Niharika Lal (BOMBAY TIMES; December 4, 2019)

A session titled ‘Real Crime - When Truth is Stranger than Fiction’ on Day Two of Times LitFest saw Neeraj Kumar (right), former Delhi Police Commissioner, Sushant Singh, who hosts the crime show Savdhaan India on TV, and authors Kulpreet Yadav and Ravi Subramanian discuss real-life crime cases from across the country. The panellists discussed headline-making cases, the excellent work police have done in some cases, loopholes in the criminal justice system. The session concluded with a Mark Twain quote: “Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; truth isn’t.”

‘A YOUNG MAN HELPED DELHI POLICE PREVENT TERRORIST ATTACK AT INDIA GATE’
Discussing crime-based shows on true stories, the panellists agreed that these episodes have created a greater impact as they are based on real life incidents. Sushant said, “Terrifying pieces of writing on crime come from real life.” Neeraj Kumar, who has written two books on his investigations, shared the details of a 2002 case, which has never been discussed in public domain earlier. He said, “When I was in Delhi Police, almost one month after the Parliament attack, we got to know about (the possibility of) another attack at India Gate. We knew about the date of the attack, but that’s it. We had no other information and were unable to crack the code. We took help of all the cryptologists of Delhi, but they produced no intelligence of value. We were also in touch with cryptologists from the US. But they were asking for a huge sum of money and the government wasn’t ready to sanction it.”

He added, “One day in my ACP’s office, a young man (ACP’s friend) came and he asked him as to why he was so hassled. When told, the friend asked the ACP to show him the code. And that young man cracked the code! We got the information and the planned attack at India Gate was averted. He was a saviour for us, but if you see such an incident in a film, you won’t find it believable.”

Sushant added, “If we would have shown this exact scenario in a film, toh aap log (audience) kehte, ‘Yeh kya bewakoof banate hain Bollywood walein! How’s it possible? Bade bade log nahi kar paye aur ek ladke ne aise hi kar diya?”

‘A CCTV CAMERA WHICH WAS NOT FITTED PROPERLY HELPED US IN THE NIRBHAYA CASE’
Neeraj Kumar was the Delhi Police Commissioner in 2012 when the Nirbhaya incident took place and he shared with the audience how an ill-fitted camera helped the police. He said, “My investigators went to Mahipalpur (as the bus took that route) and they checked the CCTV footage of all the cameras that were installed at the receptions of those dingy guest houses. Again, truth being stranger than fiction, all the CCTV cameras were facing the reception areas of the guest houses. But one camera at a guest house was turned towards the road because it was not fitted properly. From that camera, we got the footage of a bus that took two rounds of the same area, and then the bus was identified. It was an overnight operation.”

‘SANJU GLORIFIED SANJAY DUTT’S LIFE, BUT WHO MADE THE FILM A SUCCESS?’
As the panellists discussed crime and fiction, one of the members from the audience asked whether the film Sanju had glorified Sanjay Dutt’s life, despite the actor’s checkered past. Neeraj Kumar, who probed the 1993 Mumbai serial blast cases when he was a DIG with the CBI, said, “If Sanjay Dutt would have wanted, he could have prevented the blasts. He was in the know of at least one part of the conspiracy. But he didn’t, and whether he suffered or not, or not suffered enough... you and I can have a view on whether he should have been punished more. But we’ve to work within the ambit of the law, and what a policeman feels or people feel can’t be the law.” Sushant Singh said, “I agree with you that the film Sanju glorified Sanjay Dutt’s life, but who made the movie a success? Public. I’m not a fan of the things that our films glorify. Like stalking women — ladki ka peecha karte raho toh ek din haseena maan jayegi. In Housefull 4, they have such (demeaning) dialogues, but then who makes these films a success?” 

