‘Mollywood run by all-male mafia; casting couch systemic’: Hema panel report confirms the worst-feared (2024)

The Malayalam film industry is in the grip of a powerful all-male ‘mafia’ and plagued by the ‘casting couch’ syndrome and systemic exploitation of women, with those refusing to oblige or daring to speak out risking career obliteration, the Justice K. Hema Committee has concluded in its assessment of the working conditions of women professionals in ‘Mollywood’. The committee’s report, submitted back in December 2019 to the Kerala government, was finally made public on August 19.

“The women working in the Malayalam film industry are forced to provide sex on demand at shooting locations. Otherwise, they would be punished and harassed by the all-powerful mafia,” states the committee’s report based on the testimonies of numerous actresses and technicians.

The testimonies listed out various pressure tactics that women are subjected to. “The production controllers indicate to the actress in the lead role/ supporting actresses that they should be ready for adjustments or to please the director/ producer/ actor in the lead role... Adjustments mean providing sexual favours on demand,” states the report.

According to the report, the ‘mafia’, of some 15 prominent producers, directors, actors and production controllers, has a hold over operations of the film industry and decides whether an actress should be given a role or not. The industry is not immune to the influence of criminals and misogynists either.

Listing out various modes of harassment of women professionals, the report says: “If the mafia is unhappy with any of the actresses, they harass them mentally by repeating the shots of intimate scenes at the shooting sets. One actress was asked to repeat lip-locking scenes 17 times by a director after she had complained. When the film was released, the shots were not usedâ€æ Even after shoots, when the women go to their hotel rooms, many knock on their doorsâ€æ”

The Hema Committee, which had veteran South Indian actress Sarada and former bureaucrat K.B. Valsala Kumari as its other two members, was constituted to study the problems faced by women in the Malayalam film industry. This was in response to a petition filed by the Women in Cinema Collective, a grouping that came into existence following the case of abduction and rape of a leading South cinema actress in a moving car near Kochi in February 2017. Malayam actor Dileep is among the accused in the case.

The committee began its work in November 2017, summoning women working in Malayalam cinema. Based on their statements, the committee submitted a 296-page report to the Pinarayi Vijayan government. Keeping the report in cold storage for the past four and half years earned the government much flak. There had been legal obstacles too. Most recently, for instance, actress Ranjini had challenged a Kerala High Court single bench order favouring the release of the report, but this was dismissed by a division bench of the court.

The testimonies made to the Hema Committee indicate that actresses faced threats and coercion for not obliging the ‘mafia’ and the sufferers desisted from approaching the police out of fear for their life and humiliation. “The mafia has the power of making a star or ruining the career,” states the report.

“There is no value for talent. Women are treated as secondary to actors in the industry,” the report also points out.

The report remarks that a talented veteran actor had fallen out of favour in Mollywood for challenging the mafia. “When he tried to act in television serials, the gang blocked him there too,” states the report. Industry veterans feel the reference is perhaps to the late Thilakan, who had worked in over 200 Malayalam movies and was renowned for his method acting. He died in 2012 at the age of 77.

Women in Cinema Collective founding member and noted film editor Beena Paul welcomed the Hema Committee’s report as an “eye-opener”. “Our collective had demanded that the dark forces controlling the film industry be exposed. We are happy that our attempt has been half-successful. Now it’s for government to act,” Paul said to INDIA TODAY.

The Association of Malayalam Movie Artists, in its first reaction, said it needed time to go through the report’s findings. The damning report is a moment of deep introspection for Mollywood as well as an opportunity for the government to decisively intervene to make the Malayalam film world a fair and level-playing field for its talented women professionals. It should also serve as a cue to other film industries in the country to reflect within.

“The sky is full of mysteries, with the twinkling stars and beautiful moon. But scientific investigation has revealed that stars do not twinkle and the moon may not be as beautiful as it seems,” reads the opening para of the report. The stars in Mollywood have fallen.

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