Bollywood film is a hit-- and so, again, is Gandhi

Comedy inspires new generation of Indians to embrace philosophy of spiritual leader

October 30, 2006|By Kim Barker, Tribune foreign correspondent

NEW DELHI — With his round glasses, homespun white cloth and walking stick, the father of India has hardly been fashionable with the jet-setting, jeans-wearing urban Indian youth of today.

But a new Bollywood movie, a comedy about a thug, a radio disc jockey and Mahatma Gandhi, has turned into one of the biggest hits of the year and made Gandhi suddenly hip.

Inspired by the hit movie, Indians are increasingly embracing his philosophy, staging non-violent protests, starting Web sites, handing out roses to enemies and putting on peaked white caps from the Gandhi era. His face beams from trendy T-shirts. Bumper stickers proclaim his pithy aphorisms, such as "Truth is God."

"We forgot that man all these years, and everything went haywire," said Varsha Das, director of the Gandhi National Museum, a dusty repository for everything from Gandhi's dentures to his foot-cleaning stone. "I very strongly feel there is absolutely no other way to change society but through Gandhi. We have reached the peak of the mountain, as far as violence and corruption are concerned."

The movie, "Lage Raho Munna Bhai," or "Carry On Munna Bhai," is bringing a street-smart, simplified version of Gandhi into fashion, a guy comfortable shadowing a low-level mob don and understanding Mumbai slang.

It's a comedy about Munna Bhai, a gangster in the business hub of Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay, who falls in love with the voice of a radio disc jockey and decides to win a Gandhi radio quiz show to meet her. Dance scenes, gags involving Gandhi professors, sentimental music, Gandhi's spirit, weddings and non-violent protests follow. The main song in the movie repeatedly proclaims "Gandhi had guts."

In a key part, Munna Bhai leads a protest against a cruel landlord by sending him flowers and holding up signs urging him to "get well soon." By the movie's end, the hero wins the girl, and the actor playing Gandhi is busy teaching the landlord his philosophy.

Indians are seeing the movie over and over. Recently a boy took his 70-year-old grandmother, who saw Gandhi in person when she was a child. Parents took their children. People left the movie talking about how cool Gandhi was and how they wanted to follow him.

`You think more positively'

"You are pumped up with many things," said Rohit Vij, 22, a graduate student in marketing who has seen the movie twice. "You're motivated. You think more positively, and that's important, as we are kind of living in a very negative world."

Tara Gandhi Bhattacharjee, Gandhi's granddaughter, who has not yet seen the movie, said she had not heard one negative comment about it.

"My grandson who's almost 15 said it's a fantastic movie," said Bhattacharjee, adding that she wanted to congratulate the filmmaker. "He said, `I had not known Gandhi before, but this film brought him alive to me.'"

Gandhi helped lead India to independence in 1947 from British rule through his non-violence movement. His statue overlooks many traffic circles.

But his relevance and message of simplicity and self-sacrifice in gadget-driven modern India often are questioned.

Not one student signed up for a recent postgraduate class on Gandhi at Bangalore University. At a re-creation last year of his famous 1930 salt march, most of the core participants were foreigners. Museums dedicated to him have been like forgotten tombs.

Officials regularly demand bribes for the most basic services, such as setting up a new telephone number. Police demand money from drivers to avoid tickets. This month, anti-corruption advocates Transparency International ranked India as the most corrupt country worldwide in its annual Bribe Payers Index.

Since the movie came out about a month ago, some Indians have started imitating its vision of Gandhi's teachings, dubbed "Gandhigiri," Hindi slang for spreading Gandhi's philosophy. The health minister of India, criticized for not taking a dengue fever crisis seriously enough, recently visited a hospital in New Delhi to meet dengue patients. He was greeted by students and doctors carrying bouquets of red roses and holding "get well soon" posters.

Political candidates in the northern city of Gorakhpur have started wearing Gandhi caps and preaching about non-violence and truth. A leading politician with the Congress Party, to which Gandhi belonged, has urged Congress leaders to see the film and return to their roots. In the northern city of Lucknow, people demonstrated against two liquor stores near a Hindu temple by handing out roses and letters of complaint. The police, who had not yet caught the spirit, arrested the protesters.

A real gangster in Lucknow handed out bouquets of roses and talked about peace and love at a court hearing linking him to murders and kidnappings.

Gandhigiri clubs have been set up in some cities to curb reckless drivers and corrupt officials by handing them flowers.