Depictions of eroticism and sexuality in the "Rain" song and dance sequences of Bollywood Cinema.

In this article, I utilize films of “Yash Raj Films” a prominent production house of Bollywood to analyse the use of “rain” song and dance sequences to depict, sensuality, sexuality and eroticism. There has been a certain taboo on overt sexual contents in Indian films due to strict censorship code; there is also an implicit taboo amongst Bollywood filmmakers against nudity or overt physical intimacy due to cultural conventions. Therefore, since 1940s, “rain” song and dance sequences in Hindi/Bollywood cinema has been an important motif to depict sensuality, sexuality and eroticism. Rain song and dance situations provide Bollywood filmmakers with the liberty to exploit the female and male sexuality (it is the female sexuality that Bollywood is more concerned and focused on) without any censor interference. In particular, “rain” song and dance situations have been successfully exploited in terms of showcasing rain soaked, eroticized and sexualized imagery of the Bollywood heroines. Mostly, the rain song and dance sequences are designed in such a way that is full of suggestive and erotic dance movements. Prominent Bollywood filmmakers and film producers such as Raj Kapoor, Yash Chopra, Karan Johar, Aditya Chopra, Subhash Ghai and Prakash Mehra have utilized rain songs in most of their films. Yash Chopra agrees that in his films he tries to bring out the sensuality of the heroines through rain song and dance, but he asserts that he in no way tries to exploit their sexuality (Dwyer, 2002). In this article, I analyse how “rain” song and dance sequences are exploited to display the elements of sensuality, sexuality and eroticism while maintaining an Indian flavour and observing conservative strictures against nudity.