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Bengali prepares to whistle into Guinness Book

Arup Chanda in Calcutta

Calcutta will soon export a dying art to England -- whistling.

A music college in Nottinghamshire, England has invited an ace whistler from the city to teach the art there.

Prahlad Kumar Bose, 46, will go over for lecture-cum-demonstration from June to December this year. While in England, Bose will also participate in an international whistling competition to be hosted by the Guinness Book of Records in London in June.

"The world record is held by a German who whistled for 24 hours without a break," Bose, who was inspired by the whistling sequence of the famous Colonel Boogie tune in the Hollywood classic Bridge on the River Kwai during his college days and decided to pursue it, said.

"But come June and I will whistle non-stop for at least 72 hours to create a new record."

His family was initially shocked by his pastime because of the social taboos attached to whistling in India. Whistling is still considered improper because men resort to it for eve-teasing. But Bose was able to convince them that it was another art form like singing.

Bose, a bachelor, retired after 28 years as a proof-reader in The Statesman last August.

"I whistle in the bathroom and while walking down deserted streets at the crack of dawn, but my favourite place is Calcutta's underground Metro railway stations where the echoing vibrations compliment the sound of whistling. Commuters love it."

Bose feels there is no scope for whistling in Hindi movies. But English movies use it very often. "Kishore Kumar had once dared to use it, but not others."

His desire is to make whistling an accepted form of art in India as it is in the West.

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