Military Literature Festival: ‘Cinema most influential medium to convey feelings to people’

The panellists at the fourth Military Literature Festival on Saturday highlighted the role of Bollywood in raising the patriotic zeal among citizens.

The panellists for the session “Bollywood and shaping the nation” included film critic Shubhra Gupta, renowned artists Major Bikramjeet Kanwarpal and professor Makarnand R Paranjape, who is the director of IIAS, Shimla.

Professor Paranjape said the cinema bears a close relationship to what is happening in society as it works as a mirror. Major Kanwarpal said that despite several factors including stereotypes, cinema was beyond control and it had been continuously influencing people.

Film critic Shubhra Gupta said that the filmmakers were people like them who got their ideas from the daily happenings. She also said that people from outside the country had been trying to get a foothold in India as far as cinema was concerned.