Bollywood
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The quiz show contestant
Razib Khan asks, after a viral clip of a dark-skinned Australian game-show contestant, whether a man of that complexion could ever be a leading man in Bollywood, and whether skin…
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Shocking Sexism towards Kareena Kapoor
X.T.M criticises an interview in which Rajdeep Sardesai questioned Kareena Kapoor’s education and fit with the Pataudi family, arguing it patronised a blockbuster star, drawing on his wife’s view and…
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Taimur or Faiz Ali Khan
X.T.M reacts to reports about naming a Bollywood couple’s son, arguing India lets film figures off lightly, that a name should balance a child’s mixed heritage, and that unilateral transmission…
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RIP Sridevi
X.T.M mourns the death of the actress Sridevi, remembering her as the girl next door turned beloved auntie and Indian beauty icon.
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Fair & Lovely
X.T.M criticises the choice of a white egg donor for a Bollywood director’s children, arguing it sends a ‘white is right’ message in a colour-conscious society and contrasts with Hindutva’s…
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Basmati Blues
https://twitter.com/i/moments/930527539482759168
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Hindustani Culture as a Link culture?
Arguing that the Hindustani vernacular and Bollywood bind South Asian desis from Tamil to Pashtun, the author writes as both insider and outsider to this cultural complex, citing his Urdu-speaking…
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What does it mean to be “Brown?”
Disliking ‘Brown’ as a New World term, the author prefers ‘desi’, and argues its haziness is its strength: it centres on the Indo-Gangetic plain, fades in Sri Lanka, Nepal and…
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Aamir Khan’s Dangal Takes China by Storm
Shares an excerpt from a friend’s piece on why Dangal is a hit in China, arguing Chinese viewers respond to its focus on children’s achievement, as with the gaokao exams,…
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Mangal Pandey. Truth and Fiction
Hamid Hussain checks the film Mangal Pandey: The Rising against the historical record, scene by scene, finding the core facts of the 1857 episode kept intact but much invented, such…
