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In the Circus of Life, Hip Movements Are Prohibited: Zindagi Tamasha Is Free But Are We?

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

EssayPart of Issue #20: A Mobile Medium?

Last year, in August, on an unusually warm night, as I was hopping between apps on my phone, hunting for some good content treats to satiate my night owl appetite, a message popped up. ‘Zindagi Tamasha is free! It’s on YouTube!’—It read. Cut to—a few seconds later, I was on YouTube, speed-searching the film’s name. I found it, clicked on it and watched it. Fast forward: here I am, on a chilly Sunday morning, exploring the kinetics of Zindagi Tamasha and waiting for the sun to turn up with its creative warmth.

Dancing has been a consistent element of movement in South-Asian filmic works, especially where Indian and Pakistani cinema is concerned. But Zindagi Tamasha takes its application to a higher notch. It employs dance as a metaphor to expose the stifling regressive belly of Pakistani society, which takes pride in its headless codes of conduct and thrives in the lap of forced submission. This film rips open the oppressive gut of Muslim societies, where the psyche and physique of its inhabitants are first, invasively governed; second, assessed for deviation and third, gravely punished. It doesn’t take a moralistic stand or claim to have all the answers. Rather, it uses the act of dance as a hook that engines a series of events within the narrative and lets the audience determine for themselves—the heroes and villains, the right and the wrong, the black and the white, and of course, the grey(s) too.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

I. Reciting, Not Singing: Sadaf’s Lesson In Manners

A man named Muhammad Rahat Khwaja recites a Naat, a poem written in praise of Prophet Muhammad. He is well-dressed and his hands move up and down to match the inflections of the poem. He is a famous, respectable Naat-Khawan (one who recites Naat). But he is also a film lover. The word ‘but’ here is not merely a conjunction; rather, it pecks at the absurd assumption of people living in Muslim societies: a Naat-Khawan cannot be a film or music lover; it doesn’t fit into our limited imaginations. In our world, art qualifies as art only if it is religious. The rest is indecent, immoral and a deviation from the holy path. This is adamantly confirmed by Sadaf, Rahat Khwaja’s daughter. When her friend Amara applauds her father’s singing, she is quick to give her (and us) a lesson in manners by saying, “Mannerless! He doesn’t sing, he recites”. Sadaf’s stress on the usage of a good verb (i.e. recites) to escort a religious noun (i.e. the act of Naat Khawani) outlines how in Muslim spaces ‘bad un-Islamic words’ like singing are not even considered worthy of being mentioned in the same conversation as something religious. The vibration of our vocal chords is widely condemned but there’s a catch: if the words coming out of our mouths are in the praise of Allah, the Prophet or his family, we are free to move our lips, spill praise poems and create art. As a proud daughter of an esteemed Naat-Khawan, Sadaf couldn’t picture her father, whom she admired and considered her idol, singing and bringing shame to her and their family. Typically, in South-Asian households, the entire load of family honour is placed on women’s shoulders. However, Sarmad Khoosat’s Zindagi Tamasha highlights an overlooked aspect of these households: the familial expectations placed upon men. It shows how within our families, discriminatory beliefs against sexual and gender minorities do persist but when the situation demands—our family members are ready to remind the men of the family of their prescribed roles and approved actions too.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

II. Don’t Move Your Hips: Khwaja Sahab’s Shameful Dance

A wedding takes place. This is the film’s fertile soil bed, from which the seed of Khwaja Sahab’s character (of an honourable Naat Khawan) grows and ripens. In this setting, upon ‘crashingIn this scene, we can see that the Khusras are not invited to the wedding and they ‘crash’ it. But it is important to note that in Pakistan, Khusras mostly earn by ‘taking Wadhai (alms) or dancing/singing at the birth of sons and their weddings’ (Jami, 2005). In a society where the Khusras already have limited earning opportunities because of their identity, ‘crashing’ the wedding becomes less of a concern and more of a necessity for survival.’ the gathering, three people from the Khusra community sing and dance, receiving looks of disgust, disapproval and annoyance from others (including our well-mannered Sadaf). The term Khusra, in English, roughly translates to ‘eunuch’. However, employing such a myopic meaning would not aptly describe the composition of Pakistan’s Khusra community, which “besides transsexuals, also includes hermaphrodites, people with both male and female sexual organs” (Elena Becatoros, 2010). In this scene, we witness a duality in people’s attitudes—in the beginning, Khwaja Sahab’s words and voice are applauded when he recites a poem for the groom but when the Khusras start singing and dancing in front of them, the reactions of the crowd begin to turn sour. The air of appreciation changes into disgust. They are not shown an ounce of respect and are treated as if they are second-class by others. They are openly excluded by the religious followers of a myopic culture and are treated as inferior bodies, who are cursed, kicked and beaten—for they dare to breathe on the blessed land of an Islamic republic.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

