Arun Kaul wrote, acted in, directed and produced plays, skits, entertainment programs. One of his outlandish media adventure was the production of a “magazine”.
Yes, he actually wrote down content on stolen foolscap paper with a borrowed pen, put it up on the notice-board and called it MUD (with Vol No and serial No). The “print order” was just 1, but the “readership” was a few dozen H4-ites guffawing away at the notice board. And the later editions were named MUDD (the first D is silent).
In this meticulously maintained Vol 12 “published in 1978 i.e. 44 years ago, Arun talks about the fallout to a major incident in H4. H4 was successful in getting 8 of its inmates elected to the gymkhana posts and of course, there was a celebratory party. Massive amounts of products from RLC (Ratna Country Liquor) with flavours like santra, mosambi, narangi, pineapple etc. were ordered and they were diluted with sherbets of the same flavor and the resultant concoction was stored in buckets and served with ladles. There were many first time drinkers and most thought that they were imbibing sherbets and they helped themselves to several rounds. It was only when Waghmare slurred, “How come the pineyapple jooosh is sho bitterer? Hic!”, folks realized that something was going horrible wrong. Soon, there was pandemonium. Dozens of guys staggering and throwing up. Some frothing at the mouth. Future chief ministers, Godmen, CEOs…they were all involved in some way or the other. This incident was hotly discussed for a few days and a GBM like situation was threatening to erupt. The matter diffused when Arun Kaul came up with this spoof in his MUD.
Do not miss the audacious “Readers write:” box that he created in this muddy magazine.
