As the eight-phase Assembly election West Bengal began on March 27, a music video, featuring some of the biggest names in Bengali cinema and culture decrying the politics of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Sangh Parivar, has become quite a sensation, particularly among the younger generation.
The music video in Bengali begins with a message stating: “Our Bengal is a land of friendship, peace and pluralism. As Bengalis and as Indians we will have to resist anybody’s attempt to create a rift between people here. We will look hatred in the eyes and say, ‘This land is not your land. This land is one of love. This land is India.”
The lyrics of the song titled ‘Nijeder Mote Nijeder gan (In our own way, our own song) are a scathing attack on right-wing politics, and the visuals leave no one in doubt as to who the song is directed against – “Your devotion is bloodstained/You have love for no one at all/You are here to invade the nation/You don’t know nationalism…. All your explanations/begin and end with Pakistan/You have fuelled agitation/You have left us with no option,” the lyrics go. The song also has an interlude in the tune of “Hum Dekhenge”.
The star-studded video features some of the biggest names in Bengal art and culture, including theatre legend Rudraprasad Sengupta, actors Parambrata Chatterjee, Kaushik Sen, Sabyasachi Chakraborty and singer-songwriter Anupam Roy. The video projects the various controversial legislations and steps taken by the BJP government at the Centre, both through artistic imagery and newspaper clippings, and highlights the Centre’s failures. It is as much a song of protest and outrage as it is an assertion of individual rights and free thought, as is evident by the lyrics — “I looked at Goebbels’ mirror/I spotted your reflection there…. We know well enough/What is best for us, we will decide.”
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