Shabana Azmi character Indu from Shekhar Kapur’s directorial debut Masoom (1983) is asked the eponymous question of his latest directorial, What’s Love Got To Do With It? she’d say, “A lot.” Shabana’s character in the latter, Aisha, is seen advocating arranged marriage, something another character of hers bore the brunt of, 40 years ago.
Aisha Khan doesn’t go all Seema Taparia on her kids, prohibiting them from stepping outside the realm of ‘assisted marriage.’ But she imposes the regular filters of matrimonial websites like same community, soft-spoken, and sanskari while picking her prospective daughter-in-law. She even disowns a daughter who flees with a Britisher. Shabana Azmi but this is Aisha, a member of the British Muslim diaspora, asserting her Pakistani roots on her susceptible children.
Indu was a different woman, in a different country and a different time. She had a happy, stable marriage with DK (Naseeruddin Shah) with two daughters in Delhi in 1983. When she learns of her husband’s affair that took place during her first pregnancy, she can’t wrap her head around it, even though it happened 10 years ago.
She snaps at Rahul, the nine-year-old, with full knowledge that he is masoom (innocent). She’s not Pooja from Mahesh Bhatt’s Arth (1982) who walks out on her husband Inder (Kulbhushan Kharbanda) after his affair with Kavita (Smita Patil). Indu in Masoom has two daughters and wants to make it work, and the hopeful eyes of Rahul make her relent and not abandon her home and family.
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