Let’s say this without cushioning:
India does not become pan-India because a producer says so at a press meet.
We have turned “pan-India” into a buzzword — an excuse, a blanket, a marketing shield.
Dub a film in four languages and suddenly it’s “for the whole nation”. Release posters in Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, and Hindi, and the PR team starts believing the hype they themselves created.
But the audience doesn’t care about your hype.
They care about their life.
A film becomes national only when it speaks to the man shaving customers at a small-town salon, the bus conductor handling chaos from morning till night, the young woman selling insurance policies under the harsh sun. If your cinema doesn’t touch their reality, it cannot claim India.
India’s heartbeat is not located in the multiplexes; it is in places where cinema is still an emotion, not an event.
Back in the ’80s, filmmakers travelled. They sat with the real audience. They listened. They learned.
Today, many filmmakers don’t even bother to step out of the airport lounge. Yet, they want to “represent India”.
That is why so many so-called pan-India films collapse at the box-office. They are designed for approval, not connection. For algorithms, not emotions. For trending, not truth.
India cannot be captured through one lens. India is contradictions, chaos, simplicity, aspiration, tradition, rebellion — all at once.
A film can only be called truly pan-India when it reaches the lowest common denominator — not in quality, but in universality. When people from Dharwad to Dibrugarh feel the same punch in their gut at the same scene. When the story touches the barber, the ticket conductor, the daily wager, the student, the dreamer, the struggler.
That connection cannot be marketed. It must be earned.
So before we call the next film “pan-India”, maybe we should remember one simple truth: Indian sentiments decide what becomes pan-India — not the producer, not the budget, not the length of the film, and certainly not the PR team.
– Kaibalya Mohanty