Media, cinema are insensitive towards people's woes: Javed Akhtar

"The quality of films declined in the 80s when we had movies with cheap songs like 'Sarkai lo khatiya jada lage'," Javed said.

During this period, even noted filmmakers like Yash Chopra and Ramesh Sippy were marginalised, he added.

Nevertheless, the lyricist says he still has a lot of hope in the country's future because of the young population.

Akhtar said he was saying this because it was the young brigade who braved the cold in New Delhi to protest the gang rape of a girl there in December last year.

The veteran scriptwriter, while delivering the Hasnat Siddiqui memorial lecture here last evening, recollected his life in Bhopal and said he would never forget those four years that he spent in the city in the 60s as a college student.

Akhtar said he would always remember the love and affection which he got from the people of Bhopal.

He said once during the winters he decided not to participate in an event in New Delhi as he did not have proper warm clothes. But Hasnat Siddiqui, who was a well-known figure in various fields, and another person gave him blankets.

However, he misplaced his luggage carrying those blankets in Delhi.

Akhtar, in a lighter vein, said he had now come to Bhopal to repay the debt of those two blankets. "As Hasnat is no more, I will give a blanket to his son and another to

Khalilullah," he added.

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