Self-deprecating humour isn’t something one sees too much of in this country (where making fun of others is held a nobler pursuit than laughing at one’s own foibles), so I’m always pleased to read Saad Akhtar’s webcomic Fly, You Fools! (People are Mindless Cattle), a good-natured, witty take on some of the things we read about in the newspapers every day. It isn’t brilliantly written or drawn (in fact, it mostly uses photos and mixed media rather than fresh illustrations) but it’s goofy and perceptive, casting fresh light on (among other things) security checks at mall entrances (http://tinyurl.com/5s25pe), rich kids mowing down pavement-dwellers in their Mercs (http://tinyurl.com/mhpwep), and loud honking at traffic signals as a substitute for sexual inadequacy (http://tinyurl.com/kl7knc).
One of the most entertaining recent entries in the series is a take-off on the news story about Tata Sons filing a case against travel community website oktatabyebye.com for infringing on the “Tata” brand name. The comic has Ratan Tata showing up in random places to monitor use of the word (even in casual conversations between two friends). When Mr Tata returns to his office computer, he has unread emails from the Consortium of Tartar Sauce Makers and the Japanese Tatami Mat Makers, in addition to one from The Nanotechnology Institute. “You’re infringing on our brand name,” it says. Touché.
The comments on the strip are understandably lighthearted and include discussions about whether “Batata Vada” should now be a disputed food item on three fronts: not only does it include the brand names Bata AND Tata, it’s possible for a keen legal mind to discover an AT&T in there as well! “One should have to pay royalties to all the companies for eating that stuff,” a poster suggests. “Too long has it infringed on hard-working capitalists.”
As the website Travel Tales from India (http://tinyurl.com/l7p9av) puts it, “Tata owns the Jaguar and Land Rover car brands, the Taj Mahal Hotel and a very profitable software company. But do they own the English word Tata too? Looks like they think so. Even when the word has been in existence since 1823, much before the company website itself starts talking about its heritage!” Meanwhile, on Medianama (http://tinyurl.com/ln6ncm), Nikhil Pahwa wonders “Will they ask singer Tata Young to change her name next?”
The point of all this is that the story is such a farce, it can only properly be dealt with through humour. No sense in getting hot under the collar about it. But this is easier said than done for the targets of the case. On its website, Oktatabyebye.com has been soliciting public support (http://tinyurl.com/nm3fko) and the response has been strong so far — over 1,500 comments and counting. With most of these being votes of support, it’s always interesting to read a dissenting view, even if it’s one you don’t quite agree with. A commenter who claims to have lived in Indonesia and Malaysia for a long time points out that outside India, in places where “ta ta” isn’t used as a parting greeting, the word might not have such generic associations. “When I showed the portal name to a couple of Malaysian friends, their immediate reaction was that it is something promoted by the Tata group.”
Predictably, most of the other comments draw on analogies and hypotheses (“What next? Will they go out and sue every truck on the Indian highways?”), including some very far-out ones that are probably not all that relevant to the topic under discussion. “So this means we can no longer name our kids Sachin as Mr Tendulkar can sue us?” asks one poster, and the discussion quickly sinks into a quicksand of paranoia and indignation. White noise slays discourse.