Why Is Indian Cinema Hung Up On Tragic Tales Of Inter-Caste Romance?

I grew up with a thick appetite for movies (especially Bollywood). Indian cinema is known for its flamboyance, and I was swept away by it. Their indulgence in grandiose, improbable love stories always excited me. One of the oldest tropes we’ve known is the inter-class romance where the wealthy family rejects the match through either paternalistic threats or monetary leverage.

The relationship between the wealthy family and the “fiscally” inferior lover of their child, has been a staple diet for love stories in almost every decade - take Pyar Jhukta Nahin (1985), Mere Sajana Saath Nibhana (1992), Bobby (1973), Maine Pyar Kiya (1989), Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham… (2001), Chalte Chalte (2003), Jab Tak Hai Jaan (2012), Student of the Year 1 & 2 (2012-2019) and many more.

But the narrative invariably resolves in the lovers’ triumph.

This imagination of romances across regions, states or even countries has fed a fascination amongst audiences where love decides who gets to belong.

The wealthy father is going to come to terms with the relationship, or the couple is going to fight off families to claim their romance. As Shah Rukh Khan in Om Shanti Om says: end mein sab kuch theek ho jaata hai..

This melodrama felt aspirational – I teared up when the couple finally embraced because I believed, for a moment, that hierarchy could bend for the sake of desire.

The Limits Of Bollywood's Imagination

Indian cinema runs its love stories on absurdity - love stories that transcend social realities of India, and even logic; yet they feel natural.

I didn’t find it strange that the son of a billionaire family could serenade the daughter of their domestic worker in the rain (and a song). Indian cinema stretches our imagination when it comes to love, to take us into this fantasy where improbability is the point and all barriers to romance are flexible. 

Perhaps, as film scholar Ashish Rajadhyaksha observes, that’s precisely the function of Indian cinema – to dream what cannot be lived.

Then I started noticing what wasn’t there. Inter-caste stories rarely appeared on screen, and even when they did, joy seemed forbidden, almost transgressive.

Films like Fandry (2013), Masaan (2015), Sairat (2016), Pariyerum Perumal (2018), Article 15 (2019) end in either heartbreak, exile, humiliation, or death. 

The rules of exaggeration and fantasy of the same cinema that had allowed me to dream vanished. When I watched these stories, I felt a pang of recognition – these narratives mirrored the everyday caste dynamics I had seen unfold in real life. 

The cinematic law, somehow, denies caste to be overcome, even in fiction.

This contrast raises critical questions about Indian cinema’s narrative politics: Why do filmmakers offer happy endings to class-crossing lovers but consign violence and death to caste-crossing ones?

Is it to maintain authenticity? That’s unlikely, given the medium’s longstanding allergy to “realism”. 

As film theorist Madhava Prasad explains, Hindi cinema thrives on melodrama, a form that works precisely by resolving social contradictions.

In the cinematic universe, class is always considered aspirational, fluid and negotiable; as compared to caste, which is treated as immovable and eternal.

Gopal Guru, a political scientist who theorises Dalit discourses in India, argues that mainstream cultural landscapes thrive on the victimhood of Dalit tragedy and reduce their lives to cycles of suffering.

They are defined by their pain – producing narratives of punishment rather than possibility.

The Tokenisation Of Caste-Based Suffering

Watching from a caste-informed lens, I began to see the patterns: the industry’s selective imagination, the upper-caste dominance of the industry and a fatalistic portrayal of caste-based stories.

The selective optimism afforded to class-crossing romances reinforces the idea that caste, not love, determines belonging. 

Ethical representation of caste-based stories requires filmmakers to introspect, question their privilege and accept accountability when that privilege is threatened. 

Because here’s the thing: realism is not the problem. Violence based on structural oppression is real. But this reality must not be used as an excuse to preserve discomfort, to avoid dreaming of equality. Happiness and joy are codified political acts for marginalised identities. 

Cinema keeps collapsing into fatalism when met with caste-based narratives - the subtle tokenisation of Dalit characters, the aestheticisation of suffering, the ways in which female characters’ desire is punished more harshly than men’s.

If films refuse to imagine joyful endings for inter-caste couples, they deny audiences the power of aspiration. Keeping caste oppression locked in pain curbs cultural imagination. 

When Love Is Allowed To Live

After Dhadak (2018) – the Hindi remake of Sairat – had stripped caste away from the original context and had replaced it with generic class difference, I did not have any hope for Dhadak 2 (2025) making any strong commentary on structural violence.

When I finally watched it, though, there was a subtle but significant shift. For once, Dhadak 2 did not end in fatalism. It did not sanctify the reality of caste oppression, nor did it kill the possibility of love persisting in the ordinary.

There was no insurmountable climax, grand gestures of victory – the ending is almost mundane, uncinematic (in the usual sense). The film simply allowed them to survive, to co-exist.

The absence of tragedy, refusal of despair, is also a form of resistance that constitutes hope. To me, this simple, happy ending almost felt utopian. 

As a viewer, I’m not merely an audience member; I’m also a co-creator of the worlds I wish cinema dared to show.

Hence, I imagine alternatives. What would it mean for an inter-caste romance to be a feel-good movie, not a tragic tale? To see the couple stay in love instead of being punished for it? To witness ordinary joy translated into extraordinary resistance?

I demand that filmmakers stop using tragedy as shorthand for authenticity. I crave something else - a caste-based romance that is glamorous, where their desires are not marked as battlegrounds of honour.

I want an inter-caste love story where the couple navigates housing discrimination and workplace prejudice, but they also rent a place together, share a kitchen and bicker about groceries, and build a balcony garden. I want happiness on screen, where love wins, even if society doesn’t sanction it.

Kajal is a Delhi-based dreamer exploring desire, love, and the magic hidden in cities. She writes and revels in crafting spaces where the rules of convention are suspended. | Views expressed by the author are their own.