Sitting with a group of men, Khwaja Sahab decides to put in his two cents by audaciously sharing his desire to slap the Khusras across their faces for their ‘vulgar’ dance. Closely after his statement, another man tells him that he should have taught them a step or two as he knew how to dance as well. Yes, Khwaja Sahab, when he was a boy, loved to dance in front of the mirror and his father used to beat him up for that—for being interested in such an unmanly activity. This conversation, between Khwaja Sahab and his male companions, shows how dance is seen, perceived and punished in Pakistani Muslim households. It brings our gaze to a place: a Muslim house, where quite frequently, a boy was beaten by his father for dancing and years later, the same boy, in his aged body, laughingly shares incidents of punishment as anecdotes with others. And now, all grown-up, he feels entitled enough to inflict a similar punishment on others who dare to dance. He has learnt, from his father, that an act of dance must never go unpunished. He believes that violence must be committed upon dancing bodies to preserve the sacred decorum of an ideal Muslim household.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

After learning about Khwaja Sahab’s past talent, the groom’s father urges him to dance on the jolly occasion of his son’s wedding, and after a performance of hesitation typical of South Asian families, he agrees to do so. A song is played for him but he asks to change it. He walks up to the middle and—

Zindagi Tamasha plays.

Gracefully rolling his shoulders to compliment the song’s intro, Khwaja Sahab takes his coat off, covers his chest with his hands, removes the shawl around his neck, and ties it around his waist—all in flawless sync with the music. His moving lips and hands coordinate with the female voice, and his hips start swaying with the song’s verses. The camera closely follows his movements—the on-beat tap of his fingers, the moment he opens the buttons of his kameez (a long shirt), the way he twirls with open arms—all signs of his unwavering synchronicity with every line of the song. The men, watching him, lose all of their amusement, and a distasteful shock coats their faces.

Zindagi Tamasha ends.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

The men expected Khwaja Sahab to groove a little like a man having fun but he and his dance crossed a line. A line which, with great precision, separates the dance of a man from the dance of a woman (and from the dance of the Khusras). In the original Punjabi song, ‘Zindagi Tamasha’ (1979), the setting and the mannerisms of the female dancer are tied up to seduce the male gaze and entertain its fantasies. The poignant lyrics by Khwaja Pervez Sahab and the crafty voice of Afshan have an emotional depth that conveys the melancholy surrounding the female dancer but—in terms of the pure physicality of the song, the dance is orchestrated to entice the bunch of men, gawking at the female dancer. Similarly, in his dance, Khwaja Sahab tries to imitate the dancer’s feminine gestures. He moves like a woman trying to seduce a man or a group of men. He manoeuvres his body to accentuate his hip thrusts, the sensuality of his heaving chest and his inviting facial expressions. Hence, the men sitting before Khwaja Sahab cannot digest this: an old Muslim man seductively dancing in front of other men. For them, this kind and form of dance is the height of obscenity.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

III. Majority to Minority: A Series Of Overnight Sins

Khwaja Sahab’s dance subverts the status he is anointed by others—of a Naat Khawan, of a Muslim man, of a good father, of a respected father-in-law—on its head. As the video of his effeminate dance (which was recorded without his consent) goes viral, his daughter watches it, his son-in-law watches it, and they show up at his house to make him watch it. There is no explicit exchange of words between Khwaja Sahab and his son-in-law or his daughter. At this moment, they do not even verbally communicate their displeasure to Khwaja Sahab, because for them, giving voice to their thoughts about his indecent dance would also have been a shameless, mannerless thing to do. And as this scene stretches out, the awkward, uncomfortable tension between Khwaja Sahab and his son-in-law Danish is almost palpable. Across the film, right after the dancing incident, whenever these two men share a frame, their unease with the whole situation is obvious. And yet, neither of them, willingly at least, tries to strike up a clear, direct conversation about the latter’s notorious dance.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

Sadaf, on the other hand, feels angry, humiliated and sickened. Early on, she doesn’t confront her father face-to-face and distances herself from him. She visits her ill mother, Farkhanda, but makes sure to leave the house before her father gets back from work. Later, when Khwaja Sahab stops by her house, she inquires about his viral dance and expresses herself to him out loud. Her character seethes with questions: ‘How could her father dance?’, ‘How could the man of the house sway his hips?’, ‘How could a reputable Naat Khawan even know of such eyebrow-raising bodily movements?’ Her sweet little bubble, where she had placed her father on a larger-than-life pedestal, bursts. He no longer fits into the mould of a perfect father. Perfect fathers don’t dance. Case dismissed.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

