DRISHTIKON : A One Day Colloquium On Disability and Hindi Cinema
SCHEDULE OF DRISHTIKON
10:00 AM – 11:30 AM
LECTURE BY RAVIKANTH
TITLE OF THE LECTURE: Melodrama, Disability, Performance: Notes on Hindi Cinema
11:30 AM – 1 PM
LECTURE BY MRIDURAAJ DHUSIYA
TITLE OF THE LECTURE: Disabilities in Hindi cinema: Disruptive Bodies and Discourses
2 PM-3:30 PM
LECTURE BY MANSI GROVER
TITLE OF THE LECTURE: “Main abhagan, manhoos. Aaj takk dukh hi diya hai maine sabko” : Problematizing the Voice Of Women with Disabilities in Popular Hindi Cinema
3:30 PM – 5:00 PM
LECTURE BY PRIYAM SINHA
TITLE OF THE LECTURE: Is Picture mein Kya hai? Probing into Bollywood Disability cinema and the vision of filmmaking
REPORT
Cinema reflects and even influences the way society responds to disability and disabled people. The Centre for Disability Research and Training in an attempt to understand how cinema has shaped and is shaped by public attitude towards disability on the 6th of April, 2022 organised A One Day Colloquium on Disability and Hindi Cinema- Drishtikon.
The opening lecture of the day, by Ravikant was a historical investigation into disability representation and performance. Drawing attention to the various ways disabled subjects have been and continue to be marginalised in Hindi cinema, he laid stress on the emotions of pity, fear and disgust that normative disability representation evokes in the audience. According to him, Bollywood has reduced disability into a fetish that normalises ableist assumptions.
Mithuraaj Dhusiya in his lecture titled “Disabilities in Hindi Cinema: disruptive bodies and discourses” poignantly observed that representations of disabilities in Hindi Cinema have been few and far between. He lamented that for the most part, characters with disabilities have been reduced to figures of ridicule or contempt in whatever minor roles they got. Disabled characters have seldom been accorded a central position in cinematic narratives coming out of Bollywood. He however argues that of late, films like Margherita with a Straw have created spaces for disruptive bodies and discourses interrogating and destabilising the tyranny of normalcy.
Mansi Grover’s presentation focussed on the gender-disabled subject in Hindi Cinema. Her lecture linked the precarious position acquired by a disabled woman in society with the dominant representation of disabled women in Hindi Cinema, to problematize the notions of beauty and body perfection. By questioning the myths about the wholeness and completeness of bodies, her lecture contested the fundamental concept of normalcy, and the way it gets constructed and perpetuated through cinema.
In the final lecture of the day – Iss Picture Mein Kya Hai? Probing into Bollywood’s Disability Cinema and Vision of Filmmaking”, Priyam Sinha went behind the scenes probing deep into the filmmaking practitioners’ perspectives ranging from screenwriters, directors, cinematographers, editors and even snippets of stars. to unravel and understand the nuances of Bollywood’s disability representation. She introduced an expansive discourse on how studies pertinent to disability representation have not been a rarity in Bollywood and addressed how market forces, audience demand for seeing stars’ configurations as disabled, and disability performance – have the propensity to win awards and become a channel through which disability is marketed. In this way, this lecture mapped what inspires filmmakers to write and depict disability in Bollywood.
Links to the Lectures:
https://youtu.be/0-tGPzlilFM https://youtu.be/YYkFDmQ2n74
