Calling Sehmat by Harinder Sikka

Calling Sehmat

Author: Harinder Sikka

Genre: Historical Fiction

Date: 06 August 2021

Rating: 2 stars

Review: When a book is adapted into a film there is always a risk that it won’t live up to how good the former was. No one can get the characters, the storyline and in some cases the pacing of the story the same way that you imagined it while reading the book. At the end of the day, you’re left disappointed.

Going into Calling Sehmat I knew this was the opposite risk I was running. I watched Raazi the year it was released and surprisingly fell in love with the aesthetic of the film. (I am not saying that pre-Uri Vicky Kaushal had something to do with this but that won’t be a wrong assumption.) War or spy movies, especially in this time when Bollywood is churning out propaganda films like nobody’s business, is not my thing. But a small film directed by Meghna Gulzaar, starring a fresh cast, really surprised me.

So when I realised that the movie was based on a book, which in turn was based on a true story, I knew that I wanted to read it. If only to compare the two. As is evident with my spending habits, buying books and reading them are two very different hobbies. Calling Sehmat by Harinder Sikka had been lying on my shelves for almost two months when I finally decided to pick it up. If I knew how much I was going to regret reading it I wouldn’t have.

Calling Sehmat follows a young college-going girl who is thrust into the world of espionage and is married to the son of Pakistani Brigadier in the months leading up to the 1971 war. She goes above and beyond her job requirements motivated by her love for her country and the promise she made to her recently deceased father. It is the story of how she puts her own life at risk and deals with her own guilt as she takes unimaginably hard steps in order to send information back to India that altered the course of the war.

I am not criticising the story of the book in any way. It tells a very important story of certain people who have been integral to the freedom and victory of our country without ever stepping into the limelight. Raazi followed the story pretty closely in terms of plot points. The things the movie left out were my least favourite things about the book. But once again, I do not have the right to criticise the story itself.

My main problem with the book was to do with the writing itself. For a book that tells such a dramatic story with the potential to be heartbreaking and thrilling, the writing is dry. The entire experience was like reading an essay of fact. ‘Show, don’t tell’ is a cardinal rule for fiction writers and something that I did not see implemented in the book at all.

The characters too are either black or white. Sehmat and her father are good. They have no flaws. Nor do they have any doubts or regrets. Especially Sehmat is almost soldier-like, which goes completely against the fact that she is a young girl surprisingly thrust into this world. At no point in the book was there any nuance to her character. While the people on the other side of the border are not only evil but are also incompetent, depending on Sehmat for everything. Once again there is no grey area. 

I think this would have been a much better book if it was not written as a fictional book. As a creative non-fiction novel, the writing would have made much more sense. What Raazi did with the book was take the skeleton of the story and give it life and character. The dichotomy between Sehmat’s love for her country and her guilt for doing the things she does to a family she has come to love is that much more touching. When she sobs that she wants to go home, the audience feels her pain. When Iqbal realises the truth about her identity you can see the character fighting between his love for his wife and his duty to his country. It is details like these that make the story engaging and memorable. For me, the book fell flat when it came to making the characters human and if not relatable at least understandable. I am not going to lie I skipped the last few chapters of the book because it just got too wordy and felt like he kept dragging the story. 

All in all, the story was good enough to make a great book but the execution fell short. But on the plus side, I now get to watch Vicky Kaushal being all cute once again because this calls for a Raazi rewatch.