“102 Not Out” Celebrates the Very Spirit of Parenting

102 Not Out is a great example of once a parent, always a parent!

Parenting is a lifelong project, where the focus is on raising independent children, who are capable of leading lives with joy and happiness independently, without any external support (including parents).

The idea for me as a mother completely resonated, when I watched a 102 year old Dattareya Vakhria (role immaculately essayed by Amitabh Bachchan) fighting tooth and nail, through a series of comic challenges thrust upon, his already old and senile 75 year old son Babu (played perfectly by Rishi Kapoor), to instill the value of self-dependence and finding joy within.

Dattareya for this understands that he has to set the right example by living a similar life first and so he does. He believes in living life each day, without any grudge or repentance. His mission in life is to break the only living man’s record ( a Chinese who is 118 year old).To fulfill the goal, Dattareya needs to be happy, calm and composed, which he believes he will not be able to with his boring, ever cribbing and complaining son, who makes morose out of every situation. For the sake of this, he comes up with his ingenious plan of sending his son to an old age home.

What follows is a series of funny moments translating into moments that help you reflect on your ideologies as a parent and question your parenting spirit. If god forbid, we survived and lived up to 102, will we have first,  this zeal in life? And second, will we be able to spread it around so that our kids absorb it from us?

From Dattareya’s character one thing is for sure that as a parent, you need to love yourself first, so as to be able to think of your kids’ and their well being. As a parent, Amitabh’s character touched upon several aspects of parents, starting with self-love to providing the right guidance to his child (age no bar) by hook or crook.

What was endearing was that even at the ripe age of 102, Dattareya continued to parent his son, guiding him, or rather forcing him to get back on the track to lead a happy life.

He shows or rather sets an example that how as a parent, you always have to extend support to your child, to help him gain strength and confidence in himself, at every age and stage of life.

Dattareya was a man, who was hell bent to see his child, lead a happy life, sans all false dependence. He strives to make his son capable to live his life alone, to develop a positive attitude to life and everything around.

It was this spirit of Dattreya that made him “102 Not Out”! He truly showed the essence of being a positive parent, where age was no bar.

This movie is a must watch for all parents. Right from parents, who feel parenting is a short time project and they don’t need to extend any help, post children growing to a certain age, to those who resonate with the idea (this will stem the belief stronger), this movie transitions through phases of parenting and eventually teaches that as a parent, the guiding has to flow from you at every stage.

As a parent I would remain restless, till the time my son doesn’t get the idea of living right! After all, this is most important responsibility of me, as a parent.

If tomorrow, I see my child living a happy life (both physically and emotionally), gratitude filled and joyful life on his own, I will definitely give myself “a successful parent” award! Then maybe, I can would feel that I did a great job!

 
Malvika Roy Singh A freelance creative writer and blogger for the past 7 years, Malvika Roy SIngh writes about subjects like travel, food, lifestyle, health, interior designing, real estate, digital entertainment, media and marketing, education etc. Her parenting blog helps her be a conscious parent (www.wipmom.com) When she is not writing, she can be found either running or playing with her 4 year old son enjoying time reading. She resides in Hyderabad and can be reached at mroysingh@gmail.com