Bapu: The man inspired by Sita

Bapu, the famous director and artist, passed away last month. Bapu was one of those directors whose sensibilities when it came to music and lyrics was highly refined. Many of the songs from his movies are now part of the Telugu film music canon. The canonical nature of the songs owe a lot to Bapu. Like K.Vishwanath, he gave equal importance to language, tradition and music in his films. Like K.Vishwanth, he too used K V Mahadevan as the music director for most of his movies. Bapu and K Viswanath's aesthetic senses was very similar in that they had great respect for tradition and were to a large extent idealists and moralists. The only difference between them as film makers is that K.Vishwanth had a central theme which ran across almost all his movie, that of middle class and art. Bapu on the other hand made a variety of movies ranging from mythological, historical all the way to revolutionary films.

Having said that, if we have to look for a central theme in Bapu's movies, it would be the concept of Sita. Ramayana was a major inspiration for him and Sita's plight was a major concern. You can conclude this watching his major movies. His best and original movies mostly revolved around Ramayana and had a Sita like figure as the heroine.

(The number of memorable songs in Bapu's films are too many. This post cannot detail all of them. I going to select only a few of them to give you an idea of Bapu's aesthetics when it concerned film music and the way in which he drew upon culture and made these songs part of the culture.)

We start with this song from 'Buddhimanthudu'. Though the song is on Krishna the inspiration is the Mohana raga krithi on Rama by Tyagaraja, 'nanu paalimpa'  Here the opening lines  'nanu paalimpa nadachi vachchithivo' are taken and using the same Mohanam ragam, Mahadevan builds a very charming song. A song which is now part of Telugu bhakthi canon.



I thought I will put up one song per movie, but this song from 'Budhhimanthudu' is such a hit that I couldn't resist putting it up. Again the traditional forms of music are effectively used to convey a moral social message about the importance of education. A message which is relevant even today.



(This movie also had 'tata veedukolu' which is one of the most famous college leaving songs in Telugu.)

The first movie of Bapu that I saw was 'Sampoorna Ramayanam' though I did not know at that time that Bapu had directed the movie. It was the first movie screened when Hyderabad Doordarshan started its telecast and a huge number of people, including aunties who never stepped out of their houses usually, gathered in one poor bachelor's den to watch this marvel called Television. (The poor bachelor was the only one in the colony with a TV and he had won it in a lottery!!). The movie had some lovely music by K.V.Mahadevan. 'ramayya thandri' was a major hit and it is still heard whenever people talk about Guhan and his devotion to Rama. You can hear how Mahadevan draws heavily from folk tradition and adds his own tune making skills to it.



The next movie he did took inspiration from Ramayana and was titled 'Andala Ramudu'. Here again Bapu and Mahadevan take from tradition. The first line from Ramadasu's famous krithi, 'nanu brovamani chappave' is taken and given a new twist. The original song's emotion, that of a plea to Sita, is maintained. Since the movie happens on a 'launchi' which is heading towards Badrachalam, Rama and the krithis of Ramadasu become important. The other Ramadasu keerthana, 'paluke bangaramayane' is also adapted by Mahadevan in this movie.



Next came 'Sree Ramanjaneya Yuddham'. Given that it was a mythological, it came ample scope to K V Mahadevan to display his prowess in adapting classical music to films. While Mahadevan gave good songs for this movie, it was B.Gopalam's song which became a major hit and is heard regularly to this day. The singer is Raghuramaiah. His voice may not be the best but in this context it fits well and the Kalyani based tune is fetching.



The superhit 'Muthyala Muggu' was the first film that I saw knowing that the director was Bapu. That was a breakthrough film for Ravu Gopala Rao, who acted as the villain. The dialogues were mouthed by almost everyone during those times. This film also draws upon Ramayana, with the heroine separated from her husband due to the nefarious activities of the villains. How Hanuman comes to the rescue of this Sita forms the rest of the story. The songs were superhit as well with 'Muthyamantha Pasupu' even now being played on all festive occasions. As you would also know, 'edho edho annadhi' is probably the greatest hit in Ramakrishna's career.



The next movie was 'Seetharama Kalyanam'. It was praised in some foreign festival. (I have read an irate Satyajit Ray comment about how westerner's fall for such stuff. ) The song is very classical in nature befitting the movie in which it appears.



'Goranta Deepam' which was released in 1978, had a de-glamorised Vanishree playing the Sita figure: a lone woman surrounded by lecherous men. This movie's title song was a big hit. The Ramayan imagery comes in another popular song, 'raayinaaina kaakapothini'. Susheela was in peak form those days and she gives great expression to Mahadevan's tune.



It is not that Bapu did not take up the other myth, Mahabaratha. It is just that he was more inspired by Ramayana with Sita's plight touched him deeply. He did make movies based on Mahabaratha, the most famous of which was 'Manavoori Pandavulu', which was a milestone movie for people like Krishnam Raju and the man who would be a future superstar, Chiranjeevi. Here is K V Mahadevan's folk inspired song from that movie. Lyrics by Arudra.



The movie 'Rajadhi Raju' was a departure of sorts with Bapu using a Christian setting and the fight between God and Devil being the central theme of this movie. It was a biting satire and made Nutan Prasad a famous man. Here is a song in which the devil attracts the common man towards himself. SPB is given full freedom to practice his mimicry skills.



Bapu later did some films in Hindi, some were hits and some were duds. He was also involved in some remakes. Of his later day films 'Pelli Pustakam' and 'Mr.Pellam', both light comedies involving Rajendra Prasad were well received. Both dealt with marriage and the attended challenges.

It is befitting that the last movie of the man inspired by Ramayana and especially Sita, should be the Uttara Kanda episode of the Ramayana. Bapu knew that Sita's plight did not end with Rama's coronation. It went even beyond and bad luck pursued her till the end giving her no respite. This is the situation of many women in India and Bapu understood it well. His death is not only a loss of the movie industry but also a loss to a lot of women whose plight he understood and conveyed so effectively on the silver screen. Let me close this article with a couple of songs from 'SreeRamaRajyam'.

In the music release function of this movie, Illayaraja, the music director, said that he generally gave the tune first to which lyrics were written. In the case of this movie, he was first given lyrics for all the songs. He did not object to it since it was a Bapu Ramana film and he had great respect for them.

Here is a song celebrating Seetha's seemantham. Lyrics by Jonnavidhula.



Here is another superb song from the movie, 'Jagadanandha Karaka' in the voices of SPB and Shreya Ghoshal



May the soul of Bapu, who gave us some great films and music, rest in peace.