A cop with poet’s heart, remembers Sholay, the movie that turned the direction of Indian Movies

Suhaib Farooqui, a name that people that understand poetry know very well. The strange thing is the combination of profession and the hobby. Farooqui is a cop in Delhi police and is currently a senior inspector. He has an attractive number of followers on different platforms of social media. One of the hit poetries he has written became the police song during the covid time.
Recently, after the celebrations of Independence Day of the country, he gave and exclusive interview to Impressive times, in which he highlighted the 50 years of a movie that has been a heart throb of millions of Indians and can be termed as the time changer for the Bollywood movies.

Suhaib, starting the talk said, “We have just celebrated our Independence Day with great fervor and enthusiasm. Back in 1975, on this very day, Sholay was released, which itself is a record to memorise the importance of this day. A very dear friend of mine reminded me of its golden jubilee through his Facebook post, and that too brought back a flood of memories.”
Memories, as we all know carry us back to the time that this memory relates to. Suhaib Farooqui and the poet that resides in him gently lifted them from the windows of the past and arranged them with care upon the threshold of the present, taking heed of their delicacy.
He said, “this passionate love my generation shares with Sholay is something that touches the heart! I am certain, more or less, my brothers and sisters, you must feel the same. Fifty years of this masterpiece call for celebration, because this movie was not merely a film, but the heartbeat of Indian cinema, a shining milestone in its history.

Suhaib further added, “I still remember, in 1979, when we moved to Dehradun, even then the dialogues of Basanti, Gabbar, Jai, and Veeru were blazing across the boundary walls of the two biggest colleges of the city, i.e., D.B.S. and D.A.V., though it was already five years back when the movie was released. After Sholay, there is not a single movie that has witnessed similar madness of people.

Times have gone when the release of any new hit film would turn into a festival in itself. But when Sholay came on screen the things changed altogether. The same movie was released again after every six months or so and each time same madness was seen among the masses. Rows of rickshaws would parade through the lanes, loudspeakers blaring songs and dialogues recorded on cassettes:
— “Kitne Aadmi the…”
— “Tera kya hoga Kaaliya…”
Not only youth but children, men and women would gather at their windows and doorsteps. The entire atmosphere would come alive, festive, as though a wedding procession had arrived.

Even the posters of that era were a piece of art and not an easy job of digital prints that we witness now a day. Hand-painted canvases that breathed life: Gabbar’s terrifying presence, Jai and Veeru’s friendship, Basanti’s playfulness and everything rendered in vibrant strokes.

The cinema hall itself was another world. When Veeru taught Basanti to fire the gun, the moment she pulled the trigger the whole hall would erupt as Jai, in his calm but sarcastic tone, said—
“Lag gaya nishana…!”
And when Gabbar forced Basanti to dance “in front of these dogs,” the audience too, burning with anger, would shower their abuses on him like the torture is the real one in front of them. Watching Sholay was not just viewing a film—it was becoming a part of its story.

I still remember, at the age of six, watching Sholay for the first time with my father and the whole family at a single-screen theatre said Suhaib. Since then, across fifty-five years of my life, I have watched this classic countless times. Even now, its dialogues awaken in me that same old magic—heart racing, Goosebumps rising, breath stopping and surging again—a heady intoxication of ‘juvenile love’.

With the arrival of the VCR, playing Sholay became a sacred ritual—before or after any new film, the cassette of Sholay had to be played. And if some VCR-wallah didn’t have it, it was as though he had insulted the “holy scripture of film devotees.”

Media reports tell us that on the golden jubilee, the Heritage Foundation and Sippy Films Pvt. Ltd. have digitally restored Sholay in 4K, retaining its original soundtrack and visuals while reinstating the original climax, where Thakur finally ends Gabbar. This restored version premiered in June 2025 at the Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna to international acclaim. Next, it will be screened at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 6, 2025. And yet, we, the Indian admirers of Sholay, can only wait with yearning to watch this restored masterpiece in our own neighborhood theatres.

The dialogues of Sholay are etched forever on the tongue of our generation—

“Kitne Aadmi the.”
“Tera kya hoga Kaaliya.”
“Basanti, in kutto ke saamne mat nachna.”
“Yeh haath nahin, phansi ka phanda hai.”
“Hamāra naam Soorma Bhopali aise hi nahin hai.”
And that soul-piercing line—
“Bhai jaante ho, duniya ka sabse bada bojh kya hota hai? Baap ke kandhon par bete ka janaza.”

Truly, for our generation, Sholay is not merely a film but the very spirit of an era that was of laughter, tears, passion, friendship, sacrifice, and an immortal cinematic experience.

Never before, and never again—
Na bhootō, na bhaviṣhyati.
A truth that will forever echo in the heart of Indian cinema.

(The image has been imagined and suggested by #ChatGPT as per my vision.)