|
 In the world's largest film industry, some people fear the
choice signals a push by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu
nationalist party for control of India's most powerful medium.
New appointments at the film school have rattled an industry
already upset by changes to India's powerful film certification
panel, after its chairman and a handful of members resigned,
blaming government interference.
"Anyone who is sane, and who thinks, will be worried," said
film-maker Kiran Rao, who spoke out against the new censor
panel. "This is affecting the way we function."
There is no evidence yet that Modi's 14-month-old government has
significantly influenced the tone or content of films, but
concerns are growing that it could rein in the industry's
liberal outlook in an overwhelmingly conservative society.
India's popular films, though still laden with song-and-dance
routines, have recently tackled weightier topics, such as human
rights abuses by the Indian army in the disputed Himalayan
region of Kashmir, homosexuality and the caste system.
The 55-year-old film school, in the western city of Pune near
Mumbai, India's capital of film and finance, prides itself on
quality cinema and has turned out some top film-makers. It is
governed by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
Critics see the selection of Gajendra Chauhan, an actor known
for little apart from his role in a 1980s TV serial based on the
Sanskrit epic, the Mahabharata, as the latest in a string of
political appointments to cultural and academic bodies.
Indian film, particularly Hindi-speaking Bollywood, many of
whose best known actors, directors and technicians come from the
school, is wildly popular in a country where one in four people
is illiterate.
The films have long been one of the few aspects of Indian life
that transcend barriers of caste and creed: for example,
marriages between members of India's Hindu majority and its tiny
Muslim community are not unusual, on-screen and off.
"A CERTAIN AGENDA"
But opponents of Modi's government say hardliners in his
Bharatiya Janata Party want to turn secular India into a
Hindu-first nation.
[to top of second column] |
"Every single step this government has taken, whether in culture or
education, has been to push a certain agenda," said Shanta Gokhale,
a novelist and theater critic in Mumbai.
Chauhan, who campaigned for Modi's BJP last year and has been a
party member since 2004, told Reuters his political views would not
influence his work at the film institute.
"Everyone has a political ideology they identify with," Chauhan
said. "So do I. But that ideology does not come in the way of my
work."
Also appointed as a school governor was documentary film-maker
Anagha Ghaisas. Her work includes a pro-Hindu film on the 1992
demolition of a mosque in the Hindu holy city of Ayodhya, an event
that sparked riots in which about 2,000 people died.
Ghaisas told Reuters she was not ashamed of her background but would
work to improve the institute, and for its students.
"If you get a complete majority, why would you call members of other
parties to participate? It’s a political appointment, so of course
you will choose people you are confident about," she told Reuters.
After the censors' resignations in January, the government appointed
director Pahlaj Nihalani as its chief. Nihalani made his name with
adult comedies in the 1990s and his latest work was a campaign video
for then-candidate Modi.
Nihalani did not respond to requests for comment.
The new censors have demanded cuts in profanity and references to
homosexual relationships and extramarital affairs.
One recent demand was to bleep out the usage of "Bombay", the
Anglicised, colonial-era name for Mumbai.
"It makes me incredibly scared," said Rao, who has worked in the
industry for 15 years. "This sort of expression is essential to a
democracy."
(Editing by Clara Ferreira Marques and Clarence Fernandez)
[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. |
