Katha by Sai Paranjpe: A delightful, moralistic tale of

ordinary urban middle class existence

by Rupen Ghosh on Wednesday, July 4, 2012 at 2:29pm

We have all read Aesops fables in our childhood, of the oftrepeated tale of 'The Tortoise and the Hare' and how the tortoise
sincerely and honestly, excruciatingly slow in his strides, facing
severe odds, plods along, trudges, never giving up, and finally
wins the race over an ever-boastful hare. The hare always
taunting and teasing the slow-paced tortoise, gets his just
deserts, his comeuppance, when complacent, contemptuous and
dismissive of the painfully slow tortoise and sure of victory,
decides to have forty winks a quick nap which turns into a deep
slumber - and wakes up too late, to his horror, to find the tortoise
reaching the winning post first. The moral of the folklore: 'slow
and steady wins the race!' But, that does not happen all the time
and, more often than not, it is the proverbial clever and
manipulative, who wins the day by hook or crook, more by
dubious means than anything fair!
Katha, a beautiful film by Sai Paranjpe, is a tale loosely based on
this parable that in the end, an honest, hard-working, simple man,
helpful, caring and giving to others, liked by all, a loser in todays
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cut-throat world, wins the girl who he loves all along but was too
shy and hesitant to admit, over the smooth talking, suave,
opportunistic, morally neutral old school friend of his.
Naseeruddin Shah as Rajaram, the good soul, the eternal dogooder, working as a clerk in a mercantile firm, living in a Bombay
(now Mumbai) chawl, where there is collective sharing of joy and
occasional grief, where the families are huddled together in a
small space, living happily, literally cheek-by-jowl, is superb in an
author-backed role. He is in love with his neighbours daughter,
Sandhya (Deepti Naval), but his innate shyness and old-world
values of never ever expressing oneself so openly in such delicate
matters, comes in the way of opening his heart and expressing his
feelings towards her; he remains, as Deepti Naval painfully
bemoans when at the end tragedy strikes her of being so cruelly
betrayed by the suave, slick operator, Basu, that he (Rajaram
Joshi) always remained a distant, respectful Rajaramji for her, and
not a more endearing Rajaram, and what use was of so much
goodness that only does harm to oneself. Enters the smoothtalking, worldly-wise, clever and suave, Basu Bhatt (Farookh
Shaikh), who cons his way into the hearts of the chawl residents,
freeloads on his friend even to the point of helping himself
with his money as if it was his own, manages to sweet talk his
way to escape payment and probably escape a sound thrashing
after a sumptuous meal. He even smooth talks and impresses the
boss of Rajaram to offer him an executive's job (in fact, he
manages to become the superior to Rajaram in the same
company, without any qualification worth the name - quite an
amazing achievement indeed!), including winning the favour of
Sandhya and her love, and how he turns the staid, predictable,
monotonous, commonplace and straight-forward world of Rajaram
upside down and how the good finally triumphs, after all the trials
and tribulations, over charlatanism and double dealings and
simple, plain cheating, is the delightful tale of Katha.
Despite leaving us with an impression as we watch the film that
being slow and steady, the tortoise (Rajaram) would come up
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triumphs at the end, Katha is not a simple moralistic tale of good

