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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.)

Past Imperfect

Updated: Mar 17, 2025


Mughal

Thirteen individuals, including five minors, now find themselves on the wrong side of the law in Maharashtra. Their crime? Posting social media messages glorifying Mughal emperor Aurangzeb. The Solapur police booked them under various sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, citing not only the celebration of Aurangzeb but also derogatory remarks about Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj and Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj.


Every few months, a new provocation in form of social media posts or calls to remove Aurangzeb’s tomb resurrects the historical battle lines between Marathas and Mughals. But the persistence of Aurangzeb’s glorification in some quarters, despite his widely reviled legacy, raises an uncomfortable question: Why, three centuries after his death, do some still seek to celebrate him?


The simple answer is they shouldn’t. Aurangzeb, by any rational historical measure, is unworthy of reverence. He was a ruler whose religious bigotry and ceaseless warfare bled the Mughal Empire dry. His reimposition of the jizya tax, his destruction of temples, and his brutal execution of Guru Tegh Bahadur and Sambhaji Maharaj were not acts of benevolence but of intolerance and tyranny. Even within his own family, he was ruthless - imprisoning his father, executing his brothers and ruling through sheer force.


Yet, despite this record, some sections of the Muslim community in Maharashtra still treat him as a historical icon. This is not only misguided but politically self-defeating. If Indian Muslims must look for historical figures to admire, why Aurangzeb? Why not his great-grandfather, Akbar, whose policies of religious pluralism made the Mughal Empire strong? Why not Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, whose emphasis on education and reform helped modernize Muslim society? Why not Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, a man of science, vision, and nation-building?


The glorification of Aurangzeb, like the glorification of Nathuram Godse by certain elements of the Hindu right, represents the worst impulses of historical revisionism. Both figures, though representing vastly different ideologies, share one thing in common: their legacies are defined by division and destruction. To celebrate them is to celebrate an India where sectarian hatred triumphs over unity. If those eulogizing Aurangzeb in Solapur deserve legal scrutiny, so too do those garlanding Godse’s statues.


This fixation on Aurangzeb, however, serves neither Hindus nor Muslims. Maharashtra, a state with a formidable economic and industrial base, has far more pressing concerns - agrarian distress, unemployment, infrastructure bottlenecks. Yet, political discourse is increasingly being dominated by symbolic battles over a long-dead emperor.


More dangerously, this historical obsession fuels communal tensions. The individuals in Solapur who chose to venerate Aurangzeb likely did so not out of deep historical conviction but as an act of defiance in an increasingly polarized landscape. The more Aurangzeb is vilified by one side, the more he becomes a countercultural symbol for the other - an unhealthy cycle that serves no one but politicians eager to keep the flames of identity politics burning.


Maharashtra, and India at large, would do well to move beyond Aurangzeb. There is no pride to be found in eulogizing a ruler whose policies were regressive and destructive. Nor is there wisdom in continually reviving his spectre to stoke modern-day conflicts.


 

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