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‘Gandhi, My Father’ - humanising heroes
It is an interesting coincidence that the new Bollywood film, Gandhi - My Father has been released days before the subcontinent celebrates sixty years of independence. This well made film revisits Gandhi’s personal life and his troubled relationship with his son Harilal who died the same year as his father.
I saw the film yesterday and it was deeply tragic and moving at the same time. The conflict between parenting and leading a nation was delicately handled by the director, Feroze Abbas Khan. Gandhi could transform India and was a Bapu for the world but Harilal suffered in this larger scheme of fate, history and politics.
Akshaye Khanna has proven his mettle with the right director and a larger than life role - he portrays the various moods and phases of his tragic life with an amazing ease. He is truly gifted. Darshan who plays the Mahatama is also excellent and the two wives are also the sensitive characters, who while secondary to this major relationship bring much depths to the drama.
Bollywood has finally broken several barriers; and it is refreshing to see that our neighbours are recognizing that their leaders were after all humans. And this humanity adds to their stature.
Hope we also learn from this trend and stop treating our founding fathers as deities. Amazing that Gandhi and Jinnah both had to compromise their personal lives over national interests. Jinnah’s daughter did not move to Pakistan; and their relationship also became most tragic once the Quaid was close to realising the dream of Pakistan.
Interestingly, the movie reiterates Gandhi’sfamous quote where he confessed that there were two people whom he could not convince - his ‘Muslim friend’, Mohammad Ali Jinnah and his own son Harilal.
The film has its weak moments - it becomes slow paced at times and loses focus as the demands of commercial cinema make the script meander. Another irritating issue is the constant effort of the film-makers to maintain Gandhi’s stature as Mahatama. The constraints can be appreciated given Gandhi’s legendary status in India. There are times when Gandhi does appear to be a bit insensitive to his son. However, his adherence to the national cause and keeping his personal and family interests subordinate to those of India and her people is highlighted throughout the narrative.
The backdrop is the Indian struggle for Independence and this by itself makes a great viewing. Of course, the historical narrative is straight from the Indian nationalist discourse and views the demands of Muslims from that perspective. This is understandable given the subject but it does irk one a little. Why can’t a more nuanced understanding emerge? After all, Mr Jinnah had agreed on a united India during the talks on Cabinet Mission. It is a sad fact of history that the Congress rejected the Cabinet Mission Plan and not the Muslim League. The film sounds a little simplistic when the narrator states that a pained Gandhi accepted partition to avoid further bloodshed! That may be true as well. History is not that linear as claimed but then this was not the theme of the film.
Overall, it is a touching film that should not be missed by those interested in quality cinema and history.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:32 pm
Even though I respect the man for his works in South Africa, from the time he set his foot on India, he has struck me as a big hypocrat, or at least, prevaricative. Take the cast system as an example. He supported the cast system saying that dirty jobs has to be done by somebody. I have two objections to that-
one- why should somebody has to do dirty jobs because his father has done it, and
two- why did he then protest against Indians doing dirty jobs in South Africa. Indians in SA were just the analogue of low castes in India.
He was an Hindu apologist who supported every meaningless Hindu custom. Starting from cast system to vegeterianism to celibecy.
August 13th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
Ofcourse bollywood has broken various barriers and would continue to do so, as they have developed this courage to challenge everything. The know they have the right to know. But we are still so close-minded that we cant afford to even talk about the Jinnah-Dena relationship what to say about producing a film on that.
We do criticize everythign Indian leader but we dont haevt hte courage to criticize our ‘leaders’. Could we say today, after 60 years, that leaders from both sides are responsible for the blood shed? Dont call them murderers but cant we think that the failed to manage a proper structure?
Do we have enough courage?
guess not!!
August 13th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Thank you — nice essay.
Who knows if the Cabinet Mission Plan would have worked — from what we now know of loose confederations of that sort, my guess would be that it may not have — but one of the big tragedies of history is that Jinnah has forever in the Indian mind’s oversimplified tale become the “cause” and “architect” of partition.
If only Ayesha Jalal’s The Sole Spokesman and H.M. Seervai’s The Partition of India were required reading in Indian schools. But I suppose no nation’s founding myths could withstand such scrutiny!
