[Reader-list] Sagar Cinema

[tangella madhavi]

  I
Over the past few months, I have been visiting Sagar Cinema, a video theater located in the Western suburbs of Mumbai. This theatre daily screens Telugu films for the vast labour Telugu migrant population in the vicinity. Their cinematic experience in an urban space seems to be inextricably linked to the trends in cinema back Home and the Telengana conflict as a majority of people migrate from this region. Underlying their escapism into the song, fights and dances of Telugu films, is accompanied with an innate awareness. As people from Telengana, the Telugu language on screen is different from the language they speak. The screen language is the language of the Andhra people not the Telengana. According to the migrants, it is a political ploy to systemically ignore the Telengana reality and language. An indifference that forced them to migrate to the city of Mumbai in search of work and repay debts.     
					
II 
The large Telugu migrant community at Malad live in Ashok Nagar. The locality resembles any other slum area in Mumbai with its narrow pathway and dense one room housing. The place also has a distinct Andhra flavour with the women watering and sweeping the small ‘front yard’ and drawing ‘mugulu’ with rice flour. Few rooms have mango leaves stringed along the front door.
 
But many rooms look like a bachelors pad with minimal living. A cooking place and a cloth string running along a wall. Under a tree a group of seven to eight Telugu men gather talking about yesterdays work. “Four to six of us live in one room. We pay a deposit of Rs.6000 and a rent of about 250-350 each depending upon the number of people sharing the room. Now, because of the demolition, the deposits have gone up to Rs.10,000. In fact, there are no rooms where one can stay if you are new to this place.” Another man in his 30’s interrupted, “these demolitions are creating havoc. They are breaking the rocks and the mountains to widen the road. A lot of our housing has already been demolished.” There is an uncomfortable silence when I asked them where would they go if their rooms were bulldozed. “We have been here for more then two decades. I vote here. Many of us, even if given an option will not go back to our villages. There is nothing left there. We don’t bring our families to Mumbai because someone has to care for our aged parents. Also, Mumbai promises regular work.”
Another migrant added, “but here too we work hard. These days’ trucks come to pick us at wee hours. We are taken to the construction site and there is nothing like working for eight hours. The contract is made for a certain amount of work that needs to be done. You do it in eight hours or fourteen; it is not their concern. The ‘Master’, a labour contractor, ensures that work goes smoothly facilitating water and raw materials. Usually, there is a woman who provides water. Women are not given strenuous labour work. They are paid about 120 per day for carrying drinking water around the site. We are the people who build houses in Mumbai. If  all of us plan to sit at home, even for a day, the construction work in Mumbai will come to a stand still. Our lives are miserable, we work like machines. Sometimes we don’t get rest for days together. And when our bodies tire we skip a day’s work like today.” 
“On days like this, we either sleep or if someone gets a CD we watch a film. Not many of us go to Sagar Cinema. We find it cheaper to buy a VCD and a TV and screen films at a time convenient for us. We get the CD’s from either Goregaon or back home. No! We don’t watch Hindi films. We don’t ‘understand’ the language although we speak Hindi at work. Telugu is our Matru Bhasha.” 


III 
Meanwhile, at Sagar Cinema, Shuklaji agreed to take us to the place from which he gets the films on rent
. 
  
Shuklaji sat dwarfed under two huge posters of Masti and Hum Kisise Kum Nahin. The board behind him had a couple of Telugu posters on it, and one C-grade Hindi film poster with a sleazy lady looking seductively at us. Another blackboard said in Telugu and a Hindi translation, “Charminar: today 10:30 pm.” Shuklaji prodded me to go take a look inside the theatre room. “Ek Telugu chal raha hai,” he said. Inside, rows of people sat in the darkness, watching Okadu, a technically slick Telugu film with Mahesh Babu juggling comedy and special effects action sequences smoothly. The other theatre was showing a Hindi film. We went out, and Shuklaji was ready to leave. We walked down to the Malad station. We were heading to Lower Parel, and walking to a suburb near Worli, where Shuklaji would rent a few VCDs for the next ten days’ screenings. “Do you know Telugu?”, I asked Shuklaji. He smiled, “I don’t know to speak Telugu, but five years of this job has taught me to recognise movies without knowing their names. I just look at the poster and I can tell which film it is!”  I asked him whether he had a list in mind that he would look for. He replied that he searches purely by instinct. 

Shuklaji has been with Sagar cinema with five years, right since its inception. “I inaugurated the theatre,” he smiled to me. Earlier he was in the diamonds business. He has been living in Mumbai for almost 30 years now. His family stays in Uttar Pradesh. “In my five years, I’ve never seen a film create so much hulchul as Indira, there were lines outside the theatre. In a room of capacity 100, I had fitted in 250 people, with another 250 waiting outside. I had to send them home. They begged me to at least let them see the last half hour. They were ready to pay Rs 25, instead of Rs 10!” He said it was a ‘fight film’ with some comedy too. “there has been no film like Indira, ever.”

“All our people are in charge of separate departments,” he said. “But I’m the one who’s in charge of the entire set up, like a manager. That’s because I have the contacts, I know how to get out of trouble, trouble with the police and other such things, you know.” He proceeded to explain that the rule was to shut down at exactly 12 am. Since their last show started at 10:30, they had to run till 1:30 sometimes, and had their run-ins with the law. “I sort out those things whenever they happen. That’s why I have to stay here till late. After that I go home, and the next morning at 6 I’m up again.” 

