Powerful movie upacks questions of identity

Deepak Rauniyar’s third feature Rajagunj is currently in cinemas, and should be seen for many reasons: it is a solid nail biter, a kidnapping whodunnit, a political thriller with two unconventional, heart wrenching, love stories.

It is also a sharply observed commentary on race relations that refrains from being overly didactic — a common fault in many political films that alienate the viewer instead of enlightening them.

Internationally aired as Pooja, Sir, the film premiered in 2024 at the Orizzonti section which runs parallel to the main competition at the Venice Film Festival. It has since made its way through the festival circuit to finally open in Nepali cinemas.

However, it suffered a glitch at the hands of the Censor Board which has a history of choosing conservatism over wisdom in what they want to edit out, treating viewers like juveniles and attempting to subvert reality by demanding that real events be redacted.

Thankfully, the film is not hurt much from this interference, though concentration is required to follow the twists and turns of the plot. Without giving too much away, the story involves the seemingly cold-blooded kidnapping of two young boys in the eponymous Rajagunj.

It plays out against the volatile backdrop of the deadly real life protests in 2015 that killed dozens in the Madhes over fury regarding the inadequacies of the new Constitution.

Pooja Thapa (played by the formidable Asha Magrati), a detective inspector from Kathmandu, is sent to the Tarai in the blistering heat to investigate. One of the young boys is the son of a prominent, local Madhesi politician, the other child is his friend and the offspring of the house-help. One can guess which victim necessitated the dispatch of a high ranking police officer from Kathmandu.

From the beginning Pooja is a compelling enigma, she is forthright and committed, keenly intelligent and a force of nature. She is also stubborn, and occasionally not very sympathetic to her fellow Madhesi colleagues.

There is little humour in the way she is written, the nuances appear thanks to Magrati’s calibrated performance. Pooja is also a lesbian which is hinted at from the very first scene with a shot of her from the back that emphasises her short boy-cut.

Her sexual orientation is further underscored by a slight but intimate scene in the kitchen with Rama, her partner, before she has to leave for Rajagunj.

Rauniyar’s social conscience and investment in the woes of Nepali society has been evident from his first film, Highway (2012) which, while messy, showed he had both heart and brains as he grappled with multiple characters, each conveying a particularly complicated aspect of the everyman’s struggles.

His second feature White Sun or Seto Surya (previously reviewed in this paper) came out in 2016, cementing his place as an independent filmmaker and a politically conscious auteur.

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Rajagunj shows how far this director has come with a story of a woman who finds herself in an alien city and culture, racing against time to locate two helpless kids, even as she navigates the intensely charged protests in the Madhes as a Pahadi herself, with prejudices further compounded by her own queerness.

There is much that happens in this gritty, urban film that for once does not romanticise or exotify Nepal’s culture and natural landscape for viewers internally or abroad. There are no rose-tinted lenses or filters here.

The cinematography is matter of fact, precise, brutal when it needs to be, hewing to a script with excellent, natural dialogue that was written by Rauniyar, Magrati (Rauniyar’s partner in life), and David Barker.

Certainly, there are moments when the film seems to have jumped a scene or failed to impart a crucial piece of information, but the acting is moving, and the subject matter so affecting that it is easy to forgive these occasional, technical lapses.

While Magrati’s brave performance anchors the film there are several other substantial performances. Reecha Sharma, plays Sabita Koirala the fair, Pahadi, upper caste wife of the Madhesi politician, and mother of one of the kidnapped boys.

She is also the headmistress of the local, but now suspiciously shuttered, school. Veteran actor Dayahang Rai, also an executive producer of the film, does a fine job portraying Madan, the seemingly mild mannered police captain who oversees Rajagunj.

Nikita Chandak is completely engrossing in her portrayal of Mamata Gupta, a complicated junior Madhesi police officer who slowly comes into her own under Pooja’s rough but wise tutelage.

Politics is ever at work behind and infront of the scenes in Rajagunj, and not everyone is as they initially seem. Women are heroes, anti-heroes, villains, mothers, lovers, and fighters. 

Multiple personal and political realities are portrayed, sometimes simultaneously, and while there are some bizarre leaps of logic, Rauniyar’s virtuoso gift is evident throughout, particularly in set pieces like the one where Pooja and her other trusty sidekick, Inspector Amar, are following Mamata who is forced to stand in for Sabita’s timorous maid as she bravely delivers the shockingly high ransom.

As the people from the region protest their frustration over the inadequacy of the new Constitution that was supposed to enshrine the rights of all Nepalis, not just the fairer skinned ones, Pooja and Amar struggle against the tide of shouting protestors, desperately trying to keep track of Mamata.

Pooja has to do an animal mask to hide her Pahadi origin, Mamata is dressed in a red sari (to imitate the maid) that drapes around her head to hide her face. The atmosphere is tense, pregnant with violence, and our dread is further keyed up by Pooja’s mask, which renders her figure ghoulish, lending the scene a nightmarish quality which is entirely appropriate given the hellish subject matter.

Nepali cinema has evolved over the years, but from the trailers that plied us before Rajagunj and during the intermission, that evolution is still flailing somewhere in-between Bollywood melodrama and skilled, thoughtful verisimilitude, erring mostly toward the former.

Rajagunj is not a perfect film, but it is an admirable one, and will stay with you long after it finishes. It is an important stepstone, one could go so far as to say a vital one, in the journey towards better, more meaningful filmmaking in this country.

While this reviewer firmly believes in the power of cinema for pure, unaffected, even silly, mainstream entertainment, cinema is also an art form, and Rauniyar’s film has moments of pure art, motivated by an undaunted spirit, and bolstered by the filmmaker’s own humanity.

Sophia L Pandé is a writer, art historian and filmmaker. She is Director of Development at the Kathmandu Valley Preservation Trust and Founding Director of The Kalā Salon.