This article was last updated on April 16, 2022
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As the Padmavati crisis escalates to the national level, more reasonable voices from within the and outside the entertainment industry can be heard questioning the very reason of the national uproar.
Shyam Benegal who has faced furious backlash in his time for his cinema on socio-cultural equality is baffled by the extent of the Padmavati uproar. “I am sorry I can’t comment on Padmavati. I haven’t seen it, have you? No one has seen it. Yet there are hordes of people objecting to its content. Does that make any sense? I can’t understand how the protest has spread across the nation when hardly anyone has seen the film. How can the protest against a film become so rampant when no one has seen the film, no one knows the content. I am sorry; the protests make no sense, unless we judge them against the political current political climate in the country.”
Shyam Babu whose films like Ankur, Nishant, Manthan focused on the evils of the caste system sees a pattern of vote-bank politics in the protests against Padmavati. “This is being done to consolidate the Rajput vote. Now, you must understand that the Rajput community is not one homogenized community across the country. The Rajputs of Rajasthan possess a different mind-set and cultural inclination as compared with the Rajputs in other parts of India. And even those Rajputs in different regions outside Rajasthan are diverse in their outlook. By raking up the Padmavati non-issue, the Karni Sena hopes to homogenize the Rajput country across the country, unite them over an utterly irrelevant crisis. Sadly their ploy seems to be working. If I am from a particular caste and you tell me my cultural heritage is threatened I will naturally react against the threat.”
Shyam Benegal who helmed a committee to recommend reforms in the workings of the censor board has strong words of censure for the censors. “I must say the CBFC is behaving very strangely in the matter of Padmavati. If the film did not carry a disclaimer, it could easily be corrected. Why send the film back? Again it seems very suspicious.”
He urges the protesters to get reasonable. “Wait for Padmavati to release then pass your verdict. What is the point in commenting over a film whose content has not been exposed to the public?”
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