The hills of Jammu and Kashmir are alive with the sound of music these days. First it was santoor maestro Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma who descended on Jammu with his baggage of childhood memories and the melodious prophecy that times, they are a-changing. Then in Srinagar landed film director Yash Chopra with a Bollywood delegation to recce the area for possible film shoots.What one needed to do was just rewind to Darr and recall the ditty Tu mere samne, main tere samne, with a dash of Shahrukh histrionics thrown in. For the uninitiated, Darr was directed by Chopra with music provided by Shiv-Hari, aka Shiv Sharma and Hari Prasad Chaurasia. Some more sweet songs on their way? Seems so, what with Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee doing his bit recently, flying to Srinagar and painting the possibility of peace in these breathtakingly beautiful vales. A dream? Maybe. But dreams can be powerful. They propel ahead and know no boundaries.Like in my case, it has been a dream run between Neelam, Jagat and KC theatres in Chandigarh, all situated in Sector 17. At times, watching three shows in a row. What kept me going was the lure of the dream merchants of Bollywood. Copious tears, laugh riots and embarrassing histrionics — all in a matter of three hours. There is another common string running, which truly defies geographical considerations. Be it Shimla’s Ritz, Chandigarh’s Jagat or Jammu’s KC, cinema halls have been boiling and bubbling with patriotic feelings. I, too, have been drenched to the bone.Amid exchange of fire, the burst of Gandi naali ke kire from Border at Shimla’s Ritz was as fiery as The Hero’s dialogue duel (matching Yeh ek Pakistani ISI head ka haath hai, jiske saath mil jaye, uski taqdeer badal jaati hai with Yeh ek saadharan Hindustani ka haath hai, jiske upar padh jaye, uski taqdeer ulat jati hai) at Jammu’s KC. And that handpump lifting sequence from Gadar: Ek Prem Katha at Chandigarh’s Jagat entailed some emotional calisthenics. Incidentally, Sunny Deol, calling the patriotic shots in all these movies — that is, Pak-bashing — has become something of an icon.And yet, Bollywood productions are followed with passion in Pakistan. Talk of boundaries? Nope, talk of dreams. Mine, yours and theirs. Like at the end of Border, bloodshed was soon replaced by a fervent hope that good times lay ahead, with peaceful co-existence between the two neighbours.Perhaps dreams of peace need a catalyst before they can be translated into reality, perhaps they require the intervention of Bollywood.
