Afghans in Bollywood, Bollywood in Afghanistan
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A Pathan Moustache Hair’s Worth: Afghans in Bollywood, Bollywood in Afghanistan Author : Fabrizio Foschini Published: 28 August 2012 Downloaded: 15 October 2018 Download URL: https://www.afghanistan-analysts.org/wp-admin/post.php Hardy, hungry Afghan highlanders have for centuries looked beyond the Khyber Pass in search of…movies. And, be it clever marketing, be it spontaneous fascination, Bollywood cinema has also been keen on portraying Afghans throughout its different eras. Fabrizio Foschini has been looking at the outcome of this colourful cultural encounter, helped by the fact that Kabul is one of the world’s major bazaars selling old Indian movies (still with many thanks to Harun Popal for helping in the quest). The assumption on which this blog is based is that Bollywood has been a most important cultural factor in Afghanistan since time immemorial. Generations of Afghans before, during and after the decades of war and international isolation of the country have grown up watching Bollywood movies and listening to their music. Notwithstanding the current diversification of the movie offer provided for by the satellite dish channels, Bollywood, both its old classics and eagerly-awaited new blockbusters, enjoys an unbridgeable advantage over other 1 / 7 cinematographic productions, and whatever future trends, we can safely assume that it will always retain a special place in the minds of Afghans.(1) This is true also because of the all-powerful tool for intra-cultural communication and exchange constituted by the Bollywood-song&video format. This tool finds its noble and historically legitimate origins in the widely-shared musical tradition of Northern India and Afghanistan, and in particular in the poetic-musical form of ghazal (see our previous blogs here and here). This shared, direct fruition is rendered possible also by the exceptional linguistic skills of the Afghan people, which decades of exile in Pakistan or of watching Bollywood movies – sometimes clandestinely – to cheer themselves up a bit while sitting in the desolation of their war-struck homeland have strengthened. The result is that presently almost any Afghan, whatever his or her walk of life, understands at least basically the language of Bollywood movies, in particular the heavily-Persianised Urdu of some ghazal lyrics or the highly formal Hindi of movies with a Moghul or ‘nawabi’ historical setting. The few cinemas in Afghanistan have not returned to their former ‘family’ use, nor do they seem to screen Bollywood novelties, but rather a second hand choice of B movies from various Indian cinematographies. Bollywood thus remains mainly a private home entertainment, but there is a constant interest among at least part of the Afghan youth in new movies and their soundtracks. Even some media outlets follow attentively the Bollywood scene, with some rare attempts at VIPs gossiping (for example Khaama Press). Reassure your neighbourhood’s mullahs, however – no cultural invasion is meant here. The Afghan public is just reciprocating an interest and a fascination that Indian cinema first has shown towards Afghans since its origins.(2) There must have been a moment around the middle of the 20th century when the cocky, burly, moustached Pathan walked from the crowded boardwalks of Bombay into the 35mm film that was being impressed into movies in newly independent India.(3) And the Pathan did so bringing with him stereotypes and clichés worthy of a mask from the Commedia dell’Arte (for some of the literary stereotypes about Afghans in India see our previous blog). One of the first and finest examples of a Pathan on screen (impersonated by actor Pran Sikand) actually entails the presence of another such ‘icon’: the Chaplinesque golden-hearted cheater- tramp character developed by Raj Kapoor. In Chhalia (Cheat, 1960), the encounter between the two highly standardised characters is looked upon by everybody as an inevitable duel. Indeed, when the Pathan, Abdur Rahman Khansaheb, arrives in town (post-Partition Delhi, crowded with refugees from Pakistan) with his embroidered waskat and turban, everybody knows there will be troubles with the tramp, and even though the reason why the two characters should know each other is less than apparent (something to do with dues the now Pakistan-based Pathan crook has to collect from the small-time conman), the whole town waits eagerly for the fight, which does not take long to happen. However, the Pathan here is something more than a shallow mask of virile pride. Set around and in the aftermath of Partition, the movie sees the Hindu heroine (Nutan) rescued from a 2 / 7 group of Muslim rioters in Lahore by the Pathan, Khansaheb. He does so also in the hope that his human action will please God to grant similar help to his sister, who finds herself alone in India in the middle of the riots there. However, he ultimately becomes a prisoner of his own self- imposed moral intransigence when, hopeless of finding his sister alive after years of quest, he contemplates the abduction of an Indian woman as both compensation and revenge, and he targets the one he sees in the company of his rival, Raj Kapoor, unaware that she is the same lady whom he has protected for years in Lahore. When he rescued her from the rioters, he had offered her a protective veil – ‘Sister, cover yourself. I am a Pathan, I will never look at your face.’ Indeed, he cannot recognise her now but from her voice. When realisation of what he was about to do dawns on him, that almost destroys him (in his delirium he quotes a few famous lines from a short story on Partition by Sadat Hassan Manto). Insanity is only averted on the Pakistan-bound train when he is reunited with his lost sister, who had likewise been sheltered from the violence of the Partition by a Sikh family on the Indian side. In Zanjeer (Chain, 1973), it is again Pran who rocks onto the stage dressed as a Pathan. He may be slightly older, but he looks even more daring&dashing (of course, the new look Technicolor only enhances his hennaed red hair and the golden embroidery of the waskat!). He is also, obviously, a crook – in the Pathan way. Running a gambling den, he immediately states his position in this world: ‘Sher Khan does dishonest deeds, but in honesty!’ (see clip here) Also immediately he is picked up as enemy number 1 by the protagonist-cop Amitabh Bacchan and, after a memorable fight with the latter which ends in a draw and in reciprocal respect, he decides to shut down his business in order to enjoy the friendship of the upright policeman. When his now best friend is unjustly framed by a mafia boss, it is Sher Khan who goes to the moneylender to get some cash to pay the court fine for him. Having reformed and abandoned crime, he is now a penniless auto-mechanic. But, says he to the moneylender, ‘There is something I can give as a guarantee, if you value it at its right value – Sher Khan ki munch ka baal (a hair of Sher Khan’s moustache). This reminder of his honourableness is readily accepted and the hairy offer is kindly - who wouldn’t trust a Pathan’s word? – turned down. He can get the 5,000 rupees loan without interest. Pran-Sher Khan has some more great lines throughout this movie. When, for example, he is made an offer in exchange for killing the cop by the don’s henchmen, unaware of his friendship with him, he remarks: ‘A police inspector whose life is worth 50,000 rupees sounds like he must be a very honest one’. Moreover, Afghans gain the homage of featuring in a unique item number, a male-only ballet glorifying friendship (Yari hai Iman mera, Yar meri zindegi – ‘friendship is my faith, the friend is my life’) – I don’t recall any other ‘guest people’ receiving such an honour in female-dance oriented Bollywood! Zanjeer was a great success that definitely enhanced the career of super-star, Amitabh Bachchan, and it has remained a major classic of Bollywood – to the extent that a remake is currently being shot, expected to come out in 2013. It also immortalised the image of the Pathan as somebody living on the edges of ‘respectable’ society, but capable of selfless affection for friends. But there were other on-screen opportunities for Afghans to come, although the changing political scenario would make itself felt. War in Afghanistan, and the growing 3 / 7 international traffic in narcotics and weapons feeding into the Mumbai underworld – where Pathans were fairly represented – was taking its toll on perceptions and scripts (in Teezab, Acid, 1988, the Pathans even become the bad guys). So in that masterpiece of Bollywood ‘80s gangster movies, Hero (1983), a whole ensemble of Afghan musicians appear in the villains’ lair – although the head-singer, claiming to be a refugee from Afghanistan, is a police officer in disguise. It is remarkable how the presence of the rubab (together with that of daira and handkerchiefs) among the musical instruments is often used to evoke the idea of Afghanistan and Afghans. And this not only by Bollywood: even in the highly acclaimed Indian TV serial on the life of 19th century poet, Mirza Asadullah Ghalib, – an opera filled with some of Jagjit and Chitra Singh’s finest ghazals – there is just such an impromptu cameo for a Pathan, apparently with the only purpose of inserting a rubab in the scene. Muhabbat ka Dushman (The Enemy of Love, 1988) belongs to the cloak and dagger current, and relies less on plot than on an extraordinary cast (among others the veteran Pathan impersonator, Pran, plays an old fencing-master in the service of Rahmat Khan – an elderly but solid Raj Kumar).