TU HAI WAHI DIL NE JISE

Song 104:

So what if he had sung the same song of love with someone else years ago? The singing dancing diva took it in her stride, pondered over it with equanimity. He had a past and that was that. Was his past his true love indeed? Or more a folly of youth that he chose to humour? There was no way to know that.

Yet every love was similar in many ways. Every woman was the same woman, wanting love, security, stability, caring and comfort. So who was the perfect match for him, the soft, simple and borderline 'bhenji-ish' Poonam or the definitely more chic and with-it  but scarred and angst-ridden Tina he met later (from yesterday's version of the song pasted below)? Poonam lacked that certain 'je ne sais qois' but you could see he encouraged her to perform well. She seemed more submissive too while Tina had a spark.

Did both soothe his senses in the same way. Who made his heart race madly? Who cooked warm dinners for him? Who was an honest critic of his work? Who nursed him when he was unwell? Who fought with him over trifles? Who waited anxiously when he was gone? Who went to temples and asked for mannats for him? Who got annoyed if he forgot an important date?

Could one be a substitute for the other? Could the new ever make him forget the old? Or then maybe Poonam and Tina were one and the same. They were the same woman. The way every woman was the same, with the same needs and wants, same quircks and idiosyncracies, same moods and insecurities.  Or maybe Hindi film style, they were plastic surgery ka kamaal, where somehow the pretty but dumbish Poonam evolved into the hot and happening Tina? 




Yesterday's song:

Asha and Kishore were always a riot together. When they sang, it was as if time stood still, it was as if youth and exuberance were caught in abundance and bottled for posterity. Their feelings were spontaneous, their needs urgent, their wants expressed and fulfilled.

Theirs were the songs of evergreen love, anxious and waiting. Every parting was filled with promises to meet again soon. Restlessness, zeal, anticipation, ardour defined them. They were inseparable, two peas in a pod. All they did all day was to plan and plot, ways to be together. It was almost cruel to let go. Lazy afternoons morphed into golden sunsets. Dusks embraced mysterious twilights. Amber dawns evolved into naughty noons. She dressed to ensnare him. He understood the meaning or logic behind so many different colours by observing the effect they had on her moods.

The connection was so deep and true that it needed no outside validation. They were meant to be. The whole universe had conspired to get them together, come calamity or blue weather.

When Kishore and Asha sang, you just listened and believed in eternal love.

VAADA TO NIBHAYA

Song: 103

The famed Nalanda University has reopened today after 800 years. Isn't that a truly momentous occasion? Situated in Bihar's Rajgir district, Nalanda University started its first academic session yesterday, nearly 800 years after the ancient education institution was destroyed. Students attended four sessions on the first day, 9am to 1.30pm.

Congratulatory messages poured in. Nobel laureate and NU chancellor Amartya Sen was the first to call and wish the students. Members of NU governing body, Wang Bangwei, Wang Gungwu, NK Singh, George Yeo and Anil Wadhwa, too, sent laudatory wishes to the students and faculty members. "Congratulations. Indeed a moment of great satisfaction," Singh's message read.

In 1193, the Nalanda University was sacked by the fanatic Bakhtiyar Khilji, a Turk; this event is seen by scholars as a late milestone in the decline of Buddhism in India.

The complex was built with red bricks and its ruins occupy an area of 14 hectares. At its peak, the university attracted scholars and students from as far away as Tibet, China, Greece, and Greater Iran. The great library of Nalanda was so vast that it is reported to have burned for three months after the invaders set fire to it, ransacked and destroyed the monasteries and killed or drove the monks from the site.

As historian Sukumar Dutt describes it, the history of Nalanda university "falls into two main divisions—first, one of growth, development and fruition from the sixth century to the ninth, when it was dominated by the liberal cultural traditions inherited from the Gupta age; the second, one of gradual decline and final dissolution from the ninth century to the thirteen—a period when the tantric developments of Buddhism became most pronounced in eastern India."

In 2006, Singapore, China, India, Japan, and other nations, announced a proposed plan to restore and revive the ancient site as Nalanda University and all one can say is unhone 'Vaada to Nibhaya'! Well, all’s well that ends well.

So while this Asha Bhosle song is a typical situational Bollywood number, albeit featuring two of the greatest stars ever, my point in putting it up today is simply that it is shot in the beautiful and aesthetic environs of Nalanda. The expanse of the campus will give you some idea about the illustriousness of such a University centuries ago. There’s something about institutions with great ambience and aesthetic appeal that pulls you like a magnet every morning to visit them and dedicate yet another day to learning and evolving. May education evolve and flourish and never be destroyed by anyone.