“Gar Wasta hai Aasmaan se Iss Jahan Se nahin Tho Dua Dil se

“Gar Wasta hai Aasmaan se Iss Jahan Se nahin
Tho Dua Dil se mango Zubaan se nahin”
All through my school and college days, my father
must have spent most of his time, but for those spent
at the bank, telling me how important it is to study
well. I was a writer/poet at heart and was happy
writing thoughts that really didn’t seem commercially
viable, something he was acutely aware of and often
made it a point to remind me. He used to say, “Son
poetry is best enjoyed on a full stomach, but it
seldom fills your stomach”.
However difficult it is to accept that let me place
on record that he was right and will always remain
so.
But the dilemma was that I wasn’t wrong in my
thinking either. He wanted me to study and all I
wanted to do was write. He wanted me to pick up books
and read what people had to say while I wanted to
write and make people read what I had to say. I
wanted to make writing the medium to fill my stomach,
I wasn’t a rebel by nature but somewhere my faith in
my ability, the lack of any other interest and a
little bit of ego wanted me to prove him wrong.
Finally I won. Not because I had a convincing reason
but in the face of adamancy and the lack of a
respectable marks card he had no choice but to let me
work.
I joined the Times of India.
Now this is a story too. The reason he let me work
was because I convinced him that from the circulation
department I would eventually move to the editorial.
He believed me and I started the most boring part of
my life.
It really didn’t matter whether the Illustrated
weekly was picked off the shelf more than any other
weekly or not, but what really mattered was that I
had so many thoughts penned down and there was not a
soul willing to listen to me, but for my mother who
always nodded her head in appreciation at what I
wrote running between the whistle of the pressure
cooker and the milkman waiting impatiently at the
door.
Then it all happened one day, most unexpectedly.
I was part of a meeting that was convened to figure
out why the Illustrated Weekly was slipping. I was
too new and more importantly very junior in the
system for me to either say anything or for them to
even think I am capable of saying anything. So I let
it go. I sat back and let the drama unfold for the
next 20 minutes. Then I got bored. This drama was
making no sense. It was a blame game, a game played
many times and perfected. The writing pad meant to
jot down important learning of a market problem was
instead filled with names of people blamed
sequentially and randomly for the dismal performance
of a magazine or should I say grudge the choices the
reader had to decide what will keep him informed and
entertained thru the week. In the next 1 hour that I
spent in the conference room I ended up writing a
“Ghazal”.
Happy and proud at my achievement I trotted to my
manager’s desk after the meeting got over and
announced the birth of a new ghazal. His first
reaction was shock, which slowly morphed into
disbelief. After a full 3 minutes of staring at my
face he managed to say, “ We are getting whipped in
the conference room and in the market place and all
you can think of is some woman’s eyes!!”
I was sure he would be fired and honestly I was
expecting it and believe me he was well within his
rights to do that to anyone who had the audacity to
make such ridiculous suggestions. But nothing of that
sort happened. He suddenly smiled and asked me to sit
down and recite what I had written. When I finished
he smiled even more and said in a soft voice, “you
are in the wrong place, why don’t you go to Bombay
and try films”
It was my turn to look at him shocked.
No the idea was not shocking but I could see my
father’s face at the suggestion of going to Bombay to
join films. I guessed he figured something was amiss.
He leaned forward and suggested advertising. I still
remember his words “Join any advertising agency, they
will pay you to write! The only difference is
beautiful eyes will be replaced by eye liners, lovely
hair by shampoo”
I decided I would rather stay closer to beautiful
eyes and lovely long hair than the nauseating smell
of newsprint and suffocating colors of a power point
presentation. I still wanted to tell the world my
stories than read numbers and data laced with
jargons.
The incredible journey of finding a job began. I had
nothing going for me. I am a south Indian, then based
out of Bangalore who wanted to write Urdu poetry
desiring to join advertising. While advertising
agencies only hired writers who wrote in English I
preferred writing in Hindi. Getting a job was very,
very difficult if not impossible.
But I didn’t have a choice. The thought of spending
the rest of my life pouring over numbers and data was
suicidal. I started walking up and down every decent
agency in town. I liked the work done by Lintas and
was very keen to join them. My attempts with other
agencies were unsuccessful and I got the feeling
there is something I was not doing right. So one day
I went to Lintas and asked to meet the Creative
Director. A fine guy of very few words met me. I told
him I had no experience in advertising but had poetry
published in many newspapers. This was to prove that
I am creative. He saw my writing and suddenly asked
me to write a jingle, a radio jingle.
I had no clue what and how to write a radio jingle.
But I was desperate. I politely told him I would
think about it and come back with the jingle. He
smiled and said “I am going to the loo so you have 10
minutes, write it. This is advertising not a
Mushaiyara!!”
I was stunned and lost. What is a radio jingle? … and
how can someone write a song in 30 seconds!! I had
two choices either to walk out of the door or to stay
back and attempt to change the course of my life
forever. I took the second option. Here again not
because I was brave but I did not want to admit my
father was right nor did I want my thoughts to die an
unknown death suffocating between the pages of my
notebook.
The next 45 min were life defining. What I am today
and whatever I have done and achieved have been for
those 4 lines of poetry that the advertising
fraternity termed as a radio jingle.
The bike ride back home was the happiest ride of my
life. I had just got myself a writing job. My poetry
was ready to fill my stomach, while others will sit
back and enjoy it on television after dinner!
It may sound incredible but the lines between passion
and desperation are often fuzzy, many a times they
overlap and they ought to for passion sans the need
to display the passion is as good as walking with the
most beautiful woman clinging to your arm but in a
veil!
In today’s world everything has a commercial angle to
it. Poetry in its pure form may not be filling the
most desirable need for entertainment but tweak that
to advertising and suddenly you are not just creative
but relevant.
Everyone in this world is born with some talent.
Everyone is destined to succeed and this I say with
certainty. The trick is to match your talent with the
most relevant commercial facet of it. People who
manage to do that not just do what they love but make
money too.
I am the biggest living example of this.

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