Rajshri Productions’ iconic film Saaransh (1984) recently completed 40 years. Directed by Mahesh Bhatt, it starred Anupam Kher in his debut along with Rohini Hattangadi, Soni Razdan, Madan Jain, Suhas Bhalekar and Nilu Phule. The movie became a critical and commercial success. The film is about a senior citizen couple (Kher and Hattangadi) trying to come to terms with the death of their young son during a violent incident in the US.
40 years of Saaransh EXCLUSIVE: Here’s why Dilip Kumar highlighted the film’s collections at a major protest rally
While the film is still remembered fondly even after four decades, not many would know that it also had a role to play in a major agitation that took place in Mumbai after its release. In 1986, almost the entire cinema industry in India went on a strike and movie making and movie showing came to a halt. The reason behind the strike was the enormous entertainment tax levied by the state government.
As a part of the strike, a major agitation took place in October 1986 at Mumbai’s Chowpatty area where almost the entire film industry came on the streets to mark their protest against the high taxes. The legendary Dilip Kumar, who was an integral part of the protest, gave a rousing speech on the state of the industry because of the tax. And while speaking, he mentioned the box office figures of Saaransh in order to throw light on the plight of the producers.
This trivia was shared exclusively with Bollywood Hungama by the Managing Director of Rajshri Productions Kamal Kumar Barjatya and Director Ajit Kumar Barjatya.
Sharing the plight of people associated with cinema during those days, Ajit Kumar Barjatya said, “When you ask a cinema hall owner back then to improve the condition of seats, they would say they can’t because for every rupee earned, they got only 25 paise. At that time, the whole industry had shut down till Diwali. It was a very big agitation.”
Sharing about Dilip Kumar’s speech, he added, “At that time, Dilip Kumar sahab had given a speech where he had mentioned Saaransh. He presented the (box office) figures of Saaransh while doing a breakdown of how less the producers earn in the final tally (because of the enormous entertainment tax). He said that if a (successful) film like Saaransh can get affected, you can understand the injustice meted out to the industry. We had only provided the figures to him.”
The agitation was also attended by industry stars like Dev Anand, Raj Kapoor, Shashi Kapoor, Rishi Kapoor, Dharmendra, Rajesh Khanna, Yash Chopra, Mithun Chakraborty, Anil Kapoor, Raj Babbar, Govinda, Shabana Azmi, Javed Akhtar, Sanjay Dutt, Khushboo, Meenakshi Sheshadri, Farah, Suresh Oberoi, etc. The stars of Saaransh, Anupam Kher and Rohini Hattangadi, were also a part of the protest.
The strike and the agitation turned out to be successful. Kamal Kumar Barjatya informed, “Following this agitation, the entertainment tax was reduced considerably by the government.”
Also Read: 40 years of Saaransh EXCLUSIVE: The ONLY Rajshri film to get an Adult certificate in over 60 years for THIS reason
More Pages: Saaransh Box Office Collection
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