A couple of weeks ago , when a segment of Pakistan’s film industry had brought up concerns over Hindi films eroding their market portion , director-producer Mahesh Bhatt was among those who’d empathized with them .
However right now we hear that something very similar may be at hand closer home – the word around is that some industry bigwigs are lobbying to persuade the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to prohibit the dubbing of English films into local languages .
Speaking with DT , Bhatt said , “There are similar apprehensions in Bollywood and everyone is planning to come together and fight this practice of Hollywood films being dubbed in Hindi or Tamil . We cannot allow them to have a right over our mother tongue and use it to their advantage just because they have the budget . Hollywood studios have big budgets for promotions and we can never match that . Hindi film producers are now planning to come together against this . Letters have been written to the I&B ministry secretary in the past also , and I can say with full certainty that something similar is on the cards now . We face similar issues in other states at times . For instance , I cannot get my movie dubbed in Bengali .”
The fact is , in south India , English films can only be dubbed in Tamil and Telugu and no additional language , states Ravi Kottarakara of the South Indian Film Chamber of Commerce , adding , “As far as the association is concerned , I cannot say anything . But on a personal level , I can say that we do face a loss of revenue when an English movie is dubbed in a regional language and released . If such a step is taken by Hindi film producers , we’ll certainly support it , as I’m sure will other producers in south India . It’s just like the self-imposed code of conduct we have in place for the Kannada industry . It’s a very fragile industry and no movie is dubbed in Kannada , to prevent competition for local cinema .”
Whilst the industry might seem to be uniting against English releases , they are going to certainly face stiff opposition from the cinema owners’ lobby . Deepak Sharma of PVR Cinemas says , “This is not a practical move . If they do something like this , then international studios will also react . Also , I don’t agree that English movies dubbed in regional languages result in a loss of revenue . We have released 30 English films so far and only one has been dubbed in all three languages – Hindi , Tamil and Telugu . There are other factors too . When there is no Hindi content in cinemas , it’s usually English films or English films dubbed in Hindi that get patrons to cinemas . So the cinema lobby will never agree to this .”
In other regions
- Karnataka does not permit screening of dubbed movies
- In Andhra Pradesh , states Suresh Babu , president of the AP Film Chamber of Commerce , “there are serious concerns regarding Hollywood films eating into the market of Hindi and vernacular movies . The general consensus is , let Hollywood release their films in India in English with subtitles for various local markets . If Bollywood takes a call on restricting dubbed Hollywood films , we will stand by them . The other problem we face is an onslaught of dubbed films from other Indian languages as well . Such is the buzz around the dubbed version of “RA .One” that not a single Telugu film is releasing this Diwali . We’d request stars like SRK or Rajini to release their films in the original languages .”
- In April this year , several members of the Bengali TV market put their work on hold for one day to protest the airing of Bengali-dubbed Hindi serials on a local station . As for movies , Arijit Dutta , vice president , Eastern India Motion Pictures Association , says , “There is no
official ban on dubbing Hollywood , Bollywood and Mollywood movies into Bengali . But EIMPA restricts such efforts .”
( Inputs from Sarah Salvadore
and Priyanka Dasgupta )
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