June 2, 2018 marks the 30th death anniversary of Raj Kapoor Amitabh Bachchan and Rajesh Khanna were overwhelmingly powerful as superstars when we were growing up as college students. Khanna’s profound art of dying in Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Anand and the angst of Bachchan’s tormented/divided self in Yash Chopra’s Deewaar remained with us. We loved them, we loved their films. The 1970s were days of the rise and fall of Indira Gandhi, the disillusionment and anger of youth in the post-Naxalite era, the emergent possibilities in new social movements.Possibly, love and anger, or hope and despair, characterised the generation; and Khanna and Bachchan represented these two powerful emotions – captured so symbolically in Mukherjee’s Namak Haraam.However, even during those times, the past continued to haunt us. Indira Gandhi’s Emergency could not make us forget Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. Likewise, Bachchan’s overarching presence on the screen could not make us forget Raj Kapoor of the 1950s. Even though R.D. Burman’s song ‘Mehbooba Mehbooba’ from Sholay was played everywhere, it was impossible to kill the synergy of Kapoor and Mukesh in the heart-breaking song Awara Hoon.Although Bachchan as Vijay in Deewaar sought to become the ‘king’ of Bombay through unfair means, we could not forget Kapoor’s fear, shock and sense of loss as he entered the city in Jagte Raho.And today, 30 years after Raj Kapoor’s death, as I revisit his films, I find something remarkable. The poetry of his films, I believe, needs to be communicated to the young of neoliberal India growing up with hyper-modernity and brute masculinity, consumerism and objectification of relationships, and valorisation of ‘smart’ cities and associated exclusionary practices.Modern discontents: The city and the loss of innocenceOne question asked repeatedly was about the nature of post-colonial society, and its road to modernity and progress. Yes, we all know about the Nehruvian state trying to modernise a traditional society with great emphasis on techno-economic progress, rapid urbanisation and cities as sites of new opportunities and secular public culture. Yet in the voices of Gandhi and even Rabindranath Tagore, there was apprehension about the city, its urban/fast life with inherent denaturalisation and its dissociation from the warmth of community, rural intimacy and simplicity.In a way, Kapoor’s films in the 1950s captured this anxiety quite meaningfully. Look at Shree 420 (1955). Raj – the embodiment of musical innocence and simplicity with torn clothes and yet with a pure ‘Hindustani heart’ – enters Bombay. The first thing that strikes him is the heartlessness of the city. Amidst cunningness and indifference there is no warmth; it is like being reduced into a faceless stranger. It is a street beggar – yet another marginal figure in the city of wealth – who reminds Raj of this harsh reality. In every encounter with the city, Raj experiences this cunning, the tendency to exploit others. Yes, to survive in the city is to lose innocence, and become instrumental and greedy. Raj too tries; but then, a mix of Chaplin and Gandhi in the character enables him to realise its falsehood.Or think of Jagte Raho (1956). It is like poor/village India looking at the city, the armour of the sophisticated class and the cultural/psychic dirt all around. Raj Kapoor is nameless in this remarkably sensitive film directed by Amit Maitra and Shambhu Mitra. He is a poor peasant from the village; yes, like thousands of nameless migrants, he comes to the city in search of a job. He is tired and thirsty. He happens to enter an apartment complex looking for drinking water. But then, this site of privilege – like the gated communities of contemporary metropolitan India – has its own discourse of fear, suspicion and security.Raj Kapoor in Jagte Raho. Credit: YouTubeNo wonder, urban/affluent residents suspect he is a thief; they begin to chase him. He tries to escape, running from one flat to the other. And in the process of this turbulent journey in that frightening night he witnesses all sorts of nasty undertakings/crimes committed by the ‘respectable’ gentry. Look at Raj’s eyes in the film. More than words, his eyes reveal his fear, his surprise, his shock – the meaning of a villager’s encounter with the city. In a city where humans have lost their souls, a street dog becomes the empathic companion. Indeed, because of the delicate use of symbolism, in both Jagte Raho and Awaara (1951) Raj – betrayed by the city, humiliated by its wealthy class – finds a pure moment of togetherness with the stray dog.Subaltern agency amid constraining structuresWhat did happen to Gandhi’s swaraj, Nehru’s Fabian socialism and Bhagat Singh’s dream? Did the new nation lose all ideals very soon, and allow itself to be hijacked by the corrupt politician, the greedy wealthy class and the hypocritical gentry? As the subaltern speak in Raj Kapoor’s films enriched by the literary genius of Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, we witness the tragic fate of India.Raj – what a character in the much-acclaimed Awaara! As the epic song (thanks to Shailendra for such wonderful lyrics) indicates, he is a vagabond; he has no home, no family. Or is he in the horizon like a star in the sky? See the dialectical interplay of Judge