The politics of appeasement on screen
Zed Plus is Dr Chandraprakash Dwivedi's delectable spoof on a desperate pursuit of Muslim vote even by those who have, for decades, made a living out of berating appeasement politics. It has a variety of related issues too that define India's suburban public life. The banalities of coalition politics that plague even the very apex of our political pyramid; the spinelessness of our fabled "steel frame"; the extent to which the TV news-media has made a caricature of itself; the cosy nexus among rival political parties; the dargah-economy, the "adorable" terror mercenaries and their handlers; and, of course, the mindless preponderance of Pakistan in our public discourse. The film mirrors all of it and more.
The film is set in a small town of Rajasthan, Fatehpur, that has a "peepal wale peer ki dargah". Aslam (Adil Hussain), has a shack there to repair punctured tyres and he calls it a day-night service. In Delhi, the prime minister (Kulbhushan Kharbanda) is faced with a threat to his government due to withdrawal of support by "Samata Bannerji". Amidst the predictable political skulduggery, comes a suggestion to visit the dargah and seek the peer's intervention as he is known to grant wishes.
While it works for the beleaguered PM, his conversation with Aslam, distorted in translation, ends up with grant of Zed Plus security for Aslam. That is when the trouble begins for him as he can no more pursue his adulterous affair. Hamida (Mona Singh), Aslam's wife, doesn't have a clue about Aslam's torrid affair with his dead friend's widow and contributes to the household by selling handmade jootees. Some exaggerated situations and somewhat implausible leaps later, Aslam finds himself hijacked by a political party looking for a Muslim face and thrown into an electoral contest.
The story isn't very compelling all the time but keeps you engaged. It picks up momentum towards the second half. The first half is spent just about enunciating the context and carving out the characters. The film, mercifully, does not groan under the weight of star presence. The casting is good. Aslam looks every bit a road-side mechanic. The chief minister reminds you of the late Bhairon Singh Shekhawat. KK Raina acquits himself well as the PM's man Friday that most senior bureaucrats behave these days as. Kulbhushan Kharbanda does manage to look like a prime minister all right, but certainly not a politician from the South with a Hindi-handicap. Sanjay Mishra is a bit too comic as a terror-handler but entertains.
The screenplay is full of faux expletives that sound real and lend a realistic flavour to the narrative. It manages to stir you too, when you see even an adulterous Aslam walking away from a promising political career just because his native morality revolts but the hard-boiled politicians are never ever deterred by such pangs.
Dr Chandraprakash Dwivedi, who has directed the film and co-authored the screenplay too, is known for his forte in the period genre. The popular TV serials Chanakya and Upanishad Ganga and a sensitively portrayed partition era in Pinjar that won him critical acclaim, are a testimony if one was ever needed. This is his first foray into a light-hearted political satire. And it shows. Sukhwinder's singing and dervish-like dancing, or for that matter gyrating belles in ghaghra-choli on the dunes are some of the obvious concessions to the front-stalls that were avoidable. But, on balance, a watchable satire.