Stage Buzz: Film: Gulmohar

“Gulmohar” is the story of Vidya from a middle class family ,a simple teacher who works hard to make two ends meet. Her husband, Deven, a very talented theatre artist, finds himself out of step, unable to compromise with changing theater trends. Bhagwaan is Vidya’s student who with the support of a political party fights against reservations. Sonali Kulkarni was playing the role of Vidya and Rajit Kapoor was playing the role of Deven. Vidya persuades Bhagwaan to get into serious studies and helps him in getting admission in JNU from where he completes his PhD. Vidya’s mentoring and interest in Bhagwaan is misunderstood both by her husband and her colleagues. Devan in anger and frustration has a big fight with Vidya and Vidya leaves the house. As she had no place to live she goes to stay with Bhagwaan. This move opens up society’s hatred and forces Vidya to take shelter in her sister’s house . Bhagwaan graduates as a doctor and makes a search for Vidya. Not finding Vidya in her home he discovers that Vidya was thrown out from the college and she had started teaching children under a Gulmohar tree. Devan apologies to her but Vidya cherishes her new independence.

This film is directed by Gajendra Ahire. He symbolizes Gulmohar with Vidya. The metaphor of the Gulmohar tree which flowers in extreme heat is appropriate for Vidya as it establishes her blossoming in the heat of society’s rejection . In the film Ahire also puts stress on the fact that it is not necessary that there should be a “relationship” between a man and a woman living in a society. He values friendship, mentoring and the mother child relationship and lifts the relationship from the common perception that all relationships between men and women are sexual .

This movie is inspirational for me and in my opinion delivers a message of strength of an independent woman who survives the harshness of society and gets the respect she deserves.

At StageBuzz.info we encourage young talent. Asha Bisht is the third student who has contributed to stagebuzz, the other two have been; Manish Vidhani, Tarini Sridharan and Shruti Gurudanti