Morning Anthem

The white music box is in the foreground

A stupid, long-forgotten song from 1982 became the anthem of the morning today. Kishore Kumar was warbling soullessly on Arun Patil’s tiny music player with what was obviously the title number of the movie, Dulha Bikta Hai. All of a sudden, the song acquired a fresh vitality as Razia Khan started singing along, “Jeeja bikta hai” – the target being none other than Hari Singh Shekhawat.
The parody, suggestive of Shekhawat being on sale – that too, with his wife present– led to titters all around.

Arun Patil

But trust Shekhawat, he wasn’t letting it go. Taking the cue from Razia, he deflected the song towards Bijoy Gupta: “Did you hear that? Gupta bikta hai!”
This time everybody broke into loud guffaws. Gupta however, pretended not to have heard anything, leading Shekhawat to cut across the exercise circle and corner Gupta’s wife, Pushpa. “Gupta-ji is on sale, did you hear that?” The song was still playing on Arun’s system. Pushpa casually retorted: “I know. Take him for free. I have no problem…” Dumbstruck, Shekhawat quickly retraced his steps.
The incident is indicative of the importance the music player has come to occupy in our morning routine.

Neelam Choudhary distributes sweets on Rishu Rani's birthday 

Its presence is more than obligatory. A member’s absence can go unnoticed, but if Arun Patil’s little white box does not show up, it would seem like a morning wasted.
Nahid Khan (and Tara Chand Seth earlier) even carry out conversations with the player, as though it has a life of its own. Today itself Nahid taunted the player for singing “Mujhe thand lag rahi hai” on a hot sultry morning and was suitably rewarded by the song, ‘Dulha bikta hai…’
In all this, the Choudhary family celebrated their newly-acquired membership (ref post of November 6) with sohan papdi and besan laddoo. Coincidentally today also happened to be the birthday of Ajit Choudhary’s niece, Rishu Rani (also called Nanhi), who stays at Obra, Uttar Pradesh. So in a way, it was double celebration for the family with all of us clapping and singing for the birthday girl and gran’ma Neelam going about distributing the sweets.
We thank the Choudharys for including us in their family celebration, even as we are yet to meet Rishu Rani. Once again, we convey our good wishes and blessings for her through them.