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Two big, brave predictions

Every December, in the dead of winter, India's paper tigers roar in unison.

After waffling all year between "on the one hand" and "on the other", after shifting all their paradigms, and 'ad'ding to the reader's nauseum with "inasmuch as" and "notwithstanding", our editors and columnists, experts and analysts, sit down with the regularity of a northern power grid failure and give us their verdict of the events and personalities of the year gone by without fail.

Suddenly, our Ink Gun Shanmugans are firing on all cylinders.

Man of the Year, Hero of the Year, Zero of the Year, Bore of the Year, Whore of the Year... The titles tumble out faster than the tandoori tikkas did at Kumarakom. So, with the "benefit of hindsight" all our friends agree that Amitabh Bachchan had a great year last year, that it was okay for Karnam Malleshwari to hog those kebabs and Kingfishers, that 'Azhar ne pucca khaya...'

But, hey, who didn't know that? What genius does it take to deliver a judgement on what every Shyam, Schubert and Salim already knows? Okay, journos are not psephologists ("but for now" only one is, and he is a television guy). Still, why do we act like Durex salesmen (okay, salespersons) and play it so safe? Instead of looking back, why don't we for a change look ahead and make a few brave predictions?

Yours truly is willing to stick his neck -- and one other pivotal portion of his anatomy -- out to play 'Kaun Banega Clairvoyant' and make two big, brave predictions for Y2K+1:

Big, Brave Prediction No 1: Hrithik Roshan will not be Bollywood's next superstar.

Big, Brave Prediction No 2: Yuvraj Singh is not God's answer to Indian cricket.

I don't have charts and graphs to show why "Tithik, Tithik" will not replace Shah Rukh Khan. Hell, I haven't even seen Kaho Na Pyaar Hai, don't want to, and these picture postcard films piss me off like crazy. But, man, I'm willing to bet with the dons of the underworld that Sub-Junior Roshan is not going to replace the sultan of srkworld.com Not in this, the real first year of the real new millennium. Not next year. Never.

How did I reach this conclusion? Read his eyelids.

Indian fans (the male ones, at least) have never taken a shine for light-eyed heroes, or else Rakesh Roshan would have been endorsing Pantene. Okay, so the girls liked the "nifty actor with dreamy eyes" (as one magazine described him) but how many movies will it take to get bored of that? (Answer, two: Fiza and Mission Kashmir.) And how many more before the next cute face decides to don a pair of lenses?

That pencil-thin body with rippling muscles may "drive the girls crazy when he has his clothes on and the boys crazy when he takes them off" but all they remind me is of the Maruti Gypsy "with wide tyres" (that Manoj Prabhakar was promised by a bookie but never got). And don't tell me the Bollywood geniuses who can clone Dolly (Parton) can't whip up a couple of kilos of muscle?

And, boss, am I alone in thinking that too many things have happened to Hrithikji in just one year for the boy to cope?

A hit film, big endorsement contracts, two flops, death threats, a quick marriage, Nepal... Only Steve Waugh could keep his focus in the midst of such sustained chaos, but the Australian captain doesn't do Hindi movies. But the big reason why I believe Hrithik will not make it is his "family" that he keeps reminding us of so often. (Remember, how papa Roshan wailed when Pepsi did that cruel commercial spoofing Hrithik's teeth?)

First Amitji and then Shah Rukhji kicked the clans out of Bollywood. In accepting them, mass audiences were accepting one of their own; someone who makes it in moviedom by the sheer weight of his own personality without filmi-fathers or underworld godfathers. Certainly, Hrithik, who is much younger than the other two were in their debut year, needs all the help, but all this "family" business is going to do him no good.

The boulevards of Bollywood are littered with the cutouts of Aamir Khan, Salman Khan, Sanjay Dutt, Anil Kapoor, Fardeen Khan, Puru Raaj Kumar, Sanjay Kapoor, Kumar Gaurav... My hunch is Hrithik will join that heap by year-end.

But there is an overarching cinematic reason why Hrithik won't make it: his USP.

Will somebody please tell me what the hell he stands for? Bachchan's angry young man persona was a response to the prevailing social angst. Shah Rukh rattled us out of our safety-first lives with his dare-devil antics. What about Hrithik? How can the man from Matunga, Mylapore and Munirka relate to this poor little rich boy from Juhu who marries a poor little rich girl from Juhu?

Because he looks good? Because he comes from a good family? Because he can drive nice cars? Because he can work out? Because he can shake a leg? As Sunil Gavaskar would say, the percentages don't work for Hrithik. Little girls who have brothers in the US of A, send e-cards to their next door neighbour, buy bouquets for their fathers, and call their teachers m'am may be going lattoo over him.

But I bravely predict that
a. they will tire of it very soon, and
b. their numbers won't be sufficient to keep the turnstiles swinging for Hrithik.

"Furthermore", as our editor-friends would put it, Hrithik suffers from the cola curse. In this day and age, when marketers carpet-bomb our consciousness collectively, all our top cinema and cricket guns, Amitji and Shah Rukhjji and Govindaji -- and Sachinji -- have been saying 'a-ha'. And Hrithik?

Yuvraj Singh, "on the other hand", is a seedha-saadha open-and-shut case.

Like with Hrithik, a "great" debut followed by a string of failures (Vijay Bharadwaj showed why we shouldn't place too much store by great debuts in Nairobi.).

Like with Hrithik, the family problem (imagine seeing your father arrested for adulterating petrol when you are "fuelling the hopes" of an entire nation?).

And, like with Hrithik, the clan curse (Where are Rohan Gavaskar, Sanjay Manjrekar, Pronob Roy, Hrishikesh Kanitkar, Jatin Paranjape -- all sons of famous-fathers?)

Okay, unlike Hrithik, he's at least got the right cola on his side, but that will not be enough for the "Pied Piper of Chandigarh" as christened by the Paid Piper of Patiala (Navjot Sidhu).

Say what you will, but in the annus horribilis of Indian cricket (now celebrating its fourth anniversary), our plug-and-pray commentators have showed that they have lost all sense of perspective. But to compare a rank greenhorn with Sachin Tendulkar must take a very special skill.

Sure, he can send a few balls six rows into the stands. Sure, he can field. But to call Yuvraj Singh the face of the future on the strength of his showing in his first year in international cricket is a travesty. I mean, he crossbats ever other ball, can't bowl to save his life, and can't keep his place in the side when it is playing in India after just half-a-dozen matches, and we paint him as the great white hope of Indian cricket.

Gimme a break.

So, there you have it. Two big, brave predictions for two acknowledged heroes of the year gone by.

Krishna Prasad