Made on a tenth of its budget, this mythological film faced off against Sholay’s tsunami; lead actor observed ‘vrat’ during filming

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As per a report by India Today, Jai Santoshi Maa was made on a modest budget of Rs 30 lakh (over the years, many have reported the budget to be anywhere from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 30 lakh), as opposed to Sholay’s massive budget of Rs 3 crore. The film was produced by a lesser-known producer named Satram Rohra, who had just made a few Sindhi films until then while makers of Sholay had delivered hits like Seeta Aur Geeta, Haathi Mere Saathi, Andaz, among others.

The ‘blessed’ stars

The star cast of the film included Bharat Bhushan who had tasted stardom in the 1950s with films like Baiju Bawra, Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Mirza Ghalib, but had fallen off Bollywood’s star wagon by the 1970s. The film also starred Anita Guha, who had appeared in smaller roles in films like Aradhana, Anuraag, Nagin; and Kanan Kaushal. The names on the poster of Sholay were enough to pull people in but that wasn’t the case with Jai Santoshi Maa, and many at the time believed that the film was blessed by the divine since it was actually competing with an A-list star vehicle.

Anita Guha, in a chat with Rediff in 2006, shared that when she started shooting for the film, she accidentally did not eat or drink anything through the day. When the day’s shoot went well, she decided to continue fasting until she finished the film. “I still remember the first day of shooting. I hadn’t eaten breakfast, assuming I would eat something after arriving at the sets. But, as the day went by, I was so busy that I completely forgot to eat. The director asked me to have a bite, but I couldn’t because I was in costume. I decided to eat after the shot. When we finished, I realised I had not eaten the entire day. From that point, every time I played the character, I would fast,” she shared.

Kanan Kaushal in a still from Jai Santoshi Maa.

Women audience who changed its fate

Unlike Sholay, Jai Santoshi Maa addressed a different crowd and experts at the time noted that a major chunk of this film’s audience was women. Even in 2025, it is largely accepted that men make up a bigger percentage of the cinema-going audience, which eventually influences the kind of films that are successful, and affects the kind of films that are green-lit by the studios. Back in 1975, the idea of women getting out of the house to catch the latest film was strictly restricted to tiny urban centers. But when Jai Santoshi Maa released, that culture saw a significant shift as believers of the goddess, mainly women, started attending the shows with their children.

Film analyst Dilip Thakur, in an earlier chat with The Times of India, shared that separate shows would be organised for women and children on Saturdays. It honestly sounds like a religious concert in a theatre, and women were inf or it. “Amid the craze of Sholay, the only film to stand its ground was Jai Santoshi Maa,” he said.

50 years later

While Jai Santoshi Maa had a good run at the time of its release, the film was eventually forgotten. 50 years later, as the world celebrates Sholay’s grand anniversary, Jai Santoshi Maa’s biggest claim to fame is that it was once ranked second to the most successful film that Indian cinema had ever seen.