One of my favourite Indian movies, called My Name Is Khan, ran packed houses in Calgary. My Name Is Khan has a powerful message. In these days of tensions and terrorism, it is one which needs to be heard. A Hindi movie with English dialogue and subtitles, the film has a theme, which revolves around the aftermath of the 9/11 disasters and its impact on Indians living in the United States.
Rizvan, played by one of Bollywood’s leading actors, Shahrukh Khan, who suffers from Asperger’s syndrome, a disorder that makes it difficult for people to interact socially, and comes to live with his younger brother (Shergill) in San Francisco.
Here, he meets hairstylist Mandira (Kajol), a free-spirited woman who lives with her six-year-old son, Sam, from a failed marriage. While Rizvan falls in love with Mandira, she too grows fond of the good-natured Rizvan.
The age-old antagonism between Hindu-Muslim shows its ugly head and even Rizvan’s brother doesn’t attend the wedding because the bride is a Hindu and “we have differences with them.” He tells his brother, “You can’t marry a Hindu,” but love is blind before religion and Rizvan goes ahead and marries his sweetheart.
The perfect married life of the Khans is shattered, however, after the September 11 attack on the Twin Towers in New York City as Sam gets involved in a tussle with a few college ruffians who beat him up because his second name is Khan.
Sam dies of his injuries and a shattered Mandira blames Rizvan for his death. “He died only because his name was Khan,” yells Mandira and asks Rizvan to leave her. Rizvan tries to assure Mandira that things would get better, but she tells him that as long as he remains a Khan, he would be looked upon as a terrorist, even if he persuaded the US president otherwise.
So Rizvan sets out on a journey that takes him from one US state to another, following the movements of president George W Bush, for whom he has a message: “My name is Khan, and I’m not a terrorist.” The powerful message that Mr. Khan has for the public is that not every Muslim is a terrorist. That has to be recognized.
By now everyone knows about 9/11 and how it has placed Muslims in the negative limelight. I am flabbergasted when these extremists who claim to be Muslim, commit vicious acts of terror that completely contradict all the teachings and commandments of the Quran. The perpetrators of such heinous acts usually twist the Quran and its phrases to benefit their own evil atrocities. However, the interesting point is that the media falls for their claims of Muslimhood, citing their religion as the source of their twisted ideas without acknowledging that the person involved may be a Muslim by religion, but he is acting on his own behalf or on behalf of a group but not his religion. His actions are political and not stemming from his faith.
The word Islam itself means peace and as every Muslim will tell you, Islam is a peaceful religion. It is a faith of tolerance, generosity and spirituality, and murder, killings or atrocities have no place in it. Those who preach killings in the name of religion, people such as Bin Laden and his associates, are doing un-Islamic things.
The Irish Revolutionary Army (IRA) has been involved over a number of years in several bombings and shootings, but it has never been branded as an emanation of the Catholic Church. The comparison I am making is that it is a political wing fighting for the Irish war of independence yet Christians as a whole have never been blamed for it.
After 9/11, Muslim women in the U.S. were refused service in convenience and neighbourhood stores just because they were wearing hijabs. Muslims stores owners were beaten and their stores looted – all these happening in a country with a staunch belief and reputation of fair play, democratic principles, rule of law, freedom of speech and religion. It was the American thing to do in retaliation for 9/11.
I have a friend in Calgary whose last name happens to be Khan, but every time he goes to the U.S., he is singled out from the line up, interrogated and searched at least for an hour before he is let go.
Next time my friend Khan goes to the U.S., I’ll suggest to him that he take a few copies of the Khan movie with him for the immigration officials so that they can stop stereotyping all the Khans.
