Kangana Ranaut’s Emergency: A Bold, Messy Battle Over Indira Gandhi’s Legacy
Dive into Emergency, Kangana Ranaut’s biopic of Indira Gandhi, where the filmmaker’s personal battles with power, politics, and public perception echo those of India’s Iron Lady.
Cinema has always held a unique power to explore the lives of those who shape history, reflecting not only their complexities but also the times in which they lived. Kangana Ranaut’s Emergency is an ambitious attempt to capture the life of Indira Gandhi, one of India’s most polarizing figures, yet it is equally a reflection of Ranaut herself—a filmmaker and politician whose public persona is as contentious as the subject she seeks to portray. Watching the film, one cannot help but sense that it grapples with dualities: power and paranoia, reverence and critique, history and myth.
I approached Emergency with a mix of curiosity and apprehension, aware of how Ranaut’s ideological leanings might shape the narrative. Known for her provocative statements and nationalist rhetoric, she has often positioned herself as a disruptive force in both Bollywood and Indian politics. Would Emergency become a one-dimensional critique of Indira Gandhi’s autocratic rule, or would it strive for a more nuanced exploration of her life and choices? The answer, as it unfolds, lies somewhere in the uneasy middle, suspended between competing impulses.
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A Portrait of Power and Paranoia: Reflections of a Parallel Journey
The film traces Indira Gandhi’s journey from her lonely childhood to her ascension as India’s first female prime minister and, ultimately, her assassination. Kangana Ranaut’s portrayal emphasizes Gandhi’s transformation from a hesitant leader, dismissed as a goongi gudiya (mute doll), to a resolute figure navigating crises like the Bangladesh Liberation War and the declaration of the Emergency. Yet, much of this evolution feels like a checklist of historical moments, skimming over the emotional and political deliberations that defined Gandhi’s tenure.
What makes this portrayal intriguing, however, is the clear resonance between Gandhi’s struggles and those of Ranaut herself. Both women occupy fraught spaces as polarizing figures in their respective arenas. Gandhi battled against the perception of being a weak leader, only to consolidate power in ways that redefined her image but alienated many. Similarly, Ranaut’s career is defined by her rebellion against Bollywood’s entrenched power structures and the narratives spun by those who seek to undermine her. In some ways, Emergency becomes as much about Ranaut’s own navigation of power, control, and public perception as it is about Indira Gandhi’s.
The Emergency period itself—marked by censorship, arrests, and forced sterilizations—is given surprisingly limited attention in the film. Instead, it shifts its focus to Gandhi’s personal struggles: her fraught relationship with her son Sanjay, her perceived isolation, and her battles with self-doubt. These moments, though underexplored, are a mirror of the ways Ranaut herself has framed her public life. Her career, like Gandhi’s tenure, is punctuated by periods of intense control over her narrative, a sharp response to being dismissed or marginalized by the industry she challenges.
This parallel between Gandhi’s assertion of authority and Ranaut’s own journey lends the film a meta-textual layer, even if unintentionally. While the film may leave the audience with more questions than answers about Gandhi’s legacy, it also invites reflection on Ranaut’s choices as an artist, director, and public figure—choices that often seem to echo the themes of power, isolation, and resilience that define her subject.
The Shadow of Ranaut’s Politics: Art, Power, and Conservative Narratives
Kangana Ranaut’s ideological inclinations cast a long shadow over Emergency, shaping not just its narrative but also its implications in the current sociopolitical landscape. As a prominent supporter of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Ranaut has often positioned herself as a disruptor—an iconoclast railing against Bollywood’s perceived liberal elite and an outspoken advocate for conservative, nationalist ideals. This context makes her portrayal of Indira Gandhi particularly intriguing and complex. Gandhi’s legacy is itself riddled with contradictions: a woman who rose to unparalleled political power in a patriarchal society while simultaneously consolidating her authority in ways that stifled dissent and democracy.
Ranaut’s Emergency becomes an inadvertent mirror of her own dualities. On one hand, her film celebrates Gandhi’s transformation from a dismissed and underestimated leader into a commanding figure. On the other, it critiques the Nehru-Gandhi family’s dynastic politics—a stance aligned with BJP rhetoric that paints the Congress Party as a relic of entitlement. This interplay between admiration and criticism reflects the broader conservative narrative that seeks to dismantle Congress’s historical dominance while acknowledging Gandhi’s indomitable presence.
The tension is perhaps most pronounced in Ranaut’s decision to invite Priyanka Gandhi to watch the film—a move that can be interpreted as both an olive branch and a provocation. It underscores the uneasy dynamic between Ranaut’s cinematic tribute to Indira Gandhi and her political alignment with a party committed to erasing the legacy of the very family Gandhi represents. This juxtaposition—honoring Gandhi while dismantling her lineage—adds a layer of complexity to the film’s ideological undercurrents.
The Role of Women in Nationalist Conservatism
Beyond this tension, Ranaut’s portrayal of Gandhi opens up a broader conversation about what it means to be a woman representing nationalist and conservative politics. Historically, women in such spaces have often been cast as symbols of purity, strength, and sacrifice, upholding traditional values while navigating a male-dominated political arena. This disruption comes with contradictions. Ranaut’s public persona is built on a vocal rejection of Bollywood’s entrenched hierarchies and her self-presentation as an outsider fighting an unjust system. Yet her alignment with the BJP and its ideological machinery places her squarely within another form of power structure, one that often marginalizes dissenting voices and propagates regressive policies, particularly around gender, religion, and free speech. Can an artist genuinely challenge the status quo while aligning with a political framework that thrives on conformity and exclusion?
