Jai Ho Slumdog, Danny Boyle, secular India

Saudamini Acharya

India must hail Oscars for “Slumdog Millionaire” and Smile Pinki and its non-Indian director, producers. For some time before the Oscars these two films, especially Slumdog has been discussed as not being an Indian movie. It has been criticised as portraying India in a bad light by showing ist dirty underbelly. Majority of the critics come from Bollywood, the local film industry and are big names here. Let’s listen to some of their arguments. Amitabh Bachhan, India’s most adorable movie star said Oscar is not the ultimate destination for any film and had it not been for a British filmmaker, Slumdog wouldn’t have achieved such success. He may be true, but only partially. True, Slumdog exposes India’s poverty, inhuman living, and suffering children. But would one say this doesn’t happen in India. Yes it does and should be brought to global focus. This film is not a shame for the country rather is a tool which will eradicate some inequality in our society. True, Danny Boyle didn’t cast big Indian stars in the film, but he did something with real Indian stars, the kids of the Dharavi slums in Mumbai and the vulnerable strugglers Dev Patel and Freida Pinto. He chose one big name from India, Alla Rakha Rahman, who was needed for printing the emotion of Indian slums on a global scale.
Boyle made India proud by taking the service of Rahaman and Rasool Pookutty, two Indian Muslims for his film. Both of them shined and applauded by the billion plus Indians, of which more than 80 percent are Hindu. “This is a Shiv ratree (a Hindu religious festival) gift,” in after winning Oscars. Through this Boyle managed to tell the world about India’s secular fabric effectively. Boyle still did more he got the kids from the slum to walk the red carpet, which most Indian actors dream of. Jai Ho (two Hindi words which mean let’s hail) became the global entertainment anthem for 2009. What more do we need? India and we Indians dreamt of Oscar for years. We finally got it. We should be happy rather than cribbing. Jai Ho Danny Boyle.
(Saudamini Acharya is a Mumbai-based writer)