ANOKHA PYAAR (1948): Why were there No Villains in Indian Society?

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A typical plot of a popular movie, irrespective of the language in which it is made, has a hero and a villain. This is perhaps the greatest difference between a popular movie plot and real life. In the world that we live, everyone has his own mills to grind, and with the exception of criminal elements, the exploitation of one by another is incidental to the imperfections of society. What we term destiny, is generally a set of circumstances beyond the control of anyone in particular, and can either be pleasant or unfortunate.
In a way, the movies of the time reflect this maturity of the society. In the 1940s, when India earned its independence on one hand and suffered the unexpected trauma and suffering of partition on the other, the movies were still brimming with positive overtones of a generation that was hopeful, confident, hard working and even innovative, but had not yet lost the compassion and selflessness of a civilization that was called India. ANOKHA PYAAR (1948), a simple movie based on a triangular love story, has all these elements.

Nargis & Nalini Jaywant in the 1948 Hindi Movie, ANOKHA PYAR, a tale of traingular love, also starring Dilip Kumar

ANOKHA PYAAR is a 1948 Hindi movie starring Dilip Kumar, Nargis and Nalini Jaywant. It is essentially a simple story of triangular love with an interesting dynamic of class division thrown in between. Like most movies of the period between 1947 and 1950, while the country was in the process of establishing itself as a new independent nation and the society was adopting to this new notion of freedom from colonial exploitation, the Hindi movie industry, which was still not called Bollywood, was also taking major strides. The social milieu that provides the background is also simple, and yet, it provides several insights about the people of those times, what they aspired for and how they dealt with the day to day challenges.

The Plot

The movie begins with Bindiya (Nalini Jaywant), a poor young girl who makes a living by selling flowers, trying to sell some to Ashok (Dilip Kumar), a young writer, who is sitting in the same garden from where she collects flowers. He snubs her initially, but later relents and they become friendly. A local goon (Habib), who tries to forcibly take away Bindiya’s earning, is confronted by Ashok when she calls for his help. In the confrontation between the two, Ashok is badly hurt and loses his vision. Bindiya takes him to a Doctor, who treats him, and since he has no place to live nor anyone to take care of him, he keeps him in his own house, where her daughter, Geeta (Nargis) nurses him, and love blossoms between the two. The Doctor, who is dedicated to his profession, is himself a heart patient.

Ashok recovers his visions and leaves with gratitude, only to find Bindiya, who has also developed strong feelings towards him, desperately waiting to meet her. Ashok is not interested in Bindiya, whose all efforts to seek his attention end in vain. He writes a novel about his encounter with Geeta, which becomes a big hit. In the meantime, Doctor suffers a heart attack and dies. Before his death, he calls two of Geeta’s aunts, and hands them the responsibility of looking after Geeta and getting her married. They have their own families to look for, but try their best to find a groom for Geeta.

Geeta sells the house and shifts to a smaller place, and  her aunts fix her marriage with Ramdas, who is a family friend of Doctor and Geeta and also Ashok’s Publisher (Sankatha). Ashok, who is now well off, comes to meet Geeta but finds that no one is there. He hires the house, where he is lost in love for Geeta, saddened and heart broke. Bindiya tries to take care of him, but he ignores her, leaving her heart broken and despondent. She takes to bed. A chance meeting at a party given by Ashok’s Publisher brings Ashok and Geeta together.

There is initially some misunderstanding between them, which they get over with. It is then, that Geeta comes across Bindiya and realizes how badly she is in love with Ashok. She tries to make way for her by going away from Ashok, but that makes Ashok extremely desperate.

The climax is a struggle between triangular love, compassion, selflessness and sacrifice.

A Tragedy without Villains

The core of movie is a tale of triangular love affair, which is not very different from the innumerable repetitions of this story that Bollywood audiences have witnessed since this movie was made seventy years ago. One of the striking features of this movie, is that apart from that goon who hits Ashok in the beginning of the movie, there is virtually no negative character in it. This absence of a villain in a tragic movie is a conspicuous rarity, and one of the primary reasons that make its worth our attention. However, if we look at the manner in which most tragedies take place in real life, it seems surprising why we have not seen this phenomenon more often in our movies, and why it is so rare in tragic movies, not only in India but perhaps around the world. In real life, most tragedies are not caused by villains. Chain of events or unfortunate happening are generally enough to cause tragedies in real life. It seems that the traditional Indian society accepted this reality better than the individualistic urbanites of this century.

The movie flows with characters that are simple, and in the twenty first century, may not even seem fully credible. However, for the time to which they belong, they are as normal and usual as people really  used to be. The Indian society of the forties was far from a perfect one. Yet, its social fabric had a strength that the twenty first century India may not be able to even perceive. The Doctor, who is ready to risk his own life for his work, the old ladies who are trying their best to find a groom for Geeta, and the young write who is ready to defend a poor girl in trouble, are just examples that did exist in those times. Equally interesting is how the hero gets beaten up by the bad man, and yet remains a hero, a phenomenon you will never see in a Bollywood movie today. In 1948, heroism did not require being a physical superman. On the contrary, being honest, passionate, compassionate and loyal was good enough for being a hero in the society!

Another interesting aspect of this movie is the class differentiation. There is an obvious difference in Ashok’s attitude between the two girls who fall for him. He is almost dismissive of Bindiya, the beautiful but poor flower girl, right from the word go and never takes her seriously or even realizes that she is in love with him. On the other hand, he is overawed by Geeta, who belongs to a social class that he aspires to become a part of. In 1948, this was an acceptable reality, and one that has been gradually dismantled over the years. This is not the only movie of that time that shows this phenomenon, other examples are DEEDAR (1951), AANDHIYAN (1952) and AMAR (1954). Class differentiation was one of the weaknesses of the contemporary Indian society of 1940s.

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Epilogue

The movie has three young stars of the time. Nargis and Nalini Jaywant were two of the most beautiful and accomplished actresses of that time, and their acting and performance can any day fit in any movie of any time. Dilip Kumar is excellent, both as a bubbly writer flirting with his two leading ladies and as a heart broken lover. This movie may have been one of the reasons why Bimal Rai opted for him a few years later in DEVDAS (1955), in another tragic triangular love epic, which earned him the title of the tragedy king. In between, of course, there was another movie, DEEDAR (1953), which was also a triangular love story starring Dilip Kumar with Nargis and Nimmi.