Well, one could call screen courtships persistent affairs, when being extremely polite. A superstar didn’t take no for an answer, no matter how many times the heroine said it on screen. In the end, the girl would give in and would wed the guy.
All the way from the 1960s to the ’00s, that’s the way love in films was showcased, served and surmised as the “normal way” to win love. It wasn’t called stalking — this persistence — but rather, went by different names like chhed-chhaad, flirting, wooing and teasing (and not eve-teasing). In fact, this heckling, shoving, pushing, smirking and hissing became all the more rampant in the ‘naughty’ 90s.
One has to ask, are we imaging the “stalking”? Isn’t all these years of cloaking, what it really is? Why can’t we call it that? Because our superstars (or the top actors of the time, if you will) did it? Did that kind of unbecoming behaviour make it okay?
Well, that’s a debate for a different story. Here we list the “offenders” (and some repeat ones) who did exactly what they’re accused of (or worse). Here goes...
Varun Dhawan in Badrinath Ki Dulhaniya
He is a small-towner who gets the hots for the sassy girl from the next town. Varun chases Alia Bhatt down until she abandons her ambition (almost!) to become his dulhaniya (fully). Audiences approved. Persistence pays, it would seem.
Shah Rukh Khan in Darr and Anjaam
Shah Rukh Khan’s early days in Bollywood saw him in several bad-boy roles, but none as rabidly petrifying as the characters he played in Darr and Anjaam. Sure, his villainy in Baazigar had a backstory, but his roles in Darr and Anjaam were plain pursue-until-prey-surrenders outings. Today, the superstar displays the utmost respect for his female co-stars, even insisting on his heroines’ names appearing before him in the credits.
Aamir Khan in Dil and Fanaa
Khambe Jaise Khadi Hai was a ’90s anthem, where Dil’s Madhuri Dixit (no Nene, then) was humiliated and subjugated by Aamir Khan as the college kids in the background cheer him on. To avenge the insult, Madhuri accuses Aamir of raping her. He threatens to actually do it, then holds back, saying he isn’t “that kind of a guy’. She promptly falls in love because… wait for it… he doesn’t rape her?! Fanaa’s Aamir is a tourist guide who stalks and gets physical with the blind tourist, played by Kajol. Business as usual?
Amitabh Bachchan in Hum
Picture if you will, Kimi Katkar being shoved around a room full of boisterous revellers, led by the country’s biggest superstar at the time, demanding a kiss even as a chorus of favour seekers cheer him on. It would be the fodder for a Trinidadian author’s article, Stockholm Bollywood: Jumma Chumma De De and Memories Of A Cultural Shock where the writer stated, “The images suggest that this is a giant gang-rape, accompanied with a massive sperm hose, to subjugate the naughty bimbette….”
Salman Khan in Tere Naam
Salman’s Radhe in this film was compulsively obsessed with the timid girl-next-door played by Bhumika Chawla. Along with his group of wastrel friends, he chases the girl down and even kidnaps her. The terrified hapless girl finally says yes only because she’s too frightened to say no. Darr ke aage preet hai?
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