| Mumbai - December 22, 2000. |
Cover
Story
Wtriters & Writing |
 |
|
Kamleshwar
He was, still known and will always be known as one of the founding
fathers of modern Hindi literature. He came to films and at one
time looked like starting a trend in Hindi films too. He came, he
wrote, he was one of the most successful and sensitive writers in
Hindi cinema but then success or something more poisonous went to
his head. He followed his own principles. He dictated terms to some
of the most successful directors. He wrote himself to extinction
"only because of his massive ego trips, his long walks down
hallucination lane. It was a time when he believed that he was a
saint, a magician and a miracle worker all rolled into one. A time
came when he was not wanted. And he too didn’t want the industry.
He left Mumbai and went to Delhi where I hope he is back to writing
the kind of writing that made him immortal in the pages of Hindi
literature. Kamleshwar.
Can anyone who knows anything about Hindi literature and films say
that he or she has never heard of him, his name, a name he made
through his writings both in literature and films? He
was a reluctant entrant. He didn’t want to write for Hindi
films. He felt it was stooping too low for a writer of his calibre
to write for films which were nothing but "opium for the masses".
He was Kamleshwar the "guru" of a "gurukul"
of his own. How could he fall? How could he become the laughing
stock of his fellow giants, other fellow writers who refused to
come to films or came, tried, found it miserable and washed their
hands clean because their writing for films was not considered saleable. Kamleshwar,
was, however lured into writing for films by filmmakers like Dr.
Ramanand Sagar, Dr BR Chopra, Saawan Kumar and even a writer like
Gulzar. Kamleshwar
was an all-rounder. He could write original stories (who wanted
original stories?). He was good at writing screenplays and even
dialogues. He wrote very well in the initial stages. That was when
he was given the freedom to write what he wanted to, write sense.
But he gradually fell into a net, fell for all kind of temptations
and was soon and sadly a part of all those writers who were known
as writers but didn’t write and atleast didn’t write the
way they should have with their strong background in literature
were supposed to write. Kamleshwar
tried his best to give Hindi films a touch of class. He tried to
write the way he wrote his short stories which were translated into
various languages all over the world but that is not what the money
bags wanted. They wanted writing that sold, writing that appealed
to the masses and the tragedy was that neither they nor Kamleshwar
really knew what the masses wanted. The films he wrote for the best
of filmmakers flopped at the box-office. He realised that writing
for films and writing the way that made him Kamleshwar, a pioneer,
a founder of a trend of writing were two different disciplines .
He changed and compromised till he could, but no further. He could
not make compromises beyond the compromises he had already made.
He couldn’t work like a munshi (a clerk) who was dictated to
sometimes by one and many times by a number of `bosses’. He
than switched over to television which was just coming up and believe
me his was the first chat shows (Parikrama) which was as popular
or even more popular than KBC today. He brought out the stark truths
of life. He treated bold and controversial subjects that no one
else had touched in the media, both print and electronic. The unusual
success of Parikrama stormed every Hindi speaking house and unfortunately
stormed his head too. He tried making other serials. He was among
the first to start a company to produce serials but they didn’t
do well. Kamleshwar was one of the greatest writers in Indian literature,
will always be known as one but he was not made for films. He was
too sensitive. He couldn’t suffer fools. He couldn’t force
himself to write what his heart refused to co-operate with. Everytime
he tried, he found other "known" people making Kamleshwar
look like a small man. Finding fault with Kamleshwar, the writer
who once said he could cure the sick, like Christ, the Kamleshwar
who said there were women who were so madly in love with him that
they even begged of him to bless their children became a common
pastime among other writers who were no writers when compared to
him. It was agonising. Kamleshwar who watched the ways of the world and got lost in a haze, earned a lot of criticism and a lot of money, and no satisfaction, the price he had to pay. Kamleshwar the writer is still alive, still active. He could have been one of the greatest writers of Hindi films today when we need good writers like him but fate or call it what you may did not allow him to make a niche for himself in films the way he had done in literature. Ali Peter John |
|
