Geeli Puchhi: A Discourse on Multiple Realities of Exclusion

Geeli Puchhi, a short film from the Netflix anthology Ajeeb Dastaan revolves around the intersection of caste, sexuality and power dynamics that play on privilege. It also creates characters that do not exist in the polarities of good & evil, the women in the film are not larger than life aspirational heroines, nor are they wicked villains, and this is one of the myriad ways in which it breaks through the conventions in cinema.

Bharti Mondal is a Dalit Queer woman, who works a blue collar job in a factory as a machine operator, despite being qualified for the office job that is grabbed by Priya Sharma, a married Brahman woman who exercises and enjoys her privileges with naivety. 

It is apparent in the beginning of the movie that Bharti’s Dalit identiy is a major roadblock in achieving her desired desk job, while on the other hand, Priya who is underqualified gets the job by merely showing off her skills of palmistry - a skill she has learnt on the account of being born into a brahman family. This is where the vicious reality of merit vs caste based arguments come into play as caste triumphs over merit in case of Bharti and Priya.

In spite of her merit and diligence, Bharti needs to struggle to claim public space for herself. Apart from her Dalit identity, she is also striving towards exploring her sexuality. However, despite the privileges that Priya has due to her caste, there are certain burdens that come with it too. She cannot escape the mundaneness of her life, despite her job, her primary obligation is expected to be towards her husband, family, and procreation, and hence cannot fully realise her sexuality.

In their first introduction when Priya asked Bharti’s surname, she replied Bharti Banarjee instead of Mandol. The few seconds of pause before Bharti’s response succeeds in capturing the tremendous burden of anxiety of consequences, rejection, judgment, that marginalised people constantly battle with.

Bharti never explicitly comes out as queer to Priya, she does not need to spell it out. However, she comes out as a Dalit person to her, expecting Priya’s acceptance. Despite the queerness that binds them together, the caste establishes a certain distance between the two.

This goes on to prove that marginalisation doesn’t make a person automatically sensitive to other forms of marginalizations. Often queer spaces aren’t completely accepting of Dalit identities and often Dalit spaces aren’t completely accepting of queer identities.

Bharti tries to manage her romantic intimacy for Priya along with the envy and anger she feels towards her due to her casual caste blindness. Her feelings overlap as she recognises that Priya is not a direct cause for her marginalisation, but she sees Priya as the part of a system that perpetuates casteism. Ricocheting between anger, love, helplessness, revenge, vulnerability, Bharti is presented with utmost authenticity and makes morally conflicted choices.

Unlike mainstream cinema, Geeli Pucchi didn’t make a hero out of Bharti’s marginalisation. She is not placed on a high pedestal, who takes the morally superior approach. She is shown as a woman fighting casteist, hetero-patriarchal oppression by addressing her vulnerabilities and doing the best she can to claim the space she rightfully deserves.

Like Bharti, Priya too is a victim of hetero-patriarchy. Being the ‘Sharmaji ki Bahu’, she is expected to behave in a certain way, it is frowned upon for her to socialise with a dalit woman, she does not afford the freedom to explore her sexuality, giving birth to a child is made a priority for her and career takes a back seat, and these decisions are made by her husband and in laws.

By the end of the movie, we are left contemplating, is it possible to put Bharti and Priya into the boxes of good and evil? Is it possible to vilify either of them? Is it possible to definitely mark out what identity chains you, and what liberates you? 

However, the movie misses its mark a little by casting an upper-class cis-het actor who is dark skinned for a queer-Dalit role, and a fair skinned actor for the role of an upper caste woman. It also emphasizes on the ‘butch lesbian’ stereotype through the character of Bharti. It also constantly maintains that the Dalit protagonist deserves dignity because she is meritorious, as if her righteous claim to dignity would hold no ground if she were not meritorious. 

Despite some flaws, Geeli Puchhi was successful in delivering its message across. It is a lesson in intersectional film making, a movie which portrayed society without sugarcoating the several layers of marginalisation, and proved that in a complex societal setting where caste, sexuality, class, gender, come into play for subjugation, no act can be branded as morally right or wrong. Through Bharti and Priya, we see how oppression takes many forms, and the caste system works along with patriarchy to completely chain the victims.

- Smriti Choudhary