{"id":3708,"date":"2017-08-30T17:27:36","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T11:57:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/?p=3708"},"modified":"2024-12-14T07:28:55","modified_gmt":"2024-12-14T01:58:55","slug":"teesri-kasam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/teesri-kasam\/","title":{"rendered":"Teesri Kasam \u2013 A Story of Love That Meandered to its Dead End"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Raj

Raj Kapoor and Shailendra (Pic courtesy: Apnaorg)<\/p><\/div>\n

Maare Gaye Gulfam<\/em><\/strong>\u2026 this is the title of the story that Phanishwar Nath Renu wrote. And this is the story Shailendra was so smitten with that he decided to give it a cinematic form, when the best lyricist of Hindi cinema ever decided to make a film. Had he reached a creative plateau as a lyricist and was overcome by an urge to diversify his channelization? Or was this decision a destinational quirk? Perhaps it was both. Teesri Kasam<\/em> \u2013 the name given to Maare Gaye Gulfam<\/em> for its cinematic version \u2013 was hailed a classic and collected reasonably well at the gates though a little late for the great poet. Shailendra was gone before that, heart-broken and in deep debts.<\/p>\n

Gulfam means one who is rose-faced. Popularly, it is also used for a handsome male. Quite symbolic for the context in hand. Shailendra was handsome though not in a conventionally understood sense. His persona radiated a positivism owing itself to an evolved inner-self. Shailendra was a dreamer as his poems so abundantly evidence yet his dreams sourced the realities of his impoverished, struggling early existence. Consider the brutal truths beneath the sheen of hilarity in Dil ka haal sune dilwala<\/em> or that ode to rupiah\u2026Suraj ki jaisi golai!<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Shankardas

Shankardas Kesarilal popularly known by his pen name Shailendra
(30 August 1923 \u2013 14 December 1966)<\/p><\/div>\n

Shailendra was charismatic. He had an aura \u2013 an aura that glimpsed his Kabiresque depth and vision. Or was it because of a heady mix of an innate sublimity and the smoke he inhaled? The man of the other world \u2013 \u2018uss paar<\/em>\u2019 \u2013 yet so much here \u2013 the \u2018awara\u2019<\/em>! He was a non-believer who mused on the life-death metaphysics with an astonishing conviction.<\/p>\n

Phanishwarnath Renu<\/strong>, author of this story, was a revolutionary too though this fact remains a little understated in the account of times specific to the Indian Independence. He participated In the freedom struggle. Later he was an important person in the Nepali revolutionary movement in 1950 which resulted in the establishment of democracy in Nepal. He was awarded Padma Sri for his contribution to literature. He later returned the award, protesting the imposition of emergency.<\/p>\n

Renu (pen name that means a speck of dust) is regarded as the most notable Hindi writer post Premchand period. The rural India is centric to his stories. The language that he employed is full of life and incisiveness and has a liberal infusion of local lingoes \u2013 Bhojpuri and Maithili. He had an exceptional ability to create visuals through words. His collaboration with Shailendra, also from Bihar, was meeting of two great minds with shared concerns. Renu not only gave his story for a cinematic adaptation, he also wrote its dialogues.<\/p>\n

\"\"

A love that meanders forward on a bullock cart through an idyllic setting!<\/p><\/div>\n

Maare Gaye Gulfam<\/em> is a fairy tale of an un-confessed love between the one who knows too little about the ways of the world and the other who knows too much – a love that meanders forward on a bullock cart through an idyllic setting! It is love in passage, in passing \u2013 in transit and transient! Fortuitousness informs it. It concludes with the separation of the central characters \u2013 Hira Bai and Hiraman \u2013 while their emotions still ran high. In fact there could have been no other end to it. For, it was well nigh impossible for a romance in stealth, of this kind, getting even a semblance of acceptance in the socio-cultural milieu of the times, when a woman outside the wedlock was a being \/ commodity out-of- bounds, even mysterious. The response of the fellow gaadiwans to Hira Bai, even if an aside to the mainstream of the story, so realistically and brilliantly articulates this aspect.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Phanishwar Nath Renu (Pic: Internet)<\/p><\/div>\n

The lore of Mahua Ghatwarin<\/strong> occupies only a few pages but its centrality to the story should not be lost on us. She is the motif of a woman oppressed, under seize, wistfully looking to her breathing free, to her feminine fulfillment. Mahua pulls out the story from the ephemerality of the immediate and connects it, even if implicitly, to the woman through the ages\u2026 and in sufferance!<\/p>\n

