Kalank is truly and literally a Kalank on the face of the Bollywood and Mr. Karan Johar to answer the question asked at the end of the movie- “Mujhe is movie me sirf kalank hi dikhai diya!! And mere nazariye me koi khot nhi!!(I could only see kalank (blot) in the name of a movie, and I don’t think there is anything wrong with my point of view)”.
No, I am not talking sh*t about love or against love and hell I am not going communal with this open letter. Being an average earning married Indian lady all I felt after watching the movie was a sense of deep loss of time, money and patience! It hurts me deeply as to why despite having such talented actors, in fact, legends, a movie can turn out to be so baseless. Not to speak of the fact of pulling in it our struggle of freedom from a perspective which was really not depicted properly! There indeed were many love stories which were murdered with the onset of a partition and there were people who did everything in their power to make that happen but why do your movies mostly have to be on extramarital love affairs? Why?!
Ok, I can cut you some slack saying you wanted to highlight social issues such as inter-religious marriage, love, polygamy, and women empowerment but what a silly way to put it forward. First of all, an educated lady Roop (Alia) married to a reputed family ( be it second marriage) does not and could not at least in those times abandon the basic etiquette of wearing the sindur post marriage. Chalo! again I can cut you some slack and say she and her in-laws were modern that way, for the era but then how does a well-educated girl who is recognized and as well as introduced in the movie for her beauty and brains is simply attracted towards crude physical prowess of the guy Zafar ( Varun) ?! Was it just lust that she was craving, for she did not have what is usually there in a “normal marriage” ?! How is this message useful or beneficial from any aspect to our society?
Roop had been emotionally driven to make the choice of agreeing to be the second wife for the sake of her younger sisters, how does that fit with the description of a liberal father who educated his daughter in those times? What message was that? And wow what a character was Satya( Sonakshi Sinha); mind-blowing! Arranging for another girl who can replace her after her death, she is indeed trophy wife but not so much of a lady I guess; for her, all that mattered was her husband’s desire and happiness ( typical in your movies right!). It doesn’t matter what happens to the girl after, apparently, her word is supposed to be the bond.
Ok! I know you will say that you had it covered with their( Roop and Dev’s) marriage but tell me this, if Satya was really such a deity why didn’t she coerce her husband to be a husband to Roop too!? Only before she dies she tells him to give her the true respect of being his wife! So what was Roop then!? A married mistress? It is wrong on so many levels! This movie does not show the freedom of women, it only shows how fragile they are both mentally and emotionally that they give up on their dreams, love, and passion for their desire to satisfy men in their lives. In this movie, it goes another step where Bahar (Madhuri Dixit Mam) admits that she abandoned her only son Zafar on the streets, just so that Balraj ( Sanjay Dutt) would come back to her, where Balraj is a gutsy man who neither could respect his married wife nor his lover/mistress. Bravo!!!
Mr. Karan Johar sir you are a renowned director and producer, your production house is huge and you have the capacity and the vantage to work with legendary actors such as Madhuri Dixit Nene, Sanjay Dutt, etc. Please produce movies which are not just about extramarital affairs, dominance, inappropriate love and women trying to satisfy male fetishes because the world does not ‘JUST’ have these stories to put forward! It felt like old wine in a new bottle. Produce stories which do not just depict talented actors like Madhuri Dixit mam as a dancer (Tavaif), Sanjay Dutt as powerful yet spoilt, Alia Bhatt as educated yet helpless, Varun Dhawan as only rebel and macho, Aditya Roy Kapoor as Devdas and Sonakshi Sinha as adarsh dabang patni(ideal wife).
Do not mean to offend anyone or community with this letter but want to put through the message that love does not always have to come along with a drama to be appreciated, and be beautiful or strong! Women empowerment does not ‘just’ stem from the fact that women can choose whomsoever as her life partner. This letter is my honest take on the movie and a message to Bollywood biggies out there that we muggle really love to watch the magic you do on screens, so make it in such a way that it impacts the lives of us commoners in a positive way.
Thank you !
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