Now this is an important question as to why the box office report of the film Emergency is disappointing. Since its release on January 17, Emergency has not yet crossed the earning mark of Rs 15 crore, whereas its cost was around Rs 60 crore. This was an ambitious film of Kangana Ranaut. This is her third biopic after Manikarnika and Thalaivi, which is based on major events related to the life of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. The script written by Ritesh Shah was produced by Kangana's production company Manikarnika Films and Kangana herself also directed it. Kangana has tried to make this film with a lot of heart and worked hard and also spent time in research.
Kangana Ranaut hoped that her film could be a blockbuster like The Kashmir Files or The Kerala Story, but it could not happen. Despite some appreciation, people did not show much interest in watching Emergency. Even after about a week of its release, even that audience, which is said to be Kangana's alleged supporting section, did not flock to the cinema hall to watch Emergency. Otherwise such a bad condition of the film would not have been seen. Why did this happen?
Kangana Ranaut was preparing to make Emergency for many years. To avoid any controversy over the film, he chose the book (The Emergency: A Personal History) by famous writer-journalist Kumi Kapoor. This book is based on emergency. In recent years, filmmakers have started considering it appropriate to take the help of famous books to make historical period pieces or biopics. This is a new way to avoid disputes. In case of any kind of controversy, the filmmaker cleverly protects himself and raises questions towards the writer. References written in the book are cited. The responsibility lies not with the filmmaker but with the writer.
Today, Kangana Ranaut is not just a film actress but is also an MP from Mandi seat of the ruling party BJP at the Centre. His status is that of a public representative. This is the reason why she considers it her duty to provide emotional support to the government or party through her statements and films. The fiftieth anniversary of the Emergency was celebrated in the year 2024. During this, the Center announced to celebrate June 25 as Constitution Killing Day. Being a party MP, Kangana Ranaut decided to issue an emergency for this occasion. But some scenes of the first trailer of Emergency had created controversy. Sikhs protested against Khalistan and terrorism and soon demonstrations started against Kangana in Punjab. The protest was so deep that the certificate was not received from the Central Board of Film Certification. The film got the green signal after many cuts.
Now when the film was released on January 17, its story and the characterization of Indira Gandhi were shocking for most of the audiences. Kangana is also the director, producer and story writer of this film, hence the entire responsibility for it rests on her. The film proved to be exactly the opposite of what people had expected at the time of the protests. Kangana seems to sympathize with the character of Indira Gandhi in the film on many fronts. Kangana has presented Indira Gandhi as if it was not her but her son Sanjay Gandhi who had a hand in every tough decision.
In the film, Indira Gandhi is also shown repenting over the excesses of the Emergency and after losing to the Janata Party in 1977, she is presented as a juggler who came down to earth and worked hard and won the lost game. On this front, no issue is raised against the Emergency in the film, nor is there a voice in support of Constitution Killing Day. Apart from this, Kangana made another mistake as a director. He made a commercial genre film on such a big personality of Indian politics. In this, the characters of Indira Gandhi, Sam Manek Shaw, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Jai Prakash Narayan are seen singing. Who could like this? Despite having stars like Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Mahima Chaudhary, Milind Soman and Satish Kaushik, people could not like the film.
