Meandering through the rustic Rajasthan, its authentic dialect, the humour, the bhains & the bakris, the khets and the jhopdis, THE rogue sisters, their bidis, their gaalis, their ambitions, their street-smartness, their vulnerability, their over-the-top crass fights, their helpless father, their lovers, their unassuming friend dipper, and a lechorous landlord, I kept wondering who is the real protagonist in this movie.
Pataakha had a trickle down effect in my mind as I tried to unravel the central idea of the story, til… till I interpreted right at the end, the real protagonist was an intangible virtue of “Competitive spirit” portrayed by a tangible character named ‘Dipper’, the funny, clumsy friend of The sisters. It was a perfect exhibition of intangible and tangible force. While the Intangible Competitive spirit inherently existed between the sisters, but whenever it dampened, the tangible Dipper appeared forth to fuel-up the spirit again.
Vishal Bharadwaj carefully sketched him as a Naradmuni, who keeps coming and going in the lives of the rogue sisters, fuelling their menace and suggesting Jugaads to outdo each other. Having said that his intentions were always pure and always wanted the best for each of the sister. Therefore he was bigger than a Naradmuni in a garb of less-ordinaire. He was with all due subtlety a Lord Krishna’s Avataar, propagating ‘Competition' as a fundamental truth of human existence. However much one may run away from it, competition shall follow. This was exhibited by the forever-competiting sisters in their bid to run-away from each other, accidentally get married into the same family.
The protagonist continues to preach the benefits of this spirit in a society, organisations and countries at large.
A healthy competition is all inspiring as it promotes
- Ambition amongst each other. Like the second sister’s ambition of becoming a teacher encouraged the older one to develop an ambition of owning a dairy farm.
- Pursuance for the best for oneself. Looking at the younger one’s capable boyfriend, the older sister is fostered to find a competent boyfriend for herself too.
- Liberation from unfavourable situation for better pastures: The older sister's Jugaad of running away from her ill-fated wedding with the lecherous landlord encourages the younger one to do the same. Here our hero plays a pivotal role and he so does again in separating them post the marriage to pursue each of their dreams.
However, sometimes one needs to oversee the competition, introspect and develop ones own excellence in isolation. Again our Hero jugaads the separation of each sister’s married family for facilitating their own dreams.
But once the excellence is achieved, and competition is turned nil, complacency may set it and one may eventually lose their vision, their voice, their confidence, their inspiration. Like our sisters did too.
And to bring it back, one ought to get back to the market, the game, the competition.
Like our Lord Krishna Master Stroked to bring the sisters back together, to inspire, to fight, to bring back their vision, voice and passion.
Coz Between competitors at individual, organisational, international levels, lies interdependencies and respect for each other
Thereby inspiring a wholesome life of success, celebration & fireworks!
