Desi TV says the ‘L’ word

Saasu Mas plotting against their Bahus? A first-night-after-marriage sex scene? All that’s last century. Indian television will never be the same again. Ladies and gentlemen, we have had our first lesbian kiss on primetime TV. The first on-screen lesbian kiss was thanks to the MTV show Big F (fantasy, if you’re wondering).

The show, which is a series of one-off stories about relationships and romantic fantasies, recently aired its sixth episode, which tells the story of fashion design student Sharmistha (played by Asma Badar), who falls for her model Madhurima (Madhura Naik). Madhura is first courted by Sharmistha’s male photographer friend, but ends up choosing Sharmistha instead.

While Indian cinema has had its share of lesbian portrayals, this is the first time that a mainstream television channel in India has shown two girls kissing. The kiss has got a lot of positive feedback on social media though the debate of “questionable content” was also brought up. “When I had gone for the audition, they’d told me about the scene where I’d have to kiss a girl, and I was okay with it,” says Asma. “I just thought it would be a good experience, a change from the normal. People said, ‘OMG, you’re playing a lesbian,’ but for me, it’s fine. I didn’t have any problems.”

Director Abhijit Das, however, insists that the kiss isn’t what the society should focus on. “LGBT relationships are not discussed, no one wants to talk about it,” he says. “They see it as sexual content that we need to keep our children away from. We shouldn’t end up laughing about it or sensationalising it. It should be a point of discovery for youngsters; talk about it with your friends, your parents, your siblings... It’s reality, not fiction or fantasy.”

Madhura adds that she had a few issues with the role at first, but she got through them with the help of Abhijit. “It’s a big challenge to play something you’re not in real life, but that’s where you get to show your versatility as an actor,” she says, adding, “I was a little sceptical about doing the kiss on national television, but the director and the team were helpful. It turned out very well, it’s not vulgar or cheap at all.”

Abhijit explains that the apprehension is understandable from the actors’ point of view. “The actors fear that they’ll get stereotyped: ‘yeh ladki hai, aur yeh raunchy ya bold scenes karti hai’,” he says, “And then you stop getting roles of the girl-next-door or the bubbly girl in the TV and film industry. That’s why it was really nice to work with all three of the actors; that they could take this stance and say that for the sake of this particular story they would go all out and do it, and then see what happens. It’s not for the sensational part of it, it’s because we need awareness.”

The director also said that the fact that they had treated the relationship and the kissing scene in an aesthetic way — something he insists should be attributed to Jesil Patel, his director of photography — has got a positive response from the LGBT community.