Does a person have no authority on his life? What if he has no wish to live further? What if he wants to die? Would his wish be granted? Or is there any chance or hope we could save him? But setting him free isn’t a wise choice? How long we can hold onto that person who doesn’t wants to stay? We can encourage that person to live, to live life happily but we can never enforce it upon him. We can make him happy but if he already is, if he lives his life with high spirits why would he try to end his life?
All these would look comprehensible when you watch the movie ‘Guzaarish.’ A film made by Sanjay Leela Bhansali picturizing the life of a quadriplegic- Ethan Mascarenhas (Played by Hrithik Roshan). A man who garnered name, fame and money lost all these in the wink of an eye but life doesn’t stops. People don’t stop breathing, eating, walking but what if the person can’t walk, can’t movie any part of his body except for his head. Yeah, that’s what his life had become, miserable, so much so that he needed to depend on a person to clean himself, to make him eat, to help him scratch his nose. How much humiliating it becomes when you can’t do the basic things of life, you can’t feel any essence of touch, breeze, water or pain as there’s nothing below your head such was Ethan’s condition but he survived and became the ray of hope for millions going through the same. He’s the one to actually prove when life gives you lemons make lemonade. Even after everything, he started a new journey, wrote a book and became a radio jockey and all these wouldn’t have been possible without the people who supported him during his long-run. His nurse Sophia (Aishwarya Rai) was one of them even after not getting a penny for her service she worked for the last twelve years for Ethan to get better and not lose hope in life. She was more than a nurse to him, a guide, a companion and an ally. He also had an amazing best friend and a friendly doctor.
Life becomes fulfilled when you have such beautiful souls around you but there comes a moment when your life doesn’t seem worthy anymore because there’s nothing more left. How long would you want others to keep their lives on hold and be there for you when you have nothing left to give them and ultimately you feel helpless. Something similar happened to Ethan and after fourteen years of battle he finally chose to die with dignity and free himself from the incomprehensible pain he’s suffering from. He’s decision might hurt his near and dear ones but he understood it’s good to die being happy rather than being alive but dead from inside. If he wanted to die simply he would have committed suicide but he didn’t want to become the wrong example and appealed for euthanasia through his lawyer best friend Devyani Dutta and as an understanding friend, she wanted peace for him hence she fought for him against all the odds. People discouraged and humiliated Ethan for his decision still he was stuck to his decision and finally gained the convenience of the whole nation that after fourteen years of a strong war with life it’s time that he deserves to be released from his pain with dignity.
A man who couldn’t see the outer world as it hurts him by seeing the other people running freely and exploring things, it hurts him that he couldn’t feel the waves of the sea touching his feet, it hurts him that he couldn’t do magic again which was his life. A question may arise in our mind, ‘Can faith in life be restored?’ But what if there’s faith but there’s no means to survive. How long you are going to live for others if you don’t have any hope for yourself? In that case we all would want freedom. Freedom from life, from the helpless faces you look at, which says “There’s no chance of you getting any better.” But to Ethan’s disappointment, his plea of mercy killing wasn’t granted to him. Then the question is who released him from his endless pain- Sophia, whom he married at last giving her the honour of becoming his wife who risked her own life to save Ethan from his merciless life. That’s love- Strong, courageous and beautiful.
Sanjay Leela Bhansali did a splendid job by making a film like ‘Guzaarish’ which covers such a sensitive subject, different from the usual moral “No matter however your life is, live it to the fullest.” At the end it’s your choice if there’s any motive left to live that life. It shows us the courage of Ethan to lead a life like that and coming into terms to end it when he knew there’s literally nothing left. It shows us the struggle of a friend to fight unwillingly for her another friend to end his painful life, it shows us the act of forgiveness that inspite of what your friend did to you, you give the secret of your magic to his son so that he can achieve his dreams.
Written by Sukanya Chanda