This essay will focus on act 5 scene 2 of William Shakespeare’s Othello, and the scenes corresponding to its Bollywood film adaptation Omkara, directed by Vishal Bhardwaj. Omkara as an adaptation deviates from the original play in its attempt to critique a culturally rooted conflict in modern India and the Indian diaspora: the victimization of women operating within a traditional patriarchal system, while simultaneously rebelling against it with the progressing cultural ideals in Indian society. Omkara effortlessly adapts the plot and the perspective to accentuate themes of honour and responsibility central to Indian culture and through this film, audiences are being asked to question and redefine these entrenched values that have long subjected Indian women to oppression and violence. Focusing on the final scene of the film, I will argue how Bhardwaj deviates in his portrayal of Emilia (as Indu) and Desdemona (as Dolly) to not only highlight their struggles in a misogynist society, but also empower them to resist and challenge those imposed and internalized restrictions. While both end tragically, Shakespeare’s original renders the two characters as utterly powerless and passive victims in 5.2 whereas Bhardwaj, in his rendition of the scene, empowers Dolly and Indu by granting them the agency to redefine, challenge, and in some capacity dismantle oppressive ideologies of honor and responsibility framing patriarchal institutions of marriage and family.

In Omkara, the institution of marriage is a focal point of struggle for Dolly, highlighted through her controversial marital status and route to getting married, which impacts the expectations, the ideologies, and the restrictions imposed on her – and how she continues to navigate and resist them throughout the film. In the final scene of the movie, one of the most significant deviations from Shakespeare’s original is Dolly’s marital status – she remains unmarried throughout the film until the last scene where she gets married and is murdered by Omkara on their wedding night. Unlike Desdemona who is bound by marital restrictions as Othello’s wife, Dolly is given the agency to leave her progressively abusive and belittling relationship with Omkara – but she does not. This contrast is particularly stark in the last scene of the film where Omkara offers to spare Dolly’s life with, “See… the deal is accept it, I’ll spare you your life” (Omkara 2:15:50 – 2:16:22) – demanding that she accept the infidelity accusations. Dolly however responds with, “Thanks for the offer but you are free to take my life” (Omkara 2:15:50 – 2:16:22), as she folds her hands in a cultural gesture of submission and pleading forgiveness without attempting to convey her truth. Comparatively in 5.2, Othello is merciless in his jealous convictions and Desdemona is never given the agency over her life even as she desperately protests her innocence in the following lines, “And have you mercy, too. I never did / Offend you in my life, never loved Cassio” (5.2.73-74), and pleads for her life even at the expense of her marriage, saying “O banish me, my lord, but kill me not!” (5.2.98). In posing this contrast where Desdemona begs to live but is not given the choice, compared to Dolly who has the agency to decide her fate but willingly surrenders her life, Bhardwaj raises questions of responsibility and the agency that Dolly really has in her relationship, re-centering her tragic fate in ideals of honour. While Desdemona’s death can be attributed to Othello, the silent complicity of the other male characters, and the societal collusion in and normalization of domestic violence at large (Vanita 348), solely attributing responsibility to Omkara or the society for Dolly’s death is seemingly more challenging with the pre-marital agency Bhardwaj gives her in the scene and the film overall – the key word being “seemingly,” however. Dolly is empowered in multiple ways throughout the film – she rebels against patriarchal cultural norms to elope on her arranged marriage day, she professes her love to Omkara, and she stands up to her father in her defense of a societally demonized intercaste love marriage and adamancy to “follow the tune of her heart” (Omkara 15:19 – 21:05). She further challenges cultural taboos by engaging in pre-marital sex with Omkara. Bhardwaj shows in the final scene, however, that the same decisions that grant her empowerment also lead to her disempowerment in the end with the pressures to uphold toxic ideals of wifely responsibilities and protect her honour. For instance, she becomes the victim of domestic violence as Omkara hits her in his rage over the lost kamarbandh (waistband) which she reflects on as, “This is not the same Omkara for whom I gave up home and hearth. My Omkara used to shield me in his palms like a precious petal,” to which Indu responds, “Men and women have always had a pan and ladle equation. Alone, they are miserable and together, they make one helluva racket” (Omkara 2:00:57 – 2:03:03). This scene shows Dolly’s recognition of Omkara’s uncharacteristically abusive behaviour and how she is being coerced to accept, normalize, and romanticize the violence under the guise of marital responsibility. The scene also demonstrates Dolly’s forced helplessness as her once empowering decision to marry Omkara now leaves her alienated from her home and family – and her decision to have pre-marital sex further renders her unable to return home as these decisions condemn her to a life of dishonour and possibly endanger her by making her vulnerable to the practice of honour killing. Her defeated and passive acceptance of her death in the final scene, then, is a product of the patriarchal condemnation of marital agency and is driven by her desperate need to protect her honour over her life.

In another deviation from Shakespeare’s original, Dolly foreshadows her death as she plans to commit suicide on her wedding night if she were to be arranged married by her father, telling Omkara, “Put me down in the list of those you have slain” (Omkara 19:03). This confession further highlights the tragic significance of the wedding night in the last scene as Dolly would have died either way: at the hands of her father, or at the hands of her husband. In his portrayal of Dolly’s character in the final scene, therefore, Bhardwaj highlights her struggle not only within a relationship and marriage that is externally oppressive, like Desdemona’s, but also through the internalization of those oppressive ideologies and narratives regarding responsibility and honour that – despite having the agency and the empowerment to act otherwise – subject her to the same tragic fate as Desdemona.

