Can you imagine a movie trailer can hit 14M views within an hour? Yes, I am talking about the most controversial film of Bollywood in recent times – ‘Padmavati’. We all know what is happening across the country even internationally with this film. I have my own thoughts, my views, and my opinions about the film and as always my blog is the best place to express my words.
When I was watching the trailer for the first time, I was thrilled. The location, sets, that regal feeling everything has been portrayed with utmost perfection and above everything ‘Rani Padmavati’ aka Deepika Padukone – OMG! She is just stupendously fantastic.
The film supposed to be launched on 1st December, 2017 and literally I was counting the days.
But all gives a mug full of water on my excitement.
The film kicks up a storm of controversy and showing us the ugly side of India too.
What is the film story?
We all know, it is a story of Rani Padmavati, who was the queen of Chittor. The Delhi Ruler, Alauddin Khilji became obsessed by her ethereal beauty and attacked Chittor to capture Rani Padmini. He won the battle but it was a loss for him because Rani Padmavati committed ritual suicide.
Before Mr. Bhansali, many filmmakers worked with this story. In 1963, it was a Tamil Fim – ‘Chittor Rani Padmini’, In 1964, there was another hindi film with the same subject. In 2009, an entire television series, Chittod ki Rani Padmini Ka Johur, told us the same story.
Then what’s the big deal? Why such controversy has been created with this particular film?
According to recent news, SLB added a dream sequence depicting the romance in between Khilji and Padmavati though the director denied this multiple times.
In January, Bhansali was assaulted by a mob of Rajput Caste Group – Karni Sena. According to them, Padmavati is a precious part of Rajput history and the director distorted it for the sake of the film.The group threatened Deepika to cut off her nose even a member of BJP party Suraj Pal Amu,offering £1.13m to anyone who beheads Padukone and Bhansali.
This is so insane! The Indian party & politicians are basically playing dirty game in the name of this film.The Karni Sena chief, Lokendra Singh Kalvi appealed to the P.M. to ban the movie. Rajasthan, Gujarat, UP, Madhya Pradesh even Punjab Government also ban the movie.
This is our beautiful India, where such nuisance people can create with a film release! The funny part is, most of the protesters neither have seen the movie nor did they read the screenplay. Even historians have doubt with the existence of Rani Padmavati.
Don’t you think, this issue is pointing towards that typical Hindu Muslim relationship? BJP is a Hindu nationalist party and always they have shown negative notion towards Muslim community. And here the main issue is that Hindu-Muslim romance.
The director is the creator of a film, how could a political party decide the sequence and scenes of a movie? Such incidents showing us the naked story of our paralyzed society.
As a responsible citizen, we should protest against this in every possible way.
Films refresh our minds, reduce stress and above everything, India is doing good business through this film industry.
I would request everyone to share their opinions and protest against this to make India a better place.
#StandBySLB
Thanks, Sayeri, for the thoughtful piece. I haven’t seen it from the angle of Love Jihad. I thought it had something to do with Rajput honour only.
Amazing blog and very interesting stuff you got here! I definitely learned a lot from reading through some of your earlier posts as well and decided to drop a comment on this one!