tale of two widows

This article refers to my view on 2 widows one in DOR n the other one in WATER. These two movies state the way in which widows are treated in our ‘cultured’ country.
Each widow has a story to narrate.

In WATER it was the story of the little girl which made our jaws drop at the centuries-old culture of India and terrible way a child is married to a older man, disallowing her to live thru her childhood and go through what is rather a horrible experience. The character of chuyia (girl) is still relevant in modern India considering the number of child marriages made every year. We can only empathize with chuyia for having tonsured her head, performing fasts and hope no other girl goes through the life chuyia is destined to. The manner in which the girl questions “kab tak vidhva rehna padega?” might have made some people ponder over widow system in what is rather an ancient India. However one cannot rule out the same state in these times.

The way widow ashram is run in the picture helps us find why there were national-wide political protests by a so-called ‘secular’ party all over the country. Young widows are made to visit the courts of rich people for the reason of obvious and the rich fund these ashrams. Nobody can question the way these ashrams run as refered by the ashram-head who uses the power of head-woman for brokerage with an eunuch. Head-woman flouts the rules to her own comfort. Deepa Mehta wonderfully directed the movie, however could not find a way to picturize in India were she was targeted by a ‘secular’ party protesting against her stand on issue of widows down here.

DOR is a tale of a woman(zeenat) who begins her journey against all odds to save her husband arrested who accidentally kills a man. The movie is relevant in a way that the woman meets the wife(meera) of the man killed. The rest of the story is how two women meet and help each other.

Here too director elegantly pictures the grief of a widow, meera lives in a society where a widow is allowed only to mourn the death of her husband and nothing else. She finds a friend in zeenat and discovers her real self. She relives her past riding camels, eating road-side food, watching a movie. Any widow in her village is not allowed to such things as it is considered unholy and evil. This movie is all about finding our real self and living life to our interest.

These two movies highlight the fact that a woman is made to accept the dogmatic approach to life. The efforts of yesteryear leaders to narrow the gap in the society could take many more years to shape into reality. Woman till date, is considered an object by lewd men and is exploited in the name of religion and caste.