Shyam Benegal, a trailblazing auteur who successfully redefined the contours of non-commercial Hindi language cinema, is widely perceived as one of the most influential Indian filmmakers. And yet, his voluminous body of work remains relatively under-studied in contemporary film scholarship. To help fill this critical lacuna, ReFocus: The Films of Shyam Benegal undertakes a closer look at Benegal’s films and shows how the auteur, over the course of his forty-year career, used cinema as a potent medium to narrate the story of a nation in continuous transition. The book attempts to be as representative as possible in its scope by choosing to examine his ‘major’ as well as his ‘minor’ cinematic ventures. The thirteen essays in this volume explore how Benegal’s films articulate his concerns about caste, class, gender, religion, and other allied social, economic, and political problems characterizing the Indian subcontinent. They offer nuanced critiques of the way Benegal’s parallel cinema upholds the value of meaningful cinema as a means to create social awareness in the minds of the audience. This collection also includes a full-length interview with Shyam Benegal, which investigates his perspectives on the art of film-making and provides an analysis of his own films. This book will interest scholars and academics studying Indian cinema, Bollywood cinema, subaltern studies, media studies, gender politics, adaptation and postcolonial studies. Contents: List of Figures Notes on Contributors Acknowledgements Introduction Sneha Kar Chaudhuri and Ramit Samaddar 1 Ankur: Multiple Narratives of Protest Sarani Ghosal Mondal 2 Nishant and the New Dawn: Towards a Sacerdotal–Secular Modernity? Nikhila H 3 Churning Out Change: A Moment of Reading Manthan Ritu Sen Chaudhuri 4 Where Labour is Performed: The Public/Private Dichotomy and the Politics of Stigma in Bhumika and Mandi Suchitra Mathur 5 Adaptation and Epistemic Redress: The Indian Uprising in Junoon Ana Cristina Mendes 6 Cause and Kin: Knowledge and Nationhood in Kalyug Somak Mukherjee 7 The Ascent in Arohan Partha Pratim Sen and Arunima Ray (Chowdhury) 8 From Fidelity to Creativity: Benegal and Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda Sudha Shastri 9 Mammo and Projections of the Muslim Woman: Indian Parallel Cinema, Partition and Belonging Omar Ahmed 10 Adapting Gandhi/Kasturba in The Making of the Mahatma Vivek Sachdeva 11 In Search of Zubeidaa Ramit Samaddar 12 Subversive Heroism and the Politics of Biopic Adaptation in Bose: The Forgotten Hero Sneha Kar Chaudhuri 13 The Rural in the Glocal Intersection: Representation of Space in Welcome to Sajjanpur and Well Done Abba Aysha Iqbal Viswamohan and Sayanty Chatterjee 14 Shyam Benegal in Conversation Anuradha Dingwaney Needham Index About the Author: Sneha Kar Chaudhuri is Associate Professor of English at the West Bengal State University, Kolkata Ramit Samaddar is Assistant Professor of English at Jadavpur University, Kolkata