Harishankar Menon: Recreational Drugs
It's a fearsome trifecta of forces. Between the law, health concerns and thepetty spoilers who can't bear to see other people enjoying themselves,recreational drug use as we know it is doomed. Luckily no killjoy malcontent canchange the human urge to get nicely hammered. Look to technology for the bestpath where no turn is left unstoned. Here's how I reckon it can happen: biology(with a little help from new-found friend quantum physics) is already developinga science of influencing human mood through scent. Thanks to the physics, weknow scents will have analogous electrical signals. So once we have a handle onwhich signals tweak which mood and how to plug them in, all you'll ever need fora buzz is the right bit of software code for your personal iFlyHigh mood player.Hacker/hasher, crack cocaine/crack code? The differences will blur agreeably.Everything else is going digital; why not the delectable business of turning on,tuning and dropping out?
Satish Padmanabhan: Advertising
Foreheads have been rented. Cheeks hired out. Dailies have given out theirfront pages. Newschannels have Bunty & Babli for anchors. Public toiletshave become billboards. Even postal envelopes have slogans. Radios sometimesplay songs in between the jingles. There is one white space still left. It comesout everyday at primetime and lasts the night. The moon. Satellites will be sentup in the sky to beam logos. On full moons, Pepsi or LG or Mercedes will bid forthe space. As it wanes, Apple Computers will take over. The crescent on theninth day will be Nike's whoosh. But I'm not so sure about the eyeballs it willget. When was the last time you looked at the moon?
Ajith Pillai: Music
The future will be the age of the home studio. Recording equipment willbecome even cheaper and with music software becoming sophisticated andinexpensive, high quality recording will become possible in your own garage orguest room. This in turn will lead to more artists/bands recording independentalbums. Independent of the big labels. There will be more scope formusicians to experiment. New companies will spring up which will encourage thenew acts. Film music will become technically more sophisticated in terms of therecording process. With western symphonies now being committed to loops theorchestration in Bollywood songs will touch a new plane. Whether the lyricalcontent of songs will remain as banal as it is today remains to be seem.Re-mixes will certainly run out of business. So will pop songs with an overdoseof the pitch corrector effect. The new music directors will be working more onthe computer than on the keyboard. The post-production phase will become vital.So will remastering. In short, top class technology will be in place. Whetherthat will improve the quality of the song proper, is the question that cannot beeasily be answered.
Ajith Pillai: Booze
Rum Reflections: More people will grin and beer it.Old Monk rum may nolonger be the high priest.Mallus and Panjus will continue to be the most heartydrinkers. Gender no bar retail liquor vends will open in Chennai. From a nation obsessedwith dining and whining we will become a `wine and dine' country. Those whocan't afford IMFL will continue to run for their `Country.' The shortestdistance between two great highs will be a double pint.
Smita Gupta: Politics
If the BJP is going through a major crisis of faith, identity andleadership, the Congress is stuck in a time warp, unable to cope with thechanged social dynamics. Unless the BJP resolves its internal problems and theCongress re-invents itself for the 21st century, the two major political partiesin the country may not just remain stuck where they are, capable of winning onlyaround half the Lok Sabha seats needed to secure a majority they could dipfurther. The growth, then, would be seen in the vast number of regional/ smallerparties practicing niche politics, addressing the aspirations of the people of aparticular region or social group/s. In short, there is no end in sight to theera of coalition politics. And if the Congress and the BJP, which together nowhave around 300 Lok Sabha seats dip to 200, then a real Third Front governmentwould become a reality after the next general elections.
However, beyond the numbers that make for majorities, the social churningevident, particularly across the Hindi belt, will result in a more equitabledistribution of power. The force of history and ground realities will ensurethat communities and social groups, which tended to be on the margins, will be accommodatedin the political mainstream. To remain in the game, the upper castes, whotraditionally held sway, will have to meet those they had excluded half-way, orbe pushed out. If this trend continues, without a similar equitable distributionof power in the civil service, judiciary, corporate sector, academics and themedia--all still dominated by the upper castes--Indian democracy will becomeincreasingly dysfunctional.
Smruti Koppikar: Cities
Cities will evolve into global cities and global city regions, towns willtransform into cities. Ergo, our maps will show many more cities, also morechaos and confusion before any semblance of cohesiveness. Everything buteverything, including culture and governance, will be driven by economics andfinance; cities will respond and submit to global economic networks with eachcity playing a specialised role in the world economy.
The big I-word will be infrastructure, the backbone capacity of cities tocarry their growing populations will remain static even as their importanceincreases. Expect more gentrification, ghettoisation and rapidly changing socialgeography. Space will always be at a premium, but cities will have toaccommodate underground economies. Migration, unemployment and inequalities willevoke passion but few resolutions. Demographics and accountability will becomethe new buzzwords while definitions of class and status will be constantlyre-defined by those higher up the pecking order.
