Playing Nathuram Godse: Censor as sensibility

The seed of wanting to become an actor had germinated fully in me by then and I remember dreaming of someday playing Booth — I’d study pictures of the man and wonder if I could pass off as him; the role seemed to be one which I, or any actor, would devour with great relish. Everyone had heard about the humanity of Lincoln, and in no way did I identify with Booth and his beliefs, but I felt a strong empathy for the man. I thought it was greatly dramatic and would give me a chance to display all my acting wares.

But those were the dreams of a 17-year-old, would-be actor. Had I been American, I might have thought differently. Gary Oldman, who is actually British, certainly didn’t get dragged over the coals for playing Lee Harvey Oswald. I have no idea what his actual feelings about the killing of John F Kennedy were, but he obviously felt no pangs of guilt about playing Oswald, or playing it sympathetically.

Amol Kolhe of the NCP, however, is a politician and should really have thought several times before agreeing to play Nathuram Godse, because I guess a politician’s first duty ought to be to the impression his party wants to project. I don’t know if deep down he, or the filmmaker/writer, consider Godse’s act heroic or not, but they should have known that Kolhe’s party doesn’t, or at least wants to give that impression. I suppose he decided to play the part either because it would be a challenge or because he genuinely felt that Godse’s point of view ought to be heard, and I see nothing wrong with either motivation.

I am truly at a loss to understand what this outrage, over a film no one seems to have yet seen, is all about. It needs to be viewed before it is judged, and those who find its arguments unacceptable should know only too well the futility of trying to engage with unreasonable convictions. But since the ’70s this cancel culture has become a malaise; its main symptom is a tendency to condemn a thing without knowing fully about it and is illustrated in examples aplenty: the attempted embargo on the brilliant play Ghashiram Kotwal, the Kissa Kursi Ka episode, or the banning of Satanic Verses suggested by Salman Khurshid, who at that time hadn’t read the book. You can’t beat that for irony!

But if the majority of people who see Why I Killed Gandhi are offended, Kolhe will have to own up to the responsibility of having helped glorify someone who committed one of the most heinous acts in the history of modern India. He should not forget the fate of Leni Reifenstahl, who after making two cinematically brilliant documentaries extolling Hitler’s greatness, had to seek refuge in Switzerland.

Or the case of the great conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic (and Hitler’s favourite conductor) Wilhelm Furtwangler who, perhaps under the illusion that Hitler would win, did not leave Germany. After Hitler’s humiliation, Furtwangler of course maintained that he didn’t agree with the Nazis, but about whom a writer said, “…he chose the wrong side, living at arm’s length with the Nazis and holding his nose”.

I refuse to believe that any true-blue Indian, leaning however far to the right, with the slightest awareness of a man called M K Gandhi, would celebrate his murder. This insistence by certain respected undertrials that Godse was a patriot has to ring hollow, and of course we will never forgive such politicians “in our hearts”, though we may do so in our actions!

I have not seen Kolhe perform or speak, but in a scenario where the Prime Minister’s own venomous rabble-rousing passes as great oratory and a deeply patriotic foreign national wins a revered Indian acting award for playing a Naval officer with a moustache, I wouldn’t be surprised if Kolhe is considered good at both.

I am pretty sure I would not accept a part that went against my beliefs and I don’t mean religious beliefs. Incidentally I don’t remember the excrement hitting the air-conditioner to such an extent among Indian Muslims when Nawazuddin Siddiqui played Bal Thackeray, or among the countless reasonable Hindus in our country when he was denied the chance to act in the Ram-Leela in his hometown. I don’t know how much flak he had to face from Muslims!

I do know however that I have to live almost daily with hate messages calling me a Pakistani agent because I played one in a film, as if by playing him I approve of his activities. I know for a fact that Pran, after 50 years of personifying evil, never received letters telling him how despicable he was and that he better pack his bags and leave.

I am reminded of a cartoon by the master R K Laxman, in which two dhoti-clad Gandhi topi-wearing guys are exiting a theatre showing the film Gandhi. One says to the other, “Truly remarkable man… this Ben Kingsley”. The need to identify with all the characters, and not just with the hero in a movie, is the opium that draws hordes into movie theatre. They identify with everyone and when they see a character do something they themselves would be ashamed to admit doing, they squirm, but applaud doings that make them bask in reflected glory — though it’s a little disturbing to witness the content they have begun to applaud of late.

I really think we should hold our judgment on Why I Killed Gandhi till the film comes out, though I have to confess I am not greatly optimistic that it will talk sense.

(The writer is an actor, director and ‘occasional writer’)