Friends, something about yesterday's episode set me thinking hard about the way this Hamida behaves towards Jodha. The way she seems to love her and protect her at all costs. Is this normal?
At the end of the episode yesterday, it seemed so strange to me that the hakim (after Jalal got the high fever) threw up his hands and said Jalal is in his last throes and nothing could save him now except prayers. Among everybody who was devastated by this news, I would have expected Hamida to be the most distraught person on earth. And yet in the precap there was scene where she was thinking of Jodha's life danger (in the last stages of Jalal's life!) and trying her hardest to evict Jodha from the danger zone into safety!
I couldn't help thinking: How is it that the mother of a boy who is dying finds the bandwidth to be worrying about the safety of the daughter-in-law, no matter how much she loves the daughter-in-law?
I do not know the real answer to this one puzzle, so I want to ask all of you who read this post to tell me what you think is the best reading of Hamida and her inordinate love for Jodha. There are five questions I want to ask below which strike me - and for which I am seeking to find answers from all of you ...
1. Is Hamida's non-aggressive nature more comfortable with a daughter than a son? But then why not the same relationship of mother-daughter between Hamida and Bakshi Bano?
Hamida does look like a woman without any aggression whatesover in her personality. Can it be that she is unable to relate to phsyical aggression in anyone, least of all her son? She does not, for instance, relate at all to Ruqaiya, from what we have seen so far, and of all the begums, Ruqaiya seems the most physically belligerent (in addition to being also mentally belligerent).
If you look at Hamida's history, she has throughout her life had a husband in Humayun who was sickly and also not really known for his physical prowess or aggressive attitude. In fact Humayun always comes across in history as the most relatively benign of the Mughal emperors, losing many battles that were crucial. If Hamida was a non-aggressive type of woman, her life with Humayun, no matter even if they were on the run all the time, must have suited her well. In fact Hamida seems to wear her years with Humayun without rancour, and with a lot of placid acceptance, pride and calm. I wonder if Hamida has always by nature preferred people without overt physical aggression, and therefore maybe she relates better to a woman (i.e. Jodha), and not so well to an man like Jalal who is all physical and the antithesis of his father?
And yet, if that were the case, Bakshi Bano should also have admirably fit the bill as the daughter who best suits Hamida? Hamida was not a daughter-less woman, to want to dote on her daughter-in-law as a surrogate daughter that she never had? Yet the love Hamida shows for Jodha, she does not even show to her own daughter Bakshi Bano! Now why is that so?
What about Jodha attracts Hamida? Can it be the opposite of placidity ... can it be actually the "self-righteous" and often emotionally aggressive position taken by Jodha? Jodha's stance (whether right or wrong) smacks of its own brand of emotional aggression. Is it because Hamida herself has never been able to have that Jodha-type emotionality or aggression for "principle" that Hamida seems to love Jodha? Hamida certainly has none of that "Jodha-ness" in her own personality. Does she covet those emotional qualities in Jodha that she wished she herself had? Thus, while also rueing Jodha's inflexibilities that get Jalal into trouble, does Hamida also secretly admire these qualities in Jodha?
One more thing: I can't help but remember Jalal himself telling Maham once that his mother seems to love Jodha more than she loves him (her own son). It would be natural for Jalal and us viewers to think that over the time period Jodha has spent in Agra Jodha has "grown" to become a favourite of his mother. But we viewers and Jalal were privy to the fact that even on Jodha's arrival at Agra, Hamida was already pre-disposed to falling in love with Jodha. Maybe because she was a Rajput Hamida allowed herself to believe only good things about Jodha and thus set up a trend of finding only good in her daughter-in-law. But wasn't it strange to find someone waiting for Jodha to arrive and yet already half in love with her? That too someone like Hamida who wasn't even at the wedding and could not have even a clue as to what sort of a person Jodha was as an individual?
There can be many explanations for the way Hamida is, but the thing that continues to perplex me is how and why she seems to love Jodha more than her own son and daughter. And why she showed so much hasteat the outset in showering love and acceptance on her? What had Jodha done to earn this trust?
2. Is Hamida seeking a bridge between herself and her son? But then how did she get the confirmation that Jodha has the best potential to be that bridge to her son's heart?
One possible explanation for Hamida's doting on Jodha could be that Jodha provides her the best bridge between herself and her "estranged son". I use the word "estranged" because though Hamida now lives in close proximity to Jalal, there is nevertheless a gap between mother and son begging to be bridged. Jalal still seems to talk of the time when his "mother abandoned him" with sadness (as he said in that "same boats, lonely hearts" speech to Maham). Similarly when Jodha once asked Hamida why her son did not have her own nice qualities of daya and softness, she said with equal sadness: "It was the servants upbringing".
If such a gap continues to exist between mother and son, does Hamida in some way feel that Jodha is the ideal candidate - the one that she has always wanted - to be the bridge between herself and her son Jalal? That begs the question: Did Hamida never think Ruqaiya could be such a bridge? Why not? If Ruqaiya was always so close to Jalal from childhood, his best friend, then any mother would be naturally inclined to hope at least that her son's "closest wife" may be the best bridge between herself and her son? So what about Jodha qualifies Jodha to be a better bridge for Hamida-Jalal than Ruqaiya will ever be?
Does Hamida sense subliminally that Jodha has a better chance of attracting Jalal's hidden heart than Ruqaiaya ever can? Jalal's heart - and its absence - does seem to make Hamida restless for him to find it! Maybe she thinks - rightly so -that if Jodha can help Jalal find his heart, then Jodha can help Hamida and Jalal bond better via the heart. Maybe she knows that Ruqaiaya will never be able to appeal to Jalal's heart!
