Mani Shankar Aiyar, a close friend through school, college and university (we are roughly the same age, 83) has mentioned me in the first volume of his autobiography, Memoirs of a Maverick: The First Fifty Years (1941 to 1991). The incident relates to the late actor, Peter Sellers.Mani and I were then undergraduates at Cambridge University. He was studying economics, I was studying history. We were in our final year. Mani had been elected secretary of the Cambridge Union, the prime debating society of the university, where future British prime ministers had spoken as students.I, on the other hand, had been elected president of the Cambridge India Society, where Indians studying and teaching at the university used to meet. My job was also to invite eminent speakers to address us once a month.It was a challenging task as the India Society had been in the red for many years. Even inviting the then well-known editor of the influential and highly respected New Statesman and Nation, Kingsley Martin, could not attract a larger paying audience than the usual 30 or 40.Camellia Panjabi, another contemporary, who was then the secretary-designate of the India Society, and went on to join the Tata Administrative Service (TAS) and became a key figure in the expansion of the Taj group of hotels, said one day, “Why don’t you try and get Peter Sellers?”Sellers was then one of Britain’s leading comedians, famous for a popular radio programme, called The Goon Show. He had starred in some critically acclaimed British films, including the classic black comedy, The Ladykillers, in which Alec Guinness also acted.Sellers, however, truly hit big time internationally opposite Sophia Loren in The Millionairess, which was based on a story by George Bernard Shaw and released in 1960. He played the role of an Indian doctor, and spoke in what was considered as the typical sing-song Indian accent. As a result, many of my English university friends would try to get a laugh by conversing in the same accent when talking with me.Inviting Peter Sellers was a long shot but I decided to give it a go. To my surprise, I did not get an immediate “No”, but a cautious response from his secretary. So, I pursued the matter and then, to my huge delight, she told me that he had agreed to drive down from London to Cambridge to address us.Also read: A Profile in CourageI hired the largest hall available, the Cambridge Union building where it held its debates and which could hold several hundred people. We charged a small entrance fee of two shillings, I seem to recall (the equivalent of today’s Rs 10), but so big was the rush that we had to turn quite a few students away.It was probably the biggest number of people ever to attend an India Society meeting. More importantly, it got the society out of the red, even leaving behind a healthy balance.For over one-and-a-half hours, Sellers had the overflowing hall in splits. Being the wonderful mimic he was, he spoke in a variety of different English accents.Of course, they included the Indian one, but the French as well, which he would use to marvellous effect in the wildly successful Pink Panther series of films, where he played the bumbling French detective, Inspector Clouseau.Coincidentally, when Mani was writing his memoir, and asked me if I could remember the date of the memorable Sellers’ function, I was rummaging through old files and newspaper clippings, trying to put them in some kind of order. And there, I found my university diary of 1961-62, and a yellowed clipping from a local paper, the Cambridge Daily News, reporting the event!It was dated June 12, so clearly Sellers had addressed the India Society the previous evening on June 12, 1962, almost 60 years ago, a virtual lifetime, when I was 21. I even found the brief hand-written speech I had delivered to introduce Sellers.Also read: P.V. Narasimha Rao Was ‘First BJP PM’ of India, Says Mani Shankar AiyarAfter the meeting, Camelia, Brian Pollitt, a close friend who was then president of the Cambridge Union (his father, Harry Pollitt, was the founder of the British Communist Party), Romi Khosla, another contemporary of mine at Cambridge who went on to become a famous architect, and I took Sellers out for dinner to a small Indian restaurant nearby.He brought along Mario Fabrizi, an actor friend. At the dinner he revealed that the director of The Millionairess had originally wanted him to play the role of an Egyptian doctor, but he persuaded the director to change it to an Indian doctor because, as Sellers told us, “I had got to know many Indian doctors and liked them a lot.” He also made a startling confession.“Did you know,” he asked us rhetorically, “That this has been the first time I have ever spoken in public? I was so nervous at the prospect that I brought Mario along, in case I broke down and could not continue.”He needn’t have worried. He had held all of us completely spellbound with his masterly mimicry. Sadly, Sellers died relatively young, at the age of 54, while still at the peak of his career.Mani, thank you for the memories. And we are all looking forward to the next volume of your memoirs.Rahul Singh served as an assistant editor at the Times of India and editor at the Reader’s Digest.
