Nana Patekar has passed away at the age of 75. As tributes pour in, there is a curious Hyderabad story in his filmography that deserves to be remembered.
In 2005, Patekar came to Hyderabad to shoot Goutam Ghose’s Yatra. But for one part of the film, the production did something unusual: it recreated an old Hyderabad inside Ramoji Film City.
Contemporary reports described it simply and memorably as “Hyderabad created inside Hyderabad.”
A Hyderabad built inside Ramoji Film City
The sets were designed by art director Samir Chanda. A contemporary report from the shoot described an old Hyderabadi home recreated on the first floor of the set, complete with photographs, furniture and objects chosen to give the place a lived-in, nostalgic feel.
There were even musicians rehearsing an old Qader Pia composition nearby as the film was being shot.
Another report described the recreation of Mehendigali and the house of Lajwanti, the tawaif played by Rekha. The attention to period detail was part of Goutam Ghose’s attempt to move between memory, fiction and the Hyderabad of another era.
Nana Patekar was already on the set
When journalists visited the Yatra set in December 2005, Patekar had already spent time inside that recreated Hyderabad.
He was there alongside Rekha, who played Lajwanti, and the film’s other principal actors. Patekar told reporters that one of the reasons he accepted the film was Goutam Ghose. He respected the filmmaker and felt the role offered him something different.
It was, in fact, a quieter role for an actor better known for explosive performances. Patekar played Dashrath Joglekar, a writer whose present life becomes entangled with characters from a novel he is writing.
Even the title came from Nana
There is another small detail from the making of Yatra that has survived in contemporary reporting.
Ghose had been considering the title Safar. When Patekar read the script and was asked for his view, he suggested Yatra.
The title stayed.
Real Hyderabad and recreated Hyderabad
That is what makes the film’s Hyderabad connection particularly interesting.
Yatra was not simply a film that arrived in the city, used a few locations and left. The production worked with Hyderabad as both a real place and a remembered one. Parts of the film were shot in Hyderabad and the Telangana region, while Ramoji Film City provided the controlled environment in which an older Hyderabad could be reconstructed.
In other words, Patekar was working in two versions of the same city: the Hyderabad outside the studio and the Hyderabad built inside it.
A glimpse of Nana away from the usual image
Contemporary coverage of the shoot also offers a glimpse of Patekar away from the familiar image of the intense, short-tempered actor.
Speaking from the Hyderabad set, he talked about the need for an actor to understand a director’s vision rather than constantly impose his own. He described his Yatra character as understated and noted that, unlike many of his earlier roles, there were moments when the character simply had to be present and say very little.
It is an interesting detail to revisit now because Patekar’s reputation was built on the force of his voice and presence. Yatra asked him to find something in the spaces between the words.
Why this old Hyderabad story matters now
When an actor’s career is remembered, the focus usually falls on the famous films, famous dialogues and awards.
But cinema also leaves behind smaller memories: a set built for a few weeks, an actor sitting between takes, musicians rehearsing in a recreated house, an art director painstakingly assembling a city that no longer existed in quite the same form.
For Hyderabad, the story of Yatra is one of those memories.
In 2005, Nana Patekar came to Hyderabad to make a film about a journey. And inside Ramoji Film City, a piece of Hyderabad was built around him.
For a city whose history is constantly being rebuilt, remembered and reimagined, it is a fitting little chapter in Nana Patekar’s cinematic journey.
What was Yatra?
Yatra, directed by Goutam Ghose, starred Nana Patekar, Rekha and Deepti Naval. Patekar played novelist Dashrath Joglekar, while Rekha played Lajwanti, a character from his fiction whose story connects the film’s past and present.
Sources
- Rediff -“First look: Goutam Ghosh’s Yatra”, December 15, 2005
- The Times of India -“Such a long Yatra for Gautam Ghose”, November 23, 2005
- The Telegraph -“A journey, real and unreal”, November 27, 2005
- The Telegraph -“An actor volatile & versatile”, December 1, 2005
GAWAH has revisited this archival Hyderabad chapter following Nana Patekar’s death, using contemporary reports from the 2005 shoot.
