PROLOGUE
I watched a Hindi Film at TARA HD starring Akshay Kumar titled Toilet – Ek Prem Katha (Toilet: a love story). It was a great film and it gave me a mixed feeling. The obvious was the ridicule at the seemingly mundane problem; nobody could have lived like that especially for the ladies. After all the laughs are over, a reminisce of our old Kampung Life was in fact not too far different from that portrayed. How could I have lived like that is now the more appropriate question.
ABSTRACT WIKIPEDIA
Toilet: Ek Prem Katha (Toilet: a love story) is a 2017 Indian Hindi-language comedy-drama film directed by Shree Narayan Singh. Co-produced by Akshay Kumar and Neeraj Pandey, the film stars Akshay Kumar and Bhumi Pednekar in the lead roles, with Anupam Kher, Sudhir Pandey and Divyendu Sharma in supporting roles. The film was released on 11 August 2017. The film is a satirical comedy in support of governmental campaigns to improve sanitation conditions in India, with an emphasis on the eradication of open defecation, especially in rural areas. The film was a commercial success, becoming Akshay Kumar’s highest-grossing film, and his first film to enter the 300 crore club.
The film highlights India’s toilet problem, which is caused by their cultural and religional sentiments. In Indian rural areas,still people do not have this basic need which leads to a lot of frustration among women which further leads to sexual harrasment.The film received three nominations at the 63rd Filmfare Awards, including Best Film, Best Director for Narayan singh and Best Actor for Akshay Kumar.
THE SPLOT (Summarised)
In an Indian village, a group of women goes to a field, away from their village in the early hours of the day to defecate in the open, behind the cover of bushes. Keshav (Akshay Kumar) meets Jaya (Bhumi Pednekar), an educated college going girl, falls in love with her and eventually convinces her to marry him.
On her first morning in Keshav’s house, Jaya reluctantly goes to a field to defecate, but comes back agitated. Jaya remains steadfast in demanding a personal toilet in the house. Keshav makes a couple of temporary adjustments to solve the problem but fail and frustrated Jaya leaves him and moves back to her parents’ house.
Jaya files for a divorce in the local court citing the unavailability of a toilet in her husband’s house as the primary reason for seeking a divorce. Due to its unique nature, the case gets a lot of media attention. But Keshav’s father remains steadfast on his decision to not have a toilet in his house, until one day, his mother, while going out to defecate, falls on the doorstep, injures her hip and cries vehemently that she can’t possibly walk to the fields to defecate, and that she must use the toilet that Keshav constructed in the front yard. After much reluctance, Keshav’s father gives in.
On the day of the hearing of the divorce case of Keshav and Jaya, the judge gets an official notice from the Chief Minister’s office urging the judge to not grant their divorce as the construction of toilets in their village shall be started the very next day. The couple comes out together happily. Keshav’s father apologises to Jaya for his stubbornness. In the end credits, villagers are shown lining up to use mobile toilets outside their village while the construction of toilets throughout the village goes on.
REACTION
The film was a brave portrayal of the so called tradition which was chanted to have been derived from the Holy Scriptures but proved not to be. The folks went to the open field to do their natural body need. For the ladies, if anybody passed by, they just wrapped over their faces and life goes on. When a modern girl who have been used to having a personal toilet in the house since small had to undergo such life, it was such a humiliation and she would have none of it; even divorce was preferable.
The character display on how the couple endured the so called tradition, finding ways to go around it, but as the plot thickened became more unbearable making the heroin give the ultimatum; find a permanent solution or get divorced, hence the Tagline: No Toilet, No Bride. In the end it exposed a scandal in the government sanitary infrastructure project.
You just need to watch it to get the message, laugh and shed tears along the way, the way a good Hindi Film feel. Bollywood Films have now passed the cliche plot with singing and dancing at every imaginable place. Strong plot and character portrayal are now becoming more evident. Just watch the current crop of Aamir Khan Films and you will get the message.
REMINISCING
I recollect that those days at Kampung Tangok, Bachok where I was borne, was in fact toilet-free. It was unthinkable to built a toilet, locally called JAMBAN in the house, or even near to it. Jamban is Tandas but saying jamban in lilting Kelantanese way connote a dirty, smelly, low class place that you have to endure as a human. So just get it over with and Life goes on.
So how did you do it?
Every house have a jemboran. The term means a place to dry off clothings. However in Kampung Life it was much more than that. It was an extension of the house where you clean your clothes (latter the folks preferred to do it at the local open well with cemented base, in their kemban wear style, inviting criticisms by the guru agamas), take bath, clean your base anatomy after doing the job in the field. Here we have a measure of privacy.
The toilet was out there; in the field with local shrubs to give a measure of privacy. Sometimes, in going deeper for more privacy you inadvertently stepped on a pile of a recently left-after job, cursed and get on with it. When you see somebody with kain lepas wrapped onto his body, walking a brisk pace to the field, you can be sure what kind of business he has out there. And it was part of the life then, got relegated into the subconcious and became a norm. What problem? LOL !!!
The walk after that was more leasure, Hahahaha… And I know of a character who was more advanced than the mediocre village boys. He had a small radio!!! And the radio keep humming with him even to the field, LOL!!!
When Mek (my mother) was courted and married by Ayah (my father), she, a headman’s daughter of another better village had to go along with it. The story-line seemed to go parallel here with the movie, then diverse on the part of divorce. Mek was a strong resilient character with an aura of presence that caused the village women-folk to be so courteous around her. She was fair-skinned with a tinge of Tok Sheikh appearance, a novelty then. Sayyids are supposed to be descendants of the Prophet Muhammad SAW.
When I was may be about 4 yrs old, she asked Ayah to dig her a toilet which he complied. Soon we had a toilet in the pineapple vineyard at the back of the house, after the jemboran. After a week of use, the toilet reeked of smell so strong, I did not have the courage to do the job there. Only Ayah and Mek were strong enough to manage doing it there. We did not know of disinfectants yet back then, else it would have been just fine.
It was much latter that the taboo was overlooked and we started having toilets in the house. HAIL HYGIENE.
….. That’s it folks.
Razali 18 Mei 2019
Memoir of Kampung Life in Kelantan 