There is no doubt that the recent decision of the Central Board of Film Certification to scrutinise item songs more rigorously for showing on television is a step in the right direction and at the right time. Item songs, as we know them today, occupy an extreme end of the cinema spectrum, with their gross choreography, pelvic moves and thrusts and the camera crashing in and zooming on the woman’s body, all to the accompaniment of bawdy, lurid lyrics.
While I respect the idea and agree with the fact that you cannot act like the moral police and curb creative expression, all of this gets very smartly disguised as a marketing tool for promoting a film. There are also those who talk about how item songs are being served because the society wants it; that they have been part of our nautanki and village culture for hundreds of years. I totally disagree with them. We have had social ills like child marriage earlier. We went in for reforms. We did not allow them to continue.
There is a thin line that divides the decent from the indecent, and we have set no limits for ourselves when it comes to item numbers. With these songs, we are presenting a distorted vision of reality to our next generation. All this reveals our own gender biases and this in turn amounts to gender exploitation. We have subconsciously grown up with these ideas. This is how we end up perceiving relationships in our society. Moreover, it’s not as if needy women and C-grade producers and directors are doing these songs because they want to earn a quick buck. Established heroines, actors, directors and lyricists, who are all serious players, are a part of it as well. Certainly this can’t be for their creative satisfaction.
I am not against freedom of expression. If your storytelling requires nudity, then by all means show it. Nudity can be beautiful if perceived in an artistic way, like in Utsav. It can also convey harsh realities like how it was portrayed in Bandit Queen. How much can the government control? We’ll have to constantly monitor ourselves. The industry will have to introspect. The audiences will have to make choices—is this what they want?
There are days when I think who am I to ask all these questions. If the filmmakers want to have item numbers, it’s their choice. But then I realise it’s not just the item numbers which is nothing more than a producer’s desperate attempt at a publicity stunt, a heroine’s hope for fame, a director’s bid to get more and more eyeballs. It’s also something to do with the way we have evolved as a society. For I know parents for whom it’s totally acceptable to enjoy such songs along with their sons and daughters.
(The director of films like Rang de Basanti and Delhi-6, Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra is now working on a film based on the life of noted athlete Milkha Singh, titled Bhaag Milkha Bhaag.)
Tags