Actor ignites Bollywood row
2008-09-09 19:09
Tony Tharakan
Mumbai - Leading Bollywood actor Amitabh Bachchan and his family faced a boycott threat of their films on Monday after angering a local political party opposed to millions of migrants who control Mumbai's economy.
Bachchan, who hails from the northern state of Uttar Pradesh and found fame and fortune in Mumbai, has become a lightning rod for critics who say immigrants have sidelined local people from the Maharashtra state, of which Mumbai is the capital.
The latest row erupted after Bachchan's actress-politician wife Jaya spoke in Hindi at a Bollywood function in Mumbai on Saturday, prompting Raj Thackeray, head of Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) to issue the boycott threat.
Bachchan said she would speak in Hindi as her family hailed from a state where the language is widely spoken. Hindi is also the national language.
The remark irked MNS, which announced a boycott of films starring any member of the Bachchan family - Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya, their son Abhishek and daughter-in-law Aishwarya Rai.
Won't allow movies
"She has made this comment out of spite," MNS spokesperson Shirish Parkar told Reuters. "If she wants to stay in Maharashtra and even then not speak the state language (Marathi), this is unacceptable to us."
"We will not allow any film which has any member of the Bachchan family in it to run in Maharashtra. Nor will we allow any product they endorse to be sold here."
Television reports said MNS party workers in Mumbai tore down posters of Amitabh Bachchan's The Last Lear, a film slated for release on Friday.
Last week, some party activists were arrested for vandalising shops in the city after owners failed to put up signboards in Marathi language.
Earlier this year, MNS workers in Maharashtra were accused of intimidation, damaging vehicles and beating up taxi drivers, who are mostly migrants.
For generations, rural Indians have tried to escape poverty by migrating to big cities like Mumbai in search of jobs.
Less than 50% of Mumbai's 17 million residents are Maharashtrians. Many hail from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, two of India's poorest states.
The issue had surfaced in Mumbai during the 1990s when the Hindu nationalist Shiv Sena party attacked migrants, but the party changed tack after realising the crucial role immigrants played in the economy.
- Reuters