In recent years, A. R. Rahman has increasingly stepped out of the studio and into the churn of Bharat’s culture wars. Lauded globally as the “Mozart of Madras”, he now frames parts of his career trajectory through the lens of discrimination, hinting that his religious identity hindered his work in Hindi cinema. Yet a close look at his own words, choices, and opportunities presents a strikingly different picture—one that raises serious questions about his claims and highlights a pattern of selective outrage, ideological signalling, and, at times, clear hypocrisy.
The Birmingham Remark: Blaming ‘Communal’ Bias After Eight Years
On January 14, 2026, speaking at Birmingham Symphony Hall in an interview with BBC Asian Network, Rahman suggested that a drop in his Hindi film work over the past eight years might be linked not just to changing power centres in Bollywood, but also to “a communal thing.”
He said:
- Over the last eight years, “a power shift has happened, and people who are not creative have the power now.”
- He added that “it might be a communal thing also but it is not in my face,” implying subtle, identity-driven bias against him as a Muslim.
- He simultaneously admitted that “maybe I never got to know of this, maybe it was concealed by God,” acknowledging no direct experience of discrimination.
The formulation is telling: a serious allegation of communal exclusion, wrapped in ambiguity and deniability. The impact, however, was neither ambiguous nor subtle. The comment was widely interpreted as a charge that his Muslim identity had cost him work in Bollywood, and it triggered a wave of criticism across social media and in commentary.
Two days later, on January 16, 2026, Rahman released an Instagram video clarification. He claimed he had no intention of hurting sentiments, reiterated that “Bharat is central” to his life and music, and cited his work on projects like Ramayana as proof that his art “transcends religion.” But this damage-control exercise only sharpened the core contradiction: if Bollywood is supposedly communal and biased against him, how is it that he has been entrusted with the soundtrack of one of the biggest Hindu civilisational projects in modern Bharatiya cinema?
The Ramayana Question: If Bollywood Is Communal, Why Hire Rahman?
Rahman is currently composing the score for Nitesh Tiwari’s Ramayana—arguably the most symbolically loaded Hindu cultural project in contemporary Hindi cinema. The film sits squarely at the centre of Bharat’s present ideological moment, with enormous political, cultural, and religious stakes.
If the Hindi film industry, or the “power shift” within it, were truly operating on communal lines against Muslims, Rahman’s selection as composer for Ramayana makes little sense. Producers and directors would hardly hand over the musical reins of a project so deeply embedded in Hindu sentiment and mythology to someone they supposedly discriminate against. Instead, the facts suggest the opposite:
- Rahman continues to be trusted with high-profile, high-risk, and high-symbolism ventures.
- He collaborates with international icons like Hans Zimmer on projects that resonate with Bharat’s present ideological zeitgeist.
- His name remains a global brand in music, not a marginalised afterthought.
The gap between Rahman’s insinuation of communal bias and the reality of his ongoing work is hard to ignore. What the Birmingham remark reveals is less an objective assessment of the industry and more a posture: playing to a certain narrative that sees contemporary Bharat primarily through victimhood and identity politics, while continuing to benefit from the very ecosystem being disparaged.
From Dileep Kumar to A. R. Rahman: A Story of Faith and Resentment
Born A. S. Dileep Kumar on 6 January 1967 in Madras (now Chennai), Rahman’s personal journey is often cited as one of reinvention and spiritual rebirth. He comes from a Tamil Vellalar Hindu background. His father, R. K. Shekhar, was a respected composer in the South Bharatiya film industry, and his mother, born Kasturi and later known as Kareema Begum, raised Rahman and his three sisters after Shekhar’s death.
The late 1980s marked a turning point. Around 1988–89, Rahman and his family embraced Islam. The conversion, by his own accounts and those around him, came in the context of illness and desperation:
- His sister was seriously ill.
- The family had a long association with a Sufi who had treated his father in his final days while battling cancer.
- On the advice, or under the influence, of this Sufi, the family embraced Islam in the hope of divine intervention and healing.
It is not uncommon for personal tragedy to lead to spiritual shifts. What stands out in Rahman’s case is not the conversion itself, but what he reportedly said later about his former faith. According to accounts cited by commentators, after embracing Islam he went so far as to blame Hindu deities for his father’s death—stating that the very deities his father worshipped had taken his life.
That framing is revealing. It recasts an individual’s illness and mortality as a kind of divine betrayal by Hindu gods, and it casts his new faith not just as a personal path but implicitly as a corrective to something “failed” or harmful in his earlier tradition. For someone now selling himself as a bridge-builder whose music “transcends religion,” that earlier bitterness sits uneasily with his present messaging.
The Piraisoodan Incident: Intolerance in His Own Home
The tension between Rahman’s public claims of inclusivity and private practice is further exposed by a serious allegation from Tamil poet and lyricist Piraisoodan. This is not an obscure figure. Piraisoodan:
- Has won the Tamil Nadu State Best Lyricist Award three times.
