What Ajay Devgn-starrer football drama 'Maidaan' got wrong

Jaydeep Basu

The Indian audience is no stranger to sports films. Several such films have hit the market in the past two decades; ‘MS Dhoni: The Untold Story’, ‘Dangal’, ‘Chak de! India’, ‘Mary Kom’, ‘Bhaag Milkha Bhaag’, ‘83’, etc, have made a significant impact.

‘Maidaan’, directed by Amit Ravindernath Sharma and based on the life of legendary football coach Syed Abdul Rahim (1909-63), is the latest addition to the list. It is a well-made sports movie with several realistic football-playing scenes. Ajay Devgn has dished out an exemplary performance in the lead role.

That’s that. The film makes it clear that it’s based on a true story, with a disclaimer that it is a work of fiction inspired by true events. Though the makers of ‘Maidaan’ have done a tremendous job of reviving the memory of a forgotten hero of Indian football, it also leaves a lingering doubt whether they have truly done justice to coach SA Rahim and his team of the 1962 Asian Games, who won the gold medal under adverse conditions in Jakarta.

The film has somewhat taken a shortcut route to evoke sympathy for Rahim and to generate passion for his 16-member squad, which clinched India’s last Asian Games football gold medal. In doing so, the film has repeatedly discarded simple facts and added fiction. The idea was definitely to make it more dramatic. Agreed, but in doing so, it has ignored some well-documented facts that could have ignited more excitement in the film.

Promoting the lead character as a patient with a terminal disease who is ready to take life head-on is an old trick the Indian audience is used to watching from the days of Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s ‘Anand’. A similar formula has been used here to garner sympathy for Rahim, who coughed and vomited blood for the better part of the film, especially during India’s 1962 Asian Games campaign. The fact remains that Rahim and his family became aware of his having contracted lung cancer only after he returned from Jakarta and consulted a specialist.

But then, the director has taken the cinematic licence to make things more emotion-charged and he has the right to do so. But the film ignored the true story of the 1962 Asian Games final, packed with real-life drama that could have thrilled the audience more.

The Indian football team was virtually a friendless lot in the final, with nearly a hundred thousand spectators baying for India’s blood. Since the final was on the last day of the Games, the rest of the Indian contingent had already left. Surprisingly, in the corner of the VIP stands, a bunch of 20 people constantly rooted for India. They were the members of the Pakistan hockey team, who beat India the previous day.

Seated in the stands were two Indian Army officers from the Indian Embassy. As a few people around them made derogatory remarks about India, the two officers protested vehemently, and it almost reached the point of a physical confrontation. The security men had to intervene and separate the two groups.

It was not the end of the drama. After India registered a dominant 2-1 victory and the medal ceremony was over, two players of the playing eleven, Tulsidas Balaram and Fortunato Franco, didn’t board the team bus and decided to walk to the Games Village through the crowd with the medals hanging from their necks. Their idea was to directly take on the anti-India slogan shouters.

Fortunately, the duo reached the Games Village safely. All these facts could have added more punch to the story of India’s historic triumph.

Jarnail Singh has been projected as a typified Sikh youngster, happy-go-lucky, yet immensely courageous. In Jakarta, he was more than what has been shown; he was the chief executor of Rahim’s plans. An established stopper back, Jarnail was suddenly converted into a centre-forward by Rahim for the semi-finals and the final. With 10 stitches on his head from the injury he suffered against Thailand, Jarnail scored brilliant goals in both matches. It was, perhaps, the greatest deed of an Indian footballer in the international arena and the biggest masterstroke of Rahim, who could turn anything he touched into gold.

There are a series of factual errors in the movie for no apparent reason. That India trailed by a goal in the final and conceded a fictional penalty does not really add to the drama. Does it sound mundane to say India dominated the match and pumped in two goals within 20 minutes? Was it fair to say that the legendary Arun Ghosh (who is still with us) scored an own goal (which was never there) in an Olympic encounter? Once again, kudos to the director for highlighting this phase of Indian football. But given his proven competence, he could have done better.

— The writer is a sports journalist and author