Paap Culture: NASA rover returns with no sign of intelligent life in outer space and inner Bollywood

NMACC seemed like yet another award session that could’ve been a WhatsApp group save for Karisma Kapoor's ensemble

KARACHI:

 A Nita Mukesh Ambani invite is a ticket into Culture; it is no longer supposed to be ignored, taken for granted or refused. It requires immediate attention, with reverence and gratitude. It demands attendance. Especially if your presence as a prop or prop-me-up at a cultural centre built for communion, collection and celebration of art and artists will add to the backdrop of her glorious achievement for Indian Culture. By her. For the greater artistic good obviously.

According to her, she's now the patronising authority on a visual of all things art, fashion and design, craftsmanship, and even history in India. As she sees it because she says it. With the inaugural events of The Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre, she sealed the fate of Indian High Fashion with a barely concealed Anna Wintour doppelganger grin and ushered in a new age of suffering Bollywood even as it loses its relevance and is mostly known for the eight people who post selfies every other day for reasons best known to, well, no one.  

A star is born

An educationist in her earlier life, Nita immediately turned into a philanthropist as soon as she married into the Ambani family. Her accident of birth into an economy best classified as lower or middle income was thus rectified and sanctioned by Forbes once her husband, Mukesh Ambani was ranked as the fourth richest man in the world.  A world according to Forbes, obviously. Because what could possibly be more imperative than establishing a pecking order in a free world of equality for all? Especially if you hail from a secular nation, that prides itself on being able to sell secularism. With the blessings of Lord Shiva obviously. 

Nita Mukesh Ambani is a pragmatic woman, she quickly looked down at her belly and realised it's too late to be Meryl Streep but it's never too late to be Anna Wintour. Especially if you're about to deliver the male heir of a generation-old money still fresh from its dubious, mildly illegal means of acquisition. (She quickly bought a membership on the Metropolitan Museum's many boards, studied the icy exterior of her idol, and realised soon enough that no amount of money, hell or donations would crack the Wintour exterior and she'll have to develop a personality that's her own. She dedicated her life to the plight of women and arts in India and arrived at the gates of one of the many High Temples of culture, eager as a beaver to enter.  

Jab We Met Gala

On March 31 2023, my social media feed was populated by Bollywood celebrities who were posting Mike a minute. Nita Mukesh Ambani commenced the inaugural set of ceremonies for her cultural centre, Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre, NMACC. The opening was marked by a performance by Nita Mukesh Ambani, as she is also a trained Bharatnatyam Dancer and can also make sure all the dancers behind her are paid to synchronise with her, even as she misses a few beats or twirls the other way. Her way of course. 

This performance took place in a state-of-the-art theatre designed to seat 2000 people with a ceiling studded with countless Swarovski crystals. If you think money can't buy you happiness, please never think again. 

The opening was marked by an exhibit celebrating the craft of Indian textiles from way back in the 1600s to date. No one knows how she managed to cram the fabric of time and again since time immemorial into a singular exhibit but then no one who was anyone would ever care. Titled 'India in Fashion' it was meticulously curated by Hansxx and aimed to celebrate fashion and craftsmanship. The Great Indian Musical: From Civilization to Nation, marked the first day of culture. Perhaps even had a subtext of the state of affairs but that's really up to Nita. I can't tell anymore.

Along came Bolly 

Nothing says high culture like Bollywood. All puns intended. With the disdain of Mark Twain who like all white supremacist writers of his time believed in only his version of tepid wealth-laden humour, declaring puns to be the lowest expression of literary arts.  

A cultural centre that marked its grand opening over the course of a South Asian wedding had a guest list that showed up on my social media feed first. All thirteen of them frantically posted unprecedented dispatches from the War for Relevance, battling to outdo each other. Alia Bhatt's post-partum denial showed up as near psychosis as she adorned a bulbous turnip dress thirty years and a few minutes-old baby too short.

Around her were a horde of stylists in various states of prostration around her. I scrolled past, hoping her child is safe. Deepika, last seen as an agent of change, fighting against or for her love in a bralet had previously dressed up Viking Beer Barrel on FIFA grounds as the hot girl holding the cup is barely a surprise anymore. Her entire mental health foundation staff has now started placing bets on her imminent meltdown.

They stripped all metaphors of men are from Mars etc. Karan Johar dressed up in his mother's heirlooms was also normal, as far as Bollywood norms go. Sonam Kapoor is also prone to dressing up, albeit with a strong aesthetic statement, was posing as one of the two people in high fashion. It seemed like yet another award session that could’ve been a WhatsApp group chat but Karisma Kapoor's ensemble was worth the few million spent on honouring SRK maybe.

Let Them Eat Cake

A Nick Jonas peeked out from behind a pink bush, and Zendaya and Gigi Hadid were both wearing sarees. Infinity finally halted when a hapless rickshaw driver tried to keep himself and his source of income toppling over in the most bizarre image of this decade. I couldn't scroll down to a bottomless forever when Priyanka Chopra Jonas popped out on my screen, fresh off of a shoplifting spree.

She must've been chased out of the store and was already late in picking up Nick from the Tom Holland Spiderman-themed birthday party. As she raced through the sea of Mumbai's traffic she sensed a shift in the male face and visual arsenic from the Indian females.  She quickly tore off a strip from the Ricksha's linoleum to cover her chest.  It was the worst kind of fashion statement.  

I am blinded by the night circus of Bollywood pageantry that appeared to have collectively aided its mother's closet, leaving nothing out except for garments that cover up essentials, I'm confounded by yet another deluded resolve to take back an 'Indian Narrative' from it's 'Colonial Fetishism' even as they churn out unscripted cinema, my auditory input is ringing with the noise of self while serving Thali, the quintessential North Indian assortment of vegetables, daal, rice on platters made of sterling silver.  

Paap Culture is a bi-monthly column about cynical commentary on bizarre pop culture happenings.