The Zaira Wasim controversy has triggered a debate on whether it is a tactical political move or the media trying to highlight the issue that women in the Valley are being gagged or if it is just a meeting where a young actor’s success is being lauded, says KHUSHEED WANI
On January 14, 2017 Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti had no official engagement related to the ongoing Budget session in the Assembly. At her official residence in winter capital of Jammu over the weekend, her personal staff had scheduled several meetings. In the afternoon, a girl clad in elegantly embroidered green woolen pheran came in and chatted with the Chief Minister. The official photographer took several pictures while the two ladies discussed films and careers.
The plump girl with boy-cut hair at the Chief Minister’s house was Zaira Wasim, the teen actor who played the early life part of wrestler Geeta Phogat in Aamir Khan’s blockbusterDangal. Three weeks back, the critically acclaimed film was released to hit the new records of earning in India and abroad. The reason to be at the Chief Minister’s house was that the Zaira belonged to the Valley — Hawal locality of old Srinagar, to be specific. The Chief Minister described her as a role model for youngsters.
No sooner did the State Information Department release a picture of Zaira-Mehbooba meeting, the click went viral on the social media. The websites and television channels flashed it and newspapers printed it on their electronic and published versions. On expected lines, the picture received both accolades and brickbats.
Many people took umbrage to Zaira’s meeting with the Chief Minister in the backdrop of the recent happenings in Kashmir when nearly 90 persons were killed by the police and security forces to quell a public uprising triggered by the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen leader Burhan Muzaffar Wani on July 8, 2016 in south Kashmir. Many trolls reached the actor’s Facebook abusing her for acting in an Indian film and meeting Chief Minister Mehbooba who they describe as primarily responsible for killing Kashmiri teens and blinding youngsters with pellets.
However, two days later, on January 16, 2017 the issue took an entirely different turn. Zaira took everyone by surprise when she wrote “an open confession/apology” on Facebook. Beginning with the traditional Muslim greetings she wrote: “I know that many people have been offended and displeased by my recent actions or by the people I have recently met. I want to apologise to all those people who I’ve unintentionally hurt and I want them to know that I understand their sentiments behind it especially considering that what had happened over the past six months but I hope people can also understand there are certain circumstances that emerge which one cannot control and I hope people still remember that I’m just a 16-year-old and I hope you treat me accordingly. I’m sorry for what I did but it was not a deliberate decision and I really hope people can forgive me.”
She sought to be left alone and not branded as a role model as Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti projected her to be. “There are few more things which are very important and I want to clear them as well,” she wrote. “The first and foremost thing is that I am being projected as a role model for Kashmiri youth. I want to make it very clear that I do not want anyone to follow in my footsteps or even consider me as a role model. I’m not proud of what I’m doing and I want everyone, especially the youth to know that there are real role models out there whether they be in this time or in our history. To even consider me as a role model would be disgracing them and their disgrace would be ‘our disgrace’! I do not wish to start an argument here, this was a just a mere confession from my end which I really wanted people to know. May Allah bless us and guide us,” Zaira had written.
The post immediately triggered a controversy. The channels picked up the issue for debate and linked with intolerance, Islamisation, Talibanisation, and lack of space for women in Muslim-dominated Kashmir. Some news channels blamed the Kashmiri separatists for a campaign against the teenager. The trolls, as referred to by a local journalist as e-insects, also intensified their bullying. When the controversy began to occupy time slots on the TV and curious journalists began hunting for Zaira’s whereabouts, she removed the post from her account and came up with another post.
“Regarding my last post, I have no idea why this has become such a big issue. I just wanted to make sure that I did not hurt anyone’s feelings and all of a sudden it has been turned into national news. Again and again I am telling people that I have not been forced into anything by anyone. This post was not meant against anyone, just wanted to make sure that people were not hurt by what I was doing. From media to everyone else, please don’t blow this out of proportion. Neither was I forced nor am I against anyone. Hopefully this post just stops this once and for all,” she wrote. Zaira removed the second post as well, indicating how much confusion and trouble the controversy landed her in.
The news channels ran unsubstantiated reports that Zaira was receiving life threats encouraging the junior Home Minister, Kiran Rijiju, to suggest to the she could be provided security if the State Government recommended.