Shuklaji knew lots of chai wallahs, pen sellers and other hawkers on the station. He greeted them as we went along: “Hari Om!” Shuklaji perched on the footboard of the train at the door, all the way to Lower Parel, hanging out at every station so that people could get in. 30 years of train traveling. The epitome of street smartness. We hung on footboards, hopped into share cabs, broke a five-rupee-coin from a pan wallah, and finally reached a winding lane of the Worli interiors. Among pictures of Babasaheb Ambedkar on one wall and Urdu writings on the other wall, we walked to a Telugu video store. “People from all castes live here,” Shuklaji explained to me. 

We landed up at ‘Sri Venkateshwara’ the video store where Sagar Cinema has been doing business for years now. Earlier, Shuklaji informed, they used to source their VCDs from another store nearby. Once they ran out of stock, so Shuklaji tried at Venkateshwara, and got what he needed. The first storeowner got angry at Shukla’s changing loyalties, and they had an argument. Shuklaji took a call. 

So here at Venkateshwara, we scouted for VCDs. There were Hindi and Telugu VCDs, Hindi and Telugu audio CDs, and audiocassettes, and even Hindi dubbed English films like Spiderman and Dunston Checks In. Sleazy posters adorned the walls. The walls were filled with what looked like smuggled speakers, mp3 players and other electronic equipment. The helper boy asked us, “Coffee?” Shuklaji looked at him for a minute, and snapped: “Is that a thing to ask? Just get it!” 

The way it went was this – Shuklaji chooses 8-10 films every 8-10 days, and periodically comes back to this VCD library to return old ones and pick up new ones. Shuklaji knew all the names, searched for the new releases, helped by the boy at the VCD store. They spoke, pulled each other’s legs, and interacted like they’d known each other for months. “Speak in Telugu, I can’t understand Hindi,” said the boy, half jokingly. “If I knew Telugu I would be doing business in Hyderabad by now!” was Shuklaji’s pat reply. Shuklaji, the UP ka bhaiyya, juggled through the shelf and took out ten Telugu VCDs he liked. All the films looked the same to me. “What is this, Teja-Vejam?” he said, looking at one of the CDs. The helper boy was impressed by Shuklaji’s knowledge of Telugu. “What are you staring at me for? I’ve been doing this for five years!” 

More discussion. “How’s Pelli Kari Pellam?” “No, the movie is not that good.” Shuklaji kept it back in the shelf, without second thought. “What do you have? Do you have Maas?” The boy got out another CD: “We have Shankardada MBBS.” That CD went into the bunch. “Do you have Maas?” After a pause, both the boy and the man behind the counter said, “No 
 that’s not come in yet.” This upset Shuklaji a lot. “How can you say you don’t have Maas? That’s what I came here for, I had told Raju on the phone, it’s what the public wants! 
 Just call Raju. Get him on the phone - ” 

Unfortunately, Raju seth was out doing some VCD shopping, and would not be back for a while. Shuklaji growled sarcastically, “Looks like you guys are not in the mood of doing business
Just tell me what’s available and good condition, I’ll pick from there.” Maas, as I later found out, was the number one super hit in recent days, starring Nagarjuna. Shuklaji was upset that he didn’t get his hands on it. 

I returned to the boy and Shuklaji’s discussion. “
 so does this have fight?” “It has fight also, story also.” It was tossed into our bunch. “Taarak?” “That’s a solid film,” the boy advised him. That was also tossed into the bunch. The boy started making Telugu notes in his diary about the cds. They were tightly tied up in a plastic bag and then Shuklaji threw a hundred and two ten rupee notes on the table. “Where’s the bunch from last time
” “Arey it’s here, I won’t take it and run away!” Shuklaji returned the VCDs, he had got last time. 

As we were leaving, the guy behind the counter opened his tiffin. “Wow, now you’re opening the tiffin when we leave, couldn’t you ask us for lunch too!” Shuklaji quipped, and we set out back home. Twenty metres away, and Shuklaji started fiddling with his pockets. “Oh God! My cell phone!” We ran back to the store. Shuklaji had left his cell phone to charge the battery. As we retrieved it, he explained: “See I have two cards, Trump and Orange. But both are in the same phone. I need my phone! It’s got all the numbers, police officers, other important people 
 all my contacts. If there’s a problem, I know exactly whom to call.”  “at times, late at night, I have skirmishes with the police. They come there, they think they rule the town and everyone’s scared of them. They ask for bribes. I straightaway tell them, I don’t have money. Who keeps money at 2 in the night? I tell them to come tomorrow. They keep loitering around next few days. But I don’t pay up after the day’s accounts are done.” 

Once, we were back at Sagar Cinema, the CD’s were handed over to the man at the counter. He browsed through them and picked one with the glossiest cover, action hero looking with a killer instinct and a pretty actress face looking at him. He muttered, “I will screen this film tomorrow, madam can you read out the name for me? or do you want to pick and choose a film? We will show that first if it helps you in your research.”         

IV
In the coming weeks I would like to research about the Telengana Conflict. I would like to see if there are connections to the socio political situation in Andhra Pradesh and the migration to Mumbai. I would  enquire if these issues were discussed by the migrants while watching Telugu films.  

I would like to visit Ashok Nagar during Ugadi, Telugu New Years Day and sit through screenings of Telugu films in the respective homes of the Telugu migrants. Also, look forward if there are any special screenings at Sagar Cinema.  


 
               

              



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