No money and no sex please: Gandhi casts long shadow over early Hindi film hero

Ever wondered why the hero in Indian films till the 1980s shunned wealth and sexual temptation, trying heroically hard not to give in to his desires?

According to London-based writer and journalist Sanjay Suri, it was Mahatma Gandhi's long shadow rather than centuries of "conceptual tradition" that led to this reticence.

The hero -- be it Raj Kapoor, Shammi Kapoor, Dev Anand or Manoj Kumar -- would be the mirror image of the Father of the Nation, only better looking, fighting temptation and winning, Suri argues in his new book "A Gandhian Affair: India's Curious Portrayal of Love in Cinema".

"The hero must mandatorily be shown to face wealth to then turn away from it. He must be shown to face sexual possibilities to then turn away from these two. In this double about-turn lies his heroism," the senior journalist said at the book launch on Sunday evening.

"This is a heroism of surrender, not of conquest, unless it is a conquest of worldly desires. It is in this twin retreat - from both