When Asghar Wajahat wrote his acclaimed play Jis Lahore Nai Vekhya, O Jamya E Nai in 1989, India was a very different country. More than three decades later, as the celebrated play reaches the big screen as Rajkumar Santoshi’s Batwara 1947, Wajahat argues that its central concerns have become even more relevant.
In an exclusive interview with Bollywood Hungama, Wajahat says that communal tension has significantly intensified in India since he first wrote the play. “The communal tension has obviously increased. When I wrote the play, the communal tension was there, but it was not as high as it is today.”
Yet neither his play nor its screen adaptation was ever conceived as a loud political commentary. Instead of directly confronting Partition or communalism, the story works through undertones. “This play negates the two-nation theory. It's not very vocal, not very over. It does it from the inside,” he explains, describing his play more as a “human saga”.
Asked about the increasing presence of communal divisions and religious conflicts in cinema and public discourse, Wajahat points to the role of misinformation and organised hate campaigns. “There is misinformation. There is a hate campaign. It is an organized campaign,” he says, adding that such campaigns ultimately have destructive consequences because “unity is very important for a human being, for a society, for a country”.
Wajahat believes such divisions are fuelled by multiple factors. “There are many reasons for people to separate from each other. One reason is that you don't try to understand others. You are confined to your own community. You are not going out of your community. Another reason is that you have a complex of superiority. You are superior to others. The third reason is that you are being misinterpreted by history. You are being told that you were a victim.”
So, what needs to be done to promote communal harmony? The 80-year-old scholar, novelist and playwright believes the answer lies in what he calls a “confidence-building exercise”.
“The secular democratic people of both communities need to come together and plan confidence-building exercises. They need to institutionalize it. It used to be institutionalized before. For example, Holi and Eid meetings used to take place where people of both communities used to meet and greet each other. They used to eat sweets together,” Wajahat says, adding that everyday interaction remains crucial to restoring mutual respect.
“Understanding each other and coming closer to each other needs to be done at the level of the common people. Not at the level of the intellectuals. If there are confidence-building exercises, communities will come together,” the veteran writer signs off.
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