Sep 08 2014 : The Times of India (Mumbai)
Mera joota hai Japani
Sagarika Ghose
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Love in Tokyo and Seiko watches once dominated the desi imagination
`Mera joota hai Japani, Yeh patloon Inglistani, Sar pe lal topi Russi, Phir bhi dil hai Hindustani...' Who doesn't love this 1955 ditty from the film Shree 420? The Chaplinesque vagabond Raj Kapoor skipping along the dusty roads of Real India, lip synching to the rollicking innocence of Mukesh's gentle voice, Shankar Jaikishen's music and Shailendra's lyrics, the song became an anthem. It captured India's post-Independence heart and immortalised Kapoor as a tragi-comic symbol of our wide-eyed infant republic.Back then in the Nehruvian 1950s, Japan, Britain and Russia were aspirational role models for a young nation-in-the-making. Memories of the British Empire had still not faded and Communist Russia was Nehru's most favoured role model. But it was Japan which not only captured the national imagination but from the 1950s to the 1980s, also the Indian wallet.
We were Japanese-crazy in those days: a Made in Japan toy or a Seiko watch or a Sony television were seen as markers of social `arrival'. Ah Japan, we sighed admiringly, starstruck by Japanese engineering skills, disciplined society and glorified status as an Asian superpower. Tokyo was the Asian paradise. Bollywood, always a mirror to the times, kicked up its heels to the beat of `Gudiya Japan ki' and `Love in Tokyo', as army wives held Ikebana classes and homemakers gushed over glossy photos of Bonsai in prized new wall calendars.
Then, with the magic of the Middle Kingdom, the Chinese took over. The Deng revolution liberated the Chinese economy, putting China on the fast track to superpower status, as a slumbering giant leapt to its feet. The label `Made in China' replaced `Made in Japan'. But while we admired the Japanese, we feared the Chinese because of a combination of history and geography, and the 1962 Sino-Indian war scarred our memories.
If Japan was the film Love in Tokyo, then China was Haqeeqat, that poignant portrayal of India's military defeat. The trust deficit over the border and Arunachal Pradesh made China our most feared Leviathan next door.
With a more distant Japan, a country we viewed through the prism of Sony and Nissan, we didn't feel the same sense of foreboding even though World War II had drawn the Japanese army into Indian territory . An imperialist Japan did not terrify us the way an expansionist China did. No wonder we happily invited Japanese companies to set up car factories for us, build our roads and bridges, and marvelled every time we crossed a Japanese-made flyover.
Maruti Suzuki came to exemplify Indo-Japanese friendship. That happy little car, gaily painted green or maroon, packed with the extended families of upwardly mobile Bharat, symbolised our more confident dreams. Chinese companies were national security threats; Japanese businesses were partners. A love-lorn Kumar Gaurav wooed Vijeta Pandit in Love Story with the words `Mujhe to yeh gudiya Japani lagti hai'.
Which is why the sight of the Indian prime minister attending a tea ceremony in Kyoto or beating the drums in Tokyo is rather apt. Narendra Modi likes Shinzo Abe and the Japanese because there are many similarities between him and today's Japan: highly nationalist, regimented and controlled. He probably is admiring of the Chinese too, but may just be a little more wary of wielding his chopsticks when he meets Xi Jinping later this month. The Chinese are always inscrutable, the Japanese even in their great success a little more reassuringly Asian.
Modi was just five years old when Shree 420 hit the screens and the film may not have reached sleepy Vadnagar. Yet Modi's visit evokes that older era when Indians aspired to Japani joota and when Japani gudiya was a prized item in pre-liberalisation desi showcases.
We were Japanese-crazy in those days: a Made in Japan toy or a Seiko watch or a Sony television were seen as markers of social `arrival'. Ah Japan, we sighed admiringly, starstruck by Japanese engineering skills, disciplined society and glorified status as an Asian superpower. Tokyo was the Asian paradise. Bollywood, always a mirror to the times, kicked up its heels to the beat of `Gudiya Japan ki' and `Love in Tokyo', as army wives held Ikebana classes and homemakers gushed over glossy photos of Bonsai in prized new wall calendars.
Then, with the magic of the Middle Kingdom, the Chinese took over. The Deng revolution liberated the Chinese economy, putting China on the fast track to superpower status, as a slumbering giant leapt to its feet. The label `Made in China' replaced `Made in Japan'. But while we admired the Japanese, we feared the Chinese because of a combination of history and geography, and the 1962 Sino-Indian war scarred our memories.
If Japan was the film Love in Tokyo, then China was Haqeeqat, that poignant portrayal of India's military defeat. The trust deficit over the border and Arunachal Pradesh made China our most feared Leviathan next door.
With a more distant Japan, a country we viewed through the prism of Sony and Nissan, we didn't feel the same sense of foreboding even though World War II had drawn the Japanese army into Indian territory . An imperialist Japan did not terrify us the way an expansionist China did. No wonder we happily invited Japanese companies to set up car factories for us, build our roads and bridges, and marvelled every time we crossed a Japanese-made flyover.
Maruti Suzuki came to exemplify Indo-Japanese friendship. That happy little car, gaily painted green or maroon, packed with the extended families of upwardly mobile Bharat, symbolised our more confident dreams. Chinese companies were national security threats; Japanese businesses were partners. A love-lorn Kumar Gaurav wooed Vijeta Pandit in Love Story with the words `Mujhe to yeh gudiya Japani lagti hai'.
Which is why the sight of the Indian prime minister attending a tea ceremony in Kyoto or beating the drums in Tokyo is rather apt. Narendra Modi likes Shinzo Abe and the Japanese because there are many similarities between him and today's Japan: highly nationalist, regimented and controlled. He probably is admiring of the Chinese too, but may just be a little more wary of wielding his chopsticks when he meets Xi Jinping later this month. The Chinese are always inscrutable, the Japanese even in their great success a little more reassuringly Asian.
Modi was just five years old when Shree 420 hit the screens and the film may not have reached sleepy Vadnagar. Yet Modi's visit evokes that older era when Indians aspired to Japani joota and when Japani gudiya was a prized item in pre-liberalisation desi showcases.
