Words are all I have…
Somya Abrol
“I used to have a leftist bent of mind back in college, but then, practicality kicked in.” Writer Amrik Gill was sure he wanted to stay as away from commercial cinema as possible, even when he moved to Mumbai to assist art film directors, back in 1982, with just Rs 40 in his pocket! Today, Amrik Gill is credited with dialogues of Bollywood films such as Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, Yaadien, Nishabd, Jeet and Main Zinda Hoon among others.
“Art films, I thought, were my calling. So, after specialising in direction from the National School of Drama, Delhi, I left for Mumbai to assist art directors. I stayed with now-famous director Manmohan Singh for a few days and earned a little bit of money doing odd jobs here and there. So, after a couple of months there, I had the money to pay about Rs 5,000 a month for rent, but still couldn’t gather Rs 50,000 for deposit they charge on renting the house. So, railway stations served as my bed at night; cops used to hurl abuses at us in the middle of the night, which made me change four to five stations in one night. Then, I found some cement benches by the roadside, and thought to myself that the police won’t disturb me through the night here. For company there, I had pickpockets, prostitutes and eunuchs. One night, as luck would have it, a police van pulled over beside that road, and one hour later, we found ourselves in a far-off police station. And boy did they beat us all up good! I lost a tooth and some blood from the lip. They obviously wouldn’t believe that an assistant director could be sleeping on the road. After some pleading, they let me call the director I was working for, Mr Lalwani. He was at the thana soon enough; a final call from Shatrugan Sinha ji then finally led to my freedom,” recalls Gill, who has been awarded the IIFA, a Zee Cine Award and a Screen Award for Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, besides a National Award for Main Zinda Hoon.
There on, life started looking up, as his director explained the young boy’s plight to Shatrugan Sinha. “Sinha saab had a flat lying vacant in Bandra where he put me up. So, from sleeping on the roadside one night, I went straight to having a drink at a flat in Bandra the next night!” he adds.
The shift from assistant direction to dialogue writing was natural, “As I had always had the flair to write, a film I did for the Nadiadwala group made me feel that I’ve arrived.”
Gill, who has also been credited with writing various Punjabi films such as Yaaran Naal Bahaaran, Ucha Dar Babe Nanak Da, Mera Pind: My Home, Tera Mera Ki Rishta, Rabb Ne Banaiyan Jodian etc, finally directed his first (Punjabi) film in 2014, Kirpan: The Sword of Honour. Next, he plans to come up with another film, but after a hiatus from direction for a couple of years. “I’m writing a film for Salman Khan right now, and discussed my next project with him. He suggested that I direct all my energies towards writing for a couple of years. When the time is right, the second film shall be out too!”
Will his next project have a leftist character, echoing his young emotions? “I will have such a character in it for sure! How else will we know the difference between pragmatic and dreamers?”
somya@tribunemail.com
