Welcome to Sajjanpur

Welcome to Sajjanpur is a 2008 Indian Hindi comedy film directed by Shyam Benegal and starring Shreyas Talpade and Amrita Rao in the lead roles. The film is by noted Parallel cinema director, Shyam Benegal, marking his return to comedy after filming Charandas Chor (1975). Even though Benegal is responsible for other films in the parallel cinema genre, this film was one of his mainstream Bollywood films. It was a remake of the 1977 film Palkon Ki Chhaon Mein. The film was both critically and commercially successful.

Welcome to Sajjanpur
Movie Poster for Welcome to Sajjanpur
Directed byShyam Benegal
Produced byRonnie Screwvala
Chetan Motiwalla
Written byShyam Benegal
Ashok Mishra
StarringShreyas Talpade
Amrita Rao
Kunal Kapoor
Ravi Kishan
Ravi Jhankal
Music byShantanu Moitra
CinematographyRajan Kothari
Edited byAseem Sinha
Production
company
IX Faces Pictures
UTV Spotboy
UTV Bindass
Distributed byUTV Motion Pictures
Release date
19 September 2008
Running time
134 mins
CountryIndia
LanguageHindi, Awadhi
Budget₹90 million (US$1.3 million)
Box office₹147 million (US$2.1 million)

Plot

Mahadev (Shreyas Talpade) is an unemployed graduate with a Bachelor of Arts from Satna college who lives with his mother, is forced to make a living writing letters for the uneducated people of his village. His real ambition is to become a novel writer. Through his humble occupation, Mahadev has the potential to impact numerous lives. The movie is a satirical, but warm-hearted portrait of life in rural India. He realizes this passion when an aunt of his wants him to write a letter to her son who has treated his mother with disrespect and the letter seemed to have worked. This made her aunt tell the villagers what an amazing writer he truly was. Initially the village folk would come to his home to get their letters written but his mother did not approve of it so he decided to set up a small work space near the post office.

Among Mahadev's customers are:

  • Mahadev's childhood crush and second grade classmate Kamla who eventually became a school dropout because of her seizures (Amrita Rao) is desperate for communication from her husband Bansi Ram (Kunal Kapoor), who works as a labourer at a dockyard in Mumbai. In the letters to her husband, a jealous Mahadev writes the opposite of the loving messages Kamla wants to convey, while faking what her husband has written to her.
  • A hurried mother (Ila Arun) who wants to get her ill-starred daughter, Vindhya (Divya Dutta) married.
  • A landlord whose wife is a candidate for the village Sarpanch, and who wants all her political rivals eliminated from the race.
  • A eunuch Munni who is contesting the elections for the village Sarpanch but fears the threats from the landlord.
  • A love-lorn compounder, Ram Kumar (Ravi Kishan), who is crazy about the widowed daughter-in-law Shobha Rani (Rajeshwari Sachdev) of a retired army soldier.

Mahadev manages to get his friend engaged, police protection for Munni, and almost kisses Kamla before they are interrupted. However Munni is killed after winning the election by the opposition, and he learns a shocking truth about Kamla's husband who used to sell his blood so he could earn a reasonable amount of money. It soon turns out that the story was a fictional novel written by the real Mahadev, but it is mostly based on his own experiences. Though it turns out that some of the villagers didn't exactly have happy endings, Mahadev sorts out his mistakes and accomplishes his long-held dream of writing a novel.

As Mahadev, under pseudo name Sukhdev, reveals that Munnibai became a successful politician, becoming an MLA, or a Member of the State Legislature, with high connections and powerful people surrounding her. It is also revealed that Kamla and Bansi are happy in small house in Mumbai, who come to visit Sajjanpur every Diwali. In midst of all these good news, Mahadev notes that Ram Kumar and Shobha Rani were lynched because members of their community opposed a widow getting remarried. Mahadev also notes that he married the ill-starred Vindhya after wooing her by writing 40 letters. While most people consider an ill-starred person to be a great misfortune, Mahadev notes that he became successful due to his marriage, as he paid down his farm land mortgage, built a wonderful house and realised his dream of writing a novel.

Cast

Soundtrack

Music of the film is by Shantanu Moitra. The music was released on 5 September 2008.,[1] there are a total of seven songs in the soundtrack including one remix.

Reception

Upon its release, the film received positive reviews and became a sleeper hit at the box office. An Indiatimes review said, "Shyam Benegal has always been accredited as a mesmerizing storyteller known for making 'meaningful' cinema. This time he also caters to commercial consumers, coming up with his most 'entertaining' attempt, by far."[2]

Awards and nominations

References
  1. "Welcome to Sajjanpur Songs Listing".
  2. Welcome to Sajjanpur - Review The Times of India, 19 September 2008.
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