Do Aankhen Barah Haath Continues To Appeal People Even After 68 Years | Movie Review | Plot Analysis
Do Aankhen Barah Haath, based on the genre of reforming and rehabilitating hardened criminals by liberating them from jail with government approval, gave a tremendous boost to subsequent Hindi movies with social messages.
Based on the story of G. D. Madgulkar and directed by V. Shantaram, Do Aankhen Barah Haath, which literally means Two Eyes and 12 Hands, evoked global acclaim for dealing with humanistic psychology and portraying it in the right perspective.
Besides, the transformational leadership of Adinath, the film’s hero, was also acclaimed internationally.
No wonder the film won a Silver Bear at the 8th Berlin International Film Festival and a Golden Globe Award in the Samuel Goldwyn International Film Award category for the best film produced outside the USA.
In 1957, the film received the National Film Award of India in the category of Best Feature Film in Hindi.
The Indiatimes Movies described Do Aankhen Barah Haath as one of the Top 25 Must-See Bollywood Films in 2005.
Plot and Characters
The film’s title Do Aankhen Barah Haath denotes the Do Aankhen, or Two Eyes, of a young jail warden, Adinath, and the Barah Haath of six pairs of hands of six hardened criminals who took to a sober way of life. All of them were psychologically treated by Adinath, the pivotal role played by V. Shantaram, to convert them into reformed human beings even after being hardened criminals.
Adinath releases these six criminals on parole at tremendous personal risk and brings them to a farm in the countryside to rehabilitate them after reformation and help them survive with dignity by selling farm products.
Adinath’s Do Aankhen always watched them, while the Barah Haath of the six criminals worked hard on the farm to produce vegetables. The result of the hard work of the six criminals was a bumper production.
Music and Legacy
Released in 1957, this movie is particularly known for its songs. The music director of the film was Vasant Desai. An interesting fact about the soundtrack of Do Aankhen Barah Haath is that all its five songs continue to remain extremely popular even today.
People still love to listen to and hum the iconic songs like Aye Malik Tere Bande Hum and Main Gaun, Tu Chup Ho Ja by Lata Mangeshkar. The Lata Mangeshkar and Manna Dey duet Umad Ghumad Kar Aye Re Ghata is still hummed by Indians with nostalgia.
Besides Adinath, the other character that was particularly liked by the audience was that of the toy seller Champa, played by Sandhya.
Do Aankhen Barah Haath ends on a tragic note, as Adinath dies while trying to save the farm from an animal attack.
The importance of the film can be gauged from the fact that in 1975 there was a Tamil-language remake of it titled Pallandu Vazhga. It was followed by Maa Dvaivam, a Telugu-language film, in 1976.
In Conclusion
Do Aankhen Barah Haath’s plot is based on a real-life experiment of an open prison conducted in Maharashtra’s princely state of Swatantrapur. Located in the Satara district of the state, this open prison was the first experiment of its kind in India to reform prisoners.
