"most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility."
~~~ sigmund freud ~~~
i just watched asr right through this episode. his love, his helplessness, his frustration, his magnificent anger and that boy who never could let a night go.
dadi brought out the worst in him... a clear clean absolute emotion, an anger, but beneath it one sensed a human being in great pain, struggling. she was such a bad reminder of sheeshmahal, all that he has tried valiantly to put behind.
now she stands here with the archaic and erroneous views of sheeshmahal, insisting they be adhered to just because she is the elder and he is the scion of the maliks. she is his grandmother from his father's side, and in a patriarchal system, she has more authority than anyone from his mother's side... she constantly refers to the tragedy at sheeshmahal, i suspect without the power of the past, she is really nothing. it's like her magic potion.
she really has no reference or relevance in this present time. for the past fourteen years she has practically not existed.
the father's side has stopped meaning anything to her grandson. he has walked away from the claim of patriarchy and acknowledged the parent he respects by adopting her family name. he is absolutely and resolutely a raizada. what's more he has a mind of his own and he will do what he feels is the right thing to do.
he walks out of his sister's room looking worried and dadi attacks.
"kitna sambhal rahe hain aur kitna bigad rahein hain..." how much you are resolving and how much you are spoiling i can see, says she grimly, clearly challenging him.
a deadly look at nani.
i was all set to sit through the episode bored, wondering how they ruined it all. but then that look. i started to watch with interest. asr did not disappoint me.
khushi was wooden in her all will be well mode... bad dialogues, where is hitesh kewaliya.
"mujhse baat karne ka koi faida nahin hai, dadi, main wohi karoonga jo mujhe theek lagta hai..." no point in talking to me, dadi, i will do what i feel is right, rasped (yes, i will use m&b word) the man.
di is in trouble. all that is asr is out, up and about.
"di meri responsibility hai, aur main kissi ko bhi did ko zara si bhi takleef nahin pahunchane doonga," di is my responsibility and i won't let anyone hurt di even that bit. he knows shyam can casually walk into a hospital so he has moved di here, where he hopes to keep her safe.
the anjali ke pati hai rubbish starts.
asr is adamant. shyam has lost all his rights.
dadi hits way below the belt, she suggests anjali might do what her mother did.
i wince. this is so not done. actually, dadi is wonderful because there are indeed people just like her all around. essentially cowards, who need groups to survive, who accept all the unfairness of patriarchy for a melange of reasons, their own survival being a major one, they abuse the power that the system grants them and they habitually do not do empirical thinking, it's easier to accept and peddle other people's thinking in the name of parampara... that way you can spend your energies entirely on delivering dialogue with melodrama and speaking with borrowed force.
this is battle royal i think.
khushi suddenly appears by asr and puts a hand on his shoulder, asking him to calm down. why? should he? i miss my old fiery real khushi.
"jo main logoke baare mein sochta hoon unhen saaf saaf explain karne mein believe karta hoon," what i think of people, i believe in telling them clearly about it. that's asr. no manipulation in his words, no muffling, couching, designing, pandering.
dadi thinks no one loves anjali more than shyam...
i wanted to laugh my head off... a very poor judge of character this lady is... this fits perfectly with her type.
nani steps in. again, the maker, the preserver...
anjali is so unwell, why are you guys fighting?
usually, he listens to his nani, but today, "ek minute, nani" he has been looking at dadi, he's seen something...
a sharp man, it strikes him as odd...
"pehli baar shyam ki aankho mein itna pyaar dekh liya aapne? kal aap usse pehli baar mili thi na? ... pehli baar milke itni yakeen kaise hai aapko usspar?"
you saw so much in shyam's eyes the first time you ever saw him? yesterday you met him for the first time, didn't you? how can you believe in someone so much after just meeting him once?
"unless aap..."
he has guessed it isn't the first time at all.
and dadi confesses she knows shyam.
she rants about his innocence and says, "baki ki jo galat faimiya hui hain..."
"galat faimi!!!" misunderstanding! asr's voice rises.
he loses it.
"koi galat faimi nahin hui hai, dadi... aur sach yeh hai ki shyam jaisa jhoota ur ghatia insaan iss ghar mein kabhi dobara wapis nahi aayega..."
there's been no misunderstanding and someone as lowdown as shyam is not coming back to this house.
clearly the writers are building the story of shyam's return. i know that. and yet, asr sounds so wonderful i sort of forget about the plot.
dadi doesn't believe shyam tried to kill asr...
nk speaks up, instantly the hand is raised.
nani steps in, "subhadra, kauno galat faimi naahin hui hai..." there has been no misunderstanding.
dadi speaks like shyam's groupie, "koi saboot hai iss baat ka?" is there any proof of that?
