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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.)

Turncoats Hold Key in Western Maharashtra Contest

Updated: Oct 22, 2024

Western Maharashtra

Sharad Pawar, the Machiavelli of Maharashtra’s politics, has once again demonstrated his strategic prowess by undermining his nephew Ajit Pawar and disrupting the ruling Mahayuti coalition as the Assembly polls inch closer. Having already engineered political splits that thwarted the Mahayuti’s performance in key constituencies during the Lok Sabha election, the elder Pawar is now setting his sights on ensuring similar chaos in the upcoming election.


The Mahayuti is facing growing internal strife in the ‘sugar heartland’ of western Maharashtra owing to defections from the ruling BJP and Ajit Pawar’s NCP to Pawar senior’s NCP (SP).


By exploiting local rivalries, Pawar senior has significantly weakened Ajit Pawar’s position within the Mahayuti, especially in Assembly constituencies within Baramati, Kolhapur and Solapur.


Harshavardhan Patil, a former Congressman-turned-BJP leader from Indapur (in Baramati) and bitter rival of Ajit Pawar, recently quit the BJP to rejoin Sharad’s camp. Patil’s had major grievances when the Ajit-led NCP faction had aligned itself with the ruling BJP-Shinde Sena last year.


A seeming rapprochement between Ajit Pawar and Harshavardhan Patil was effected by state BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis ahead of the Lok Sabha polls to ensure that Patil campaigned wholeheartedly for Ajit’s wife, Sunetra Pawar, who was fielded from the Baramati Lok Sabha seat as the Mahayuti’s candidate. However, Sunetra Pawar crashed in Baramati contests, losing to her sister-in-law, Supriya Sule.


Besides securing the adhesion of the disgruntled Patil, Sharad Pawar recently poached Sanjeev Raje Naik-Nimbalkar, the brother of Ramraje Naik Nimbalkar, a senior member of Ajit’s faction and a prominent figure in the Phaltan region.


In September, Pawar senior managed to engineer the defection of BJP leader from Kolhapur Samarjeet Ghatge, said to be close to Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. Ghatge has been seething ever since his arch-rival Hasan Mushrif, a cabinet minister and another key member in the Ajit Pawar-led NCP, aligned himself with the ruling coalition in wake of Ajit’s rebellion.


Ajit Pawar’s decision to split the NCP founded by his uncle, Sharad Pawar, last year and join forces with the BJP last year seemed like a bold move to stake his claim in Maharashtra’s political landscape. But the uneasy alliance has been more of a liability than an asset for both Ajit and the Mahayuti.


The cracks in the Mahayuti alliance became starkly visible in the immediate aftermath of the recent Lok Sabha election, with Ajit Pawar’s faction winning just one of the four seats it contested - a poor showing that tarnished his image as a kingmaker. Secondly, the undivided NCP’s traditional vote bank—Marathas, Muslims, Dalits, and a section of OBCs—has not fully transferred to the BJP, leaving Ajit’s faction vulnerable within the coalition.


BJP leaders in western Maharashtra, once sworn adversaries of the undivided NCP, have expressed unease at having to compromise with Ajit’s faction which was a Johnny-come-lately in the Mahayuti bandwagon. Such leaders have been resolutely opposed to shaking hands with NCP leaders of Ajit’s faction, whom they had hitherto bitterly fought against. This is the chink in the Mahayuti armour that Sharad Pawar has sought to exploit with remarkable success.

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