Friends, yesterday's episode was dedicated to giving us the full back story of Chand Begum. The episode did have one of the usual lollipop Jodha-Jalal romantic scenes, but the crux of the episode, as I said, was the whole story of how Chand Begum came to be where she now is - in the surang as a captive of Maham.
When we see the episode there are many seemingly correct flows of narrative scripted by the Creatives, but when we begin to analyse the details later after seeing the episode five or six times, there are many remaining questions unanswered by the back story narrative, where we have to assume the in-between sequences. When I give you the analysis below you will see that yourself ... I have tried to give the in-between understandings along with the scene descriptions!
Anyway, overall the episode moved fast because it was a new flashback story to us all and it was interesting to see just how Maham managed to get Chand Begum to herself when all the rest of the family had given her up for dead. Additionally there is one bit in the Jodha-Jalal scene (rocking the empty cradle as apshagun) that is to be specially noted as a sanket of Ruq getting exposed ... and there's also the precap where I think Ruq has passed off a pregnant bandhi as herself when the Hakim came to check. All this is in the detailed analysis below so read on.
Here's what all happened yesterday :
Maham, Chand Begum and her little girl child - all grown up now!
The episode begins with Maham in the surang yet again. She is once more threatening Chand Begum with dire consequences to her and her child if she does not tell Maham the secret location of the khazana. By now we see Chand Begum's face very clearly and we can see that she is not a woman in her senses at all. She is a half-crazed psychotic woman holding a baby doll and calling it her child. She looks too aged to be the mother of any small baby, but she looks caught in a time warp.
Maham bullies her endlessly, even pulling the baby doll away from her, whereupon this Chand Begum begins to plead for her baby to be given back. Maham's voice grows shrill with frustration as she tells Chand Begum "Tell me, tell me, where is the khazana? Your memory has this information locked inside. Take it out and tell me. Everybody already thinks you are dead, now I will really kill you and your baby, if you refuse to tell me and no one will know anything about you both at all? Who did you get to deliver your paigam for you? Who is your accomplice?"
Folks, when we see the condition of Chand Begum we realise that she is so far gone in madness that she could not have even instructed someone to send that paigam to Jodha, she may not even know of the existence of Jodha and Jalal as her step son and step daughter-in-law, and she could not even have enlisted some accomplice to write a cogent telegram. So someone unknown to even her must have sent the paigam to Jodha so that the khoj of Chand Begum can be started. This person must have wanted the family to start looking for the missing Chand Begum and so only someone who was very keen that Chand Begum should be found would have put this paigam in the palki without even Chand Begum knowing that she was being helped (i.e. Shehnaaz?)
Anyway, after Maham''s surang threats, several bits of flashback are shown that give the full story of Chand Begum.
Chand begum is shown dressed like a queen and living all by herself somewhere in a palatial house alone with a small baby in a cradle - and along with another begum - Gauhar Begum. She says she is there for safety since her husband Humayun has been gone in the last few months for war with Sher Shah Suri. Now before he went for war, it appears that Humayun took the precaution of keeping a secret khazana of wealth for his child and also keeping a farman that when born this child will be entitled to the Delhi takht. (Of course, Humayun was not to know if the child would be a boy or girl, but he nevertheless left the Delhi takht via farman for this child, since he was going to war and didn't know what his own fate would be.)
Chand Begum knew where this farman and khazana were stored, but since she thought her own family members would try to snatch this inheritance of her child, we are to assume that while Humayun went to the war his pregnant wife deliberately "went gaayab" from the palace and took safety somewhere in a hidden house suited to her status and gave birth to the child - a baby girl.
She took Gauhar begum with her to this safe house, and had the child away from the greedy eyes of the rest of her family. And thus it may be the reason why the family keeps saying they knew she was seven months pregnant but she then went gaayab and no one knows what happened to the mother and child.
In her khidmat, Maham was a bandhi supposed to care for her. But Maham, who came to know about the khazana and farman, tried greedily to get this information out of Chand Begum ... and then a daily tussle started with maham threatening death and asking for thee khazana location and Chand begum refusing to give the information.
Gauhar Begum tried to help Chand Begum when she came to know that Maham was threatening her. (Gauhar begum actually had been a bandhi herself but Humayun had later married her and given her begum status.) When Gauhar Begum tried to intervene to save Chand Begum and the baby from Maham's death threats, Maham actually murdered Gauhar on the spot saying "You are after ll a mere bandhi, who do you think you are to come between me and my destiny which is in that khazana and farman!"
After the murder of Gauhar, Chand Begum knew that the day when she too would be murdered was not far away, and that only because she was holding back vital information about the khazana and the farman, her life was being spared till Maham came to know the truth. So Chand Begum did her utmost not to reveal anything to Maham. But one day in utter desperation, Maham took out her knife and started menacing steps towards killing the baby in Chand Begum's arms.
