On the eve of Diwali, the Hindi film industry has released yet another movie on the Ramayana , three years after the film Adipurush based on the epic was panned for the use of street slang and depiction of Ravana played by Saif Ali Khan.

However, the latest retelling of the Ramayana, starring Ranbir Kapoor as Ram and Yash as Ravana, deviates from the allegedly divisive Bollywood tropes and narratives which have marked a slew of its historical and mythological movies in recent years.

It also breaks free from the shadow of contemporary politics – something that seems to have informed several recent iterations of history and mythology on big and small screens, which have been accused of trying to shape public opinion in partisan ways.

Ramayana: Rise of a Legend

This Ramayana, directed by Nitesh Tiwari, takes a few liberties with popular versions of the Hindu epic, but not in any predictable manner that the Hindi cinema has done over the past decade.…