Everyone aspires to success in Mumbai, in Delhi they contribute to your downfall — but in Kolkata much intellectual debate goes into pronouncing why something is wrong rather than right. “Dada,” the posturing thinker will tell you, “dis ees ay myshtek,” without having bothered to check the offending piece of writing, or cinema, or art, you’re referring to because, of course, a heated “deeskashun” is better than the point of the debate anyway. And woe be the Dilliwallah who brings “kaalchur” – apparently a Bengali birthright – to a city Mamata Banerjee is currently in the process of painting blue. It makes the bhadralok bristle like a porcupine, unleashing quill-like ripostes on anyone who dares to thus cross their path.
It’s the reason for their public bad behaviour, though the Bengali will tell you that he’s merely putting the Punjabi – all northerners being so labelled – in his place. Dare to lecture in his presence and you can be sure that at least one Bengali will shout “spheek loudly” into his phone, another will stage a walkout, while the rest will simply glare when you step into their midst, mike in hand. As the token northerner in the midst of Bengalis, it’s sensible to keep quiet if you don’t want a finger-wagging “Shaat up, shaat up” hurled your way should you dare to challenge the established order of superiority.
As an outsider beyond the pale of Bengali culture, you aren’t allowed to consume it either. Shorshe maach for dinner? “No, no, you will not like it,” you will be told, despite protests that you’re partial to the taste of fresh mustard with your steamed fish. Hilsa will be snatched away from under your nose because you don’t have the culinary bandwidth necessary to appreciate it, and the Bengali would rather throw it away than have some philistine pronounce on the delicacy over which the Bengali and the Bangladeshi routinely trade insults. And don’t expect a Bengali household to waste their patishapta on you — what would a paratha-eating region know about such fine delicacies?
On the evidence of the Nobel alone, it’s evident – at least to them – that the Bengali reads more, sees more cinema and theatre, watches more football, and is superior in every way to the rest of the subcontinent. Because of the frequency of my visits to Kolkata of late, I find myself googling information at random because you don’t know when you will be tripped up over some obscure fact that you ought – by their standards – to be an expert on.
“So,” asked my wife, when last I was in Kolkata, “did you like the Bengali food I suggested?” “I wasn’t allowed any,” I whined, “because I was told I wouldn’t enjoy it” — my portion of daab chingri replaced by a club sandwich by the self-appointed culturati. “What about the shopping at New Market?” she asked. “Sorry,” I sighed, “my hosts insisted I wasn’t up to New Market, so I was sent off with the driver to some mall instead, where,” I continued, “nothing you wanted was available.” My wife had the grace to commiserate before asking, “How did your speech go, then?” “I didn’t bother to make it,” I said, “because there’s nothing I could say to my Bengali audience that they didn’t already know — and know better than me.”