There are moments in history when the only correct answer to the question: “Are you Muslim?” is a quiet “Yes”. Those are moments of truth, and moments in solidarity. Instants in which a gruff policeman asks you that question, after calling you a jihadi-terrorist for protesting against certain discriminatory laws; or when there is only a very slightly embarrassed pause in dinner conversation, where they’ve been holding forth on Muslims’ propensity towards crime and general disorder. It doesn’t do to giggle apologetically and agree, ‘nobody on this table is that kind of Muslim.’
When those things still held some cultural capital, sometimes you would say in response: “only culturally Muslim”, to indicate that you were not a hijab-wearing Muslim, but rather the gharara-owning, aadab-saying, wine drinking, fine dining, Faiz quoting one. Alas, those signifiers of elitism are also all cut down to size now.
In the eponymous film, there is a moment when Pathaan is asked if he is Muslim. One answer could have been a simple ‘Yes’ (from Dilli, or from any old provincial town in UP or Bihar, if he had wanted to further elaborate). Or he might even have come from lower Assam, worrying about his family having to commandeer papers to show to the Tribunal. His family could have been tanners in Kanpur, weavers in Banaras, farmers in Murshidabad, or business owners in Chennai, each with their particular set of ‘Muslim problems’. And he might even have added, “Baqrid to khair ab kya hogi, magar Muharram bohat zabardast hota hai. Kya Soz parha jaata hai; kya juloos nikalta hai”.
The invocation of provincial Muharram would have ticked all the boxes for syncretism and inclusive nationalism. Additionally, it might have served to throw the Pakistani spy who quite superfluously wanted to know whether Pathaan was Muslim. It would have established a safe distinction between ISI Muslim and Shia Muslim. In the event, Pathaan chooses more kosher forms of inclusiveness: its hero is born without a religion, or history and political context; brought up in national togetherness, and much later in life adopted by a Pathaan village in Afghanistan.
Although, traditionally, Eid (much like Holi) is spent at home, as in ‘watan’ – you’d see the last stragglers, and students, and migrant workers catching the last train or bus home on ‘chand raat’ – he spends Eid in Afghanistan. Pathaan is probably sentimentally Muslim. Which would in normal times be as good a Muslim as any other, I suppose.
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Outside of the present political context, the ambiguity around Pathaan’s religious identity is just fine. It’s a good thing in fact, when such ambiguity allows you to form solidarities with other marginalised identities, or even when it gives you space to distinguish yourself from those within your own religion, whose politics you might disagree with.
The present context
I have argued elsewhere that our present political context has successfully delegitimised certain political identities and articulations as ‘anti-national’. Acceptable citizen action is redrawn as one that does not overtly identify itself with any ‘Muslim cause’, but has a working relationship with majoritarian sentiments.
Take for instance the prosecution’s case against Umar Khalid, which is based solely on the delegitimisation of certain counterpublics. Thus Khalid and his ‘co-conspirators’, who organised protests against the CAA-NRC legal regime are accused of having deliberately mobilised Muslim protestors, after suggesting to them that certain policies of the present government were discriminatory and must be challenged on the streets. There were other participants at the street protests, but they were brought in only to provide “secular cover, gender cover and media cover” to the ‘Muslim critical mass’[…] In creating, a ‘critical mass’ of Muslim protestors they communalised the political space and excited violence.”
In popular imagination, the counter-mobilisation to quell the protests, supported by the state and by majoritarian sentiments have never been identified as ‘Hindu political mass’. In fact, the counter protest are popularly seen as an organic, ‘nationalist response’, which sought to clear the streets of anti-nationals. The formation of ‘Muslim political identities’ thus disturbs the inclusive fabric, while the counterforce, Hindu majoritarianism is the corrective.
I couldn’t help but notice that Pathaan’s superior officer did not carry the same burden of having to be evasive about identity and context that Pathaan did. She was Hindu, had a family (whom she evidently neglected in the line of duty), was secular and inclusive, and most important, a healer of all broken souls. She is a good woman, and isn’t located in the dystopian frames of the present that I have described above. She is very likely Nehruvian, but yet her religious identity ( which is revealed in a prominent way towards the end) is able to segue lightly into inclusive nationalism. In fact, in an ironical inversion of the history of wars, the post-nationalist lines are all delivered by the evil, deranged and very violent villain, whereas the heroes positively thrive in their national identities, even when cooperating with each other, and work towards peace within the nation-state framework.
