Friends, in a series of good episodes this week, the Wednesday episode of Jodha Akbar was no less. I liked the episode a lot - if not for anything else, definitely for the arrival of Todarmal. Instantly the court at Agra seemed to be of a far better quality with a man of his presence, his experience and his lightning quick assessment of the state of the accounts. He was also not just one of those "advice givers" who states problems and leaves them hanging in mid-air. He gave Jalal practical solutions to handle those problems.
I just loved the way Todarmal handled things yesterday. He first arrived, even at short notice, with a mind to help. Jalal and he exchanged fond hugs despite there having been only three meetings between them both so far. Hamida was thrilled to see Todarmal after all these years and as Jalal said to Todarmal "We met twice by "ittefaq", but this time I needed you and sent for you." Jalal explained how he needed a wise experienced hand with the accounts since things were not going smoothly in the Sultanate on the financial front. Todarmal was glad to accept Jalal's job but on two conditions that he laid upfront: one, he would work in his own method and needed total autonomy; two, he needed to be answerable to Jalal alone directly and no one else. And if it was a "yes" to both these conditions he would start work right away. How could Jalal have said "no" to such a non-fussy, clear as crystal, forthright man?
It took hardly half a day then for Todarmal to put his finger on exactly what was going wrong on the accounts. He told Jalal that the swindling from the exchequer was hurting the Treasury as well as the people, for the people were being taxed left and right but the benefits of that were not reaching them. The officials who stood between the Shahenshah and praja were the culprits who were lining their own pockets, fooling both King and praja. And Todarmal did not want to leave it at that, he also told Jalal what he needed to do. He said "You do go out among the people occasionally in disguise, but do it all the time and often. Thus you will hear what ails the people and also put the fear of God into the officials that their malpractices were being watched."
Which boss can ever do without a straightforward, highly experienced, honest, sincere, dignified and ruthlessly upright man? I am so happy that we will get to see more of Todarmal now in the days to come for I like the low-voiced, soft-spoken way he delivers his diction and at the same time "tells it like it is" to Jalal. This is what Jalal also liked a lot as he said when talking later to Samila. He needed to slowly weed out the insincere flatterers and treacherous ones out of his immediate circle and supplant them with upright, honest, hard-working men with experience and wisdom and fearlessness to give the King good advice. It doesn't matter whether the man is a Mughal or a Hindu, what matters is his solid reliability.
But then that's just the point that seemed to go down badly with Jalal's coterie. Adham, Sharif and the disgruntled maulvis (including the fence-sitting Munim Khan) were all seen later huddled in a discussion where they ranted and raved because one more Hindu was now in high position in Jalal's inner circle. First Jalal marries a Hindu Rajvanshi, then she brings her father, brother and nephew into the coterie, and then ther's this new inductee Tejwant, and now there's a Hindu heading the Finance Portfolio! Mughal blood was boiling as Adham in his narrow-minded way laid the blame for all this at Atga's door, for if Atga hadn't precipitated this financial issue, it would not all gone from bad to worse for Adham. Sharif seemed to enjoy Adham's discomfiture, the maulvis were feeling fenced in by Jalal's previous diktat that they could only talk religion and not politics - and the bandicoot Munim Khan (henchman that he was of Adham and Maham) was sitting among the plotters, looking for his own chance to betray Jalal even after acquiring his new titles and privileges.
Judging by the precap, it looks like Jalal is again reminded of the unfair teerth yatra tax by the praja. In the precap Jalal is seen having a flashback (a fake one) where Jodha too reiterated to him the need to remove this unfair tax on the Hindus going to places of pilgrimage. This was supposedly immediately following the Sikri Trip on which Jalal was himself mistaken for a Hindu Seth and imprisoned by his own sipahis for not paying this tax! Spoilers seem to indicate that as soon as Jalal lifts this teerth yatra tax, Jodha in a fit of happiness returns to Agra, extremely proud of her husband. So we have to thank Todarmal indirectly for Jodha's return, I guess?
