Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar, also known as Mohammed Yusuf Khan, passed away on Wednesday (July 7) at Hinduja Hospital in Khar, Mumbai. The veteran actor was 98 and left a legacy spanning some six decades in the Bollywood industry. Dilip Kumar is one of the few actors that managed to keep a blemish-free career. However, that being said, Kumar during the peak of his Bollywood career became the poster boy of communists looking to imperceptibly brainwash masses against the rise of capitalism and industry-driven modern Indian society.
The trend of such characters played by Dilip Kumar started in 1948 when the movie ‘Shaheed’ was released in theatres. The film shows how a freedom fighter’s real fight is with his father and friends. The movie doesn’t hit it straight out of the bat but subtly tries to impose the figure of a capitalist ‘bad’ father. This is an important part of Marxist theory – where the wealth of any kind acquired by anyone is always frowned upon and the person amassing the wealth is dubbed as the one true villain.
Similarly, in 1957, a rather popular movie named, ‘Naya Daur’ hit the theatres. Unlike Shaheed, the movie did not have any filters and it out rightly projected that if modern industries, modern transportation and other mechanised means of production came to the country, it will be the end of India as we know. Again, it is pertinent to point that opposing change has been a hallmark of Marxist and communist theories, and the opposition to industrialization was codified in generous quantities in “Naya Daur’.
That befitting reply will hurt the soul of lehru ji.. 😭
— Keh Ke Peheno (@coolfunnytshirt) July 7, 2021
While Dilip Kumar did not promote anti-Hindu beliefs like most of his co-actors did, he certainly promoted the Left-leaning ideologies. His films had a common trope running throughout the six-decade long career – the villain was always either a capitalist landlord/overlord, or a smuggler/industrial who profited unfairly, and the hero, Dilip Kumar, always fought against him using meagre resources.
Be it dacoit Gangaram in ‘Ganga Jamuna’, or Vijay Khanna in ‘Leader’, Marxism and its related entities were served in ample quantities to the public, which most of the times remained clueless about the propaganda being fed to them.
Read More: Why Mohammad Yusuf Khan became Dilip Kumar
However, Bollywood soon dropped the charade of pretentiousness and started openly peddling the communist agenda. The two glaring examples of this were movies named ‘Mazdoor’ and ‘Mashaal’. In Mazdoor, directed by Ravi Chopra, Dilip Kumar was a trade union leader who fought against Suresh Oberoi’s policies. On the other hand, in Mashal directed by Yash Chopra, Dilip Kumar runs a newspaper, and circumstances force him to turn to crime as well.
Not only this, in ‘Vidhata’ directed by Subhash Ghai, Kumar played the role of Shamsher Singh, a train driver who turns himself to crime when he encounters a dishonest smuggler due to adversity.
At his best, Dilip Kumar stayed away from controversies as much as he could but at his worst, he directly or indirectly encouraged the agendas of Marxists and other vicious leftists to instigate the masses.
Thus, it could be said that Dilip Kumar was his own worst enemy but that doesn’t take anything away from his acting prowess which still remains highly unrivalled, even after his departure.
