DEBUNKING MUSLIM STEREOTYPES

For much of Hindi cinema's history, Muslim characters have occupied a narrowly defined moral and visual frame

- ASIF ULLAH KHAN

For much of Hindi cinema' history, Muslim characters have occupied a narrowly defined moral and visual frame. In earlier films, they appeared either as upright allies - Inspector Khan or Ali, loyal and self-sacrificing - or as caricatures: the street urchin in a skull cap and mesh vest chewing paan or the sherwani-clad Nawab Sahib bending at a ninety-degree angle in elaborate 'adaab. These figures were recognisable but rarely real, their identities flattened into shorthand.

In recent decades, this frame has hardened into suspicion. The Muslim character has increasingly been normalised as the villain, the extremist or the perpetual outsider. This shift mirrors a broader social and political polarisation, where representation no longer generates empathy but anxiety. What has been steadily erased in this process is normalcy - the everyday lives of Muslim families navigating work, aspiration, compromise and survival like millions of others.

Against this backdrop, 'The Great Shamsuddin Family, written and directed by Anusha Rizvi of 'Peepli Live' fame and Single Salma, directed by Nachiket Samant and written by Mudassar Aziz, arrive as rare and quietly radical interventions. Both films centre Muslim women not as symbols, metaphors or ideological statements, but as protagonists negotiating deeply contemporary realities. Their stories unfold not through extraordinary crises, but within the familiar terrain of family obligation, economic pressure, emotional labour and personal choice.