Dr. Ramanand Sagar, the man who captivated India with his televised version of the epic Ramayana, passed away yesterday at the age of 87.
First telecast in 1987 on India’s state-run television, the 78-episode serial, based on the life of Lord Rama, one the most revered deities in Hinduism, often brought the country to a halt.
Weddings were delayed, trains came to a halt and social events were re-scheduled so that people could watch the series, telecast every Sunday.
The high-pitched serial, with its garish production values, also had its critics who suggested Sagar’s work helped fan Hindu nationalism in the country.[BBC]
I don’t know about that last sentence– I remember the serial and I didn’t see saffron, but perhaps I was too young to notice such things. “High-pitched” or not, I will always be grateful for this unintentionally campy classic; it gave a frustrated father and sullen teenager a reason to talk, interact, bond. Asking my father why Sita was suffering and listening, spell-bound as he expounded on epics, Hinduism, faith and culture is something I’ll never forget.
Though born near Lahore to “one of the most aristocratic and wealthiest families“, Sagar didn’t remain privileged:
Sagar was later thrown out of his house after he refused to accept the dowry system and had to struggle for a living. The young Ramanad worked as a peon, truck cleaner, soap vendor, goldsmith apprentice during thr day and studied for his degree at night.[Rediff]
At age 30, after knowing success as a journalist, author, filmmaker, actor, screenwriter and playwright, Sagar, like so many others, lost everything:
In 1947, Sagar had to flee to India with his family.
Penniless, his only possessions at that time were five annas and a trunk full of manuscripts that described the horrors and destruction, witnessed by him during those turbulent times.[Rediff]
He later turned those manuscripts in to the much-lauded Aur Insaan Mar Gaya:
In 1948, he wrote his life’s masterpiece – the novel Aur Insaan mar gaya depicting the horrors of the 1947 partition of India. Acclaimed as an all-time classic in Urdu and Hindi literature, it was translated into several Indian and foreign languages. The English version And Humanity Died was published in 1987-88.[Rediff]
As a producer and director, he was responsible for over a dozen box office hits:
The blockbusters include silver jubilees – six in a row – including Ghunghat, Zindagi, Aarzoo, Geet, Lalkar, Hamrahi, Charas, Pyaara Dushman, Ram Bharose, Bhagawat and the diamond jubilee Ankhen.[Rediff]
Sagar received the title “Padmashri” in 2001.
he will be missed 🙁
The high-pitched serial, with its garish production values, also had its critics who suggested SagarÂ’s work helped fan Hindu nationalism in the country.
Dr. Sagar’s Ramayana supposedly incited Hindu Nationalism just as Mel Gibson’s ‘Passion’ Mania set off the Conservative Right..
To the best of my knowledge, it started airing in 1984 and ended in 1987…
…at 10:45 AM. The joke was that if there were law and order problems, instead of declaring curfew, the police could just telecast Ramayan – people would stay home!!
These same critics were against the telecast of Mahabharata a few years later. Eventually, when Chankya was telecast, these critics succeeded in stopping its run mid-way on the grounds that too much Hinduism was being shown.
M. Nam
i loved this series. i remember watching it with my parents on vhs and always asking what, what did they just say?” since i didn’t know a drop of hindi. it was way cool when i was in elementary school.
Pour some sagar on me Ooh, in the name of Ram Pour some sagar on me C’mon fire me up Pour your sagar on me Oh, I can’t get enough
I’m hot, sticky sweet From my head to my feet yeah
Thank you for posting this. Not many know that Ramanand Sagar was an accomplished writer too. He worked as an editor before moving to films. This article sheds more light on Sagar’s writing career.
Undoubtedly, Sagar worked hard for his success but his interpretation of Ramayana was not only garish but viscid and overwrought. This “noutanki” became a lightning rod because the actors used to dress up as characters from this story and campaign for BJP. For crying out loud, the actor playing Rama drove around the country in a freaking chariot telling people to vote hindu or the sky will fall! For those of you that actually paid attention would have seen that this was Sagar’s interpretation of Tulidas’ interpretation of the Ramayana. Valmiki’s version is more of a narration of an epic. Tulidas presented a groupie’s viewpoint.
