security, insecurities, exclusions

In PVR Priya they think well dressed young women cannot be suicide bombers and modestly dressed slightly older young men can. The other day I went to watch this new movie there with my laptop bag slung on my shoulder. I was promptly advised to leave my bag out of the auditorium premises. Appreciting their keen attention to the security of the patrons, I asked them where they have the baggage counter where you deposit your bags for the duration of the show and get it back after you walk out of the auditorium. This is a common practice and a desirable one too. I am familar with it, especially when I visit libraries and shops of various descrirptions, institutions that put in place such mechanisms to keep kelptomanics at bay.

But I was wrong in this case. It is not kleptomaniacs but potential suicide bombers that these plush seats of entertainment worry about. Therefore, they just don't want your bags to be around in the first place. I was directed to a paan bidi shop nearby, the owner of which had been doing precisely what I expected the PVR authorities to do--keeping your bags for the duration of the show, at a price of course.

In other words, PVR authorities are devoted only to the secutiry of their own premises and and to yours too only when you are physically within their premises. The physical bit is taken very literally, for if you happen to carry a bag and a laptop, it will be assumed to be potential bomb and you will be forced to deposit it with that upwardly mobile paanwala. The uniformed secutiry men did not heed my repeated requests to subject the bag to a metal detector test and, if found harmless, let me carry it in. Only purse, they as well as their boss, an older young man like me but slightly better bulit and 'tie'd, said like robots, is allowed in. I will return to matters relating to their idea of purse later. In the meantime, I tried to reason, then demanded to meet the manager who I was told was too big a shot to meet an occassional oddball and then, proceeded to the ticket counter and asked for a refund since I was no longer in a mood to enjoy their hospitality. These sites of entertainment of course do not entertain any concept of refund. I was free to sell my ticket to any interested customer but the chap at the box office dismissive stared at me as if I was a beggar who has to bother about the measly sum of 75 Rs. His gaze having fixed me as a beggar of a certain kind, my middle class instincts prompted me to behave like one and and I went over to the paanwala and deposited my bag with him. No I was not carrying my laptop on that given morning.

It's here that the twist in the tale comes in. But I am going to bring that in tomorrow or whenever I am going to return gain.