Religious factions have made it a habit to protest on every little thing that goes against their interpretation of Islam and term it as a conspiracy against their ideology. Acceptance of reality and of the fact that every sect has its own set of black sheep is a far fetched idea for those whose only jargon is piety. The religious scholars should develop tolerance and try to address the shortcomings instead of protesting each time. These were my initial thoughts about the protest staged by the largest minority religious sect against the second revival of cinema in Pakistan movie- BOL.
Following in the footsteps of its predecessor, BOL also made a blatant stand against a sensitive topic for Muslim society, population control. Covering under this basic theme the story also deals with other social issues like that of eunuchs, sexual abuse and sectarianism.
Sectarian divide is a reality of Pakistani society and has been a lot more pronounced since 1980s. Depicting this crude reality in a film dealing with societal ills is appreciable, however too much of it can easily cause the effort to move beyond the thin demarcation and land up in the harmful territory. That’s exactly what happened with this movie.
It is not difficult for someone to understand that non-verbal forms of communication are as much effective in getting the message across as any other direct form. Few scenes in the movie with their apt dialogues and funny punches were enough to let the audience grasp the element of sectarianism; however the deliberate use of a symbol revered by the second major religious sect and then associating it with a segment of society which is looked down upon can in all its reasons be offending. With a connection being made between the sect and the brokers of heera mandi, one can expect the myths and misunderstandings regarding the sect to get magnified.
For instance, when Mina (Iman Ali) gives birth to a daughter, her father wearing the revered symbol as a large pendant, welcomes the grand daughter in the world with playing an item song in her ears. This might be a custom among the families of heera mandi, but it won’t come as a surprise if a radical Muslim of some other sect starts believing it to be true for all the followers or might assume that reciting Azan is not a custom among the followers of respective minority sect, which is entirely incorrect.
In current situation of the country, we need to concentrate on bridging gaps rather than providing more arenas for misunderstandings to flourish. Our liberal class should show some wisdom in their actions to prove true their claim of impartiality.
