Move over, Gabbar: In Swachh Bharat twist to Sholay, open defecation costs Jai his life
JAIPUR: It’s the climactic scene of the 1975 movie, Sholay, where Veeru (played by Dharmendra) returns to find Jai (Amitabh Bachchan) covered in blood. Veeru gathers his friend in his arms and asks: “How did you get so hurt?”
Jai stirs and mumbles: “I don’t have a toilet at home. I injured myself while heading out to defecate at night.”
That doesn’t seem right, does it? Didn’t Gabbar Singh have something to do with Jai’s death?
If one were to go by posters put up by the Chhoti Sadri Municipal Council in south Rajasthan’s Pratapgarh district, answering nature’s call in the open can be just about as harmful as being shot by a dacoit. The civic body has used scenes from several movies starring Bachchan, who happens to be the poster boy of Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, to promote the construction of toilets at home.
Another poster has Shashi Kapoor and Bachchan fighting for their mother’s custody in Deewar (1975), only to be told that she will stay with the son who has bothered to build a toilet at home. And if you thought Anand (1971) wasn’t full of messages, here’s another — Do not litter in the open. Use dustbins.
These posters are part of an initiative launched by munic- ipality executive officer Himanshu Agarwal to ensure that open defecation is eliminated from Chhoti Sadri limits. “I was inspired to use the posters here after seeing them on the social media,” he says.
Agarwal says as many as 1,000 households of the 1,800 in the area have toilets. “We received 800 applications for toilet construction, of which 600 have been completed. In addition to this, 15 public lavatories have been constructed in areas with toilet-less households,” he adds. A similar concept has been adopted in Barmer, where the poster reads: Ghar mein shauchalay banwaya tho beendadi aa gayee (When I built toilet, I got a bride).
Before Chhoti Sadri, it was the Nainital Municipal Corporation in Uttarakhand and Ranchi Municipal Corporation in Jharkhand that used Bachchan movies to promote their sanitation drives.