Kamal Hassan’s recently-released Vishwaroopam has landed in a big controversy in Tamil Nadu and the film has been slapped a two-week ban in his home state Tamil Nadu few days ago. It is alleged that as the subject of the film deals with the world favorite topic these days i.e., “Islamic Terrorism” and that the main villain in the movie is named Omar (many refers it to Taliban’s Mullah Omar), the Muslims have protested against the release of the film in the state. And now, there is a rumour that even Uttar Pradesh is set to ban the movie soon because, the authorities there think that it had the potential to hurt Muslim emotion there.
A handful of men who are driven by their own political interest are appearing before the media apparently as the representatives of the community. What these men are saying about the film before the media are not always enough what Muslim masses think about it. It is of utmost importance that we offer the Muslim viewpoint on the entire subject. Most of the people protesting against the film have not seen the film as it is not released there as yet. But on the basis of whatever little we have read about the film, we are sure that the movie is based on terrorism, and “Al Qaida” does form an integral part of the storyline with ‘Omar” as one of the evil protagonists. Now the issue is: is the name of Omar or the interwoven reference to Al Qaida or the terrorist shown offering namaaz or reading the Quran objectionable? No absolutely not. It is no secret that Al Qaida is an Islam-based organization which has indulged in evil activities, and in that case it should not be bothersome to us at all.
Just like all members of the groups that killed Mahatma Gandhi, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi happened to be Hindus and Sikhs. But we can never say that all Hindus or Sikhs are terrorists. There are noble and evil people existing in all communities. However, in recent times Islamic Terrorism has become the favorite topic with the film-makers globally.
But then there are other angles to the controversy as well which are equally important to be mentioned here. As some say the trouble started brewing earlier when Kamal Hassan’s big gamble to screen the film simultaneously on (Direct to Home) DTH services came to the limelight. Apparently, he struck a deal with several DTH operators which would have made it possible to screen Vishwaroopam on DTH on the same day as its theatrical release. As soon as one leading distributor came to know about Kamal Hassan’s new distribution model, he alerted other theatre owners across Tamil Nadu. Others put in that Kamal Hassan declined the copyrights offer from a famous south Indian satellite channel, thus antagonizing some powerful people in Tamil Nadu. There is a third version too that goes like on December 30 at a function down south Kamal Hassan admired Mr.P.Chidambaram’s efficiency as a politician and said that he was fit to become the prime minister of the country. Although how efficient Mr Chidambaram would be as the PM is a subject for a bigger debate, the fact is the comment by Mr Hassan has certainly not gone down well with some powerful politicians on the other side.
But whatever the reasons be, the community feels in the absence of proper leadership amongst the Muslims, they are made scapegoats in all cases and have turned as the favorite punching bag for the pseudo-nationalists who tend to undermine the glaring fact that no religious community is synonymous with terrorism and so the Muslims must not be seen through the prejudiced spectrum as some filmmakers and others are doing.
There have been incidents where a colonel-ranking Hindu officer was found ganging up with some Hindu religious people in terrorist attacks against Muslim targets by India’s National Investigation Agency. In many attacks those terrorists, who included even one Hindu nun, interestingly posed as Muslims, I wonder, why no filmmaker has shown interest in this subject of Hindu terrorism as yet. Frankly speaking many films have been made on Islamic terrorism and the theme has become hackneyed. On the other hand, Hindu terrorism (http://www.indianexpress.com/news/joining-the-dots/1068448/) is rather new and films based on this theme could be very interesting, I think....
http://www.kashmirmonitor.org/kashmonitor/02062013-ND-controversy-surrounding-%E2%80%9Cvishwaroopam%E2%80%9D%E2%80%A6-41589.aspx
http://www.milligazette.com/news/6300-kamal-hassans-vishwaroopam
Please follow the link to talk show (I attended) on NDTV INDIA's Prime Time of 31/01/2013 on the same issue....
http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/prime-time/video-story/263638?fb_action_ids=553375484682244&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=timeline_og&action_object_map=%7B%22553375484682244%22%3A345766705537210%7D&action_type_map=%7B%22553375484682244%22%3A%22og.recommends%22%7D&action_ref_map=%5B%5D&code=AQDxUwEAFQMDV2k7rhPw_3gi8L2lsOx1o0kLPXavlwM7tTMML-YPL8u0tPCs0dwegx-B8LIadcVgTFfxEJcTUS3lnKyW4OOazd7U3tIgcG34pAu_-bwQQim3gQ9oASY1D4_GgSxpbMiPrkwDj1w2gtzq7SUEvJGkaS01iLV-ct7ygnQI5e7nMVNNPtknuwSd7uxBzRYPuiqIFtDr55bvcdU8#_=_
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