Fortunately, at that very moment, there was for some reason a commotion outside in the city streets. People were agitated and running about here and there, and Chand Begum saw her chance. She escaped into the crowds with her baby and was looking around for a way to go for her own and her daughter's safety, when she saw a daasi lady also running helter-pelter. She gave the baby to that daasi and said "Look after her, take her" and then ran herself somewhere else for safety. The net result was that Maham totally lost track of Chand and her daughter.
But destiny always comes round again sometime, and it happened that after that war was over, Maham and her caravan were returning to the Palace at Agra (as were the other wives of Humayun and their kids). En route to Agra, Maham suddenly brought her caravan to a halt when she spotted someone looking like a bedraggled Chand Begum sitting by the roadside, half-mad and dishevelled and clutching a rag doll to her chest as her baby and talking to this baby!
Maham realised that it was indeed Chand Begum gone mad and believing the doll to be her baby. She quickly cajoled Chand Begum to go with her to Agra, promising fine clothes and food for the child and a fine palace life again for Chand Begum. The poor Begum, trapped by the lure of safety again, succumbed to Maham's wiles and went with her in her caravan.
From that point on I suspect she has been ensconced in the surang by Maham, and daily been tortured to try and remember where the khazana and farman are. However, even if Chand knew where the khazana and farman were, what are the odds that a mad woman may remember and tell all to Maham? So Maham's frustration has been daily increasing because by this time in the present her son Adham needs both the money and the Delhi takht - and finding that khazana and the farman have become a dire necessity!
Meanwhile what happened to the baby in the hands of the daasi? We were shownthat that the baby later became - Shehnaaz. The daasi woman seems to have brought her up and seems to have told her whatever she knew of her own background. Thus Shehnaaz seems to be calling the daasi "Ammijaan" and seems to know that she is the child of Humayun and Chand Begum. She seems to have grown up with a feeling of being wronged by life. She feels she should have prior right to the throne which she should have inherited from Humayun, as people like Jalal were born much later and so she has first right to the takht.
She doesn't seem to know anything about the khazana and the farman giving her the Delhi takht, since I suspect the daasi never got that information from Chand Begum. That is why Shehnaaz (which may be the name given by the daasi to her) believes she has the right to the entire Sultanate and not just the Delhi takht. She thinks to herself "I could have been the first ever queen of the whole Sultanate so why should Jalal be the inheritor of all my father's wealth and kingdom, which should have all been mine as I was born well ahead of Jalal. And where is it written that only a man can inherit, I could have been the first ever queen to reign over the entire sultanate. I now have to get rid of Jalal, kill him and get back all that is due to me. And I need also to find my mother again!". These must be the trend of thoughts in Shehnaaz's mind, and the fact that she is partly Hindu and partly Muslim in upbringing could be because the daasi imparted both customs to the girl - her own Hindu customs as well as the Muslim customs which the girl had a birthright to know.
We then gather from Shehnaaz's dialogue to her "Ammijaan" in a successive flashback that Shehnaaz had been searching for a way to get back at Jalal and had been studying all the happenings at the Agra court and knew that Jalal had married Jodha etc. It was then fortuitous and totally a co-incidence that when Shehnaaz was at the Mathura ashram for a bit, she heard that Jodha had run away from her husband and taken asylum there.
She therefore befriended Jodha (by acting mad herself) and came to learn the personal confidences of Jodha's own story from her, and she knew if she stuck to Jodha like a leech, she would soon get access to Jalal. And sure enough it all happened that way - and thus Shehnaaz ended up at the Agra Palalce, waiting for the right time to eliminate Jalal and stake her claim to the throne.
Meanwhile Shehnaaz seems to have also be keeping periodically in touch with her daasi "Ammijaan" and telling her the latest developments, and I suspect Shehnaaz is also wanting to search out her own mother. I thus believe it was Shehnaaz who put the paigam into Jodha's palki so that the royal family can suspect some foul play and start the search for Chand Begum.
I also suspect that since Shehnaaz has heard from the daasi that the Queen, her mother Chand Begum, had a bandhi called Mahamanga in her employ, this Shehnaaz has been searching the rooms of Maham and her son at the palace for clues on the whereabouts of her own mother! Shehnaaz of course doesn't know that Maham herself has ensconced her mother in captivity in the surang for the grabbing of the farman and khazana for her own son Adham. But being the clever girl that she is Shehnaaz surely knows, I suppose, that if her mother was still alive and Maham had anything to do with her disappearance, then Maham must have stashed her mother somewhere nearby within managing distance from the Agra Palace.
Shehnaaz takes an oath to herself in the presence of her Ammijaan that she will kill Jalal and grab back the kingdom that is hers, and that she is quite close to that day, and is only waiting for the right opportunity. Meanwhile she continues to act half-mad in a bid to disconcert everybody at the palace and deflect all suspicion on her true identity and intentions.