The overzealous media sidestepped the crucial issues confronting the country and focused on the Zaira controversy. The local media, however, treated the issue exactly the way the common people in Kashmir do, fighting the vagaries of weather amid heavy snowfall, power outages and death of essential supplies, remained ignorant or indifferent. The social media however was abuzz with netizens expressing their opinion. Some abused and cursed her, others lauded her talent and favoured her choice in life while many others targeted the Chief Minister for dragging Zaira into controversy.
The celebrities could not keep themselves away. No sooner did the rumours about her threat perception spread, support began flooding for the teenager. Most of the Bollywood celebrities tagged #I stand by Zaira#.
Aamir Khan, Zaira’s mentor and lead actor inDangal made an elaborate statement and described her as role model across the world. “I have read Zaira’s statement and I can understand and imagine what led her to make that statement. Zaira I want you to know that we are all with you. The beauty is that bright, young, talented, hard-working, respectful, caring and courageous kids like you are a role model not only to kids in India but across the world. You certainly are a role model for me! May god bless you, love Aamir,” Khan tweeted. He also appealed to people to leave Zaira alone and respect the fact that “she is just a 16-year-old girl trying her best to deal with life.”
Former J&K Chief Minister used the opportunity to bully his political opponent Mehbooba Mufti. “A 16-year-old shouldn’t be forced to apologise & that too allegedly for meeting @MehboobaMufti. What are we coming to!,” he tweeted. “I’ve a problem with @MehboobaMufti trying to usrp other peoples success to cover up her own failures but why punish/troll people she meetsIJ” Abdullah wrote.
Anupam Kher, the Kashmiri-origin Bollywood actor, lent his support to Zaira. “Dear @zairawasim! Ur apology letter is sad but full of courage. It exposes d cowardice of people who made u write it. But ur my #RoleModel.”
In his post legendary poet Javed Akhtar said: “Those who shout AZADI from the roof tops don’t give an iota of azadi to others. Poor Zaira Wasim had to apologies (sic) for her success. Shame!
Another Bollywood figure Swara posted: “To those demanding #Azadi in #Kashmir. U seem fundamentally undemocratic, bigoted n incapable of respecting any1 else’s freedom #ZairaWasim.”
Singer Sonu Nigam tweeted: “May God give sanity to this world. And a bigger perspective of humanity beyond religion and patriotism. #ZairaWasim.”
Many teenagers spoke in support of Zaira Wasim and her choice to pursue acting as a career. “I have watched Zaira acting in some commercials and then heard that she was going to act in a film with Aamir Khan. I was eagerly waiting for the film to release and watch how a Kashmiri girl demonstrates her mettle,” Sualiha, a Class XII student from Naseembagh area of Srinagar said.
“Zaira has performed brilliantly. I am fond of watching Iranian films and found Zaira’s acting in Dangal equally full of talent and promise,” said Sania, a college student from north Kashmir. “Unfortunately, talent of Kashmiris is looked through a different prism and that creates problems,” she said.
Amid the debate, several Kashmiri intellectuals, journalists, theater personalities and writers came out in support of Zaira and attempted to dissect the controversy. They linked the issue with the questions of identity that the conflict-ridden Kashmiris are grappling with.
“Zaira Wasim, a proud daughter of the soil, should enjoy her success. She is a talented actor. A Government — responsible for killing, maiming and blinding civilians (mostly children) — has no right to appropriate Zaira’s individual success. Other players too must respect her career choice and let her live her dream! She is only 16. Can we let her be herself and not force anything on her. Neither ideology nor psy ops (psychological operations)! No narratives either,” wrote prominent political analyst Gowhar Geelani.
A US-based Kashmiri academic Ather Zia targeted the Indian media for deliberately targeting Kashmiris for their own motives. “The Indian media are bent on using this incident as a show of how ‘fundamentalists’ in Kashmir are caging their womenfolk; bolstering their propaganda of the ‘terror’ Muslim Kashmiri men present in the Valley. To any gender activist/scholar such opinions from the media and allied Indian narrative, despite a lucid clarification by the actor is perpetuating and furthering the misogynistic violence on her. The Indian media, by portraying as if Zaira has no agency, and is being forced into issuing an apology to denouncing her career choice without any will of her own is one very direct violence that is being perpetrated on her,” Zia wrote.
