Page 42 - Seniors Today Jan20 Issue
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now. The agitating students are kept in check
by the promise by the Vice Chancellor Awasthi
(Rajendra Gupta), that he will look into their
demands after the jubilee event.
There are whispers that dissenting workers at
Trivedi’s factory were burnt alive, but nobody
has the courage to take him on. The cops and
local media (represented by a magazine editor
played by Alok Nath) are obviously under his
thumb.
On the day of the function, as Uttam and his
gang enter the campus to attack Rohit, the
students barricade themselves in the hostel and
shout anti-police slogans. In spite of Awasthi’s Campus turmoil is the story of Mishra’s first film
well-meaning appeals for peace, and Rohit’s assured debut by Sudhir Mishra, which won
panicked warnings to his mates, the cops him a national award. He captured the social
enter the campus to crush the rebellion. Sarita hierarchies of a north Indian town astutely,
witnesses it all, but her camera is snatched the kind of place where the powerful hang
away. The cops pin a murder on Rohit and he out together in clubs and everything can be
flees the scene with the police and Uttam in ‘managed’ by pulling the right strings. He later
pursuit. made Hazaaron Khwahishen Aisi (2003), which
was a much more mature work—one of the best
Confronting the past political films made in India.
Meanwhile, the three old friends are forced to
confront their past, when they run into one of Star beginnings
their former comrades, Ismat (Kusum Haider). Seen today, the film is interesting for the glimpse
The three were active in the freedom movement it gives into the early days of some of the actors
against the British Raj, but when it came to the who went on to build successful film and TV
crunch, they betrayed a friend (Lalit Mohan careers. Naseeruddin Shah played dad to an
Tiwari) and escaped from Rajpur. That incident actor about the same age as himself, which
of their cowardice has haunted them all their did not seem to hamper his growth as a star.
lives. When a battered Rohit falls at their Pankaj Kapur and Sushmita Mukherjee went
doorstep with Sarita begging for refuge, it is on to co-star in the hugely popular TV serial
time for the three to redeem themselves. Karamchand, and remain active on screen and
The plot may seem simplistic now, but it was an stage. Sushmita was then married to Mishra,
and later to Raja Bundela, while the director
married editor Renu Saluja, after her breakup
from Vidhu Vinod Chopra. From bit roles in
this film, Alok Nath and Rajendra Gupta also
moved on to better work in films and television.
Manohar Singh did many more films, Habib
Tanvir gained even more renown for his work
with Chhatisgarhi folk theatre, while BM
Shah also returned to the stage—all three are
deceased.
With student activism and campus politics on
the rise again like never before, there is certainly
Pathbreaking director Sudhir Mishra cause to revisit and update this film.
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