Overview

• Speaking at the launch of The Chola Tigers: Avengers of Somnath on September 1 in Mumbai, Amish Tripathi accused Hindi cinema of misrepresenting historical figures.
• He cited Ranveer Singh’s Alauddin Khilji in Padmaavat and Hrithik Roshan’s Akbar in Jodhaa Akbar, also referencing Akshaye Khanna’s Aurangzeb, as examples of misleading portrayals.
• Tripathi said these rulers came from the Central Asian steppes and would have appeared foreign to contemporaries rather than resembling modern Bollywood stars.
• He argued that using Urdu for characters from those periods is anachronistic, asserting that Persian or Turkic languages would be closer to the historical record.
• He warned that such choices can skew public memory and confuse foreign invasions with Indian Muslim identity, while also claiming school histories reflect narratives shaped by the British Raj; Indian media reported no immediate response from filmmakers.