Qala | Ending Explained

In this section of the Colossus Movie Guide for Qala, we will explain the film’s ending.

Cast

• Tripti Dimri as Qala Manjushree
• Swastika Mukherjee as Urmila Manjushree
• Babil Khan as Jagan Bantwal
• Amit Sial as Sumant Kumar
• Sameer Kochhar as Chandan Lal Sanyal
• Girija Oak as Sudha
• Swanand Kirkire as Mansoor Khan Sahab
• Tasveer Kamil as Naseeban Appa
• Varun Grover as Majrooh
• Abhishek Banerjee as Dr. Banerjee
• Anushka Sharma as Devika
• Written and directed by Anvita Dutt

The end of Qala explained

Recap

Unable to deal with the guilt of taking Jagan’s life, Qala tries to kill herself by swallowing a bunch of pills. This sends Qala into critical condition. The doctor calls her mother, Urmila, who travels to bring her daughter home. However, by the time she gets there, Qala has hung herself. As Urmila weeps with her daughter in her arms, a song sung by Qala plays.

After Qala’s funeral, we then return home with Urmila, who plays Qala’s record. There is then a montage of Qala working in the industry. Throughout these final scenes, these words are sung by Qala:

My mother asks,

Oh, my darling girl

What makes you wan so pale

What makes you wan so pale

Oh, Mother in the yonder forest

A peacock does sing

He has stole my dreams away

He has stolen my dreams away

My baby girl should we find a weapon

Should we hunt him down

And kill him now

And kill him now

Let’s not kill him Mother

Let us just silence him somehow

Let us trap him in a cage now

Let us trap him in a cage now

Meaning

Qala details how age-old oppressive views in one’s culture can weight mentally on succeeding generations. This larger story that affects thousands is embodied by the relationship between Qala and Urmila. Qala desperately desires her mother’s approval and attention, but Urmila rarely shows love or compassion. Urmila has always been bitter towards her daughter, who absorbed her twin brother’s nutrients in the womb, leading to his death. To cope, she takes on Jagan as her protege and disenfranchises Qala.

Urmila and Qala’s tumultuous relationship becomes reflective of today’s culture. Urmila is sad she never had a son, whom she would have raised to take the place of her late husband—a “musical maestro.” So when Qala makes it clear she isn’t destined for greatness like her father, Urmila changes out Qala for her son’s replacement, Jagan. Even though her son is gone, Urmila commits to the age-old approach of advancing her son’s profession while subjugating her daughter. Thus, she ignores her daughter’s greater ambitions.

Qala, however, does become famous. She is fed up with rampant sexist views in society. As a famous person, she seeks to use her position to help women advance and gain more presence in culture. But, ironically, she can’t seem to get past her mother’s inherent sexist views. Qala knows that her mother is bitter about her dead brother, so Qala constantly tries to gratify Urmila at any cost. Without the approval that Urmila meant for her son, Qala feels lost. Despite her ambition, and despite her resources to fight such conservative views, Qala becomes a slave to that culture.

That stress pushes Qala to the point of accidentally killing Jagan. She only meant to destroy his voice so she could take his place and win her mother’s approval, but Qala’s mercury eventually leads to Jagan’s death—that journey is depicted in the song being sung at the end of the movie. But there’s more to that story: because Jagan serves as a stand-in for her brother, Qala has now taken Urmila’s son twice. By “fighting” the system, she commits an unforgivable atrocity. Despite what greater good she could enact, she can’t escape the guilt. So in the end, Qala takes her own life.

Both Jagan’s and Qala’s death becomes symbols for their culture’s perpetual sexism. Change is slow, and thus becomes a grueling process for many young people. And when people are hurt, they hurt other people. Because of society’s rigid standards, Qala became mentally unwell. But feeling defeated from the cultural fight, she hurt one of her own instead. The struggle, the deflection, the in-fighting—it’s all reflective of our current divided times.

Thus, Qala’s song at the end repositions the entire story. Her song is a whimsical recreation of a terrible situation—turning Jagan into a singing peacock who steals her dreams away—allowing her to cope with her terrible sin. She wanted to advance her career and fight sexism, but she also didn’t mean to kill Jagan. So in the song, she positions the mother as the bad guy who wanted to kill the peacock. While Qala was the one who committed the crime, the mother also drove Qala to a level of insanity that allowed her to commit the crime. So to some degree, the song tells the truth.

In a way, you can think as the song as a symbol of hope. Qala is dead, but her words live on. Her art lives on. And her art reveals a deeper issue in society that drove her to do something so terrible. By understanding that art, we can understand the person—and all the people affected by the system. By listening, we can help the mental wellbeing of everybody in society.

What are your thoughts?

Is there more to the ending that you think should be part of the Colossus Movie Guide for Qala? Leave your thoughts below and we’ll consider adding them.