I also find your generalization about fathers and sons talking amusing. Me and brother actually used to go outside to play to avoid catching a glance of a series that was clearly miles apart from the original Ramayana. This was the time that we NEVER talked to our Dad except deriding him for sitting through such drivel.
Hear hear…I watched the show on video, several at a time, with my mother. And I asked a million questions because I couldn’t always remember faces and I’d get the characters confused and couldn’t remember how someone was related to someone else.
My mother says that she actually had to do a lot of reading on her own and research a lot of stuff to answer some of my questions and as a result learnt a lot of things about Hinduism because of that serial. Pretty cool stuff.
For what it’s worth as someone who’s lived out of India for decades it was something I really appreciated.
This “noutanki” became a lightning rod because the actors used to dress up as characters from this story and campaign for BJP. For crying out loud, the actor playing Rama drove around the country in a freaking chariot telling people to vote hindu or the sky will fall!
Anjan, do you have any proof whatsoever of this? I was in India during the time and as far as I remember it was only the actress that played Sita that ran for and won an election for BJP
Ahh yes Ramayana on Doordarshan- that takes me back- back to the dasy of no cable, when Ramayana and Mahabharat on Sundays and Chitrahar on Thursday or wednesday nights was all you had to watch on TV. (well and Buniyaad if you were older)
Yeah Sagar’s Ramayana was the Tulsidas version. Valmiki wrote Ramayana as a story. Rama was Maryada Purushottam Ram (the ideal man), not an incarnate of Vishnu. For that I believe, we have Tulsidas to thank. His version was from the “bhakti” perspective.
My favourite thing about Ramayana is that a major work of hindu mythology got airtime every week thanks for the generous and supposedly secular government of India.
@ Just Checking,
Just by googling I came with a couple –
How intelligent BJP quickly cashed in on the popularity of the series using the foolish voters – http://www.askenni.com/archives/2004/05/intelligent_bjp.html
From http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=12&page=32 – “If the top-Bollywood stars are falling for the BJP, particularly to the charm of its youthful Prime Minister and leader Atal Behari Vajpayee, same goes for the tele-stars. Sudha Chandran of the film, Naache Mayuri fame and now a popular face on the small screen joined the BJP. Smriti Z. Irani and Prachi Sha have also joined the BJP. Incidentally, the BJP has had the majority of the players in the mega serials of Ramayan and Mahabharat. Arun Govil (Rama) and Deepika (Sita) had campaigned for the BJP.”
I was in India at the time and I actually saw Arun Govil in that “rath” that ran on petrol and had a steering wheel 🙂
Without missing a cue, BBC had to throw in that blurb. Next they will blame Ramanand Sagar for the Ayodhya riots.
Good catch. One of the episodes was censored when Chandragupta (grandfather of Ashoka, a shudra by birth, made king by a brahman) was fighting greek invasion, had a saffron flag with him!! Ew…how absurd.
Infact Arvind Trivedi, who played “Ravan” also ran for Lok Sabha and got elected.
Chandragupta (grandfather of Ashoka, a shudra by birth, made king by a brahman)
Arun Govil (Rama) and Deepika (Sita) had campaigned for the BJP
Actually the book “Many Ramayanas” (mentioned on some SM article before, that’s where I heard about it) has an interesting bit on Sagar’s serial as a narrative of the Ramayana. Sagar’s Ramayan, I believe is primarily a “bhakti” style, based on the Ramcharitamanas by Tulsidas.
It’s crazy, but it does make me somewhat nostalgic about pre-cable, DD-only days of Indian TV that I grew up with.
I didn’t know the other things about Sagar’s life, my respect for him has increased infinitely. RIP!
Man I left for the US before Buniyaad. I only remember Hum Loog and I was hooked as was everyone else to that serial. Now it’s like a billion $ industry with all these channels and all these serials all about how the women are wronged by other women and horrible men!!
Anna: There used to be unconfirmed rumors that some Jacobite Syrian churches in Kottayam bumped up Qurbana(Mass, for the others) timings so they didn’t lose their congregation to Sunday morning Ramayana. I kid you not!