Divya Kaushik (BOMBAY TIMES; December 4, 2019)

She was an amazingly sensitive, supremely intuitive, loving, caring, funny, childlike superstar, but she was my very own Shashi” — that’s how director Gauri Shinde described Sridevi, as she struggled to choose words that could define the superstar. “It is very difficult to describe a person, an actor like Sridevi, in a few words,” added Gauri, who was speaking at a session at Times LitFest, in Delhi, which saw the unveiling of the book Sridevi: The Eternal Screen Goddess by Satyarth Nayak. Gauri was a part of the session on Sridevi, which was also attended by Boney Kapoor with Deepika Padukone joining them on stage towards the end of the conversation.

MEETING SRIDEVI FOR THE FIRST TIME WAS LIKE GOING ON A BLIND DATE: GAURI SHINDE
Reminiscing about her first meeting with Sridevi, Gauri said that it was like going on a blind date. She shared with the audience, “My meeting with Sridevi for the first time was like going on a blind date as I had never met her before. I was nervous and looked at myself in the mirror to check whether I was looking decent. When I met her, I was strangely at ease. There was something so warm about her. She was just so normal, lovely and something connected immediately. I had this positive feeling that this date might go well. When I started narrating the script, throughout the narration, she was so instinctive, genuine and everything that I would have liked her to be. By the end of that first date, I had a feeling that both of us would want to go on our second date. There was instant chemistry, instant love and it was too special.”

Talking about the time when she was shooting English Vinglish, the movie in which Sridevi played the lead character of Shashi, Gauri said she fell in love with the way the actress would transform when in front of a camera. “I enjoyed the whole process of working with her. We got along so well, we understood each other so well. I think what connected us was our ability to express ourselves through anything but work. She had such a great sense of humour, which was why she could be so funny on screen. Through the working of this film, we had so many amusing moments that we laughed like little girls and when it was time for work, she would change so effortlessly and she was in her character. So, it was so fascinating to watch someone just transform in a few minutes from this smiling person in private to this diva on screen.”

‘I WAS PLANNING TO MAKE ANOTHER FILM WITH SRIDEVI’
When Gauri was asked about her favourite Sridevi film, she said that it would definitely be English Vinglish. “At the risk of sounding selfish, I would say that my favourite will always be Shashi from English Vinglish... for me that role has been special. Before that there have been so many of her films that I have liked, but when I miss her, I miss Shashi,” she said, adding, that she has been a huge fan of her movies like Sadma, Lamhe, Chandni, ChaalBaaz and Mr India. “She was the only female superstar and it makes me so happy that I could work with a woman who was a superstar,” said Gauri.

The filmmaker also said that she was planning another film with Sridevi. “I would have loved to make a film with her every month or every year, if it was possible, but for someone like her, you had to have an amazing subject, you had to do justice to a star that she was. Yes, I was planning something with her. In my head, she was always like a parallel track and I was always thinking what can I do with her and there was a plan, but before I could say pack up, she left and that’s unfortunate,” she said.

‘WHEN SRIDEVI ENTERED A FILM SET, SHE’D TOUCH THE GROUND’
Author Satyarth Nayak said, “Sridevi started acting when she was only four. The actress said in an interview that before every act, the director of her first film, would break a coconut and do aarti because she was playing Lord Murugan in it. So that stayed with her, the fact that the ground was like a temple, very sacred. So when Sridevi would enter a film set, she would touch the ground.”

MY LAST CONVERSATION WITH SRIDEVI WAS ABOUT STAFF ISSUES AT HOME: DEEPIKA PADUKONE
At the Times LitFest, Deepika Padukone said, “I feel extremely honoured that I got this opportunity to be here. Boney ji and Sridevi ma’am are my first champions. From the time I started my career in 2007, they would send me a personal message during the release of my every movie and I still have all those messages. Sridevi ma’am was someone I got really close to at a personal level, may be it was a south Indian connect. We connected so well that my last conversation with her was about staff issues at home. So, that was a kind of relationship we shared. She was a support in everything that I have done in my life, personally and professionally. She’ll always be missed.”