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By:

Rajeev Puri

24 October 2024 at 5:11:37 am

Before Sholay, there was Mera Gaon Mera Desh

When the comedian and television host Kapil Sharma recently welcomed the veteran screenwriter Salim Khan onto his show, he made a striking claim. India, he joked, has a national bird and a national animal; it ought also to have a national film. That film, he suggested, would surely be Sholay. Few would quarrel with the sentiment. Released in 1975 and directed by Ramesh Sippy,  Sholay  has long been treated as the Everest of Hindi popular cinema -quoted endlessly, revisited by generations and...

Before Sholay, there was Mera Gaon Mera Desh

When the comedian and television host Kapil Sharma recently welcomed the veteran screenwriter Salim Khan onto his show, he made a striking claim. India, he joked, has a national bird and a national animal; it ought also to have a national film. That film, he suggested, would surely be Sholay. Few would quarrel with the sentiment. Released in 1975 and directed by Ramesh Sippy,  Sholay  has long been treated as the Everest of Hindi popular cinema -quoted endlessly, revisited by generations and dissected by critics. In 2025, the film marked its 50th anniversary, and the release of a digitally restored, uncut version introduced the classic to a new generation of viewers who discovered that its mixture of revenge drama, western pastiche and buddy comedy remains curiously durable. The film’s influences have been debated almost as much as its dialogues – from scenes taken by the Spaghetti westerns of Sergio Leone, particularly ‘Once Upon a Time in the West’ (1968) or to the narrative architecture of ‘Seven Samurai’ (1954) by Akira Kurosawa. Others note echoes of earlier Hindi films about bandits and frontier justice, such as ‘Khotey Sikke’ (1973) starring Feroz Khan. Yet, rewatching ‘Mera Gaon Mera Desh,’ directed by Raj Khosla, one cannot help noticing how many of the narrative bones of  Sholay  appear to have been assembled there first. Released in 1971,  Mera Gaon Mera Desh  was a major hit at the box office, notable for holding its own in a year dominated by the near-hysterical popularity of Rajesh Khanna. The thematic framework of the two films is strikingly similar. In  Sholay , the retired policeman Thakur Baldev Singh recruits two petty criminals - Jai and Veeru - to help him avenge the terror inflicted upon his village by the bandit Gabbar Singh. In  Mera Gaon Mera Desh , the set-up is not very different. A retired soldier, Jaswant Singh, seeks to protect his village from a ruthless dacoit and enlists the help of a small-time crook named Ajit. Even the villain’s name seems to echo across the two films. In Khosla’s drama, the marauding bandit played by Vinod Khanna is scene-stealing performance is called Jabbar Singh. In  Sholay , the outlaw who would become one of Indian cinema’s most memorable antagonists was Gabbar Singh. There is an additional irony in the casting. In  Mera Gaon Mera Desh , the retired soldier Jaswant Singh is played by Jayant - the real-life father of Amjad Khan, who would later immortalise Gabbar Singh in  Sholay . The connective tissue between the two films becomes even clearer in the presence of Dharmendra. In Khosla’s film he plays Ajit, a charming rogue who gradually redeems himself while defending the village. Four years later, Dharmendra returned in  Sholay  as Veeru, a similarly exuberant petty criminal whose courage and irrepressible humour make him one half of Hindi cinema’s most beloved buddy duo alongside Amitabh Bachchan as Jai. Certain visual motifs also appear to have travelled intact. In Khosla’s film, Ajit finds himself bound in ropes in the bandit’s den during a dramatic musical sequence. A similar image appears in  Sholay , where Veeru is tied up before Gabbar Singh while Basanti performs the now famous song ‘Jab Tak Hai Jaan.’ Other echoes are subtler but just as suggestive. Ajit’s pursuit of the village belle Anju, played by Asha Parekh, anticipates Veeru’s boisterous attempts to woo Basanti, portrayed by Hema Malini. Scenes in which Ajit teaches Anju to shoot recall the flirtatious gun-training sequence between Veeru and Basanti that became one of  Sholay ’s most cherished moments. Even the famous coin motif has a precedent. Ajit frequently tosses a coin to make decisions - a flourish that would later appear in  Sholay , where Jai’s coin toss becomes a running gag. Perhaps most intriguingly, the endings of the two films converge in their original form. In  Mera Gaon Mera Desh , the villain is ultimately killed by the hero. The uncut version of  Sholay  reportedly ended in a similar fashion, with Gabbar Singh meeting his death at the hands of Thakur Baldev Singh. However, censors altered the climax before the film’s 1975 release, requiring that Gabbar be handed over to the police instead. All this does not diminish  Sholay . Rather, it highlights the alchemy through which cinema evolves. The scriptwriting duo Salim–Javed took familiar ingredients and expanded them into a grander narrative populated by unforgettable characters and stylised action. On the 55 th  anniversary of  Mera Gaon Mera Desh , Raj Khosla’s rugged western deserves a renewed glance as the sturdy foundation on which a legend called  Sholay  was built. (The author is a political commentator and a global affairs observer. Views personal.)

