I suggest therefore that ‘ability' itself is an implicit discourse of masculinity. The preservation of the patriarchal Indian values within the institutions of marriage and family results (in these films), in the assimilation of the protagonist with disability, or the solution to the problem of the disabled, into the conventional masculinist gender model within these social structures. Indian cinema from the 1960s onwards had made interventions in portraying disability as part of its mission of socially committed cinema, with a bias for portraying clearly identifiable disabilities such as vision, hearing or speech impairment. Dosti (1964), Koshish (1972), Sparsh (1984), Nache Mayuri (1986) and Khamoshi (1996) were committed approaches in mainstream cinema, drawing attention to the day-to-day struggles of people with disabilities, their sensitivities, the difficulties they face in procuring jobs (in the absence of reservation policies), as well as their loneliness and need for companionship, friendship and marriage.įilmmakers' keen revival of interest in the lives of the physically and mentally challenged begun a decade ago, has resulted in films that attempt the cross-over from commercial to socially purposeful cinema, though not always successfully.
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