Oh My God

Well folks, it has been a while since I updated my blog. A number of things have kept me busy over the past few months and hence I have had no time to get my act together and update my blog.

What prompted me to find sometime to write this entry is after watching recently the movie ‘Oh My God’ a bollywood comedy film. I usually have very little expectation on Akshay Kumar starrer movies but I was pleasantly surprised to find this movie taking an unconventional route from  usual hindi movies.

The plot of the movie revolves around the character Kanji Lalji Mehta played by Paresh Rawal a middle class Hindu-athiest who owns a shop that sells Hindu idols and antiques. One day, a low frequency earth quake destroys his shop and the movie goes further about how he fights against all odds to get compensated for his loss. When his insurance company declines his claims citing reason that damages caused by natural calamities classified under  ‘act of god’ is not claimable, Kanji files a law suit against god, implying a fight against godmen who accumulates wealth from the common man. What a novel concept.

At a time when a set of fraud godmen commercialize religion reducing God into an industry, the relevance of the subject is admirable. Questioning the dangers of blind faith, the film unearths several hypocrisies deeply rooted in our society and it is thought provoking.  It highlights rituals like, in the name of feeding god, how devotees pour several  thousands of litres of milk that go wasted in some temples when 100’s of less privileged people wait outside for a single meal.

This movie showcases the various myths, outdated traditions and customs of most of the religions, which have lost their significance during current times. However, people in almost all religions and faiths are still not able to get away with them and blindly follow so many things in their life without questioning the significance of the same. Due to such blind following, most of these are proving to be detrimental to the human life giving a scope of proliferation to all those false prophets and priests who are capitalizing on the lack of knowledge of truth of the devotees.

When spirituality overtakes humanity it just serves no purpose at all. Spiritual paths and practises that distance us from what it means to be human are not good for humans.

The message here is, believe in God but not blindly. while following regular faiths of visiting temples, or other religious places come out and help those who are in needs.