The recent release Srikanth, stars Rajkummar Rao as a visually impaired character, based on real-life entrepreneur, Srikanth Bolla. It is the story of amazing determination and never taking no for an answer. He legally challenged the then rule that did not allow visually challenged students to take up science, a scholarship to MIT in the US, and setting up a successful business. Hindi cinema has, over the years made several films with blind characters, the plots mostly using them for sympathy, melodrama or for the male lead to play saviour. Films like Dosti (1964), Chirag (1969), Anuraag (1972), Jheel Ke Us Paar (1973) come to mind. To top of the weepie heap is Nitin Bose’s Deedar (1951), in which a blind man played by Dilip Kumar, undergoes successful treatment, but when he finds that his childhood sweetheart is married to another, he blinds himself again, rather than live in a world where he cannot be with her! One of the best films with a visually impaired protagonist, was one in which he was pretending—Sriram Raghavan’s superb thriller, Andhadhun (2018)
Here’s a pick of ten films, which portrayed visual impairment in an unusual or inspiring way:
Kinara (1977):
Written and directed by Gulzar, this film starred Jeetendra, who was often criticized for his inability to act. Inder is besieged by guilt when an accident caused by him, kills the fiancé of dancer Aarti (Hema Malini). Later, in trying to tell her the truth and make amends, he is responsible for Aarti losing her vision. Taking on another name, he helps her get back on her feet and resume her dancing career. When she finds out that he was the one who ruined her life, she breaks up with him. Eventually, she realizes that she was wallowing in her past and turning down the love of a good man. (In 2010, Pradeep Sarkar directed Lafangey Parindey, starring Deepika Padukone and Nein Nitin Mukesh), using the same basic plot.
Sparsh (1980):
Sai Paranjpye’s film sensitively portrayed the character of a visually challenged Aniruddh (Naseeruddin Shah), who heads a school for blind children. Kavita (Shabana Azmi), still coping with the trauma of recent widowhood, volunteers at the school, on the suggestion of a friend. She becomes popular with the students, but it takes time for the prickly and fiercely independent Aniruddha to accept his feelings towards her, or accept that her love for him is genuine, and not just pity. His well thought-out performance won Shah the Best Actor National Award. Interestingly, Shah played the villain in Mohra (1994), a man putting on a sightless act, and he did that equally well.
Qatl (1986):
In RK Nayyar’s film, Sanjeev Kumar played a pianist who loses his sight while trying to save his wife (Sarika) from being crushed by a falling chandelier. He goes abroad to get treated, but when he returns, he finds his wife in an affair with his best friend (Marc Zuber). He kills them both, and has to prove in court that he is blind, so he could not have committed the crime. Sanjeev Kumar’s performance as a blind man, who later has to pretend he cannot see, was what made this film watchable.
Sangeet (1992):
Madhuri Dixit played the double role of a mother who abandons her infant daughter born out of wedlock, in this K.Vishwanath film. The blind girl is raised by a woman, who makes her a dancer, discovered by folk singer Jetho (Jackie Shroff) performing a vulgar dance and getting lewd comments by male audiences. He gets her out, and over time falls for her, and also reunites her with her contrite mother.
Dushman (1998):
In Tanuja Chandra’s film, Naina (Kajol) wants to hunt down her twin sister’s rapist and killer, the sadistic Gokul Pandit (Ashutosh Rana), who has been evading punishment. Naina seeks the help of a visually impaired army veteran, Suraj Singh Rathod (Sanjay Dutt), who trains her to fight and overcome her fear of Gokul. When the villain strikes, Suraj and Naina together have to put him down. Once the mission is over, they realise they are in love with each other and get together in the end. Kajol played another visually-impaired woman in Fanaa (2006), in which she inadvertently harbours a terrorist.
Aankhen (2002):
An ingenious heist, planned by a man who uses three blind men to carry it out, in the certainty that nobody would believe such a thing. Directed by Vipul Amrutlal Shah, based on Aatish Kapadia’s Gujarati play Aandhdo Pato, the slick crime thriller had Amitabh Bachchan playing the mastermind. Akshay Kumar, Paresh Rawal and Arjun Rampal played the pawns and Sushmita Sen the teacher he forced to train the three to pull off the near-impossible feat. The heist is successful, but things go wrong, and the stolen booty is hidden, as the perpetrators fight over it.
Black (2005):
Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s film adapted The Miracle Worker, about the devoted teacher Anne Sullivan, who taught the sight and hearing impaired Helen Keller to communicate. Amitabh Bachchan played Debraj, the teacher, and Rani Mukerji was his student Michelle (played as a child by Ayesha Kapur), whom he treats with endless patience to get an education and become independent, forming a bond that is only broken by his memory loss.
Margarita With A Straw (2014):
Laila Kapoor (Kalki Koechlin) is the protagonist of Shonali Bose’s film, but the one who encourages the young woman with cerebral palsy to live life to the fullest is Khanum (Sayani Gupta) a blind Pakistani-Bangladeshi woman. Laila, who is struggling with rejection and trying to come to terms with her sexuality, falls in love with Khanum. She is impressed and inspired by Khanum’s independence and joie de vivre, and her ability to rise above her disability.
Dhanak (2015):
In this charming Nagesh Kukunoor film, Pari (Hetal Gada) loves her blind brother Chotu’s (Krrish Chhabria), and has promised him that before his ninth birthday, he will have his sight back. She sees a poster of Shah Rukh Khan encouraging eye donations. When her letters to SRK go unanswered, she finds out that the star is shooting in Rajasthan. Pari and her brother embark on a 300 km journey across the desert to meet him, in the hope that he will help Chhotu with the operation that will enable him to see again.
Kaabil (2017):
Hrithik Roshan played a visually-challenged dubbing artiste in this Sanjay Gupta film. When his wife (Yami Gautam), also blind, is raped and killed, he uses the power of his other senses to go after the politician and his brother (Ronit and Rohit Roy who committed the crime. He uses the ability to alter his voice, his strong sense of smell to find the culprits, lure them where he want them to be, and stage their deaths to look like suicide. A cop suspects him, but cannot understand how a sightless man could have gone about trapping and killing those men.