Pathaan and the Bharat Jodo Yatra
A similar criticism about evasion of marginalised identities may also be levelled at the Bharat Jodo Yatra. Sagar, writing in the Caravan says:
“Gandhi classifies the victims of this hatred and violence in terms of identities such as farmers, the youth and the owners of small businesses. Such categorisation, which may strike a chord with Savarna voters, allows him to escape taking a stand on the hate crimes that have proliferated during the tenure of the Modi government, whose victims— Dalits, Adivasis and Muslims—find themselves absent from his narrative.[…] By putting these identities on the same pedestal as those who have borne the brunt of the BJP’s hatred and violence, Gandhi fails to acknowledge that marginalised communities continue to face atrocities, humiliation and discrimination, or to provide a political vision that would alleviate this misery.”
There is no doubt that both Pathaan and the BJY operate in the realm of the affective. Hartosh Singh Bal did mention the ‘deafening silence’ during the Yatra, on the 39th anniversary of the Sikh Genocide, even as it marched to establish a narrative of peace. It marched through North Eastern Delhi, which had seen the worst violence in the aftermath of the anti-CAA protests, and it also paid obeisance at the Harmandir Sahib. There was an affective symbolism there for those that it appeals to without getting into explanations and apologies.
Also read: Does Pathaan’s Phenomenal Success Mark the Start of a Pushback Against Hate?
The BJY and Pathaan have both managed to quietly project love. There has been popular and easy support for an affective politics, which is not so much in your face. Even the Supreme Court of India has adopted this approach while hearing the ‘hate speech cases’: the bench often appeals to civilisational virtues, and makes an affective pitch for love, and away from the politics of hate. Both sides, the victims and the state that is allegedly in breach of its duty to protect the victim, nod in agreement. Only, with time, and without any effective orders thus far, the victims’ nods are getting less vigorous.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi waves at supporters during the Bharat Jodo Yatra, in Kota, Thursday, Dec. 8, 2022. Photo: PTI
Pathaan too was received with vigour perhaps proportionate to how much one feels in the line of fire. It has been argued that even as the character Pathaan’s origins are kept ambiguous, he really only mirrors Shahrukh Khan’s life. Of course Pathaan is Muslim, and in a clever reference to Khan himself, was nurtured by the traditionally open film industry. Yet when Shahrukh Khan spoke in his personal capacity at the press conference later and called Deepika, John and himself, Amar, Akbar and Anthony, that was a more straightforward answer, akin to a ‘yes’, than the film offers. It is conceivable that he has felt very much more directly exposed to hate, and chose to speak overtly, beyond the poetic ambiguities and the affective signalling in the film.
Pathaan has been variously described as cleverly subversive, a nationalist project, and also as a Shahrukh Khan spectacle, which should be seen for what it is, without demanding from it any overt progressive politics. Of course, an intuitive politics of love has its uses, but when it is articulated as an actual politics of equal participation, it is even better. It validates the more overt struggles and builds solidarities.
I don’t think it’s unfair to expect good politics from films either: I rather think Pathaan is expecting it from us.
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Towards the end, in a scene where the hero finally vanquishes the villain, he says that a good soldier never asks what the country has done for him, but focuses instead on what he might do for his country. At first blush, it sounds very much the statist discourse on how duties are more important than rights, but Pathaan is a clever film. It struck me that it could also be a call for more participation, from those pushed to the margins now. To not become despondent and withdraw, to not give up on home. There was another film of his: Phir bhi dil hai Hindustani, where he sang: “dil dukha hai lekin, toota toh nahin hai; Ummeed ka daaman choota toh nahin hai…”
If the film is indeed making a plea to all good people to not withdraw from civil spaces in dejection and despair, it will not be disappointed. Nobody gives up on home easily. Especially, not lovers. You’ll see them at every opportunity to push back tyrants. You’d know them from their lack of cynicism, and from their innocent belief that there is a fair political playing ground available to all.
Shahrukh Alam is a lawyer who practices in Delhi.
This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire & Galileo Ideas – and has been republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.
