*continued..
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VILLAIN: This MLA is the REAL villain. But he is not a villain because he is an MLA. Dont get confused by (media-created) stereotypes. Open your eyes. He could very well be an Armani-clad, english (with french toppings!) speaking corporate mogul too. He comes in many forms, he changes faces, he very subtly disguises himself behind the various veils we naively provide to him.
They smile and smile and still be villain. - Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoevsky)
The villain they show in the movies is unreal, a very simplified version of this real villain. This real villain is not loud and vulger. His looks are not abnormally made-up. You can hardly recognize him in a crowd. He is not even a one-man-army. He has, when he is alone, his limitations and his insecurities. This villain is rather a man of system; a part of a greater, much greater structure. He understands the system, respects it, submits to it and is happy with it. He very well understands the mechanism of power. He knows that power doesnt reside in an individual but in the network. This networks sustains him. This network protects him. And so he values his allies or contacts who are placed at (or are chosen from) the strategic positions. He knows the rules of the game. He knows what is exactly happening around. His runs his business smoothly in this perfectly harmonized world, a world of 'prey and let prey'. He is cheerfully sure of himself and he feels unassailable in this impregnable fortress. He is pleasant and sociable. He makes you like him. He asks you about your mother's health and your daughter's admission in the college. He takes pleasure in the trifling details of life. He has no ideal to die for. Infact he mocks at idealists and pities their naivety. He is cool amd amiable. He cracks jokes and keeps himself surrounded by giggling females. For him, morality(!!) exists within the system. He knows of no morality without it. His sense of corruption is distorted; interestingly but not surprisingly, for him disturbing the harmony, the equilibrium of the system is an act of corruption. He accepts the things as they are. He worships the rising sun, the right God. Very naturally, very comfortably he changes his loyalties and rationalizes his priorities. He is pragmatic. He is wise. In the later stages of his life you can hear him preaching about right and wrong, properiety and improperiety and 'money-is-not-everything'. He is necessarily religious and invokes mythological(which are at his fingertips) events and metaphors to support his actions and position every now and then. All his goons are his Hanumans! For even worse things(promiscuity or politics of the most diabolical nature), Krishna is dragged down from heavens. He goes for pilgrimage every year. And finally he builds a temple and settles all the accounts.
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HERO: On the other hand our DCP saheb is a poor victim of his own ideals. He burdens his mind with the things that are outdated and that noone takes seriously. Perhaps he takes life a little too seriously. Perhaps he should not. He actually gets distressed by seeing others in distress. Perhaps he should not. Remember Dr Bhaskar Bannerjee in Anand? Remember his angst, his bitterness? Remember his grit with which he fights his own helplessness before the enormity of the monster he was fighting with? Like his other friends, he can not pretend to be pained by the ubiquitous misery around him at one moment and gleefully plan a comedy movie the next moment. Perhaps he should also learn to ignore things. Perhaps he should also learn to forget things.
But he doesnt forget what his father had tought him when he was a kid. He doesnt forget even when his father himself teaches him just the opposite of what he had tought him when he was a kid. He is incorrigibly idealistic. He just doesnt understand that the real world is not that good.
The real world is a place where everyone is converting into bad simply because everyone else is doing so!
To start with, he is a betrayed man. He has been betrayed by his books and teachers. Oh how I wish he knew the efficacy with which the books cover the reality! That realization wouldve averted the disillusionment and heartbreak. He is like a man who was trained in cricket and was sent to a stadium where a football match was being played. And he stood like an idiot in the middle of the playground with his bat, amazed and clueless, amid guffawing spectators. What should he do there? He is like an actor who finds himself totally out of place at the stage. He finds that a different play is being staged. Imagine this situation! He is not required, not wanted but still he is there. He feels absolutely alienated there. What does a hero do here? We'll come to that in a while.
He observes that the real world works very differently from the bookish world. And noone cares or dares to write what actually happens around us. There are things that are known to all but said by none. He wonders why the world is like that. He wonders what to do with his bat in the football match?
