Friends, today's post has to be somewhat short on account of my having to do Diwali preparations at home. I don't have much to describe ... as the episode was about 95% war action , including the usual fun-filled "lalkars" from both sides.
Jalal's armies marched up to the foot of the Chittor fort and Jalal went ahead of his armies and stood as a lone unarmed rider in the middle of the field calling on Rana Pratap and Udai Singh to come out of the fort "like men" to take him on. The Rajvanshi's standing on higher ground than the Mughals, atop of their fort battlements, replied Jalal that it was against their code to deal with lone unarmed men and he'd better face them all in the battlefield if he wanted to die at their hands.
Jalal then told them "This is your last chance to kill me, for if you don't now, you never will. I will create carnage and tear down your fort. If Pratap is a man I dare him to face me while I am here alone to give warnings to all of you." The Rajvanshi's on the battlements simply rained arrows all around Jalal ... that was their reply. In disgust Jalal turned back to join his armies.
The Rajvanshis then decided to keep the Mughals at bay with a rain of arrows at full blast. Many Mughals on the front lines got felled as a result, but Jalal did not seem unduly worried. He had already made arrangements for reinforcements. He decided to play the superior waiting game when the enemy would exhaust its arms and resources inside the fort and have to come out.
But that night as the Mughal army camped and readied itself for the next day's battle, Jalal decided that enough was enough, the fire power from the fort was getting thinner and the time for the storming of the fort had come. He kept his big arms in readiness to blast open the gates of the fort and enter.
True enough the next morning the Mughals made the charge under the orders of Jalal and broke down the fort gates and entered ... and an extremely fierce man-to-man combat began with hundreds of humans getting felled and splattering blood enough to make us all cringe. Meanwhile the Rajvanshis who had reached the ends of their resources decided to make it a "do or die" battle and the woman all decided on the ultimate sacrifice - jauhar! They lit a huge pyre and ranged themselves around it. Minutes later they were all gone into the fire.
Jalal got off his horse, removed his helmet and with swords in both hands began chopping the men who faced him to pieces. But the last minute resilience of the Rajvanshis was also to be seen to be believed. Not a single man gave his life lightly and when Jalal tried to accost one of them to say where Pratap was, he chose death rather than betrayal of Pratap!
Soon there was relative quiet on the grounds of the fort for most of the Rajvanshis had been killed and dead bodies were lying strewn around everywhere. Jalal ordered his men into the fort to clear out the remnants of the enemy. But just then he heard the cry of a baby - a toddler amidst the Rajvanshi dead bodies around him.
He turned to look at a very small child crying alone amidst the carnage. Jalal suddenly remembered his "lalkaar" to God that he would kill all his children ... and he began to advance towards the child, but the crying of the child was heart-rending and even Jalal, at his most heartless, had to halt for a moment in his tracks.
The episode ended there ... but in the precap we were shown the child's father running towards him. Jalal ruthlessly killed the man as he fell to the ground. The child was still crying alone when his mother then ran towards him now to try and save him. Jalal, sword in hand looked ready to kill them both but the episode left us in suspense at that point.
Four small topics of interest arise at this point of the episode:
One, Jalal's fury seemed unabated throughout the episode which I thought was a remarkable piece of acting. Throughout all the war sequences he looked consistently angry and ferocious and blood thirsty. His strategy for warfare required calculated waiting ... and he played the siege card on the fort with aplomb, waiting for the enemy to run through its resources before making his advance on the fort a done deed. But in spite of that need to wait it out with patience, his anger, his eagerness and his readiness to raze the enemy to the ground stayed tenacious throughout.
Right down to the moment he saw the lone baby crying amidst the dead bodies in the front courtyard of the fort, his eyes were red from the inner need to trample the enemy, so much so that even the crying baby looked like the last vestige of the enemy he wanted badly to tear into! He simply cut the child's father down with a slash of the blade of his sword and seemed ready to do the same to the child and mother.
I want to give full marks to Rajat for the acting, for it really touched the soul whenever he was on screen. He consumed the screen with his blood-curdling "lalkaars" and his dual-handed sword action. When he shouted at the enemy almost bursting his vocal chords we could see the stretch of his throat muscles to their limit. His eyes burned with fury ... and his sneers and condescensions at the enemy were so part of him that we didn't know where the man in him ended and the savage in him began.
