Nepotism and Favoritism; what must matter to the people!!

Recently, I heard a lot of discussion on nepotism in Indian film industries and how it’s affecting the newcomers a lot. People discussed this so much that they even started promoting boycott movements in social media and few unlucky film actors of Bollywood film industry had to face the wrath and some of their films were also doomed. Later on, few came back stronger and delivered very successful films also, perhaps people forgot nepotism after few months. I was wondering whether nepotism in the film industry really matters so much to common public and is it really affecting them seriously. Perhaps, it might be affecting few upcoming actors to get good chance in the beginning of their career. The reason behind this thought was, the film industry just entertains us and people has the absolute power to reject that movie which does not entertain us. ???

Nepotism is not a very new thing for a country like India and more or less for the Indians. I collected the most simple and best meaning of nepotism as “the use of power or influence to get good jobs or unfair advantages for members of your own family”. We had kings (both in history and mythology), where the kingship was hereditary mostly. And we give respect to many such kings who practised this. Then in the name of democracy we elected leaders who became more dangerous than the Kings in many cases and then they put their children as the next leader and people even voted for them without considering the competency.

So, questions popped up in mind and I hope to get the answers from the readers.

1.?? King transferring the kingship to their children is nepotism or not?

2.?? Politician transferring the leadership post to their children is nepotism or not?

3.?? Then Adani or Ambani transferring the directorship to their children is nepotism or not?

4.?? Mahesh Bhatt putting his daughter Alia Bhatt as a heroin is nepotism or not?

In the case of 1st two points, it should be point of concern for the citizens as these people rule you, they frame policy that affects your day-to-day life, they make rules, acts and programs that affects all the citizen.

In the case of last two points, it should hardly matter to the common citizens as its their own money which they have earned and they are taking the risk of putting their own children which might close their business. And it’s not affecting the common citizens that much, perhaps.

But unfortunately, in India people raised their voice against the question no 4 very seriously for few months and then they forgot it. And unfortunately, the films like Sadak 2, Gunjan Saxena; the Kargil girl tanked and failed to make money. I have not seen those movies; hence I am not commenting on the quality of the content. There are many more films also in the list, I think.

However, some of these cases are not the clear case of nepotism, rather it may be termed as favoritism. So, I tried to understand what is favoritism and the best meaning I got is “unfair support shown to one person or group, especially by someone in authority”. The difference is the beneficiary in the later one is not only family members rather than any individual or group or organization or company you like and favour them. So, Karan Johar who is levelled as the biggest culprit of nepotism falls under favoritism as he used to promote the children of the reputed film stars mostly and he is yet to promote his own children.

For me favouritism is more dangerous than nepotism, perhaps as the beneficiary numbers increased a lot and you are not putting your own money/wealth at risk. You are using your own power to favour someone, however in return you can be benefitted also. One can be a victim of this even in his or her own family also. The girl child in traditional Indian families suffered a lot due to this historically and in some places the same situation prevails. The sons are sent to school in some families and daughters are not. In some families you can see the sons are sent to good schools and daughters are not. In some families’ sons are sent to professional or technical education and daughters are not. However, these are not only because of favoritism only, there are some other reasons also.

So, in the case of favoritism, you lose the chance of getting good jobs, contracts and works and whatnot. In India one can find most of the politicians practicing both. They put their children in politics, mostly and help their known people to get good jobs, contracts, works and what not. Even they use their incompetent children to hold significant posts of importance and where lot of money is circulated. You can see these children in film industry, sports bodies, PSUs and in many other important places. And if you put your brain then, you will understand only in the case of film industry the talent matters to survive and thrive and in other places it does not matter at all. They just enjoy the positions and avail the benefits and lead a great life with taxpayers’ money mostly. To make this simple I must cite few names where people failed as they did not possess talent but got the benefit of nepotism as well as favouritism. Among two sons of Dhiru Bhai Ambani, one spoiled the wealth, and the other one is thriving like anything. Randhir and Rajiv Kapoor failed miserably while Rishi Kapoor became one of the great actors of the industry. Ram Charan, Allu Arjun, Jr NTR succeeded like anything while Kumar Gourav, Uday Chopra, Tushar Kapoor failed drastically. Now tell me the name of a politician’s child who failed literally, if at all in politics, he must be doing something else.

So, being a good citizen of the country, we need to understand when and against whom we need to raise our voice. Basically, everyone transfers their wealth and business to their own children only and that’s absolutely normal. Perhaps that culture has made most of the Indians accept nepotism subconsciously. But I must stress on the point that when a position of power goes to an incompetent person who makes and breaks policies, that affects each and every citizen, then we must not shut our mouths.