I know I had told you that I will not be writing my blog as I am busy but its was the need of the hour and I also had to put certain plain facts into perspective. Today some scum bag decided that my fifteen year old friendship with Shah Rukh Khan was over. And he decided to use his platform to express it. I have only this platform as I no longer make money writing about people. So here I am in blog world putting all my loved ones at peace that nothing that psychotic article said was true...and everything else that they cook up to burn their embers in their kitchen (just how do they manage to digest the food) was pure fiction.
I could have refrained for reacting but another reason to pull me to put my thoughts to words was all my “loved ones” reaction to this article…They sounded hurt, they sounded angry, they wanted me to do things that one does not really do in a civilized society. So here I am, doing what sane people should be doing, "clearing the dirty air diseased ones have polluted".
I had read the article published in the tabloid, and after the initial burst of amusement, and resignation, (one does have to pay the price of fame and all that), I was aware of an increasing irritation. I went, "oh please! come on," at some places at the hackneyed phrases -- first we have drifted apart, then we have fallen out, things are not the same between us. I used to be a journalist myself, and it irritates me no end when I see unimaginative writing. The only places where imagination was applied was of course the supposed reason why the friendship had broken up.I know its too much to ask of a yellow journalist to get real, (which would make them a paper with no stories then!) but atleast make it seem plausible, will ya? In my times, a favourite phrase of journalists without credited sources, was -- 'a little birdie told us'. I liked that, it had a sublime sense of the ridiculous. But this business of a source 'close' to Red Chillies Entertainment... a source close to an organisation? Like what the watchman? Or the chai wallah? And a source in Bollywood! Whew! That really narrows it down. The journalist rushes to reassure us, by affixing the adjective, Reliable...Phew!!! The mind boggles!Coming to the supposed bone of contention, it irked me no end to read that Shah Rukh had parted ways with me because of Billu. That's demeaning and derisive to Shah Rukh, as a person and as a professional. I hate it when my friends are attacked. That's something I will not tolerate. The article has quoted me that I have always said that Shah Rukh was a blessing. And he is. He is a tremendously gifted individual, and is a terrific friend, and a highly compassionate human being. Its absurd even to hint that he would break a friendship just because of the non-perfomance of a project. And that brings to the accusation that the film was a 'disappointment'. Our yellow-eyed one has played it safe here. He could have said the film was a flop at the box-office, but the figures would have proven him wrong. He could said that the critics blasted the film, but the critical acclaim that Shah Rukh got, which printed in the papers would have proven him wrong. So he goes in for the word 'disappointment'. I was enraged, I wanted to call the stuff as it is, the undiluted crap it is, the sheer piece of muck it is. I could sue the yellow eyed one, but in this Recession Times, where the poor chaps of the paper are not even getting their conveyance allowance, I don't want this misguided journalist to lose his job. What helped were the four words that echoed through the mails and the calls from my friends and readers -- 'We don't believe this'. My friends, my readers across the globe send me these four words that soothed my hurt. They sent this because they see Shah Rukh, as I see him. They have taken the slur on his character as personally as I had and so they had sent me this message, they don't believe it. I realised that the love and affection people had for Shah Rukh was not to be affected by poisonous words of the yellow eyed creatures. These friends of mine, from across the world, know what friendship is, they know what it means to be friends, they know the gift of it, the blessing it is.Which this poor thing from the so-called newspaper doesn't.
I pray to Allah that he gets his peace after this piece... and when i am in the prayer mode let me wish some thing he knows nothing about: friends!!!
