(“Teri maa tere paas mein, aur tu pyaar ki talaash mein” go the lyrics of Farak ) This scene then, is emblematic of just how close Divine was to being yet another Indian rapper blending in a sea of rappers singing – as Zoya Akhtar puts it in the documentary – about “cars, tits, and ass”.
But as Divine, he built his reputation on emotional vulnerability instead, rapping about the struggles of growing up in a gully and missing his mother. If Fernandes had borrowed from these influences when he started out as a musician, it’d be considered natural progression. In fact, the commercialised Punjabi rap that dominated the mainstream narrative until about a decade ago, arguably catered to these fans: They spoke of cars, girls, and the luxury of being a man’s man. In India, Salman Khan fans are the easiest to dissect they tend to believe in a display of masculinity that mirrors the testosterone-fuelled one championed by the aging superstar himself. Fernandes acknowledges the memory and nods in approval, “Haan, bahut bada Salman Khan fan tha (Yeah, I was a big Salman Khan fan).” The camera trains its gaze on them and he reads out the question to her: What’s the fondest memory you have of Vivian from when he was a kid? “Salman Khan ko dekhta tha aur shirt nikalta tha (He used to watch Salman Khan and take off his shirt),” she promptly answers before both of them break into peals of laughter. Near the 30-minute mark, Fernandes sits in the living room of his house next to his mother, Nathaline Fernandes. There’s a moment in Gully Life, a new documentary offering an insight into Vivian Fernandes, the rapper behind “Divine”, that encapsulates precisely why Fernandes’ origin story in the Indian rap scene was sui generis.
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