Short ‘N’ Snappy

- MMM

The Holy Indian Cow

These are very bovine times. The country is divided into two – those who rejoice in the cow and the other half that rejoices in what is within it and by that The Man from Madras Musings does not mean milk. The party of the first part is threatening to carve up the party of the second part as they say in legalese, rather in the manner in which party of the second part was all along carving up the cow. It is in the light of all this no doubt that a company decided to put out appropriate messages on the sachets of cows’ milk that it sells.

MMM is featuring the picture alongside for your reference and reading joy. It is also to prove that he is not making up much of this column, a calumny that he has had to suffer much from frequently. But since the photo alongside may not be very readable, MMM is also giving below the relevant extracts from it, together with his interpretation on what each line is meant to signify.

The first and most important statement is what you see clearly – Indian Cow Breeds Milk. That in effect means cows and bulls are saintly creatures who only breed through immaculate conception when it comes to progeny. For the rest of the time, whenever they get excited, they breed milk. Now for the lines up top, on what could signify as the masthead of the sachet. Reading l to r, the first line states ‘No injection use conceive, Natural only.’ This once again establishes the purity of the cow. It does not obviously receive any injections from bull of any kind. It conceives, but naturally, when it feels like it, or when ordained by God. Line 2 states ‘No injection use before Collect Milk’. Taken in conjunction with the main statement that Indian cow breeds milk it is quite obvious that just like Indian people, the cow too breeds rather freely, without the help of any injections, only it breeds milk. For progeny it looks to nature. Talking about humans, MMM is aware that Indians are rather prone these days to taking injections to breed. But that is largely because they have become slaves to degrading Western habits. In the good old days, when toilets were all out in the open and the Gods designed the first aircraft, we Indians could breed without such artificial aids. Let us therefore learn from the cow.

Line 3, which is Daytime go outside for Nature Food is to be taken together with Line 4, which is Night time inside Shelter. This is no immoral or depraved cow. In keeping with its purity of thought and action, it sets out each morning in broad daylight and not for any hanky panky at that but only for Nature Food, which considering their abundance in our city, MMM assumes refers to plastic covers and poster papers. By evensong, holy cow is back at home. It does not tarry at the local Tasmac bar or wonder if it can pick up a bull and be off to the local discotheque. In short, its private life is above board, as an Indian cow’s ought to be.

It is therefore no wonder that such a wonder cow can claim to be ‘rich in medicinal properties’. It must be so repressed that it must be requiring a tonne of anti-depressants to keep it standing. MMM will ignore the last line that states the saintly cow in question is from Q1 Organic Form, whatever that means. But he is quite clear that is the kind of cow that this will win votes, and also foment riots.

On moving statues

Last fortnight’s piece by The Man from Madras Musings on the great thespian’s statue going walkabout resulted in some feedback, the burden of which was that MMM ought not to have rejoiced at its shifting. MMM reserved his judgement on that, but then having all along been a fan of Simply Great (SG), the actor, MMM decided to pay a courtesy call on him in his new home. After all, having enjoyed the breezes of the beach for so long, SG may be feeling rather claustrophobic in his new location by the Adyar, which river, as though in welcome, has been rather extra smelly of late.

And so MMM went to meet SG. The tall gates leading to the memorial were locked and there was no way MMM could have entered, he having never been lissom enough to leaps and bound. Not wanting to be impaled on the spear-shaped grilles, MMM just hung around for a while hoping that some security guard or the other would turn up to let him in. This did not happen. As MMM left, the guard to the neighbouring property sauntered up and advised him to be sure to visit on October 1, that being SG’s birthday when, so the guard said, there was sure to be a commemoration of some sort.

What of the rest of the year MMM wondered. Well, SG, like so many other Tamil greats, is fated to remain behind locked doors. Which seems a great pity for SG was a man who loved the public and would have been happy if they were allowed to saunter in at will.

On the same vein, MMM could not help reflecting that Chennai as a city is dotted with several memorials of this kind. There is one to the constitution maker, which is not far away from that of SG. This is also locked up all the time. The ones to the father of the nation, his sambandhi who was Governor General and then held a series of other public offices each less important than the previous one, and that of a beloved Chief Minister who put us on the industrial map are all next to each other. These, though open to visitors, hardly see any footfalls and remain for most of the year empty structures. So is that of a leader of the backward classes. This edifice, incidentally, was put up after quite a bit of jingoism on the part of his followers. But they too appear to have forgotten all about it once the building was put up.

All of this is rather sad, at least in MMM’s view. This is a city that is rapidly losing whatever it once possessed by way of commons. Where then are people supposed to go? The beach, once a happy place to congregate in, is now out of bounds for any group that is greater than four in strength, chiefly because there is a fear that the bull people will return. And talking about the bull peoples, MMM wonders as to what happened to them all. Where are those experts on indigenous vs imported cows, and the same breeds of bull on whom whole pages were written in print and social media?

Anyway, to come back to the memorials, it is high time the Government decided to put these places to some use. Yes, MMM is aware that in foreign countries too memorials are what they are meant to be – places honouring the dead. But there they appear to attract several tourists, which is not the case here, especially with gates barred and watchmen chasing people away on all days except birthdays of the dear departed.

Tailpiece

The Man from Madras Musings has heard of waterbeds, but he had never seen a water tanker bed. The man in the pic appears to be quite comfortable sleeping on top of the vehicle. You can never account for tastes.

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