The confusing 1990s, when we were growing up, it was a taboo for  Bengali middle-class children of my age to have any fascination toward Bollywood films and Hindi songs, two pure evils that were blamed for spoiling the “morality” of children and teenagers alike. Bollywood films were loathed by aristocratic and middle-class Bengalis alike. It was considered “inferior” vis-a-vis the golden era Bengali films of Tollywood. It was expected of the middle-class children, teenager and youth, in that era, to have a knack for Rabindra Sangeet and recite flawlessly, using the best of their voice modulation skills, the poems from Tagore’s chef-d'oeuvre - Sanchayita. 

Still, Bollywood allured us, especially the teenagers of 1990s who grew up sans internet, mobile phones and social media; the curly hair of Mithun Chakraborty or Amitabh Bachchan touching their shoulders, the authority with which they spoke, yelled and presented themselves on-screen were a sheer inspiration for us. We loved the bell-bottom pants and dog collars of the 1970s, the parallel pants, straight jeans and grunge shirts of 1990s. There were the Khans, who still rule the Bollywood somehow, though, to some lesser extent, there were Akshay Kumar and Suniel Shetty, there were Rajinikanth and Govinda as well. We loved them and to some extent, idolised them. Actresses like Madhuri Dixit, Karishma Kapoor, Kajol, etc. mesmerised us with their vivacious and enticing beauty. We boys of 1990s, before tempering ourselves in the fire of feminism, fancied dating someone equally “beautiful” as these actresses. But Bollywood didn't love us, the fans, or rather all sections of the fans equally. 

It wasn’t easy for the teenagers in a politically volatile West Bengal to grasp the very essence of Bollywood’s class character and its inherent Brahminical nature. For us, like everyone else, Bollywood meant sheer entertainment. We idolised the actors with the larger-than-life image because for us they were the most happening entertainers on earth. Remember Madhuri Dixit in films like Dil or Beta, Amitabh Bachchan in Sholay, Deewar (though from the 1970s they were quite a hit in 1990s too) or Agneepath and Shahrukh Khan in Baazigar or Darr? Remember the mesmerising beauty of Aishwarya Rai and Sushmita Sen when they started acting in Bollywood? They were the veil, the very dazzling mask covering a grotesque and horrifying face of the Bollywood - the Islamophobic, hardcore feudal, pro-imperialist film cum propaganda industry that would dance to the tune of any killer for the sake of money.

Nearly two decades later, it didn’t shock me when I found Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, Abhishek Bachchan, Vivek Oberoi, Soha Ali Khan and a host of other Bollywood stars eagerly jumped into the frame of a selfie with the butcher of Palestinian men, women and children - Benjamin Netanyahu. The very man whose regime has killed thousands of Palestinian men, raped hundreds of Palestinian women, maimed, raped, tortured, imprisoned and killed hundreds of children with utmost impunity - is now considered as a “hero” in Modi-fied India, where his best buddy, Narendra Modi, who played a pivotal role in managing the genocide of Muslims in Gujarat during the 2002 pogrom, is ruling with the strongest support of their common master - the US imperialism.

During Netanyahu’s visit to India, Bollywood organised a special event to honour this Zionist terrorist, condemned and despised throughout the world for his notorious rule and violation of human rights. The “Shalom Bollywood” programme organised by the Bollywood stalwarts, sans few, was an attempt by the “official Hindi film industry”, the vessel of Hindutva and Hindi chauvinism in India, to forge a close tie-up with the Zionist Israeli regime that promotes bigotry and manufactures zealots through its communal propaganda-based cultural outlets. The alliance is commercially and politically very viable at present, as it will help Bollywood to mint a lot of money by appeasing the new fascist world order rising under Donald Trump.

By playing according to the tunes of the Zionist Israeli and Hindutva fascists, Bollywood made it clear that in the coming days it will officially and utmost unapologetically propagate and preach the communal, xenophobic and Islamophobic ideology of the Zionist and Hindutva fascist camps. The writing was clear on the wall, Bollywood isn’t for Muslims, and it never was. Add to this, it never was for the Dalits, the tribal people and the minority communities. It’s not for the majority of Hindus, who belong to backward castes, it’s only for the handful of elite and upper-middle-class Hindus from the higher echelons of the Hindu caste system. The rest may just die; Bollywood and its super-rich, upper-caste actors don't care. 

The hatred shown by the Bollywood, step-by-step, against the Muslim community incessantly since early 1990s and its projection of the long-bearded, trimmed moustache, kohl-eyed, skull cap-clad, Pathani suit-wearing and bead-running Muslim as a terrorist did help the Hindutva camp to intensify its patent Bush Telegraph campaign against the minority community with extreme vigour and seduce the vulnerable sections of the Hindu society, from both upper and lower castes as well as ostracised Dalits into its murderous regiments. 

The swelling of the ranks of the Hindutva camp was helped by the Bollywood, which joined the anti-Muslim frenzy of the Hollywood by producing films that promoted Islamophobia. The overtly hyped threat of "terrorism", used by the Indian reactionary state machinery to drive the majority community with an anti-Muslim hysteria, was repeatedly linked with Islam and Pakistan and this way the narrative of a terrorist Muslim was built. The Muslim isn’t officially the “terrorist”  in India, however, in the films, the Muslim is certainly the aggressor, the “other”, the violence-incensed orthodox outsider and Pakistan-loyalist. The pious Hindu lead character, or the Hindutva-loving and overtly patriotic “Indianised” Muslim lead character will do anything to thrash and defeat the “terrorist Muslim” trying to break India into pieces. 