- Wrote lyrics for numerous films and advertising jingles.
- Was instrumental in Rahman’s early rise: Rahman first gained notice composing music for advertisement jingles written by Piraisoodan.
According to Piraisoodan’s account, when he visited Rahman’s residence for professional work, he was asked not to wear Vibuthi and Kumkum—sacred Hindu symbols commonly worn on the forehead. He refused to remove them. The implication is stark: a man whose early career was intertwined with a Hindu lyricist allegedly allowed (or enabled) an environment where visible Hindu markers were unwelcome in his own home.
Taken at face value, this stands in direct contradiction to the image Rahman projects—of an artist above religious divides, whose home and music are supposedly open to all. At the very least, it shows a discomfort, if not outright intolerance, towards Hindu symbols in a private setting, even while he publicly claims to transcend religion and criticises others for “divisive symbolism.”
Selective Outrage on Symbolism: Chhaava and ‘Divisiveness’
Rahman’s own words about the 2025 film Chhaava further cement this pattern. The Vicky Kaushal-starrer, which portrays Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj, carries heavy historical and religious ballast. Rahman composed the soundtrack, gaining credit and visibility from the project. Yet, in the January 2026 BBC interview, he described Chhaava’s symbolism in starkly negative terms:
- “It is a divisive film. I think it cashed in on divisiveness through symbolism targeting a community.”
- He says he asked the director why they needed him, but was told “we need only you for this.”
- He concedes the film is “enjoyable” but “definitely people are smarter than that.”
The contradiction here cuts both ways. If Rahman truly believed the film was cashing in on divisive symbolism targeting a community, why did he accept and retain the project? A composer of his stature and financial security is not compelled to score every film offered to him. By his own description, he suspected the film of exploiting communal fault-lines—yet he contributed to it, then publicly disowned its symbolism after the fact, positioning himself as morally above the very work that bears his name.
The message is clear: he will collect the professional benefits of high-visibility, controversial projects, and later distance himself rhetorically, aligning with fashionable critiques of “divisiveness” while leaving his own complicity untouched.
Language Politics and The ‘Hindi?’ Walkout
Rahman’s public conduct has also repeatedly intersected with linguistic and regional identities, often aligning him with one side of polarising debates and then retreating into “joke” explanations when backlash follows. A notable example is the May 2021 event for his film 99 Songs.
At a promotional event in Tamil Nadu, the anchor welcomed him in Tamil but shifted to Hindi when addressing actor Ehan Bhatt. Rahman reacted with a visibly pointed “Hindi?” and briefly walked off the stage. The clip went viral:
- Social media users accused him of anti-Hindi bias and regional chauvinism.
- The moment fed into an already heated discourse over Hindi imposition and language hierarchy in Bharat.
Later, in an interview with Bollywood Hungama in April 2021, Rahman attempted to dismiss the incident as a light-hearted joke tied to event protocol. He claimed that since the Hindi version of 99 Songs had already been launched, the Tamil event was meant for a Tamil-speaking audience, and his reaction was playful.
Yet the optics and impact tell a different story. For a seasoned performer, walking off stage and mocking a switch to Hindi in a public event is not a neutral gag; it is a deliberate signal. Once criticism mounted, Rahman switched to a softer narrative, insisting it was all in jest. This pattern—provocative gesture followed by a pacifying explanation—recurs across his controversies.
‘This Is Not My India’: Branding Discomfort as Patriotism
Rahman’s politics came into sharper relief in 2017 when he reacted to the killing of journalist Gauri Lankesh in Bengaluru. At the premiere of his concert film One Heart: The A.R. Rahman Concert Film, he said:
- “I am very sad about this event. I hope such incidents do not happen in India.”
- “If such events happen in India, then this is not my India. I want my country to be progressive and soft-hearted.”
The desire for a non-violent, progressive Bharat is uncontroversial. But the phrase “this is not my India” became a rallying line in a broader narrative that painted the country as sliding irreversibly into intolerance. Once again, Rahman positioned himself as a moral commentator on the state of the republic, associating himself with a particular ideological reading of events—one that consistently paints Bharat in dark colours.
Yet when he now says that his music “honours Bharat” and that Bharat is “central” to his life and work, the selective nature of his public lament becomes evident. On some issues, Bharat is not “his” if it fails his expectations; on others, especially when he faces criticism, he falls back on the rhetoric of unity, harmony, and transcendence. The Bharat he claims or disowns appears to depend largely on whether it suits the narrative he wishes to project at a given moment.
The Vande Mataram Controversy: Patriotism on Pause
Rahman’s fraught relationship with national symbols surfaced again when journalist Swati Chaturvedi alleged that he declined to sing Vande Mataram or Maa Tujhe Salaam during an interview. The claim sparked intense online debate, with many questioning his intent and patriotism, especially given that Maa Tujhe Salaam is one of his own most iconic patriotic compositions.
