Smita Patil's Old Interview on Objectification of Women to 'Sell Films' is Still Relevant

On late actor Smita Patil’s 66th birth anniversary on October 17, an old clip resurfaced on the internet that shows how deep her understanding of women’s bodies vis-à-vis Indian films ran. The clip of the interview was shared on Twitter, where, at the time of writing this article, it has almost 4,000 likes. In the interview, Patil was questioned on 1981 film Chakra, starring her, Naseeruddin Shah and Kulbushan Kharbanda. The interviewer, referring to the film, asked her about a poster that showed her bathing in public. Stating that the poster showing her in a semi-nude condition was gaining popularity across the country, she went on to ask Patil how she “let it" be shown to the country. In answer, Patil said slum-dwelling women bathing is a daily occurrence, and nobody stopped to consider that such women did not have room to live in, let alone room to bathe. She added that if the matter of the poster had been in her hands, she would not have let it span out as it did.

Patil said that when films are made and sold in the commercial circuit, their publicity is in the hands of distributors. Indian viewers have been conditioned to flock to films that display sex and the nudity of women as selling points, she said, adding that the exploitation of women’s bodies occurred everywhere in advertising campaigns, in all films, and was not limited to Smita Patil in the Chakra poster. Criticising this “attitude", she said if a film has to run, it should run by virtue of what statement it makes from the heart of it. “Sirf aise poster se film chalti nahi hai," she said. She said that, “Hero ko toh nanga nahi dikha sakte, uss se kuch hone bhi wala nahi hai“. But if women are shown in the nude, then distributors think it is a way to draw in hundred more viewers, she added.

The user who shared the video on the microblogging platform commented in response to another user who said the matter was of “modesty" as such: “She isn’t preaching morality or modesty. Clothes don’t define modesty. She is talking about objectification of women’s bodies by film distributors and the use of their pictures out of context and without consent to attract audiences."

“Every woman can relate to the anger in her voice.I think, we all experience it where we want shout out loud: it’s not my body or just my body, it’s you and your objectification of it. Some might not understand or know the right words to explain but all can relate to her sentiment," wrote another user.

Patil was born on October 17, 1955, in Pune, Maharashtra. Regarded as one of the finest actors of her time, Patil acted in over 80 films in a span of a decade. The films did not include only Hindi cinema but also Bengali, Gujarati, Malayalam, Marathi, and Kannada hits. Patil started her career as a television newsreader for Mumbai Doordarshan. She debuted in films with Shyam Benegal’s Charandas Chor in 1975. Some of her critically acclaimed movies were Manthan, Bazaar, Ardh Satya, Waaris, among others.

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