Mocking or Shocking – Peepli Live?

While I was having Monday blues, I still managed to execute a plan with my girls for Peepli Live. A movie, I was waiting to watch from the first glimpse of the trailer. The very first glance was so strong that it caught my attention in a split second. I personally, liked the movie. Reason being, I myself belong from a small town and hail from a farming family. People are having mixed feeling about the movie and the whole gimmick created on farmer suicide issue.

Infact, I had a pretty healthy debate with someone on the movie. So, let’s look at the movie from two perspectives. First, hats off to Aamir Khan for publicizing the concept of farmer suicide which is actually one of the very sensitive issues in our country. The whole mockery was constituted to lure the attention of public. Which, in return was very successful because the movie received 4.5 ratings. However, the mockery didn’t go waste. From an audience perspective, I believe, I left the theatre thinking about Prakash [one of the characters of the movie]. His dialogues moved the viewers. Even though the script delivery was given in a very calm manner and did not bring tears to the eyes; it still left a durable connection with the viewer. A satire of farmer’s destruction was nicely and neatly explained. The movie showed the farmer’s tragedy sarcastically. It was depressing to see how a farmer gets entangled between bank’s loan which turns into a debt and then pressure from family and to make matters worse, the Thekedaar!

Second, some people are not taking this movie positively at all. Infact, they think it created hoopla only because Aamir Khan promoted the movie. Also, that the movie was presented with wrong intentions. It was left in people’s mind as a publicity gimmick and not a serious issue. Farmer’s didn’t commit suicide because they were greedy but because they were frustrated, agitated of loosing their only land inherited from their forefathers. By manipulating and mimicking this concept, the director was not able to show the actual reality. For a farmer, his land is the only property which makes him proud and provides him roti, kapda and makaan.

How is it that our Rajneeti never concocted any policy for such delicate issue? The media played their role effectively. Aam junta is already aware of deceit played by the news channel on every sensitive issue. That was not new to the audience. Indians are very smart people plus very well aware of the tricks played by our very own media. I openly ask my readers, what’s their say in this? Which perspective do you agree upon? Is it okay to produce a gimmick out of an issue or did this film really change people’s point of view towards the farmer’s of our country?