When art becomes business, it loses its soul: Raghubir Yadav

Veteran actor Raghubir Yadav believes best lessons in life are learnt in scarcity, which is why art created in luxurious isolation lacks soul.

The actor, who currently stars plays the role of a village head in Amazon Prime Video's critically lauded show "Panchayat", said he learnt everything about acting from his Parsi theatre days.

"People have made a business out of our culture and artistes have isolated themselves. Earlier, one had to go through a lot of pain to learn something, that's why it had soul. But now it has become only about physicality. When art becomes business, it loses its soul," Yadav told PTI in an interview.

Recalling his days of struggle, the 62-year-old actor said he made little money, but received some of the best life lessons. "When I was doing Parsi theatre, I would get Rs 2.50 per day and there were days when it was only 50 paisa. For six years, I lived like a nomad with that theatre company. It taught me everything about art, culture and music. Our industry is all about business and unless and until one learns these things they can't do good work."

Yadav said there were days when he went to bed hungry, but the thrill of learning new things everyday kept him going. "The best lessons in life are learned in scarcity. If I would have been living in the luxury of big houses, I would have never gained the knowledge. The thrill of learning gave me another kind of high."

Reminiscing his time in Parsi theatre, Yadav said he wanted to continue living the gypsy life as it taught him about the culture, music and art of real India, that resides in rural areas. "I was in the heartland of our country. I was close to the real life. People from Parsi theatre only considered Balraj Sahani and Motilal as great actors. Otherwise they never gave any importance to film actors.

"There was this legendary actor in my theatre company Moti baba, he died at 108 and when he used to come on stage it was magical. I’ve never seen anybody act like him. He was the one who taught me the importance of learning a language," he added.

After spending six-years on the road, Yadav moved to Lucknow and eventually landed in National School of Drama, Delhi. His first film was 1985’s “Massey Sahib” and for his performance in the movie he received many prestigious awards including the best actor recognition at the Venice Film Festival as well as FIPRESCI Critic’s Award.

He followed it up with memorable TV show “Mungerilala Ke Haseen Sapne” and "Mullah Nasruddin”. The actor said he has become selective about his roles as he feels "quality of cinema is deteriorating". “That’s why I’ve done very few films in my career. I’ve managed to save myself from running after business or money. I’ve always enjoyed theatre more because the characters there are more real,” he said.

Yadav, however, is hopeful that artistes will come back to their roots one day and many people in the new generation have already started walking on that path, like the writer and director of his latest web-series “Panchayat”. “Panchayat”, which started streaming from April 3, is written by Chandan Kumar and directed by Deepak Kumar Mishra. Yadav said he loved the way the series captures the essence of rural India without making it look caricaturish.

“I really liked the script of ‘Panchayat’ because the language of the show, the characters, the story are all very real. I know the villages really well. I know how a panchayat functions because I’m from a village. The script has captured the real essence of a village beautifully.” The actor said while most of the people in the industry are unable to get hold of the musicality of the village dialect, the writer and director of “Panchayat” have successfully captured that on screen.

“The tone in which people in villages speak is very musical and there are only few writers who can capture that. In most of the films, if they want to show a village they make actors speak Bhojpuri. They don’t understand that in our country every village has a different dialect. There is Awadhi, Bundelkhandi and others. “The beauty of every dialect is different. And rather than capturing that, people mostly make it look gimmicky. ‘Panchayat’ doesn’t do that.”

The series focuses on the journey of an engineering graduate Abhishek, who for the lack of a better job, joins as secretary of a Panchayat office in a remote village of Uttar Pradesh. It also features Neena Gupta and Jitendra Kumar in prominent roles.

READ: Coronavirus LIVE Updates: India's Confirmed Cases Cross 4000-mark; 109 Deaths Confirmed