"dadi, main jaanta hoon ki sach kya hai aur mujhe kissi proof ki zaroorat nahin hai." i know what the truth is and i don't need any proof, insists asr.
"aap bas woh galati mat kijiye jo main pehle kar chuka hoon," he acknowledges he made a mistake. it possibly bothers him often now. how could he have misread shyam like this? he, who believes in his dimaag, his ability to judge a thing correctly.
"really?" he says at one point and i have to go for a cool down session.
dadi refuses to budge, accept it or not, she says, i have come to save this home. "hum kuch bhi galat hone nahin denge..." i won't let anything wrong happen. a nice return to the core issue of sahi and galat there.
"no!" he strikes out. he is incensed. sharp clear enraged "no!", you deserve a poem.
"aap tab bhi galat thi, dadi, aur aap aaj bhi galat hain!" you were wrong then, you are wrong now.
he has pondered sahi and galat too long, too honestly and intimately to let his prejudiced and unfair grandmother take away that premise. beside she has stoked a smouldering wound. she has opened up that wound right in the middle of this... this insensitivity too is typical of her kind.
barun is unspeakably moving each time there's any allusion to maa, but if you refer of her without respect, even slightly hinting at something not sahi in her actions, he is lethal.
dadi, "aap kehna kya chahte hain?" what do you want to say?
asr, "yehi ki hamare liye kya sahi hai aur kya galat, aapko na chauda saal pehele pata tha aur na aaj pata hai." this, that what is right or wrong for us, you didn't know fourteen years ago, you don't know now.
simple clear fact stated.
"ittne saalo se di ka khayal main rakh raha hoon," for so many years i am taking care of di. sublime accent on "main".
"aap nahin... aur aagey bhi rakh sakta hoon." not you, and in the future to i can take care of her.
"aap toh hume chhorkar chali gayi thi na? phir kyun wapas aayin aap? kya lene aayin hain apni ashram se? wahin rehna chahiye tha na?"
you'd left us and gone, right? so why did you come back? what have you come seeking? should have stayed there, no?
i smiled. man has a point.
he leaves, his family arrayed around, looking nonplussed. a fabulous shot. he is undoubtedly the captain of this ship.
"shyam iss ghar mein wapas nahin aayega..." shyam won't come back to this house, he grates. undoubtedly this is a clear sign, shyam will be back.
"rahne dijiye, sister!" shyam is already here. asr has arranged for security, but from next day. must funny smile happen in each frame of shyam? when he was not yet revealed, pre 41, he was so good, nice but creepy in a way you couldn't figure out.
asr stands before his pool, tortured.
khushi walks in... looking to comfort him it seems to me. she insists he take his medicines. whenever there was a gap in ideas, a dose of medicines was administered. usually via di, but tonight it's asr. as though a girl can't just walk in and tell her man she is worried sick for him, the situation at home sucks, and just be by his side, let him feel a little better.
a gripped glass...
"i hate that man, khushi!"soft broken angry seething helpless with emotions.
khushi tells him that she felt shyam had bachhe ko khone ka dukh, the sadness of losing achild. sigh...
and promptly comes an absolutely beautiful: "so?"
so maybe he should be given a chance to meet anjali... khushi starts off. i feel the loss of the khushi i knew.
"khushi, tumne shayad suna nahin theek se..." khushi, perhaps you didn't hear me... he is looking stonily at her. no way is shyam coming here.
the irony is not lost on audience, the cretin is sitting in the house with wife. shyam feeds his wife the entire idea of how exactly he can be brought back. she swallows the whole thing, thinking it's her idea really. would have been interesting, but anjali's character was not convincing any more.
and in her brother's room is a man not easy to fool or convince any more.
"woh sabko bewakoof bana sakta hai par mujhe nahin..." he can fool everyone, but not me. sharp man. he made a mistake, but now he has learned his lesson. not making the same mistake twice.
"are you kidding me, khushi!" at her mumbling about shyam. too cute.
she is going on.
"ok?" he looks at her... he needs her support.
khushi looks achhi bahu and states all she wants is di should get better.
and di barges into the room. he is worried, then elated, she looks better. mami exclaims "ee toh miracle hui gawa," this is a miracle. nk is more pertinent, "di... iss ek ghante mein aisa kya ho gaya, haanh?" what happened in this one hour?
asr looks at his sister, love brimming in his eyes. he would bring her anything she wants i get the feeling.
she says what she wants...
"hume shyam ji lauta do, chhotey." return shyam ji to me.
the first time i saw, i wondered how he would react. would he give in? of course, he would. he had to. but he didn't... how to forget this man.
somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience, your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near
~~~ e e cummings ~~~
......................
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