Peddi’s focus on the male gaze
Ram Charan’s big-budget Telugu sports-drama Peddi arrived in theatres on June 4 riding enormous hype – and immediately ran into a firestorm. Audiences flagged the film for the hyper-sexualisation of Janhvi Kapoor’s character Achiyyamma, with the camera repeatedly lingering on close-ups of her body even as dialogues focused on her facial beauty. The sharpest criticism was reserved for a scene where Ram Charan’s character uses a power cut to forcefully kiss Kapoor’s character – a sequence widely condemned online as depicting sexual assault.
The controversy deepened when Kapoor reportedly liked, then quickly unliked, an Instagram post criticising the film’s portrayal of her character – a fleeting moment of apparent solidarity that the internet screenshotted and dissected endlessly. Unverified private chats also leaked, of her allegedly expressing frustration during production over objectifying camera angles. Faced with mounting outrage, director Buchi Babu Sana issued a public apology, stating that cinema should never make viewers feel uncomfortable or disrespected, and confirmed that the controversial scenes would be revised.
“370 rupees ki biryani”
What started as a throwaway crowd-work moment at a stand-up show has become India’s most talked-about internet controversy of the week. During comedian Pranit More’s live show, audience member Himanshu Jangra shared a story about going on a date where he spent around 370 rupees on chicken biryani and then casually implied he needed to ‘recover’ what he had spent – a remark widely interpreted as expecting physical intimacy in return. Many laughed it off, calling it a “peak Gurgaon moment” and watched it detonate across the internet.
The fallout was swift. Jangra, a 23-year-old web developer, lost his job. More faced a furious pile-on for amplifying the attitude rather than challenging it. “370 rupees ki biryani” is now a cultural shorthand for male entitlement in dating – a reminder that in the age of the viral video, the internet will always determine the punchline.
Cockroach Janata Party
It started with an insult – on May 15, Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, during a Supreme Court hearing, compared unemployed young people to ‘cockroaches’ and ‘parasites of society’ who ‘start attacking everyone’. Most politicians would have moved on. Instead, 30-year-old political strategist Abhijeet Dipke flipped the slur into a movement.
The Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) – slogan: “Voice of the lazy and unemployed”, was born on May 16, complete with a mock manifesto, a parody website, and an AI-generated cockroach mascot. Within a single week, it amassed over 22 million Instagram followers – more than either BJP or Indian National Congress. The humour masked genuine rage. The online movement manifested in a real protest this week. Waving national flags and clutching schoolbooks at Jantar Mantar, hundreds of protesters demanded the resignation of education minister Dharmendra Pradhan over a string of exam paper leaks, technical glitches, and cancelled tests. CJP spokespeople have Modi’s government a seven-day ultimatum to dismiss Pradhan – or face a nationwide stir.
