Film / Swades

"It's easy to live outside India and say that nothing's going to change".

Swades (English title: "We, the People") is a 2004 Bollywood film directed by Ashutosh Gowariker, starring Shah Rukh Khan and Gayatri Joshi. It tells the story of an Indian-born NASA scientist, Mohan Bhargava (Khan), who returns to India to reconnect with Kaveri Amma, the woman who brought him up. His search for her leads him to a remote village in Uttar Pradesh. There, he comes to experience how millions of Indians live and the issues they face.

Tropes

• The Ace: Mohan is a top scientist at NASA, and just good enough at science all around to help the villagers generate their own electricity. He is also a good wrestler.
• Career Versus Man: Gender-Inverted and discussed. Mohan's friend and colleague at NASA calls him out for wanting to quit his job and return to India, all because of his love for Geeta. Mohan replies that it's not just about Geeta or Kaveri Amma. It's also about India, and the fact that he can do a lot more to help people there personally than he can as a NASA scientist.
• Childhood Friend Romance: Downplayed. Mohan remembers that he and Geeta sometimes played together as children, but his main memory of her is that she used to be snotty-nosed.
• Cool Car: Mohan hires a high-end, fully equipped caravan to travel to the village, as he is not sure about the facilities he will get in rural India. The villagers have not seen anything like it, and a lot of them pay Mohan a visit just to check out the caravan.
• Deceased Parents Are the Best: Mohan's parents died in a car crash when he was 17, and he still misses them. Geeta's parents were conscientious reformers, and they, too, are dead before the events of the film.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: Geeta is initially hostile towards Mohan because she is afraid he will take Kaveri Amma away to America and has prejudices against Non-Resident Indians like him. Overtime, she comes to appreciate his humanity and his genuine efforts to improve living conditions in the village, and starts reciprocating his feelings.
• Driving Song: Yuhi Chala Chal Rahi is a famous song In-Universe, which Mohan and his passenger sing along to when driving to the village [1].
• Embarrassing Nickname: “Gitli” for Geeta.
• Elemental Motifs:
  • Water: Mohan's drinking only bottled water represents his "outsider" status early on in the film. His decision to buy and drink un-bottled water at a train station signals his beginning to "reconnect" with India. The last scene shows Mohan and Geeta dipping their feet in a stream, symbolising that he is now wholly immersed in his Indian identity.
  • Earth: Geeta's parting gift to Mohan is a box which has (among other things) a fistful of earth to remind him of his roots in India. Upon returning to India for good, Mohan is shown smearing his body with earth before participating in a wrestling match with the villagers.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The old headmaster at Geeta’s school complains about the poor electricity and says they might as well hang a bulb over his grave. He dies the same night that the villagers (led by Mohan) generate their own electricity.
  • Kaveri Amma’s prediction that it is “natural for ice to melt in water” (referring to Mohan becoming integrated among his fellow Indians) comes true at the end.
• Geeky Turn-On: You know you are a geek when you are attracted to someone because they (a) tell someone off for walking over books and (b) are great at mental maths.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Geeta respects Mohan's decision to return to America, and Mohan respects Geeta's decision to remain in the village - despite both being heartbroken over having to part ways.
• Kiss-Kiss-Slap: Mohan pulls Geeta into an awkward embrace in an empty classroom. They hear footsteps outside and Geeta, panicking, smacks Mohan on the forehead with the blackboard duster to make him let her go.
• Meaningful Echo: Mohan overhears Geeta telling her prospective in-laws that “A woman’s hands don't exist simply to be dyed with henna”. He then re-uses this quote when trying to convince the villagers to send their daughters to school.
• No Antagonist: Unusually for a Bollywood film, there is no "villain". There are a couple of grouchy village elders who don't approve of Mohan trying to break down caste barriers, but no one goes out of their way to obstruct him. A subtle irony is that Mohan's "Brahmin" status undoubtedly helps; had he been from a lower caste, he would have faced a lot more opposition.
• Noble Bigot: Most villagers have prejudices against different groups in the village: Brahmins look down on the lower castes, the lower castes don’t trust the Brahmins, and everyone ostracises people who change their occupation. Despite this, the villagers are not bad people; they are just blinkered.
• Non-Idle Rich: Geeta's parents owned a lot of land in and around the village, and the rent is enough for Geeta and her brother to live comfortably in a large house. Despite this, Geeta works as a teacher because she wants to improve life in the village.
• Parental Substitute: Despite having been hired as a domestic help, Kaveri Amma has been like a mother to Mohan and afterwards to Geeta and her little brother Chikku.
• Science Hero: The villagers' electricity problems are solved through Mohan helping them generate electricity locally.
• Shipper on Deck: Kaveri Amma unabashedly ships Mohan with Geeta.
• Show Within a Show: The villagers put together a musical depicting scenes from the Ramayana, with Geeta and the postmaster playing the roles of Seeta and Ravana respectively.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Some of the most iconic moments in the movie come from characters who only appear for that scene:
  • The hermit in Yuhi Chala Chal Rahi resets Mohan on the right path (literally and spiritually).
  • Haridas, the ostracised farmer, opens Mohan's eyes to the unimaginable poverty in which many Indians live.
  • A little boy sells water to Mohan at the train station, resulting in Mohan drinking un-bottled water for the first time since coming to India.
  • A partially-blind grandma sees an electric bulb light up for the first time when the villagers generate electricity.
• Spirited Young Lady: Geeta is not afraid to speak out for her causes and beliefs. This is particularly apparent when she advocates the need for a bigger school in the village and rebukes her would-be in-laws for expecting her to quit working after marrying their son.
• Tender Tears: Unsurprisingly for a character played by SRK, Mohan wells up quite frequently. The most notable example is when he buys a drink of water for 25 paise from a boy at a train station, and then starts crying quietly as the boy's dire poverty starts to sink in.
• Very Loosely Based on a True Story: Swades is inspired by the story of an NRI couple who helped a village generate its own electricity [2].
• What the Hell, Hero?: Mohan gets a few from Geeta in the course of the movie, mainly around his cynical attitude towards India and the fact that he didn't stay in touch with Kaveri Amma after his parents died.