guy winning in the long run; or, conversely, those who con their
way through, befool people, play with their emotions, cause
heartbreaks, betray the trust and faith reposed in them, with
nonchalance and insouciance and with a kind of jauntiness and
breeziness that leaves one cold, are not always the losers. Well,
not always! In the opening sequence, Leela Mishra as old granny
narrates the fable to her grandchild, reminding him that in the
real world, the tortoise seldom wins and it is the clever hare that
generally has the last laugh. And the film unfolds and takes us
through this uncomfortable and painful reality of Rajarams
increasing troubles and predicaments, despite his so much
goodness, to the realization that the hare is hardly the loser, we
feel sorry for him. Rajaram suffers in silence as Sandhyas parents
decide to get their daughter married to the super-suave Basu, not
knowing the danger lurking around the corner, of his slippery
character, of his dodgy past. We always get the feeling that the
tortoise would somehow tide over this misery and get his beloved.
But how? Till the twist in the tale with Basu suddenly disappearing
into fine air, brings home another tragic turn of events and a
bitter-sweet ending. With the engagement between Basu and
Sandhya being called off and the parents devastated and in grief,
Rajaram offers to marry Sandhya, but she tells him that she had
been very intimate with Basu and is perhaps pregnant with the
child of Basu. Rajaram as we know at the beginning of the film
and all through, simple and well-meaning and a trifle nave, shows
his maturity and may be greatness, when he admits his love for
her, long hidden in his heart and never mustering courage to
express it to Sandhya. The story ends with the couple being
happily married off. The tortoise has won, after a long, tortuous
run, with so many pitfalls on the way and finally the good and the
virtuous triumphs, but not before making the tortoise suffer and
also drives the painful realization that the hare does not pay for
his indiscretions and betrayals in this morally vacuous world and
is on his way to con others in another time and space.
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What causes discomfort to the viewers that Basu, the ever fast
talker and ever impressing people with his boastful lies, manages
to ply his wares elsewhere - having been thoroughly exposed after
promising marriage to Sandhya and disappearing before they
were supposed to tie the nuptial knot, without ever having any
moral compunction of having betrayed her of more conning and
smooth-talking perhaps others in another place and time, now
buzzing off to the Gulf, as the plane is seen to be heading there.
Basu is hardly the loser at the end, not getting his just deserts, so
to say, as it should have been, from the shell-shocked chawl
residents, who are crestfallen as well as livid with rage as to how
could a charlatan, be so ungrateful - seducing Sandhya and then
leaving her on the wedding day - deceive them and play with their
emotions when they had showered so much love and affection on
him and how could a person show no remorse, be so amoral and
carry on with life with so much nonchalance, so much brazenness!
It is also touching that the entire community of residents join in
the sorrow and grief of Sandhya's family and stand rock solid
behind them.
Sai Paranjpes etching of characters was nuanced and layered and
built on exploring shades of humanity as Basu is not shown
getting his comeuppance even after having played with the
emotions of those who trusted him and letting them down; he is
not treated as an outright villain, as we normally witness in the
run-of-the-mill commercial cinema with contrived plots and loads
of melodrama, where the evil finally meets its match and pays for
the misdeeds and the audience goes home happy with the belief
that all is well with the world! In that respect, she blurred and
obliterated the distinction between mainstream and parallel
cinema.
Paranjpes depiction of middle class existence in the chawls or
low-cost tenements, originally meant for the factory workers,
about the daily lives of ordinary people in the seventies of the last
century, was so authentic, so realistic, so believable and so
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touching that in this narrative-driven film, one gets absorbed by

the small happenings and everyday occurrences in the humdrum
life in the chawls and gets captivated by the story and the
characters who keep the film alive and never lets the attention
sagging. It is worth a repeat view, such was the charm Sai
Paranjpes genre of middle-of-the road cinema, of middle class
aesthetics and sensibilities.
As Mumbai has become far more rich and wealthy, like never
before, and as swanky glasshouses, glistening skyscrapers, multimillion luxury apartments increasingly dot the landscape and as
old tenements and chawls in the heart of the city are making way
for gated communities of super rich, the film captures a slice of
urban existence, of communitarian and collective living, of
sharing of joys and sorrows, that is receding into history and is
fast fading into oblivion. Therein, it acquires poignancy as never
before and makes compulsive viewing, if not anything, for
nostalgia and for sheer joy that such films were once made. The
cinema which is now only catering to a section of affluent urban
middle class and their narrow concerns of unbridled consumerism,
of their desire to be incessantly entertained, has long since
stopped looking into the larger issues of social and economic
realities afflicting the majority. Sadly, the films of Sai Paranjpe and
others of her genre have today no takers and so also are lost the
simple tales of ordinary, humdrum existence, the films, made on
small budget and boasting of no great stars, that had no tinseltown gloss, no candy-floss romance, no grandiose happenings and
no larger-than-life characters, and were so close to reality.
There was a story behind Sai Paranjapes naming the smoothtalking character of Farookh Shaikh as Basu, as Sai was very
annoyed with producer Basu Bhattacharya, the maker of such
films like Teesri Kasam and Aaviskar, when the release of her
earlier film Sparsh got delayed. To spite Bhattacharya, Paranjpe
named Farooque Shaikh's character, which had negative shades,
Basu Bhatt.
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The film had impeccable performances from an ensemble cast of

Naseeruddin Shah, Farookh Shaikh and Deepti Naval and by all
those residents of the chawl where the film was crafted with so
much care, attention and love.