Alia Bhatt and Varun Dhawan starrer Badrinath Ki Dulhania is minting a lot of money at the Box Office. But the film has also been at the receiving end of ire for a particular scene. Critics slammed the film for turning male molestation into a joke but director Shashank Khaitan has defended his work. Shashank said they never intended to turn such a sensitive issue into a joke.
The sequence in context is the one in which Badri (Varun) became the target of miscreants in a dark alley of Singapore. It was the film’s heroine Vaidehi (Alia Bhatt) who came to his rescue. This particular scene smashed the set rules of Hindi movies. Usually, in films, it is the actress who gets stuck in a situation and the actor becomes the Knight in the shining armour. But, with Badrinath Ki Dulhania this set norm took a backseat.
While the makers were lauded by many for shedding light on male molestation, a topic which is usually left untouched in movies. However, there were others having the opinion that the makers reduced such a sensitive topic to a joke. As it happened in the film after Badri was rescued everyone present there had a good laugh.
Varun Dhawan, Shashank Khaitan and Alia Bhatt.
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Defending the humour in the scene, Shashank told a leading daily:
The intent was to show Badri’s character at an all-time low. Emotionally he was down and out. Vaidehi (Bhatt) had stripped him of his ‘mardangi’ when she asked him to call his father and he couldn’t. He was emotionally defenceless and was unable to even protect his physical ‘izzat’. The humour was to comfort and not trivialise the issue.
Sahil Vaid and Varun Dhawan in Badrinath Ki Dulhania
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In fact, Shashank also went ahead and gave the example of 3 Idiots. He said the iconic scene in which chamatkaar was replaced with balatkar could have offended many if taken in wrong sense.
Now that Shashank has spoken on this, we wonder what critics have to say on this.
