Ramanand Sagar: The Man and the Legacy

In 1976, at a café in Switzerland, the successful film personality, Ramanand Sagar, announced to his three sons that he was leaving cinema for the small screen (television). “My life’s mission is to bring to mankind the virtuous story of Maryada Purushottam Shri Ram; followed by the one with sixteen virtues, Shri Krishna; and finally, the story of Maa Durga with infinite shakti,” an awakened Ramanand Sagar declared over a glass of red wine, as if it were ordained. His son Prem Sagar recalls that the industry people thought that the Sagars had lost their mind. After all, they were a successful cinema production house. Who would watch a serial about mukut-mooch (crown and moustaches)? However, the destiny would prove to be a greater force. Sagar’s long-held belief in preordination was aided by the increasing hold of the Dubai-based mafia on Hindi film industry that had made life difficult for honest and dharmic people.

 

 

The journey to making of Ramayan was not smooth. In words of his son Prem Sagar:

 

“The I&B minister V.N. Gadgil feared that Ramayan would instil a sense of pride in the Hindu community and increase the possibility of the BJP coming to power. On the other hand, there were whispers that Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi himself had suggested that the DD authorities telecast the great Indian epics like the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, and that these epics were our cultural heritage and needed to be shown with pride and in all their glory… A cat-and-mouse game had begun between the bureaucracy ruling Delhi and the cultural decision-makers in Mandi House, the DD headquarters in Delhi. The ploy was not to convey an outright ‘no’ but find some excuse or the other to delay the permissions and finally find faults or loopholes to not let the epics be telecast.”

 

However, a ray of hope dawned when a very young sadhu visited a frustrated and angst-ridden Sagar, and in a manner what could actually be called as ‘divine inspiration’, conveyed to him a message from his guru in the Himalayas:

 

“Who are you? What is this pride…What do you think…you are making the Ramayan! Why are you worried? In the upper spiritual world, there is a yojana vibhag (planning commission). India is going to lead the world and a few of you have been sent to create awareness. Do your work and come back …”

 

Soon therafter, things changed for better when a more cinema-friendly Ajit Kumar Panja took over charge as I&B minister.

 

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Before bringing out his magnum opus, Sagar needed to test the small screen. His beta version for the experiment was TV serial Vikram aur Betaal, based on Somdev Bhatt’s classic Betaal Pachisi. Vikram aur Betaal was a big hit that resulted in ushering of the era of special effects in Indian television. It was decided that the tried and tested star cast of Vikram aur Betaal would be employed to create the magic of Ramayan as well. Thus, Arun Govil, who played King Vikram in Vikram aur Betaal, was cast as Ram; Deepika Chikhalia, the princess, became Sita; Sunil Lahri, a prince became Laxman; and Dara Singh, who had played Virvar, was now the mighty Hanuman.

 

 

 

 

Before entering Hindi cinema, Sagar had worked as a peon, a cleaner, a salesman and more. After graduating with a gold medal in Persian and Sanskrit, he took to writing full-time. He penned book Aur Insaan Mar Gaya that was inspired by the madness of Partition. Sagar made his debut as a script writer in cinema with Raj Kapoor’s superhit movie Barsat. It was followed by other box office hits such as Paigham (1959), Ghunghat (1960), Zindagi (1964), Arzoo (1965), Aankhen (1968), Geet (1970), Lalkar (1973) and Charas (1978). At the peak of his time and fame (six back-to-back silver jubilee hits), Sagar unexpectedly decided to make a switch to television. Thought as foolish that time, the decision turned out to be one of epoch-making.

 

With an estimated 77 million viewers, city streets and marketplaces used to become empty on Sunday mornings when Ramayan was televised. Power stations were burnt in case of power cuts during the televised time. Cabinet ministers asked for their swearing-in ceremony to be delayed so that they could watch the Ramayan. A bride was missing at the muhurt of the wedding as it clashed with the timing of Ramayan. The anthropologist Philip Lutgendorf wrote that “never before had such a large percentage of South Asia’s population been united in a single activity, never before had a single message instantaneously reached so enormous audience.” When Madhu Jain wrote off his Ramayan as ‘moving calendar art pictures’, he yet replied triumphantly of having “brought the college boy from the disco culture to the Ramayan.” He counted it as his success that “College boys don’t say ‘Hi’ any more, they say ‘Jai Shri Ram ki’”.

 

Westerners have wondered how could a suspense-less story, which everybody knows, be a recipe for success? The secret probably lies not just in the story but also its masterly “execution” by the masterly Ramanand Sagar. Sagar however always refused to take credit for his Ramayan: “I have no credit. All credit goes to Hanuman – he could have picked up any other person like me and told him to do this.”