Other than the Todarmal Effect, yesterday, I noticed three other things of importance in the scenes we saw:
1. Bharmal seems miffed even after hearing that Jalal had pardoned Shivani, and allowed Shivani to stay on at the Agra Palace, and given Tejwant a job and title. I wonder why Bharmal is being shown as miffed. Is he upset that he has not heard the word "marriage" so far and thinks Shivani is continuing to live in sin with Tejwant, in the presence of the Mughal family? Will he accept Shivani again in his heart after Jalal announces her wedding?
2. When Jodha was in her room, pensively thinking about Jalal having caught and pardoned Shivani, Shehnaaz comes there and they get to talking about Jalal's love for Jodha and Jodha's hidden love for her husband. Jodha asks Shehnaaz "How do you know so much about love?" and Shivani replies "Because there was someone who loved me too, whom I lost!" Folks, is my yesterday's prediction showing signs of coming true? Is Shehnaaz's husband the one trapped by Maham in the surang?
3. Was there any special significance to the fact that when Maham was all alone in her room and discovered that she had been stripped of all bandhis now in her disgraced position, only Javeeda swore continuing allegiance to Maham. Maham looked so moved by her daughter-in-law's loyalty that she actually hugged her and cried openly on her shoulder. I am finding it interesting that Javeeda gave Maham a "vachan" of unwavering loyalty. Does this mean Javeeda in some way may try to help Maham with the surang matter. I feel she may try to help but will botch it all up and indirectly get Maham caught. I didn't think the Maham-Javeeda scene was just to show the bonding between saas and bahu. There must be something in that "vachan".
Accha, now for my detailed analysis I have chosen the scene I loved best. It is the scene where here in Agra, Jalal starts talking to Salima about the Sikri visit with Jodha ... while there in Amer, Jodha is telling the exact same story to Dadisa.
I loved this scene simply for the whole choreographing of it - the director's creative idea of intercutting the scenes between Agra and Amer was superb. The Sikri trip details were being told by the two protagonists with the scenes switching between one and the other, like a pendulum swinging from one side to the other gently and yet precisely. So here goes the scene ...
Jalal and Jodha talk to Salima and Dadisa about the Sikri trip ...
Jalal is standing on the terrace of the palace, a drink in hand and looking at leisure. It is one of those quiet moments of his day when he most seems to miss Jodha. He looks up at the moon and asks if Jodha too was remembering him as she looks up at the full moon herself. He says to himself "How strange that people think that a Shahenshah has everything he could ever want, and yet here I am without that one thing I most want. All I want is to look at you, Jodha Begum, one more time." There is such wistfulness in his eyes that my throat feels like it is choking.
Just then as if to call a halt to his personal reverie, Salima comes up to him and said "Adaab Shahenshah, I hope I haven't interrupted your quiet and private moment?" Jalal says he was actually feeling the loneliness and would like her company. She refuses the drink he offers her and they both sat down for a pleasant chat. (I am amazed at the beautiful relationship that Jalal and Salima share. They are not close in the truest sense of the word, and yet they are close because they can freely talk of almost anything together without formality. The relationship is just at that perfect distance that mutual respect allows it to be. It's no closer, yet also no further than that!)
Jalal asks Salima "Have you also come here to ask me why I hired Todarmal Ji when he is a Hindu and a prior wafaadaar of Sher Shah Suri?" Salima says "No Shahenshah. I assume if you have hired him, you must have applied deep thought to it. But how did you get to know of Todarmal Ji?" Jalal replies, "Salima Begum, there are times when even when we try hard we are not able to meet the ones we care for ... and sometimes coincidentally we end up meeting the new ones that become important to us. Do you remember how Jodha Begum and I had made a trip disguised as common folk to the dargah of Salim Chisti?" Jalal is shown as having flashback memories of that trip as he walked beside Jodha in a doli, almost like that first visit he ever made to Amer!
Just then the scene cuts to Amer where Jodha has her head in Dadisa's lap and is telling Dadisa of the self-same story of the Sikri trip. "We were aghast initially at the magnitude of the trip" Jodha confides. "It was to be such a long yatra and that too alone. But the Shahenshah had not an ounce of fear about it. Do you know, Dadisa, at one point we both were imprisoned for not paying the teerth yathri tax! How strange it was that the Mughal Shahenshah, in his own kingdom, was made a prisoner by his own sipahis!" Dadisa is amazed. She stops her hands that are gently stroking Jodha's head to ask "What, his own men captured and imprisoned him?" "Yes", Jodha replies, "but since we were in disguise no one recognised us". Dadisa is eager to know more. "Then what happened?" she asks.