Zia says that trolling is not a new phenomenon and exclusive with actors like Zaira. “When a person decides to be a public personality they have to be ready for all kinds of public reaction. Actors, especially women actors are put to too much pain through shaming and ostracisation across the globe which spurts forth from a toxic masculinity and a fossilised patriarchy that needs to be denounced at all costs,” she says.
Calling Zaira and any Kashmiri young achiever like kick-boxing sensation Tajamul Islam, a 14-year-old from north Kashmir’s Bandipora who won an international championship recently, for a meeting with Chief Minister is seen as appropriation of talent and success. The observers say that Chief Minister Mehbooba used the opportunity to build a new narrative and conceal her actions against the agitating youngsters who raised a rebellion in the aftermath of Burhan’s killing.
“Appropriating the young actor’s success in the Valley where this very politician (Mehbooba) has presided over a brutal assault on children and adults alike is nothing less than a provocation for wounded people, and a show of arrogance of power (see, I can pellet some, I can call some to meet me). It is also invoking the misogynistic elements which are present in all societies, to make them latch on so that the ‘Islamic’ fundametalism narrative is propagated,” Zia opines.
But a senior leader of ruling People’s Democratic Party refuses to buy the argument. “The Chief Minister has every right to appreciate the talent and meet the achievers. There is no politics in it. Encouraging youngsters especially the girls is a special attribute to the first woman chief minister of the state,” the leader said.
He said that the Chief Minister has shown remorse over the pellet victims and personally visited the blinded Insha Manzoor in a Delhi hospital. In the ongoing Budget session of the Assembly she announced relief and rehabilitation package for the violence hit people including the people who were partially or fully blinded by pellets,” he said.
Interestingly, with the exception of all-women separatist group Dukhtaran-e-Millat, whose chief Asiya Andrabi suggested to Zaira to come out of the “filth” of Bollywood, no separatist leader or group spoke about the issue. Andrabi is a staunch Islamist but her initiatives to impose a dress code in the initial years of militancy in Kashmir miserably failed.
The Joint Resistance Group of separatists comprising Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik who spearheaded a protest campaign in Kashmir during the past six month completely ignored the Zaira controversy. However, some separatist leaders expressed their opinion through the social media while reflecting on the ground situation in Kashmir. “Insha is a victim of Indian aggression and Zaira is exploration of talent in adverse conditions. No comparison. But both are our daughters. Respect all. We as a nation are fighting for freedom and we must learn to respect the choice of freedom for all,” advocate GN Shaheen, a former secretary general of separatist Kashmir High Court Bar association said.
There is a possibility that the controversy over Zaira Wasim would increase the popularity and viewership of Dangal, which has broken all records thus far in terms of revenue collection. Zaira will move on and prove her prowess in other Bollywood projects she has already signed. However, the competing narratives on such issues in conflict-ridden Kashmir would continue to hog the headlines, like they did in the past.
In December 2013, in almost similar circumstances three young girls announced to wind up their musical band, Pragash (Morning light) when the Government-backed Grand Mufti Bashiruddin issued a decree declaring the all-eve band as un-Islamic. The media that time also linked the decree to supposed imposition of Islamic code in Kashmir. The band comprising vocalist-guitarist Noma Nazir, drummer Farah Deeba and guitarist Aneeka Khalid, was formed at a local musical institute. It was just seven months old with a few performances to its credit, when the circumstances compelled the girls to call it quits. They were never seen again on any stage.
Back in 1993, some unidentified persons shot dead Shameema Parveen, a TV artist at Safakadal in old Srinagar. The police never came out with conclusive evidence on the killing. Nevertheless, this murder did not deter a handful of Kashmiri artists to perform on stage or in front of camera whenever they got a chance. Sadly, the artists have a very little space and lack the genuine institutional patronage.
The Doordashan’s Kashmir channel, which had been started with a prime objective to promote local culture and encourage the talent, is at the verge of closure. Marred by corruption and controversies, the Centre stopped funding to the channel. The situation rendered a number of performing artists, writers and producers jobless. In this backdrop, the emergence of stars like Zaira Wasim was reassuring for this minority of artistes but the needless controversy became yet another depressing chapter in their battle of existence.