film review
Do you know who shudras are, mr. Jaiswal ?
SANJEEV KHUDSHAH
The films that
ware made before ‘Shudra: The Rising’ were primarily aimed at exploiting this
issue for box office success. I would like to keep commercially successful
films like ‘Delhi-6’, ‘Rajneeti’
and ‘Aarakshan’ also in the same category.
‘Shudra:The
Rising’ Got stuck in the Censor board and this fact was widely publiciesed
through facebook and other media.
Finally, the film
was released on 19 October. There ware complaints that no multiplex was ready
to screen the film. This also triggered a spate of SMSes. I saw the film on 23
October. The film begins with a photograph of Dr. Ambedkar. It goses on to
realate how the alien Aryans pushed back the original inhabitants of India
and enslaved them. Then Manu wrote this law-book ‘Manusmriti’, which divided
society into various castes.
After this
prelude begins the narrative. A woman of the Shudra neighborhood (whether the
residents are Shudras or untouchables/Atishudras is not clear ) is summoned by
the village thakur to his haveli. The thakur’s
musclemen drag ther forcibly to the thakur’s place, where sandalwood paste is
applied on her body and she is presented before the thakur in his bedroom. The
scene of sexual intercourse has been filmed in great detail. The attempt to
portray it as rape comes cropper. On the other hand, the husband of the woman,
who is injured while resisting the thakur’s musclemen , dies. Shudra viewers
are naturally dismayed by the portrayal of a shudra woman as a commodity. After
all, hasn’t section of feudals been claiming the shudras are its illegitimate
offspring?
The film has no
story worth its name and script is very weak. No actor could imbibe his or her
character. The film seems to be set in an era at least 200 years back, when the
untouchables had to move around with a ‘gadga’ hanging from their necks and a
broom tied to their waists. The women characters of the film do not feel or
look like oppressed or untouchable. The have threaded eye-brows, wear lipstick
and the way they walk or even cry is ultra-modern.
The male Shudra
characters also have well trimmed beards and distinctive hair-style. They
appear quite healthy and well-fed. In the entire film, they keep on screaming
at the top of their voices for no apparent reason. The film has utterly
disappointed those members of the audience, who were impatiently waiting for
its release. The film’s Shudras are sometimes shown making earthen pots and sometimes,
bamboo baskets. At another place, one character says, “We are Shudras. We carry
your excreta on our heads but you avoid even our shadow”. Thus, it is not clear
whether the residents of the tola are shudras or untouchables. Probably,
Sanjive Jaiswal himself does not know who Shudras are.
This film raises
the issue of humiliation of Shudras but does not move an inch beyond it. The
film was publiciesed claiming that it was based on Dr.Ambedkar book ‘who were
the shudras?’ This book is a research work, which has shown the lit to
millions. Dalit movement’s well-known SMS group DMAINDIA was among the SMS
group that publiciesed this film. All this done spontaneously because the film-
makers had referred to Dr.Ambedkar and is book in the posters and promotional
material for the film.
During the
campaign, thousands of people received
SMSes, asking them to make calls or send SMSes to particular numbers. The SMSes
said that if these calls were made and SMSes sent, the Censor Board would clear
the film. The same kind of clam was made on Face book. It is difficult to say
whether the film’s writer-director Sanjeev jaiswal had any hand it this rum our.
It later transpired the Censor Board had never
said that if a certain number of calls or SMSes were received the film would be
cleared.
My personal view
is that ‘Shudra: The Rising’ is a failure from every angle-story, script,
dialogue and direction. The irritants in the film are too many to be listed.
Jaiswal deserves praise for only one reason: he dared to make such a film. The
film may have failed to click bit it has paved the way for others to undertake
similar ventures. Dalit literature is quite rich and scores of stories, novels
and autobiographies, based on which an excellent film could have been made,
were available. Had that been done, the 85percent oppressed people would have
scripted a historic success for the film. Unfortunately, that was not to be. We
can only hope that in future, better films will be made on this theme.
Courtesy :- https://www.facebook.com/forward.press.india
