By Gurpreet Singh
Dear Shah Rukh Khan,
I am writing this to you as someone who has been your admirer since I was a teenager.
When you first showed up in the TV serial Fauji decades ago, in which you played as a young Indian army soldier, my family and I never missed any episode. As your career progressed and you made an entry to the Bollywood, many of your films left a lasting impression on me. Especially your role in My Name is Khan (2010), in which your character exposed Islamophobia in western society following 9/11. Your acting was remarkable.
For your stature and talent, you certainly deserve an award from your nation. But the one recently conferred upon you by the ruling Hindu supremacist government in New Delhi impress me. What has been even more heartbreaking is the way you accepted the National Award for Film, without questioning the state that chose you.
Do I need to remind you that there are many scholars and other cultural activists who returned their awards to this very government a few years ago? This came in response to attacks on religious minorities, including when people from your own Muslim community were being lynched by mobs as police looked away. The day you were given the award, news came in from Karnataka where some right-wing Hindu activists were caught mixing poison in the water system of a school whose principal is a Muslim. They hoped to defame him.
Leave aside your deafening silence over this, you showed no spine to even politely refuse the award.
Bollywood disappoints
To be honest, I had already given up on Bollywood stars, including you, for not saying anything against this government. I hoped that you folks had learned something from Hollywood stars who had stood up against Trump. I dare you to make a sequel of My Name is Khan in the Indian context and then see the results. Rather than making that kind of a movie with a star like you to show the world real side of India, all of you are having a good time with Trump-like bigots in your own backyard.
This is despite the fact that they tried to frame your son under false charges. Your whole family was hounded and asked to leave for Pakistan by supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has Muslim blood on his hands. Back then, journalists like me tried to defend you through our writings. And yet, you chose to accept this award. What a shame.
The Modi government, we can all see, is now trying to put a moderate face after losing its majority in the last general election. How can you be so innocent and naive not to understand this. You have already done enough for the country by playing a patriot in different movies, dancing for songs glorifying the Hindu religion, and marrying a Hindu woman who did not have to change her religious identity. For doing so, you were accused of being involved in a “Love-Jihad”.
So stop pandering to the apologists of Modi. I hope that good sense prevails upon you and you return this award with a strong statement. Otherwise, history will never forgive you.
Gurpreet Singh
Gurpreet Singh is a B.C. author and co-founder of Radical Desi. Follow him on Bluesky @gurpreetradical.bsky.social. Learn more about the communities that make up Canada on the Toronto Spark website. Find the Toronto Spark on Bluesky @torontospark.bsky.social.
