Bawandar
| Bawandar | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Directed by | Jag Mundhra |
| Produced by |
Gaurang Doshi Jag Mundhra |
| Written by |
Screenplay: Ashok Mishra, Sudha Arora Dialogue: Hariram Acharya, Deepak Purohit Jag Mundhra (written by) |
| Starring | Deepti Naval, Nandita Das |
| Music by | Vishwa Mohan Bhatt |
| Cinematography | Ashok Kumar |
| Edited by | Jag Mundhra |
|
Release date
|
17 November 2000 |
|
Running time
|
125 min |
| Country | India |
| Language | Hindi, Rajasthani, English |
Bawandar (English title: The Sand Storm) is a 2000 Indian film, based on the true story of Bhanwari Devi, a rape victim from Rajasthan, India. The film depicts the personal trauma, public humiliation and legal injustice that Bhanwari Devi went through, while pursuing justice in the Indian courts.
Bawandar is based on the true story of Bhanwari Devi's gang-rape case. The names of characters and places have been changed for legal reasons. For example, Bhanwari's character is called Sanwari, her husband Mohan's character is called Sohan, and their village is called Dhabri (Bhateri in real life).
The story is introduced through first-person narration by a foreign reporter called Amy (Laila Rouass), who has read about Sanwari's case in a newspaper. Amy and her friend-cum-interpreter Ravi (Rahul Khanna) visit Sanwari's village to investigate the matter, five years after the gang-rape incident. Upon their arrival in Rajasthan, Amy and Ravi meet a rickshaw-puller named Sohan (Raghuvir Yadav) by happenstance, who helps them on their way to a village where they encounter Sanwari's rapists. Sohan turns out to be Sanwari's husband, and tells the tale of Sanwari's rape case.
Sohan and Sanwari are a married couple belonging to a low-caste Kumhar (potter) community. The couple live with Sohan's parents and have a two children, a young girl and a boy. Sanwari makes pots whilst Sohan plies the rickshaw for their subsistence. While working at a local quarry, Sanwari stands up for her rights to the corrupt supervisor. The news of her bravery reaches Shobha Devi (Deepti Naval), a social worker who works for the Government of India. Her job involves creating awareness amongst the illiterate villagers against social evils like child marriage, oppression of women etc. In Dhabri, she recruits Sanwari (Nandita Das) as a Saathin, a grassroots worker employed as part of the Women's Development Project run by the Government of Rajasthan.
As part of her job, Sanwari educates the womenfolk in the village against child marriages and oppression against women, and invites ire of the conservative village elders. Most of these villagers belong to the Gurjar community, a higher caste. To subjugate Sanwari, five members of the Gurjar community order a social and economic boycott of Sanwari and her family. The villagers stop selling milk to her family or buying the earthen pots they make. When Sanwari informs the police about a child marriage happening in the Gurjar community, five men from the Gurjar household where the marriage was supposed to happen decide to teach Sanwari a lesson. Having had enough of her shenanigans and what they perceive as her affront to their male ego, they collectively beat up her husband and two of them take turns in gang-raping her.
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Wikipedia