But my question is: How does Hamida get that impression that Jodha may be able to unseal Jalal's locked heart? What does she see in Jalal as a heartfelt-attraction for Jodha and what does she see in Jodha as the potential for stealing Jalal's heart? Hamida was not present at Amer during the shaadi to know how Jalal's mind was turning with respect to his reasons for marrying Jodha. So as a mother, what does she think was Jalal's reason for marrying Jodha? Just politics? In that case why does she think Jodha holds the key to Jalal's heart?
3. Is Hamida consumed by a debt owed to the Rajputs? Is that overshadowing all Jodha's faults in Hamida's mind?
Not only does Hamida frequently talk of how the Rajputs embraced her when she was on the run and gave her shelter to bear her son in their home, but we have all noticed the way Hamida preens herself when she gets one small word of praise from the Bharmal family for being an ideal mother for Jodha in Agra.
Once after the miscarriage saga was over and Bharmal was taking leave at the gates of the Agra palace, he showered praise on Hamida being a lovely mother to Jodha. Again Mainavati recently said the same thing. Notice how Hamida lapped it all up and wanted almost desperately to earn that praise from them?
To owe the Rajputs a debt of gratitude is one thing, but to immediately pull Jodha into her own embrace the minute she arrived in Agra, without so much as waiting to assess her daughter-in-law's personality, seemed a bit odd to me. No matter how much you love the Rajput clan, will you not spend at least one moment assessing your daughter-in-law as a person before you decide that she is all good because she is a Rajput?
One more thing: Hamida also never seems to let go a single chance to tell Jodha: "You are as dear to me as my own son ... and I am your mother if you call me Ammi Jaan ... and as your mother, I cannot allow this or that evil to befall you ...". She seems to need every opportunity to re-iterate this mother-position, and she says it in a way that seems to underscore the fact: "I am not your mother-in-law, I am your mother!" Jodha's acceptance of her as "mother" seems so important to Hamida, more so than the whole idea is to Jodha, (who, if you think about it, is the one who should be feeling lonely in a new home and seeking Hamida's closeness and not vice versa?)
4. Is Hamida not in the least affected by the presence of Ruq in Jalal's life? Did Ruqaiya's arrival in Jalal's life pre-date Hamida's own re-arrival in his life?
My history is weak on this topic so I am not sure whether Hamida was at all involved in the marriage of Jalal and Ruqaiaya when they were still very young - or was this marriage orchestrated entirely by Bairam Khan and Mahamanga? Did Hamida ever get the chance to vet Ruqaiaya as a wife for her son Jalal? Or was Hamida at all consulted even?
On screen also, we viewers have had only two chances so far to see the relationship between Ruqaiaya and Hamida and both these instances showed more of polite cordiality rather than any feeling from either side - definitely there was no wavelength connect.
Once when Jalal was about to execute a harem lady for having an affair with a non-allowed man and for getting pregnant, Ruqaiaya was rooting for the execution, but Hamida intervened in the affair and made Jalal put aside Ruq's recommendations. But notice how Hamida purely addressed Jalal on that occasion and told him not to get himself the "bad dua" of a pregnant lady and be without child himself, but Hamida did not even look at Ruqaiaya or address a single word to her! Ruqaiaya was part of the landscape to Hamida in that scene, and all she was concerned with was Jalal getting a proper understanding about the value of the heart in a marriage that expects to produce progeny.
Again in recent times, we had one scene where Ruqaiya appeals to Hamida that she wants to be the begum who gets the first sun rays and can go to Ajmer Sharif with Jalal, but Hamida merely agrees with a politicallly correct "Ameen" and later, with great glee almost, brushes Ruqaiya aside with a "Parvadikar ka ishara" theory about Jodha being the chosen one.
I can't also help pointing out that when Ruq got pregnant, Hamida said it was all due to Jodha's "paak kadam" and later when Ruq went through the miscarriage, the reasonable amount of empathy or sympathy from Hamida for Ruq was not evidenced. Whether the creatives did not add a scene that should have been added (where Hamida is openly caring about Ruq), or whether it was deliberately shown that Hamida did not feel that strongly, I can't say. But then in the Diwan-e-Khas the way Hamida argued on behalf of Jodha begs comparison with the absence of any fervour she had for Ruq's position. Hamida thought only of Jalal's loss of waaris, but even then she thought more of Jalal's misfortunes while exonerating Jodha from these!
5. Of all Hamida-Jodha sequences so far, this current week takes the cake. The "Jodha" fixation of Hamida seems to cross all limits of reasonability!
In the last two episodes this fixation for Jodha that Hamida has seems to have, has been revved up to a never before level. Even at her angriest best, when Hamida hears from Jodha that she put Jalal's life in khatra by removing the bullets from the gun, the best that Hamida can shout at her is "Your naadani has put Jalal in danger!" (Jodha's naadani? For God's sake was it nothing more than that? How about stupidity?)
And then again in the very next sentence Hamida is heard telling Salima et al: "Not a word about this to Ruqaiaya!". I may be wrong but it sounded to me like she was less worried about Ruqaiya's distress there, and more worried about protecting Jodha's naadani from Ruq's tearing wrath!
Then comes this fixation with Jodha's safety in the supposedly dying hours of Jalal! Which mother would leave her dying son's room to rush the daughter-in-law to a hideout? The precap of Hamida "ordering" Jodha to safety while Jalal is taking his last breaths in the adjoining room seems out of all reason.
And to crown it all, comes this "Jodha ka magic lep". Why would Hamida acccept some amateur lep from Jodha and insist on its being applied on Jalal who is on his last legs? Is Jodha some certified "hakim-cum-lepologist" of scientific repute? As for the quack of a hakim that accepts this lep and applies it as if he has been let off the hook, I have no words.
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
365