This film is a terminal Indian view of Pakistan. The India we are shown in Veer Zaara is lush. It is the Punjabi countryside in all its verdant glory. We are shown vast fields and small villages where big-hearted philanthropists set up schools for the poor. It is an India of trees and tractors, at one with its agrarian roots and industrialist aspirations. Lahore, on the other hand, is a Kafkaesque funnyhouse packed with jails and the gaudy, ostentatious mansions of rich politicians. India is outdoors, Pakistan is indoors. In India, poor people sit atop trains and sing paeans of patriotic love for the motherland. In Pakistan, the poor either sweep the floor in jails or sweep the floor in mansions. In India the poor are citizens, in Pakistan they are servants. The India of Veer Zaara is vibrant and multicultural, where Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs mingle with ease and are in fact indistinguishable from one another. The Pakistan of Veer Zaara , on the other hand, is a rigidly monolithic country, crawling with rich politicians and their families, who greet each other by raising a cupped hand to their forehead in what is supposed to be the traditional adaab gesture of north Indian Muslims. Zaara's villainous fiancé, despite being a Punjabi politician, speaks the most highfalutin Urdu and wears exquisitely embroidered Nehru jackets. In other words, the Lahore of the film is really Hyderabad Deccan and its Punjabis are actually Mohajirs. Finally, India is brought to life by the voice of Lata Mangeshkar (Mother India?) while scenes from Pakistan are accompanied by stern instrumental renditions of the rather ominous Raag Bhairavi .
So India is rural, outdoors and Gandhian, while Pakistan is elitist, indoors and Versaceian ? Wait. That can't be right.
Because India is, believe it or not, more than this equation allows, while Pakistan is less . The India of Veer Zaara is not just Gandhian, it is Nehruvian in its appeal; there are no Dalits or Harijans in this India. This India is miraculously free of BJP-style Hindu nationalists. It is secular, progressive, squeaky saffron clean. The country that lurks to its west, however, is garish and nightmarish. It is a country where all the men look like Liaqat Ali Khan and all the women look like Fatima Jinnah. It is populated by politicians and policemen, and has giant murals of Mohammed Ali Jinnah pinned to its walls.
This is what I mean by a terminally Indian view of Pakistan. Mr Chopra, despite his good intentions, suffers from a Pakophobia that has plagued India since independence. He is evidence of the fact that for many Indians indeed, for many educated, wealthy and creative Indians the Pakistani clock stopped ticking in August 1947. India has lived for sixty years with a frozen image of Pakistan as a tragedy in India 's history, orchestrated by a group of elite, Urdu-speaking, Indian politicians. A modern Pakistani identity that is different from India's Muslim sub-identity is therefore inconceivable for the Indian mind. Hence the Nehru jackets and Liaquat Ali Khan clones. Even when Veer Zaara tries to be creative and imagines a Lahori shrine, it ends up with a replica of Nizamuddin Auliya in Delhi.
We have yet to identify the most serious and insidious of Veer Zaara 's indiscretions.
Islam is used as a motif in Mr Chopra's film. But when it appears in the form of human beings, they are invariably women; all the Pakistani female characters of Veer Zaara cover their heads. Even Saamiya Siddique, the character modelled on Asma Jehangir, is shown to be guided by some higher religious cause. She wants to deliver justice, true, but only in the name of Allah.
So India is rural, outdoors and Gandhian, while Pakistan is elitist, indoors and Versaceian ? Wait. That can't be right.
Because India is, believe it or not, more than this equation allows, while Pakistan is less . The India of Veer Zaara is not just Gandhian, it is Nehruvian in its appeal; there are no Dalits or Harijans in this India. This India is miraculously free of BJP-style Hindu nationalists. It is secular, progressive, squeaky saffron clean. The country that lurks to its west, however, is garish and nightmarish. It is a country where all the men look like Liaqat Ali Khan and all the women look like Fatima Jinnah. It is populated by politicians and policemen, and has giant murals of Mohammed Ali Jinnah pinned to its walls.
This is what I mean by a terminally Indian view of Pakistan. Mr Chopra, despite his good intentions, suffers from a Pakophobia that has plagued India since independence. He is evidence of the fact that for many Indians indeed, for many educated, wealthy and creative Indians the Pakistani clock stopped ticking in August 1947. India has lived for sixty years with a frozen image of Pakistan as a tragedy in India 's history, orchestrated by a group of elite, Urdu-speaking, Indian politicians. A modern Pakistani identity that is different from India's Muslim sub-identity is therefore inconceivable for the Indian mind. Hence the Nehru jackets and Liaquat Ali Khan clones. Even when Veer Zaara tries to be creative and imagines a Lahori shrine, it ends up with a replica of Nizamuddin Auliya in Delhi.
We have yet to identify the most serious and insidious of Veer Zaara 's indiscretions.
Islam is used as a motif in Mr Chopra's film. But when it appears in the form of human beings, they are invariably women; all the Pakistani female characters of Veer Zaara cover their heads. Even Saamiya Siddique, the character modelled on Asma Jehangir, is shown to be guided by some higher religious cause. She wants to deliver justice, true, but only in the name of Allah.