The Hindu Business Line : Welcome to Shyampur

As Mahadev’s cycle turns the corner, you can see that the hut he’s just left behind is not ‘real’. Its part of a set, constructed for Shyam Benegal-directed, UTV-produced Welcome to Sajjanpur, which gives us a completely new kind of collaborative venture — a story set in a village and funded by a corporate house in search of the new and the ‘real’.

The irony is inescapable. Welcome to Sajjanpur reunites Benegal with his rural roots, and gives us one of the most real and meaningful films of this year, in a setting which is carefully not as grim and grey as a ‘real’ village; barring a few exceptions, our villages are infinitely greyer and grimmer.

Yes, there is poverty in Sajjanpur, which is why its young men are leaving to find a living elsewhere, but its farmers are not hanging themselves. Its people are not slowly starving to death. Starvation and suicide and sickness are not glamorous, multiplex-friendly subjects. Summer of 2007, an unpublicised but brave film, released earlier this year which dealt with these issues was out of the theatres within a week. Given the corporates’ compulsion to keep their bottom-line healthy, not a bad goal in itself, production houses have to walk the thin line between reality and fakery with a great deal of care. Too real? No one turns up. Not real enough? Ditto.

Strikes the right balance

Sajjanpur’s significance is in the way it gets it just right. Interesting characters, and identifiable markers — the village dispensary lorded over by a ‘compounder’ of romantic disposition; the local neta who keeps parading on a motorcycle with a rifle-bearing, moustachioed escort; the ramshackle shops dispensing milky tea and torrid gossip; the bus adda from where the rickety vehicles come and go; and the tree under which sits Mahadev, our hero, with his magical ink-bottle and mighty pen.

Enough serious issues to make us feel that we are participating in a worthwhile enterprise — widow re-marriage, the stranglehold of illiteracy and superstition, brutal power play between local strongmen, craven cops, eunuchs standing for election. A smart admission that not everything will come right, but even more smartly placed in a trajectory that’s always upbeat.

Real characters

And actors who are recognisable enough to carry the whole thing, but not starry heavyweights who will overwhelm the story. Shreyas Talpade, who has been in two other films in a rural setting which have done well — Iqbal and Dor — is the affable yet charmingly fallible poster boy of his village — the only one who can read and write, so he’s a letter-writer and communicator, all rolled into one. Amrita Rao, who’s also done winsome rustic roles (Vivah), plays the woman longing for the return of her prodigal husband.

A whole bunch of well-etched characters, including Yashpal Sharma as the perfect lout, and old Benegal favourite Ravi Jhankal, who is superb as the sensitive-yet-strong eunuch. And the sort of dialogue which doesn’t sound Bollywood-rustic: there’s a bite to the lines, which make you sit up and listen. This is language with history and context.

Yes, it’s too long, but you leave with a smile on your lips and feeling good — a win-win for UTV and Benegal. After the small-budget Aamir, this is UTV Spotboy’s second film to have hit the spot: of reeling in enough curious multiplex walk-ins, as well as creating a template for itself for making ‘interesting, new cinema’. And it heralds the return of Shyam Benegal, who’s been missing in action for a while now, doing long-winded bio-pics, and heavy-on-the-message features.

Benegal’s best, which the young viewers who comprise the bulk of the multiplex audiences these days would have caught on DVD, happened back in the 1970s and the 1980s. He’s the man who gave us Ankur, Nishant, Manthan, Bhumika, and Mandi — whose sharp satiric edges are revisited and softened in Sajjanpur. And he, more than any other director who was his contemporary, kept the flag of social concerns aloft with an inimitable style.

Even now, looking at a couple of his lesser known films like Trikaal, and Suraj Ka Saatvan Ghoda, one is struck by the complete command the director has on his medium and storytelling. The last time he was his own person was in Samar (1999), and even there, the strain was showing. After that, clearly, it became difficult to make his kind of film, and he got diverted into making the likes of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero (2005), which had no Benegal hallmarks: it could have been made by anyone who was following a producer’s script. In between, there was Hari Bhari (2000), which dealt with fertility and parenthood, but it was so top-heavy and unwieldy, that its subtext went missing.

Welcome to Sajjanpur is Benegal’s kind of film. So what if you can see that it is a set, not a ‘location’, that Sajjanpur is a sanitised Village India — not all shine, but not all dark either. So what if there’s a little bit of froth to make sure that the sharp edges don’t cut too deep. And so what if it’s called Welcome to Sajjanpur, instead of Sajjanpur Ka Mahadev, which was its original title.

What matters is that Benegal is back.

shubhra.gupta@gmail.com