It was the summer of 1978 and I was in a fix. As a founding member of the Rajasthan Yuva Manch, I was co-hosting the biggest event of the year—the all-India premiere of the Raj Kapoor mega-starrer Satyam Shivam Sundaram. The eminent director and a host of Bollywood celebrities were arriving for the occasion, which was to be held at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi.
The trouble was that the Janata government was in power and it had imposed total prohibition on the serving or consumption of liquor!
Raj Kapoor, a superstitious soul, had sworn off alcohol and meat until the premiere of Satyam Shivam Sundaram, or so rumour said. He would naturally be expecting drinks at the after party at the Maurya Sheraton where all the guests were staying. Almost the entire cast of the film, including actors Zeenat Aman, Shashi Kapoor, Padmini Kolhapure, David, and singer Nitin Mukesh would be present. His sons, Rishi and Randhir Kapoor, Randhir’s wife Babita and her father Hari Shivdasani—who were also part of the cast—were among the invitees, as were Rajendra Kumar, a matinee idol of the 1960s, and his son Kumar Gaurav.
All the arrangements were in place. They were to occupy an entire floor of the hotel which was to be blocked off to all visitors, except for me and a few others. My co-organizers, Ashok Mehta and Pawan Kanodia, pointed out that after all the stress and hard work, the film personalities who were accustomed to free-flowing liquor in Bombay would want to relax with a drink or two after the premiere. If we couldn’t provide them with alcohol, it would reflect poorly on our hospitality.
‘What do we do?’ asked one of my co-hosts glumly. ‘Have you seen the celeb list? All these filmwallahs love their tipple. If we don’t manage the booze, the whole event will be a washout.’
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An air of intense gloom pervaded us. There had to be a way to beat the system. They all looked at me hopefully. My connections were considered legendary and I was generally regarded as Mr Fix It. I made no promises, but cautiously told them that I would see what I could do. I approached the senior manager at the Maurya, Ajay Mehra, who was a friend of mine. Perhaps he would know a way out. As it turned out, he did.
He suggested that we augment the guest list. ‘We are allowed to serve liquor to foreigners. We can serve alcohol to your guests if there are foreigners at the party.’ This loophole in the prohibition statute, we agreed would serve our purpose, provided we could find willing foreigners.
I picked up the phone and called Lalit Kothari, a film distributor who was associated with Shashi Kapoor and was handling the distribution of Satyam Shivam Sundaram in Delhi. I informed him of the senior manager’s solution. Kothari laughed. ‘I don’t think we’ll have a problem inviting foreigners. Let me speak to Shashi Kapoor.’
He rang up Shashi, who immediately said, ‘Raj Saab will invite the entire Russian embassy.’ Raj Kapoor, as is well known, was a big hit in Russia and his contacts amongst Russians were stupendous.
The party after the premiere was a mega-hit. The Russians arrived en masse from the embassy. Liquor flowed in copious quantities to satisfy even the most inveterate drinkers among the filmwallahs, and it was all perfectly legal.
Satish Agarwal, the minister of state for finance, lent gravitas to the whole affair as chief guest, and several prominent politicians attended the premiere. Politicos and bureaucrats had pressed us for free passes, after we released ads for the premiere. A snapshot of me addressing the audience at Vigyan Bhawan still graces the family album. We had managed to book the place courtesy a member of the Rajasthan Yuva Manch whose father was in the government.
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Culture Clubs
The Rajasthan Yuva Manch was founded in 1971. I had always been a sociable creature and in my first year of college I had joined hands with a few of my friends, notably Ashok Mehta, Pawan Kanodia and Lata Poddar, to set it up. Lata, a schoolmate, had topped the higher secondary exams in the commerce stream. Our families went back a long way. His father, Kailash Poddar, and Bauji were friends. His grandfather Biharilal Poddar had been an admirer of my grandfather, Atmaramji. Our family had also known Pawan’s for generations and our mothers were old friends.
We were all very thick and thought it would be a great way to network. Our initial objective was the promotion of Rajasthani culture and fellowship. But as the membership of the Manch grew, it also started functioning as a business forum for entrepreneurs from Rajasthan and Haryana. Over time, as our numbers swelled, we decided to include Punjabis as well. Eventually, I became president of the Manch, a post I held for several years.
The Satyam Shivam Sundaram premiere was not the first such event the Manch had organized, there had been several others which had gone off just as successfully. We had also been approached to launch a Zeenat Aman – Sanjeev Kumar starrer, Manoranjan (1974), an adaptation of the popular English movie, Irma La Douce. However, the release of the film was delayed and the proposed premiere petered out.
In 1980–81, the Manch folded up. Four years later, the India Foundation (not to be confused with the think tank of the same name) was born. It was conceived as a platform for social and philanthropic work and was far more broad-based than the Manch had been. It became a fulcrum for cultural expression. Plays, musicals and dances were staged to wide acclaim.
This excerpt from On The Move: My Journey As A Relentless Entrepreneur by Hari Khemka has been published with permission from HarperCollins India.