Politicians and groups often use movie lines, memes, and metaphors to attack their opponents. More and more, political messages are sent as carefully chosen material.
The day before the Kerala assembly polls on April 9, Telangana Chief Minister Revanth Reddy used a famous line from the Malayali movie Narsimhan to start a scathing attack on his colleague in Kerala and CPI(M) leader Pinarayi Vijayan.
During a campaign stop on April 1, Reddy said, “Nee Po Mone Dinesha.” This meant that Vijayan’s time was up.
Regardless of party, lawmakers are using movie tropes more and more to attack their opponents.
On April 4, Raghav Chadha, a Rajya Sabha MP for the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), retaliated against his own party by saying a line from the movie Dhurandhar: “Ghayal hun isilye ghatak hun” (I am dangerous as I am hurt). This was done as his party had fired him as deputy leader in the Rajya Sabha.
At the same time, BJP leaders have been free to be creative
As a jab at Arvind Kejriwal’s “Sheesh Mahal,” which was a popular campaign theme for the BJP in the 2025 Delhi elections, Delhi minister Parvesh Verma compared him to “Rehman Dakait,” a famous dacait from Dhurandhar. Verma said this in the assembly on March 26, 2019.
The BJP’s 2025 Delhi election campaign was based on fighting corruption. They often used the “Sheeh Mahal” jibe to insult Kejriwal, saying that when he was chief minister, he wasted public money on remodelling his official home.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi does it, no one else does it quite like him, either on the political stage or in Parliament.
From “picture abhi baaki hai” (from Om Shanti Om) to “How’s the josh?” “(from Uri: The Surgical Strike)” Modi has made lines from films into political catchphrases that people quickly understand.
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He has even used old films like Sholay and Sharaabi to poke fun at the other side
In February 2020, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi answered the Motion of Thanks on the President’s Address in the Lok Sabha, he used the famous Sholay dialogue to attack the opposition, mostly the Congress, as they had lost so many elections, including the 2014 and 2019 general elections and several state elections. “Teesri baar toh hare hain, par mausi moral victory toh hai na.”
In February of this year, actor and politician Kamal Hassan used the Telugu line “Jagannatha ratha chakralu tirugutunnay” (the wheels of Jagannath’s chariot are coming) from the movie Kalki 2898 AD in his first speech in the Rajya Sabha to show that political change and democratic momentum were growing in the country.
Not to be beaten, the Opposition has also used lines from films to criticise the government.
Mallikarjun Kharge, the head of Congress, criticised India’s reaction to US head Donald Trump’s harsh taxes in January, saying, “India didn’t elect you (PM Modi) to nod to whatever he (Trump) says.”
Then he used the famous line “Mogambo Khush Hua” from Mr. India to say that the government seemed more interested in making Trump happy than standing up for India’s rights.
Movies talk to the gut before they talk to the brain. Politicians have known for a long time that a well framed picture or a line from a movie moves people more quickly than any number or policy paper. “Political messages have just followed the trend of making people feel first and think later, thanks to films,” said Anant Mishra, an assistant professor at Lakshmibai College, Delhi University.
Mishra also talked about how people consume media. He said that social media, TV, and streaming services have turned politics into a show. “Every speech, debate, and rally today is edited, framed, and used as content.”
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The “industry” of memes
Besides movie references, political parties often start “meme wars” on social media based on lines and scenes from movies. These wars get worse during elections.
An Associate Professor and political expert at Ramjas College named Tanveer Aeijaz said, “There is a whole industry working on it.”
“We choose who to vote for based on what we see on social media.” These things are used to talk about the enemy. A whole business is working on this. “People are getting paid by political parties to make creative memes for them,” Aeijaz told ThePrint.
This can be seen on the main Instagram account for the Aam Aadmi Party. It has a great part called “memes” where political commentary meets artistic edits.
The collection of memes is very diverse. There is a Jolly LLB inspired edit that criticises Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s handling of the dollar, and there is a Sholay inspired Gabbar Singh reference that says, “school theek karlo nahi toh Kejriwal aa jayega.”
On X, AAP’s handle has a modified picture of Kejriwal as Pushpa from the movie “Pushpa” with the words “Kejriwal jhukega Nahi” written on it.
In the same way, the BJP’s nicknames call PM Modi “Dhurandhar.” Last month, the BJP’s X handle shared a clip that had been changed to make him look like the real Dhurandhar. The state arm of the party also put videos of him on their X accounts and called him the “Dhurandhar.”
A versatile writer mainly works on trending news, daily updates from politics, business, crime, current affairs and entertainment.