But who was Mahua Ghatwarin ? A petite, virtuous girl under the domination of her cruel, oppressive, licentious mother. Her cannabis-dulled father had a marginalized existence. Mahua had come of age but her mother was not interested in her marriage. One night, her step mother tasked her to be in the service of the saudagar<\/em> (trader) in wait in his barge at the river bank, It was a terrifying night in the month of Shrawan, when it was raining in a torrent and the lightening was streaking across the sky without a breather. Mahua remonstrated with her step mother but that was futile, for she had already taken the price for the service. Mahua was distraught, cried, cried for her mother \u2013 if only she were there! And then cursed her in the same breath: why did you die alone?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Teesri Kasam (Maare Gaye Gulfam)<\/a> by Phanishwarnath Renu<\/p><\/div>\n

Her cries fell on deaf ears as she was caught by her hair and dragged to the boat. The saudagar<\/em> promptly ordered a sail down the river to preempt Mahua\u2019s escape. She struggled the whole night. Yet she waited for her time and just before dawn when the servants were overcome by fatigue, Mahua stole a moment and jumped into the river. Swimming against and across the stream was daunting but she was no less than a fish in water. At about the same time, a servant too jumped and got into a chase. This servant however was one smitten with Mahua and kept crying as he swam after her, \u2018Pause Mahua, I am not your adversary, I want to be your companion for ever!\u2019<\/p>\n

But Mahua did not look back and quickened her strokes instead! The servant was tired, hopelessly tired! And Mahua swam against the stream, against all odds to reach the safe shore, crying \u2013 crying not out of any anguish but out of joy of having attained her freedom, for the joy of having discovered the real Mahua, free of 15 years of bondage and suffering!<\/p>\n

Teesri Kasam<\/strong><\/em>, the film deviates from the original story majorly on two counts.<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, it modifies the final status of Mahua \u2013 from the one escaping to her freedom to the one who remains condemned to captivity. In the film, Mahua is portrayed to be in love. In the original story, it is not Mahua but saudagar<\/em>\u2019s servant who is smitten and goes after her.<\/p>\n

Second, the film interpolates, in the story, a lecherous zamindar who wants to possess and keep Hira in an exclusive resort for the satiation of his senses. And that forces Hira Bai to virtually flee to her earlier company, to escape Zamindar\u2019s clutches. In the original story, it is Hira\u2019s decision, taken out of her own volition and not because of any coercing factor, to return to her old Company.<\/p>\n

These are significant changes in the story. It is certain that much thought must have gone in before the incorporation of these changes, especially as Renu himself was there proactively, as a dialogue writer.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Does Hira Bai at the end attains her freedom, like Mahua of the original story?<\/p><\/div>\n

The question that must have come up for a discussion is: does Hira Bai at the end attains her freedom, like Mahua of the original story? Viewed in a larger perspective, Hira moves from one captivity to another, remaining ever condemned to the drudgery of charming and enthralling her audience that largely holds her as a woman of easy virtue. The woman in her, with all her natural aspirations, remains deeply buried and supplanted. Thus if Mahua and Hira were to be aligned, to be given a kindred existential connect, the story of Mahua needed a major reorientation as to its end. The film brings that in ironing out thereby what could have been a jarring disconnect.<\/p>\n

A story in written words presupposes a learned readership and can afford to jump leaving the justifiable space to the ken of the readers. Maare Gaye Gulfam<\/em> does precisely that as Hira Bai decides rather abruptly to return to her earlier company, offering no reason for the decision. Such void in its cinematic adaptation could have been disastrous. The audience will not understand, will look askance. Also, a film must spice itself with logically acceptable drama or a sub-story, if necessary. Interpolation of Zamindar and his villainous ways which Hira Bai is able to ward off not only sustains the audience interest but also heightens her virtuosity or rather her unsaid fidelity towards Hiraman, leaving audience to sigh \u2013 such a good woman undone by the lecherous male dominated system!<\/p>\n

I will even dare say that if Renu were alive to rewrite this story, he would have aligned it to its cinematic script. Perhaps this is the only film that changes the story to take that to a higher and more acceptable level.<\/p>\n

\"maare

Hira moves from one captivity to another, remaining ever condemned to the drudgery of charming and enthralling her audience that largely holds her as a woman of easy virtue.<\/p><\/div>\n

Except for these, the film runs very close to the original story. In fact many a dialogue in the film is taken straight from the story.<\/p>\n

