Subhash K Jha looks back at Tanuja Chandra’s 1998 film Dushman, which starred Kajol in a brilliant performance and Sanjay Dutt. We also hear from the director about the making of the film.
Tanuja Chandra’s grossly underrated film, Dushman, features Kajol in her career-best performance in a double role. When one of the twins is brutally murdered, the other takes revenge. The film was adapted from John Schlesinger’s tepid thriller An Eye For An Eye, where Sally Field avenged the death of her daughter. Several clever changes were made to the original script. In the original, it is the mother (Sally Field) who goes on a vendetta spree against her daughter’s rapist and murderer. In Dushman, it is the twin sister (Kajol) who seeks retribution, while the mother(Tanve Azmi) seeks closure to the tragedy. Dushman also added a romantic angle to the original with Sanjay Dutt playing a blind soldier wooing Kajol.
Dushman had a terrific star turn by Kajol and a truly menacing villain in Ashutosh Rana, which the original did not. And what about Uttam Singh’s outstanding songs? Can Hollywood beat that?
Dushman featured Kajol in the first of three double roles that she has played, the other two being Raju Chacha in 2000 and Kuch Khatta Kuch Meetha in 2001.
Kajol was nominated for Filmfare’s Best Actress in three films: Pyar To Hona Hi Tha (where she co-starred with her husband Ajay Devgan), Kuch Kuch Hota Hai and Dushman. She won the award for KKHH. I feel she was far superior in Dushman, where she played the twins as two characters, Sonia and Naina Sehgal, one of whom is brutally murdered.
In Dushman, Kajol worked for the first time with a female director, Tanuja Chandra. Twenty-three years later, she again worked with a female director in Tribhanga, which was directed by Renuka Shahane, wife of actor Ashutosh Rana, who had played the terrifying psychopath in Dushman. Small (and vicious) world.
Sanjay Dutt’s role of the surviving twin’s blind love interest was an add-on. The role was not there in the original. But the distributors and exhibitors felt the film needed a strong male lead to go with Kajol’s double role. Dutt was not only blind he was also quite oblivious as to what he was doing in the film.
Uttam (Dil Toh Pagal Hai) Singh’s music in Dushman was a highlight. Even today, it is impossible to listen to Lata Mangeshkar and Jagjit Singh’s ‘Chitthi na koi sandes jaane woh kaun sa des jahan tum chalen gaye’ without getting teary-eyed. The shot where the surviving twin reaches out into the empty space in the bed gives me goosebumps as I write about it.
Released during the year of mammoth blockbusters like Karan Johar’s Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Abbas-Mustan’s Soldier, Mani Ratnam’s Dil Se and Vikram Bhatt’s Ghulam, Dushman held its own at the box office.
Many, including this writer, consider Tanuja Chandra’s Dushman to be Kajol’s best performance to date.
Says Tanuja Chandra, “In my debut film, Dushman, which completed 25 years this year, I had the crazy good fortune to work with absolute Hindi Film industry stalwarts. Mahesh Bhatt, Sachin Bhowmick, Anand Bakshi, Jagjit Singh, the veteran Editor, Waman Bhonsle, and the great Lata Mangeshkar. My producer Pooja Bhatt and I hung onto the coattails of legends – it was an unforgettable experience.”
Being very young at the time, Tanuja was apprehensive about how the stalwarts would respond to her, but Tanuja was in for a surprise. “Working on the songs for me was such a privilege. I was scared out of my wits when I first sat with Anand Bakshi Saab on the lyrics, but I needn’t have been. He gave me the respect one gives a seasoned director. He was never patronising. I adored Bakshi Saab.”
As for Lataji, this is how Tanuja had the privilege of working with her: “It was our music director, Uttam Singh, who asked Lataji to sing for us, and I was full of nervous anxiety when she came to the recording studio. Being a beginner, though, has its advantages too: one feels invincible. I was able to blank it out of my mind that here was the premier singer of India who had recorded fifty thousand songs, who had moved listeners to tears or brought instant smiles on the faces of generations. To be honest, I had a wonderful time!”
In a rare occurrence, Lataji and Jagjit Singh sang two different versions of the same haunting song, ‘Chitthi na koi sandes’ in Dushman.
Recalling the historic song, Tanuja says, “It was when Jagjit Singh came to record ‘Chithi na koi sandes’ for us that I, as a director, ran out of instructions to give to an artist. He knew what we needed; I merely listened in awe. He was affectionate and extremely sweet. I can hardly get over my good luck, the brilliant people I worked with in Dushman, my very first film as a director.”
