SATIRES

      The auditorium was filled with a sense of expectancy. The Puppies - Prosperous Urban Punjabis, the Pussies - Prosperous Urban Sindhies and Pumas - Prosperous Urban Madrasis - were all there in large numbers. The atmosphere was like the finals of an India -- Pakistan cricket match in Sharjah.
Suddenly there was a kind of hush all over the hall as his Corporate highness Yuppie Baba strode on the stage. He was wearing a Van Huesen shirt, a Calvin Klein suit, a Zegna tie and Gucci shoes. A Christian Dior watch and an exotic French perfume completed his ensemble of quiet, understated dignity. His hair was permed, his nails manicured and he had just had his fourteenth facial of the week.
On reaching centre stage he grabbed the mike and declared, "My dear nine to five comrades, at last we are together. After leading my corporate brethren in Botswana, Somalia and Turkmenistan into the heaven of Yuppiedom I am back in the land where I attained enlightenment.
I still remember the day vividly. It was the Ides of April and I had been fired once again. This was the seventh job I had lost in seven months. To elevate my spirits and if possible a portion of my flesh I switched on the idiot box and zeroed in on 'Quick Rise' the adult channel. A dance ballet called Monika was in progress. Aleck Padamsee as Bill and his wife Sharon, in the eponymous role, were cavorting to the tunes of Diler Bhindi's latest Pop Bhangra 'Bolo duh duh duh!' inspired by Big Moose of Archie fame. After performing the cigar sequence as they moved closer for oral interaction something landed on my head and I blanked out. When I came to, I found that a framed photograph of Lord Krishna placed lovingly on the wall by my late mother had made contact with my cerebrum (or is it cerebellum). As I picked up the photo and looked into the eyes of the Lord, enlightenment struck me like the proverbial bolt from the blue. I lost complete touch with reality - it was silent communion between me and Giridhar..... And at that very instant Yuppiesm was born!"
Yuppie Baba paused, allowing his profound words of wisdom to sink in.
"Can you tell me who is the first Yuppie of the world?" he questioned.
There was a complete silence for a full minute and then Baar Baar Peekarmarjani, the spokesman for the Pussies, gently queried, "Was it Todarmal?"
Yuppie Baba laughed and said, "No! No! No! My dear Peekarmarjani, you are thousands of years off the mark. The first Yuppie of this world was Lord Krishna. Just consider what were the three things dearest to him? The three Ms - Maakhan, Melody and Maidens. And what do the Yuppies of today like - Moolah, Music and Monica or Madonna. Whether we speak figuratively or literally, doesn't it amount to the same thing? What I am trying to emphasize is that Kittu was fond of good life. He was not like Rama roaming the jungles with a wild assortment of creatures like a benevolent ringmaster of a wandering circus. And like Rama our Kanhaiya was not a prude. While Ram went around mooning over his Sitay, Krishna merrily played the field with Radha, Rukmini, his Gopikas and his small and compact harem of sixteen thousand raanis. Even in his value system he was like the Yuppies of today. To him the end justified the means. Not for Keshav idealism, duty and all that kind of bull manure. He believed in winning at all costs and if this meant asking Arjuna to kill his cousins, uncles and Gurus he didn't mince words. Today we talk about corporate mergers and takeovers. But who started it all? It was the one and only Gopal. By getting his favourite disciple to marry half a dozen times he managed to expand the kingdom of the Pandavas."
Yuppie Baba's fiery eloquence and compelling logic had the desired effect. There was a thunderous applause and shouts of "Jai Jai Kittu, Jai Jai Gopal, Om Yuppie Namah," filled the air.
After the applause had died down, Karrupshun Singh the CMD of Profits India Limitless got up and said, "Yuppie Baba, what are your instructions to us? What should we do to attain Yuppiedom?"
"First and foremost we have to unite all the Yuppies under one banner. With my creative fourth eye I can see there is a lot of infighting amongst you. The Pussies can't stand the Puppies and the Pumas can't even stand each other. At this rate what you will attain is Yuppiedoom not Yuppiedom. Remember, my call to all of you is 'Yuppies of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your stresses and strains'. Once this is achieved we have to start the struggle for our own land on the lines of the struggle for Gorkhaland, Jharkhand and Khalistan. My aim is to create a Utopia which is of, by, and for the Yuppies."
Yuppie Baba stared at his converts for a few vital seconds and then declared, "Now all of you join me in singing the Yuppie anthem inspired by Gurudev but adopted and adapted by yours Yuppily:

      Where the mind is without migraine
      And the bottomline is high.
      Where Monicas are aplenty.
      Where time is filled
      With takeovers and mergers
      Where the scare of Y2K
      Has not petrified everyone.
      Where ends are important
      And means aren't.
      In that nine to nine Utopia
      Lord Krishna,
      Let my Yuppies flourish.