Editorial: Play it again, Sam

Telangana witnessed the rare occurrence last week of a minister in the state government, owning up to a slanderous statement and apologising to the aggrieved party, a popular film actress. While it is only a straw to clutch at, it is a welcome example of two things: of artistes being unafraid to speak their minds to the powerful, and of women in the film industry standing up for themselves. While shooting off her mouth at political adversary KT Rama Rao, endowments minister Konda Surekha made asinine remarks about the divorce of Samantha Ruth Prabhu, and Rakul Preet Singh’s alleged drug addiction. Both actresses were engaged as brand ambassadors by the Bharat Rashtra Samithi regime that ruled Telangana until last year.

The insensitive remarks triggered a backlash from the film fraternity and women activists. Samantha’s peers spoke out against this intrusion into her privacy, while her former husband and his influential family sent notice of a suit to the minister. But the most eloquent defence came from the actress herself. In a social media post telling the minister to mind her own business, she said, “To be a woman, to come out and work, to survive in a glamorous industry where women are more often than not treated as props, to fall in love & to fall out of love, to still stand up and fight... It takes a lot of courage and strength.”

Such was the recoil that the Congress high command took notice of Surekha’s statement, and the state president of the party persuaded her to publicly eat her words, which she did unconditionally. Samantha has won a point for women in Telugu films—a welcome one but it was an easy score. It does not make a revolution. While she has received wide support from Prabhas, Mahesh Babu, Allu Arjun, NTR Jr and Chiranjeevi, the sentiment is no more than a nod to the influential family she was married into. It’s patriarchy standing up for patriarchy, really. Such courtesies might not have been extended to Samantha had she no association with a family of privilege, and indeed have not been afforded to Rakul Preet Singh, who has reason to feel just as injured by Surekha’s calumny.

Women in a different context or of a different status would find Tollywood to be the epitome of male patriarchies, with zero regard for modern gender correctness. Not so long ago, Radhika Apte spoke of it as the film industry she struggled the most with, an industry “that is so patriarchal, male dominant and chauvinistic, that it is unbearable.” Everything in it, the content of its productions, the conduct of its stars and impresarios, its defining spirit, is the result of a relentless 360-degree male gaze. Last week, parallel to the Surekha-Samantha episode, we witnessed the arrest of choreographer Jani Master, charged with sexual assault under the POCSO Act. His National Film Award was subsequently suspended by the I&B Ministry.

Tollywood has never had a #MeToo moment and is in dire need of a Hema Committee. A group of women artistes did form within the industry back in 2018, inspired by Kerala’s Women in Cinema Collective. It submitted a report to the government on the treatment of women and issues like pay parity, but the regime kept it under wraps. It wasn’t until a leading star like Samantha tweeted about it that its existence became public. Straws in the wind, but well done, Samantha.