I Don’t Believe in The Gloss & Glitter of Bollywood: Adil Hussain

Actor Adil Hussain talks about the faulty education system of our country.

Adil Hussain and Prakash Jha during the making of ‘Pareeksha’.

(Photo Courtesy: Twitter)

Actor Adil Hussain plays the lead character in Prakash Jha’s latest film Pareeksha, which saw a digital premiere some time back. Written, directed and produced by Prakash Jha, Pareeksha is the story of a rickshaw-puller from Bihar who dreams about sending his 14-year-old son to a fancy English medium school, in the process jeopardising his own life. Adil Hussain plays the character of Buchi Paswan, the rickshaw puller.

Speaking to The Quint, the actor opened up about the faulty educational system of our country.

"We take pride that the Google CEO is from India, NASA scientists are from India and we brag about them. But it’s a shame that they are there and they are not here. It’s a shame that India couldn’t facilitate them or given them a field to run wild and experiment with their ideas.

Adil Hussain, Actor

He added, “All we have are the leftovers of the British education system. And they educated us in order to run their missionaries. I think we need a fundamental and radical shift in our idea of education.”

The actor even spoke about how people in our country look down upon those who are not fluent in English. Adil, who is a student of the National School Of Drama and now a professor there, spoke about the discrimination he faced in the institute. The actor, who hails from Assam, didn’t have a command over the Hindi language and that made him lose out on lead roles in plays.

He also gave his views on the raging insider-outsider debate.

"Yes, in the film industry there is a sense of insider-outsider. I never faced it myself because I never wanted to fit in. I had been convinced by an amazing director called Abhishek Chaubey who directed Ishqiya. He convinced me to come and act in his film. I was in Delhi. I am a theatre guy. So I went, I came back. I still live in Delhi and I do not believe in the paraphernalia and the gloss and glitter of the Mumbai film industry".

Adil Hussain, Actor

The film Pareeksha is streaming on Zee5 from 6 August,