1986-1988
Um. Ramanand Sagar also produced “Krishna”,”Luv Kush” and IMHO his best work on TV, “Vikram aur Vetaal”.
I think he was also involved in the production of a serial based on the 1001 nights, which had a predominantly “Arabian” theme.
Err..Atavist.
Sigh..Has anyone read Anand Rajagopal’s ‘Politics After Television’? Read and then comment on whether the beeb’s statement was really so shocking. It’s about the role the televising of the Ramayan and the Mahabharat had in changing the Indian political sphere.Also, remember that the Ramjanmabhumi campaign that culminated in the destruction of the Babri Masjid happened simultaneously. And i’m sorry but i don’t find Rath yatras amusing in the least considering the violence wreaked along its trails..The Sangh was drawing on considerable symbolism by making this highly warped version of “Ancient India” seem very real in a then newly liberalizing India.
cough Schwarzenegger cough
Does anyone else find it strange that a B movie actor is deciding executions? I suppose if a B movie actor can run the Cold War…
That’s ok– my parents used to make us watch the Jesus of Nazareth miniseries with them 😉 (Along with all the interminable Ramayana and Mahabharata serials with their super-duper special effects.)
The folks at the BBC sure know their revisionist history, especially when it suits their worldview.
Though I hated the serial for its melodrama (partly because Sagar was milking it by stretching it forever), it was a pioneering effort for TV.
Its amusing to read the BBC epithets and derision aimed at its world view. This is coming from a coterie of people breast-fed on the news sources censored by the Indian government at a news organization revered even by Indian journalists as hardcore liberal. Note that I don’t call them unbiased because you have to biased one way or the other. But if you are calling BBC as interpreting news events then you also defended the destruction of the Babri Masjid as an accidental act that was not organized in detail by the Sangh parivar.
Every political party uses popular actors to campaign for them but the way the Sangh Parivar exploited the teeming, illiterate masses of India to incite violence against minorities is astounding. No news organization’s coloring the event either way will change that fact.
Every political party uses popular actors to campaign for them but the way the Sangh Parivar exploited the teeming, illiterate masses of India to incite violence against minorities is astounding.
Ok lets see: Ramanand Sagar made the TV show Ramayana and promoted Hindu Nationalism. Using the same measure: Vikram and Vetal promoted demonic rituals involving vampires. No sir, it was not a simple folk tale. Mahabharat, on top of Hindu Nationalism, glorified war, gambling and disrobing of women in public. Tipu Sultan inspired rebellion by a Muslim against Western powers and inspired Bin Laden and gang. Could you guys reach anymore?
And all these Saas-Bahu serials are the primary cause of divorce in contemporary India!!
LOL! When will people realise that art is a reflection of society and not the other way around?
M. Nam
Moornam,
With all due respect, I would not classify all those psychotic Saas-Bahu serials as being an accurate reflection of Indian society. The very worst aspects and behavioural traits in certain quarters, yes, but “accurate” — not the way I see it.
Taking this back to some of the semi-off-topic comments about Indian TV programmes from the Doordarshan era, I would say that the overall quality of mainstream Indian serials have taken a significant turn for the worse since Ekta Kapoor (deliberately or inadvertantly) hijacked the genre. And although I certainly wouldn’t blame (for example) escalating divorce rates on the effect of these serials, it’s not unrealistic to state that such programmes do have an impact on the thinking and behaviour of some of the more impressionable viewers, especially with regards to the whole Saas-Bahu dynamic. The characters concerned do serve as role models in the minds of many people.
And yes of course such over-domineering, over-political types with matriarchal fantasies do exist “for real” within Indian society — both in India and amongst the diaspora — but perhaps it doesn’t exactly help matters for the constant depiction of the aforementioned characters to further encourage such behaviour, especially if they use these examples as ways to rationalise/justify such attitudes in the name of “Indian culture.”
Someone lost out on my sarcasm back there. RIP Mr. Sagar. Oh wait, am I promoting Christianity by using “RIP”?
In case you meant me… I just extended your sarcasm into Saas-Bahu.