There will be multitude of visions but a sore absence of planning. Publicparticipation or citizen voice will compete with big-ticket business to be heardin the corridors of political power. Politics, in turn, will have to re-orientitself to the concept of a city-state. Global cities will continue to be part ofa nation but have equally powerful sub-national identities. They will also liveon the edge, always. Pico Iyer's work is cut out for the next 50 years.
Pramila N. Phatraphekar: Food
In 2010, eating will be all about ecstasy.Food, our greatest thrill bymouth.And swooning and moaning will move out of the bedroom.Because"let's do it" will mean dinner, both to an increasing singlespopulation and couples. Too stressed to stroke anyone, even with white feathersand too pooped to make emotional investments, we'll turn to sexually loadedfoods. Anything from titillating tipples like the Fuzzy Navel, or aphrodisiacaloyster hors d'oeuvres as foreplay and deep dark velvety chocolate desserts,which will have us mming and aahing together, openly in public.
Partners who know each other's eating proclivities will gleefully order anorganism, since its only food that can easily satisfy the 4,600 raised redpapillae or taste buds in each other's mouths-together. And the only personasking if "it was good enough for you?" will be a chef in tall whitecap by your table.
Science, which has dubbed this phenomenon as hedonics, the pleasure ofeating, will be ten years older and more expert in the hands of chefs, who willhold out infinite oral pleasures to singletons and doubletons whose postmidnight menus are unfulfilling or even non-existent. Don't believe us? Wait. InNew York they're already using the naked body as a plate.
Sunil Menon: Chutnification
If you got no dosh to play the stockmarket, nor the stomach neither,brother, you can still bet your bottom rupee on this. Chutney Mary will rule thewaves. Not the restaurant at Chelsea, but that saucy hybrid speech, thatmutating gene which crosses borders faster than mad cow disease. This sourcecode infects all in its path: it slips through Code Orange security, it meltsthe walls of punditry. It's cultural anthrax. But isn't it, finally, the sourceof everything that is novel in form?
Chutnification, fortunately or not, waits neither for divine sanction norlegislative agency. It follows its own frontier law, written right out there inthe streets. And as the Tamil cop loved to say, twirling his mooch: 'Nobody isabove La!' You can't stop all that shameless social intercourse, can you now?You know how these things are. Bobbysoxer meets Bluestocking at Soas,London--they're "doing" philosophy and Islamic jurisprudence, withspecial reference to "Bakhtin-Shakhtin and all that". Down in Trichy,Quick Gun Murugan finds Phataphat Jayalakshmi on the classifieds. Rohini III32/179 broad-minded IIT unemployed and Srivatsa 25/153 fair slim Bharani. Thissummer, they're going to Santa Monica, passports thaiyyar. "What to do, myco-brother is calling, da." Up north, Baba O'Really meets Junkie Pandey onthe steps of the Assi Ghat in Benares. Thoda sa aasmani ho jaaye? Sure, son,beat the dhol, rock and roll. Ya, roll over, Beeb One...and tell Rushdie thenews.
Sundeep Dougal: The World Wide Web
Big brother will be watching you, 24/7, but, then, you'd be watching rightback. There'd be no reason to blink, unless of course you have something tohide. In which case, of course, you'd better be afraid. Very, very afraid. Forthey won't let you get away with even jumping a traffic light. You'd do it,though, but they'd make you pay for it. Yet you won't mind the price, for thevalue would be great. No, war will not be peace, freedom will not be slavery andignorance will not be strength. We'd all finally get the ultimatereality: we'd all be part of the www, and it would be a part of us. Meanwhile,here's a small personal wish, a prediction that better be fulfilled: O, pleaseGod, I know you do not exist, but please make it possible to order used booksfrom amazon.com for direct delivery to India. Preferably, by instantteleportation.
G. Rajaramanan: Cricket
NEW DELHI, December 26, 2011: Cricket India CEO Anil Kumble today said thatthe steps taken in the past decade have helped Team India move away from thetreadmill it had found itself in 2004-05.Having steered India to a World Cupvictory last month, he said it was time for him to move on and let someoneyounger bring in fresh ideas into the administration of the game.
"If the incremental steps helped us get better over the past four years,the quantum jump we made last year saw us win the World Cup. We are now the teamto beat in world cricket," he said, presenting the State of Indian Cricketreport before the stakeholders of the game. "I am so glad that India is nolonger only a darkhorse or a footnote on the pages of cricket history."
"For years, India Inc has supported the cause of a sport that is thepassion of the average Indian. We are pleased that our successful partnershipswith many members of India Inc has taken us to such unqualified success. We areglad that Test Cricket has remained strong, feeding off limited-overinternationals and Twenty20 cricket. Above all, we are delighted that Crickethas remained the simple game that it really is."
