If your fellow ‘secular’ filmwallas feel so strongly about the ‘secular foundations’ and its preservation thereof, how come they never uttered a word… - Vivek Agnihotri

I am utterly confused and tired. Everything is becoming clinical. I remember in 1985, a Leftist friend of mine had tried explaining the Naxal organizational structure to me, and finally exasperated, he’d said, ‘Trying to understand the Naxal movement is like peeling an onion. In the end, you will have only tears in your eyes and many disconnected and scattered layers of the onion.’

I had spent years working on a superhero subject. It was a simple story, rooted in Indian mythology. And that was its biggest problem. There is a mindset in Bollywood that doesn't let Indic ideas flourish.

I open the newspapers but there is no news about the sabotage. It would have been national news backed up with protests if I were a Dalit or a Muslim or a Leftist or a liberal. Indian media, especially the metro-based English media, is the most dishonest institution of India. They are always in a hurry, their questions are statements, they have no courtesy, they are arrogant, rude and humiliating. They are always running late for something and, therefore, have no concentration. I am not talking about those hundreds and thousands of hard-working young girls and boys who are running from one breaking news to another. I am talking about those who instruct them to twist the news. Or who twist it themselves to further their or someone else’s agenda. And it’s no rocket science to understand the design of this parallel politics. They have become victims of their own agenda. For the last 70 years, English media has loved to paint any rightist organization, especially RSS, as regressive, uncivilized, aggressive and fundamentalist. Any organization connected with RSS e.g. ABVP is considered a party of goons. Whereas the student members of left-wing parties are considered rebels, revolutionaries, progressive and intellectuals. It’s more like a perception battle. The media has created a ‘group of somebodies’ and a ‘group of nobodies’. Those raising slogans against the State of India are painted as The Superiors and the ones singing ‘Vande Mataram’ as The Inferiors. This is the reason why people like to associate themselves with the left – The Superiors. Some people like to believe they are liberals. Liberals are those who do liberal things, not the ones who are against the right. If you look at the reporting of the Jadavpur University crisis after the seditious JNU incident, they always wrote ‘left-wing students’ and ABVP goons or outsiders. I realized this when a journalist asked me at JU, ‘What do you have to say about the presence of some outsiders, ABVP goons?’ I wondered, ‘Aren’t they students here? Aren’t they called Akhil Bhartiya VIDYARTHI Parishad? Vidyarthi means student.’ She was taken aback and said ‘But…no… yeah… But…’ I knew she had no answer, only biases. I again asked her, ‘Aren’t they students of the same university? What do they need to do to be recognized as students? Raise anti-India slogans?’ She got upset and left me to cover the protesting students – the real students, according to her.