As war scenes go, this one was shot quite well I thought, considering that it's tough to show the siege of a fort with credibility in a TV serial. There were some small moments of bad editing, but they are too few and too insignificant, so overall, yes, I thought the war scenes looked good. It was also good that the CVs managed to show the bulk of the war within one episode, including the jauhar by the women, and so it was an action packed 22 minutes and in one episode virtually the entire war was over and it still managed to give us a feel of all that fierce fighting and the to-and-fro swinging advantages that went to both sides as the battle was fought. I am happy it was all looking plausible and credible, and that ultimately it was all almost over in one episode.
Two, from the Jodha angle the episode found enough time to include in her speech to Moti which was in itself remarkable. She was seen with Moti in her room looking at the ominously reddened sky and fearing for the red blood of the Rajvanshis that Jalal would be spilling. She didn't think her applying a blood tilak on his sword at the tilak rasam in any way quenched his need for drawing more Rajvanshi blood, and despite Udai Singh and Rana Pratap being good warriors she had no doubts that Jalal would win ... but as she told Moti, "He will come back okay ... but he will never change!"
That remark that Jodha made was strongly reminiscent of the question Hamida had asked Salima in the previous episode saying "Jalal seems to have lost the "dil" that Jodha gave him. Will she ever get back "her Jalal" again?"
I suppose the Creatives are reminding us of that question episode after episode in order that when Jalal does feel the remorse after the war, it is a dramatic much-awaited moment. I personally am curious and want to wait for that moment to see exactly how Jalal reaches that point where the "light of reason reaches his war-and-carnage-fogged" mind.
Three, we now come to the tantalising question of the suspense that left us hanging at the end of the episode. I have an inner feeling that Jalal will not be able to kill that innocent baby and his mother - and his epiphanic moment may come when he is about to try and kill them but finds he can't. It would also be too gory for the Creatives to show him killing that baby. We would never be able to forget that he did that and it would change our perception of Jalal forever, even if he changes ... so I don't want to see him get so ruthless that he kills that baby.
But Diksha differs from me. She thinks he will kill that baby and the mother - thus giving justification to the words he says in the promo about having become the "haivan".
Now its 50-50 folks, so I'll leave you all to debate whether he will or should kill the baby - and whether the baby's actual death is needed to spur his mind to crash-land into reality ... or whether the mere thought that he is unable to kill an innocent baby should itself help him shed the feral haze his mind is in.
Four, a word about the new tagline of the serial which says Jodha and Jalal are on the way to having another baby. There are two theories on this.
The bulk of the people on the forum seem to want Jalal not to return to Jodha just because she has become pregnant again as a result of the night spent with Jalal, when Hasan was dying. People don't want Jalal to return to Jodha just for the waaris, and not for the love he rediscovers for her. That point of view is understandable.
The other way to look at this issue is via Donjas' viewpoint he expressed on my post on the Friday episode. Donjas had written that if Jodha finds herself pregnant, Jalal may well have an epiphanic moment that the God he was berating and sneering at was not after all just the ruthless taker of innocent babies. What God takes away with one hand He also gives plentifully with another.
So it's not just about love for Jodha that is the issue if Jodha is pregnant again ... but we have to see if Jalal changes because his attitude to God changes and he sees Fair and Just Spirit in the Heavens Above. Maybe Jalal will see that God in his wisdom took Hasan away but the same night he also gave Jalal and Jodha the first signs of Salim who was fated to become the falg-bearer of the dynasty. Maybe Jalal will see that there's something to be thankful about that this time there are not going to be twins to be "shared" with Ruq but one just one clear heir who belonged to Jodha.
Folks, I take the side of Donjas in this issue. I feel that if we simply reduce the equation to "Does Jalal love Jodha or does Jalal love the waaris?", it would be a very immature way of understanding the epiphanic moment Jalal will soon have that changes him.
We have to see "Why does Jalal change towards God, love and Jodha (in that order)?" I guess Jalal needs first to get back that faith in God before he can truly "love" at a mortal level again, If he comes to Jodha from love, but without his faith in God restored, he would just still be half an animal, with that barbarism hidden in him somewhere but not purged.
