BREAKING NEWS

The recent damage to Ustad Amjad Ali Khan’s sarod while flying Air India wide the article http://tinyurl.com/ye2ysbl was deeply regretted by Civil Aviation Minister among other dignitaries.
Arnab Goswami hosting a special discussion on Paedophilias wrapped up the show in haste without lending a complete voice to the learned speakers because of the sad tale of a broken sarod. My heart sank as I heard about the dutiful sarod that served its master for thirty four years. It was time for the age old warrior to rest in peace. If Ustad really loved the instrument then he should have let it go without a whisper of complaint. Isn’t art and creativity an act of total liberation from trappings of trivial matters?
Such are the ways of the elite in this country. A dark spot on their effervescent dentures is a topic for national debate. Where does the common man go, travelling in packed buses, robbed and stolen in every sense, everyday, all ears to the blowing wind?
A top artist or a sportsman could find a place in the ‘who’s who?’ book of the President making him/her totally insured. Today innocent people lose their lives everyday which is unheard and unnoticed. They lead a nondescript lives on the scruples of honesty and hard work only to be slain for no good reason.
Ustad had flown the airline for so many years and never found a reason for complaint. It’s surprising if not totally ludicrous that a broken article while transit could elicit apologies from the highest of officials including the Chairman of Air India.
Probably the Ustad has heard the tale about the sage and his magnificent horse of the purple moor. It was his life in gallops of song, chastely white and treated with utmost care. He could trade his life for the horse and still be indebted to this perfectly sculpted beauty. One fine day this thug comes along and steals his horse. Does the sage file complaints to the angel in heaven for stolen property? No, he just smiles and takes a promise from the rogue not to spread the word that the horse had been stolen. He let it go with no regret. Perhaps it was meant to be that way.
Today we have monotonic standards in the field of performing arts, be it musical instruments, painting, sculpture,etc. For tabla we have Ustad Zakir Hussain, for the flute there is Ustad Hari Prasad Chaurasia, for painting M.F.Hussain and of course our very own Ustad Amjad Ali Khan with his prodigious sons. We don’t hear other names besides them, not in abundance anyway. In India people don’t take to the performing arts readily. The reason is probably not finding enough promise in a future with the performing art. They take to professions not their own in the awnings of a meagre existence. Yes, they do find devilish content at the outset but the fever slowly dies down fighting job hassles and finding so many hours of sleep. And then there is poorer section of the society that simply can’t afford the art and its medium of expression. Life beckons on the other side far from the flights of imagination. The obvious question in our minds would be that does India have the talent in its teeming population. We sure do but the sad story is that we don’t hear from those pearls scattered in a mundane milieu. Don’t we swear by our hearts after listening to greats like Kishore Kumar and Lata Mangeshkar. Yes there are voices even better but hardly come to the fore.
Ustad Amjad Ali Khan is no doubt a genius at what he does. His intrinsic ability with the instrument has seen him scale new heights of performance and creativity. On those shoulders rests the future of sarod in this country. Just like other arts I have not heard of another name besides his very own when it comes to sarod. It’s time to rise above a level of a material minion and be selfless in keeping his art above all. It’s time he did his bit to promote this magical instrument among young talent of this country. Maybe he already is. Why don’t we see more of them instead of the broken sarod on national television?