Muzaffarnagar Baaqi Hai - Some conversations after a film

One feedback to the earlier post on the topic - to elaborate - has me putting up a revised piece.

I moved out to the street – in heavy and slow steps – and called up the number I had not answered as the film was being screened. As the conversation moved,

Friend: How was the film?

Me: Disturbing.

Friend: Audience?

Me: Room was full, more people than chairs and no one either talked on the phone or went out.

Friend: Did anyone disturb the screening? Problems have been reported from Delhi.

Me: Thankfully no.

We were to discuss conservation education but it was a kind of difficult task after one had heard of people being cut, killed and burnt. The ‘normalcy’ with which people talked of the massacres will remain with me for a while. As I sat in the bus, I wondered on the very notion of saving wildlife when human life had very little value. I was returning home after attending a screening of Nakul Singh Sawhney’s ‘Muzaffarnagar Baaki Hai’ at Lamakaan. 

The screening had been disrupted few weeks ago at Delhi and 25^th August was the date for screenings at multiple locations across our country. Approximately 7,000 people attended the screenings across the country at 40 odd centers.

If I am to pick two moments from the film - the scene which stuck as chilling was where people visit the burnt house and audio from Garam Hawa (the M S Sathyu classic on partition) played in the back-ground. It left me wondering if we would ever learn – we don’t seem to have learnt from one of the greatest tragedies of the past century! While the line which hit on the face was that of a young girl referring to the male members (in the household) during a group interview “Ghar ke bahar jaane nahin dete, Kuch karne nahin dete, Lekin izzat bata dete hain, Yeh izzat ki topi khud ke sir pe kyun naihn pehen lete”. They do not allow us to do anything - including going out - but designate us as the honour of the household; why don’t they themselves wear this crown of honour? A line like much that is simple and stark, true.

Discussions - post screening - had one participant state ‘riots took place primarily because of prevalence of poverty and lack of education’. This left me stunned. The disturbing image my mind carries from 2002 riots is that of a not small group of aunties in sarees coming out on streets in aggression banging vessels. These (and other) collective aggressions took place in fairly affluent and literate pockets of Amdavad, Vadodara, Surat and elsewhere over a period of few weeks. I am left baffled when those younger use two of our societies’ seemingly favourite phrases to glorify self and absolve itself from all; “educated” and “hailing from a good household”.

The film is unsettling and one that we will do good to invest little more than two hours in. during And as I was to realize in the week that followed - it is a film which stays with one and sets the thinking wheel in motion. Conversations with friends, on the film and else – raised further questions.

As I shared of having gone for the screening with a friend he said he would want to go to such screenings – comprehend and if possible support the causes - but is caught up amidst meetings and documents. And this is a reply I have heard on numerous occasions. Are we too caught up in our lives? Isn’t this a reflection too of how we have voluntarily chosen to live our lives? Of the choices we make? Another friend I called up said such films left him disturbed and troubled and that he did not see much that was gory and gross. Wasn’t that the idea of the film? To get aware to the disturbing and gory reality. Harsh Mander pointed out - during a talk at Hyderabad during the previous month – to 40% population in our national capital staying in slums and the balance 6o% - as if continuing to feign ignorance or simply refuse to acknowledge their presence.

I was left in stunned silence during conversation with third friend who initially referred to Uttar Pradesh as ‘bad lands of Uttar Pradesh’ and went on to state that he was aware of the situation in Bihar when his sole qualification to that claim was being an audience of 2 Anurag Kashyap films. Are we so disconnected with our own country or are we just not bothered till we are affected? Arundhati Roy summed it up nicely - albeit starkly - when she said “The Indian elite has seceded into outer space. It seems to have lost the ability to understand those who have been left behind on earth.” Elite here, encompasses the middle class. The fourth friend, I called up after a few days, told me that our generation neither believes in nor perpetuates caste – this was done by the previous generation! How I wished this was true. During the same conversation I had pointed out to him that the surveys showed 14 % of our country people having smart and as opposed to his ‘most of us now have smart phones’ remark! The ‘us and them’ – I later wondered and recalled Siddharth Deb in his ‘Beautiful and the Damned: Life in New India’ write succinctly of a new urban India which is blind and immune to the India beyond metros.

The last friend (I will mention here) called and I began by talking of having enjoyed Bajranji Bhaijaan some days back. He too had seen the movie but had found it too mushy and melodramatic especially scenes like the one where the principal character walks awkwardly in the mosque besides others. Something struck me as amiss and the very next day I called him up again to ask when was the last he had been inside a mosque or a church other than on a touristy circuit. No answer. Have we becoming good at denying the complexities around us and looking the other way? 

I recalled a relative asking mumi on the phone why we had moved to Hyderabad of all places – in other words staying amidst a community they like to dislike! Why? As I shared of this phone call with mumi over tea I asked her how many relatives had close friends who were not Hindus? By the time tea got over mumi’s count had – with some effort – reached three! I do not claim this is a representative number (and fervently hope it is not) but given how spread out the Kachchhis and Gujaratis are geographically this is a very very stark indicator!

Given where we stand, if we continue to remain ‘distant and oblivious’ from all that is around us neither will we have anyone else to blame if another Muzaffarnagar occurs nor will it necessarily occur in far and distant ‘badlands’.