Bollywood has finally woken up from its slumber and knocked the doors of the court to safeguard its name, reputation and image, all of which had been tarnished (like never before) in the aftermath of the unfortunate and untimely demise of Sushant Singh Rajput on June 14 this year. While most television news channels, social media platforms and even 95% of the film journalists (who thrive on Bollywood and its celebrities) lost no time in churning out unsubstantiated and juicy gossip about Bollywood, describing it with such words as “gutter”, “filthy” and “industry of drug addicts”, and its people, with words like “mafia”, “underworld”, “murderers” and “drug addicts”, Film Information was one of the very very few voices which stood in support of the industry and relentlessly wrote against the unfair media trials and unsubstantiated nonsense which was being passed off as news. Whether online (on this website) or on your editor’s YouTube videos, Film Information has been waging a relentless war against the electronic and social media which, for its own ulterior motives, was busy painting Bollywood and its people black.
Today, with Bollywood having taking legal recourse against the villains of the piece, Information feels vindicated that its wake-up calls to Bollywood and its stars did not go to waste. Of course, Bollywood can never stoop to the level which some of the news channels stooped to during the media trial they were conducting in the Sushant Singh Rajput death case, but it would make for a good psychological study if there were now at least one channel which would give a cooked-up account of what Arnab Goswami and Pradeep Bhandari of Republic TV, and Rahul Shivshankar and Navika Kumar of Times Now will be reduced to in court. Imaginary stuff, masaledaar stories, juicy gossip, inside accounts — all written by Bollywood’s own screenplay writers and aired by this one channel. Only then will the four ‘guilty’ (is it alright to call them guilty? I think so, because that’s the journalism they propagated in the last last four months!) know the correct meaning of vilification.
On its part, the industry should not sit back, now that it has filed a court case against Republic TV, Times Now and some other channels. This is only one part of its fight. The film industry needs to boycott the entire media groups and houses which these channels represent. It would, for instance, be pathetic if the same production houses, which have signed the court petition, were to be seen participating in, say, the Awards function of one of the defendant media group’s gossip magazine next year. Playing good cop, bad cop is a game the media is adept at. While one arm of the media group can be atrociously critical of the film industry and needlessly so, the other can be absolutely patronising just so that the stars continue to make their appearances on the channels and in the magazine pages of the media house, and Bollywood advertisements don’t dry up for the media house. This one time, Bollywood must show that it cannot be bullied, and its reputation cannot be sullied. All these channels will come to their senses once Bollywood patronage stops. In India, films and cricket sell. Without film stars and Bollywood films, these media houses will realise their true worth. They have been thriving on Bollywood for years, and they lost no time in condemning the same Bollywood and its people, that too, without substantiated facts or figures. Nothing of what Republic TV or Times Now said about Bollywood or its people has been proven in the investigations by the CBI, NCB or the ED. But reputations have been destroyed, careers have been harmed, lives had almost been taken. Bollywood cannot forget this in a hurry. It is never advisable to hold grudges, but this one time, Bollywood must not forgive so easily and never forget. Bollywood would also do well to not forget those journalists and photographers who work for magazines and portals/websites/radio channels which revelled in writing/airing horrific stories about the film industry and its celebrities — again without any proof whatsoever. Stars would for their own good do well to not forget those YouTubers who thought, they had hit pay dirt after Sushant’s death, by uploading loathe-worthy and disgusting videos about them and about Bollywood. Stars and producers need to realise that every article and every wrong word about Bollywood went a long long way in ruining the reputation of the film industry. If you don’t believe this, take a look at the negative comments on YouTube for the trailer of Laxmmi Bomb. It doesn’t need a film trade analyst or film reviewer or film critic to say that the film’s trailer is wonderful, that going by the trailer, it can be predicted that the film would’ve hit bull’s eye if it were released in the cinemas in normal times. But yet, if people have posted nasty comments under the video, it is because of the negativity towards Bollywood, created in the last four months by TV news channels, social media, film journalists and press photographers. Most of the wrong-doers have thus far thrived on Bollywood.
Strangely, while Bollywood and its associations and production houses have gone after the media, they have spared the handful of people who instigated the media circus in the first place. They seem to be targeting the intermediaries while letting its own people go scot-free for starting the filthy campaign against Bollywood. Something is still wrong, very wrong. This is war. Half-hearted measures will not work. If Bollywood needs to become the happy place it was before June 14 — and yes, IT WAS a superbly happy place — it needs to rid itself of all the negativity around and within it. No shortcuts will work.
And yes, the 5% film journalists who kept their principles and morals intact cent per cent during the last four months… they need to celebrate today. And they need to be celebrated today!