One Wednesday night in November 2014, New York’s prestigious Columbia University played host to Vishal Bhardwaj’s Haider. The film was watched in rapt attention by over 2,000 students.
My daughter was one of them.
The screening was followed by a definitive, incisive, and exhaustive interactive session helmed by the Haider writer Basharat Peer, who is a former student of Columbia University. Interestingly, the guest of honour at the screening was eminent litterateur Salman Rushdie.
Rushdie is himself of Kashmiri origin. Feeling a pinch of paternal pride, I had impulsively texted Mr. Rushdie saying, “Sir, my daughter is right now one of your audience at Columbia.”
“What’s her name?” came the prompt query. I told him.
What happened next is stuff out of a dream. Mr. Rushdie asked from the stage, “Where is Lata Jha in the audience? Your father is asking about you,” he said.
I am sure Mr. Rushdie has long forgotten this incident. I haven’t. I never will. It is so illustrative of the supremely gracious man and artiste that he is.
After the session at Columbia, I thought it would be interesting to know his opinion on Haider. When contacted, Salman Rushdie said, “I liked the film and thought it used Hamlet very well to illuminate Kashmir.”
It was Tabu’s performance that enthralled Rushdie. Said the distinguished author, “Tabu’s performance is what holds the film together and the use of Shakespearean motifs — the play within the play, the revenge tragedy, the ghost — is elegant and effective.”
Rushdie was tickled by his namesake being featured as two characters in the film.
Says the author with his tongue firmly in cheek, “I enjoyed the fact that the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern characters are both called Salman, though I think it’s intended as a joke about Salman Khan and not me.”
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