{"id":37545,"date":"2019-02-24T10:14:49","date_gmt":"2019-02-24T10:14:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepubliceconomist.com\/?p=37545"},"modified":"2019-02-25T14:55:11","modified_gmt":"2019-02-25T14:55:11","slug":"polliwood-the-new-battleground-for-politics-in-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepubliceconomist.com\/?p=37545","title":{"rendered":"\u201cPolliwood\u201d-The New Battleground for Politics in India"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

–<\/strong>This Sunday morning, I decided to take myself back to that one afternoon summer at the Bombay Central station with me staring at that particular spot on one of the platforms that I had come across in my favourite satirical comedy; Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro<\/em> (Let it be, Friends!). The cult classic based during 1983, the time when the city Mumbai looked at its best, essayed a brilliant satirical takedown on corruption.  While the Indian Film Industry has begun blowing the political propaganda technically out of proportion, a movie buff like me can\u2019t really keep silence on where and how it all started.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To\nbegin with, it\u2019s not something new at all. The first such attempt of making Bollywood\na political battleground dates back to 1975 and 1977, when “Kissa Kursi Ka” (Story of the\nchair) and “Aandhi” (Storm), with the former satirising Indira Gandhi\u2019s\npolitics and the latter, allegedly basing on her relationship with her\nestranged husband, had fallen foul of the then Congress Government. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The trend did slow down then but made an\nattempt to pick up once again in 2010 attempting to tackle the ever-difficult situation\nof farmer suicides with \u201cPeepli Live\u201d gaining traction not only at a societal\nlevel but in the political scenario as well. Films with such propaganda back\nthen induced discussions among masses and helped formulate a solution in the\nprocess. Surprisingly, this new kick-in of the propaganda in the 2018 and this time\nwith a 2.0 version is inducing something poles apart from what it did a decade\nago. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Political movies today hesitate the wait to\ndeliver their message until the movie is released and instead prefer to drop in\nsnippets of the same in the trailer itself. Let\u2019s take a walk through how the\ndifferent scenes of different such biopics offered a rendition to remember them\nby as we approach the most important month of 2019: May. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first story that decides to trigger the\nstorm knocks on the door in the form of \u201cThe Accidental Prime Minister\u201d: Rahul\nGandhi looks lost, Sonia Gandhi reminds us of Nurse Ratched of Ken Kesey’s 1962 novel, One Flew over\nthe Cuckoo’s Nest and the former Prime Minister played by Anupam Kher, soft\nand feeble. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next up would be \u201cUri: The Surgical Strike\u201d. Kher\u2019s\nportrayal of Singh was on the brink of lampooning a sketch; the audience did scornfully\nlaugh at the halting and high-pitched voice he assumed. But nobody laughed in\nUri. WHY?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rajat Kapur, who played the role of Prime\nMinister Modi neither said \u201cMitron” nor did try to imitate him. The\nBharatiya Janata Party (BJP) looked as organized in the film as the Congress\nlooked uncaring and rudderless in the first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In The Accidental Prime Minister, Singh has to\nnegotiate the Nuclear Deal past the unwilling Gandhi family. In Uri, Modi doesn\u2019t\nhesitate once before ordering a surgical strike on Pakistan-administered soil. All\nin all, the films successfully paint a neat composite picture for the undecided\nvoter: The ruling party is tough on terror, tough on Pakistan while the\nopposition is power-hungry and doesn\u2019t have the appetite for aggressive geopolitics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Very recently, a video featuring Varun Dhawan,\nRanbir Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, Karan Johar, Ranveer Singh, among others went\nviral with them shouting \u2018Jai Hind\u2019 twice and trying to send across the message\nof the change that has come about in the past 4 years. Leaving aside this video\nwhich I found no significance with politics as such, if shouting out \u2018Jai Hind\u2019\nhas helped instill some knowledge regarding the basics of the NAMES of the\nPresident and Prime Minister in the minds of those present in the video, then\nkudos to the Modi Government. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Almost every month, the previous year produced\nsome film or the other that waved the flag: Pad Man, Gold, Satyamev Jayate, and\nParmanu: The Story of Pokhran to name a few. In Baaghi 2, Tiger Shroff\u2019s army\nman ties a stone-pelter to his jeep, just like Major Leetul Gogoi did in\nKashmir. Later in the film, he pauses while decimating a police station,\ncatches a small plastic India flag mid-air, and places it down carefully. This\nwas greeted with cheers\u2014probably originating from the same sort of crowd who\nharass others for not standing when the national anthem is played.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This new propaganda of basing films in such\npolitical background hints two important incentives: one being simple commerce\nand the other opportunism. Lately, Manikarnika, which stars Kangana Ranaut as\nthe queen of Jhansi brilliantly, hinted a short propaganda which most viewers\nmight have ignored. The trailer ends with the queen saying that the difference\nbetween her and the British is that they want to rule and she wants to serve.\nThis was the same argument Modi had used against the Gandhi family in the\nrun-up to the 2014 general election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the question arises whether the wonderful\nportrayal of the political history of India through the \u201creel\u201d world would\nbring about a difference in the voting decisions we make in the month of May or\nnot. If it doesn\u2019t, the movies will remain a memory if not anything else and if\nit does, two situations arise. One, the realization of the long-lost power of\nBollywood in the Indian Political System and second, a serious question on the\nindependence of Bollywood cinema. Just having a flashback of the contentious Section\n7 of the RBI Act that questioned its independence a few months back, doesn\u2019t it?\nLet me leave it for my brilliant readers to ponder over.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While the Indian Film Industry has begun blowing the political propaganda technically out of proportion, it\u2019s not something new at all. 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