Mann ki bhadaas

Illustration/Uday Mohite

The other day someone asked me, "I've never seen you sly tweet or respond to people who are being mean about you online. How are you so restrained?" This beatific picture of me made me laugh, and would have almost anyone who knows me in sardonic splits.

Like anyone else there's plenty of times that I get that ate-a-tinda expression while scrolling through social media: at humblebrag, at virtue signaling aka batting of political eyelashes, at bloodthirsty envy disguised as critique, the teacher's pet starting of fires ("Is it just me or…). Yes, I have yelled in my mind like many, no doubt, "It is just you, you and only you!" I confess that upon seeing many a "humbled to receive an Oscar/massive contract/aeroplane/etc" I have frequently considered replying "humbled to receive my Amazon order." Indeed, I have probably done so, but wisely not posted it. If I could find that folder where Unsent Tweets are apparently stored it would no doubt be a supposedly shameful but actually exhilarating display of hectic irritation.

"What was the movie you compared to expensive shapeless Goa dresses in your stories" someone asked me. "I like watching things that get negative reviews." Yes. The term hate-watch exists for a reason, just like vamps in TV serials. Sometimes I think OTT platforms are founded for this purpose. So many bad shows, so many snarky reviews we scarf down like gol gappas. Venting is for toddlers. The full operatic scale of this explosive annoyance is captured in a beautiful Bambaiya word: bhadaas.

Why is bhadaas so satisfying? Bhadaas allows us to judge hypocrisy, while acknowledging we are powerless before the complicity which enables it - including our own. Bhadaas occasionally helps us feel good about ourselves, especially when someone ratifies it. Yes! I am right! This person is insufferable - yaniki I am not. Most of the time, the behaviour we kick at does not actually impact us - as another Bambaiya term has it, what goes of your father? We know we have zero business cribbing about it. That provides a certain relief of doing what is forbidden by politeness. Often conflated with courtesy, politeness is a different animal, which does sometimes serve as a mask for contempt. Bhadaas is its unkempt opposite.

Some people are artists of bhadaas, dispensing extravagant lukhmas of sarcasm and comedic hyperbole laced with insight into human nature. Others are just funny because their irritation is disproportionate, hence entertaining.

Bhadaas in private requires that you name the emotion and even acknowledge it is a bit unnecessary. Bhadaas is best done only with those who can warn you when you tip over into pettiness or meanness, lest you end up stewing in toxicity. Bhadaas' best quality is that it eventually runs out of steam. Like indigestion it must be expelled, not nurtured, and leave us with an understanding of others and ourselves equally as flawed and limited creatures. Later, you even laugh sheepishly at yourself, as after a night of drunken behaviour and mumble things like, "actually she's not that bad. I'm being a bit extreme" (you are). Public bhadaas, too often feels compelled to put on political or moral dress to justify itself. As if such people are unwilling to confront and laugh at their own human unreasonableness. Which is bad for politics and sad for bhadaas. Its voluptuous body was made for cabaret, not the performance of worthiness.

Paromita Vohra is an award-winning Mumbai-based filmmaker, writer and curator working with fiction and non-fiction. Reach her at paromita.vohra@mid-day.com