Mumbai, Aug 9 (IANS): Filmmaker Anant Mahadevan Narayan’s film ‘Phule’ which is based on one of India’s biggest proponents for women’s education, Jyotirao Govindrao Phule has entered its post-production stage.
The film will detail the life of the great Indian icon and how he struggled to bring to light women’s education at a very difficult time when India was in its peak of colonial oppression and their fight against the injustices of the caste system.
Talking about his film, Mahadevan told Variety ““The two of them are lethal, the husband and wife, because at a time when the girl child was being refused education and just pushed into marriage, Jyotirao chose to actually educate his little wife – she was just 11 at that time, he was 17 when they got married, because it was the time of child marriage.”
Though the film is a historical biopic, Mahadevan has questioned whether the movie is historical or futuristic as women’s education and discrimination against people of lower strata be it in the form of caste, status or gender is a prevalent issue even today.
He said, “It’s still there, it’s prevalent, all the issues that they addressed. Have I made a film that’s historic or futuristic? That’s the question you ask at the end of the film.”
“We still haven’t sorted these issues out, whether it’s here in India or the rest of the world. Gender discrimination and caste discrimination is prevalent everywhere today. The Phules emerge as icons for this fight that has been going on for generations.”
Talking about the question that ‘Phule’ ultimately poses, Mahadevan said “Have we taken 10 steps back instead of taking two steps forward, or are we addressing this issue? So that makes this film very potent and we have treated it on an epic scale.”
Jyotirao Govindrao Phule and his wife Savitribai were social reformers known for their efforts against to bring all people education which included women as well as people from the backwards strata of society.
While Jyotirao Phule remains a revered figure in India to this day, a forgotten fact about him is that he was in fact the first ‘Mahatama’ earning the title back in 1888, way before Gandhi.
In India ‘Mahatama’ Jyotirao Phule found the first school for women’s education in Pune, 1848. In 1873, Jyotirao Phule and his followers began the Satyashodhak Samaj to campaign for increased rights for the underprivileged.
Mahadevan has directed a variety of films ranging from erotic action thrillers such as ‘Aksar’, ‘Aksar 2’, ‘Aggar’ to grounded movies such as ‘Life’s Good’ and the historical Marathi film ‘Doctor Rakhambai’.