We should avoid bodyshaming the way rich people should avoid wealthshaming. So nobody should call Anant Ambani ‘fat’. Yeah, he might weigh more than average, and that is the result of a chronic disease that made him heavier than average. The result is that he has become the low-hanging fruit of fatshaming.
But the response of the family has been to give him the most expensive wedding the world has ever seen. It cost Rs 10 billion. That’s Indian rupees, and it’s an obscene amount. True, Anant is the son of Mukesh Ambani, one of the world’s richest men, but he still reminds one of ‘Fat Man’, the US nuclear bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki to end World War II. It just goes to show that no matter how rich your daddy is, if you’re going to be fat, you’re going to be fat.
And it’s not as if Anant has got other redeeming qualities. He’s not good at cricket, like Azam Khan, who’s got to be one of the weightiest men ever to keep wickets for Pakistan. Or any other sport for that matter, even though throwing the hammer and shotput are usually best done by hefty guys.
Or the tug’o’war, where the anchor of the team is usually picked for his sheer weight.
Young Anant is not exceptionally bright, for he dropped out of Brown University without taking a degree. He’s not jawdroppingly dumb either, for he got into Brown, which is Ivy League. Whatever the reason, he got married to a childhood sweetheart, a daughter of family friends, Radhika Merchant. As they were both from Gujerati bania families, I’m sure she faced family pressure to stick by him when he suddenly got fat, after their engagement.
The wedding was starstudded. Both Mike Zuckerberg and Ashton Kuchner performed, while Rihanna attended. Or was it Rihanna who performed? Anyway, Jeff Bezos wasn’t there, nor was Donald Trump. His daughter Ivanka was, though.
No guest was murdered. Normally, that would be a given, but after Balaj Truckanwala, you can’t be sure it’s over until it’s over.
The PIA stewardess who slipped in Toronto stayed there, and didn’t go to India for the wedding. Apparently, PIA air hostesses slip quite frequently in Toronto. This airhostess was not even the first this year, but the second. And last year there were seven. And apparently, so many have slipped, that those who have are now advising those who want to slip, how to. One of the essential steps is to burn one’s passport, apparently. And once you get in, make sure you don’t report for the return flight.
I wonder whether the impending privatization of the national airline has any relation to this desire to settle abroad, specifically in Canada? Anyhow, the privatization is going full speed ahead, and Shiehbaz Sharif is doing what Umar Ayub presumably wouldn’t have done, which is rushing through the privatization.
Elsewhere, I see that Gazans aren’t getting much luck. Israel is not just continuing its attacks, but is doing its damnedest to make sure that no aid gets through. However, Sweden’s and Canada’s decision to resume aid to UNRWA, the UN Relief and Works Agency, which was founded specifically, in 1949, to provide relief and help to Palestinian refugees .
Some aid is being airdropped, but that does not seem viable, what with five people killed when a pallet of food aid fell on them after its p;rachute failed. Israelis called for this to stop, as it was only encouraging the Palestinian resistance. They shouldn’t object, for the crowds of Palestinians getting into the sropzone provided convenient targets.
Does anyone remember how many Jews were killed when manna fell from the sky in the Sinai? The Israelis want the Gazans thrown into the Sinai it seems. And they begrudge them even what falls from the sky.
Gaza was in bad shape before the present invasion, which is now in its sixth month. It had not recovered from previous invasions, or the covid-19 epidemic, and could have tipped into starvation anyhow. But this This is too much. But for whom?
What really shook me was the appeal by a Palestinian on social media in the name of Islam. It’s not just the governments and the militaries that will have to answer, but all of us who call ourselves Muslims, on the Day of Judgement. It’s a scary thought to go into this Ramazan, because the Almighty might be infinitely Merciful, but He is also Just. And if Palestinians don’t forgive us, I don’t know if He will.
