| Garm Hava | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | M. S. Sathyu |
| Produced by | Ishan Arya, M.S. Sathyu, Abu Siwani |
| Written by | Kaifi Azmi Shama Zaidi |
| Story by | Ismat Chughtal |
| Starring | Balraj Sahni Farooq Shaikh Dinanath Zutshi Badar Begum Geeta Siddharth Shaukat Kaifi A. K. Hangal |
| Music by | Aziz Ahmed Bahadur Khan Khan Warsi |
| Cinematography | Ishan Arya |
| Editing by | S. Chakravarty |
| Release date(s) | 1973 |
| Running time | 146 minutes |
| Country | India |
| Language | Hindi/Urdu |
Garm Hava (Hindi: गर्म हवा; translation: Hot Winds or Scorching Winds)[1] is a 1973 Urdu film directed by M. S. Sathyu, based on an unpublished Urdu short story by Ismat Chughtai and adapted for screen by Kaifi Azmi, who also wrote its lyrics.[2]
The film deals with the plight of a North Indian Muslim family, in the years post partition of India in 1947, as the film's protagonist, deals with the dilemma of whether to move to Pakistan or stay back. The film details the slow disintegration of his family, and is one of the most poignant films ever made on India's partition.[2][3] It remains one of the only films that deal with the (immediate) plight of Muslims in post-Partition India,[4][5] with Shyam Benegal's Mammo (1994) being a notable exception. [6]
It is often credited with pioneering a new wave of Art cinema movement in India, and alongside a film from another debutant film director, Shyam Benegal, Ankur (1973), are considered landmarks of Indian Parallel Cinema. The movie also launched the career of actor, Farooq Shaikh. It was India's official entry to the Academy Award's Best Foreign Film category, nominated for the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival, won a National Film Award and three Filmfare Awards. In 2005, Indiatimes Movies ranked the movie amongst the Top 25 Must See Bollywood Films.[2]
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Set in Agra, India in late 1940s, Garm Hava is a socio-political drama about a Muslim family headed by an elderly shoe manufacturer, Salim Mirza. Salim (Balraj Sahni) is struggling to come to terms with changed realities after many of his family and friends migrate to Pakistan.
As head of the family, Mirza is facing a crucial choice to make, whether to continue the ancestral business and stay on in India or to migrate to the newly-formed state of Pakistan. Salim's brother Halim and his family migrate to Pakistan. Halim's son Kazim tries to return to India across the border to marry Salim's daughter but gets arrested.
As the refugees from Pakistan start competing with Salim's business, the moneylenders refuse to invest in his business, as he might emigrate to Pakistan. In face of discrimination, will Salim Mirza finally decide to leave the country?
The film was an adaptation of Ismat Chughtai’s story by noted Urdu poet and lyricist, Kaifi Azmi. While the original story centred on a station master, stuck in the throes of Partition, Kaifi Azmi brought in his own experiences as a union leader, for the workers of a shoe manufacturing factory, to the film. He not just changed the profession of the film’s protagonist, but also placed him right in the middle of film’s emotional cauldron, as he watches his livelihood (shoe manufacturing) and family disintegrating rapidly, immediately making the trauma of the Partition personal, compared to the original story, where the protagonist is a mere observer, watching his friends and family migrate. This fulfilled the main object of the film, to show the human consequences, not social and economic consequences of a large political decision, like the Partition of India, to which none of its suffers, the people, were party, as in the words of film director, M.S. Sathyu, “What I really wanted to expose in Garm Hava was the games these politicians play...How many of us in India really wanted the partition. Look at the suffering it caused."[7]
The screenplay was written jointly by Kaifi Azmi, and Satyu’s wife, Shama Zaidi, with Kaifi Azmi, adding the dialogues to the film.
The movie ends with a poem/shairi by Kaifi Azmi "Jo door se toofan ka karte hai nazara, unke liye toofan vahan bhi hai yahan bhi
Daare me jo mil jaoge ban jaoge daara, yeh waqt ka ailaan vahan bhi hai yahan bhi" - Kaifi Azmi
The film was shot in location in the city of Agra, with scenes of Fatehpur Sikri as well. Due to repeated local protests owing to its controversial theme, a fake second unit with unloaded cameras were sent to various locations to divert attention from film's actual locations. As the film's commercial producers had early on backed out fearing public and governmental backlash, and ‘Film Finance Corporation’ (FFC), now National Film Development Corporation (NFDC), stepped in later, the film was made on a shoe-string budget of eight lakhs.[8]
Most actors in the film, barring a few new ones like Farooq Shaikh (who was making his film debut), were stage actors from Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA), to which film’s lead, Balraj Sahni, had long been associated, and for whom this was his last important film role, and according to many his finest performance.[9] Badar Begum, who played his mother in this film, was in fact discovered in the locality where the film shot, in an old haveli of Mr. R S Lal Mathur in Peepal Mandi who helped the whole unit through out the shooting.
Prior to its release the film was held by Central Board of India, for eight months, fearing communal unrest, but film’s director persisted and showed it to government officials, leaders and journalists. Finally the film was released to both critical and commercial success.[7]
Today it is noted for its sensitive handling of the controversial issue, dealt with in only a few Indian films,[1] like Kartar Singh (1959) (Pakistani film),[10] Manmohan Desai's Chhalia (1960), Yash Chopra's Dharamputra (1961), Govind Nihalani's Tamas (1986), Pamela Rooks' Train to Pakistan (1998), Manoj Punj's Shaheed-e-Mohabbat Boota Singh (1999) and Chandra Prakash Dwivedi's Pinjar (2003).
Ironically, in the subsequent National Film Awards, it was awarded the Nargis Dutt Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration.
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