BYE BYE, MUMBAI: (Above) Bhojpuri singer-actor Manoj Tiwari; (top) Ravi Kissen, centre, and other stars of the Bhojpuri film Hum Bahubali during a promotion in Patna recently

After remaining comatose through the entire day, Manoj Tiwari’s cellphone finally kicks back to life around 10.30 pm. “I am so sorry I couldn’t take your call,” the superstar of Bhojpuri cinema apologises after calling back in response to a voicemail alert. He sounds weary, but his voice is nonetheless laced with uncanny enthusiasm. “I’m now in Patna, and was meeting Nitishji and his ministers through the day. You must understand that for a few of us it’s been a very hectic week. But I have news to give you.”

After months of living in fear and apprehension, Tiwari and his ilk are seemingly a happy lot today. Overwhelmed by a feeling called home, these expatriates from the cowbelt region of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh who once left their hearths to chase celluloid dreams in tinseltown have suddenly found a reason to look east once again. Bollywood can seat itself pretty in Mumbai. The Bhojpuri show is travelling back to where it belongs.

At a time when thousands of hapless Biharis and UPites continue to invite the wrath of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) for foraging in Maratha territory, the Bhojpuri film industry — until now operative solely out of Mumbai — has taken the long-pending decision of shifting base to its homeland. “We aren’t totally safe in Mumbai,” reasons Tiwari, the man who rakes in millions of rupees from the cowbelt with his super-hit productions.

“Despite police promises and intervention by the Centre, insecurity haunts us through every living day, and few of us can do good work under such pressure. Shifting base could give us a reason to put our heads and hearts back into cinema once again,” he says.

Earlier this year, Tiwari’s office in suburban Versova was ransacked by a party of Raj Thackeray loyals, who left behind a heap of shattered glass and woodwork. “The situation worsened to such an extent that we would travel around the city in cheap cars and leave our Mercedeses sitting in garages, simply to keep our prized possessions out of the MNS’s eyes,” laughs Tiwari.

Abhay Sinha, a much-respected producer and distributor in the Bhojpuri circuit, reports similar hassles. “Shoots for Bhojpuri films in and around the city were often ambushed by the MNS,” says Sinha. “Things once became so bad that we had to cancel the shooting of our film Khalnayak in Satara and relocate to Ahmedabad in Gujarat, in an attempt to save our sets and equipment from the MNS’s vandalism.”

Dharamveer, another of Sinha’s big-budget films, ran into similar trouble. When shooting resumed after some frantic damage control, the producer had already incurred a loss of Rs 5-6 lakh. “Tell me, are such losses really worth the effort and patience,” asks Sinha. Needless to say, most of his brethren think not.

That is why, after four years of smooth cruising, those at the helm of the Bhojpuri ship have decided to steer it on a different course. With an annual turnover pegged at nearly Rs 100 crore by experts, the industry grew steadily since 2002, with the real boost provided by the blockbuster Sasura Bada Paisawala in 2005, which blazed through box offices across Bihar and UP, running to packed houses and suggesting — for the first time — that Bhojpuri cinema had the potential to make it big.

In subsequent years, the industry became the jewel of many eyes, tempting even a bunch of Bollywood biggies — Saira Banu, Saroj Khan and Ekta Kapoor included — to dip their toes in its untested waters. Now sailing full tilt, the industry routinely churns out about 80 productions in a year, most of which are meant to cater to the hungry audience back home and elsewhere.

Yet, despite its snowballing size, Bhojpuri cinema — the only major regional cinema industry to be working out of camp offices in Mumbai — has so far had no native moorings. “The lack of infrastructure and technology back home was a problem, forcing us to work in Mumbai,” says Ravi Kissen, another big name in Bhojpuri cinema now made popular across the board thanks to his stint in the television reality show Bigg Boss.

This, says Kissen, cut both ways, since Bhojpuri cinema couldn’t draw on local resources because it was based in Mumbai, and many youngsters from Bihar and UP who wanted to find a footing in the industry couldn’t afford to make the great crossing to Mumbai. Either way, it cost the industry in terms of both fresh talent and exploring newer horizons.“But all this might finally change now,” says Kissen. “After screaming ourselves hoarse for years, we could finally open new channels of income back home, and provide opportunities to our future generations. Of course it can’t happen overnight, but the sooner it happens, the better.”

Things, says the Bhojpuri brigade, took a dramatic turn last week when the Bihar government passed a proposal in Cabinet for a new film city in Bihar and followed it up with discussions with industry insiders regarding the technical and logistical aspects of setting up a state-of-the-art film unit. “We’ve chosen a wonderful location near Rajgir, close to Patna,” says Tiwari. “With rolling hills and lakes, it boasts a landscape that could give Mumbai’s Goregaon Film City or Hyderabad’s Ramoji Film City a run for their money. Technologically, we’re going to be on a par with the best as well. In fact, after handling our own share of work, we could handle work outsourced from Mumbai, and effectively lessen the load on studios there,” he reasons ambitiously.

Further details, says Tiwari, are pending more meetings lined up through the coming days.

But a few are not so optimistic. “You might import technology, but you can’t import experienced hands,” argues veteran director Mohanji Prasad. “It will be a while before Bihar catches up with Mumbai in terms of manpower and facilities, and if production is left to the greenhorns it will show in the poor quality of our movies. As it is, Bhojpuri cinema isn’t aesthetically as good as Bollywood productions, and it stands the chance of suffering even further in terms of quality,” he warns.

However, such reservations are harboured by few. At the moment, everybody is caught up in the frenzy that homecoming is generally associated with. “And anyway, we aren’t moving lock, stock and barrel from Mumbai,” assures Sinha. “This is going to be a parallel development where we use Mumbai as our marketing and promotional base while getting the bulk of work done in Bihar. So when it comes to reaping cosmopolitan favours, we still have Mumbai to look up to.”

For now, though, it’s up to the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar to pull the last rabbit out of the hat —and bring succour to the thousands associated with the industry. Kissen has a poetic way of putting it. “Ek lawaaris industry ko finally sahara mil jayega (a rootless industry would finally find shelter),” he muses. You couldn’t be more Bhojpuri than that.