There are few things more shocking than the spectacle of art coming under attack. Art, which is supposed to delight, illuminate and make you think and feel, being kicked and shoved is at odds with democracy. Yet that is exactly what happened yesterday in this democracy called India.
Oh, and by the way, let’s congratulate ourselves – we have graduated from vanilla agitation and effigy-burning to going ahead and beating up any practitioner of art who offends our delicate sensibilities.
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Bhansali Assaulted by a Fringe Group
On Friday, director Sanjay Leela Bhansali was assaulted while shooting on the sets of his film Padmavati at a Jaipur fort. A right-wing group called Karni Sena stormed the sets, smashed equipment and roughed up Bhansali.
His crime? There was a rumour going around that his film had a love scene between the legendary Rani Padmini of Chittor and Alauddin Khilji, the Delhi Sultan who invaded and conquered the Rajput kingdom in the 14th century.
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Bollywood’s Hypocrisy
How did we get here?
There is now the usual hand-wringing going on about Hindu fundamentalism gone rogue. However, without trivialising the noxious reactions of right-wing groups, let’s for a moment look at the part Bollywood itself has played in this. When faced with prejudice and out-and-out bullying, did it stand up and fight or did it go down in a funk?
Truth is, the recent history of our vibrant Hindi film industry is marred by a series of sorry episodes of capitulation to the demands of extremism and hate. When Raj Thackeray’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (ably seconded by certain prime time television talk shows) demanded a ban on Pakistani artistes in the wake of the Uri terror attack last year, few Bollywood notables protested.
Karan Johar, who has so touchingly supported Bhansali on Twitter today, vowed never to work with Pakistani artistes again. Shah Rukh Khan — whose film Raees, starring Pakistani actress Mahira Khan, released this week — met with Raj Thackeray last month and presumably gave him whatever assurances were needed to ensure the smooth release of his film.
In 2015, both Shah Rukh and Aamir Khan had spoken out against the growing tide of intolerance in the country. But faced with a furious backlash – Aamir’s contract as brand ambassador of Snapdeal was allegedly not renewed in deference to the outrage against his comments – both stars have fallen silent. They must have figured that protecting one’s business interests was much more important than doing foolish things such as taking principled stands.
Well, the ease with which the film fraternity has succumbed in the face of pressure seems to have only upped the lust for browbeating Bollywood some more. The assault on Bhansali is a testament to that.
Bullying in the Name of Preserving Culture
Given that according to lore, Rani Padmini and several other women of the royal household committed jauhar (immolated themselves) rather than lose their honour to the Muslim conqueror, the idea of a love scene between the two would indeed be distasteful to many. The brave queen, renowned for her beauty, unvanquished by a marauding Sultan, is a symbol of Rajput pride. Few would want the purity of that image distorted in any way.
Bhansali now says that there was in fact no such scene in his film.
Perhaps. It could well be that the whole thing is a canard, or fake news, as it were. And that Bhansali had no intention of bringing together his lead pair – Deepika Padukone (Padmavati) and Ranveer Singh (Alauddin Khilji), who looked so gorgeous in Bajirao Mastani – in even a fantasy or a dream sequence.
The point, however, is that even if such a scene were to be shot, should one’s sense of distaste give way to criminal bullying and lawlessness?
One cannot expect fringe groups that thrive on a new outrage every day to grasp the concept of creative licence. But clearly, they are now so superbly fired up with their sense of impunity, the essential rightness of their actions, that mere protests are no longer enough. They feel they can go and beat up filmmakers, or anyone who deviates from the “accepted” narratives of our history and culture.
Time to Walk the Talk
Protests against films are not new in our country. Our self-appointed religious and culture police are ever ready to take affront at perceived slights to their maan and maryada. If Muslim groups agitated against Kamal Haasan’s Vishwaroopam (2013), Dalit groups protested Prakash Jha’s Aarakshan (2011); the Rajputs trashed the distortion of history in Jodhaa Akbar (2008), and the Shiv Sena burnt an effigy or two of Bhansali for his depiction of the love story of Bajirao and Mastani Bai in Bajirao Mastani (2015).
But the latest incident shows the dangerous audacity of offence – the growing confidence that violence pays, and that this filmmaker, like others of his ilk, will simply cave in.
To be sure, the chorus of support for Bhansali from the film fraternity is heartening. But the time has come for Bollywood to walk the talk. To look beyond cosy self-interest, and band together as an industry body which can use its huge economic clout as a bargaining chip to put pressure on the state to act against hate-mongers.
It is time for Bollywood to stand up and be counted in the fight against intolerance.
(The writer is a senior journalist based in Delhi. She can be reached @ShumaRaha. The views expressed above are the author’s own.The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)
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