Dowry anyone? A movie story
Last week Babul was released with widow re-marriage as its base subject.
The led me to seeking out more women issues that plagues India. My search took me to the dowry issue. I looked up the judiciary system and found Indian Penal Code 498a, the anti-dowry law. Following is an excerpt of the same
“Whoever, being the husband or the relative of the husband of a woman, subjects such woman to cruelty shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and shall also be liable to fine. The offence is Cognizable, non-compoundable and non-bailable.”
As per the law if a woman lodges a complaint against her husband or in-laws (or anyone else), there is now way in hell they can run away. They are presumed guilty till proven innocent.
Hundred of movies have been made denouncing dowry and are in favor of this law.
But no movie has questioned the abuse of this law by women and their families. The numbers of false complaints filed by women with intent of gaining wealth, divorce or custody of children are on the rise.
There is a damn good story to be told here. So my wish it that someone makes a movie with the following story
Movie prior to the Interval (has to have one as it is Hindi movie)
Young Madhu is from a middle class family living in a city like Poona. Her father (Mr. Gopal Dutt) is working for Hindustan Fertilizer as an accountant for the past 30 years. Her elder brother, Rakesh, a good for nothing bum who only devises way of get rich without a sweat. All’s well with this happy family.
One day our hero (Abhishek Sawant) bumps into Madhu on a PMT bus stop and falls head over heels with her. He is an upcoming executive with a MNC and only son of the wealthy Sawants. To get his lady-love he starts to woe her in every Bollywood fashion till she relents. (Some songs will happen here)
Once his love is reciprocated he has his parents ask Madhu’s family for her hand in marriage. Lady-love’s father and brother are delighted and consent to this holy matrimony.
Hero and heroine have a jhat mangi, pat biya and go off to Goa for honeymoon. Here they sing, dance and make merry.
Interval. And a complete about-turn of the story.
Hero gets a big break and goes of to Dubai to do a special project of 10 months. As he would be traveling a lot he asks his wife to stay back. Being a director of a reputed firm he makes huge money which he sends back to his wife, who in turns starts blowing it all away on jewelry, clothes cosmetic, clothes and every frivolous activity.
The in-laws watch all this while being concerned of financial well-being other their son. After reaching a saturation point (Madhu coming home drunk with some guy) they inform their son of his wife’s kartook. So hero packs his bag and comes back home without informing anyone about his return. He spies on his wife’s activates. Gathering enough evidence he confronts her and asks for an explanation. She just shrugs him off and asks for more money.
Not able to take this insult he tells her he is going to divorce her and will not part with any more money.
Heroine somehow manages to get a hold of all the evidence against her and destroys it. Once done she goes to the cops to lodge a complaint that her husband has been asking for dowry (items like a new car, Rs 5 lacs and some more items) since their marriage. As her father does not make that kind of money from his measly job and her brother being a bum her family was not able to pay up. Plus she was tortured by her in-laws in her husband’s absence.
Next thing the cops arrest the husband and his parents under IPC 498a. They call in heroine’s brother and father to ascertain the complaints. Surprise of surprises both of them back the heroine and make claims that indeed the hero’s family had demanded dowry on several occasions.
Now for the flashback.
Knowing that Hero comes from a well to do family, the brother had hatched a plot with his sister get married and embezzle the wealth and live life king-size. Everything was going fine till the threat of divorce. The whole deal was a con devised by the father. He actually never worked anywhere but was the King Con. They had played this card with different rich folks across the country. Father, Gopal Dutt, has never worked in his lifes other than doing con jobs.
The Ending
1. My choice: – The con people get away and are showing running another one in Calcutta while Hero and family rot in jail for 3 years.
2.Will be loved by audience: – Hero is able to prove that this was a con. All 3 con artists are arrested and sentenced.
3.Alternative: – Unable to prove his innocence Hero kills his wife and in-laws. Gives himself up to cops, takes all the blame and has his parents released.
Writers like Anurag (Satya was a top drawer act) can develop this story and directors like Suparn can give it a fantastic look (Ek hasina thee was a very good movie)
Actors I like to see doing this movie
Madhu - Rani Mukherjee
Abhishek – Abhishek Bachan
Brother – Arshad Warsi
Father – Dalip Tahil
In-laws - Can be anyone as they don’t have much role to play
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
OMG….Let us ask Karan Razdan to direct this…lol …kidding Muzzy…
The interval needs to be at some point where Madhu comes drunk…
Anyway, Muzzy, this kind of story will be welcome in Bollywood, I guess…
There have been numerous dowry films, and its a played out issue on television and film. Still, dowry hasn’t gone away, although that whole “raising awareness” thing is supposed to imply that it has gone away. If only the media was that persuasive.
Well they are, but not for these sort of issues. Watch tv during diwali and wedding season lately? Lotta insurance ads, the widowed mother, talking to the portrait of the dead husband, telling him how good it was of him to get life insurance. In the background is the wedding, and look, there’s a brand new car with a ribbon on it, stereo set, television and many more things for the groom.
Oh…right right. They’re just gifts, is all.
Misuse of laws, misuse of powers all this is Indian ethos, people enjoy it till their neighbour is hurt and start shouting foul when they themselves are in net.
This world needs brothel – GOD has created India to fulfill that need.