Catch 22. Since he can function only within a (legal) framework and the framework is itself a device of the system, it is deliberately not made powerful enough to challenge the system. If he chooses to fight his battle without the (legal) framework then he himself becomes an outlaw, a criminal! He is nothing outside the system. He needs the system to beat it! And of course the system would not allow itself to be beaten. But this was so ridiculously simple! Why didnt he think it earlier? When he realizes the obvious absurdity in his erstwhile expectation, he feels foolish and frustrated.
He might decide to take the things head-on. Then he finds himself living against someone or something. Always. 24*7. His life virtually becomes a guerilla war, he finds himself thinking about the moves of the game he has pushed himself into. This game takes a toll on his personal life too. He most likely becomes irascible and grows sharp claws that hurt those who are near to him. His relationships start suffering. People gradually start avoiding him. After sometime he feels so much lonely that his battle seems to be only for the sake of his ego and nothing else. Perpetual loneliness cast a shadow on his life. He doesnt know what to do. Remember Shool?
Most of the people dont see the life of heroism beyond this stage. They succumb to the mounting pressure. But he, the hero, persists. He has the character to persist.
He starts delivering his dialogues at the stage. He doesnt mind others. He doesnt mind their indifference. He doesnt mind their hoots, their cries, and their vociferous protests. He deflates the self-assurance of the other actors who were banking on his passivity. Now it's their turn to be taken by surprise. Now it's their turn to feel that they are vulnerable too. The audience come to know about the other, the alternative play. Now they can choose between the two. They first step is taken. The first battle is won.
Camus says that the ultimate hero of humanity is Sisyphus* (read this). He somewhat repeats to what Krishna had suggested to Arjun (Karmanyevadhikaraste.. or Swadharme nadhanam shreyah paradharmoh bhayavayah) in Bhagavat Geeta.
A hero exhibits an unflinching faith, an indomitable devotion in his purpose. He stands by his values. He lives for what he believes in and he dies for the same. He might not be pragmatic but then a hero is NEVER a practical man. A practical, worldly man can never evoke strong emotions and respect from us.
The hero makes his own way. He challenges the unchallengables. He defeats the skepticism of others who are too weak to do so. He breaks the matrix by breaking its nodes one by one, with utmost patience. I have recently watched a movie called 'Ek ruka hua faisla'. In this movie, a man, who is the hero, changes the opinion of all his adversaries one by one. Watch the movie to see why this man is a hero.
Popular cinema perpetuates the myth that a vanquishing a villain is a necessary condition for a man to be a hero. Infact even the presence of an external villain is not needed. A man becomes a hero by winning over hsi own frailties that are abundant in anyone of us. This is an important point to understand.
The concept of hero is very interesting, as I see it. Initially people pull his leg, they block his way, they deny him their attention, they make fun of him. Perhaps they do it perhaps because they refuse to accept his superiority over them. Those who are near to him do it out of jealousy and others because of habit. But once he crosses a threshold, they admire him and raise him up. They positively want him to rise higher and shine brighter. They look up to him. He becomes the center of their hope. They fight on behalf of him coz they fight through him. They win through him. They live through him. They need him for themselves. He gives them a direction. He leads them. He frees them.
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. - Mahatma Gandhi
* Greek Mythology: Sisyphus is forced to roll a block of stone against a steep hill, which tumbles back down when he reaches the top. Then the whole process starts again, lasting all eternity.
My description of villain and hero might seem to you philosophically unteneble or unfounded. It might be dificult to be defended but it is not unfounded. This is what I have seen in my life and I have written it here at the risk of being laughed at in case you find yourself unable to relate to my experiences. Let me say that it is in no way an exhaustive definition or something of that sort. I never intend to do that. I have never done that. The scope of this essay is just a part of what I have seen and felt. I recognize that it is incomplete.
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