Role
Model
A review of a ten memorable roles that made the Hindi film heroine proud.

MOTHER INDIA (1957)
This was undoubtedly a role-of-a-lifetime for Nargis and made her the stereotype of the Indian woman and her never-say-die spirit. After her husband’s cowardly desertion during a famine, Radha moves heaven and earth to feed her hungry children, clothe their naked bodies and mould them into becoming good human beings. When the younger boy and her favourite son, Birju rebels against convention and attempts to abduct a village virgin, in a burst of righteous anger Radha guns him down in an unforgettable climax. The strength and endurance of Mother India is akin to that of Mother Earth. And the picture of a grimy, sweaty Nargis towing a plough through barren land has become one of Hindi cinema’s most enduring images.

SEETA AUR GEETA (1972)
A regular commercial film what made Seeta Aur Geeta special was that this was the first time the heroine or should we say heroines, took on the mantle of the hero. Hema Malini sang, danced, fought, humoured, earned, rebelled and cried with such aplomb that Dharmendra and Sanjeev Kumar were reduced to becoming mere ‘supporting’ actors. Seeta Aur Geeta paved the way for similar films like Chalbaaz and Kuch Khatti Kuch Meethi that proved equally enjoyable.

SAU DIN SAAS KE (1980)
The issue was sensitive, yet sadly, a common one. A daughter-in-law from a poor family not bringing in enough dowry, is tortured mercilessly by her mother-in-law. What made Sau Din Saas Kie a landmark film was Reena Roy enacting the role of the tormented bahu, defying conventions to oppose her tyrant saas and transform her from mother-in-law to mother.

INSAAF KA TARAZU (1980)
Never before had the trauma and humiliation of rape been depicted as effectively as in this film. Zeenat Aman essayed the role of woman who has to pay a very heavy price for her beauty. She is brutally raped by an admirer, Raj Babbar. History repeats itself with her sister, Padmini Kolhapure. The second violation becomes the irrevocable nail in the coffin — the coffin of the rapist. Zeenat unlike her cine-predecessors, doesn’t entertain any thoughts of suicide. She refuses to be cowed down by social pressures. She files a case against the rapist and has no qualms about baring herself in front of the world. She only suffers another rape, this time publicly in the courtroom. When she’s denied justice by society she becomes the lady of justice herself, holding the scales—the insaaf ka tarazu in her hand. However, she is no longer blind or blindfolded and ends up giving the rapist the punishment he’s due.

ARTH (1983)
Must a woman always need the shoulder of a man to lean on? Not always, discovers Pooja (Shabana Azmi) the protagonist of Arth. Bruised by her husband’s infidelity, Pooja initially wallows in self-pity, afraid to make a life without her husband. But a true friend, Raj Kiran, helps her re-discover herself and when her maid is imprisoned for murdering her husband, she becomes a mother to her “orphaned” daughter. By the end of the film Pooja is at peace with herself and has found the strength to live alone and be an anchor to a helpless child. Refusing the temptation of seeking support from another male crutch, she gently turns down Raj Kiran’s proposal and walks away into the sunset...holding the the hand of her new-found daughter.

EK PAL (1986)
It is loneliness and pent-up passion that drives a woman (Shabana Azmi) into a brief affair. When she joyfully tells her lover that she’s pregnant, he scuttles away like a frightened rat in a sinking ship. When her husband (Naseeruddin Shah) returns, he is delighted to find his much-loved wife in an advanced stage of pregnancy and jumps to the obvious conclusion that the child is his. But the burden of living life based on a lie is far too heavy for her to shoulder, and she makes a clean breast of her momentary weakness well aware that her confession could end her marriage. It doesn’t.

KHOON BHARI MAANG (1980)
Inspired by an English film, Return to Eden, Khoon Bhari Maang was the story of a rich plain Jane who is pushed into the snapping jaws of a host of crocodiles and left for dead by her gold-digger husband. The encounter leaves her physically and mentally disfigured but after a miraculous plastic surgery she returns to her Eden, beautiful and posed, determined to lead her husband to his death. Death at the hands of the crocodiles who had once mauled her. It was an interesting revenge drama, and Rekha as the wronged woman was mesmerising.

DAMINI (1993)
Damini is an ordinary girl-next-door. What makes her extraordinary is her innate honest and integrity. When her maid is raped by her brother-in-law, she refuses to cover up for the hideous crime. Her indignation at the attitude of her in-laws, her sense of betrayal at the quiet acceptance of the crime by her husband and her subsequent tirade to bring the criminal to task, made her a woman to be proud of. More so because she fought for justice even though the victim was ‘just a maid.’

MRITYUDAND
When in Rome, do as Rome does! But three women realise that in their male-dominated village where oppression is a way of life, the old saying just does not apply. Madhuri Dixit’s sudden widowhood makes her an easy prey to the sarpanch’s lecherous intentions. Her sister-in-law, Shabana Azmi has to face hell when after years of loneliness with an impotent and chauvinistic husband, she finds solace and bears a child with another man. Representing the have-nots of society is their maid (Shilpa Shirodkar) who is battered and beaten day in and day out by her husband. The fiery Madhuri Dixit rebels against these atrocities and infests the two women with her fury. Together the three fight against male injustice, and are eventually joined in their battle by the other village women. Their unity is a death wish to the oppressors... a mrityudand.

ASTITVA (2000)
Tabu is a devoted, dutiful wife for whom home is where the husband and heart is. For more than two decades she has quietly lived through her loneliness, even sacrificed her dream of having a career at the insistence of her selfish, workaholic husband (Sachin Khedakar). And she’s rewarded by being roundly abused by her husband for submitting to her music teacher in one solitary moment of weakness. The son who is born from this one-time affair is equally scatching when he learns the truth about his paternity. Quietly, she tries to get them to see her point of view. Alone for months together, she was tormented by her sexual needs. “Are a woman’s desires any different from a man’s? Has her husband never had an affair? Are all her years of devotion and dedication to be nullified for one single moment of weakness? How come they never had another child? Was her husband’s impotency not the reason?” Her questioning tirade manages to strike a chord but by then it is too late. She has decided to step out of her roles as wife and mother and to go into the world to find her astitva—her own identity.

MONICA MOTWANI