Jodha tells Jalal that rocking an empty cradle is an apshagun!
Apart from the huge flashbacks of Chand Begum and her child, there was the usual single scene of romance between Jodha and Jalal. Jodha was combing her hair at night before going to bed, when Jalal sneaked into her room silently and stood watching her with awe and love. She suddenly noticed him in her mirror reflection and asked why a Shahenshsh needed to come into her room as a chor?
He then gets flirty with her for a bit before dumping himself on her bed saying "I've come to sleep here! And you can get in to bed beside me!" She demurs again and this coochey coo seems to continue till he suddenly sees a cradle in the room. It's the one Jodha has kept ready for Ruq's child. Jalal sees Jodha referring to the cradle as "for our baby" and he gets mighty thrilled at the selflessness in Jodha that never sees any distinction between her own baby and Ruq's child. Jodha simply explains this to Jalal as follows: "Even if the baby does not have my blood, it surely has your blood. Any child of Ruq is dear to me too as my own baby would be. And this baby will call me Choti Ammijaan, wouldn't it?". Jalal is filled with even more awe that he has married this paragon of all virtues!
Jodha then also explains to Jalal that she learnt so much about babies because she helped her own bhabhi with her baby in Amer.
Then he marvels at the cradle imagining his future child in it and starts rocking the empty cradle. Jodha immediately sends out a sanket "Don't rock an empty cradle. It's an apshagun" she says, making us all aware that an apshagun surely will now happen when Ruq is exposed for her fake pregnancy.
All this no doubt is setting the stage for the great bhandaphod of Ruq during her godh bharayi function! It is common expectation in Hindi serials that all these jashns are times of high climax and most bhandaphods happen at jashns, marriages and celebrations. So be prepared folks for the great burst out of Ruq's fake pregnancy during the godh bharayi!
Ruq may be passing off a pregnant bandhi as herself during the Hakim test!
Accha, now coming to the precap, this is sensational. Jalal is seen here telling Ruq that his own chosen Hakim will test her for the development of her pregnancy. When the Hakim actually comes, Ruq is seen wearing a beauty facepack mask of some paste with her eyelids wearing two slices of cucumber! The Hakim does the test and when Ruq asks what the diagnosis is, the Hakim says "I will tell the Shahenshah that!". Obviously this is a teaser precap, because the very fact that the lady was wearing a face mask suggests that Ruq must have made some pregnant bandhi take her place and cover her face thus and get checked by the Hakim so that the result is a positive diagnosis that the pregnancy is coming along fine. (This bandhi switch idea comes from Maddy!)
Diksha also had a great insight on this last night. She says the precap of the previous episode was not shown in the episode yesterday at all i.e. the scene of Jalal shouting at Ruq for smoking the hookah. So maybe when we see the episodede of tonight, we may see both the precap scenes of day before yesterday and yesterday. Jalal may see Ruq using the hookah, get very angry and therefore get his own chosen Hakim to check out Ruq's condition and confirm all is right with the developing baby. Put into the plight of having to be checked by Jalal's Hakim, Ruq may have switched places with a pregnant bandhi to pass the Hakim test!
My comments on the episode:
Okay folks, I now have so many thoughts on this episode that I will just list my points as they occur to me ...
The "madness" story ... is it true? Are both mother and daughter "acting mad"?
It looks like Shehnaaz knows her parentage and her entitlements to the main throne, but she has no clue about the khazana and farman by her father leaving the Delhi takht to her. That explains why she talks of the entitlement to the whole Sultanate and not just the Delhi takht. It also explains to me that Shehnaaz must be the one who put the paigam in Jodha's palki so that a khoj of her missing mother may be started.
She knows that Maham may be involved in her mother's disappearance somehow for she was the only remaining relic from her mother's times still surviving now at the Agra court. She must be suspecting Maham may have hidden her mother somewhere close to the Agra Palace, to be able to keep control of her easily. She may thus be searching for clues to her mother's whereabouts in Maham's room and Adham's room. There is no way Shehnaaz may be searching for the farman or khazana as that information Chand Begum was never divulged to the daasi!
In all this I am getting one big doubt. If Shehnaaz could think of acting "mad" to entice Jodha into friendship to get access to the Agra Palace, what are the odds that Chand begum herself is not "acting mad" to avoid telling Maham about the khazana and farman location and to stay alive. Chand Begum must be knowing that if she withholds the information from Maham she will stay alive, because if she's dead Maham cannot hope to unearth the khazana ... the only clues to the khazana and farman are inside Chand Begum's head!
