Delhi delight

Mumbai’s parochial grip on cinema’s cultural landscape seems to be losing with Delhi 
emerging as a favourite backdrop, writes Shakuntala Rao

In Dibakar Banerjee’s Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!, Delhi is the centrepiece of storytelling

IT was Mohammad Zauq, the famed 19th century poet from Delhi, who wrote, with much flair (and some condescension), "Kaun jaye Zauq Dilli ki galiyan chor ke." Zauq, of course, wrote and lived in Delhi when Mumbai was a quaint city port rather than the heart of the largest movie industry in the world and Delhi was both the political and cultural capital of the subcontinent.

Unlike brother Hollywood where New York and Los Angeles — the bicoastal cities — have asserted comparable panoramic space, no city except Mumbai has had much presence in the world of Hindi films. Unlike Chennai and Hyderabad that had their own prolific indigenous film industries, Delhi remained more of a Hindi theatre and Urdu poetry town.

I remember how excited we would be as children if one film showed a scene of Delhi. Few can recall, except old Delhites, when Rajesh Khanna drove down Rajpath in a convertible in the opening scene of 1971 film, Haathi Mere Saathi. While several non-mainstream films like Gharonda and Rajnigandha were the first to feature Delhi as backdrops, images of Delhi were marginal in Mumbai films.

The last few years, Mumbai filmmakers have (finally, I exclaim) discovered Delhi. Several reasons could be contributing factors. A number of Delhites are now part of the mega movie business including the industry’s two biggest stars, Shah Rukh Khan and Akshay Kumar, and established directors like Dibakar Banerjee and Rakeysh Mehra.

It was in Mehra’s hit film, Rang De Basanti, where Delhi got the kind of exposure not seen in Mumbai films before. India Gate, first built by the British to commemorate fallen Indian and British soldiers in the two World Wars, made its appearance in a forceful manner; since then, India Gate — as depicted in Rang De Basanti — has become a place of social protests.

In both of Banerjee’s films, Khosla Ka Ghosla and Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!, Delhi is the centerpiece of storytelling and provides much cinematographic delight. Subhash Ghai’s Black and White also captured the charm of Delhi in its own inimitable manner and Ismail Merchant in the film, Muhafiz (based on Anita Desai’s novel, In Custody), tried to replicate the post-independence era of Delhi with its vanishing culture of poetry, literature, and music.

In Mehra’s more recent, tepidly reviewed, Delhi 6, the city makes its most creative mark. For the uninitiated, Delhi 6 is the pin code of old Delhi, the area around Chandni Chowk and Red Fort. In the film, Mehra rekindles not only the architectural beauty of old Delhi — frequent scenes of the fort, Jama Masjid in the distance — but also lives within the havelis and katras where communities, castes, and religions coalesce. While Delhi 6 was tempered by, as all recent Bollywood films, the presence of an NRI from (where else), America, the success of the film is less his metamorphosis into a Dilliwala as in Delhi’s profound and poetic presence in every scene, delectably inserted with panoramic shots of jalebis and Ramleela.

The slew of films — Delhi 6, Chandni Chowk to China, and the forthcoming Delhi Belly — is finally expected to break Mumbai’s parochial grip on cinema’s cultural landscape.

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