I would personally prefer him to realise his faith in God before he realises his love for Jodha anew ... and if that faith in God is restored thanks to seeing that night spent with Jodha not as a night of loss created by God, but as a night of gain from the goodness of God, I am all for Jodha being pregnant as a way to give Jalal the path back to divinely-inspired peace and soul-level love restored for Jodha. This is my position on this topic.
Anyway it seems imminent that Jodha will be pregnant and as one of the Creatives has already confirmed the Salim-Anarkali track is on ... and my sources say it's from the end of November. So I see this Salim pregnancy track definitely happening now as a precursor to the end of the serial as we know it. After Salim is born by end November, they may take the leap of 15 years to show him as a young man in the Salim-Anarkali track.
All that happened in yesterday'sepisode:
Jalal's armies arrive on the battlefield standing at the foot of Chittor fort. The Rajvanshis are at a height on the walls of the fort. Suddenly Jalal parts his soldiers lines and rides ahead saying no one should follow him. He rides forward alone and from his lone position "lalkars" Rana Pratap and Udai Singh to come out if they dare.
The Rajvanshis shout back that it is against their code to kill a lone man. They ask Jalal to meet them on the battlefield if he wants to die at their hands. Jalal says "This is your last chance to kill me. If you don't, my flag will soon fly atop of Chittor fort and you will see carnage. I have come alone to face the whole lot of you." Jalal says also "Tell Kunwar Pratap to face me like a man".
Meanwhile Jodha in her hojra is filled with dread and sorrow. She sees the angry red sky and is reminded that Jalal must be spilling Rajvanshi blood ruthlessly. She says the red sky is a big apshagun. She tell Moti "jalal will come back safe but he will never change. Even my blood on his talwar at the tilak rasam won't change his blood thirstiness. Udai Singh and Pratap are good warriors too, but Jalal is too good he will get his way". Moti tries to calm Jodha but she is filled with uneasiness about the lengths that Jalal will go to in killing the Rajvanshis - and is also scared for him.
At the foot of the fort as Jalal waits alone ahead of his armies for answer there is no sign of Pratap or Udai Singh and the Rajvanshis are not prepared to come out of the fort. They rain arrows all around Jalal but refuse to react to his "lalkaar". Then when Jalal goes back in disgust to his own men the Rajvanshis, from their height on the fort, rain blasts of arrows on the Mughals.
Many Mughals die under the rain of arrows but Jalal decides not to worry. He has sent for reinforcements. Instead he decides to lay siege to the fort knowing that they will soon exhaust their arms and resources and will have to come out. Jalal shouts to the Rajvanshis that soon he will break down their walls and enter the fort.
At night as Jalal and his men are at the camp, after warfare ends, Mansingh and Aziz Koka say they can wait till the Rajvanshis come out. But Jalal changes his mind. He decides they will not wait too much more and they will bash down the gates of the fort and enter. He gets his cannons and big arms ready.
Meanwhile inside the fort the Rajvanshis are running out of arms and resources and their commanders say the men have to now fight a do or die battle for Jalal will storm the fort. The women decide en masse to do jauhar and prepare the furnace to jump into. As a last ditch attempt one Rajvanshi from the fort tries to shoot Jalal with a gun but misses his mark. Jalal quickly takes his gun and shoots down that exact man on top of that fort. It is their commander Jaimal.
Seeing their advantage now, as less and less fire power is coming from the fort walls, Jalal's men follow his cry and storm the fort. They break down the gates and enter. There is extremely fierce fighting inside the fort now.
Jalal joins his men as fighting gets intense. He removes his helmet and with swords in both hands fells the enemy - left, right and centre. Meanwhile the Rajvanshi women all commit jauhar.
At that point, as Jalal looks around, almost all the enemy are dead on the ground. He sends his men to clear out the fort and asks one Rajvanshi to say where Pratap is. But the man refuses to tell. That man chooses to die rather than betray Pratap.
Jalal then looks around him at the dead bodies ... when he sees a small Rajvanshi toddler crying amidst the dead bodies. Jalal is reminded of his promise to God to kill all his children and seems to advance towards the child. But the child's crying just halts him in his tracks.
In the precap, the child's father tries to run to his child - but Jalal cuts his body with his sword. The child is still crying alone in that sea of dead bodies. Suddenly his mother runs towards that child and Jalal advances menacingly towards them sword in hand ... will he kill that child and mother or spare them becomes the suspense!
Happy Diwali in advance, folks!
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