The Indian film industry is the biggest in the world and it churns out about 1,800 movies per year (all languages combined). Among all the film industries of India, the Hindi film industry also known as Bollywood is the biggest one. Various genres of movies are made here in Bollywood every year, commercial masala movies being the main ones. But you must have noticed bizarre and annoying stereotypes in Bollywood movies. It has stereotyped almost everything from gender to religion to sexual orientation and the list goes on and on. Let’s discuss five such annoying stereotypes you will find in Bollywood.
Stereotyping characters based on their ethnicity
Bollywood has always stereotyped people based on their ethnicity. It was at its peak before the 2000s when every ethnic group was stereotyped, mostly for comic relief.
Remember the classic comedy movie “Padosan” starring Sunil Dutt, SairaBanu, and Mehmood. Well, it was a decent comedy movie but the character of Mehmood was one of the most stereotyped characters ever. Probably the character belonged to South India and according to Bollywood, all south Indians are Tamil and they speak Hindi like a buffoon. In Bollywood, a Christian will be someone who speaks Hindi in a strange accent and no grammar and mostly will be a drunkard and a Parsi will ride an ancient car with a fat wife and will talk in a funny accent. A Thakur will be a cruel dictator; raping and killing people are his hobbies. Though with time such stereotypes are reducing but not vanished.
All Punjabis are Sardars and they are Brainless
Sardars are mostly used in Bollywood for comics. He will always be happy like he is forever high on something.
According to Bollywood, all Punjabis are Sardar and they are dumb!! Yes, it has been the portrayal of the Sikh community in Bollywood for years. He will be a friend to the hero or a sidekick character who will always be laughing and dancing, mouth words like “BalleBalle” at the drop of a hat, and will always crack jokes no matter what is the situation. Give us a break, please!!
All Hawaldars and Constables are Marathi
If you have noticed, in our movies most of the hawaldars/ constables are Marathi with names like Tambe, Sambe, etc.
If you go by Bollywood, all constables in the Police force are Marathi with surnames like Tambe, Khandekar, etc. Marathi people are never on a big post (except BajiraoSingham) as that is reserved for north Indians with a surname like Singh, Rathore, etc. Marathi people will be mostly constables who stay in chawls (No, the government does not provide police quarters to constables in Bollywood), provide some comic relief, and most probably die by ending.
All NRIs are Punjabis.
A common stereotyping in Bollywood is that almost all NRIs in Bollywood are Punjabis and they are homesick.
First, they will go abroad to earn money, but will loathe Western culture and will always talk about how sanskari country India is. Well, first of all, you have no right to loathe a culture from where you are earning money and India is not as sanskari as you believe, and also all NRIs are not Punjabis for God’s sake.
LGBTQ people will always behave in a certain way
In Bollywood, people from the LGBTQ community are mostly used for comic relief and they will behave and talk quite differently from normal people as according to Bollywood, they are not normal.
There is no doubt that Bollywood has contributed a lot to homophobia in India as according to them LGBTQ people always behave in a certain way, feminine way to be precise. Gay people will always be hitting on the actor and wear a colorful dress. Bollywood has stereotyped LGBTQ people so much that an average person will definitely believe that LGBTQ people are not normal and behave and talk strangely. With movies like ‘ShubhMangalJyadaSavdhaan’ and ‘Badhai Do’ Bollywood is, of course, trying to bring the LGBTQ community into the mainstream but still in big-budget masala movies stereotyping of LGBTQ people continues and it’s something that should be stopped immediately.
