Like 2002 was a doomsday for BJP, 2017 is a doomsday for mainstream Bollywood. From big budget charmers, to the statements of the top stream actors, nothing is working for the next thing to revel in India after Ganpati and cricket. While on one hand, we have content oriented creations like ‘The Ghazi Attack’, ‘Hindi Medium’, [Bahubali is beyond any judgement] surprising one and all with their astounding creativity and masterpieces, we have also seen big players like ‘Rangoon’, ‘Raees’, ‘Tubelight’, ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’ etc. biting the dust.
Into this very league, stepped in Siddharth Malhotra, an apparent casanova whom girls love to ogle at, but has only a few hit films to his credit, compared to his partners, Alia Bhatt and Varun Dhawan, who too had co-debuted with him in their mega debut in Karan Johar’s ‘Student of the Year’.
Only recently, he posted a tweet on his Twitter handle, at a time when some overactive supporters, rather zealots of the cult known as Dera Sachcha Sauda, created mayhem on their chief, Baba Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Insaan, being convicted by a District Sessions Court at Panchkula, near Chandigarh:-
But what was so outrageous about his tweet? What was there in the tweet that Siddharth Malhotra is now at the butt end of a plethora of jokes? Read between the lines, my friend.
Siddharth Malhotra posted this tweet at a time, when a region of Haryana was embroiled in arson and anarchy. Okay, he asked everyone to stay safe, and not do anything that might put their lives at peril. Cool. But why, why did he have to promote his own movie with that very tweet? Was he too attention hungry?
Doesn’t this look like ‘Oh, I’m sorry for your loss, but please come to my marriage?’ Mr. Siddharth Malhotra, this was an incident of anarchy, not some instance of heavy raining, that you ask people to stay safe and then ask them to see your movie! No wonder the troll.
This is perhaps, the third instance of absolute shamelessness that Bollywood has showed, after Imtiaz Ali brushed off the criticism that his trash, ‘Jab Harry met Sejal’ was subjected to. Don’t even get me talking on what happened after Kangana openly accused Karan Johar of nepotism, and how Karan and Saif took the stage of IIFA awards as a nasty means to get even. It seems that Bollywood still wishes to live in its own cocoon, unaffected by the change happening in the outside world. We’re seeing people like Christopher Nolan getting better and better with movies like ‘Dunkirk’, and here we see the likes of Siddharth Malhotra and Karan Johar indulge in tomfoolery in the name of entertainment.
This is not all. I’m a bit late on this issue, but it looks as if Varun Dhawan is no less guilty. Only a couple of weeks ago, the trailer of his next movie ‘Judwaa 2’, unofficially a remake of the 1997 movie of the same name was released, where in a scene, Varun is seen forcibly kissing Taapsee Pannu in a scene, and look at the statement that Varun Dhawan gave in promotion of Judwaa 2:-
“My film is for twins, families and children specially. I remember going for movies with my maasis and cousins. I would buy a samosa and a beverage and watched the film which helped me make the best memories with my family. I want the children to make the same memories today. I want to make films for which a mom can take her children and watch it with them.”
So Mr. Varun Dhawan wants to promote forcible kissing as something that is acceptable as family entertainment, something that even kids can do? Really?
Where is the notion of ‘No Means No!, as described in ‘Pink’? Or is that reserved for mere preaching? But that’s not surprising anyway, as Mr. Varun Dhawan is the same guy who inadvertently promoted stalking as a way of wooing a girl in ‘Badrinath ki Dulhania’, even kidnapping your love interest [i.e. Alia Bhatt] would be okay!
To be truthful, with such statements and tweets, all mainstream Bollywood is doing is digging its own graves. If Bollywood doesn’t change itself, none would care a straw for them 5 years down the line.