South Actor Sudeep has recently taken a slight dig at the Bollywood industry after the massive Pan-Indian success of KGF2. The debate has taken on the heights after Sudeep was heard talking about the success of the film in a video and mentioned how Hindi is not a national language, and it is their movies that are garnering success in the country. He also said in his tweet about Hindi Imposition.
South actor Sudeep garnered the attention of Ajay Devgn, when he said, “Hindi is no more a national language and that Bollywood is struggling, hence they are making pan-India films”
To this Ajay Devgn said that if Hindi is not a national language then why South films are being dubbed in Hindi. However, this debacle didn’t end up here and got other experts from the country, who have now expressed their views on the same.
Komal Nahta said, “I don’t know what Sudeep meant in his statement. It was a baffling comment. Just because some language film is doing well, it can’t be the fabric of the cinema,”
Trade expert Atul Mohan also stated that Sudeep was wrong on his part too, while Girish Johar said, “It is about perspective. I don’t think they meant what we are thinking. They know it is one country and one cinema,”
Reacting to the same, popular actress Shriya Saran said, “Bollywood, Tollywood, Kollywood” to define cinema from a particular region. “Why don’t we call it Indian cinema,” she asks, adding, “The recent success of films proves the fact that we are looking at one industry, and it is high time we acknowledge it.”
However, this truly was a worthy debate after south films like Pushpa, RRR and KGF 2 made humongous success worldwide. But Saiyami Kher has got different views as he says, “Language is not something one should be bothered about. Right now, regional films are working, because the content is great and is connected with the audience, for instance, Gangubai Kathiawadi,”
Aakanshaa Singh has said, who earlier has worked in Telugu films, “Languages unite people and do not divide it and the same goes with cinema. In fact, it helps people to unite and gives the opportunity, especially for actors and creative people to work across different language mediums.”
After this Avika Gor added, “Regional and the so-called Bollywood films both coexisted before too. It is just that now south films are getting audiences nationally and globally. But cinema doesn’t have any language barrier anymore. At the end of day, cinema is cinema, not regional or Bollywood.”
However, several stars do believe that the discrimination and the stereotypes still exist, as Pia Bajpai said, “There was one co-star of mine in the Hindi film industry, who said, ‘south ko puchtha kaun hai’. And if you notice, actors from Hindi showbiz aren’t picked for lead roles, but villains, which show the divide. Bahut saare double standards abhi bhi hain.”
Then Shwetha Shrivastava supporting Sudeep said, “As entertainers, we have a huge responsibility of representing our language, nationality, humanity, through our work and our name… With huge respect to all the artists and creative people in our country, I agree with Sudeep sir, as we love all good films no matter which language it is made in India. It is an Indian film.”
While actor Suraj Gowda said, “We respect every language and no single language will make sense to be the national language. There is a reason why our currency embodies all our languages. I think Sudeep sir made it quite clear when he said what would the situation be if he’d typed in Kannada. We expect senior actors like Ajay Devgn to speak more responsibly.”