Jai,
I agree that Saas-Bahu serials are not an accurate reflection of society, and that they may actually end up causing some problems in families. Sometimes, art can affect reality.
M. Nam
I am not saying airing Ramayana lead to December 6, but a STATE run channel aired a major work of one religion- one religion only.
You can’t call yourself secular and then have the state indirectly endorse one religion, even it means airing the sweet ass special effects with the arrows.
and dont point to tipu sultan for heaven’s sake- is not a major work of islamic faith.
Brown Magic,
You may DD seem like some sort of biased Hindu fundamentalist bogeyman. It was not. It took years of battle to get them to telecast this serial. Additionally, there were no televised works on Islam primarily due to the beliefs of that religion. In the early 80s, DD had telecast a cartoon series on the history of the world. This was either an American or a European production, I forget which. The episode on Prophet Mohammed drew huge protests since Muslims believed that projecting his image was blasphemy. I vivdly recall DD apologising on air for airing that episode.
typo -> may = make
..and to set the record straight, I would contend that the raison d’etre behind the support for the BJP was not so much the telecast of these serials (the screenplay of Mahabharat was written by a noted Muslim scholar), but the culmination of a series of events wherein the majority community, rightly or wrongly, felt alienated. Shah Bano, Sikh terrorism on Hindus, the assasination of IG (and the aftermath), deaths of IPKF soldiers in Sri Lanka and other important matters was very much in the radar in the minds of the people.
Mind you, I am not justifying anything here, but simply giving a the details of a background that is far more complex than the simplistic formula dished out by the beeb.
And yes, anyone who calls Tipu Sultan an Islamic leader is misinformed. I’ve written about Tipu here and here.
Sarcasm is truly an ineffective means of communication in these parts. My apologies, oh fountain of knowledge.
Moor, its cool. I was not referring to you.
Reincarnation,
My comment was not aimed at your very obviously in-your-face-sarcastic comment which I had missed. It was in reply to BM’s comment about TS.
DD a bogeyman? I would never dare. DD gave me Byomkesh Bakshi and Karamchand Jasoos and what was that show called – Mr. Yogi? I would never betray my doordarshan. I am just saying, the only religion I learned anything about watching DD was the majority one.
Reincarnation – yes, thank you. your sarcasm was duly noted but my point was about DD’s line up being hindu-friendly and I was only using tipu sultan as an example.
Anjan is really anjaan, Arun Govil, who played Ram, campainged for Congress and not for BJP. Plzzz, check your facts before speaking out. Congress used Arun Govil with all his “Ram”-uniform, complete with saffron and all, and not the BJP.
Jai Shree Ram.On Sunday when the serial Ramayan was goins on my father was in the hospital.He wants two bottels of blood.U can imagine what happened next.
I am trying to buy Ramanand Sagar’s Krishna series on VHS tape. I already have the DVD set, but this does not include some of the later episodes. Does anyone know where I can buy either the complete set of VHS tapes, or just episodes 107 onwards – either on DVD or VHS tape? Thanks mb@softbyte.co.uk
i watch ramayan when i was i 12 i loved it before i know there is ramayan tv series iv’e seen rama raj from maharishi so that i know it and still now i like wathcing it on the net if im going to be a tv or movie star i want to play the role of rama raj wow
a jewel he was the ultimate storyteller
I have seen Krishna In the last part Dr. Sagar told this in not complete After some year we will make other part of Krishna.did you make next Episodes.
Please tell
i salute…………. ramanand sagar sir….. he just super…… i can’t describe him in words…… sir u have just done superbly…….. i love everybody who has acted in ur serial………… ur krishna, ur arjun, karna and duryoudhan….. r my favorite characters in ur mahabharath……….. they just been superb…….
sir….. i want to complement people who acted in ur serial………. firstly krishna, arjun, duryoundhan, karan,draupadi…… plz plz mail me there e-mail ids……… my e-mail id is sandhya.naik13@yahoo.co.in…….. i have not missed even one episode of ur serial……… i’m a great fan of mahabharath serial………plz plz mail me
701-702 7th Floor kapadia Apt S.V Road Ville Parle (w) Mumbai-400056 Sir Sampun ramayan