"Shahid" The Movie and its Indelible message

"Pyaar hai dheh sa gaya

Hai kadar kahaan

Mann hai yaadon ka ek majmaa"

Its been a year or so I saw Bhaag Milkha Bhaag and I wondered, why it was not adjudged the Best Film at National Film Awards. I was so wrong.

There are movies which can stir and enrage you to a point where to not speak up is hardly an option.  Which can test your dormant conscience and make you believe that yes, there is injustice in society and that all’s not fair and what if, he were you? A Courtroom drama, with Human values, the city of Mumbai and picturesque Kashmir valley revolving around it, tied with reverberating background score is a Biopic of Late Shahid Azmi (played to perfection by RajKumar Rao), who took up cases for ordinary people who are dragged to court, outrageously put behind bars, tortured and questioned with disdain. People who had lesser means to prove the truth.

Let us believe, first, in the systems & institutions we've made.

This world*, which, quite mercilessly allows a person to only be on one side of *its propaganda. It cannot let him seek his own calling and if he dares to overrule the side he has once chosen or to build up on his committed mistakes, to fight for a rampant injustice he sees, which the world itself is oblivious to, the world fights back and stabs his nuanced, noble efforts to help re-build humanity. Oh gosh! To imagine all this to’ve happened to someone is horrendous.

Shahid Azmi makes two valid points,

We don’t have to consider an accused, a criminal simply because he is in a lock up for two years, if his arrest proves the point completely, what good is Judiciary for? 

Having said that, I wonder do I really believe in courts or do I decide on my own contempt? Actually, the accused, the moment he is publicly raided, arrested is then immediately put on trial by our societal opinions and media. We need to shun our contempt and let Judiciary do its task. Let us believe in our courts and not take laws in our hands. (Shahid Azmi gets shot at and dies in 2010 chiefly due to common people taking laws in their hand). :-/

The other point is actually his life. It is the society which enrages him to step into a terror (read fundamentalist) organization, especially in Islam, where its easier to do things for your religion, there is no doubt about it and especially at his age of 15 years. I remember how easy it was for me to think of doing anything that came to my mind. Then, it was easier to get convinced, who researched, who cared, enough? And still he came back and he got himself educated to a point of bourgeois acceptance. However, quite irrationally the society inflicted rage onto him via some disillusioned but acceptable fundamentalists. Not done! This is not done man!

I then, think the biggest problem this world is facing is nothing but fundamentalism, whichever side you take. Why can’t we see the other side, let them live their life and lead ours?  I am grief struck, so as to think, exactly which world am I living in?

Issues aside, I rated the movie 9/10 at IMDB. It, as a lot of good films, is slightly underrated in terms of its popularity. Can the readers, atleast, spread it out?

PS: Shahid won two Awards at National Film Awards 2014, with the Best Film Award, however been bagged by another masterpiece, Ship of Theseus.