nation and why we are so.
The subject of Bollywood “heroines” remains incomplete without mentioning the notorious Koffee with Karan show, an aspirational platform for these female celebrities to unabashedly parade all of their lack of cultural mores. Whether it is to seek acceptance in the Bollywood clique or having no qualms in displaying their shallowness, the show encapsulates their full descent into debauchery: thirst traps, serial flings and their locations, cheating, infidelity…every vice and depravity has been mainstreamed without batting an eyelid.
Contrast this filth with the Navodaya Schools across the country and look at the quality of their produce. Here are some:
Sundar Pichai who now heads Google, studied at Navodaya school in Chennai. Hima Das who brought laurels in athletics, Surendra Poonia, the international award-winning sportsman and C.K Vineeth, the national football player, are only some of the noteworthy alumni of Navodaya schools. Each one of them has mastered the art and craft of their chosen field and has made a positive national or social contribution. Why?
The purpose of these schools is to build model citizens who are rooted, who come from rural or humble backgrounds and often can't afford good schooling. It is evident from the aforementioned names that the school, in formative years has a lasting impact on shaping adults. In all these cases, it goes beyond mere academics and is clearly a function of the environment one studies in. When one is surrounded by those who aspire to excel even when they don’t have the means, those who come from impoverished backgrounds have that fire burning in them to hone merit and accomplish their dreams which go beyond material glitter.
On the contrary, when one has an entitled upbringing, gets schooled in convent schools which are completely divorced from India’s cultural ethos, you get the likes of Neha Dhupia and her ilk. They somehow make it to the silver screen and end up influencing an equally rootless woke generation which is the result of poor upbringing. In India, we often confuse English with education.
Bollywood “heroines” are the mascots of absolute deracination and degeneracy, and it augurs ill for the young and impressionable youth to look up to them.
As they say, choose your role models wisely, but more importantly, choose with great caution where your child receives his or her education so that we can produce future generations that take genuine pride in non-material accomplishments and propel our rich culture and civilisation forward as Bharatavarsha has much to offer to the world.
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