Moreover if Chand Begum acts mad she can pretend the doll is her child and Maham's dhamkis to kill the child will not matter at all, since the child must be safe with the daasi and now all grown up. So what can Maham really do? She can't kill Chand Begum and neither will she do any harm killing a doll. If you look at it folks, if Chand Begum is in her senses and just "acting mad" she is playing one hell of a smart game with Maham and probably biding her time till she can catch up with her daughter if opportunity permits.
That is why I feel that after the surang mystery is solved and Maham is caught for her misdeeds in hiding and torturing Chand Begum for years, we all have to watch Chand Begum's behaviour closely. She and Shehnaaz may lay claim to the entire throne and try to unseat Jalal. Then it will become necessary for Jalal and Jodha to find the khazana and farman to limit Shehnaaz into getting only the Delhi takht and not the whole throne!
What about the Todarmal story ... where does that fit in?
In all that flashbacks that happened yesterday, one part didn't fit in for me ... Todarmal told Jalal that he took Chand Begum as part of his entourage back to Humayun after the war with Sher Shah Suri ended. And after that Chand begum has gone missing. How does that fit in with the fact that Chand Begum was shown as having a small baby in a cradle and living somewhere in a rich sort of house with a bandhi (Maham) and the other begum Gauhar also living with her?
As I have already written, my explanation for that is like this:
There may have been two wars that Humayun fought with Sher Shah Suri. Maybe during the end of the first war, Chand Begum, the pregnant wife of Humayun may have been delivered safely to Humayun by Todarmal. Then Humayun may have gone for another war, when the child was not yet born, when he would have told Chand Begum that he has kept a khazana and farman for the child. But the rest of the family may have been eyeing this inheritance. So to keep herself and the baby safe from the family, Chand Begum (along with Gauhar Begum) may have deliberately "gone gaayab" ie. started living hidden in a separate hidden house, because as Chand Begum said she feared someone from the family may try to snatch the unborn baby's inheritance. Then in that hidden house Chand Begum may have given birth to Shehnaaz. The flashback may have been shown from this point.
Thus we may have been shown the flashback between two wars for which Humayun went. One ended when Chand begum was still pregnant, and the pregnant Chand Begum was delivered safe to Humayun by Todarmal. But the second war may have started already during which time Chand had taken a separate hidden house to protect the baby's inheritance from the family, and then delivered the baby ... but this time Maham herself threatened her and the baby for the farman and khazana, and killed Gauhar, so Chand Begum had to again flee to save her baby and herself from Maham.
The empty-cradle-rocking apshagun sanket, the godh bharayi and the bhandaphod!
I doubt if ithe single Jodha-Jalal scene was intended more as a romantic scene. The empty cradle rocking "apshagun" seems the high point of the scene. This shows me that a sure bhandaphod of Ruq is on its way during the godh bharayi.
But three times already the Zee man has confirmed that it will be Maham who bhandaphods Ruq's fake pregnancy to Jalal. So I would assume it can happen in one of three ways:
One, maybe Ruq starts shouting at Maham in a high-handed way if Maham is discovered as the hand behind the surang mystery. This may enrage Maham and she may spill the beans on the arrogant Ruq.
Two, Maham may look for an opportunity to belittle Jalal as a result of his doing jasoosi and finding Chand Begum in the surang. So Maham may say "I am not the only one cheating you and separating you and Jodha. Your so-called Khas Begum has also been pulling the wool over your eyes all the time with this whole fake pregnancy!"
But both these theories above seem to be about Maham taking revenge after being discovered as the surang-torturer of Chand Begum. I am now beginning to wonder if the godh bharayi comes bfore or after the surang mystery is found.
Let's take a third possibility therefore. What if maham does the bhandaphod before the surang is found? What if Maham senses that Jalal and Jodha are about to uncover the surang mystery and she decides to do something spectacular to distract them from unearthing the surang mystery ... and so she does Ruq ka bhandaphod as a method of preventing Jodha and Jalal from concentrating on finding Chand Begum?
I now feel as if this is the most likely theory because spoiler pics of godh bharayi are already here. So maybe Maham will do this Ruq exposure to prevent Jodha-Jalal from concentrating on Chand Begum ki khoj?
Maddy and Diksha's theories are great... the hookah will lead to the hakim test with the facepack!
Last night via SMS, Diksha suggested to me that maybe the fact that he caught Ruq smoking a hookah led Jalal to fix his own Hakim to test Ruq. Then Diksha gave me her masterstroke that Ruq may have made a pregnant bandhi wear a face pack and pose as Ruq for the hakim test. Both these theories are excellent, don't you think, folks? (However it's obvious that the Hakim test will be successfully passed if the godh bharayi is to soon take place!)
Okay I'll sign off here before more doubts assail me. Folks, start your debates on all these points and any more you can think of. At least the story is getting interesting even if the romance is taking a bit of a back seat now!
CID
Cricket