The scene just then beautifully cuts back to Agra where Jalal continues telling the story to Salima. "Then what happened? Well, because Jodha Begum was with me, all the tough times just got dissolved somehow. Through thick and thin she kept smiling. I learnt a lot from Jodha Begum ...". Salima starts smiling knowingly and Jalal suddenly realises that maybe he has been saying too much about Jodha Begum and himself. He looks bashful like a teenager caught in his first revelation of love, but then gathers himself to continue, changing tack slightly. "Ah, yes we were talking of Todarmal Ji. Well, one night it happened that we had to spend the time at his house. He thought we were in fact simple common folk and gave us shelter."
The scene then swings back to Jodha and Dadisa. "Then what happened? Dadisa, that very night some dakus attacked Todarmal Ji's house. But the Shahenshah was not one for taking this easy. He attacked back and killed every one of them. Do you know, he single-handedly has the capacity of a whole army! And that night, seeing his prowess, even Todarmal Ji got completely taken by surprise." Jodha is then seen having flashbacks of the way Jalal fought the dakus and vanquished them.
The scene goes back to Jalal on the terrace. "This Todarmal Ji is a very helpful kind of person. Do you know, Salima Begum, he not only helped us that time but even this time when I was searching for and located Jodha Begum at the Mathiura ashram. I got wounded and he helped me immediately. He recognised who I was really, but even after knowing that he wouldn't accept anything in return for his help. And I too got to see that in financial matters he was a very strong professional, experienced, and reliable too." Salima says "Oh, so that's why you called him her?" Jalal replies "Yes absolutely. You may also have seen at the durbar that he is a very self-respecting dignified man. I am thinking that I need to replace all these insincere flatterers around me with men who are straight and can call a spade a spade. I want to have such people in my durbar who are good at what they do and on whom I can rely."
Salima says "That's wonderful Shahenshah, for people must be employed for their work and not because they are relations." ""You are right Salima Begum", says Jalal with recent incidents regarding Maham on mind. "I have relied on those I thought were close to me and have seen the poor results of that." Salima gives Jalal some support "But if you learn from mistakes, you are better able to progress in future, isn't it?" Jalal replies with sombre realisation ""Yes, but sometimes there are those we should trust and not relying on them also becomes very expensive, as I did with Jodha Begum." Jalal's eyes wear a faraway look like he is lost in thoughts of Jodha.
The scene again shifts to Amer. Jodha is sitting up, looking at Dadisa, but the look in her eyes too is far away, thinking of Jalal. "You are getting lots of memories of him - our Jawai Sa - isn't it?" Dadisa asks Jodha gently. "You still look miffed". Jodha replies "It isn't about my angst and his cajoling me. It isn't even about anger or ahankaar. It is that when I so accepted him as my husband, and I was always so ready to protect his "maan and sammaan", why did he so hurt my "sammaan"? Why did he suspect me?" Jodha's voice fails as she chokes on her tears.
Her sadness seems to affect Jalal's too as we are again shown the scene of him sitting on that terrace with his head bowed in remorse. Salima says quietly "Shahenshah, I love this point that you never once thought about Todarmal Ji's religion." "Right, Salima Begum, " Jalal says "often mazhab and tehzeeb differentiate people, even making them enemies, but I learnt from Jodha begum that religion is never a wall between people, but what makes the difference is the feelings of respect that people have for each other. It doesn't matter where you come from, it's where you are headed that makes the difference." "You are right indeed," says Salima, and the scene leaves Jalal looking back at the moon where he probably feels oneness with Jodha.
What a lovely scene this was. I felt it was more like a dance of two different people in different places matching their movements and feelings together and staying in sync. Quite beautifully done!
My comments on the whole episode:
Before I launch into the comments I have to share something with you all. My four or five "telephone friends" with whom I chat every night - and right through the day - all have their own different reaction styles which is sometimes more interesting to me than the story.
