Unlike other lyricists who take up political campaigns as impersonal commissioned projects, you have openly voiced your support for Nitish Kumar. How involved were you?
I was as involved as I was during Tanu Weds Manu Returns. In a film, I try to find a way to connect a song to the characters. “Phir Se Nitishe” came out of conviction and belief in Nitish Kumar. He has done well for Bihar. Women have gone out in droves and voted for him. I am from the state and I’ve seen it through the last few decades. Living outside has made me see the changes more objectively. When I signed up for the campaign, it didn’t feel like I was selling my soul for money. I wanted him to win. The words came from my awareness of the state’s issues.
What are the issues that you have talked about in the song?
The song talks about gender equality, the party’s inclusive politics and also of the land acquisition bill. There’s even a line that goes ‘Bhoomi ka sapoot, bhoomi bachayega (the son of the soil will save the land)’. The song uses metaphors from a farmer’s life. As someone whose father still earns his bread through farming, I understand their problems. The song refers to improving women’s conditions in Bihar. In my more recent visits to my village, Bhelwa, in north Bihar, when I see a bunch of girls cycling to school, carefree, playing games with one another, I see the blueprint of a new Bihar in their cycle carriers and schoolbags. The line in the song — “Gaon gaon tak rasta hai, gali gali ujiyara, mahol men kono dur hui andhiyara (There are roads leading up to all the villages, the streets are well lit, the darkness has vanished from the environs),” talks about safe streets for women, where they are treated at par. Also, in the hook, I decided to refer to Nitish Kumar as ‘Nitishe’, which is the affectionate way of calling someone in Bihar.
As a professional, would you have taken up a project for any other political party?
I may write for others, but I won’t for certain parties, under any circumstance, simply on ideological grounds.
There hardly seems to be an outlet for a lyricist with political concerns such as you in Bollywood.
Unfortunately, mainstream Hindi films shy away from politics. Some of the politically charged films I can think of are Dibakar Banerjee’s work, Haider and Hazaaron Khwahishein Aisi. Masaan had a political undercurrent, especially the way it dealt with caste. Politics doesn’t just mean party politics, there is politics in gender and even love. The only political work I’ve managed to do was in a film called Oonga that unfortunately has not released yet. It is about a tribal hamlet in Orissa that is under the threat of being destroyed by illegal bauxite mining. I wrote a song called Taram Taram Tartara, in the local Kuvi language. A part of it talks about the red tesu flowers, a symbol of the lives of the tribal folk; the red signifying a revolution.
How have fans reacted to your campaign song?
I got messages from some of them saying that they liked my work but don’t approve of the fact that I did it for Nitish. There is also this wrong notion that an artist shouldn’t court politics. I don’t live in a vacuum. I take words from society and give them back to it. One can’t keep writing about birds, leaves and flowers. The online trolls ask me why I hadn’t written anything during the Emergency. All I can tell them is that I was only four years old then.
But there was a time (50s) when Hindi mainstream cinema was brimming with poets leaning towards politics such as Sahir Ludhianvi and Kaifi Azmi.
Add to that Shailendra. They wrote great, simple songs, the deeper political meaning of which I understood only at a more mature age. They were all involved in political movements in some way or the other. Some were CPI members, they were part of the Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA), Azmi was a part of the Progressive Writers Movement. They would do a lot of work apart from films.
Raj Shekhar's top political film songs |
The entire album of Pyaasa (1957), Sahir Ludhianvi: Each song is politically charged in its own way. “Jinhe naaz hai hind par who kahan” directly questions the ones who claim to be patriots. Do they actually care about the country and its people? It is particularly relevant today. Anari (1959), Shailendra: The lines “Kisi ki muskurahaton pe ho nisar, kisi ka dard mil sake to le udhaar, kisi ke waaste ho tere dil mein pyaar, jeena isi ka naam hai” from the song “Jeena Isi Ka Naam Hai”. As a child, I thought it’s a usual romantic song. But later in life, I realised those lines encapsulate the essence of the Communist manifesto. Mere Apne (1979), Gulzar: “Haal chaal thik thak hai, sab kuchh thik thak hai” from It deals with politics in a sarcastic way. Usne Kaha Tha (1960), Makhdoom Mohiuddin: “Jaanewale sipahi se poocho wo kahan jaa raha hai”, the song has a clear, anti-war stance. Gulaal (2009) Piyush Mishra: “Ranaji” is a mujra that talks about a neo-liberal economy and the imperialist world powers in a whimsical tone. Rockstar (2011) Irshad Kamil: Independent of the film’s context, it has a certain kind of politics; the orthodoxy of the society that crushes individuality. “Sadda Haq, Aithe Rakh” was the slogan of the Punjab University students’ revolution. |
sankhayan.ghosh@thehindu.co.in
