In this scene f romNamak Halaal (1982), Bhairon has brought our hero, Arjun Singh (Amitabh Bachchan), into the manager’s office of a founstar hotel for a job interview. The manager asks Arjun if he can speak English. This is his enthusiastic reply, all in English except for the very beginning.
‘Sir, I know such English [in Hindi] that I can leave Angrej behind. You see, Sir, I can talk English, I can walk English, I can laugh English because English is a very funny language.
132 the tenth r 3 s a
Bhairon becomes Baron
and Baron becomes Bhairon 83
because their minds are very narrow.
‘In the year nineteen hundred and twentymine, Sir, when India was playing against Australia in Melbourne City, Vijay Merchant and Vijay Hazare, they were at the crease, and Vijay Merchant told Vijay Hazare, “Look Vijay Hazare, this is a very prestigious match, and you must consider this match very carefully.”
‘So considering the consideration that Vijay Hazare gave Vijay Merchant, Vijay Merchant told Vijay Hazare that ultimately we must take a run. And when they were striking the ball on the leg side, Sir, the consideration came into an ultimatum, and ultimately Vijay Hazare went to Vijay Merchant. . .’
The hotel manager screams: ‘Oh, shut up!’
Arjun continues, to the chagrin of the manager: 'Similarly, Sir, in the year nineteen hundred and seventymine, when India was playing against Pakistan in Wankhede Stadium, Bombay, Wasim Raja and Wasim Bari, they were at the crease. And Wasim Bari gave the same consideration to Wasim Raja.
And Wasim Raja told Wasim Bari, “Look, sir, this ultimately has to end in a consideration which I cannot consider. Therefore, the consideration that you are giving me must be considered very ultimately.”
‘Therefore, the run that they were taking . . . Wasim Raja told Wasim Bari, “Wasim Bari, you take the run.” And ultimately both of them ran and, considerately, they got out!’
88 Bhairon: The ending of this name is pronounced nasally, in a countrified manner, and rhymes with the word ‘narrow’. Part of the joke is also that Bhairon, the character, is a powerless and somewhat pathetic man, quite the opposite of a ‘baron’. One aspect of‘sense’ in this line might also lie in the inability of most English speakers to pronounce or even hear certain aspirated consonants in Hindi, like the letter representing the sound ‘bh’ (say the two words ‘bob harrow’ together quickly, to get the sound of ‘Bhairon’). Hence, to an English speaker, ‘Bhairon’ really does become the simplified and perhaps not coincidentally English title, ‘baron’.
Lyrics: An3n4 Baksbi
The scene in the film (1977) is an Easter celebration dance. A giant Easter egg is wheeled out on to the dance floor. The top half of the egg revolves to reveal our hero, Anthony Gonsalves (Amitabh Bachchan), seated inside, wearing a black tuxedo complete with top hat, monocle and an umbrella, apparently every inch the English gentleman. He sits in a mock dignified, stiff manner, quelling the enthusiasm of the gathering crowd by imploring them, ‘Wait! Wait! Wait!’ He then rattles off the following line in English, meant to mystify and impress the crowd with his borrowed English ‘erudition’:
You see the whole country of the system is juxtapositioned by the haemoglobin in the atmosphere because you are a sophisticated rhetorician intoxicated by the exuberance of your own verbosity.
The song itself, otherwise all in Hindi, is about Anthony’s ideal woman and general state of availability. As he woos his present love interest on the disco floor with song and his wiry dance moves, he also idealizes his own poverty by claiming that only the love of the poor is real. Later in the song, Anthony presents other English-language crowd- stoppers, continuing to spoof on the English and perhaps the kind of overblown English language that English-influenced, and probably wealthy, Indians supposedly speak:
You see, such extenuating circumstances coerce me to preclude you from such extravagance!
And once more he professes to the kneeling, mesmerized crowd:
You see the coefficient of the linear is juxtapositioned by the haemoglobin of the atmospheric pressure in the country!
Folk Nonsense