Father of Indian Astrophysics dies at 86

Mumbai: Globally renowned scientist, Dr. Jayant Vishnu Narlikar – acknowledged as the Father of Indian Astrophysics – passed away peacefully in his sleep on Tuesday, officials and associates said.


He was 86 and breathed his last early today at his residence here. Dr. Narlikar is survived by three daughters and their families.


His wife Mangala - a Mathematician who served as a lecturer at TIFR and University of Mumbai besides Savitribai Phule Pune University - passed away in 2023.


Dr. Narlikar’s final rites will be performed tomorrow (May 21), said an official of the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), of which he was the founder.


Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Governor C. P. Radhakrishnan, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and other dignitaries mourned the passing of Dr. Narlikar by offering glowing tributes to his lifetime of scientific achievements and contributions.


Born on July 19, 1938, in Kolhapur, Maharashtra, Dr. Narlikar hailed from a family steeped in academia. His father, Vishnu Vasudev Narlikar, was a renowned mathematician, Professor and Head of Department at the Banaras Hindu University and his mother, Sumati Narlikar, was a Sanskrit language scholar.


The young Narlikar pursued his early education in Varanasi before moving to the University of Cambridge, where he completed his Ph.D. under the mentorship of Sir Fred Hoyle.


As he continued to blaze new trails in his chosen field, in 1972, the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi invited Dr. Narlikar back to India to help boost the development of science in the 25-years young Republic.


Accordingly, he joined the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and served in several other prestigious assignments till a major turning point in his career.


In 1988, he founded the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune, served as its first Director and shaped it into a premier institution for research and training in astronomy.


“His vision for the institute, dubbed the “Eightfold Way”, emphasized not only excellence in astronomy research but also outreach to University faculty, guidance to PhD students, access to latest observational facilities for Indian astronomers as well as science outreach and education for school children and the wider public,” said an IUCAA official.


Beyond his scientific endeavors, Dr. Narlikar was a prolific writer and communicator who penned numerous books and articles in English, Hindi, and Marathi, aiming to make science accessible to the general masses.


His works ranged from advanced scientific treatises to science fiction, reflecting his commitment to fostering scientific temper across society.


All through his illustrious scientific career, Dr. Narlikar was decorated with numerous national and international accolades, including the Padma Bhushan (1965) and the Padma Vibhushan (2004), India's third and second-highest civilian honors, respectively.


He was also honored with the UNESCO Kalinga Prize for the popularization of science in 1996 and the Prix Jules Janssen from the French Astronomical Society in 2004.


Dr. Narlikar’s legacy as a scientist, educator, and communicator will endure, continuing to inspire both the scientific community and the public for generations to come.


Visionary scientist extraordinaire

An internationally acclaimed Indian Astrophysicist, a visionary, passionate science writer and communicator, Dr. Narlikar’s passing marks the end of an extraordinary chapter in Indian science.


Over the course of a remarkable career spanning more than five decades, he made groundbreaking contributions to cosmology, challenged prevailing scientific orthodoxy, and dedicated himself to making science accessible to the broader public.


Dr. Narlikar is best known for co-developing the ‘Hoyle–Narlikar Theory of Gravity’ — an alternative to Albert Einstein’s General Relativity — and for championing the steady-state theory of the universe, a bold counterpoint to the widely accepted Big Bang model.

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