The other day, I met Hemant Shutterkhalikar. A chronic Mumbaikar and Saffron Brigade fanatic, he lives in Dadar and takes that fact very seriously. Dadar is to Mumbai’s Hindus what Jerusalem is to the Jews – you can strut your stuff anywhere, but this is simply the best place from where to do it. I’ve never been able to figure out why.

Anyway, you’d be hard put to find a more typical example of the illustrious Manus Marathicus genus than Hemant Shutterkhalikar… the man literally chews green and spits saffron. He hasn’t had much of an education – his father pulled him out of school after he flunked the seventh standard so that his precious male spawn would have more time to go and wave wooden poles at Shivaji Park.

No thoroughbred Brahmin male is considered worthy of the saffron flag if he hasn’t done this for an extended period of time. It has something to do with expressing one’s hypothetical willingness to do war against the ill-defined oppressive forces that would usurp the Maharashtrian Hindu from his rightful place on the top of the heap. (The top of the heap in Maharashtra, that is. Die-hard or not, this lot is realistic enough to know that they cannot trot that stuff beyond those sugar-caned borders.)

Hemant Shutterkhalikar spends most of his time hanging around the local barber’s shop, where he and his compatriots talk of their day’s ethnic purging exploits and slap each other on the backs. There is no shortage of non-Maharashtrian self-esteem to shatter in Dadar, so Hemant & Co. always have plenty of cannon fodder.

You’d think that Mumbai’s Gujaratis and North Indians would have savvied up by now and shifted their act to more convivial locations, but no – humans have this tendency to make their homes in the war zone. Maybe they feel that living so close to the source of infection stimulates their immune system into higher protection levels. The Jews didn’t shift out of Germany even when they could practically smell the Nazi concentration camp fire, either.

In the evenings, Hemant engages in the traditional neighborhood extortion game called ‘pygmy collection’ and repairs with the proceeds to the local hooch dive. There he and his pals drink deep of Government-approved rotgut and watch the sun go down over the slums of ‘Amchi’ Mumbai. He was there that evening when he saw me attempt to evade him and his sozzled cronies by crossing the road. He shot up drunkenly and hailed me.

“Oye! Where you going, yaar? Come here, come here. I am wanting to share with you somet’ing.”

There was no way out. Telling an inebriated saffronite that you have better things to do than listen to his self-aggrandizing frog-in-the-pond rantings is not on. You may not actually wind up battered and smeared with dogshit in the nearest gutter, but you can bet your last modak that your bike tires will be just about as flat and perforated as a rava dosa the next morning.

I walked over and sat down beside him on the barber’s hospitality bench. From the smell of it, Hemant already had at least a quarter of arrack under his belt.

“I saw de movie your told me to watch. ‘Borat’,” he said. “About dat Afghani asshole who goes to America?”

He was talking about the outrageously spoofy film ‘Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.’ In this film, the fictitious character Borat Sagdiyev uses his assumed Third World ignorance to poke fun at the American mindset. He is portrayed as a total bigot and MCP who hates Jews and considers women as only slightly better than cattle.

“Kazakhi,” I corrected. “Borat is supposed to be from Kazakhstan, but he’s actually an American Jew.

“Ya, ya, whatever,” said Hemant dismissively. “Anyway, he funny – but he also right, you know. I know how he feel about de Jews. We have so many same problems here in Mumbai wit’ people who not from Mumbai.”

I chose not to comment. I’m not an inbred Mumbaikar myself and therefore walk a tightrope every time I sully this Sacred City’s pavements with my contaminated footsteps.

“But I think he not right about women, yaar,” he continued. “Women are not good only just for the sex. Dey also needed for cleaning and washing de laundry. Dey also take good care of the kids. We (he flapped his sweaty saffron neckerchief) treat de women wit’ respec’.”

“Yes,” I agreed readily enough. “Women have their uses.”

“But he right about dis ‘sexual consent’ business, yaar,” he said, looking drunkenly wistful. “What bullshit, consent?”

I said nothing, but did wonder just how long this guy would be able to run from a lynch mob of Californian women libbers if some unfortunate twist of Fate would ever land him in Yankeeland.

“Women are good, but what is use of asking dem about de man business?” asked disgustedly. “Sex is de man business - they not enjoy anyway. Do dey take consent of de man before de cooking or de cleaning house? No! Dat is de woman business, and dey enjoy and we don’t enjoy. Do dey ask for our consent when dey are washing de laundry or cleaning de baby kaka? No! Dey much better at it and we give dem respec’ for it! Mother is like Goddess, no?”

It was a tricky moment. Did I agree with a “no” or a “yes”? Indian English can be complicated.

“Dere as so many things where de man just shut up and let woman do. Same way, why can’t woman just shut up and let de man do de sex? Anyways, dis Borat he good man. He actually Kazakh Maharashtrian,” concluded Hemant. “I spoken to de Boss and he say we should ask him to join our party. We can use him in de Mahim ward. So many non-Mumbaikars dere.”

He look out an oversized cell phone that had what looked like old chicken grease smeared all over the display window. “You have Borat’s mobile number in de Kazakhstan?”