'Bandit Queen' through Indian Eyes: The Reconstructions and Reincarnations of Phoolan Devi
1998; Springer International Publishing; Volume: 24; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0311-4198
Autores Tópico(s)South Asian Studies and Conflicts
ResumoLocated at the intersection of gender and caste oppression, women in rural India have for centuries generated their own coping mechanisms of compromise and challenge. Phoolan Devi has come to symbolise an extreme, not necessarily of oppression but certainly of contestation. When pushed to the edge of a terrorised life, she opted to cross over into a career of terror herself as a bandit leader, avoided capture for about three years, and became a figure of legend and fantasy until her voluntary surrender, which was followed by a long prison term. The symbolism and mystique survive in the on-going myth-building despite her subsequent reincarnations as a respectable married woman and a Member of Parliament that have won her a measure of social and political acceptability. Phoolan the person remains an enigma amid some of the enduring myths surrounding her, including her reification as an icon of subaltern agency in Shekhar Kapur's film Bandit Queen (1995), a story of oppression and revenge plotted neatly on the grid of gender and caste. Until recently, the average Indian's knowledge of Phoolan Devi came from her constructions in the print media over the years - that she was the product of the arid, rocky Chambal Valley which straddles the States of Uttar Pradesh (UP) in north India and Madhya Pradesh (MP) in central India, and which has historically been the cradle of dacoits or armed bandits as well as thugs; that she controlled the area with her daring exploits, murdering, looting and occasionally playing Robin Hood (all in the region's accepted tradition for bandit gangs), eluded the two State governments until she was persuaded to surrender voluntarily (again in the region's accepted tradition) in early 1983; and that she was subsequently forced to serve a long prison term. The woman behind all this publicity assumed a recognisable shape only after her release in 1994, followed by public appearances, television exposure and entry into politics. As one of the rare women bandit leaders, Phoolan inevitably became a legend larger than life-long supposed to be an all powerful Amazonian beauty-who inspired numerous articles, two internationally known 'biographies'(1) and at least two little noticed Hindi films. When Kapur's Bandit Queen burst on the film world in 1994, winning acclaim at the Cannes and other prestigious international Film Festivals, it re/constructed, mainly but not solely for the Western world, a powerful image-or even trope-of the 'doubly oppressed low-caste Indian womanhood' This article focuses primarily upon the film's ostensible and underlying messages, and contextualises the film within the genre of the Indian commercial cinema which has portrayed women's rebellion and agency over the decades. It also discusses the politics, ethics and legality of making and promoting Bandit Queen, and Phoolan's life subsequent to her imprisonment and release. The discussion focusses upon discourses generated by the film; it does not deal with the issue of Phoolan's criminal culpability. Bandit Queen-the Film Kapur's film,(2) made for BBC's Channel Four Films, produced by Sundeep Singh Bedi and scripted by Mala Sen, positions itself carefully in terms of gender/class ideology through a series of prefatory statements: 'This is a true story'; 'Animals, drums, illiterates, outcastes and women are worthy of being beaten-Quote from the Manu Smriti, a book of Hindu religious scriptures'; and 'The events in this film are based on the dictaled Prison Diaries of Phoolan Devi-Goddess of Flowers-the Bandit Queen.' The opening shot further sets the tone, with Phoolan the bandit proclaiming her identity in obscene language ('I am Phoolan Devi, you ***'), calculated to shock the audience with her defiance and brutalisation. A flashback takes us to the year 1968 (the film's meticulous dating of events reinforces its claim to authenticity) when ten-year old Phoolan's marriage is being casually negotiated by her callous father, a poor villager of the low caste of 'Mallahs', overriding her mother's feeble protest. …
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