Basu Bhattacharya directed this film. This was his first directorial essay and arguably the best. While Bhattacharya maintained that he was influenced by Ray\u2019s Pather Panchali<\/em>, but for the discerning the film looks straight out of the books of his mentor Bimal Roy – the same faithfulness to the story, the same seamlessness, the same man-nature integrity, the same emphasis on the unsaid. Yet there was a creative X factor in Bhattacharya that made the film typically his own. He surely was a non-conformist whether it related to his creativity which was much in evidence later, or to marrying the daughter of his mentor despite mentor\u2019s strong disapprobation.<\/p>\n

\"SJ,

What a team! Hasrat Jaipuri, Jaikishan Raj Kapoor, Shankar and Shailendra – the coming together of amazing talents in perfect symphony (Pic: Cinema Sangeet)<\/p><\/div>\n

The Songs of Teesri Kasam<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Teesri Kasam <\/em>has ten songs. Together they take over forty minutes in a film time of 159 minutes. This is easily understandable as music is existential essence of the two central characters. Hira Bai eked a living as a ballerina in a music-dance company, and Hiraman – he grew in a milieu that had lore and music for every conceivable occasion.<\/p>\n

The music by Shankar-Jaikishan<\/a> is soaked in the soil of the countryside of northern India, with rich use of jingling of cow bells, the sounds of rustic, folk instruments, the chirrup and twitter of birds. Sung evocatively by stalwarts such as Mukesh<\/a>, Manna Dey, Lata Mangeshkar and Asha Bhosle, the songs of Teesri Kasam touch an emotional chord with the audience as the story moves through them. Ace cameraman Subrata Mitra\u2019s camera lucidly captures every mood, every emotion, every turn of the story and its characters with lyrical finesse, creating an outstanding impact in black and white.<\/p>\n

The original story, as also the film, has a prose-verse undulation sustained on a subterranean emotion of love. It is this non-prosaic character of the film that further lends it the impression of a fairy tale. Also, the conception of songs in the film is no different from the one that obtains in the original story. The film takes the opening lines of four of its songs from the story itself<\/strong> – Sajan re jhoot mat bolo, Sajanva bairi ho gaye hamaar, Laali laali doliya <\/em>and Maare gaye gulfam.<\/em> The prose interspersed in the lokgeet\u00a0 – Duniya bananewale<\/em>, draws upon the text in the story.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Raj Kapoor and Waheeda Rehman in Teesri Kasam<\/p><\/div>\n

Five songs (1) Sajan re jhoot mat bolo<\/em> (2) Paan khaaye saiyan hamar<\/em> (3) Haye gazab kahin tara toota<\/em> (4) Maare gaye gulfam<\/em> and (5) Kissa hota hai shuru<\/em> have an impersonal character even though they flow from within the story and indispensable to its momentum.<\/p>\n

Of the remaining (6) Sajanva bairi ho gaye<\/em> (7) Duniya banana wale<\/em> (8) Laali laali doliya<\/em> and (9) Chalat musafir<\/em> – each alludes to, and even exacerbates, Bai\u2019s fancies and emotions of the moment. In (10) Aa aa bhi ja raat dhalne lagi, <\/em>Hira Bai directly hints at the hopelessness of her situation.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Mukesh and Raj Kapoor With Shanker and Shailendra<\/p><\/div>\n

Since these latter five songs not only unfold and take forward the film but also supply its emotional contents, these have been briefly deconstructed here.<\/p>\n

Sajanva bairi ho jaye hamar\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sajanawa bairee ho gaye humaar<\/em>
\nchitheeya ho to,<\/em>
\nhar koee baache,<\/em>
\nbhaag naa baache koye<\/em>
\nkaramawaa bairee ho gaye humaar<\/em><\/p>\n

jaaye base parades sajanawa,<\/em>
\nsautan ke bharamaaye<\/em>
\nnaa sandes naa koee khabareeyaa,<\/em>
\nrut aaye rut jaaye <\/em>
\ndoob gaye hum beech bhanwar me,<\/em>
\nkar ke solaa paar<\/em>
\nsajanawaa bairee ho gaye humaar<\/em><\/p>\n

sonee sej gaud moree sounee,<\/em>
\nmaram naa jaane koye<\/em>
\nchhatapat tadape pareet bichaaree,<\/em>
\nmamata aansoo roye<\/em>
\nnaa koee is paar humaaraa,<\/em>
\nnaa koee us paar<\/em>
\nsajanawaa bairee ho gaye humaar<\/em><\/p>\n

Mukesh<\/span><\/p>\n