Nagraj Manjule’s 2016 Sairat brought a cultural shift in the Marathi film industry, which until then had shown little desire to move beyond Brahminical narratives. The film’s success shook up the industry, triggering a discussion on caste and elitism, with filmmakers looking to capture this lightning in a bottle.
The result, though, was nothing extraordinary, mainly because filmmakers lacked the lived-in experiences of the caste/class to which their characters belonged.
A scene in Sairat features Archi (Rinku Rajguru) sternly asking her male cousin to keep his hands off Parshya (Akash Thosar), who is from an oppressed caste, warning him not to get involved. “Do you understand Marathi or should I speak in English?” she says authoritatively in a now-famous dialogue.
Shocked, the cousin backs off with Archi threatening to “break his face” if he dares touch Parshya again. This scene establishes Archi’s character and sets the tone of the film.
At the time, this was an unthinkable, gutsy departure from the prevalent archetype of the Marathi female lead. This and many such template-breaking characteristics helped Sairat become the highest-grossing Marathi film to date. Its representational authenticity resonated with millions.
Elitism in Marathi cinema
The movie appeared in an industry that has never tried to hide its elitism. In the ’70s and ’80s when Dada Kondke’s movies were pulling crowds and achieving the coveted silver and golden jubilees, the critics called his cinema crass, and the audience that patronised him, tasteless. This looking-down attitude has been present in the Marathi film industry since its conception.
An overwhelming majority of Marathi actors, directors, and producers across film and TV industries belong to dominant communities and act as gatekeepers of art.
Flashback time: Raja Harishchandra (1913) was not only the first Marathi movie but also India’s first full-length film. Since then, Marathi cinema reached great heights with filmmakers like V Shantaram and Bhalji Pendharkar. But barring notable exceptions like the political drama Saamna (1974) and the tribal-musical Jait Re Jait (1977), Marathi films have portrayed either the tamasha tradition, family drama, or slapstick comedy.
In the 1990s and early 2000s, the film industry’s proximity to Bollywood worked against it, leading to a lull period. While it has experienced a renaissance in recent years, it has also garnered criticism over its elite gaze.
Mumbai and Pune-based filmmakers, often from Savarna backgrounds, tell stories that cater to audiences with similar sensibilities. As a result, the Sanskritisation of the Marathi identity superposes the diverse experiences that define Maharashtra. An example of this is the dominance of coming-of-age movies like Duniyadaari (2013) that depict the lives of young adults from privileged backgrounds. The characters’ social positioning plays a significant role in their impact.
Hit films like Mumbai-Pune-Mumbai (2010), Jhimma (2021) and the recent blockbuster Baaipan Bhaari Deva (2023), all depict a certain Savarna social strata with similar tropes. The complexities of life in, say, the state’s sprawling agricultural heartland, are glaringly absent.
As a result, Marathi cinema only resonated with urban, upper-caste audiences for a long time and the rich tapestry of rural life went underrepresented.
But all films didn’t succumb to this trend.
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A growing shift
Directors like Umesh Kulkarni—who made critically acclaimed movies such as Valu (2008) and Deool (2011)—began making significant strides in portraying the nuances of rural life. Sairat challenged the urban narrative further with its authentic take on rural romance and proved that serious social issues like casteism can be dealt with in mainstream movies as well.
Kastoori (2019), a National Award-winning film, dealt with a boy from a family of manual scavengers who excelled at Sanskrit. It showed his beautiful friendship with a Muslim boy from a family of butchers. In the film, the boys bonded over their similarities: They occupied the periphery of civil society and were said to “smell”. The film lent a voice to the marginalised, with almost all its characters being social outcasts.
More recently, Trushant Ingle’s film Zollywood (2022) centred on the Zhadipatti theatre troupes, which have been a source of entertainment for the farmers of Vidarbha. The neo-Buddhist protagonist, speaking in the Varhadi dialect that deviates from the purist Brahminical Marathi, represents a growing shift in the Marathi protagonist.
Smaller films like Killa (2014), Jayanti (2021) and Baaplyok (2023) have also found an audience. The increasing frequency of films that challenge the status quo signals that ‘otherness’ is gaining acceptance and sparking important conversations among Marathi audiences.
There’s growing awareness around the limitations of the elite gaze and the need for more inclusive narratives. Discussions about the marginalisation of Dalit voices and the need for caste representation are gaining traction.
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Long way to go
On TV, one of the most popular shows remains Home Minister (2004). As the name suggests, it is about the lady of the house. In the show, married women compete for a Paithani saree by playing kitchen-centric games. One of the sections features them saying their husband’s first name, which they do bashfully—just some light patriarchal humour.
Even on the phone screen, most of the content still caters to the minuscule but powerful Desai-Joshi-Kulkarni crowd. BhaDiPa (Bhartiya Digital Party), founded by Canadian actress Paula Mcglynn with Sarang Sathaye and Anusha Nandakumar, was one of the first Marathi OTT channels. It is a textbook example of how the foreign gaze fails to penetrate the surface of the Indian social fabric.
The channel now champions content for the Marathi diaspora, which longs for simple, non-diverse (and classist) entertainment, far from home. The OTT space should be used to experiment with genres, tell fresh stories beyond the Mumbai-Pune axis, and platform independent voices. Once they taste blood, the big-screen filmmakers will follow suit.
Instead, we get appeasement-based films every month about Shivaji or his generals and their glorious past. Then there are the rabble-rousing kind of films like the latest Aamhi Jarange (2024), which is about the demand for Maratha reservations raised by political leader Manoj Jarange Patil. Such films have found a niche, politically invested audience.
It is no wonder that the sequel to Dharmaveer (2022), which glorified a local Shiv Sena politician implicated in a murder case—whose followers burned down the hospital he died in—is set to be released next month. Such films cater to the “us vs them” mentality and divert the audience’s attention from larger issues of the industry, further deepening its stagnancy.
Meanwhile, independent filmmakers in the Marathi industry, particularly those from marginalised communities, struggle to secure funding and distribution channels. This limits their reach and makes their stories commercially unviable.
For truly inclusive Marathi cinema to emerge, a conscious effort must be made to diversify the stories being told, which can’t happen without diversifying the voices behind the camera.
Vaibhav Wankhede is a creative marketer and writer. Views are personal.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)