Gods and the gods of Bollywood
On the first day of his new production, the foreign DoP (Director of Photography) was amazed by the elaborate puja organised. He was further surprised by another Bollywood tradition -- the first shot of every day is of Lord Ganesha. A good part of his first day on shoot was spent in amusement as others explained these traditions.
When Aamir Khan did a similar puja to inaugurate his office and a few photos from it went viral, some from the Hindu Right hailed it as a sign of their power that even a Muslim is forced to show his Hinduness. Fed on the garbage of lies cooked by news channels, they think Bollywood is a godless swamp.
The reality is the opposite. Few on the planet are more religious, more superstitious than those who make Bollywood films. And after the annus horribilis that 2022 has been for Bollywood, this has only reached a fever pitch.
Getting back to Aamir's puja, if you dig deep enough, Muslims of Bollywood have always played a big role in celebrating Hindu gods and Indian mythology. In fact, many of the best, most evocative odes and songs to Hindu gods have been commissioned, written, composed and sung by Muslims.
Let's take India's, perhaps the world's, greatest epic -- Mahabharata. The one who wrote the 1988 BR Chopra series for Television was Rahi Masoom Raza. Till targeted attacks disheartened him, Aamir Khan was the most passionate in all the world -- and perhaps the most capable -- about making a cinematic adaptation of the Mahabharata. The current, greatest scholar of the Mahabharata in Bollywood, one who might forget to breathe but never forget to tell his screenwriting students to not just read, but study the great epic, is Anjum Rajabali.
It goes further.
Let's take Ganesha. Salman Khan has the most elaborate worship of the lord during Ganeshotsav. I've heard tales of how he takes offence if his close friends -- especially producers and directors of his current films irrespective of religion -- do not pay his Ganesha a visit, and how no matter what he does all year, these ten days he touches no flesh and stays as sober as a fish swimming in Arctic freshwaters.
Ganesha is the reigning deity, the guardian angel of Bollywood. Nothing happens without detailed and expanded blessings of the elephant-headed Vakratunda. Go to any set in Mumbai, be it the far-flung new studios of Mira Road or the ancient ones like Mehboob Studio in Bandra, be it for a feature film, series, serial or even a short film, be it a set made and produced by a Hindu, Muslim or Christian -- the first port of call every single day, without fail, is Lord Ganesha.
This is how the first few hours pan out on any given day in any of the hundreds of sets across Mumbai.
If the time for the first shot is 9 am, most of the set design team will work through the night (theirs is literally the toughest, most underappreciated job). Most of their main team will start arriving around 6 am, along with the catering team. Around 2 hours before the first shot, everyone -- the director, DoP, direction and production teams, the lighting department, the spot boys etc. -- start congregating, have breakfasts in between work breaks and around 8:45 am most things set, the most important shot of the day -- one that never makes it to the film -- begins production.
A chair, stool or a high plinth is placed at the centre of the set. The DoP will light up the place artistically. A spot boy (yup, never a girl), brings a framed photo of Ganesha, places it over red cloth, lights a lamp, incense stick, and breaks a coconut while the team -- Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, Christians, Parsis, men, women, LGBTQI+ -- all sing the aarti 'Jai Ganesh, jai Ganesh, jai Ganesh deva - mata jaki Parvati, pita Mahadeva'. In some sets I have been on, this or some other Ganesh aarti is put on a Bluetooth speaker.
Then, the first 'action' on the set is screamed to capture the serene image of Lord Ganesha on camera. All the Heads of departments are usually there at this moment and most of the work stops for those two minutes. If the actors are enthusiastic, they join in on this though usually, they are in their vanity vans or green rooms remembering their dialogues, hoping not to goof up because following up on the heels of the elephant god is a hard act to follow.
Gods, especially Ganesha, are not just about religion. It is part of the rich cultural heritage of Bollywood. Every star or spot boy, disgruntled screenwriter or starlet, superstitious producer or atheist, Hindu or a foreigner of another religion, follows it. One might be a staunch follower of any religion off set, on set everyone is united by the worship of Ekdanta. The two-minute prayer is an act of meditation, a reminder to do the best one can that day.
On two Shyam Benegal sets that I have worked on, the ones entrusted with this most important responsibility of the day i.e. taking care of Ganesha, have been Muslims. Shyambabu's most trusted spot boy is from Hyderabad and though he does not work as a spot anymore, he is always called every time the veteran dons the director's hat. And he comes. Every time. And he is the one who lovingly brings and puts back the puja paraphernalia, hugging the Ganesha image for the fear of tripping on the under-construction set while he carries the god.
People in Bollywood might be crooked and cruel in other ways (most importantly in undermining and underpaying screenwriters), but when it comes to the gods, there are no shortcuts or compromises. They believe in god. Period. The religion of the god is irrelevant.
Like Ganesha, most Mumbai filmwallahs are huge fans of the boon granting Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti of Ajmer Sharif, Siddhi Vinayak of Mumbai, Saibaba of Shirdi, Tirupati's Balaji and Amritsar's Golden Temple, with a trip to either or all of them, often becoming part of the production cost of a film. And one is sure to hog the limelight on set for a dozen minutes or so if she's come back from any of the thousands of pilgrimages available in India with some offerings.
Religiosity is not discouraged, it is actively encouraged. No one objects to any religious symbolism of any kind, be it rings, taveez or sacred threads, or the puja or namaz they offer in the corner of the set, or the blessed prasad brought from a temple or mosque: everything religious is welcome on a film set without discrimination of any sort. On one set, I saw half a dozen people struggle for half an hour to untie a sacred thread from the wrist of an actor. The usually impatient director waited - unusually patient.
Part of the reason they believe in god is that they feel they have no choice. Commercial filmmaking is such a skewed, uncertain business that success is never ever guaranteed. No one anywhere in the world truly knows what an audience really wants though charlatans often make a business of claiming to know. At best we reach an approximation of what works based on what has been made in the past and its reception. Making films is hence an act of supreme will, it is an unnatural act where you have to push the entire kainat – existence – to make the projection light penetrate the heart of the images you create.
It's a lottery. A film casually entered into can resurrect careers (Sanjay Dutt with Munnabhai MBBS) and one made with dogged determination and focus (Laal Singh Chadda) can fail to find the intended audience. Hence everyone wants divine light to shine on their corners, a little luck and favour to go their way.
By the end of the many months-long shoot, the amused foreign DoP mentioned in the beginning became the most enthusiastic believer of the morning Ganesha ritual, lighting the small setup with the same nimble dexterity with which he lit every one of his other frames. Some will call this the power of the Gods, some will call it a tradition. Television anchors will call it Bollywood hypocrisy. To those on every set, this debate is irrelevant for the presiding deities of Bollywood, unlike haters or lovers -- do not discriminate. And just for that, if nothing else, they feel truly blessed.
Satyen K Bordoloi is an award-winning screenwriter, researcher weaving words for moving images in Mumbai. His journalistic side is filled with tales of Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Computing and cinema.