How Bollywood has wronged Phoolan Devi
At present marks the 59th delivery anniversary of activist and Lok Sabha MP Phoolan Devi, arguably one of the vital polarising figures in Indian historical past. Whereas she is a Bahujan icon for a lot of, her well-liked picture has been tarnished by her violent previous and a infamous biopic.
‘This e-book is the primary testimony {that a} girl of my group has succeeded in making public. It’s an outstretched hand of braveness to the humiliated and downtrodden, within the hope {that a} life like my very own might by no means repeat itself. I ought to be useless as we speak, however I’m alive. I took my destiny into my fingers. I used to be born an underdog, however I grew to become a queen.’
– Preface from Phoolan Devi’s autobiography
Phoolan Devi’s tragic origins have been marred by sexual assault and humiliation by an abusive husband (a 30-year-old with whom she was pressured into marriage on the age of 11), police authorities in UP, and a number of other upper-caste Thakur males whom she and her gang later killed in revenge. Hailing from a Mallah (boatman) caste, she confronted the brunt of casteism for the longest time till she needed to take justice in her personal fingers.
Why Phoolan Devi hated Bandit Queen: Following her publicised give up and post-dacoit life as a politician, her actions may need been debatable however Indian well-liked tradition has principally rendered her unvoiced. Contemporary off the celebrity of Mr India, director Shekhar Kapur tailored Mala Sen’s biography of Phoolan, titled India’s Bandit Queen, because the 1994 biopic Bandit Queen.
Garnering controversy for its graphic content material in India and gaining overwhelmingly constructive evaluations abroad, Bandit Queen was the discuss of the city when it was launched. Trendy viewers may nevertheless confer with the film as bordering on ‘trauma porn’ and this makes extra sense given Phoolan Devi herself was by no means keen on the top product.
For starters, the scenes of sexual assault are proven in unnecessarily graphic element, with Devi citing that she wasn’t even consulted within the inventive course of. For the auteur Kapur, this is likely to be ‘lifelike cinema’, however for the film’s real-life heroine, re-watching such scenes is likely to be reliving the trauma.
What occurred to Shekhar Kapur: In Arundhati Roy’s essay The Nice Indian Rape Trick, the creator cited a report from the Sunday Guardian that said ‘He has overtly admitted that he didn’t really feel that he wanted to satisfy Phoolan’!
Phoolan Devi made her disdain evident by even threatening to immolate herself if Bandit Queen was not pulled off theatres. After the producers paid her 40,000 kilos, Devi calmed down just a little however continued to criticise Kapur’s enterprise for the remainder of her life.
As for Kapur, he gained Greatest Director on the Filmfare awards whereas the film gained Greatest Hindi Function on the Nationwide Movie Awards. Bandit Queen was additionally chosen as India’s official entry to the Oscars and Kapur went on to piggyback his strategy to Hollywood, directing two well-liked biopics on Queen Elizabeth I.
Phoolan Devi writes her personal story: Additionally pissed off with Mala Sen’s biography on which the film was primarily based, Devi wished to write down a extra correct and delicate story of her life. Collaborating with British authors Marie-Therese Cuny and Paul Rambali, she wrote I, Phoolan Devi. The great autobiography delved into her growing-up years, the casteist violence she was subjected to, her retaliation, her romantic relationship with fellow dacoit Vikram Mallah, the 11-year-long jail sentence, and her eventual retribution.
Years have handed however no one has dared to adapt her autobiography right into a big-budget Bollywood biopic. She appeared as a short but important character (in reference; not named) within the 2019 interval motion thriller Sonchiriya however apart from that, there’s not a hint of her in mainstream cinema after Bandit Queen.
Her murderer will get a biopic: As an alternative, her notorious murderer Sher Singh Rana is getting his personal biopic! With Vidyut Jammwal slated to star within the movie, the poster itself goals to venerate Rana as an impressive Rajput hero who not solely killed Devi but additionally introduced again the ashes of ruler Prithviraj Chauhan from Kandahar, Afghanistan.
The actual-life Rana himself appears to have a simple life proper now. Claiming to have taken revenge on behalf of the upper-caste males that Phoolan killed, Rana himself surrendered to the authorities and was arrested instantly after the 2001 assassination of Phoolan. In 2004, he escaped from Tihar Jail claiming that he had gone to get better Chauhan’s ashes. Re-arrested in 2006, he was sentenced to life in 2014.
In 2016, the Delhi Excessive Courtroom launched him on bail, following which he married the daughter of an area politician and even fashioned his personal political social gathering.
One may argue {that a} Sher Singh Rana biopic would present the opposite facet of the story. However by this logic, a polarising determine like Phoolan Devi deserves one other shot after Shekhar Kapur’s biased and half-baked tackle her life. Right here’s hoping that Bollywood doesn’t mess up the casting by protecting an Alia Bhatt or Taapsee Pannu in layers of brownface and making them communicate in a fabricated UP accent!
“Sing of my deeds Inform of my combats How I fought the treacherous demons Forgive my failings And bestow on me peace”
– Phoolan Devi in her autobiography
