Why Abu Salem spared SRK
This one is straight from a Hindi film plot – almost.
Rediff recently carried an excerpt from Anupama Chopra’s new book, King Of Bollywood titled “When SRK got a call from Abu Salem“. Here is an excerpt from the rediff story.
Straight from rediff (emphasis mine):
One day, on the drive back (from Khandala where he had gone for a shooting), Shah Rukh received his first phone call from Abu Salem. In typical Mumbai street language, Salem asked, “Haan, kya chal raha hai” (What’s going on?).
Shah Rukh asked, “Who’s this?” The question prompted a spate of choice Hindi curses. Shah Rukh didn’t retaliate. He spoke politely but deliberately in English, situating himself and his caller in separate worlds.
Shah Rukh said, “What is the problem, sir?”
Salem replied that he was angered by Shah Rukh’s refusal to work in a project being made by a Muslim. As a Muslim himself, Salem said, Shah Rukh should give his community some support.
Fortunately, at the time, Shah Rukh happened to be working with several Muslim directors and pointed this out to Salem: Mansoor Khan, Abbas Mustan, Aziz Mirza. Mahesh [Bhatt]’s mother was also Muslim.
Salem saw Shah Rukh’s logic and decided that he would, after all, spare his life. “Log bolte the tu bahut proudy hai lekin tu bada sharif hai,” he said. “Abhi police ki zaroorat nahin tereko. Main nahin maroonga.” (People tell me that you are very proud but you are a decent man. Now you don’t need the police. I won’t kill you.)
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Moral of the story: If you want to stay alive in the Hindi film industry, make sure you work for several Muslim directors. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
By the way, I have little reason to doubt Anupama Chopra. She is after all, an insider (married to Vidhu Vinod Chopra) and a well-known film journalist.
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P.S. Just to refresh everyone’s memory, Abu Salem is one of the main accused in the March 12, 1993 bomb blasts case in Mumbai and is also implicated in the murder of Gulshan Kumar plus several other cases. It was Abu Salem who delivered the weapons to Sanjay Dutt on January 16, 1993 and his confession eventually led to Sanjay Dutt’s arrest.
An earlier rediff story claims, “He is said to be an extremely conservative Muslim…When the US launched Gulf War I, he led a protest march in Saddam Hussein’s support…(separately)…His men fired on three different occasions at a Muslim actor who was working in B R Chopra’s television serial Mahabharat.”
This in an industry that rediff says has been “Historically immune to the conspicuous Hindu-Muslim tension that thrives and often erupts in India”.
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Suggested read: SRK: “Jihad” a small little “word”
I suppose this might be enough to ignore that SRK has a Sikh/ Hindu punjabi wife. Big of Abu Salem, don’t you think?
By this measure, Amir Khan should be in Salem’s list. He married Hindu women not once but twice. Hrithik Roshan too, because he married a ‘modest’ Muslim girl. What about bad girls, Tabu and sister Farah, who are so immodest they work in films instead of being good muslim girls and staying home? And reportedly Salman Khan is very close to his non-muslim step mother Helen. Perhaps he is on the list?
The truth, no matter what Mrs Chopra says, is that the Indian film industry is quite blase about religious and social restrictions.
The other side?
Conversions to marry whom they wished to, when as Hindus, they might have found it was illegal and divorce too costly.
Hema Malini and Dharmendra converted to Islam to marry while D was married to his first wife, still is. Raj Babbar converted to Islam to marry Smita Patil because Nadira Babbar would not divorce, and now ironically N brought up late S’s daughter.
Religion that acts as it suits – whether Hinduism or Islam – is not religion. It is a fashion accessory…
Nice post as always Shantanu!
@ An only mouse: good points and I think you are right when you say: the Indian film industry is quite blase about religious and social restrictions.
@ Suresh: Thanks. I am glad you enjoyed it.
The one or two exceptions of people converting for sole purpose of marriage convince cannot refute the essential chauvinistic character of Islam when it comes to inter-communal marriage. This Allah-given facility bestowed upon the muslim male is the sole cause of their demographic invasion on our secular-maniac elite. Ambitious clerics like Zakir Naik stick to it like anything! ( he will, he says, embrace uniform civil code only if the Hindus embrace sharia ! What a logic !! )
Look at the heart rendering tales of Sikh and Hindu girls ending up in brothels in Pakistan ! Look at the open encouragement by muslim mullahs to carry on, what is today come to be known as campus jihad. There is not a single case the other way round ! And yet all the religions are equal ! “…is that the Indian film industry is quite blase about religious and social restrictions…” and on and on and on….These lectures of tolerance and secularism by their Hindu parents create the rosy illusion over the incredibly inhuman reality of islam, and rest of the damage is done by cheap bollywood escapist movies that inspires this dove-like creature called hindu girl to love a “khan”, it’s cool !
…now listen to Mr Elst….
… it will be the long road of freeing the intellectual atmosphere from the morbid compulsion to praise Islam, replacing it with a frank criticism of Islam, and making sure that not a single Muslim remains ignorant of it. Learn from the way the Christian stranglehold on Western society was broken: make them think again about their ideological commitment by exposing its irrational basis.
A piece of practical advice to conclude with: before you start teaching Muslims, teach your own community first. Your daughter will think twice about becoming the breeding cow of a Muslim family if she is properly informed about Islam. And to get a proper perspective on Islam, she should first know what mighty heritage she is carrying, what treasure she would throw to the wind if she were to drop her native tradition in favour of Islam.
Apparently SRK was not the only one spared by Abu Salem.
Excerpt from Whose candidate is Sanjay Dutt? by Ashok Malik in The Pioneer