Innocence and Exploitation: Two Movies
Mandakini in Ram Teri Ganga I watched Ram Teri Ganga Maili in Lonavala, a hill station near Mumbai. I was a hotel management trainee at an international hotel at that time. It was a weekday in the winter of 1985-86 and the golden sunlight kissed the arid landscape to a mild temperature. There weren’t many guests in the hotel and we were totally relaxed. Along with two friends, I bunked off to watch the movie in a theatre that was at walking distance. A decade and a half later, I watched another Hindi movie, Taal , along with Maggie in Shillong, another hill station, more than 2000 km from Lonavala. Watching a movie in a Shillong theatre was quite a daring venture for nontribal folk like us. The whole air was redolent of animosity towards dkhars , outsiders, as we were called by the local populace. Both the movies present hill-folk as innocent and simple. The mountains in both are not just a romantic backdrop; they symbolise purity, simplicity, and a life in harmony with na...
