Don't make devis out of us | Music
Hindi films paint the tawaif as pitiable, but history shows she was more radical and spirited.
by Shreevatsa Nevatia
May 03, 2019
2 minutes
Set in 1945, Kalank (2019) uses pre-Partition India as its backdrop, when religion mattered more than national unity. In this film, it's a Muslim tawaif, Bahaar Begum (Madhuri Dixit), who first emerges as a secular hero, singing paeans to Rama and decorating her kotha with a Natraj statue. She is not hapless. She owns her scenes.
Madhuri had played a courtesan, Chandramukhi, in Devdas (2002), and in
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