The society is never ashamed. Never. Of the various double standards it pets in the open.
In the midst of a highly misogynist statement by Congress supremo Rahul Gandhi(which the media did well to sweep under the mattress), a flurry of pretentious statements by Hardik Pandya inviting social media’s wrath unto him has shook the internet.
Before going ahead with the defence , some things need to be made clear,that this defence is not under the intoxication of being a fan. If anything, I am certainly not a fan or an admirer.
In the nation,where in a biopic of a criminal, where he brags that he has slept with 308 women and the audience cheering and clapping and later advocating for the criminal in the public space while making the movie a blockbuster becoming the 3rd highest grosser in the history of India cinema, statements like those made by Pandya should not shock us.
Aren’t we the same nation who glorified the romance of “Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge” ? The movie in which the male protagonist on his first meet with the heroine flirts with her in an isolated place, continuously despite she being uncomfortable and expressing the discomfort and scene ends with him lying with his head on his on her lap while she is protesting.
Aren’t we the same nation where “Ranjhana” was praised by old and young alike- a movie where the female protagonist accepts her lover’s advances after he had been stalking her everywhere for days,while she as disinterested throughout but later her disinterest faded away and she was “impressed” by his “consistency”?
In the nation where the teenagers are consistently fed with the idea that their culture is prudish and backward,Pandya’s statement shouldn’t be bothering us much. We have teenagers and young people all around behaving in a manner distancing themselves from their cultural upbringing and masquerading themselves as individuals who grew up in a sophisticated family and culture.
Yes-no doubt-there is a fine line between being broad-minded about sex and being a creep,but in India,the line is blurred and variable,being decided by the upper middle-class and middle-class few who vary this whenever and however they want by shaping the public opinion. You can’t,or I should say,you can but you shouldn’t be wearing lens of different colours to judge different people,or scenarios. If “Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge” was romance,if “Ranjhana” was romance, what’s wrong with Pandya’s statements?
Some of what Pandya said was,for sure, misogynist and sexist(and some part of it was just blown out of proportion) but can we blame him for it? Certainly not. Being in a society where we have cheered and clapped and rewarded creepy behaviour through movies, through stories and through the advertisement of a (western) culture which is as Liberal and broad-minded as it gets,when it comes to sex.
This isn’t just moral hypocrisy,this is also a tool used by the “educated” and “well-off” few to set themselves apart from the poor. This isn’t just that. This is modern hierarchy in India at work.
You glorify a certain kind of living. Unhindered romance. Hedonism. Promiscuity. Flirting. You tell the lower social status masses, very condescendingly,that their culture,their ways of life,their upbringing is inferior, backward and of no use. You don’t want to be associated with them at any cost.
This kind of attitude from the cream of the society exists everywhere,but more so in India due to its colonial hangover. In colonial times,as an Indian,if you wanted to be a successful and a power-wielding person,you needed to stand apart from the “brown” scum of the society. To collect taxes properly, you needed to be harsh and have no sense of brethren towards your people. The British furthered cemented this idea by following disrespectful practices which treated anybody with Indian ways inferior and hence to be in good sight of their white overlords, the elites were careful to stay away in an sophisticated fashion. The British went away. They left the system,for these elite cream of society,who was brown in skin but white in manners. There was widespread condescension for the native way in the Indian elite circle and this condescension trickled down to the lower classes who looked upto these English – educated elites as more cultured and sophisticated.
Even after the British went away,the system of class-narcissim has stayed,for reasons it is present almost everywhere else in the world – insecurity of these elites that they will be dethroned and replaced by those below. These people read in the newspaper rags-to-riches stories of the uncultured folks replacing those which have been rich by family heritage. Also,making other view you as superior has other benefits in politics too as it leads to slaving the mind.As elaborated by German sociologist Mark Weber ,if you view someone as a social superior, that person will have power over you because you believe that person has a higher status than you do. Hence,to set themselves apart and superior,the cream of the society they launch a smear campaign to demean the ways of the masses.
