Finally, Pakistani hero gets the girl

By Kamran Rehmat/Islamabad

Finding love…on reel: Ali Zafar with Aditi Rao Hydari shooting for London Paris New York

Make love not war. It is a much bandied cliche in the context of India and Pakistan. Certainly, foreign wires never fail to point out the dark underbelly in padding up stories with the insertion “the two neighbours have fought three wars”.  It amused expat Indians and Pakistanis like myself living in the Gulf no end until a fourth in 1999 tanked the good neighbourly tilt a bit. Figuratively, it allowed the likes of Sunny Deol to unleash his feared dhai kilo ka haath (a much indulged heavy hand — weighing approximately, 2.5kg) in a frenzied depiction of patriotic current. The detente so-to-speak was provided by Yash Chopra’s Veer-Zaara, an Indo-Pak love story, that not only won rave reviews but also record business, proving in a classic sense that love pips war - famously described by John Milton in a letter to Cromwell thus: Peace hath her victories no less renowned than war.However, while this genre has sold better, Pakistanis often wonder why this kind of Bollywood juice ends up being framed with gender roles remaining static: an Indian boy “getting the Pakistani girl”. Even in Veer-Zaara - the best-selling Indo-Pak love story of all time, the Indian hero wins the domineering sympathy vote for his tribulations. All Pakistanis in the film were played by Indians, including the pretty heroine (Preity Zinta).Even the 1991 Raj Kapoor romantic flick Henna starred his son Rishi Kapoor in the male lead opposite Pakistani Zeba Bakhtiar.The real life love story of Shoaib Malik, a Pakistani cricketer, and Sania Mirza, an Indian tennis star, meanwhile finds no takers even though the general consensus is that it offers an ideal script, not in the least for real life drama before the nuptials. Pakistanis reckon it is because the gender role, in this instance, is reversed. Amusing as this sounds — there is no other way to describe the rather filmy fulmination — there is now an interesting pairing in this month’s release London Paris New York, a rom-com which, for the first time in Bollywood history, has a Pakistani male lead and an Indian female as his heroine. However, it is not a love story scripted with the India-Pakistan angle. A pity, some feel, given their chemistry — as is evident in several promos and pressers where Aditi Rao Hydari, she of the royal ancestry, can’t take her adoring eyes — and hands — off Ali Zafar, the consummate artiste from Lahore, who writes, composes, sings, acts, models and paints.  Simply put, there’s quite no-one like Ali in Bollywood and it’s a cinch if he gets a decent run, he’ll knock off a few perched at the top.      What is not in doubt though are the feel-good vibes emanating from the latest twist to the Indo-Pak frame, which of course, cannot be said of films used as a propaganda tool in the past to justify war actions. It is instructive that war movies haven’t produced the kind of subtlety that would induce an objective interest amongst serious viewers. But that hasn’t stopped filmmakers from blowing up the trumpet in the line of patriotism.Despite a concerted effort to seek how Pakistani filmmakers have fared in the propaganda stakes, one could come across only a few names: Maujaza (Urdu) and Parohna (Punjabi). Neither made waves but the latter is known for hit numbers by Melody Queen Noor Jehan, some of which like Meriah Dhol Spahyiah and Mera Mahi Chail Chabeela assumed legendary status. These patriotic songs during the 1965 war struck an emotional chord with the masses. Like Pakistan, filmmakers in India, too, haven’t quite been able to set the box office alight even though some of them have spared the kind of budgets simply beyond the imagination of their counterparts this side of the Indus.The first such noticeable flick was the1973 Raj Kumar starrer Hindustan Ki Kassam. The movie revolved around the Indian Air Force’s mission of destroying a Pakistan Air Force radar, which blocked IAF pilots radios in combat. The Indian intelligence plants Tahira (played by Priya Rajvansh), who is the fiancee of a PAF pilot (Amjad Khan). Tahira goes to Pakistan and starts working as a singer in a Pakistan Television studio (where the radar, which jams the radio frequency of IAF jets, is also kept)! Tahira informs the IAF about the jammer. IAF asks her to leave the building in the night after her programme is done so that they can raid the building.PAF’s counter intelligence finds out about her and so zero in on her that very night. As soon her programme is finished the IAF air raids the studio while she is still inside. In the dogfight with Pakistani Sabers, Raj Kumar’s jet is destroyed and he crashes. He radios for help and the IAF fighters destroy the pursuing Pakistan soldiers and their vehicles. Lo and behold! the pilot and Tahira are evacuated.However, the 1997 hit Border proved to be an exception to the rule. The plot revolved around the Battle of Longewala in Rajasthan and is inspired by Director J P Dutta’s own feelings for a brother he lost in 1987 when his Mig crashed. The movie shows many soldiers being killed. However, in real life, the defenders at Longewala lost only two soldiers!Unfortunately, Border was not without its share of mishaps, when 60 cinegoers died during a show when a fire broke out in a New Delhi cinema.To give the devil its due, one song in the movie — Ghar wapis kab aao gay — continues to melt audiences on either side of the border, thanks to its universal appeal for soldiers who leave their soil to fight for their motherland.Kargil provided enough fodder to induce at least two war flicks including LoC Kargil and the Hrithik Roshan-starrer Lakshya.Mushier stories replaced propaganda wars on the reel once the peace process was resumed in 2004, resulting at one stage in the great Naseeruddin Shah refusing to play the villain in the blockbuster Main Hoon Na because the role required him to badmouth Pakistan! However, it has been some time since the last bud bloomed. Meanwhile, Bollywood has become a richer place to be for Pakistani artistes — particularly, singers who have carved a niche for themselves. There was a time when late maestro Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan was the only one raising a fever pitch but now there’s a steady stream and they are quite literally making themselves heard.*** The writer is a freelance journalist based in Islamabad and can be reached at kaamyabi@gmail.com