August 13th, 2007 at 4:48 pm
a good review on that….. Our dear Gandhi, smiling on the Indian
currency notes…This is now, that was then…so quite difficult to
grasp… Gandhi had many problems with Tagore also…he was obstinate
often,but that was his strength as well. He was full of mistakes but
his contribution can not be thrown into the sea. His idea that every
one should do his own ( dirty )job was a blow to Brahmincal order,
but labelling the entire Dalit community as HARIJANS was wrong. He was
never intersted in Bhagat Singh and that was his another mistake. His
great achievement, however was that he sacrificed his life for the
Hindu Muslim unity which is monumental, besides his courage to abandon
the chair of power in 1947. We will keep on looking at him through
varioius perespectives….. He was elephantine in many ways….
personally i like him for his idea of SALT. His approach to sexuality
was idiotic, but i guess we all are striving to understand sexuality
in our own ways… His power to fast was amazing, which gives us some
understand of his will power, or simply his ‘ death-wish…
August 13th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
Dear All
these are thoughtful comments - Gandhi’s personality and life was so myriad and complex that no single book or film can capture it all. Having said that, I am encouraged by the fact that there are signs of healthy discussion and debate and a move to treat our heroes as humans.
AC: I know that Cabinet Mission Plan remains a postulate of history. But it was a way out and would have handled the strong centre curse that still bedevils our region.
IS: I agree that Gandhi’s sacrifice for Hindu-Muslim Unity is unparalleled - it is s shame that followers of Mahasabha (and the Islamic extremists) are now causing bloodshed again. In a way, Gandhi’s message is still relevant.
August 13th, 2007 at 7:51 pm
Nice review Raza.
Good to see that Indians have started realising that Gandhi, despite all his strengths, was a highly flawed human being. In the last 10 years, quite a few books/authors have exposed the myth of Gandhi. Personally, the book which I think exposed Gandhi the most is Patrick French’s “Liberty or Death”. As French wrote “if Gandhi is your hero, reading this book will be a deflating experience”
Among Indians, eminent sociologist Ashis Nandy wrote an interesting essay in 2000 on many facets or versions of Gandhi. The weblink to the essay is
http://www.transnational.org/SAJT/forum/Nonviolence/2001/Nandy_Gandhi-after-G.html
Last month, an interesting book on partition, which also goes into details of Gandhi’s deeply troubled personal/family life and flawed political/social views, has been published. Indian Summer-The secret history of the End of an Empire by Alex Von Tunzelmann. As Ms Tunzelmann writes about Gandhi and relations with his family: It is not easy being a saint, and it is perhaps even less so to live with one!
About Cabinet Mission Plan’s chances of success, one can only look at history of the region and see that, after 1971, the subcontinent ended up as divided into 3 states- something that Groups A, B and C of Cabinet Mission had suggested. So much bloodshed and human misery ( of 1947 and 1971) could have been avoided. But then Nehru rejected Cabinet Mission as it included united Bengal and Punjab. In Nehru’s own words, he accepted partition and applied scissors to the map of Pakistan (as proposed by Cabinet Mission).
August 13th, 2007 at 11:56 pm
Indeed, and that message is required by Pakistanis more than anyone else.
He was striving to unite Muslims and Hindus, and we need his message to unite Muslims with Muslims.
August 14th, 2007 at 10:11 am
I saw the film a few days ago as well. It was good though you are right that it is slow paced at times. I left with the thought that the Mahatma was human after all.
The gradual destruction of the character of Harilal reminded me of Samuel Bicke played by Sean Penn in ‘The Assassination of Richard Nixon’, which is a really good film as well.
August 15th, 2007 at 4:21 am
I couldn’t understand some parts of this article , but I guess I just need to check some more resources regarding this, because it sounds interesting.
August 15th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
I have lived in Gandhi’s ashram; the last time I did so was in Sevagram in 1948. In the ashram, all adults had to clean toilets in the morning by rotation - remove the buckets, and empty them into compost pits. It is simply not true that Gandhi supported untouchability. He campaigned against it all his life.
August 15th, 2007 at 8:01 pm
Reza, i saw the actual play starring Naseeruddin Shah as Gandhi in Washington DC a few years ago. It is a fresh perspective on Gandhijie. Of course Naseeruddin Shah was amazing. I hope the movie is as good!!
August 17th, 2007 at 6:24 pm
A thought provoking post, indeed! I will definitely like to watch this one; thanks for sharing.
August 23rd, 2007 at 2:48 pm