For Ranaut, the answer seems to lie in a selective rebellion—one that critiques certain power dynamics (dynastic politics, Bollywood cliques) while reinforcing others (Hindu nationalism, anti-liberalism). This duality mirrors the way Emergency handles Gandhi’s legacy: celebrating her strength while critiquing the systems that enabled her rise.
A Reflection of Contemporary India
Emergency arrives at a time when Indian cinema is increasingly entwined with the narratives of nationalism, its stories shaped by the ideological currents of a country at a cultural and political crossroads. Unlike many recent historical dramas that overtly glorify establishment figures or vilify opposition voices, Ranaut’s film occupies a more ambiguous and unsettled space. It neither fully endorses Gandhi’s actions during the Emergency nor unequivocally condemns them. This ambivalence, far from accidental, reflects both the contradictions inherent in Ranaut’s ideological positioning and India’s broader struggle to reconcile its complex history with its fractured present.
Ranaut’s portrayal of Gandhi invites comparisons with other cultural depictions of the former prime minister. In Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children, Gandhi is caricatured as the Widow, a dystopian symbol of authoritarian overreach, embodying the fears of unchecked power. Rushdie’s portrayal, dripping with satire, offers no redemption for Gandhi—her authoritarianism is both personal and political, a calculated extension of her insecurity and ambition.
Suchitra Sen in Gulzaar’s Aandhi and Kangana Ranaut in Emergency
On the other hand, Suchitra Sen’s portrayal in Aandhi takes a more romanticized, fictionalized approach. Loosely based on Gandhi’s public life, the film steers clear of her political controversies, focusing instead on the personal sacrifices she makes for her career. Aandhi strips Gandhi of her authoritarian overtones, presenting her instead as a tragic figure caught between duty and desire. These two extremes—Rushdie’s sharp critique and Sen’s sentimental gloss—highlight the challenge of portraying a figure like Gandhi, whose life and legacy resist easy categorization.
The Ambiguities of Nationalist Narratives
Ranaut’s portrayal of Gandhi’s transformation from the goongi gudiya (mute doll) to the Iron Lady reflects her admiration for women who defy patriarchal norms, but it also comes with an ideological cost. The film critiques the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty’s role in fostering political entitlement and corruption, echoing the BJP’s narrative, yet it refrains from a full-throated condemnation of the Emergency itself—a period defined by censorship, arrests, and widespread human rights abuses. This selective engagement mirrors the BJP’s own ambivalence about authoritarianism, as it increasingly consolidates power in ways reminiscent of Gandhi’s rule.
The film’s treatment of Sanjay Gandhi’s forced sterilization program, for example, is emblematic of its broader approach. While acknowledging the program’s devastating impact, Emergency shifts focus to the personal dynamics between Indira and her son, framing his actions as the tragic outcome of a mother’s blind love rather than a systemic abuse of state power. Similarly, opposition leaders like Jayaprakash Narayan and Atal Bihari Vajpayee are depicted in broad strokes, their resistance to the Emergency reduced to symbolic acts of defiance rather than substantive political struggles.
This narrative strategy serves two purposes. First, it avoids alienating audiences who view Gandhi’s legacy with ambivalence, offering a sanitized version of her tenure that emphasizes personal conflict over political accountability. Second, it allows Ranaut to frame Gandhi’s authoritarianism as a cautionary tale while drawing implicit parallels to her own struggle against perceived injustice in Bollywood and Indian politics.
Cinema and the Burden of Legacy
Biopics, particularly those of political figures, often reveal as much about their creators as their subjects. Ranaut’s conflicting impulses—to critique Gandhi’s authoritarianism while celebrating her resilience—mirror the nation’s own divided relationship with its past. India’s contemporary political climate is one where historical narratives are fiercely contested, often weaponized to serve ideological ends. In this context, Emergency functions not just as a historical drama but as a commentary on the role of women in power, the nature of authority, and the tensions between personal ambition and public responsibility.
Ranaut herself is emblematic of these tensions. As a woman navigating conservative political spaces, she wields power in ways that defy traditional gender norms, yet her alignment with regressive ideologies complicates her position as a feminist figure. This duality—of empowerment and conservatism—is reflected in the film’s portrayal of Gandhi, who is both celebrated for her strength and critiqued for her excesses.
The parallels between Gandhi’s legacy and Ranaut’s career are striking. Both women have been dismissed by their detractors as unfit for their roles—Gandhi as a goongi gudiya, Ranaut as an outsider disrupting Bollywood’s status quo. Both have leveraged this dismissal to consolidate power, reframing their narratives as stories of resilience against overwhelming odds. Yet both are also guilty of wielding their power in ways that stifle dissent, whether through political repression or ideological conformity.
Ultimately, Emergency is not just a film about Indira Gandhi; it is a reflection of the India in which it was made. It captures the contradictions of a nation grappling with the legacies of its leaders, the weight of its history, and the complexities of its present. The film’s uneven tone—celebratory yet critical, personal yet political—mirrors the broader ambiguities of contemporary Indian identity.
— David Kalal is an artist, writer, and Communications Director at Hindus for Human Rights.