Aamir Khan: Muslim Bollywood actor rounds on ‘obscenities’ of Hindu critics

Bollywood gets caught up in the inter-faith tensions now rampant across India

Aamir Khan has been catapulted into the headlines since he intervened in the raging debate about intolerance under the Hindu nationalist government of Narendra Modi (AFP/Getty)

Fans of India’s Bollywood megastars, accustomed to scouring the showbiz columns for juicy details of their favourite celebrities, have been taken aback to find one of the film industry’s biggest icons splashed across the front pages – for talking politics.

In a controversy that is absorbing the nation, Aamir Khan has been catapulted into the headlines since he intervened in the raging debate about intolerance under the Hindu nationalist government of Narendra Modi.

Khan is one of the nation’s best-loved and most successful actors, brand ambassador of the official “Incredible India” tourism campaign – and a Muslim in a majority-Hindu nation. In remarks that provoked the debate, he admitted that recent violent attacks against Muslims and intellectuals, coupled with the absence of swift or strong condemnation from politicians, had left him with a sense of insecurity and fear.

It had led his wife, Kiran Rao, a Hindu film director with whom he has a three-year-old son, to question whether they should remain in the country, he told an audience at a journalism awards ceremony. “For the first time, she said: ‘Should we move out of India?’,” he said. “She fears for her child, she fears what the atmosphere around us will be, she feels scared to open the newspapers every day.”

Khan’s comments, which echo the feelings of dozens of leading writers, artists and scientists, have provoked a furious backlash, with many critics questioning his loyalty to India.

Hardline Hindus urged him to move to neighbouring Pakistan, a sedition case was filed against him for “anti-national statements”, and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accused him of tarnishing India’s image. “He is defaming the entire country. I feel it is a moral offence,” its spokesperson told reporters. The right-wing Shiv Sena Hindu party announced a reward of one million rupees (£10,000) to anyone who slaps the actor.

Until now, Bollywood – the world’s biggest film industry – had largely avoided the inter-faith tensions that surface repeatedly elsewhere. Many leading men are Muslims, a fact that has been no apparent impediment to their success, and mixed marriages are not unusual. But now Khan has been pointedly reminded of his religion and, as one veteran actor cautioned him to remember: “This country has made you.”

Since Mr Modi and the BJP came to power last year, critics say affiliated conservative Hindu groups have been emboldened to claim India as a Hindu nation, with a corresponding definition of what is a true Indian and patriot. The Prime Minister has been too slow to condemn a series of violent attacks against Muslims, his critics claim, and some say BJP members have been instrumental in fanning communal flames.

The explosion of outrage at Khan’s remarks, and equally vocal outpourings of support, highlight the ferocity of the debate surrounding intolerance in a country proud of its pluralist traditions. The opposition Congress party, which prides itself as the guardian of India’s secular foundations, has seized on the row. “Instead of branding all those who question the government and Modiji as unpatriotic, anti-national or ‘motivated’, the government would do better to reach out to people to understand what’s disturbing them,” said its leader Rahul Gandhi on Twitter.

Khan has now been forced to clarify that he has no intention of leaving India, a country he says he loves. But he added: “To all the people shouting obscenities at me for speaking … out, it saddens me to say you are only proving my point.”