We are like this only.

India, as she is in 2021.

Sooryavanshi’s dhamakedar box office success, taken with the frenzy surrounding the recent star wedding, and the entire media and political circus around the recent chopper crash explains almost everything about today’s India.

India analysts who are trying to make head or tail of this giant elephant in a dark room can learn much from these three happenings.

Here’s a quick and dirty list of what we seem to like:

• stereotypes, in everything;
• misplaced priorities in what is important and what is not;
• extrajudicial executions of ‘terrorists’;
• flashy weddings;
• extravagant funerals;
• loud celebrations and jubilations;
• even louder mourning and lamentations;
• over-the-top and misplaced patriotism and unnecessary and unsavoury chest-thumping that is cringey and would have been out of place even in the 20th century;
• creating heroes out of singularly undeserving men (some of them who either indulge in some or all the above activities, or condone and support them); and
• not minding, or even noticing that someone is making money and building political capital out of all the above.

The other seminal lesson from the recent past has been the seemingly political leaderless movements that have put the dampeners on one party deciding the direction of all social and political discourse. That said, this is a visible, and still kind of debatable, lesson. No one is missing seeing it.

But the lessons from the success of Sooryavanshi, the PR coup that was the VicKat wedding, and the unfortunate accident and funeral of the ‘people’s general’ are not as in-your-face, while being equally, if not more, important in understanding the psyche of the aam Hindustani. The movie, and the videos, images, and news emerging from the other two incidents, are a must-watch for those that want to understand this country as she exists in 2021. No one book, article, or commentary by any expert will help them cram so much information in so little time.

I highly recommend it.

P.S: Oh, I should have added one more to that list of three, make that four: The Paytm IPO.