Chhaava’s Success Fuels Hindutva Myth-Making and Bollywood’s Obsession with Toxic Masculinity
The HinduPublished : Mar 08, 2025 16:34 IST - 6 MINS READ You are angry because you are afraid, a character tells Dev, the feral hero of Deva. Watching the rage historical Chhaava about the 17th century warrior king Sambhaji—the son and successor of Shivaji, who founded the Maratha empire—filmed at an agony decibel level somewhere between deafening and deafened, the question of anger is brought up again, recast as this: what is it that you are afraid of? Anger: ‘Poisonous and popular’ The word “anger” is derived from an old Germanic word angaz that means a distressing narrowness, a squeezed, aching grip. “They did not define adulthood or manliness in terms of anger… seeing it as destructive of wellbeing and democratic institutions.” Extending Nussbaum’s claim, a culture that celebrates anger is one that is anti-democracy and anti-wellness because it looks forward only to retribution, not justice, thinking they are one and the same. The philosopher Amia Srinivasan, complicating Nussbaum’s theory, wonders if there is a distinction to be made between “misplaced rage” and “justified anger”.
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