For example, at the current stage of the story, Maddy is chagrined by the delay and unbearable stretch of the Jodha-Jalal reunion at Agra and sends me a lot of crying and twisted mouth smilies via WhatsApp. Ela is telling me "What's the hurry? If Jodha comes to Agra, then there'll be love and what after that? Sabr rakho, this politics is interesting with the downfall of Maham." My other friend Jyoti is saying to me "Take a chill pill Mansi, this is IPL season so don't set your expectations high, the story will 100% be kheecho-fied!" Diksha, the ever unshakeable one is just calmly commenting on the daily happenings and enjoys what there is without wishing for anything else. She predicts from episode to episode and is generally 100% right. Jaya, on the other hand is the no-nonsense one who even yesterday told me "How many more fake flashbacks do we have to see before they get to planning Shivani's wedding?"
As you all can imagine, I am usually in the middle of all this communication to and fro waiting to see how many coconuts to break for Ganpati the next morning! Where will I be without my friends? A round of applause to your girls for zinging my brain from all sides and making me ready each morning to write my post!
Okay, now for the comments on the episode ...I have three things to say overall:
1. Jalal is in the process of separating the men from the boys. It's good that he is getting space away from his love life to focus on this area and rectify all that is wrong.The enforced separation is allowing him to review his ruling style.
Todarmal's entry has truly strengthened the ranks of the Hindu contingent at the darbar. I can understand the insecurity of the Mughals at Jalal's court, including the maulvis, because their numbers are decreasing fast and they are being replaced each time by more Hindus. Till they listed the names yesterday even I didn't realise how over time Jalal has added more and more Hindus to his advisors. There's Jodha, Bharmal, Bhagwan Das, Man Singh, Tejwant and now Todarmal.
But the silliest part of that whole "secret society meeting" between the gang of Mughals was the way Adham zeroed in on Atga as the cause of all problems. Did you all notice how Sharif smiled away at this piece of idiocy? I am not surprised that the Mughals are feeling insecure because they are not just treacherous to Jalal, they are cut-throats with each other also. They are a divided group of self-serving guys who are capable of eliminating each other with no assistance from the Hindus.
And in the midst of all this I hope you all saw Munim Khan? Abhay sent me a PM saying "Look at how history is working out. This Munim Khan, after all the perks and promotions he has got is now already in cahoots with the disgruntled gentlemen". What a rat!
I also remember Sangeetha (Lizzy2012) once writing to me saying that as the story progresses we will see the gradual "Rajvanshification of Jalal and the Mughalification of Jodha". I think yesterday with Todarmal swelling the ranks of the close coterie of Jalal, this swing towards more Hindus in the darbar has started in full earnest.
Till now it was all about Jodha and her immediate family members (father, brother, nephew) getting positions at Jalal's court. But with the addition of Tejwant and then Todarmal, a wider circle of other non-related Hindus is beginning to consolidate. New blood in the darbar is also infusing Jalal with ideas for a new style of ruling his kingdom. Todarmal has set him on a new path already by asking Jalal to stand between his praja and his courtiers - instead of letting the courtiers stand between him and his praja. Such moves may make Jalal more powerful and popular but he must also realise that his life is at greater risk with the treacherous ones in his own family now gunning for his blood even more. Jalal is probably going to become a thorn in the flesh of the ambitious side of his own Mughal family that has till recently thought that familial relationship is the basis of power and rank - and not merit or reliability.
That's where this separation track from Jodha for a while becomes so important ... because we are seeing Jalal getting more space and time to see what direction his darbar should take hereafter and to re-order his immediate circle. The talk with Salima, I think, was also important for he consolidated his own mind as he explained to her that he needs to throw out the "insincere flatterers-cum-backstabbers" and get people who "call a spade a spade".
He has realised he needs to keep religion and familial relationships aside and choose people on merit and reliability. Also, he has realised that he needs to be close to his praja as Todarmal advised, so that he personally can see how happy the praja really is and where exactly the courtiers given adminsitrative responsibilities are serving themselves and lining their own pockets. And most of all he has also realised that he needs to re-examine his deepest and closest relationships more than others, for even the Badi Ammi's colours have run with the wash.
