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Theatre legend Feroz Abbas Khan's directorial venture "Dekh Tamasha Dekh" is a brutal chronicle of the communal divide between Hindus and Muslims that stares in our face. He says it was essential for him to express a concern for the times "we're living in".

Excerpts from the interview.

Q: "Dekh Tamasha Dekh" throws the simmering discontent between the two communities out in the open?

A: Yes, I think it makes the private the public. It started in our cinema with matters pertaining to sex and sexuality coming out in the open. But a confrontation of communalism in the public was so far hidden from cinematic view. The mindset of public communal violence begins in the privacy of homes. The tenor of discussion in these private discussions suggests that a genocide on a small scale is perfectly okay if it brings about any economic growth. Now that's kind of mindset where people sit in their drawingrooms and discuss violence. But they don't really go out and wash their hands in the bloodshed. They let other people do it for them. The minds behind those acts of violence stay out of sight.

The thinking class doesn't understand the long-term repercussions of their secretly sanctioned violence. To me (Bharatiya Janata Party's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi) Modi, non-Modi, VHP (Vishva Hindu Parishad) is not important. All these leaders are to me, manifestations of a dangerous mindset where the logic is, sacrificing 4,000-5,000 lives is ok, as it puts a community in its place and is also good for economic growth. Such rabid mindset doesn't realise what dangerous effects their action would have on society. It is this violent mindset generating out of the drawing rooms that troubles me.

Q: So you're fundamentally opposed to fundamentalism?

A: Ha ha. You can say that. I can understand the minority communinity's feeling of persecution. But that doesn't make their vitriolic any less insane than the majority community's vitriolic. You can't say, 'My bakwas is better than your bakwas'. After watching my film, people are shocked by what they see.

Q: Was there no trepidation that this film would stir up a hornet's nest?

A: The responses in the most communally volatile places like Varanasi, Lucknow and Kanpur - hotbeds of communal tension - they all felt that the language of truth is undiluted. It comes across without prejudice and with no baggage.

I didn't make this film to generate melodrama by creating a filmy conflict between the protagonist and the antagonist. I made this film with no agenda except to tell the truth. It is neither for or against any community. I think I've been responsible in putting across the truth. Sure, the language that the two communities use to address one another is harsh. But nothing compared with the language our politicians use on television.

Q: Your film certainly doesn't flinch from confronting the demons of communalism?

A: For me, it was essential to go out there and express a concern for the times we're living in. The idea of communal identity being bigger than humanity is absurd and dangerous. Communalism is like a damaged ATM card from which something harmful will always come out. The next stage of the nation's development cannot happen without a character development. For the younger generation ever response is based on an instant emotional stimulus.

Q: So is the situation completely hopeless for the younger generations?

A: Young people in the smaller towns are connected with a sense of history. I've travelled to places like Patna and Kanpur with the film. The youth that I encounter in these towns is not the same people I meet where I stay in South Mumbai. In the larger cities, the youth is fed on alternate reality based on cricket and Bollywood. And that's a fine option to exercise. However to believe that alternate reality is the only reality worthy of inhabiting is a frightening thought. If you make diversion the focus of your life reality would one day be knocking on your door. Even the intelligentsia is shown to be quite helpless in my film. It's all very fine to be an intellectual. But what good is your ideology when you are beaten by a mob on the streets? Thinkers are becoming redundant. We're creating a sharply polarized society consisting of generations that are wither extraordinarily brilliant or a mass of morons.

Q: Your film comes during Lok Sabha elections. What do you have to say about the looming reality of a BJP government?

A: I've immense faith in the check, balances and sanity of the country. I think the people who will vote for Narendra Modi will actually be protesting against the complete failure of the Congress government. I am optimistic about the basic decency of the people of the country. However it is very important to be warned that this decency can easily be manipulated for small political gains. Political desperation leads to all kinds of bizarre alliances and compromises...like Mrs Sonia Gandhi meeting the Shahi Imam.

Q: How did you convince the censor board to let go the volatile content and the strong dialogues?

A: It was cleared nine months ago when Pankaja Thakur was still the CEO of the Censor Board Of Film Certification. She was very rational in her approach. The entire censor board loved the film. One lady actually felt children should be allowed to watch the film. But the film had go to the Revising Committee. After a very long discussion they decided I only had to cut 40 seconds of the Maulana's rabid speech.

Q: Would your future films continue to display the same level of social commitment?

A: I've told what I had to tell. I had to get it out of my system. My health was getting affected because of all these ideas were bottled up against me... It's out of my system. My next film is a pure love story. Luckily I got a fabulous cast.

With purchasing power on the rise in India, television sets are no longer a luxury and, given this scenario, well-known TV artist Harsh Chhaya feels that the medium should ideally be used to "uplift the benchmark of sensibilities" rather than taking them to base levels.

The actor, who has witnessed the highs and lows of the small screen for over 20 years, pointed out that till the 1980s, things like telephones, TVs, refrigerators and even tape recorders were a luxury, but with the growth of purchasing power, especially with the advent of credit facilities, larger parts of the population came into the entertainment arena.

The effect of this?

"Programming started to get worse to cater to base sensibilities in a bid to find that lowest common denominator," Harsh told in an email interview.

"It would be very easy to call me an obnoxious 'literate' to talk like this about fellow human beings, but I wish TV had taken on the responsibility of uplifting the benchmark of sensibilities rather than falling down to cater to base sensibilities," said the outspoken actor.

He has a valid reason for his views - no other medium, he says, is as strong as television in affecting the minds of the people.

As per an industry report, there were an estimated 155 million TV households in India at the end of 2012.

"Many people in the country still do not have easy access to the cinema or the written word. Not that the semi- and illiterate people are not sensitive and sensible otherwise, but by and large, their tastes differ.

"Also, one observes that of late, more literate people too seem to prefer to live in a semi- or illiterate state of mind in the name of entertainment," said Harsh, who has featured in offbeat and mature shows like 'Tara' and 'Hasratein'.

That explains his absence from the small screen.

"TV certainly was better about 10 to 12 years ago. But then it seems that the channels have these marketing departments that claim that their surveys determine their programming.

"Nevertheless, it is quite possible that as television is moving deeper and deeper into the interiors of the country and more and more people have access to television, one needs to find a lowest common denominator to attract as many viewers," he added.

As an actor, who endorses quality entertainment, he rues that "TV is more for advertising than programming" as things stand today.

"Programming is needed so that something can be shown between ads," he said and added that "the more the society is moving towards defining success and satisfaction as only acquiring things in life, the more the superficiality in television".

"Nothing can look mundane, poor or just regular in ads and that is exactly how they would want the programmes to look like. So everyone has to look young, everyone has to be fair with the exception of villain at times, every home has to look big even for the most poor because that is exactly what advertisers are selling all the time.

"In fact, there have been many instances where advertisers do not put money on programmes they think look 'poor' or 'down market' according to them," he said.

So, Harsh says the only content that can pull him back into TV is something that "agrees with my sensibilities".