Depiction of Violent Crimes in Bollywood Cinema and its Impact on Pakistani Society

Abstract

This study aims at examining the possible relationship between increasing violence in Pakistani society and its excessive portrayal in popular Indian movies, ardently watched in Pakistan, during 1970s, 80s, 90s and 2000s. Firstly, five top grossing films selected through popularity charts and youth polls are analyzed from the four decades under study. Then Violence Index, as per adjusted George Gerbner’s Formula, 1976, is calculated to identify and compare the trends in the defined time period. Subsequently, four samples of one month issues of the largest circulated Daily Jang from each decade (1976-2006) were carefully analyzed for crime news as an authentic daily record of social crime scene in the country. Results show that violence has increased both in Pakistani society and Indian movies during the forty years sampled but the increase is curvilinear rather than linear in nature. Only a negligibly weak correlation of + 0.2 is being found between the incidences of silver screen violence and real-life, reported crimes. Though, there seems to be fragile relationship between the two variables, it is observed that the violent crimes rate in Pakistani society fluctuate, following the trends and frequency of portrayal of violence in Indian movies in preceding decade under study.