With a good deal of dramatic flourish, Maharaj fictionalises a defamation case that was significant in history. Nevertheless, the Netflix movie is anything but revolutionary, even with the uproar that postponed its premiere.
The historical film produced by YRF presents significant issues that are still relevant now, yet by softening its core assumptions, it partially loses its storyline. It turns to narrative techniques that are equivocal and sadly effete.
Directed by Siddharth P. Malhotra and adapted for the cinema by Vipul Mehta from Saurabh Shah’s best-selling Gujarati novel of the same name, Maharaj serves as a mediocre platform for debutante Junaid Khan. The actor can’t seem to escape the constraints and weight the project puts on him.
The newcomer portrays a young journalist from Bombay in the 19th century, whose passion for social reformation during a time of extreme change puts him in danger of running into a predatory holy man. Khan makes a valiant effort to overcome the script’s tameness. The battle is not winning.
He manages to flesh out the kind of daring crusader that the audience can quickly root for, but with a certain amount of performative rigidity. He consistently works hard in that quest, but he is unable to hide how much work it actually takes.
Maharaj chooses a true narrative that is undoubtedly not without inherent value. More than 160 years ago, a journalist faces off against a strong religious figure from the Gujarati Vaishnav sect who abuses his female followers sexually and has tremendous influence over the society. The journalist was motivated and inspired by social reformer and political leader Dadabhai Naoroji.
The conflict reaches the Bombay Supreme Court when Yadunath Maharaj (Jaideep Ahlawat), the chief priest of a haveli (a religious order housed in a particular temple), files a libel suit after a feisty Karsandas Mulji (Junaid Khan) publishes a bold newspaper expose.
The religious man is a charlatan who thinks that by deflowering newlywed ladies or underage girls who are offered to him by their husbands or parents, respectively, he is carrying on a long-standing custom and fulfilling a heavenly obligation.
The community sees the surrender of body and mind to the lust of the venerated Yadunath Maharaj, JJ to his disciples, as a way to earn the blessings of the Almighty. The godman perpetuates the myth and his followers unquestioningly buy into it. “This is both devotion and tradition,” the maharaj says when Karsan confronts him.
Karsan is driven his radical ideas regarding women’s education, widow remarriage, banning of the veil, abolition of untouchability and blind faith. He articulates his revolutionary thoughts not only to an enraged family headed by an orthodox maternal uncle but also to his would-be bride Kishori (Shalini Pandey).
He also writes articles in Dadabhai Naoroji’s Anglo-Gujarati newspaper Rast Goftar to spread awareness about social evils. Maharaj is about one extraordinary man’s fight against a powerful spiritual guru. It is also about an all-out battle between religious manipulation and individual resistance. But the film also addresses several other significant themes that have relevance across time and societies.
These centre on the dangers inherent in creating personality cults, the importance of free thinking in a society where large segments of people fall prey to indoctrination and the risks that uncompromising, intrepid journalism is inevitably fraught with.
In an emotionally charged exchange between Karsan and his fiancee Kishori, the former insists that one needs intelligence and wisdom, and not religion, to tell right from wrong. But he soon figures out that devotion, like love, is blind.
In another scene, a senior priest from Yadunath Maharaj’s haveli advocates rationalism. One who does not ask questions isn’t a true bhakt, he says to Karsan when the young man is wracked by doubt about the efficacy of his lone fight against an evil practice. And a religion that cannot provide answers, the old man adds, isn’t a true religion.
Karsan is not exactly alone in his war against the gatekeepers of religion. Viraaj (Sharvari Wagh), a feisty woman who has trouble with intoning sibilant sounds, materialises out of nowhere and joins his newspaper as a proofreader without pay. Her backstory, revealed later in her own words, explains her enthusiasm for the job and Karsan’s mission.
The undeniable pertinence of the issues that Maharaj addresses is undermined by its over-reliance on pretty visuals. But that is not to say that cinematographer Rajeev Ravi and production designers Subrata Chakraborty and Amit Ray are to blame in any way for the film’s lack of genuine heft.
There isn’t a single frame in the film that is less than perfect in terms of framing and design. Maharaj is Sanjay Leela Bhansali lite, a glossy production minus the eye-popping sweep and scale of a film by Bollywood’s emperor of excess.
Maharaj is more interested in producing a rich sensory experience than in stirring up feelings of outrage, revulsion, and contempt for the abuses that people are frequently subjected to in the name of organised religion.
Though what we see is carefully wrapped and delivered in a way that verges on being unduly circumspect, we certainly sense the ugliness and depravity within the vast mansion that symbolises the clout of the titular character.
The craftsmanship seen in Maharaj is impeccable, to be fair. The film consistently demonstrates technical mastery, with Rajeev Ravi’s camera masterfully capturing the setting and the time period. Especially striking are the hues of gold and russet crated in the maharaj’s spacious bedroom by a combination of fire and smoke.
Jaideep Ahlawat gives a subtle portrayal that oozes spooky mendacity, making him tower over everything and everyone else in the movie. He never speaks up and maintains a near-beatific look that is only occasionally broken by a range of repressed smirks, crooked smiles, and all-knowing grins—all characteristics of a guy who believes he is God and wants his followers to ignore his evil activities.
There are many components in Maharaj that don’t work well for every one that does. Never before has a historical drama with so much to say seemed so lifeless and unproductive.
