Blast from the past

No, I'm not giving you a link to some golden oldies here. MTV does that I think, or is it Channel V? I cannot remember which one. Anyway, I'll take you back to an "age" when we did not have MTV, Channel V and the like in our drawing rooms. A few people had it and sometimes we stuck a pin in the cable going over our antenna to catch the signal; or better still tied the cable to our antenna, which the cable operator very promptly undid on one of his routine inspections. He never complained, though I'm sure he could easily track the antenna down to the house. Perhaps, he did not want to offend a prospective customer. It seemed to work too; one by one, all of us were hooked.

That was the early '90s and for the first time we saw trailers of movies on TV. We saw film stars being interviewed in their plush homes, showing off their wardrobe and dogs. We saw cricket matches live from Australia at 4.00 in the morning, with no "rukkawat ke liye khed hain" and no Hindi commentary. We were overawed. We actually participated in contests with the hope of winning. We looked forward to Friday nights, for the double Bonanza we got - Close up Antakshari followed by Philips Top Ten ! For the first time, we didn't want to go to Swathi hotel to have North Indian dinner; instead we insisted our parents pack it home for us. That's when it started I think.

No one wanted to play anymore. Before, you could tell if Mahabharath had started on TV, on a Sunday morning by looking at the streets. Now, it was always deserted, with or without Mahabharath; but always with Cable TV. The only time children would come out to play was when there was a power cut in their house or in the cable operator's. After, generators came into vogue, this stopped too.

Atleast, we got our share of skipping, kunte bille, lock-and-key, i-spy and gate-gate. I pity the ones who came after us. They never heard of these games I think. Even now, sometimes on some streets, I see kids playing, but it's almost always cricket. ( With the kind of hype that surrounds the game, that's hardly a surprise ). I wonder what the little girls do. Doesn't anyone play, "Crocodile, crocodile can we cross the golden river" anymore? Doesn't anyone play, "Gate, gate, which gate do you choose" and then form a human chain to move from one gate to another ? Wasn't it this bond that built friendships, that lasted for years? Where is that bonding? Where is that laughter? Where is that camaraderie ? Is it a thing of the past? Buried, never to be unearthed again ?