When a sixty four year old actor decides to help the poor
farmers in this country where they would even travel miles to commit suicide in
full view of the live media (cameras) I should not look at that helping hand
with doubt or cynicism. Like many in the media as well as in the public domain
I too appreciate the act of the Bollywood start, Nana Patekar who has just
declared financial help to the widows whose husbands have committed suicide due
to crop failure and debt. Patekar has also said that if anybody feels like
committing suicide, before doing that act of self annihilation, he or she just
remember him and approach him so that he could extend his helping hand. Social
media is abuzz with the news and the news has gone almost viral. Once again I
tell myself, behave. Don’t be cynical. But I have to take this news with a
pinch of salt.
First of all Nana Patekar, though he is a methodical actor
and has been successful in reaping good at box office, has never been a social
worker in the true sense. In his younger days he had acted in films like Gaman
and Salaam Bombay where he acted more like a Tapori (an urchin) and his matured
films include Parinda, Prahaar, Krantiveer, Agnisaakshi and so on. While
Amitabh Bacchan played the roles of a brooding angry young man, Nana Patekar presented
his alter ego. His characters were highly vocal and in more than one ways
incited people for executing street side justice. His characters expressed
thorough cynicism for law and order and he waited till the evil displayed all
its colors and the weapons in store. His characters waited and watched like mad
men who were not affected by the presence of evil. He exhorted other people
take up cudgels for themselves and only when they failed he came up to vanquish
the evil.
(Nana Patekar in the film Krantiveer)
Nana Patekar became very close to the people in Maharashtra
than the film goers in the North Indian Hindi speaking Bollywood lovers for he
expressed the Marathi-Manus character. If Amol Palekar was acting out the
timidity of a typical Marathi or Mumabikar who would do some tricks to survive
in the big bad city and would show all skills to flow with the stream, Patekar
was the aspiring side of the Marathi, who would take all the dirt on him till
he is provoked and become a tiger. That’s why his filmi dialogues were the
staple items in the Shiv Sena processions and the Marathi youth in those days
liked the cassettes of Patekar’s recorded dialogues. They cherished his
dialogues more than the mainstream Hindi movie songs. Patekar could complete
Palekar or the other way round. Though they did not act together in films, they
complemented each other tremendously and became integral part of the Marathi
pride.
From the anguished but cynical lonely man, Patekar moved to characters
that showed patriotism. They could kill anybody for clearing this society of
all kinds of human vices. Patekar showed tremendous skill in acting patriotic
characters and at the same time his performance was unparalleled when it came
to the presentation of psychotic characters. As he moved from cynical
characters to the villainous ones, his ranting and peculiar dialogue delivery
became more poetic, shrill and intense but by the time he started acting the
roles of cops, his dialogue delivery became much more controlled and grave.
While Amitabh Bacchan moved from his monosyllables to long dialogues in his
later movies, Patekar took the reverse routes. His guns spoke while his tongue
rested in the holster of his mouth. Patekar’s acting abilities found full
fruition in Marathi movies like Baba Amte and his tested his comic bone in the
mainstream Bollywood multi starrer like Welcome. We could say, as an actor,
Patekar has done all kinds of roles that an actor would cherish to do. Now what
is left for him?
(Nana in Ab thak Chappan)
I remember Patekar in an interview with the television journalist
Rajat Kapoor in his program ‘Aap Ki Adalat’ (Your Court/People’s Court)
reciting a poem on water. He could eke out thunderous applause including
standing ovation from the studio audience as he could impress them with his oratorical
skills. In fact that was an enactment of the younger Patekar who had enthralled
the audience with his dialogue deliveries. When people see a matured and old
Patekar doing the same but with lot of environmental concerns, he once again
becomes the darling of the audience. But at the same time, in one of the commercials
we see a rough, reticent but no nonsense Patekar acting as a middle class
shopper in a shopping mall where he is offered a chocolate in the place of
change. He reacts by giving his shoes as the total amount for the grocery. To
the surprised salesperson he says that as they would not take his shoes for money
why should he take their chocolate for change? Once again Patekar was playing
to the gallery.
The new move of Patekar is a populist move because all the
film actors in the country cannot come forward and give away money to the people
who have committed suicide and who are intending to do so. It is not the job of
the film actors and actresses or anybody in this country to distribute their
hard earned riches to the poor people. You may be surprised to hear this. Nana
Patekar or anybody else in that case could do so. But it is not their job.
Philanthropy and charity are good but they do not fundamentally change poverty
in a country. Changing the socio-economic imbalance through political programs and
will is the duty of the elected governments. The governments that take tax from
people cannot expect the film actors to do the public charity. Even if Patekar
does it, is he going to help all those who have lost their kith and kin in this
debt related- crop failure related deaths? What would he do if a whole lot of
people in this country come before him and tell him that they are about to
commit suicide? When there is an elected government, we should not expect a society
or country could be run on charity.
(Nana's latest film Welcome Back poster)
The second reason I would cite for not accepting this move
of Nana Patekar is this that it is not a political act. It does not have any
ideology other than human compassion (which too comes under cloud and I would
explain it soon). Any act devoid of an ideological aim or theoretical strength
cannot run a long innings as it is bound to crumble under the weight of
practical problems. Patekar claims that he knows Phadnavis, the chief minister
of Maharashtra and it is time that the government should do something towards
this calamity called farmer suicide. In fact, by giving away money to the
affected, we come to know that Patekar was not intending to shame the government.
Had it been so we could have appreciated the move. But here the actor is just performing
his role as a Marathi elder who ‘knows’ Phadnavis even before he became the
chief minister of the state. If it was a really a political move which could
create a long term result, Patekar could have gone on record implicating the
successive governments. Instead taking an appeasing route, he could have boldly
spoken against the government/s. But his intention is not that.
The fact that chokes me with indignation is the timing of
Patekar’s move to help the farmers. On 4th September, his new movie ‘Welcome
Back’, a sequel to the rom-com, Welcome is going to be released where he share
screen space with Anil Kapoor, John Abraham and Paresh Raval. Just before the
release of their new movies, most of the Bollywood stars either do something
good to the society or they get into some kind of controversy. Amir Khan is the
best example of a do gooder before the release of his movies. Some stars paint
or exhibit their works and give away all the money to some charity organization
(Salman Khan), some stars take their families to some European trip (Akshay
Kumar), some stars fall in or fall out of love with their co-stars (the younger
ones like Ranbeer Kapoor et al) or someone like Shah Rukh Khan appear on a
stage show talking about Hindu-Muslim unity. They are all stunts that are meant
to promote their movies. Nana Patekar knows who is going to get the media space
by announcing relief to the farmers. Who else knows the Indian psyche better
than the people who move them with their histrionics? Hence, I have all the
reasons to doubt Nana Patekar though I like him as an actor.
No comments:
Post a Comment