It's been a while since the tale of Rani Padmini and what was then alleged to be the cinematic portrayal (or, depending on how one saw it, distortion) of her story made waves. The Queen herself was believed to be a historical figure by some, whilst others thought of her as the creation of a medieval author's imagination. My own suspicion, based on very little given that there is a spectacular dearth of documentation, is that there was likely a real Queen based on whom the legend has been drawn.
Around the time the controversy about her being portrayed in a film arose, I'd posted a series of tweets based on what I either learnt or believed of the Queen and the legend:
The controversy as it arose did not take long to become mired in allegations, counter-allegations, and wide-ranging denunciations of the various persons who featured in it, and, like most controversies, was extremely polarised: the Queen was either a fictional character or a revered historical personage, and one had to be either pro- or anti- free speech in relation to the film which portrayed her (never mind that, at the time, no one seemed to have seen the film). There was very little space to air the possibility that it didn't really matter what the provenance of the legend was, that it did (to whatever extent) matter how the Queen is (even today) perceived by the people who revere her, that the absence of documentary evidence proving her existence isn't necessarily evidence of absence, and that it is possible to have concerns about the portrayal of revered figures without necessarily being "against free speech" as that trite and convenient phrase goes.
Without getting into the specifics of this controversy, what it highlighted is that opinions in black and white are easy to form, and that they require very little engagement with detail or nuance. Our law, however, isn't entirely black and white. For better or for worse, it recognises and occasionally criminalises the publication or broadcast content which is incompatible with the maintenance of societal harmony, and it implicitly demands that we take a closer look at subjects without falling back on the easy accusation people are either "thought-free liberals" or "conservative sticks in the mud" when certain content makes them defensive or uncomfortable. The accusations are as easy to hurl as it appears the entirely unacceptable resort to violence and vandalism to make one's point can be. Neither approach, however, is particularly helpful, and neither one engages with the issue at hand: how to portray persons — historical, legendary, or living — in works of art in ways which are neither unlawful nor which amount to an impingement of free speech.
Looking at the broader picture, there is, likely, a case to be made for legal reform so that less content runs the risk of being considered to be unlawful but simply dismissing the concerns which many people air about content is unlikely to be the best way to achieve such reform. What is certain is that we need to find more productive ways to engage with each other which are not quite so insistent on othering and diminishing anyone who has an opinion that isn't aligned with our own. And it's high time we did that.
Around the time the controversy about her being portrayed in a film arose, I'd posted a series of tweets based on what I either learnt or believed of the Queen and the legend:
Can I just mention that Malik Muhammad Jayasi's poem on Padmavati may have been an 'insult' to Sher Shah Sur with little relation to fact?— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
A translation of 'The Padumawati of Malik Muammad Jais' published in 1911 is available here: https://t.co/VrxXdItQMP— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Contemporary court records do not appear to mention the 13-14th C Padmini, and the 15-16th C Jayasi was distant in both time & geography.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Jayasi's Padmavat is a religious-philosophical work displaying 'archetypes and splendours' to borrow a term from elsewhere. Not historical.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Padmavat is an allegory: sovereign power, the fight of good against evil. Padmavati is wisdom, her husband the soul, Khilji misconception.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
At no point here is Padmavat a tale of the divergence of Hindus & Muslims. It is a tale of beauty & courage against greed & covetousness.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Padmavat may well simply be a warning by a Sufi mystic, Jayasi, against the baseness of temporal desire to Sher Shah Sur (?who deserved it).— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Jayasi was apparently attached to the court of Jagat Dev, a Hindu ally of the Muslim Sher Shah Sur; to the latter is Padmavat dedicated.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Communal lines in Padmavat, and in its making, are fuzzy, and (drawing on Kiefer who's unrelated to it) both art & truth are always grey.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
The legend of 'Padmâvatî' made its way into our own time through an eponymous French opéra-ballet: https://t.co/engWsRAPWO inspired in 1909.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
With too much singing to be ballet, & too much dancing to be opera, the FR 'Padmâvatî' didn't make a splash. (Ideal for Bollywood though?)— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
This French telling of the tale of Padmavati substantially differed from Jayasi's tale featuring amour (but of course!) and orientalism.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Social issues of the time the opera-ballet was written were highlighted which meant, from a non-Indian POV, communal issues were in focus.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
By the early 20th C, the foundation was laid to take the tale of Padmavati from abstruse philosophical enquiry to communal horror story.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
The apparent lack of documents evidencing Padmavati's life isn't necessarily proof she's fictional. Jayasi likely drew on oral history/trad.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
Traces of Jauhar, an integral part of Padmavati's story, appear at the 'her' fort. Sadly, her story can't be pieced together with certainty.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
What is certain is for some writers & artists across the centuries, Padmavati's tale has been the equivalent of a modern journalistic hook.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
The extent to which the woman who was — I believe she existed — has been shrouded by the men who've purportedly told her story is unclear.— Nandita Saikia (@nsaikia) January 28, 2017
The controversy as it arose did not take long to become mired in allegations, counter-allegations, and wide-ranging denunciations of the various persons who featured in it, and, like most controversies, was extremely polarised: the Queen was either a fictional character or a revered historical personage, and one had to be either pro- or anti- free speech in relation to the film which portrayed her (never mind that, at the time, no one seemed to have seen the film). There was very little space to air the possibility that it didn't really matter what the provenance of the legend was, that it did (to whatever extent) matter how the Queen is (even today) perceived by the people who revere her, that the absence of documentary evidence proving her existence isn't necessarily evidence of absence, and that it is possible to have concerns about the portrayal of revered figures without necessarily being "against free speech" as that trite and convenient phrase goes.
Without getting into the specifics of this controversy, what it highlighted is that opinions in black and white are easy to form, and that they require very little engagement with detail or nuance. Our law, however, isn't entirely black and white. For better or for worse, it recognises and occasionally criminalises the publication or broadcast content which is incompatible with the maintenance of societal harmony, and it implicitly demands that we take a closer look at subjects without falling back on the easy accusation people are either "thought-free liberals" or "conservative sticks in the mud" when certain content makes them defensive or uncomfortable. The accusations are as easy to hurl as it appears the entirely unacceptable resort to violence and vandalism to make one's point can be. Neither approach, however, is particularly helpful, and neither one engages with the issue at hand: how to portray persons — historical, legendary, or living — in works of art in ways which are neither unlawful nor which amount to an impingement of free speech.
Looking at the broader picture, there is, likely, a case to be made for legal reform so that less content runs the risk of being considered to be unlawful but simply dismissing the concerns which many people air about content is unlikely to be the best way to achieve such reform. What is certain is that we need to find more productive ways to engage with each other which are not quite so insistent on othering and diminishing anyone who has an opinion that isn't aligned with our own. And it's high time we did that.
(This post is by Nandita Saikia and was first published at IN Content Law.)