Deviating a little,before proceeding ahead, a question must be asked: in the modern Indian context of 2018,who are the elites? So the answer is : in the Indian context,where 99.68% of the population live at less than ₹5,50,000(₹5.5 lakhs) per annum,you are an elite if,at home,you use an unsubsidized gas cylinder[the ceiling for subsidy is household with annual income ₹12,00,000(₹12 lakhs).] Even this is a liberal definition since the majority 99% happen to be earning less than half of the floor of the cream I have defined. So, knowing what kind of a reader base I have,more often than not,you are an elite – one of those I am speaking about). Although this is true to a large extent,but a person who was poor before and got rich in recent history is still not counted as an “elite”(old money)but as Nouveau Riche.
But soon,the masses catch up to the cream and start practicing in the same way as them. Then,the well-off go into a mode of condescension again labelling the behaviour with all sorts of innuendos,smearing them,not realising that they were the ones who advertised and practised this behaviour while beating their chest not very long ago.
There was a time only the well-off educated elites used English and English was the cool stuff. If you knew English,you are an intellectual force to reckon. It is still true in some areas,but in urban areas where the number of English speakers increased[who learnt English to get the a higher social status],there was an interesting trend in the higher spectrum of the social hierarchy- they started. This is a fine example of such a system in the society. We all can think of someone learning French.
This is visible in Pandya’s interview with Karan Johar and the nonsensical response it got from the elite and their wannabes. In a sense,Pandya is a wannabe himself behaving in a manner to imitate these elites. By virtue of being a Nouveau Riche, he behaves in such a manner characteristic of the old money ,to get acceptance into their social order. On being asked by Karan Johar,what is his favourite pick-up line, he responds that he likes introducing himself as “Hardick” to girls at bars. Is these indecent and creepy? Maybe,but it depends on the context. Pick-up lines are,by various definitions in the Urban dictionary(Using Urban Dictionary for a very specific reason) is is a conversation opener with the intent of engaging an unfamiliar person for sex, romance, or dating.
s a conversation or a
opener with the intent of engaging an unfamiliar person for sex, romance, or dating,or simply a line you use to get women.
These pick-up lines are generally humourous and if used at a social setting like a bar(same place where Ed Sheeran wanders to find a lover and where his lover asks him to “grab on my waist and put that body on me“),this isn’t indecent or creepy.
When the elites use pick-up lines,its progressive but when the Nouveau Riche or the poor and uncultured masses do it, it is being a creep.
Hardik Pandya talks in his interview how he watches girls move. This is creepy. For sure. But as a nation we have set the mark exactly that way. Stalking girls is romance. Be it the Indian movies which we cheered at,or,the heroes we have glorified. These ideals were romanticised. Everyone wanted to flirt,like they see in movies. They were the goals a hormonal teenager watching them would set?
An interesting example will be the modern Masterclass of Hindi cinema,”Masan”. This didn’t find a room with the masses ,but hit a chord which saw it as a metaphor of life and a very romantic tale in the ancient city of Benares. It is very good. As good as it gets. One of my favourite movies. But,it still didn’t stop me from noticng a somewhat creepy being romanticised. Deepak Kumar,the protagonist,played by the impeccable Vicky Kaushal, prints down the facebook page of the girl(Shalu,played by Shweta Tripathi). No,not even the pictures. He takes colour prints of her Facebook page. It doesn’t stop there. He follows her and her friends on a bike. A girl being trailed,or we can say stalked, seems right out of some crime based movie,but the movie shows that the boy is behind the girl’s rickshaw in a very non-threatening manner and the girl is getting flattered. Imagine what impression a boy will get ? Stalking or trailing a girl is romantic. So,as a nation,if you romanticise scenes like these from “DDLJ”,”Ranjhana”,”Masan”, how much of a right we have to say that what Pandya thinks as romantic is creepy? We are part of the problem.
Finally,yes,I reiterate some part of what Pandya said and does is creepy. Ignorance of law is no excuse. But,does he deserve the fury he has been recieving for speaking what does when the bubble around us and him as presented it as absolutely normal? And this argument is true for everything controversial he said. From his promiscuity to his loose outlook of sex.
While some part of what he said is part of the normal milenial culture and has been blown out of proportion for no reason.
And the 2-match ban is absolutely unnecessary. His sins were not that big to warrant a 2-match suspension. Not at all. Funny because the BCCI CoA who banned him is an ex-IAS and CAG of 2-G,where all the accused went scot free after years of investigation.
Nemonia 