Bollywood economics

Did you ever imagine getting insights into the Indian economy from Bollywood? If some of the recent books hitting the market are any indication, there is much to be learnt from approaching this vast arena of popular culture with a critical eye. Hindi films are not to be regarded merely as entertainment and escapism; they have a finger on the pulse of important shifts in the way that citizens and consumers live, aspire, transact, and define themselves.

Nikhil Menon, assistant professor in the Department of History at the University of Notre Dame, discusses how the film industry jumped in to back the Five-Year Plans critical to India’s vision of economic growth. His first book, published by Viking, is called Planning Democracy: How A Professor, An Institute and An Idea Shaped India (2022). The title refers to statistician Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis and the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata.

Dr Menon writes, “Plan-consciousness suffused Naya Daur (New Era), a movie directed by B R Chopra, whose oeuvre reflects an allegiance with the Nehruvian emphasis on democratic socialism and secularism.” Written by Akhtar Mirza, the film released in 1957, a year after the inauguration of the Second Five-Year Plan that emphasised large-scale industrialisation.

Shankar, the tongawalla played by Dilip Kumar in the film, says, “Jhagda toh haath aur machine ka hai” (the fight is between the hand and the machine). Dr Menon, therefore, identifies the film’s central theme as “the conflict between traditional employment and modern machinery”. He shows how Mirza and Chopra use Shankar to acknowledge “concerns about redundancy through mechanisation” and reinforce “an ultimately optimistic view of where the country was headed under the strategy adopted by the Second Five-Year Plan”.

Given the significance of music in Hindi films, it is not surprising that filmmakers chose to milk it for ideological reasons. Naya Daur is still remembered for the song “Saathi Haath Badhaana”, which Dr Menon describes as “an anthem and advertisement for democratic planning and rural community development”. It was written by Sahir Ludhianvi and sung by Mohammed Rafi and Asha Bhonsle. O P Nayyar composed the music for the entire album.

Do you remember “Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein”? The song that was written by Prem Dhawan and sung by Mukesh for Ram Mukherjee’s film Hum Hindustani (1960)? Usha Khanna composed the music. Dr Menon points out how it urges audiences to “take pride and take part in independent India’s economic progress” not only through the lyrics but also the visuals highlighting “the country’s march towards planned modernity through images of Nehru at a Congress session, the construction of hydroelectric dams, modern roads and cities, soaring fighter jets, trains forging ahead and factories with tall chimneys that plumed smoke.”

Many years before Dr Menon, social anthropologist Sanjay Srivastava wrote about “the Five-Year Plan hero” in his book Passionate Modernity: Sexuality, Class and Consumption in India (2007), published by Routledge. Dr Srivastava is of the opinion that this “FYP hero” derived legitimacy “through the Keynesian model of economic thought” by standing up for “government intervention” and “delayed gratification”.

Dr Srivastava links this specific construct of heroism to a model of “Indian masculinity” where the emphasis is on scientific temper and rationality.

This changes with the arrival of actor Shah Rukh Khan, as economist Shrayana Bhattacharya notes in her book Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India’s Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence (2021), published by Harper Collins India. She tracks how the characters that Mr Khan has played in each decade since the late 1980s reflect key themes in India’s post-independence journey — middle class morality, the quest for success, the need to defend family honour, single parenthood, overseas migration, diasporic identity, clashes between tradition and romantic freedom, and the anxiety of being a Muslim in India.

Ms Bhattacharya, who works at the World Bank, has interviewed women from Patna, Chandigarh, Delhi, Kolkata, Jaisalmer, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Lucknow to understand why Mr Khan represents the kind of desirable masculinity that makes them feel alive as sexual and political beings who want equal partnership, respect, and economic independence.

Journalist Kaveree Bamzai’s book The Three Khans: And the Emergence of New India (2021), published by Westland, expands the analysis beyond just one Bollywood superstar. She is interested in the careers of Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan and Salman Khan, all “products of Nehruvian socialism and its deep-rooted secularism” who came after “angry young man” Amitabh Bachchan. She traces the journeys of the Khans against the backdrop of liberalisation in 1991, the assertion of Hindutva, and the rise of multiplexes and social media.

Would the story of India’s economic growth look different if told through the lens of characters played by women in Hindi films, and the careers of women who work in Bollywood as actors, producers, directors, screenwriters, cinematographers, editors, choreographers, set designers, make-up artistes and body doubles? I think it would.