Share Facebook

Twitter

Whatsapp

Mail

Whatsapp Scenes from the set of the Bollywood romantic thriller Loot show the contrast between male and female characters on India's silver screen

A recent spate of violent rapes in India has forced the country's film industry to face some uncomfortable truths. Rapes in Bollywood films used to be part of the formula, and while they've dropped out of scripts in the last decade, many feel the films still present women as passive sex objects.

Last year’s horrendous gang rape of 23-year-old Jyothi Singh on a New Delhi bus, and another recent rape of a five-year-old girl, have sparked a national debate in India and a bout of intense soul searching. But they've also forced many Bollywood actors to look at the role the country’s film and television industry plays in encouraging violent sexual assaults.

Bollywood stars were among the first to react to the horrendous crimes. India’s most popular star, Shah Rukh Khan, sent out some heartfelt tweets, expressing sorrow for being part of a society where human beings behaved so shamefully.

‘Rape embodies sexuality as our culture and society has defined it. I am so sorry that I am a part of this society and culture...I promise I will fight with your voice,’ he said.

Simi Garewal, one of India’s most famous and popular actresses, now a television presenter, believes that India is going through a transitional period. She described the gruesome rape recently of a five-year-old girl.

‘The two men who raped her had been watching porn on their mobiles just before the rape. When porn is available on a mobile to an uneducated man, who obviously gets stimulated and picks on the first person he can—a vulnerable little child—and proceeds to mutilate her. So who do you blame?’

Simi doesn’t think that the recent problems with sexual violence can all be lumped on Bollywood, although she says the industry has a massive effect on India's popular imagination.

‘Where I do blame Bollywood is that they have so much power and people emulate them. They could have easily made things easier for women. They could have shown women with more freedom and dignity and that it’s all right for a woman to work. But they never did that. So it’s more a sin of omission than commission.’

However, in the past rape scenes were common in Bollywood films, so much so that they were considered part of the formula for Indian blockbusters. The villain often raped the lead actress, and some audiences in the 1970s and 80s would look forward to this scene because it triggered the beginning of the hero’s big budget quest for revenge.

Although the rape trend tapered off in the 90s, actresses like Shabana Azmi are of the view that such scenes have been replaced by new forms of misogyny.

‘Crass lyrics, voyeuristic camera angles, fragmented images of heaving breasts, swivelling navels, [and] swinging hips rob women of autonomy,’ she said. ‘So much easier to blame than to reflect and share part of the blame. All sections of society including films need to analyse how we are part culpable.’

Simi Garewal says that the previous convention of rape in film still echoes through modern Bollywood, where women are portrayed as passive and where men remain the heroes.

‘It used to be part and parcel of every film earlier on. That era has gone. But films continue to be male dominated. The movie is constructed around the hero. If there is a mother she is going to be a sacrificing creature, and she will worship her son. If there is going to be a wife she is also going to serve her husband and she will worship him. If there is a sister...there is the possibility that she is eventually going to be raped, and of course the brother will save her, and seek vengeance. It’s all built around the hero.’

However, there are instances where Indian film does include representations of strong women and portray the reality of women’s lives. The 2005 film Water, directed by Deepa Mehta, is a recent example which explored the Indian custom of sending widows into exile. Bizarrely, filming had to be moved to Sri Lanka after local Hindus rioted over perceived slights to their religion in the script, and destroyed the set.

‘Widows have been considered bad omen or bad luck in society,’ Simi said of the film’s theme. ‘But this is still a better situation than what it was 120 years ago, where if the husband died, the wife had to burn alive in the funeral pyre—whatever her age. Okay we have moved one step further. She doesn’t have to jump into the fire. But who decided all this? How could people accept this? How do you fight it?’

Simi hopes though that the entertainment industry can change from holding back women's rights, to actively helping to turn around Indian attitudes.

‘There is a lot of urbanisation. I think a lot of the reasons for the change is satellite television. It’s brought the world into people’s homes. If you go to villages in India—however remote—they are completely cut off from the rest of the world but if nothing else you will see satellite antennas and satellite dishes. The world is now coming to their home. Freedom has come to India through satellite.’

Simi Garewal is in Australia as a guest of the Indian Film Festival in Melbourne. You can listen to her full interview on Late Night Live.