Manini (1961)

Mane’s urban melodrama with stagey realist overtones, although formally very different from the Tamasha hit Sangtye Aika (1959) made by the same crew, almost matched its success. Heroine Malati (Gadkar) marries poor hero Madhav and is disowned by her wealthy aristocratic family. Her father Annasaheb tries to force her to abandon her husband. When she refuses, reprisals ensue: she and her husband are accused of theft and publicly humiliated at her younger sister’s wedding. Malati eventually breaks away from her oppressive feudal family (until then portrayed as the guardians of traditional virtue in Marathi film). The film includes hit numbers like Are sansar sansar (saying you must first burn your fingers on the stove before you get bread to eat). Gadkar’s performance as a demure, exemplary daughter-in-law helps the film to relocate a neo-traditional value system into the emerging urban middle class. A. Vincent remade the film in Malayalam as Abhijathyam (1971), and Krishnakant in Gujarati (Maa Dikri, 1977).