The controversy was sharp because it cut to a basic question: if Rahman has no problem invoking Bharat and patriotism when it enhances his brand—through songs like Maa Tujhe Salaam and his association with national events—why would he balk at singing such a song in a simple, respectful setting? Even if, as some of his supporters insisted, he was not obligated to perform on demand, the optics again suggested a disjunction between the patriotic persona he has built and his willingness to publicly stand by those symbols when challenged or requested.
The fact that this episode struck such a nerve shows how carefully Rahman’s image has been curated as a “national” figure—only for that image to be undermined by his own behaviour.
Career Peak and Recognition: Hardly a Marginalised Figure
Any discussion of Rahman’s claim that “communal” power shifts may have cost him opportunities must be weighed against the scale of his success and recognition, especially in mainstream Hindi and global circuits.
- He rose to national prominence with the 1992 film Roja, whose music remains iconic in both Tamil and Hindi versions.
- Since then, he has composed music for more than 100 films across Hindi, Tamil, and international cinema, working with the biggest banners and directors in the country.
- He won two Oscars for Slumdog Millionaire, along with Grammy and Golden Globe awards—an achievement unmatched by any other Bharatiya film composer.
- The Government of Bharat conferred on him the Padma Shri in 2000 and the Padma Bhushan in 2010, marking him as a national icon.
- Even in the period he claims was marked by a “slowdown” and possible communal bias, he remained attached to high-profile projects, including Ramayana and major Hindi releases.
No serious reading of his career can present him as structurally sidelined or suppressed by a communal establishment. Like many senior composers of his generation, he may be less omnipresent in today’s Bollywood than in the 1990s and 2000s, but that owes as much to changing musical trends, new composers, and generational shifts as to any alleged bias. Indeed, he explicitly admits he never “felt” discrimination in his face and that it may have been “concealed.” The allegation rests not on demonstrable patterns but on conjecture and insinuation.
A Pattern of Convenient Positioning
When these episodes are placed side by side, a pattern emerges:
- On religion: He converted to Islam in the context of illness and reportedly blamed Hindu deities for his father’s death, yet now speaks in lofty terms about transcending religion while his own home allegedly turned away Hindu religious symbols like Vibuthi and Kumkum.
- On films and projects: He labels a film like Chhaava “divisive” and accuses it of exploiting symbolism targeting a community, yet composes its soundtrack and retains the professional benefits, distancing himself only later in interviews.
- On nationalism and symbols: He creates some of the most iconic patriotic music and frequently invokes Bharat in his branding, yet reportedly refuses to sing Vande Mataram or Maa Tujhe Salaam when requested, and declares “this is not my India” when criticising the state of the country.
- On language and identity: He walks off stage over a “Hindi?” quip, feeding into regional-linguistic fault-lines, then calls it a joke when criticised.
- On discrimination: He alleges a possible communal element behind a dip in Bollywood work, yet simultaneously leads the music of Ramayana and continues to occupy a privileged, celebrated space in Bharat’s most powerful cultural industries.
Seen together, these are not isolated missteps. They reflect a consistent strategy: push statements that flatter a particular ideological ecosystem—one that sees Hindus and contemporary Bharat as inherently suspect or oppressive—then backpedal when backlash arrives, invoking unity, transcendence, and misunderstanding. All the while, Rahman continues to enjoy the full fruits of a system he sporadically portrays as hostile.
Hypocrisy at the Heart of the Narrative
A. R. Rahman has every right to his faith, his politics, and his opinions. No artist is obligated to be neutral or apolitical. The issue is not that he has views, but that he wants to have it both ways: to position himself as a victim of communal power shifts while standing at the centre of the very cultural mainstream he claims is biased; to denounce “divisive symbolism” while working on—and profiting from—projects he brands divisive; to wrap himself in the tricolour and speak of Bharat as his soul, while repeatedly undermining national symbols and sentiments when it suits his ideological posture.
When he suggests that “communal” currents have quietly cost him work in Bollywood, he invites scrutiny not only of the industry but of his own record. That record shows an artist lavishly rewarded by Bharat—by its audiences, its governments, its film industries, and its cultural institutions—who now increasingly participates in a narrative that casts that same Bharat as exclusionary and unjust.
In that dissonance lies the core hypocrisy: a man who has been embraced as a national icon repeatedly chooses to present himself as a subtle outsider, wronged by forces he cannot quite name, even as he composes the soundtrack to the country’s most ambitious Hindu epics and collects its highest honours. The facts of his life and career tell one story. His rhetoric now tries to tell another. It is up to audiences to decide which they find more credible.
Source: A Profile of A. R. Rahman: Who Says Communal Identity May Have Affected His Bollywood Career