Although Indu is granted more expressive liberties in marriage compared to Dolly, her struggles are evident through the institution of a patriarchal family where, in a significant deviation from Shakespeare’s original, the main characters are related: Indu is Omkara’s sister and Langda is his brother-in-law. This set of relationships makes the betrayal and the tragedy in the final scene more profound for Indu as Indian culture highly reveres family loyalty and honour. The most marked deviation from Shakespeare’s original in the final scene, and arguably the entire film, is Indu avenging the death and deception of Dolly by killing her own husband, Langda, in a moment of silent, unflinching rage. In doing so, she rejects the husband who has belittled her and destroyed her family, and chooses to honour her alternate family ties and loyalty to Dolly that have empowered her – thus rebelling against the patriarchal structure of family to reimagine an alternative definition of family honour. Similar to Indu in her assertive personality and adamant in her defense of Desdemona’s fidelity, Emilia in 5.2 fearlessly condemns Othello for his actions and confronts his drawn sword in stating, “Do thy worst! / This deed of thine is no more worthy heaven / Than thou wast worthy her” (5.2.194-196). Emilia also refuses to remain silent in her revelations of truth despite the marital, societal, and religious repercussions she knows she will face as she states, “No, I will speak as liberal as the north. / Let heaven and men and devils, let them all, All, all, cry shame against me, yet I’ll speak” (5.2.261-263). In these lines, Emilia demonstrates an unwavering loyalty to and love for her mistress. However, unlike Indu, she is of lower social status and does not share a family dynamic with Othello or Desdemona which significantly undermines her power, her incentive, and her agency to enact revenge on Desdemona’s behalf. Emilia is ultimately victimized with limited agency to act in the interests of herself or her mistress as she completely relies on the other men in the scene to hold Iago and Othello accountable for their actions and to protect her – which they fail to do. Indu on the other hand, is portrayed by Bhardwaj in a well-respected, nurturing, elder sister role to both Dolly and Omkara, a role which gives her the familial access and the agency to voice her opinions to Omkara without fear of punishment, and to revenger herself against the man that has dishonoured the woman she considered family in her promise to Dolly, “I’m with you, I’ll take care of you, I’ll be your pa, ma, bro, sis” (Omkara 1:46:47 – 1:48:21).

In the final scene, Bhardwaj’s focused depiction of Indu’s face in the moments before she kills Langda is particularly remarkable as it mirrors the characteristic features and representations of Hindu goddesses as fierce protectors and vengeful deliverers of justice – in stark contrast to their otherwise nurturing avatars (Heidenberg 99). This parallel to Hindu deities in the scene is significant since earlier in the film, Indu fervently questions Omkara’s misogynistic objectification of women as property and his doubts about Dolly’s fidelity based solely on her father’s parting words, “May you never forget the two faced monster a woman can be! She who can dupe her own father, will never be anyone’s to claim” (Omkara 20:51). In her defense of Dolly, Indu states, “When the scriptures themselves have sullied women, who can blame mere mortals like you, brother, we renounce our homes and walk into your lives with bare empty hands, but even after the holy fires approve us, we’re regarded disloyal sooner than loyal” (Omkara 2:04:08 – 2:06:05). With this statement, Indu questions and challenges many of the traditionally oppressive, misogynistic, and repressive beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours towards Indian women that have been perpetuated through time – informed by or misconstruing centuries-old mythologies, religious practices and scriptures. The same scriptures, however, also serve as her motivation and strength to defend her family honour in the last scene. This aspect of the film signifies how religious beliefs can be a source of dogmatic restriction for women or they can be a source of enlightenment, empowerment, and reverence of the divine feminine. By protecting her family’s honour – a role traditionally reserved for male characters such as Othello in 5.2 – Indu dismantles the established patriarchal norms, and in doing so, questions Omkara’s suitability and worthiness in avenging Dolly’s honour when he himself is involved in sullying it which he confirms by letting Langda leave unharmed. In adapting her as a family member in the film, Bhardwaj grants Indu the agency to avenge Dolly that Emilia did not have to avenge Desdemona, as well as the ability to redefine honour as a source of empowerment rather than the oppressive patriarchal ideology that condemns Dolly to her death.

In his rendition of Othello as Omkara, Bhardwaj thus adapts the misogynist critiques and issues of Elizabethan society still largely prevalent in modern Indian culture, to highlight ideologies of honour and responsibility in the institutions of marriage and family central to Indian audiences. Through his differing portrayals of Dolly and Indu in the last scene of the film, Bhardwaj empowers both characters in their marriage and family respectively, while also foregrounding the obstacles that hinder their agency in a patriarchal society. With India being a country with one of the highest rates of gender-based violence in the world, Omkara is particularly significant in its critique of a conflict stemming from patriarchal resistance to shifting feminist cultural ideals which threaten the male ego, the oppressive ideologies, and the cultural beliefs deeply entrenched in the fabric of Indian society which force women to operate within a system that has oppressed them since time, while relentlessly fighting for their power and equality.

Works Cited

Heidenberg, Mike. “No Country for Young Women: Empowering Emilia in Vishal Bhardwaj’s Omkara.” Bollywood Shakespeares. Reproducing Shakespeare: New Studies in Adaptation and Appropriation. Edited by Craig Dionne and Parmita Kapadia, Palgrave Macmillan, 2014, pp. 87-105. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137375568_5.

Omkara. Directed by Vishal Bhardwaj. Eros Entertainment, 2006. YouTube, uploaded by YouTube Movies, 23 August 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4iy-EJ2fgI.

Vanita, Ruth. “‘Proper’ Men and ‘Fallen’ Women: The Unprotectedness of Wives in Othello.” Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900, vol. 34, no. 2, 1994, pp. 341–356.  JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/450905.