Historical Accuracy
Many of the events portrayed in the movie are based on real events. Certain Rajput groups claimed Jodhaa was married to Akbar's son, Jahangir, not Akbar. They also demanded a public apology from Ashutosh Gowariker. The film was not released in 30 cinema theatres in Rajasthan.
Several historians claim that Akbar's Rajput wife was never known as "Jodha Bai" during the Mughal period. According to Professor Shirin Moosvi, a historian of Aligarh Muslim University, neither the Akbarnama (a biography of Akbar commissioned by Akbar himself), nor any historical text from the period refer to her as Jodha Bai. Moosvi notes that the name "Jodha Bai" was first used to refer to Akbar's wife in the 18th and 19th centuries in historical writings. In Tuzk-e-Jahangiri, she is referred as Mariam Zamani.
According to historian Imtiaz Ahmad, the director of the Khuda Baksh Oriental Public Library in Patna, the name "Jodha" was used for Akbar's wife for the first time by Lieutenant-Colonel James Tod, in his book Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan. According to Ahmad, Tod was not a professional historian. N. R. Farooqi claims that Jodha Bai was not the name of Akbar's Rajput queen; it was the name of Jahangir's Rajput wife.
Ashutosh Gowarikar's reaction was,
| “ | While making the film I did my best to go by the book. I consulted the best historians and went through the most rigorous research. And there are different names used for Akbar's wife, Jodhaa being one of them. In fact, there's a disclaimer about the Rajput queen's name at the beginning of the film. But to see that, the protesters have to see the film. | ” |
Read more about this topic: Jodhaa Akbar
Famous quotes containing the words historical and/or accuracy:
“Among the virtues and vices that make up the British character, we have one vice, at least, that Americans ought to view with sympathy. For they appear to be the only people who share it with us. I mean our worship of the antique. I do not refer to beauty or even historical association. I refer to age, to a quantity of years.”
—William Golding (b. 1911)
“Such is the never-failing beauty and accuracy of language, the most perfect art in the world; the chisel of a thousand years retouches it.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)