I am not a frequent movie-goer; but last month I
deliberately went to the cinema to watch the Hindi movie "Sanju." I
had also read bits and pieces about Sanjaya Dutta, the famous Bollywood movie
actor whose life is at the centre of the film's plot, and I was attracted
towards this movie because I figured I could go through his life story in a
matter of hours.
I found the movie a living example of not giving up
hope in life no matter what happens; be it good or bad. Every Bollywood
movie-watcher knows who Sanjaya Dutta is on screen. But in real life he is none
other than one of the common humans who commits mistakes now and again and gets
back on his feet with continuous efforts and faces numerous ups and downs in
the course of living. Yet, the beauty of Sanju's life is that he accepts all
the consequences of his mistakes gracefully; he strives to come out of the
adverse situations he faces as a better and stronger person.
Anybody is happy to share their bright side to the
world but one needs guts to share their dark side and Sanjaya Dutta seems to
have those guts.
The first massive blow hit the actor when he fell
prey to drugs at a crucial time in his life when he was just about to begin his
acting career. It took him a long time to come out clean from his drug
addiction; and during this time he obviously went through a painful emotional
upheaval.
Sanjaya Dutta has exemplified that it is possible to
be free from drugs if you really want to. In the movie, there is a scene when a
doctor at the rehabilitation centre gives a long list of drugs to Sanju and asks
him to tick the names of drugs that he has used, and making the doctor as well
as the movie-watchers gape, he ticks all of them. This all proves that he was a heavy drug
addict and it was not easy for him to quit drugs just like that. However, once
he realised he did not want to take drugs any more, he started to move towards
the process of improvement with his dedication and determination; eventually he
succeeded too.
Another misfortune of Sanju's life was that he was
name-tagged as a terrorist as he was rumoured to be involved in the Mumbai bombings
and he was arrested for the same reason. Although he admitted that he possessed
a gun for security reason, he never admitted to being a terrorist. As a good
civilian he cooperated with the court's decision and went to the jail. He,
however, never stopped fighting for justice and was duly rewarded as the
Supreme Court gave its verdict that Sanjaya Dutta was not a terrorist.
These two major incidents created a lot of
controversies. Apart from Sanju, his family also suffered unnecessarily. Finally,
everything got settled and these days Sanjaya Dutta is living a dignified life.
The movie may have flaws if it is reviewed
critically but nobody can deny the fact that Sanjaya Dutta's story presented
via "Sanju" is inspiring and it can give a new hope to the people who
are on the path of destructions and have lost all hopes to get back to their
normal life.
(Published in The Rising Nepal on Friday, June 22, 2018 under the title "Beyond Textbooks )
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