Lights, camera, Shivaji as history meets politics in Maha
MUMBAI: At least 12 films on the life of the 17th century Maratha hero, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, are in the works in several of Mumbai’s dream factories. Marathi film trade experts assess that over ₹120 crore is riding on the warrior king.
This despite the fact that just last week Maharashtra’s former housing minister, Jitendra Awhad, was arrested along with 100 workers of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) after he disrupted a screening of the recently released Marathi film, Har Har Mahadev , at a mall in Thane. The movie tells the story of the real-life battle of Pavan Khind that took place on July 13, 1660, during which a small band of Chhatrapati Shivaji’s army, led by Baji Prabhu Deshpande, fought the forces of the Bijapur Sultanate for over six hours to help Shivaji escape. Deshpande, Shivaji’s general and the hero of the film, was killed on the battlefield.
Several Maratha organisations, including the militant Sambhaji Brigade, have claimed the film is historically inaccurate. In 2003, the same Sambhaji Brigade ransacked Pune’s Bhandarkar Oriental Institute (BORI) and desecrated several valuable texts after the publication of historian James Laine’s book on Shivaji. Sambhaji Brigade which has the tacit backing of the NCP and Sharad Pawar, a Maratha himself, contended that BORI helped Laine perpetuate a Brahmanical view of Shivaji’s ancestry. That attack had a chilling effect on most scholars. Writer Vaibhav Purandare, whose book on Shivaji came after two decades of the Laine attack, said, “You have to be very meticulous and careful while writing about Shivaji. I based my book on historical facts and relied on primary sources and the records that exist. However, filmmakers who take any of kind of creative license can easily get into trouble today.”
Why the schisms of the early 18th century are playing out in the 21st has everything to do with the Marathas being the state’s dominant caste. They constitute 31% of the state’s population and political power has traditionally vested in them. Bal Thackeray’s Shiv Sena wooed them while the bulk of Congress party’s chief ministers, Sharad Pawar included, have been Marathas. The rise of the BJP since 2014, and especially that of Devendra Fadnavis, a brahmin from Nagpur, has altered the balance of power, though Fadnavis has himself been keen to win over the community’s support.
In 2018, in his first stint as chief minister, Fadnavis introduced 16% Maratha quota, a longstanding demand, which was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2021. After the EWS quota order in the Supreme Court, the state government has renewed its efforts to give reservation to Marathas.
Last week, the Shinde-fadnavis government also announced that they have written to the UK government asking for the repatriation of Shivaji’s sword, Jagdamba, once given to King Edward VII.
As Maharashtra’s politics gets increasingly fractious and fragmented, Shivaji remains the lodestar with all political parties claiming allegiance to his legacy. Even Raj Thackeray (Thackerays are Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhus or CKPS) has announced that he will be producing a three-part Shivaji biopic. Last fortnight, both he and chief minister Eknath Shinde were present at the launch of actor-director-producer Mahesh Manjrekar’s Marathi film Vedat Marathe Veer Daulade Saat in which Akshay Kumar will play Shivaji. Most of these films are slated for release in 2024, coinciding with Lok Sabha and assembly elections. “The enduring mystique of Shivaji comes from the fact that he’s the creator of a sovereign Maratha state who sowed the seeds of the downfall of the Mughal empire and changed the political architecture of the Deccan and of the subcontinent,” said Purandare.
Given that Shivaji Maharaj died at the early age of 50 and ruled as Chhatrapati only for six years, the filmmakers have to work imaginatively to mine different aspects of his life. Marathi filmmaker Ravi Jadhav is working on a film on his childhood called Bal Shivaji. Nagraj Manjule, director of Sairat, who is known for his razor-sharp take on caste politics, and Riteish Deshmukh, son of former chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, are collaborating on a trilogy based on Shivaji’s life. They have been registered as Shivaji, Shivaji Maharaj and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. Another Marathi filmmaker Amol Kolhe’s Shivpratap Garudzep, a film about Shivaji and Afzal Khan, which released in October and has been a hit, has announced two sequels — Shivpratap Waghnakh and Shivpratap Bichhua. Film producer Akshay Bardapurkar’s Moghul Mardini Chhatrapati Tararani, starring actress Sonali Kulkarni, is under production, and tells the story of Shivaji’s courageous daughter-in-law Tararani.
“Today, we are witnessing the empowerment of women in almost every walk of life. Even the president of India is a woman. The younger generation will be able to relate to the story of Tararani,” said Bardapurkar. “Movies based on various aspects of Chhatrapati Shivaji’s life are always a crowd puller.” Other than politics, this slew of Shivaji films is helping boost business for the Marathi film industry which is still reeling from the after-effects of the pandemic. Bardapurkar, who also owns a Marathi OTT platform, says he is investing ₹60 crore in various Shivaji films.
Yet another Marathi filmmaker, Digpal Lanjekar, has dedicated himself to making a total of eight films on the Maratha king. Of these he has already released four: Farzand in 2018 which grossed an estimated ₹10 crore at the box office followed by Fatteshikast in 2019 and Pavan Khind and Sher Shivraj this year. “I am not a person who is looking for business while making a movie on Shivaji Maharaj. His life story is vast and any point can be picked to make a film, but a filmmaker should ensure that they should stick to historical facts,” he cautioned, refusing to be drawn into the controversy over Har Har Mahadev based on the battle of Pavan Khind, which he has already tackled in his film of the same name.
But the idea of historical veracity itself is being revisited when it comes to Shivaji. In these revisionist times, there is a view that the narrative of Shivaji’s life has been controlled by Brahmins in Mahrashtra whether it’s by historians such as Vasudeo Sitaram Bendre and Krishnarao Keluskar, or by popular shiv shahirs or balladeer such as Babasaheb Purandare, who died in November last year.
However, it’s also a fact that Shivaji’s life story is intrinsically linked with Brahminical figures — his guru was Ramdas, as was another of his influential teachers Dadoji Konnadeo. Like any other history of India, it remains difficult to view Shivaji’s life too from any one caste or community’s perspective.