A Hyderabad native, Gautam has been a Bombay based writer/director since his return to India 14 years ago from NYC. With a couple of Masters degrees, in Communication from the University of Hyderabad and Television-Radio- Film from Syracuse University, he worked as a producer for three and half years at the music TV station Channel[V] during the height of its influence. As an independent since 2000, he works in Broadcast Design, Promotion & Brand Identity as well as in non-fiction TV shows & documentary. Contributing off and on to a few publications, post-colonial India and its strange cities is a primary interest of his, amongst several unrelated, excursionary ones. Email: [email protected]
by Gautam Pemmaraju The migratory Pied-Crested Cuckoo is believed by some to ride the seasonal winds of the South West Monsoon to arrive in the sub-continent in late May to early June. It makes the journey from sub-Saharan Africa, traversing the Arabian Peninsula, across the ocean, visiting the Seychelles and Lakshadweep, only to arrive in…
by Gautam Pemmaraju The hot summer months of April and May allow for some indolence. Slack jawed, enervated street dogs, seem somehow to be the most suffering. If their parched tongues say it all, their blinking eyes, bereft of the sharp darting aggression of cooler nights, seem to offer urgent supplication. In part alleviation, they…
by Gautam Pemmaraju Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, or Tertullian, born at Carthage around 150 or 160 AD, is said to be the first great writer of Latin Christianity. He was a highly regarded scholar, having written three books in Greek, none extant, and was the first to write a formal exposition on the doctrine of…
by Gautam Pemmaraju It was in Kankakee, IL, at a thanksgiving celebration in the mid 80’s that J introduced my fresh-off-the-boat brother to his family as “the guy I told you about, who eats boiled rice with plain yogurt”. They apparently, recoiled in horror. His alienness was acutely amplified by what was to them utterly…
by Gautam Pemmaraju The ubiquitous presence of the peacock in Indian art and religious iconography is seen across the last two millennia and dates back to the Mauryan period. Peacock motifs are even seen on Indus vases and pots. From temples carvings, bronzes, sacramental and cosmetic adornment, to thrones and miniatures, the peacock has a…
by Gautam Pemmaraju On January 7th news publications ran reports of a young Muslim cattle trader being harassed by members of the Hindu right-wing Bajrang Dal in Madhya Pradesh. A group stopped 25-year-old Anish Aslam Kureishi, son of a cattle trader of Chhindwara district, on December 31st, who was ferrying cattle. The men demanded money…
by Gautam Pemmaraju Thro’ the Heaven and Earth and Hell Thou Shalt never, never quell: I will fly and thou pursue: Night and morn the flight renew’. From William Blake's My Spectre Around Me Day And Night Once I happened to see two brothers, tennis champions, matched against one another; their strokes were totally different,…
by Gautam Pemmaraju The beleaguered liquor baron/industrialist/MP Vijay Mallya, considered to be the ‘Richard Branson of India’ by many, is currently seeking ways to rescue his debt-ridden airline. Having drastically cancelled flights over the last few weeks, the colourful airline promoter, who also has an Indian Premier League cricket team, an F1 racing car, one…
by Gautam Pemmaraju In sound and music production, close miking refers to the practice of placing the microphone close to the sound source – from 1 inch to 1 foot – as opposed to distant or ambient miking. There are several kinds of microphone techniques, countless kinds of specialty microphones to suit a wide range…
DSC00104 A distinct advantage to my small rental in the once ‘leafy suburb’ of Bandra in western Bombay is its garden. Actually, not quite a ‘garden’ in the sense that it is arranged with great care or acuity, tended to diligently, or bedecked with decorative flowers and plants, it is rather, for the most part, an unkempt, somewhat derelict yard with several planted trees and a wide range of wild ferns, creepers, fruit, herb, and vegetable plants.
Two weeks ago, India and Pakistan commemorated their 64th year of independence, and two weeks from now, 13th September will mark Operation Polo – the 1948 military action against independent Hyderabad by Indian armed forces deposing the defiant princely ruler, The Nizam, who had refused to accede to the newly formed Union of India.
by Gautam Pemmaraju On a recent television panel discussion show, the BJP leader and senior advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, in response to how the nation should respond to periodic terrorist attacks, said, unsurprisingly: “why can't we be like America?”. He also said that India should “stop comparing ourselves to Pakistan” in terms of terror attacks, for…
by Gautam Pemmaraju Last month, while on my way to 7 Bungalows, a neighbourhood in Bombay’s northern suburb of Andheri, I stuck my head out of the rickshaw as we were momentarily caught up in traffic at Juhu Beach. Just a week earlier, on June 12th, a large merchant ship, charmingly named MV Wisdom, had…
by Gautam Pemmaraju One fairly nondescript morning a few years ago I found myself headed to Barkas in the old city of Hyderabad to meet my friend, Saleh Ahmed bin Abdat, the Public Relations Officer (PRO) of Al-Jamaitul Yemenia bil Hind, which administers affairs related the migrant community of Yemen, particularly the Hadramaut province of…
by Gautam Pemmaraju What then is time? If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know. – St Augustine Of the many professional vexations that I have encountered, there are a few that remain implacable. They appear unannounced, lurk in…
by Gautam Pemmaraju “I dreamed of retribution from the sky. I made plans in the course of my sleepless nights to stop this individual and have him judged by an honest, independent tribunal. I dreamed of a court martial, of justice for the people. I dreamed of a national cleansing; a magic hand would pass…
by Gautam Pemmaraju As the picture here suggests, the local parish of Mt Carmel’s on Chapel Road in the western suburb of Bandra in Mumbai, is exhorting upon the Chief Minister of Maharashtra State to exert his efforts elsewhere. Recently, in a most controversial and aggressively conducted manner, the BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation), the city’s…
by Gautam Pemmaraju Allauddin Khilji1 did not vacation in France. The Turko-Afghan marauder and conqueror did not say to himself on one hot Delhi summer at the end of the 13th century, after having marched into the city with his uncle Jalaluddin’s head at the end of a lance, that the tropical heat, the sweeping…
by Gautam Pemmaraju I was once arrested, detained for a few hours, and then let off with a malevolent bubblegum pop song stuck in my head. The very first time I had the occasion to visit an after hours club in Bombay, in mid 1997, having ventured out but a few times with work colleagues,…
by Gautam Pemmaraju I. Deviations Last December, while at a common friend’s house in North London, Steve Savale or Chandrasonic of the British band Asian Dub Foundation played us a video clip of a recent concert of theirs in St Petersburg. Prior to their performance, a local production person had approached the band with a…