Secularism and popular indian cinema

By-Aman ChhabraDevna Chaturvedi

Divya DesaiNidhi Avinash

Palak Gosai

Secularism

• Secularism in India means equal treatment to all religions by the state. There is no official religion of the state.

• Being a multicultural and plural society,we have always negated communal ideology and aspects and communalism is never welcomed. But we see various movies highlighting the differences amongst us.

• Bollywood, or the Hindi film industry of India which produces almost 1000 films every year is the world’s largest film industry. From the time the first Indian sound film, Alam Ara was produced in 1931 till the present decade, this industry has a remarkably rich history of producing a variety of movies, showcasing different spheres of Indian life, in myriad themes, be it comedy, romance, thriller, horror or drama.

• However, there has been a changing trend in the representation of Indian films through the years. The way movies were made in the 1950s is completely different from the way it is done in the twenty first century.

Cinema during Nehruvian era(1950s-1960s)

• Reflects the “tolerant secularism”

• Rise of New Cinema

• Brand names in the industry

• Rajkapoor's Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai and Sangam; Dilip Kumar's Gungajamuna; Gurudutt's Sahib Bibi aur Gulam; Dev Anand's Guide; S.Mukherji's Junglee; Sunil Dutt's Mujhe Jeene Do and Yaadein; Pramod Chakravorthy's Love in Tokyo; Ramanand Sagar's Arzoo; B.R. Chopra's Waqt were some of the noted films.

Some significant films

Cinema during 1970s and 1980s

• Rise of independent entreprenuers and speculators

• Realistic depiction of contemporary indian life• Of these majority of the films were action

oriented with revenge as the dominating theme.• It was the age of the angry young man and

Amitabh Bachchan rose to prominence with the success of Sholay, Zanjeer and Deewar.

Some significant films

Hindutva dominating era(1990s-2001)

• Basically described as the revolting era .• New changes were noticed in Indian Cinema .• Patriotism bordering on anti-pakistani

jingoism had become a major theme .

• The concept started from the movie Junoon (1978) based on incidents of Uttar pradesh cantonment town .

• This was followed with other film makers coming up with movies like Albert Pinto ko gussa kyon aata hai ? about Goan Catholic family .

• Salim Langde Par mat ro about a young thief in a muslim ghetto .

• The first film made on the hindu-muslim divide during partition was a miniseries based on a Bhimsham Sahni’s novel Tamas.

Some significant films

The new millenium(2001-present)

• Now, the Indian cinema has reached the new millennium and a revolution of sorts has happened in terms of defining glamour, entertainment, commercial values, budgeting, marketing and box office reports.

• Today Indian Cinema ,especially, Hindi cinema is not only popular in India but in parts of the Middle East, Pakistan, UK and virtually every other place where Indians live.

• Emergence of new age filmmakers like Anurag Kashyap, Rajkumar Hirani, Dibakar Banerjee,Vishal Bhardwaj,etc., has changed the scene.

• There are movies on a number of themes. There are comedies, thrillers, horror, fiction, movies with message like Taare Zameen Pe, Vicky Donor, Dabangg ,Ek Villain,Munnabhai MBBS, Chak De India, Lajja,The Lunchbox and many more.

Some Significant films

Conclusion• Amitabh Bachchan calls the film industry the most

nationally integrated family. He illustrates his point with an example. "When we stand in queue to buy a ticket for a film, we never ask what the faith or belief or caste or colour of the person sitting next to me shall be. In that darkened hall, we all laugh at the same jokes, sing the same songs, cry at the same emotion. Does this not demonstrate to the world the most perfect example of national integration?''

• Though the films do influence us and the depiction in films may sometimes cause some damage to the communal harmony, in the end we are a nationally integrated family.