What 3 Idiots and Bollywood gets wrong about Indian Students.

WHAT 3 IDIOTS AND BOLLYWOOD GETS WRONG ABOUT INDIAN STUDENTS
India is known worldwide for the cinema we create. It produces the largest number of films all over, the loud extravagance of our typical song and dance regimen has made us popular for the right and wrong reasons worldwide. Like any cinema anywhere, even Indian cinema goes through its phases, we have seen our cinema snowball from the freedom cry unanimism cinema of the pre independence period, then it reflected a sense of nation building precisely in most Manoj Kumar films, then came the hero-heroin-action-villain phase which plagues us with its distorted sense of reality.
But as the fuel of distortion quickly runs out, inevitably our cinema is becoming more and more real by every film release. It is a harmonious mixture of angry rebellion and unstoppable cycle of evolution. But here’s a thread that hasn’t changed ever since the pulp cinema of the 80s; the students in Hindi films.
Rishi Kapoor in Naseeb, Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikander, Rockford, Mohabbatein, 3 Idiots; there may be an evolution in the aesthetics of the school uniforms and popular hymns in their respective institutions but how many films have truly tapped into what Indian students are really like.
In the spectrum are two polar opposite ends; one one end resides the palpable vulnerability of 3 idiots and on the other is far from reality-glitz glamour of Student of the Year.

3 idiots is a unanimously loved film. Indeed, there are only a handful films that receive such widespread love and affection but the reason for it’s wide acceptance isn’t its belief in reality but the creation of a magical whizkid that leads to an optimistic and euphoric conclusion to those around him. Breathtaking and cathartic as that resolve may be, realism is a far knock of the bat.
Here’s a protagonist Rancho; genius, street smart, anti rote learning and basically a vessel just waiting to be filled for him to be one of the greatest minds of the 21st century. And here’s a archetype scapegoat for the protagonist, the anti-antagonist Chatur; intelligent, but not smart and a true worshipper of learning through rote methods. Now, if 3 idiots were to abide by realism, Chatur would have been everybody; probably just not as caricature-ish.

Our education system worships rote learning and when a harmless Rancho walks in with his einstein brain telling us ‘Ratta mat maro, excellence ke peeche bhago, science ka maza looto’ , 3 idiots seizes to be a portrayal and becomes a commandment. It becomes a ‘should’  than a ‘Why can’t’. A special recipe for it’s monumental success is this secret sauce of escapism, it acts as a balm to rub over the petty lives of students than hitting the hammer that truly wakes the government out of its slumber.

The Indian student isn’t Rancho, at least not in majority. But, every Chatur has the potential to be a true ‘jahapana’, like him. If only mugging and cramming weren’t worshiped and the students were truly given space for their knowledge and identities to flourish, India would have been blessed by the genius inventions that are akin to the creations of Rancho, our name wouldn’t be popular because we run the Silicon Valley but because we build one of our own. But it’s all just a big what if and that is the sad reality.

A boy studying for 7 hours in the school and then spending rest of his life at coaching institutes gives birth to a penchant to follow excellence but the infrastructure, people, culture and the methods that have been shoved down his throat strangulate that passion and penchant and hence we lose another Bill Gates to a Ram Prakash Mishra who works for him.

Cinema is a powerful weapon for awakening. Since the days of roman proscenium, art has made it possible to act as a big bouncer to the hopes, aspirations and struggles of its people. But, when an opportunity like that is wasted into being a tentpole blockbuster that creates a need without a facility, it is a greek tragedy to witness. Some however still fetishise the quintessential student life by making them dance on hot numbers and wearing glossy, brand clothes, having chiseled bodies and even that is too heinous to its students. In a way a spit on the faces of a student who barely has time to breathe, stuck solving physics problems, lives in his hawai chappals.
The problems pertains. Escapism isn’t the medicine we need, realism is a treatment that we deserve.




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