Raghunath (Prithviraj Kapoor) and dacoit Jagga (K.N. Singh) in the making of Raj – the complex life-trajectory he passed through. Raghunath – the respectable judge symbolising the bureaucratic machinery of new India – is snobbish, patriarchal and culturally conservative. He retains the prejudiced consciousness (emanating from some sort of casteist/hierarchical mind) that ‘good people are born to good people, and criminals are born to criminals’; this leads him to convict Jagga – the son of a criminal – of rape which he did not commit.Jagga in a mood for revenge kidnaps Judge Raghunath’s wife (Leela Chitnis); but then, he releases her when he comes to know about her pregnancy. See Raghunath’s conservatism: societal gossip makes him suspect his loyal wife and he eventually expels her from home. Raj was born amid the stormy darkness. He grew up with poverty, a disturbed childhood and social marginalisation; it was simply impossible for him to fulfil his mother’s dream of being educated and becoming a judge. Instead, it was destiny that made him fall into the trap of the vengeful Jagga. It was not easy to come out of the trap. Instead, circumstances led him to kill Jagga, and even make an attempt to kill Raghunath. In court, when Raj speaks of the dirt in the social system that destroys the life of the poor and transforms good human possibilities into criminals, we hear something like a Marxian discourse.Likewise, in Shree 420, for mere survival in a heartless city Raj falls into the trap of Seth Sonachand Dharmanand (Nemo) – the ultimate manifestation of the unholy nexus of politics and business; eventually, the compulsive urge to become rich, to dress and look like the elite takes him to the dirty world of cheating, gambling and exploitation. However, the film reveals a curved journey– the fall of Raj and eventually the assertion of the subaltern’s ‘true consciousness’: his merger with the poor and the destitute and the homeless, and his declaration that the road to emancipation lies in moral courage and the unity of the oppressed.Raj Kapoor in Shree 420. Credit: Wikimedia CommonsAnother point of revelation in these films is the power of love and simplicity that the poor, despite all sorts of hardship, carried with them. No wonder, in Awaara Raj can still sing: “I am destroyed. But still I sing the songs of happiness. My heart is full of wounds. But still there is a smile in my eyes.” And in Shree 420 it is only on the footpath with a cup of tea in a small tea shop that love blooms; the mysticism of the soft darkness after the rains, the warmth under the umbrella, and the two souls moving with a prayer Pyar Hua Iqrar Hua take us to the aesthetics of film-making, and its poetry.A still from the song Pyar Hua Iqrar Hua. Credit: Wikimedia CommonsMaya, Vidya and the feminine mystiqueYes, the world tempts; its wealth or outer glamour is an intoxicant; it seems irresistible even when it corrupts and degrades the human soul. In Shree 420, Raj falls into this maya. As a director, his use of metaphor is perfect. Maya appears as an embodied form; she is a woman (Nadira ); she tempts; she does not love him; she uses him, takes him to a dark world of money and gambling. Nadira’s eyes seek to conquer; when she sings Mudh Mudh Ke Na Dekh on Diwali night, we begin to feel the ultimate fall of Raj, his confusion of the wealth and prosperity of goddess Laxmi with quick money. But then, there is Vidya (Nargis) with a feminine grace filled with the abundance of love and wisdom. In a heartless city that worships the power of money, she retains her sanity. Her teaching is musical; her engagement with children is lyrical; she has the eyes to see the treasure stored in the innocence of Raj. She is the conscience; and eventually Vidya enables him to come out of the trap of Maya.Nargis in a still from Awaara. Credit: Wikimedia CommonsIn Awaara, Nargis is Rita – Raj’s childhood friend. Her love transcends the class divide; even as a child she assures her poor friend that money cannot buy a true gift because it is as simple and natural as a flower. True, destiny took Raj to a different path; but then, tormented Raj’s salvation lies in the union with Rita.Possibly, in one of the finest ‘dream sequences’ of Indian cinema, we see Raj’s restlessness, his earnest urge to break the vicious cycle of the corrupt path in which Jagga took him; we see the play of clouds, the use of spiritual symbolism; and when the melody Ghar Aaya Mera Pardesi enters our souls, we find Rita (almost like an angel) giving warmth to Raj’s schizoid existence. Yes, her wanderer has finally returned home; and the thirst of her eyes has been quenched.Not aggressive masculinity. In surrender lies ultimate fulfillment. In the feminine grace lies the ultimate key to redemption. I have never been tired of listening to the enchanting song Jaago Mohan Pyare; time and again I have watched its visual representation in the film. As the darkness of a horrifying night ends, like an illuminating ray of light Nargis appears; Raj Kapoor surrenders; as she gives him water, quenches his thirst I find myself in a divine moment that celebrates the life-affirming power of the feminine. Is it like Gandhi trying to take us beyond the chains of hyper-masculine colonial modernity?Avijit Pathak is professor at the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, JNU.
