Ghulami

Plot

The film focuses on the caste and feudal system in Rajasthan. Ranjit Singh is the son of a peasant living in a village which is dominated by a rich landlord family. As a teenager studying in the village school, Ranjit is rebellious and defiant. He is bullied by the two sons of the landlord, who are of his own age. Two girls who also study in the same school are sympathetic to Ranjit. These are the daughter of the school-master and the daughter of the rich landlord (sister of the bullies). Sick of the exp;itation he sees around him, Ranjit runs away to the city.

Several years later, Ranjit's father dies and a telegram summons Ranjit back to the village to perform the last rites. Ranjit returns, to find that nothing has changed in the village. He is also told that his father had taken loans from the landlord to pay for his medicines and healthcare, and that Ranjit now is required to repay those loans, or forfeit his lands and house, which was the collateral for the loan. Ranjit feels that this is a great injustice. His logic of reasoning is that the peasants have been tilling the land and working hard for many generations, that the landlord only owns the land and does no work, and therefore if the landlord has lent money to a peasant, the loan does not need to be paid back. A long and emotional monologue delineates this logic for the benefit of the viewers.

The circumstances clearly call for class war and revolution, which Ranjit duly proceeds to ignite. He begins by storming into the landlord's living room, accusing him and his ancestors of being blood-suckers, and challenging him to take possession of the mortgaged land if he dares. The landlord's daughter (Smita Patil), who listens from behind a door, is deeply impressed by the scene created by her old schoolmate. Ranjit then retires to his house to perform his father's funeral, and bonds with his other friend, the school-master's daughter (Reena Roy). The stage is set for a love triangle and for a revolutionary vendetta.

The love-triangle is however solved very quickly. The landlord's sons (Bharat Kapoor and Mazhar Khan) make an attempt to rape Reena Roy, the school-master's daughter. She is rescued by Ranjit, who then marries her because she clearly needs a protector, and her father is too old to defend her adequately. The disappointed Smita Patil then agrees to marry the police officer chosen by her father, the landlord. She however carried her unrequited love in her heart, and her husband soon discovers that she had been in love with this other man. He is incensed and joins hands with his two evil brothers-in-law in their bid to finish Ranjit. By this time, after a random gunfight or two, once over the fact that the landlord's men were collecting their share of the harvest from the village peasants, Ranjit had become a fugitive from the law. Therefore, it is possible for the police office to go after him, beat him up in jail, and so on.

The rest of the movie comprises general bloodletting and defies description. Ranjit is supported in his vendetta by Mithun Chakraborty, a villager who has returned home after serving in the army, and by (Kulbhushan Kharbanda), the village policeman, whose son had been murdered by the landlord's henchmen for daring to ride a horse on his wedding-day. The film ends with the slaughter of most of the protagonists on both sides. The violent climax underscores the harsh reality that the rebels always die, the cruel and unjust system does not.

Cast

Soundtrack

The music composed by Laxmikant–Pyarelal.

All lyrics written by Gulzar; all music composed by Laxmikant–Pyarelal.