Disabling Images

Anita Ghai, Reader in Psychology, Jesus & Mary College, University of Delhi, and a well know disability scholar and activist, gave a talk on Images of Disability in the Indian Media at the Equal Opportunity Cell (EOC) of the University of Delhi on 21^st October, 2009. She spoke for about 1:45 hrs and interacted with the students from the Media, Sign Language and ICT courses run at the Centre. Many of the students present were blind and Mamta, an employee of the DU Library who has been working with the EOC for sometime, is deaf. Hidam Gaurshyam, the EOC technician for the Hearing Impaired interpreted for Mamta. From the faculty, Rama Kant Agnihotri and I were present from Linguistics.

Terminology

Anita started with clarifying the terminology involved, especially the phrase ‘Disabled Person’ (DP) and ‘Persons with Disability’ (PwD), indicating the former as the preferred term for her. The movement at the University of Leeds was mentioned in this connection.

My own observation in this regard is the confusion in terminology being used and in practice in India, especially in official documentations, must be addressed. While we have the PwD Act of 1995, we have ‘Handicapped’ quota (VH, PH, etc.), ‘Visual Impairment’ (VI), we have ‘Parking for Disabled Persons’, etc. Among the public, ‘Handicapped’ is still the most commonly used term and using ‘Physically challenged’ is the ultimate sign of political correctness. In this milieu, the Social Model of disability is a relatively modern concept, and one, for which we have to keep sensitising the public at large.

Hindi Films of the 50s and 60s

Next, Anita, discussed chronologically the major examples, first from the Hindi movies, and then from the Hindi serials on the TV. Mother India, Boot Polish, Dosti are the movies of the 50s and 60s which looked at disability from the point of view of the Charity model. However, these films also scored the point that disability is not to be ashamed of and one needn’t beg for survival and rights. In this connection, characterisation of disability in the Mythologies was seen as interesting. Dhritrashtra (being blind), Manthara (a dwarf) and Shakuni (being lame) – all characters in Mahabharata, are dominantly portrayed as negative characters, disability being something to be afraid of, something negative.

In general, the ideal concept of human is the able bodied one, as far as the media is concerned. I raised the issue that in fact, it is more than that, the media actually considers the ‘perfect body’ as the bench-mark. Anita talked about the TAB or Temporarily Able Bodied, as being the most workable notion of the human body, for her.

Hindi Films of 70s to 90s

The major films in Hindi of the 70s through 90s that used some form disability as part of the main storyline, were Koshish (Deafness), Sparsh (Blindness) and also Upkaar and Sholey, to some extent. There were many other films — and films continue to be made on this line — where cure of the disability is used as a major theme or a turning point in the story. The film Shaan was also mentioned in this connection where Mazhar Khan characterises locomotive disability.

Hindi Films 2000 onwards

2000 onwards, we saw films like Black, Khamoshi, Tare Zamin Pe, Guru, KANK, Koi Mil Gayaa etc. that take up disability as part of the storyline. She criticised Black for the absolutely medieval teaching techniques shown to ‘educate’ the young Rani Mukherjee. I of course hated the film because of Amitabh Bacchan’s over the top hysterical acting (for which he even got an award!!) where the only goal seemed to drown every other voice in the film through his screaming. Dhritiman’s calm and controlled performance is a very clever way of exposing the vacuity of Amitabh’s histrionics. TZP, we both agreed was absolutely wrong-footed in showing how finally ‘competition’ mattered the most. Anita told us about the panicky phone-call of one of her friends whose son is dyslexic, right after the movie became popular, saying, ‘Anita, what will happen to my son, he can’t even paint’. Someone in the audience pointed out how KMG was v-e-r-y bad. Anita talked about Venkatesan and the case in the Supreme Court related to euthanasia, and her apprehensions of a movie being made on the theme.

Hindi TV Serials

Then she moved on to the Hindi serials on TV and mentioned Apki Antara, Jyoti and Baa Bahu aur Baby in this connection, where the dominant theme seems to be how to get out of disability. These programmes also reiterate how the dis-ability of the disabled is a curse through the characters and through events in the stories.

Popular Views of Disability

In fact, it was pointed out, how various themes like ‘laughter’, ‘charity, ‘hostility’, ‘cure’, keep coming back over the years. Most importantly, disability is used only as metaphor in the media, and understanding of disability takes a back seat. Very crucially also, disability is often equated with asexuality, chopping off Suparnakha’s nose in the Ramayana is, according to this thesis, desexualising her. The same way, Amitabh’s going away after kissing Rani Mukherjee is made to show guilt – as if disabled people are not entitled to desire.

Need of the hour

She appealed for a cautioned viewing of TV programmes and films from this renewed perspective and keeping the notion of deconstruction in mind while analysing these. I pointed out that it is important here to remember the activism issue involved, since a vacuous application of deconstruction may lead one to classify disability as another form of discrimination and to therefore imply that there is nothing special with disability. Anita too outlined the importance of activism in this context.