Should they remake Sholay today, I’m sure, Gabbar Singh will be the pious Bajrang Dal leader who will try to save the unsusceptible villagers of Ramgarh from the notorious “Jihadi” Imam Sahab, who would plan to send his grandson to Pakistan to get terrorist training and then lure Basanti to marry him and convert her religion, a sheer “love Jihad” case. The aggrieved Thakur, who lost his family and hands to the “Jihadi” Imam would bring the RSS apparatchiks like Jai and Viru to assist Gabbar in lynching the Muslim terror monger and save the cow. A definite blockbuster in Modi-fied India, a real magnum opus of the Zionified Hindi film industry. If Adani and Ambani fund him, Vivek Agnihotri will certainly oblige them with a saffron remake of this epic film.


Back to “Shalom Bollywood”. For a while I felt that they were taking that happy Bollywood selfie with the visiting terrorist and his wife in the backdrop of a heap dead bodies of Palestinian children, killed by the Zionist Israeli forces, lying in a pool of blood and their grief-stuck parents wailing in  profound pain over their untimely death at the hands of a brutal regime. I felt a tinge of crimson, like a droplet of blood, was rolling out of the smiling lips of Netanyahu, and probably I saw the Bollywood celebrities, elbowing each other to be clicked with the monster, drooling for their share of that blood and flesh of the dead children too, which can pave the steps for their ascension to higher echelons of financial gains, more than what they are already sitting on. Zionist Israel means more money; truly I felt Amitabh Bachchan and his coterie drooling and craving for their share. A lot of money is waiting.

When these Bollywood celebrities, celebrating “Shalom Bollywood”, were hobnobbing with the Zionist terrorist Netanyahu,  a lot of children became victims of sexual violence meted out by the most horrendous and brutal armed force in the world. Many may have died that very evening, their bodies may have been fed to the pet dogs of the Zionists, their lamenting due to the pain caused by the brute force of the occupation regime may have been lost forever, what all they left behind were their brief memory on earth, which their parents, their siblings and friends will cherish until they meet the same fate at the hands of the Zionist occupiers. The Bollywood is a conniving comrade-in-crime of the Zionist Netanyahu regime and very soon, it wants to be the biggest cultural propaganda division of the occupation regime outside the occupied Palestinian land.

For me, the Bollywood’s action and acceptance of the crime committed against humanity in Palestine were very predictable, nothing surprising at all. In my mid-30s, I know very well that the Hindi film industry, like all official and mainstream political-economic and cultural outlets operating in India, will only amplify the propaganda trumpet of the Indian ruling classes and their reactionary partners around the world. Truly, the participation of these celebs in "Shalom Bollywood" didn’t matter much to anyone politically conscious, rather my mature, mid-30 soul knows well that this act of Bollywood would help in politically exposing its reactionary character before the very people who still consume its content with much fanfare. However, there was something that kept haunting me and until now, even after weeks, I cannot forget that feeling - the feeling of being cheated and duped.

The teenager me, who didn’t care about the “political correctness” of the mature me, trusted the Bollywood, loved its action flicks and some of the romantic ones too. Aishwarya Rai’s green eyes, her beautiful smile, the macho angry young man image of Amitabh Bachchan, his incredible role in a socialistic film “Main Azaad Hu”, the numerous hit songs that kept our tape recorders on for nights, now feels like an episode of the bygone era where my unsusceptible mind was exploited and I was cheated upon. These were all a part of a bigger lie, the lie that has been peddled since time immemorial to twist and tweak the young brains and make them believe in something that didn't even exist. 

These celebrities, who call themselves artists and may often sign petitions demanding an end to cruelty against animals, actually love blood of children spilt on the streets; they want the hapless people, whose country is aggressed by the foreign aggressors, to be enslaved and butchered. These filmstars betrayed a teenager fan very badly that night; the betrayal wounded his soul for loving and trusting the magnificent communication medium called films, especially those made by the really "inferior" Hindi and intrinsically Hindutva-incensed film industry. 

Bollywood showed the teenager fan within me, who loved those utterly romantic and thrilling films and their flawed actors - that the "Hindi film industry", which is actually filled with homogeneous narcissist people, with very little or negligible deviation, stands behind the very force that reduces the teenager to his immediate identity and then maligns that identity in a libellous fashion to instigate others to kill him. In a direct contrast to the behaviour exemplified the "politically correct" mature man in his mid-30s, the teenager howled that night due to the pain caused by the betrayal. His tears of redemption, came out when he repented loving the very Bollywood that now wants to kill him for his identity. He silently cried when the film stars danced to please a monster, welcoming him to the “Shalom Bollywood”, the event of Modi-fied India that glorified gory atrocities and genocides. "Shalom Bollywood" actually became - I am ashamed Bollywood. Tomorrow, the entire country will be ashamed of you and your power and money-hungry celebrities.