Going Bonkers

Siba Prasad Maitra solemnly sermonises on love and courtship

Harbans Kaur (l) will not be going on the weekend picnic  

Nobody knows why Swati Punjabi addresses Siba Prasad Maitra as “Mr Mantra”. After employing all his persuasive skills (to the extent of spelling out each syllable of his name) he has succeeded in getting her to call him “Sibu Babu”. But that too is not okay with him. “Call me Siba,” he insists. “S.I.B.A. Simple.”
Likewise, Swati demands that Maitra be on first name terms with her. And Maitra, being the classic Bengali bhadralok by default, cannot get beyond addressing her as “Madam”. This makes Swati wild – obviously because it sounds matronly. It makes her feel old. “Like everybody else, why can’t he call me Swati?” she complains.
It would be hard to say whether all this is for effect or genuine slip of tongue. Maitra is known for his way with words – like the way he slipped in bhadwah (pimp) this morning when what he meant was badawah (to take things forward). He was discussing the ritual of courtship, holding forth on the merits of going one step at a time, rather than “jump into” an affair. “You should go dheere-dheere (slowly-slowly),” he explained.
Maitra’s audience today happened to be three notoriously impish women – Bhaswati Bose, Kajal Babani and Pushpa Gupta – with Kiran Prakash, Srichand Arora and Lt Col Angad Singh playing cheerleaders. They all wanted to know how any progress in love can be made “dheere-dheere” leaving Maitra hard-pressed in demonstrating with both hands why we should stop at hand-holding and not proceed beyond. "Haath tak, buss!" he said.
The subject came up when Maitra declared that on Valentine’s Day (next Sunday), he would be carrying three or four roses for presenting people of his choice. “Not for everybody, but selectively,” he clarified. When told that he was asking for trouble, his explanation was that he’d have a hospital bed already booked in advance – just in case.
“Do you know the definition of love?” he asked, suddenly sounding philosophical. “It is like cigarette. It starts with fire and ends in ashes!!!”