Nationalists, Loyalists or Spoilers?

RRR (Telugu; 2022)
Director: S.S. Rajamouli

Week after week, this film seems to be roaring to greater heights at the box office. And the reviewers are going gaga over the offering from Tollywood and giving the Bollywood mafia and their chamchas a run for their money. The recent spate of blockbusters from the South cinema has evoked has started a Twitter war that may be related to the rekindling of the national language debate. RRR also reaffirmed the fact that the Baahubali duology was no flash in the pan.

In keeping with Baahubali's drift, RRR also threads along with big bucks on CGI and historical slunt. In RRR, the storytellers decided to create a fictional account loosely based on the lives and times of two freedom fighters from India.

Alluri Sita Rama Raju

Alluri Sitaram Raju (1897-1924) opposed the 1882 British Forest Act, which restricted movement in forests. It interfered with the tribals' practice of the 'slash and burn' style of farming (podu). The reason for the British legislation is to usurp the land for mining. Alluri used to ambush local police stations for British weapons to arm and lead his revolt against the colonialist. He grew up in Andhra Pradesh, gave up college, pursued spiritualism, found Christian evangelists annoying and found the purpose of life amongst the tribal people. He himself was not from the Adivasi community. After two years of terrorising the British, the British had to dig deep into their coffers with their special force to employ extreme measures to violate, kill and torture his sympathisers. Alluri was executed by a firing squad.

Komaram Bheem (1900-1940) is a member of the Gond tribe in the princely state of Hyderabad. He led an Anti-Nizamite rebellion in the 1930s against the monarch's feudal and oppressive Zamindar system. Restrictive regulations hampered the tribes' way of podu farming. Failure to comply with the state law saw brutal killings and forced amputations. In reality, the Nizam was just another British conspirator in the field of Indian who played lackey to the invaders, sold their motherland and continued to be immersed in the loot of yesteryears.

Komaram Bheem
© Praveen Kumar Myakala

After failing peaceful negotiation, Bheem went underground, linked up with the Communist Party and created an Adivasi guerilla army to protect their lands. It took the British, all its local police, and local turncoat Muslim aristocrats (taluqdars) to capture him in an ambush. Bheem's battle cry was 'Jal Jangal Zameen' (Water, Jungle, Land). [Note: Jangal = Jungle; another Anglicised Indian word.]

 

In reality, Bheem and Alluri Raju probably never met. With the creative artistic licence, the storyteller portrayed Bheem as the protector of the Gond going under disguise in search of a young girl appropriated by the British Governor's wife just because she could do beautiful hand painting. Raju is seemingly an obedient British bulldog scurrying around doing his Master's dirty job. Unbeknownst to anyone, Raju holds a dark secret. His father died fighting the British, and Raju has big plans to sabotage the British and defeat them at their own game.

The plan sees Bheem and Raju finally discovering each other's identity, and after many mind-boggling and gravity-defying acrobatic aerial fights, the heroes come out victorious. Bheem unites the abducted girl with her mother, and Raju smuggles British guns to the revolutionaries.

It is a question of whether one is a nationalist, a loyalist or a collaborator. A nationalist may be one who does everything to preserve the honour and dignity of his flag. A loyalist is loyal to whom - his country, his paymaster, the powerful, race, religion? The list goes on as schism amongst the population becomes more acute. The nationalist may look at someone who works against his interest as a collaborator. At the height of the rein of their empire upon which the sun never set, the British were master planners in planting collaborators amongst their subjects. During the pre-Independence era, in and outside India, the British successfully planted informants among the rank and file of the RSS movement and the Gaddar movement in the USA to thwart their planned ambushes and mutinies. In fact, Chandra Bose and Homi Bhabha's mysterious air crashes are said to have British handiwork written all over them.

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Every system needs periodical revamp

Rangasthalam ( రంగస్థలం, Theatre, Telugu; 2018)

You think he is alright as your leader. He seems well composed to hear things out. He exudes an aura of confidence. He always has people around him who love him. He gets things done. He must be doing something right. He is even to be personally partaking in religious functions. He appears charitable enough. The same divine forces that govern your life must be the same one that runs his. The Ruler of the world must have sanctioned him to rule over this piece of land.

Then you realise one or two things do not match. It does not seem fair; not proper. You pass it off your own naivety. After all, a person with so much public support and approval cannot be wrong. Then it hits you. Your liberty is snatched away. You scream injustice, but then it dawns upon you the whole administrative machinery has been turned to suit him. You and the ones wronged by the once thought to be the saviour of the land is actually a wolf in sheep's clothing.

You have no recourse to highlight your plight. What do you do? An uprising at the risk of losing everything you have accumulated like a sparrow slowly building its nest? A violent revolution causes the destruction of lives and property. Psyop needs time and resources. What avenue is left when the powers that be controlled the amenities that were created to serve you, anyway.

One website described this movie as one of those movies from South India over the last few years that changed the cinema landscape. This is just baloney. In the 80s, so many movies came out highlighting the nonsensical administration of the village panchayats and the cruelty of the land zamindars. Now it is the cooperatives, that is all. This formula of a lone wolf fighting a corrupt system, coming out unscathed and winning the heart of the beautiful lass is as old as the industry itself. The redeeming factor must be the excellent cinematography and its soothing melodies.

The film tells the story of a young hearing-impaired agricultural worker, who after seeing too many injustices happening under his very nose, takes the Village Cooperative Society President head-on. Mysteriously villagers who opposed the President's decisions committed suicide or went missing. The last straw came when his learned brother was killed when he decided to stand against the President in the local elections.

Can give it a miss but the massive box office earnings and the remake in Kannada may mean that the producers are just riding on its financial success.

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