Deciphering “Ahalya – The Short Film”

Long back I had posted three really good short films. However, I had not written in detail about them. I recently showed one of those three short stories, “Ahalya”, to my non-Indian friend and he liked the quirky film a lot. However, when I explained to him the mythological context behind it, he appreciated it much more! That’s when I felt that I should write about Ahalya again on this blog.

First, do watch it here if you haven’t done so already.

Now, the context of the story.

This is a twist on the mythology of the story of Ahalya. Indra, the king of the Gods used his powers to change his form into Ahalya’s husband and tricked Ahalya into sleeping with him. When Ahalya’s original husband came home later and found out that his wife had slept with another man disguised as him, he blamed Ahalya for being tricked and turned her into stone. The curse would be lifted only when someone who is truly righteous would touch her. Ahalya remained that way for hundreds of years until one day Lord Rama while wandering in the forest where Ahalya lived, touched the stone and Ahalya’s curse was lifted. Here Ahalya and her husband take revenge on those people who use their powers to abuse women and instead curse them to be turned into statues. It’s a shift from blaming the victim to bringing her to justice by cursing the victimiser.

It is based on Ahalya’s story in Brahma Puran, Indra the king of God, he mentioned in the Short film. Ahalya was sage Gautama’s wife, she was loyal to him. One day, Indra seduced her in disguise of her husband, Gautama and real husband found out next day, and he cursed her to become stone for eternity. There is continuation in Ramayana.. Ahalya story has been considered to reek of patriarchy of men. Victim blaming is norm even today.

The fun part is how they twisted the original myth. Instead of the tricked woman getting punished, it’s the perpetrator getting punished by turning into stone.