Listen up 'macho' Indian star, you aren't above law: What SC decision in the Salman black buck case says

Of Salman Khan’s many achievements was giving Indians a real life equivalent of ‘macho’. But for Salman introducing the concept of Subway sandwich biceps to Indian men they would have otherwise elevated another Khan’s stammering to the pedestal of ultimate coolness in the 90s. Given that in India, masculinity is synonymous with courage and everything from politics to popular culture works to endorse that idea, Salman Khan cut a picture of ‘macho’ that a large chunk of Indian men strove to emulate.

Salman Khan’s evolution as an actor with average success in the 90s to a box office darling worth crores, is also the story of the evolution of the common Indian man. The same man, who is bred in a society that is largely patriarchal by default and attributes the man with courage, power, responsibility and even heroism as opposed to the woman and secretly relishes the idea of an unbridled, often violent machismo as the answer to all his life’s problems, and as the means to the label of a ‘hero’.

Apart from physically fitting into the character to a T, Salman Khan’s life was stuff an aam aadmi’s fairytale would look like. Women swooning over him despite several reports of him being physically aggressive in his youth, Khan rocking his aviators and stubble as he walks into a courtroom to appear in cases of hit and run and killing endangered animals, Khan packing court appearances, press conferences and fan-meets all in a day. What’s not to crush on, right?

The fact that he was alleged to have run over a few men and shot a few black bucks were never dismissed, but added to the aura of power around him and he roamed free. A powerful man, Salman Khan’s life seems to say, is beyond the law of the land.

As I had noted in an earlier article, Khan is the ‘ adarsh bharatiya purush ’ in the eyes of his fans, millions of whom troop into theatres to watch his films. And that’s exactly why the Supreme Court quashing the Rajasthan High Court’s order in the black buck poaching case - which withheld his conviction, so that he could travel abroad - is significant.

Firstly because the order comes from the highest court in the country, and while most civilians trust neither police nor politicians much, they seem to have some kind of a petulant faith in the judiciary, if the number of PILs filed in the country is anything to go by.

Secondly, it sends out a message that the seemingly sexy combination of power, prosperity and masculinity isn’t all that invincible after all. To put things in perspective, Khan was first sentenced in the black buck poaching case in 2006. In the nine years between then and now, several courts have sentenced Khan and issued remand orders but the star has never been jailed, dodging the course of law every time.

The other case, the hit-and-run one where Khan allegedly was drinking and driving, occurred in 2002. One person was killed and three pavement dwellers injured. But the case in still in limbo , with the latest twist being the prosecution wanting an RTO officer involved in the case re-examined.

Khan’s spectacular luck with the law, at some level, lends credence to the idea that men with money and connections, can get away with murder. In a country steeped in misogyny and witnessing a spurt in violence against women, the warped idea of what constitutes the ‘real man’ to the masses, needs an urgent correction. And that’s definitely not Salman Khan. The Supreme Court rap basically boils down to saying that there’s no reason Khan should be making foreign trips when his trial is on and thus quashes that image of the all-powerful Indian man.

Much has been made and valorised about our Prime Minister’s  ‘56-inch’ chest  comment. Sanjay Dutt, who is serving a three-year term in the 1993 Mumbai blasts case and was out on parole, was recently spotted in a rolled-up vest, proudly showing off his abs to the cameramen. India’s most eulogised men, deliberately or unwittingly, have always come to associate valour with a physical evidence of masculinity. In that warped picture, a film star shooting animals and driving drunk, fits right in. It’s a good thing that the Supreme Court made clear that there is nothing worth celebrating about that.