Slumdog Millionaire, which won 8 Academy Awards in
2009, has been the subject of a number of controversies(2), notably
regarding how it portrays Indian society and whether any of the people
involved in it were exploited. Following its release in India, the film
faced criticism from different sections of the society alleging that the
film fuels Western stereotypes about poverty in India and that it peddles
"poverty porn". Earlier also, in 1988, a film centered on Mumbai’s
slum-street-kids, ‘Salaam Bombay’ (SB), attracted
international attention and similar allegations.
The Contentious Issues
The above incident brings certain issues to the fore.
Does Western cinema indeed exploit our poverty? Why do they only focus on
our impoverishment and ignore our rapid economic progress and major
strides in other sectors? Why do they cast only poor slum kids in their
films? To get as authentic as possible in their attempt to portray
reality? Or is it a ploy to exploit their miserable existence to garner
wide international acclaim and accolades? Don’t they exploit their
existence and violate human rights by ‘fiddling’ with their milieu and
creating disharmony in their family lives? Are the incidents of child
trafficking, child labor, child molestation, extortion, juvenile
delinquency, etc are exaggerated to create a sensational impact at
international arena for voyeuristic delight of their viewers. Can we do
something to prevent a repetition of this in future? What role Indian
Academy of Pediatrics (IAP), the greatest custodian of child health and
children in the country, can play in safeguarding the interest of these
marginalized kids?
It is alleged that the film producers exploited the
slum children who had worked in the film by paying them very paltry sum as
their fee, which was even less than what was received by the Afghan child
stars of a recently released documentary film! They were forced to work
for many hours a day during the shooting. Wouldn’t it be yet another
example of child labor? At the end of the movie, both of the child actors
continued to live in makeshift shacks in the slums of Bandra, a suburb of
Mumbai. The grotesque violence and scenes of child torture and brutal
maiming are certainly going to have a negative impact on the psyche of
young, growing kids. While dealing with these sensitive issues, one should
be careful enough of the broader consequences of these on the society,
especially the impact on vast child fraternity.
Counterpoints
Every coin has got two sides. Let us be candid and
honest in accepting the facts. And the fact is extreme poverty, child
labor, child abuse, illegal trafficking, illicit drug use, sibling
rivalry, forced beggary, child prostitution, etc are quite prevalent in
some sections of our society. They exist in almost every city in some
forms or others. It seems that we cannot bear too much reality, and are
certainly not willing to pay to see it when we are confronted with it on
the streets every day! Whatever the film showed is a part of India - the
part which we educated and well doing Indian refuse to acknowledge. If we
are so uncomfortable with slums sullying India’s image abroad then why
don’t we do something for those who have no other options but to live
there.
The allegations of exploitation of kids are also
non-existent as the producers not only paid a very handsome sum to the
child artists, but also developed funds to take care of their future needs
of education and healthcare expenditure. Also because of these films, the
lives of some of the slum kids and their families had improved a lot. The
positive impact of the film, ‘SM’ on the lives of slum child artists can
be summed up by the statement of Rubina’s mother, "They made a poor child
a heroine - other people would have given a rich child the chance and set
aside the disadvantaged one".
Epilogue
The main criticism of the films like SM and SB stems
from the brutal way they portray our poverty, state of our slums, and the
people residing in them. These films have created a deep divide among
India’s ‘urban intelligentsia’, where none should exist. India is too
diverse to be portrayed in totality in any one film or a documentary but
that doesn’t mean that the poverty and misery portrayed in these films is
unreal! Poverty, like AIDS, is not shameful. What is shameful is that more
than 60 years after independence poverty continues to exist in our midst,
like a curable, or least preventable, but chronically neglected disease.
The reaction against SM and other works of its kind that have shown us the
face of our disowned poverty is rooted in a misplaced sense of shame. What
we are or ought to be ashamed of is not our poverty but of our attempts to
wish it away, to sweep it under the carpet, to decry all depictions of it
as commercial exploitation and social and cultural voyeurism.
On the other issues raised by these films, we need to
take proper remedial actions to safeguard the interests of our poor kids
working in these projects to prevent them from exploitation in the hands
of film makers. Institutions like Censor Board, Children Film Society of
India, Ministry of Woman and Child Development, other child welfare
organizations and groups, and human right organizations must keep a strict
vigil on any incident of exploitations by them. Even IAP and its sub group
like CRPP and CANCL can help these institutions by bringing any such
incident in the knowledge of authorities. Even media has to play a
serious, mature role as a watchdog. The prospective film makers should be
asked to ensure respect of child rights and must be warned in advanced
against occurrence of any untoward incidents on these counts. They should
be asked to donate a part of their earnings from the project to help these
kids and their families lead a better life and improving the conditions of
urban slums from where these kids are drawn. Another option would be to
ask these film-makers to stick to professional child actors, rather than
create such havoc in the lives of poor children. It is not at all the
fault of the film producers - they have gone beyond the call of duty ...
but the negative impact of this on children - to be taken to stratospheric
heights from their lives in a slum, and then brought back to ground zero
in a week - that process is so brutal!
