Glimpses Of History: Of A Piquant Padmavati And A Kafkaesque Khilji

Rajasthan: The only state among India's twenty nine states that is completely a desert. I went to Rajasthan as a four year old when my Dad was posted there by the Indian Army and we left very abruptly when I had just turned seven, because my paternal grandfather was on his death bed and we had to rush to be with him and my grandmother. I have never been back to Rajasthan since then but the memories are crystal clear to this day...Acres and acres of sand, as far as the eye could see, strong hot winds that blew periodically, whipping up the dry as dust sand into a mad frenzy, getting into our hair and our eyes, into the pores of our skin, settling down on our tongues, making us feel as if we had had grit for lunch! Awe inspiring forts and palaces, designed to allow the strong breeze to waft over deep pools of precious water, in an attempt to bring respite from the intense day time heat. Women in brightly coloured cotton clothes, very carefully placing the ends of their odhnis (a long piece of cloth draped on the upper body) over their hair and allowing them to fall halfway across their faces, especially if there happened to be men around. They were very cheerful women though and I recollect that they used sand to scrub their kitchen utensils in what, I know today, was an eco friendly bid to save water...

Today I went back to a Rajasthan on celluloid, after exactly thirty five years, almost to the day, courtesy of renowned Bollywood director Sanjay Leela Bhansali's film 'Padmaavat', which has been mired in controversy practically since the hour of its inception, but which finally got to see the light of the day last Thursday. The movie is based on the life and death of the famous Queen Padmavati of Chittod, which is in the province of Mewar, in Rajasthan. While there are multiple versions of the story and there is a dispute about the place Rani Padmavati originally came from, the movie is based on the poem, 'Padmavat' written in 1540 AD, by medieval Indian poet Mallik Muhammed Jayasi, more than two and a half centuries after the Queen's death. He claims she came from Sinhal, modern day Sri Lanka and was married to the Rajput King of Chittod, Raja Ratan Sen. Colonialist historian Col. James Tod, in his book 'Annals And Antiquities Of Rajasthan', written in 1832 AD, has her married to a completely different king altogether! 

A certain Rajput caste group has been up in arms ever since Bhansali announced his magnum opus. We were horrified to read of sets being destroyed while the movie was being filmed, we read of the lead actors and the director being threatened with dire consequences if they continued filming, we were appalled to hear of absurd amounts being bandied about to cut off the leading lady's well chiselled nose or worse to slice her head off her slender neck, and all because the said outfit thought the director would show their revered (and long dead!) queen romancing her husband's arch enemy, Allaudin Khilji, who at that time, was the ruling Sultan at Delhi. 

After much yoyoing, a couple of cuts and a slight change of name, the censor board of India allowed the producers to release the movie. Not without destruction and drama though. Movie theatres were trashed and malls were attacked on the first day by members of that particular group, highways were blocked, effigies of the main cast were burnt, worst of all a school bus carrying very young children was attacked in Delhi, with the result that four states in India have not released the movie, in direct contravention of the orders of India's apex court. But it is enjoying a very successful run in the rest of the country and the world, as was proved by the packed theatre in Nairobi today!

The whole story revolves around the fact that  Khilji is enamoured by the description he hears of Padmavati's unparalleled beauty and is determined to add her to his harem. That she is already another man's wife, is of no consequence to him. India's leading Bollywood hero does a marvellous job in the role of Allauddin Khilji and is evil personified! You do not want to be alone in a room with this man...Every time he and his coterie come on screen, it is as if darkness descends upon Earth. I do not know if this is a clever play of lights by Bhansali or it is the evil that emanates from Khilji that sucks out light and happiness from the screen...No morals, no scruples, no principles, he is the complete antithesis of Padmavati's husband.

Bollywood's leading lady glows as Rani Padmavati and the external trappings (and in my mind unimportant) of designer clothes and jewellery from one of India's leading jewellery houses only help to enhance her ethereally regal aura. But her real strength lies in her intelligence and that is how she rescues her husband once from the clutches of Khilji. Her highly principled husband is finally killed treacherously by Khilji's slave and the enemy is about to descend upon the Chittod  fort and Khilji can barely wait to finally lay his hands on Padmavati.

Now comes the part, which, those of us who have studied in India, had only read about in history books. Padmavati exhorts all the women in the fort to commit Jauhar. Jauhar is mass self immolation by women to avoid falling into the hands of the invaders to avoid capture, rape or death at their hands. It embodies the Rajput motto of 'Death Before Dishonour'. Jauhar was outlawed by the British in the 19th century and is obviously no longer practised in modern day India. But this did not stop a few hundred foolish women from promising to commit Jauhar if the movie was released...

Now comes the second part of the controversy being fuelled mainly via FaceBook, by India's intellectually elite women. They say the movie glorifies Jauhar. They say it feels like they have been reduced to a certain part of a woman's anatomy. They say there is life after rape. They are angry that she took her husband's permission to perform Jauhar, if the need arose. They are absolutely right but in the context of the modern world! It is important to watch this movie in the correct context. Rajasthan lay in the route of all invaders from central Asia and Europe. Battered and buffeted by constant invasions, women and children resorted to Jauhar as a last resort after all the men folk had been butchered. And the director has not made up this part of the story, it is a sacred part of Rajput history and folk lore and the site of Padmavati's Jauhar nearly seven hundred years ago can be viewed in Chittod even today. Let it remain in the past and do not even think of applying it to any aspect of our lives today...

Protest if you must but do it against female foeticide and female infanticide in Rajasthan and other states in the same belt. Protest against people grieving when a daughter is born, protest when a home maker needs her husband's 'permission' to spend money and does not even have an ATM card, let alone a credit card...despite India going cashless and digital. Padmavati proudly proclaims in the movie that there is as much strength in a Rajput woman's bangle as there is in a Rajput man's sword. So maybe with the spotlight sharply on Rajasthan, thanks to the movie, it is time to use that strength to protect fellow women, instead of using it to shove a grain of rice up a new born female's nostril?

The state that has one of the worst child sex ratios in India needs help. Instead of wasting time over what may or may not have occurred many centuries ago, folks need to wake up and prevent evil from spreading now. Go watch the movie if you so desire, do not be cowed down by protestors who have nothing better to do. Don't buy popcorn though, the Kafkaesque Khilji's shenanigans will dry up your mouth and throat and it will be that much harder to swallow! If you do choose to buy it, the very piquant Padmavati's character will add enough spice to it...Enjoy the movie for what it is, a slice of history delivered for the small price of a movie ticket. And be thankful you are a woman of today...

                                                        PC: Wikipedia.