It's a new chapter in the life of Jalal, in a way, for he has to systematically root out the corrupted "blood loyalties" and replace it with "outsiders with new and smarter perspectives and ideas for change". Would he have done all this if he was with Jodha through this time? I doubt he would have had the bandwidth to handle both simultaneously - his budding love life and his darbar re-ordering. So in a way, this enforced separation is a valuable time for Jalal to look again at his ruling style and his political priorities.
2. Jodha too is re-examining her relationship with Jalal as she sits alone in Amer talking about him and working out in her mind what exactly irks her and where he scores high on her list of laudable traits in her husband.
The talk Jodha had with Dadisa was important to the story too, if we see it as a chance for Jodha also to refine her ideas about Jalal. It's easy for a person in love to brush aside the parts they don't like and to focus just on what they love about the other person. But enforced separations have a way of making one re-examine all previous assumptions in thinking and rutted points of view.
Jodha is getting time to see first of all what irks her most about the current impasse in her relationship with Jalal. She - and we - have been playing this guessing game of what exactly her angst is about. She is even now adjusting her ideas, because every time she tries to articulate what she finds distasteful in what Jalal did to her, she is coming up with a different way of saying what she means.
I was one of those feeling a bit irritated that Jodha had not yet returned to Jalal in Agra till yesterday, but now, if I think things through calmly, I realise that even till yesterday Jodha herself was not 100% clear what she expects of her relationship with Jalal. She said yesterday for example "I have been a true wife to him and have thought him to be my husband, and given him all the "maan and sammaan" - and yet he did not give me the "sammaan" ... he suspected me!"
If we break this sentence into its constituent bits, can we see that Jodha was perhaps not absolutely right in all respects in her assessment of herself and of Jalal? She has to sit down and dissect every part of the sentence she said and ask herself "Have I really been the true wife to him that I think I have been? Have I really thought him to be my husband in every sense of the word? Have I really given him the "maan and sammmaan" that I think I have? Has he really not shown me "sammaan" at all? Have we both been misled by the extraordinary things that happened in our relationship, and forgotten to see the daily small acts of "sammaan" that we have given each other? Is "sammaan" measured by the extraordinary things we do for each other or by the small daily acts of respect we give each other from just unplanned good intention?
What has happened in this relationship is that to both of them, the small every day actions they do for each other has got hidden in the big high-profile dramatic events that have overtaken their marriage. For example, it is not what Jodha does for Jalal everyday that has been reckoned by her or him as examples of her "sammaan" for him, whereas that big moment of drinking poison for saving his life is treated as the equivalent of giving him "maan and sammaan". Likewise his daily actions and little goodnesses to her have been hidden behind the big and dramatic "suspecting of her fidelity" that makes her feel that her "sammaan" has been trampled upon.
How easy it is to forget the small daily actions and tender emotions, the acts of kindness and the simplicity of love, and to see only the big dramatic watershed moments as the hallmarks of a relationship!
This enforced separation should help Jodha see the small daily things between her and Jalal as more important than just the big good or bad things they have done to each other ... because it is only now in separation that she will really miss the little things he did for her the most as she sits all alone at Amer. She has to realise that life is about the insignificant things all adding up to greater significance than the few big things.And when she goes back to him, that is what she needs to tell him also ... that "Let's not measure our relationship by its big dramatic moments, let's learn to value the everyday goodnesses of each other done in mutual respect."
Jodha is also getting time to think through what exactly she like or dislikes about Jalal, and how she wants the relationship to go forward. Sometimes it is important to take stock of things and course-correct rather than to drift along thinking life will automatically correct everything that is askew.
3. Maham is getting her priorities right too, isn't she? Finally Javeeda, the blithering idiot became the only person still willing to stand in Maham's corner. Does Maham really value her at least now?
I think Javeeda will still be a bungling madcap and despite her vachan to stand by Maham forever and ever, it is she who may accidentally lead everyone to that surang and hand Maham a top-class fiasco.
But still, as of yesterday, when not even a single bandhi was in sight for the privileges-stripped Maham, Javeeda was the only one left on whose shoulder she could cry.
I hope Maham also uses this opportunity to see who is important and who is not. Javeeda has always been the irritant fit only to make sevaian. Let's see if at least now she is seen slightly better as at least a "loyal irritant".
Cricket
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