Why a new Razakar movie can influence the Telangana elections

Warning: Graphic image containing violence. 

Following the footsteps of Vivek Agnihotri’s polarising filmography and the controversy-stirrers The Kerala Story and 72 Hoorain, a new Telugu movie might be the next in line to be accused of hate-mongering.

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Titled Razakar, this upcoming 2023 drama aims to unleash the horrors unleashed by the titular paramilitary forces on numerous Hindu families during the 1948 Hyderabad Liberation Movement.

So far, only a poster of the movie has been shared that features a Brahmin boy (as is evident from the ritualistic ponytail and dhoti) being graphically mutiliated on a spike. The blood-stained visual is supported by the movie’s title with a promo line reading as “Silent Genocide of Hyderabad”. 

The poster also reveals that Razakar will be theatrically released in Hindi, Malayalam, Kannada and Tamil along with its original language. 

First things first, who were the Razakars? 

After India attained Independence in 1947, Mir Osman Ali Khan (the last Nizam of Hyderabad) proved to be quite a tough nut to crack for the Sardar Patel-led plans to incorporate princely states within the nation. Back then, the Hyderabad state included eight districts in Telangana, five districts in Maharashtra and three in Karnataka.

With the takeover of the Hyderabad state involving the Indian Army in 1948, the Razakars made national headlines. 

However, this armed collective traces its origins back to 1938 when it was instituted as a paramilitary volunteer force of the nationalist party of Hyderabad (which was then under the British Raj). Post-Independence, the Nizam refused to join either India or Pakistan and wanted to regain his absolute control over Hyderabad. 

With its volunteers fiercely loyal to the Nizam, the Razakars were involved in the imposition of Muslim hegemony in the state and often killed and tortured Hindu families and other opposers of the Nizam rule such as the oppressed peasants and Communist-aligned leaders. 

September 1948 found the Razakars indulging in armed conflict against the Indian Army. India had planned an annexation of the Hyderabad State (codenamed Operation Polo). This military operation went on for five days with the Nizam finally secedding to India and the Razakars being disbanded. 

What political statement is Razakar trying to make? 

During a recent poster launch event, Razakar director-screenwriter Yata Satyanarayana claimed that he is very much inspired by Vivek Agnihotri’s The Kashmir Files (that aimed to present the genocide of Kashmiri Pandits in the 1990s). At the same time, Satyanarayana also added that his movie shouldn’t be misunderstood as an anti-Muslim hate campaign. 

Speaking at the launch, he also took names of Muslim personalities like Sheikh Bandagi (peasant-turned-freedom fighter) and Shoebullah Khan (editor of the Urdu daily Imroz) citing how they too fought against the colonial authority of the British and later the Nizam of Hyderabad. However, he didn’t mention if figures like Bandagi and Khan would feature in the movie to play along the “good Muslim” trope. 

Like many citizens of Hyderabad, the filmmaker also shares a disdain towards the Nizam and his tortuous force. At the event, he went on to mention how still, some people “call the Nizam-Razakar rule a golden period” by citing architectural contributions like “the Charminar, the Osmania Hospital and the Osmania University”. 

In this way, he feels that a demonic figure like the last Nizam is being portrayed as “a good civilised person”. It’s to debunk this myth that he was inspired to make Razakar. 

However, it must be noted that the Charminar was built in 1591 by Sultan Mohammed Quli Qutb Shah of the Qutb Shahi dynasty, a lineage that was never connected to the Razakars. 

The political consequences of the Razakar movie 

No matter how unbiased the filmmakers might try to act, the BJP connection to the Telugu movie is undeniable. Not only did BJP MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar appear at the trailer launch but Razakar is also produced by another BJP member Guduru Narayana Rao (under his banner Samarveer Creations). 

With the Telangana Legislative Assembly election scheduled for this December, the release of Razakar can influence public opinion towards BJP. A minority party in the state with just two seats, BJP is trying hard to gain public approval. One of these measures has been to get September 17 (the day when the Nizam accepted defeat) recognised as “Telangana Liberation Day”. This campaign was also repeatedly mentioned at the poster launch of Razakar. 

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While it is obvious that the BJP will back the release of Razakar and possibly ask for it to be screened “tax-free”, incumbent CM K Chandrashekhar Rao and his party Bharath Rashtra Samiti would be in a fix. Even if the movie resorts to any hate-mongering, it will be difficult for them to voice any criticism as that would lead the media to interpret it as siding with the Nizam and the Razakars. 

But the Razakar era is more complex than “Muslims killing Hindus” 

The genocide of Hindus at the hands of Razakars was much talked about at the trailer launch. And as is evident from the poster, the movie is keen on showing even Brahmins were subject to this barbarity. While further plot details remain uncertain at the moment, one can only hope that Razakar shows the complete picture instead of reducing the “Razakars vs the people of Hyderabad” binary to another “Muslims killing Hindu” clash. 

Historical accuracy naturally needs to be kept in mind for a movie that attempts to recreate a sensitive real-life tragedy like the Razakar violence. That’s why it must be considered that the Razakars found their enemies not just in Hindu civilians but also progressive Muslims. 

In the early 20th century, Hyderabad was already on its way of becoming a theocratic state with the aggressive rise of the Nizam-backed political party Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (MIM). The party’s chief goal was to convert Hyderabad into a wholly Muslim state, an ideological stance that drove them at loggerheads with Hindus, progressive Muslims and the Communist Party of India (CPI) workers.

But what also needs to be considered is that there were also other dominant players (other than the Nizam loyalists) who set the stage for political chaos in 1940s-era Hyderabad. The Razakar poster might paint the upper-caste as victims and while this might be true, it is public knowledge that the feudal society of Hyderabad state also saw the oppression of lower-caste Hindu peasants at the hands of the upper-caste Hindu landlords. 

PR Rao’s comprehensive 1991 work History and Culture of Andhra Pradesh suggests that apart from the Nizam’s vast landholdings, most of the lands in the Telangana districts were under the control of oppressive upper-caste landowners. Like many a zamindar of that era, the landowner’s duty was to use peasant labour and collect revenue from them (part of which would go to the Hyderabad state). These feudal lords were often involved in forced collection of rent from farmers in a few violent instances too. 

This is why the CPI seemed alluring for the peasants to rise against their lords. One of the peasant revolt leaders and CPI member P Sundarayya wrote in Telangana People’s Struggle and its Lesson on how the bonded labour practice of Vetti Chakiri was quite a common practice in Nizam-ruled Hyderabad. This entailed the lower castes to be forcefully obligated to serve the ones above them. 

This discontent among peasants led to the Telangana Rebellion that lasted from 1946 to 1951. So, yes, the Razakars did target Hindus but it’s not like the Hindus were a united front either. The peasants and CPI workers were involved in armed clashes during the Rebellion with their enemies being both Hindu and Muslim landholders. 

While the Razakars are publicly condemned for their acts of violence, it is interesting to note how the Indian Army’s arrival in Hyderabad and the general communal tensions led to large scale massacres of Muslims too. Later, when the erstwhile Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru set up the Sunderlal Committee to look into the atrocities of 1948, the report suggested the killings of 27,000-40,000 Muslims in major districts like Osmanabad and Bidar. 

Most of these deaths can be pointed to communal clashes and what the Indian Army described as “police action”. But the fact that the chronology matches that of the Razakar reign of terror calls for it to be represented in a movie about this era and region. But based on what we have seen and heard right now, it’s doubtful that the Telugu movie would be able to showcase this complexity of the era. 

So, will Razakar end up being ignored upon release or will it manage to actually influence the state elections? The question remains.