Thoda roti,
thoda cha
Queen Victoria bahut achha
Thoda roti, thoda jam
Queen Victoria very fine man!
Have you heard
this doggerel? Perhaps yes, perhaps not. This is from the repertoire of my
friend Prem Bhasin (all of 87 years in 1994) during my five-year stint in
Patiala. Bhasin was the most colourful personality that I can remember. More of
him later.
This ditty is
supposed to be one of the nursery rhymes that the Indian nannies of the British
Sahebs used to sing to their charges. Like our very own Little Miss Muffet in
Muffety Mai
dahi malaai
ghaas pe baith ke khaai
ek badaa saa makraa
kapraa ko pakraa
aur bhaag gayi Muffety Mai
But I must not
digress.
Obviously, the versifier of the first belonged to the pre-Independence era. Equally obvious it is that he had a pragmatic approach to life and, sure, his priorities were right. He was perhaps the pioneering proponent of the concept of mai-baap sarkaar. The inspiration behind the slogan "roti, kapda aur makaan" flogged to death several times over by the politicians of India in the past three score and twelve years could have been none other.
Poetic merits
apart, the attempt to curry favour with the presiding officer of the Empire
where the sun never sets is transparent. Nevertheless, the Queen, after whom
the orthodoxy of tight-corseted primness and prudery is named, I am sure, must
have raised her royal eyebrows in a frown at the confusion that caused her to
be described as a man. She must have, in her characteristic style, exclaimed,
"We are not amused!"
