The lawns of Swaveda School situated on laksar Road are having a different scene these days from the usual tiny tots playing their games. Action, camera, lights are the words echoing with a moving camera taking shots of a seer clad in saffron robes who is seen narrating a story to a band of his attentive disciples. A movie on Saint Ravidas is in the making which has many local artists playing while the crew is from Mumbai.
In the makeup room is visible a man whose beard and moustaches are being fixed by the makeup artists to make his face look like the 15th century seer – Ravidas. The man who plays Ravidas in the film Sandeeep Mohan has acted in tele serials based on mythologies.
The film on saint Ravidas is being produced by Swami Sharad Puri of Juna Akhada Haridwar who has taken an extra care to get things approved by the saint fraternity to help the film steer clear of any controversy taking lessons from the fierce controversy created by Sanjay leela Bhansali’s Rani Padmavati.
Speaking to The Pioneer, Sandeep Mohan said, “Eighty percent of the scenes in this movie are being shot in Haridwar covering Bhagirathi ghat and Raja ghat while a few are shot in Benares.
We intend to finish shooting in Haridwar by the first week of December after which we would move to some hill areas of Uttarakhand. Ravidas known to have great reverence for Ganga, the movie is aptly titled ‘Ganga bhakt Ravidas’.”
Mohan shot to fame from Ramanand Sagar’s teleserial Shri Krishna in which he played the role of Arjuna. Earlier, he enacted the roles of Ved Vyas and King Janaka in Upanishad Ganga, a famous Indian television drama series based on the message of the Upanishads directed by Chandraprakash Dwivedi and produced by Chinmaya Mission.
He has played almost every Indian mythological character, be it Brahma, Vishnu, Mahesh besides different incarnations of lord Krishna. He has played some negative roles too. Currently he is doing the supporting role in Siya ke Ram in Star Plus.
He has appeared in some films too such as Wrinkle-free, Hola Venky and X: Past Is Present while he made his debut in the realm of movies with the movie titled love.
Speaking of the challenges his role of Ravidas presents, Sandeep says, “Ravidas is a historical figure. It is always a challenge to play such roles as a lot of people deify them and it turns a testing moment for the actor to things intact.”
Swami Sharad Puri says, “The movie spanning 2 hours and 15 minutes has four songs. It is likely to be released on January 31 next to mark the saint’s birth anniversary. We made it a point to get things approved by the saints of the akhadas prior to shooting.”
Notably, Ravidas was a north Indian mystic, poet and saint of the Bhakti Movement that thrived during the 15th and the 16th century CE.
He is venerated as a Guru across large areas of the land now in Punjab, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.
His devotional songs impacted the Bhakti Movement deeply which were included in Guru Granth Sahib and Panch Vani text of the Dadupanthi.