Nagarkirtan and Its Relevance to Society

Be it the repealing of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code or the wide acceptance of movies like Shubh Mangal Zyaada Savdhan, the struggle of the LGBTQ+ community has apparently secured small victories. But movies like this present a sugarcoated version of reality that takes our attention away from the actual picture. The blatant manner in which reality is depicted in Nagarkirtan is what makes it a brilliant film. The subject of non-heteronormative relationships are anuncommon theme in Indian cinema and are  being explored only recently, by  a small number of directors. Their approach too remains mostly restricted to a certain upper stratum of the society. This is where Nagarkirtan becomes different in its portrayal of a non-binary love affair between two people- Puti, erstwhile Parimal (who is born a male but relates to the opposite gender) and Madhu, who belongs to the countless many whose voices remain unheard. 

Very often we turn our noses up to hijras at traffic signals. We often pull up our car windows at the vision of these “others”, a scene very well portrayed in the movie. However, the required statement is made by also portraying the circumstances that have pushed this community to resort to this act. A scene in the movie shows the head or the “guru ma” of this particular intersex community (those people who cannot be identified as either of the sexes and bear the reproductive organs of both sexes) reading a news article about a student who had been removed from his hostel on account of him showing attributes of the opposite sex. These two scenes, when analyzed in juxtaposition, make it very clear that the members of the intersex community are pushed to this plight given that, from the very beginning, they have been prevented from gaining basic access to things like proper education, employment, healthcare, and so on. Hence, this is the only available option for them to sustain themselves. In this context, we are also quite responsible for their situation, having snatched their basic rights and necessities. Hence, here this movie- by pointing out this interconnection through these two scenes to the audience- goes a long way in arousing a retrospective reflection in a few if not all and subsequently a guilty conscience in many which might end up triggering a will to change their attitude towards the members of the LGBTQ+ community.

The main plot of the movie contains the love between Madhu and Puti. Their relationship is fraught with difficulties. While Puti struggles to escape his ghetto and meet Madhu, he himself struggles with identifying with his own sexuality. As they keep rendezvousing secretly beside dirty canals and dark alleys streets, Madhu is haunted by a question – is their love even possible? He is ready to help Puti with all his own means and also with his own money to undertake the sex-transformation surgery. He keeps asking Puti not to open her hair until he grows her own- a remark to uphold the internal struggle of Madhu and his attempt to break free of the shackles of prejudices but not be able to do so completely. This also reflects on the numerous people in the society who, despite attempting to be more inclusive and rise above prejudices, can’t quite do so. They struggle to come out of the belief system that has been ingrained in them since a tender age. Madhu and Puti even visit Manabi Bandopadhyay, India’s first openly transgender college principal, to ask about the details of the surgery and the cost involved. What she informs them is not very bright and happy. She tells them that the entire surgery is a difficult and most importantly, costly endeavour. She also informs that it doesn’t mark the end of all problems, since she still faces discrimination from other female professors who do not allow her to use their washrooms. But she still encourages Puti to go through the process as it reduces the pain that she is facing right now on a daily basis. These scenes collectively hold a mirror to the pain that the trans community in India faces, and how there is never an end to the pain until or unless the mindset of the people is changed. Further, economic constraints often prevent the members of the trans community from developing and forming their own identity- an identity that they create on their own right and is not dictated by the society. This might appear really demotivating for the trans community. But it’s also a desperate cry to the masses to accept the differences in others without any discrimination by showing them see how their prejudices have hampered the development of an entire community and making them realise the pointlessness of such marginalization without proper justification. Having avoided any unnecessary sugar-coating, it has also empowered the trans community to realise the reality and plan their struggle accordingly rather than giving them false hope of an easy win. A scathing rebuke to the hypocrisy of humanity is made when Madhu’s family ousts them from their house in Nabadweep, as they realise the true identity of Puti. They earn their livelihood as Vaishnava kirtaniyas, a form of song promoted by Mahaprabhu Chaitanya who is believed to have been an incarnation of Radha and Krishna in one soul. But while they can accept a figure like Shri Chaitanya who they have only heard stories of, his true identity when reflected in a man of flesh and blood disgusts them.

The very fact that this film has won quite a number of awards in the National Awards 2017, including the Special Jury award and the best actor award, is a small win for the trans community as it is a very small step towards their acceptance on a national platform. But we understand that there is still a long way to go when we see a cis male portraying a trans person. It is necessary for trans people to tell their story themselves and when their story is portrayed by someone beyond their community, all the steps that the movie had taken towards the upliftment of the trans community suffer a setback. This is because of two reasons: firstly, the film loses its integrity to some extent as it itself goes against the propaganda that it seeks to promote, one of them being the representation and equal rights for the trans community. In this case, its credibility and acceptance to the audience is reduced. Secondly, representation gets severely affected since in an attempt to show the deprivation that the trans community faces, they are further deprived by taking away their scope of employment and an opportunity to voice out their opinions, their own story without any unnecessary sugar coating on their own. Instead, a cis male is employed to play the role which essentially belongs to them. Undoubtedly this is Riddhi Sen’s best performance till now, nevertheless, this is where our prejudices come to play. While there is no hesitation in casting members of the trans community in supporting roles, the main role still remains quite inaccessible to these people: another remark to the society which has barred these people from exploring their true potential by reducing their accessibility. Nevertheless, the very few steps that this film has aimed at taking for this community still have the potential of achieving something big, if not now, later maybe after a few years.

Srija Dutta

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An undergraduate student of History at Presidency University, Kolkata and an enthusiast in social and cultural history, European History especially the Renaissance period, and gender studies.

• Srija Dutta

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