Jaya: no silent rebel

Bachchan plays the part of an anguished mother who rediscovers her son Brati after his death in the Naxalite movement in Calcutta in the early ’70s.About her self-imposed exile from the big screen for 17 years, she said, “I was offered a few films before this one, but I didn’t identify with the characters and didn’t feel close and comfortable with them.”

But she insists that Sujata is not like her. “I don’t rebel silently. She is a person who doesn’t react physically, she shrinks in and covers herself,” she said.

Though she absorbed the finest details of her character’s background, both from Mahasweta Devi’s novel on which the film is based and from director Nihalani, she said she didn’t really prepare for the role.

“If you are doing a serious role and spend too much time over it, you tend to go overboard. It’s a great help to have a well-defined role like Sujata’s.”

Working with newcomers like Joy Sengupta and Nandita Das has been an enjoyable experience for her. “I was always curious about the new generation of actors and the minds of youngsters: the way they walk, talk and communicate. I experienced a lot of frustration in my youth. We were post-independent India’s neglected children. These youngsters are modern,” she said.

Defending her director for changing the end of the film, she said, “I liked the end because it was more positive. If it had ended like the book, it would have been a suspended end without a hint of hope,” she said. The book ends when Sujata dies of a burst appendix in a party. But in the film, she lives on to re-educate herself and becomes a human rights activist.