Shekhar Gupta: In Mulk, Indian Muslims look you in the eye

Anubhav Sinha's film breaks Bollywood's 'terrorist' mould for Indian Muslims and makes you feel the fears, dilemmas and frustrations of an ordinary Muslim family

One out of seven Indians is a Muslim. The 2021 census will see their numbers cross 200 million. Definitely, more than one out of seven of our best actors, music directors, lyricists, directors and technical artistes have always been Muslim. Yet, Muslims are rarely portrayed in Hindi cinema. And on the rare occasion when they do, they are either very good guys, or really bad ones. It is as if Bollywood has concluded that a “normal” Muslim, an equivalent of some Karan or Sameer or Raj or Rahul either doesn’t exist, or isn’t box office friendly. That is why Anubhav