When a group of poor migrants went to a multiplex to watch a movie, it made the great divide obvious
Sreelatha Menon / New Delhi Aug 22, 2010, 00:10 IST
What if Natha, the protagonist of the latest Aamir Khan movie, Peepli Live, were to watch this movie in a multiplex? Can he dare to? In the story, Natha is a debt-ridden farmer who has lost his land to moneylenders and decides to commit suicide in the hope of some compensation from the government.
There was not a single Natha in the hall. None would dare enter such a movie hall, most of which charge Rs 100 and more for a ticket. I wondered if the movie was made for Natha.
So, the next day, me and a fellow journalist — a profession generously lampooned in the film — decided to take some of them to SRS Cinemas at Jaipuria Mall in Ghaziabad to watch the movie.
We managed to gather 60 rickshaw-pullers, rag-pickers and construction workers, all of them migrants. As we got the first group of about 20 people, they stood outside the multiplex, not knowing how they would be treated inside. Raziya, a rag-picker who had come after leaving her garbage bag at a shop, pointed at her rather short salwar and asked, "Would they let me in?” I said no one dared stop her. But I knew I could not vouch for the future shows.
The rickshaw-pullers who had promised to get at least 20 friends the previous day could gather only five. No one believed them, they said. But seeing them there, more rickshaw-pullers agreed to join. Raziya's fears were not totally misplaced. Someone in the mall pointed at the group of six rag-pickers and whispered in my ears that most of them were pick-pockets. But the management was generally polite.
Most people who came for the movie were migrants, all of them farmers. Some were from Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, some from Ararhia in Bihar, and some from Chattarpur in Madhya Pradesh.
Did they identify with Natha and Budhiya, the poverty-stricken farmers of Peepli, a village imagined by the director of the film, Anusha Rizvi? They laughed and nodded in agreement as they watched the movie . But generally they were quiet, perhaps angry. None of them had ever been inside any mall or on an escalator.
As I watched the motley crowd disperse after the movie, I longed for the movie halls of the pre-multiplex era when cinema did not divide.
There was no board outside saying coolies and dogs are not allowed, as in British days. Maybe it is now too obvious to be said.
The government, which charges entertainment tax, can surely ensure cheap movie tickets, like free hospital beds and free school seats. But even free tickets may not help. Natha cannot see Peepli Live unescorted.
This is thanks to the fact that little is happening to bridge the divide. The biggest dividing line is the ability to read English.
When earlier I went looking for people in the slum closest to the mall, my feet sank in dirt, as theirs do every day. The women who came for the movie said their children did not go to school. The reason was that they lived in make-shift hutments which were moved frequently.
As I agonised and wondered if it mattered at all whether Natha stayed alive, Sattar, the migrant rickshaw-puller from Shahjahanpur said cheerfully: “We watch all the movies on pirated CDs. We don't need the halls.”
Your writing touched my heart.As a former daily wage laborer I can identify with the rickshaw pullers and rag-pickers. Then I did not have two meals a day and when i survived many times because of the generosity of my friends in Odisha and in Delhi.
Peepli-Live is heart touching and disturbing both at the same time. Many found this as a satire on the system- the police, bureaucracy, politics and the media but we perhaps forget about Natha, the helpless and poor man struggling to make ends meeet. Very well written! Keep it up.
Kamala Kanta Dash
Monash University
While I sincerely appreciate the effort in bridging the divide by bringing have-nots to the multiplex, and feelings of deep empathy that brought about this experiment, I doubt if any of the rickshaw pullers or rag-pickers would relish the experience of watching Natha on-screen. If Sreelatha could have delved slightly deeper with the migrant rickshaw puller, she would know that the pirated movies they watched on CDs, would all be song, dance and love triangle routines. Frankly, I am not trying to belittle his intelligence or show my holier than thou attitude - but obviously, who would want to spend 'hard-earned' money to see his own misery on-screen. Even though I have not seen the film, but from reviews and comments, it seems the target audience of the film is that of 'haves'. If the well-off society, that seeks to guide public policy, learns its lessons and decides to act accordingly, the film would have served its purpose.
Brilliant..... This journalist has simply and strategically....managed to mine substantial joy from a tragic real life situation and offered a pointed ? and poignant ? social commentary in the process.....heartwarming indeed.
Dear Sreelatha,
Thanks for this lovely write up... you rightly say that the divide cannot be more obvious than in a swanky mall which house film theaters for us the rich Indians. We are consciously removing the have nots from our cities, our minds and our sight.
Content Guide
