A whole decade-and-a-half before the MeToo campaign became a global phenomenon and films like Pink and Thappad talked about women empowerment, a Bollywood epic became the voice for challenges that women in India confronted daily. An ensemble cast of the biggest Bollywood actresses and actors at the time were all ready to stand out for women and use the power of film to improve the world and make India a safer place for women. We are talking about the Rajkumar Santoshi film Lajja, which starred industry stalwarts like Rekha, Madhuri Dixit, Manisha Koirala, Mahima Chaudhary, Jackie Shroff, Anil Kapoor and Ajay Devgn. Released on August 31, 2001, the movie completes 21 years today.
Lajja by Rajkumar Santoshi was a horrifying depiction of the abuse women endure in India as males saw them as things with no function other than trophies to show off and to give the family a child. The movie may be broken down into four segments, with Manisha Koirala’s character Vaidehi serving as our guide. She portrays abuse against strong feminist women who were shown to be so before the word “feminism” became popular. Four women are featured in the plot: Apart from Manisha Koirala’s Vaidehi, we have Maithili played by Mahima Chaudhry, Janki played by iconic actress Madhuri Dixit and Rekha’s Ramdulaari. All four women are subjected to the regressive norms of patriarchy and misogyny and their struggles were beautifully highlighted. It is highly interesting to note that the names of all the four protagonists are versions of Sita, an underlying message in itself.
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The idea of a movie on this issue came to Rajkumar Santoshi upon a chance encounter with a piece of news. He read about a 42-year-old woman from a village near Kanpur who was held captive for 9 days and was burnt alive after being subjected to sexual assault for days. Shaken by the news, Santoshi realised that there are different types of abuse women are subjected to, both physical and emotional regularly. Santoshi along with Ranjit Kapoor and Ashok Rawat finalized the story and script of the film.
They even visited the village in Kanpur where the incident had taken place, however, in an earlier interview, Santoshi revealed that not a single soul in the village was ready to talk about the incident.
Whether it was for the unconventional plot or for not having a larger-than-life action or a romantic hero as the protagonist which was the norm at that time, the movie failed at the box office. However, Madhuri Dixit and Rekha were awarded the Filmfare Award for their excellent performance in the film. Despite Lajja’s commercial failure, it became the forerunner for many of the women empowerment-centric films that we see nowadays.