After Khwaja Sahab’s blood and flesh scorn him because of his ‘cheap’ dance, others are happy to follow. In the following scenes, Zindagi Tamasha takes us from Khwaja Sahab’s house to the narrow streets of a congested Muslim locality he lives in, and step by step, frame by frame, we witness his social exclusion. It displays how in packed, well-knit communities, the process of ostracisation does not take years to happen. People who are invited to weddings, religious celebrations or gatherings must like, follow and subscribe to a lifestyle, where a certain set of rules are followed by all members and one such rule is: never dance; dhumkas (hip-thrusts) are prohibited. But Khwaja Sahab, as a part of this Muslim clan, violated this rule. So his banishment is ordered. Marriage invitations stop coming to his house; people start abusing him; posters are pasted on the walls of his house and adjoining ones too, and just like that, he is thrown out of the clan. He becomes marginalised amongst his own people. The threat is clear: if you don’t follow the herd’s code of conduct, you will be thrown out, cornered and eaten alive by the surveilling pack of wolves. Be safe and don’t dance.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

IV. Day of Mawlid: Birth Of Allegations

The plot reaches its boiling point on the day of Mawlid, also known as Eid-e-Milad-Un-Nabi (the day on which Prophet Muhammad is reported to be born). Khwaja Sahab and his wife, Farkhanda, both start preparing for it. He buys naan (a type of leavened bread) and prepares halwa (a dessert) to give out to his neighbours. But as he knocks on their doors, some do not open, and others, after seeing his face, shut it close. All this while, a person, from the Khusra community, watches Khwaja Sahab and then proceeds to take the naan-halwa from his hands and distribute it to others. Ironically, everyone takes it. This scene marks the crucial distinction between Khwaja Sahab’s societal status—before and after his dance. Earlier in the film, during the wedding scene, the respect and treatment accorded to Khwaja Sahab are superior to the one of the Khusras. But now, after the eruption of his ‘lewd’ dance, he is stripped of all of his Muslim male privileges and deemed lesser than a Khusra.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

Religious gatherings and Naat recitation form an essential part of Milad celebrations and for a Naat Khawan, like our Khwaja Sahab, it is a special day, when he can showcase his recitation prowess and garner a stockpile of praises. He deposits surma (collyrium) on the waterline of his eyes; puts itar (perfume) behind his ears; wears his vest; places a topi (cap) on his head; picks up his Naat notebook, and leaves for the recitation event. Upon reaching, he is stopped and told that his entry is not permitted. He has been banned. Banning is in the love life of ultra-religious individuals, groups and states—they ban anything and everything that contradicts their pond-frog vision, thin-skinned beliefs and pea-sized sense of freedom.

Zindagi Tamasha (Circus of Life) (Sarmad Khoosat, 2019)

He exits the tent; walks through the celebration-spirited crowded roads and rests within the silence of his house. When his wife asks about the event, he lies to her; enters the bathroom; takes off his clothes; stands below the shower, and cries—for himself, his loss and his collapse. The blasphemous corporeality of Khwaja Sahab’s dance robs him of his principled reality. His character of an applauded Naat Khawan, an admirable father, a good Muslim man and a noble community member is rubbed into the dirt. This is apparent in a following market scene too, when Sadaf, while shopping, looks at the hanging Naat Khawan posters and sees her father’s face and name—all smeared in black. This deliberate erasure of Khwaja Sahab and his being signifies how the ‘deviant’ materiality of his dance seeped into his public and private life and resulted in his existence being burnt to ashes. His reputation came rolling down from the heights of social conformity and as the storyline welcomed an end, he was broomed away—by his beloved family and dutiful clan.

This film, as it still stands banned in Pakistan, paints our screens with the story of an ordinary Pakistani man, who is turned into a mere spectacle for mass consumption by one extraordinary dance. On one hand, he becomes an object of people’s disgust, anger and unease but on the other, his dancing body is viciously dissected (online and offline) for vile jokes, meme fodder and crooked collective amusement. Zindagi Tamasha drops light on the naked and hidden truth(s) of Pakistan, its tightly-knit communities, clogged lanes and rigid, abusive households. It neither exaggerates nor hesitates to scrape the surface and dig into the shameful parts of the realities of a Muslim society, where the fear of mob justice and honour hunts is frighteningly perpetual.