Bhavneet Singh Aurora: Cyberpiracy
Cyber piracy will become legal in the next decade. Only you'll have to payfor a licence to be a cyber pirate. Of course, there will be some dissidents--acyber Black Beard or Long John Silver of sorts--who'll want a free run on thenet without the hassle of licences. These will be the rogue pirates. P2Pprograms like Kazaa will be replaced by better and faster programs to ensure aquick entry, download and exit from any site. Banks will hire these pirates toprevent other pirates from hacking into their servers. Then, of course, therewill be the cyber cops trained to catch all sorts of unlicenced piracy.Governments will use these pirates to hack into the servers of their rivalnations for secret codes, information and other state secrets and at times tomess up things there and leave the victim nation confused. But before all thathappens, let me get back to try and hack the accounts of the Ambanis, Tatas,Birlas and Mittals to transfer some money into my own depleted account.
Namrata Joshi: Films
I would have made my first film in the next ten years. Not because, likeevery film critic, I carry a "bad" script in my pocket. Definitely notbecause I have friends in Bollywood who would help me raise the moolah. But Iwould have found an ally in technology. Falling prices of digital equipmentwould mean that many arm-chair filmmakers like me would be able to dabble withthe medium without having to chase a producer, financer, distributor orexhibitor. It will be the age of gorilla filmmakers who'll create cinema withjust a couple of thousand rupees. And with lap-tops proliferating a la mobilesour films will have their world premiere on the Net. Multiplexes? They willcontinue to thrive on the happily-ever-afters. And the media would be writing ineager anticipation about the proposed debut of a certain Aryan Khan.
Jaideep Mazumdar: Communists in 2015
They won't perish, because they're reforming. But, a decade from now,they'll be a pale shadow of their present ideological selves--red would bemetamorphosing to a pale shade of pink. Mainstream Communists would be akin toSocial Democrats. They would have broken out of their traditional bastions inWest Bengal, Tripura and Kerala, but only marginally.The Commies will, ofcourse, keep on mouthing their tired slogans in favour of the working classesand the masses, but they would be, at the same time, unabashedly wooingcapitalists and hosting delegations from the World Bank and the IMF.The CPI(M)and the CPI would have increased their tally of Lok Sabha seats to about 80 orso and will, as at present, try to wield power disproportionate to their actualstrength.They'll continue their efforts to set the country's agenda in economicand foreign policies with limited success and, when faced with roadblocks, tryto paralyse the country as they did on September 29, 2005. And at the end of theday, they'll tango with capitalists. For, they'll draw more inspiration fromChina where the Communist Party would, by 2015, have been taken over byhomegrown Chinese capitalists. Indian Communists would be received, wined anddined in Washington and, perhaps, even the White House ten years from now and aPrakash Karat or Sitaram Yechury, nattily dressed in a Karol Bagh suit, would beat ease sharing the podium with "imperialist" George W Bush'ssuccessor. Only, their primary enemies by then wouldn't be western capitalistsor the Indian bourgeois, but the ultra-Leftists or Maoists who would be wreckinghavoc in many states.
S. Anand: Dalits
A caste system that has withstood the onslaughts of Buddhism, Islam,Christianity, colonialism, and the radicalism of Phule, Periyar and Ambedkar, isunlikely to come unhinged in the next ten years. In a society that thinks inyugas, this is a blip. Yet, as 'Kaliyug' peaks the Dalits will come into theirown. Smaller states will proliferate, and the post-reservation post-BSPgeneration of Dalits will consolidate politically across the nation, and wrest asizeable share of power. Yet, Hindu society will continue to wear its caste onits sleeve. UP Brahmins may electorally ally with dalits, but they will notintermarry or interdine. Untouchability may cease to be a political phenomenonbut socially will remain a manifestation of Hinduism's sanatan nature.Shudra-Dalit contradictions will climax; and the Brahmins, untouched, will watchthe scenario with we-told-you-so glee. Landless, Dalits will increasingly desertthe villages and seek the anonymity of urbandom. In medical and engineeringentrances in Tamil Nadu, Dalits have been topping the open quota. Materiallysuccessful Dalits will not integrate socially with the Indian mainstream; theywill build a parallel universe, and increasingly prefer the obscurity of lifeabroad--Australia, New Zealand, West Asia, Canada and the US--where the specterof caste will not haunt them.
Shefalee Vasudev: Sari
Unstitched and free spirited, the sari is the iconic drape of the future. Itwill reveal and cover women across the world with its magical warp and weft. Itsglobal look will be gossamer and gauzy. In New York and Paris; in Mumbai andSingapore, it will flaunt its verve and nerve. Handloom will hold and hybridwill go out. Bhagalpuri silks, organic khadis and gold Kanjeevarams will climbthe charts; sequined chiffons will fold-up. The sari will adapt, glide andcaress. It will live for ever more, as Carl Jung said as the sexiest garment inthe world.
Anuradha Raman: TV
It's boom time for anchors who are re-launching themselves as broadcastersthis year. Rajat Sharma of Aap Ki Adalat did it early this year. Two moreprime-time anchors (Rajdeep Sardesai and Arnab Goswami) will be taking theirbows. While it might be too early to talk about how these channels will shape upin the pecking order of viewership, with 50 million cable homes, the figuresonly add up with each passing year, 150-odd channels might seem too small.Thinkof it.
