Award winning Bollywood and South Indian filmmaker Sandeep Malani has always made women-centric films. All his films, be it short films or feature films, have women playing the main lead (central character) with the men playing supporting characters. Be it SMS 6260, Jo Jo Laali, Sulige Sikkidaaga, Shaayad or Janleva 555 and Maa–Yeh Cinemaa Hai. Following this trend, his latest short film is titled “Bandagi”.
What is Bandagi?
‘Bandagi’ lays emphasis on woman empowerment with various topics and issues that the celebrities talk about. It fights for women’s freedom, to live peacefully.
The various topics in the film create awareness in the society to stop child marriage, dowry system, rape, molestation, eve teasing, domestic violence etc., and encourage education for the girl child, adoption, rights for women in the society and girl/woman’s empowerment. It also gives importance to motherhood.
The Concept
It all begins when Ayushmann (Silver Malani) addressing his classmates in the college, talks about successfully completing a video project he was working on for a long time, and finally, releases it. He thanks his lecturer Sanjay Sir (Dilip Malani) and his family members Mahesh (Mahesh Dulam), Namrata (Anita Dulam), Alia (Sanjukta Ghosh) and the little ones too (Aditi and Sriman) for supporting him. The project is revealed as “Bandagi”, the fight for a woman’s freedom to live peacefully. Ayushmann captures them all which include celebrity messages, artistes singing, the college band singing, the ladies discussing, a round up at the old age home, peace and candle light for support etc.
The Artistes
The artistes who carry the strong social message in the film include award winning actress/dancer Sudha Chandran, actress Adaa Khan (of Nagin fame), Mangalurean actress Sonal Monteiro, Kannada actress Harshika Poonachcha, fashion stylist Janu Arasu and model Komal Atmaramani.
The musical video “Jeene Se Pehli Hi” features Meena Malani, Sanjukta Ghosh, Shubha Raksha, Reshma Malani, Anitha Dulam, Sharanya Jit Kaur, Jagruti Mehta, Jyothi Harindranath, Varsha Acharya, Cherrie Ash, Ranjeet Jha, Mahendra Pandey, Vishal Digani, Mahesh Dulam, Akash Hora, Bharath Lakshmikanth, Anant Joshi, Mann Hora, Chirag Kundapur, Vivek Mishra, Vivek Punjabi, Kkewal Vyas, Prayas Singh, Shivam Kataria, Chitranjani Chittu, Shane Abhishek, Priya and Drushika Padmanabhan with Aditi Dulam, Sheetal Malani and Silver Malani.
In addition to it, Thirumalesh, Valerian Menezes, Aurobindo Kiriyakere, Jayashri and Madhura Ammu have been part of the song, which has been shot separately. The song has been sung by Soma Basu and Shrikanth Nair with lyrics by Roop Kumar and music by Jayant M Aryan.
Also messages regarding mother and motherhood have been given in a very special way by actress Kalpana Pandit, actress Sowmya Murthy, dancer Jyoti Colaco, teacher Salome Pinto and model, socialite Jaz Shabir.
Malani also acknowledges Arpit Goyal for the title, Sanidh Poojary for giving his voice for Ayushmann, Dilip Malani for being the support as Sanjay Sir. Also, the students of St. Josephs’ College Bangalore, Ladies Social Service League and KASK members of Mangaluru have been part of the song. A special mention has been made of the St. Ann’s Old Age home/St. Anthony Ashram members who are part of the song as well.
Editing is done by Santosh Chawla and Vignesh Thanupillai for The Studio Agency. Concept, screenplay, camera and direction are by Sandeep Malani for Malani Talkies Production.
Malani’s Message
The episode also has a special segment wherein Sandeep Malani speaks about the strong women in his life who influenced him in his career. He attributes and gives full importance to his mother Meena Malani and his wife Reshma Malani, the two strong women in his life because of whom today, he says that he is a successful filmmaker. He also attributes his stepping into the film industry to Sridevi, his idol since he was a child and whose films he follows and who also influenced the strong women characters in his films; be it Jo Jo Laali, SMS 6260, Sulige Sikkidaaga, Shaayad, Janleva 555 and now Maa-Yeh Cinemaa Hai.’ The women in his films who have played strong pivotal characters are Janu Arasu, Kalpana Pandit, Shona Chabbra, Jenica Kalra and all the female characters of “Maa.” The message Malani gives is- “Respect women in your life, be it your mother, sister, wife, daughter, neighbour, colleague or friend.”
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