SUSHANT SINGH RAJPUT

Suicide

June 15, 2020

Yesterday we all were left shell-shocked with the news of actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death by suicide: From a small-town and making a successful transition from TV to Films, his was a success few others have been able to replicate.

According to media reports he was suffering from depression and this is what made him take his own life.

But can we ever know what goes inside someone’s brains?? When do those billions of neurons in the brains start malfunctioning? Who are we to judge and offer solutions?

Are suicidal thoughts a pre-cursor to an attempt to suicide and is attempt to suicide a step towards that last fatal one? When staying positive and strong does not help what do we do? How do we seek help?

Not everyone is blessed with family/friends to take care of one’s mental health even they are sometimes ill-equipped to handle these matters. Seeking help of a psychiatrist conjures up all kind of reactions and reluctances.

Every other day we read stories about suicide for one reason or another, how does one start the journey on the ardours road? I have an aunt who is known to have luckily unsuccessfully attempted this thrice and each time she has managed to have her way and come out stronger. She has been lucky that her family was there to support and listen to her but not everyone has fate on their side.

These are the beautiful lines from a song of Ghazal Maestro Jagjit Singh’s album Someone Somewhere that he released after the death of his young son in 1990 that encapsulates the feeling beautifully.

फ़ुर्सत किसे थी जो मेरे हालात पूछता, हर शख़्स अपने बारे में कुछ सोचता मिला

उसने तो ख़ैर अपनों से मोड़ा था मुँह, मैंने ये क्या किया के मैं ग़ैरों से जा मिला ….

Kedarnath

December 8, 2018

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A debutante Star Daughter, a director with an impressive track record barring the last outing and actor with promise and talent. That’s what made me watch this movie straight after the Voting ended in my state for the assembly elections 2018.

The plot is set in the holy temple town of Kedarnath, with an inter-religion love affair and the devastating Floods that rocked the state or Uttarakhand as the climax. So there is Nitish Bharadwaj aka Lord Krishna of the Mahabharat serial a Brahmin priest running a Guest House in Kedarnath with his wife and two daughters; the sombre elder one and feisty younger one played by Sara Ali Khan. Then there is Mansoor – the local Muslim porter who ferries pilgrims to the temple. The kind hearted, believer and then is this villain so to say i.e. first the fiancé of elder one and later of the younger daughter of the priest.

Sara Ali Khan plays the feisty, talkative girl with aplomb and doesn’t disappoint reminding so much of her mother, so does the ever bankable Sushant Singh Rajput who plays the understated, inhibited man. images What however fails is the blossoming of the love between the couple; it seemed forced and not natural. Somewhere I read that usually in a Hindi Film of a Inter Religion love story the boy is usually a Hindu and here the director does take that risk of reversing the roles but doesn’t deliver on this risk. The conflict that appears too seems just for the heck of it.

Then there is floods of Kedarnath that appears in the last 20 minutes of the movie and also fails to create the lasting impact. The movie though just around 2 hours seemed long and plays out at a languid pace. The music is passable barring the title song.

One thing that stands out is the way valleys of the Himalayas and the path to the temple has been shot. They look spectacular and makes one take the holy pilgrimage to Kedarnath sooner than later.

As far as the movie Kedarnath is concerned it is a pilgrimage that can be taken though a little delayed when it plays on a TV screen near you.