Life as a Beggar

As far as onscreen entertainment goes, the Telugu film patrons have always loved their heroes as supermen and endure anything they exhibit to sustain that larger-than-life image. This also means that the fans do not want their matinee idols to even remotely do anything un-hero like as they prance around for a good two hours and more on the silver screen, doing their bidding.

In this milieu, a regular commercial film, Bichagadu, a Tamil dubbed one at that, aimed at appealing to the aam aadmi has been released recently in the two Telugu speaking states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.

In this era of multi-media publicity blitzkrieg and sponsored advertising space in television and entertainment channels, unlike many of its ilk, it had a very low-profile, conventional build up to its release on May 13. The fact that the hero, Vijay Anthony, a music director turned hero is a totally unknown name must have also been a main reason. Still, it had one valid USP- a fresh approach, a relatively new story line based on a true incident and a strong people connect, not to speak of commensurate proportions of melodrama and action.

The straight-to-the point plot which speaks about a rich business tycoon undertaking a penance and living an austere life as a beggar for 48 days to save his coma-struck mother from sinking forever must have been laughed at by established heroes who would have dreaded de-glamourising themselves for the lead role. Yet, here is where the film bases itself soundly, thereby spotlighting the drudgery and terrible lives of beggars as they compromise on their self-respect to satiate their hunger pangs and live life for another day.

Cleverly interspersing the grime and the glamour, of a neo beggar’s life with that of an affluent businessman, the 130-minute film liberally showcases the insecurities of a beggars’ lives, the constant threats to their existence, the callous treatment they merit in comfort homes where they are seen as guinea pigs for clinical trials and above all, the buried aspirations of theirs to lead ‘decent’ lives like that of their benefactors.

Even if the central strand to the story is based on a godman’s counsel that bides the hero to meet the stringent conditions during his beggarly avatar, the counter arguments built in by the hero’s wellwishers who want him to abandon it to stay next to his seriously-ill mother attempts to strike a balance among the doubting Thomases.

Where the film maintains its high octane watchability is the realistic undertone to the hero’s changeover and how he endures humiliation, physical assaults and demeaning behaviour from one and all to do his best to bring his mother back from the brink. Here is where the winning elements of the movie surface, incidentally rubbing in a sharp message to the viewers that beggars, too, are after all engaged in doing their best to keep their body and soul together, thus deserving our respect for their efforts in doing so.