New Delhi: The verdict is out for Imtiaz Ali’s new movie Main Vaapas Aaunga in Pakistan. Pakistanis love it. One X user summed it up perfectly, saying, “It leaves a wound in your heart as deep as the British left in Punjab with the Radcliffe Line.”
Ali’s film, released last week, follows the story of a 78-year-old Naseeruddin Shah’sn dementia-driven memories from pre-Partition India and his yearning to return to what is now Sargodha, in Pakistan. While it opened to rave reviews from critics, the film has not yet been able to perform well at the box office in India and worldwide.
Ali has a massive fan following in Pakistan. Several fans speculate that when the film, which is not yet available in theatres in the country, comes on OTT platforms, it will be a huge hit.
It has, however, found a place in the hearts of Pakistanis who cannot stop talking about it. The obsession began even before the movie was released. When the team performed at the Attari border in Amritsar, filmmaker Saad Sheikh posted a heartfelt note on how he travelled to Lahore to merely catch a glimpse of Ali, who he claimed, “waved at him” as he screamed: “Main Wapas Aaunga.”
For those who were able to watch it, the period drama was a lesson in remembrance.
“Main Vaapas Aaunga is not just a film, but a wound that refuses to heal. This one hits home for anyone whose grandparents left everything behind during Partition and moved to a country they knew nothing of… The film leaves you with is that those who sow discord, sectarianism, ethnic and religious hate aren’t human. They’re blue-faced creatures from Mars. They must be defeated. We can’t let hate become a legacy for the next generation… The wound must end with us,” one Pakistani X user wrote.
What Pakistan’s elites think of Main Vaapas Aaunga
The film found appreciation from all sections of Pakistani society especially from its liberal elites including professors and filmmakers.
Ali Usman Qasmi, professor at Lahore University of Management Sciences, wholeheartedly agreed that Ali’s latest film is a lesson on the Partition and its legacy. For him, the film’s biggest lesson is to “not appropriate the trauma of those who suffered it.”
“What I liked most about Imtiaz Ali’s Main Vaapas Aaunga—other than that he has shown incredible courage against the tide of hate-driven communalist cinema in India—is that he makes it clear that we must not appropriate the trauma of those who suffered it,” Qasmi posted on X.
The history professor added: “We can relate to it, empathise with it, and may also inherit parts of it as it is passed down through generations, but we were never its actual victims; we can never imagine what it meant or felt to be in that position, and so the best we can do is to keep the memories alive, tell these stories, and use them to build a better world—as Imtiaz Ali is trying to do in this film.”
Pakistani filmmaker Umair Nasir Ali, in a series of Instagram stories, said Ali’s latest silver screen venture is a “deeply emotional movie that stays with you long after the movie ends.”
Pakistani author Muneeb Qadir called it “a reminder of the humanity that we have lost through endless politics of division and hate.”
“Many Indians & Pakistanis get offended when I say that our generation has inherited the trauma of the 1947 Partition & that we still haven’t gotten over it. The loss of innocence & youth of 2 star-crossed lovers in the middle of the ‘Great Partition’ serves as a tragically beautiful metaphor in Imtiaz Ali’s masterpiece MAIN VAAPAS AAUNGA; a metaphor for all that we lost on a human level by continuing to be governed by hate to this very day,” Qadir, author of Paying the Price (2024), wrote on X.
Also Read: India-Pakistan Partition film Main Vaapas Aaunga is defeated at the box office by Haunted 3D
An everyman film
For others, it’s a timely reminder of the never-ending cycle of death, devastation, and the traumas of Partition that runs across generations on both sides of the border.
Pakistani content creator Rafay Akbar, in an Instagram video, talked about how the movie and the Partition, in general, is something he associates with his grandmother, who left her village in India and settled in Pakistan.
Akbar goes on to share how his grandmother waited years to visit her village. When the family applied for visas, only hers was approved. While the family was worried about how she’d make the journey at the age of 71, Akbar asks, “How could one forget the roads leading to your home?” Visuals show her crying when she visits what she left behind. Akbar adds that she passed away shortly after her visit.
He then appeals: “We are the third generation who grew up listening to these stories. Now, those who tell those stories are almost gone, and animosity between the two countries has increased. For this reason, the stories should stay alive.”
Soon, others joined in—both Indians and Pakistanis sharing stories told by their grandparents.
As Saad Sheikh wrote, “When I told Imitiaz Ali ‘Main Vaapas Aaunga’ that’s when the entire Indian side cheered, smiled and clapped. And for a brief second, the gates had abolished, the borders were friendly, and art had won.”
(Edited by Insha Jalil Waziri)