Given the importance of Hindi cinema as a cultural form deeply imbricated with 'the secret politics of our desires' - the importance of Gehlawat's book cannot be overstated.

Journal of Religion & Film

Gehlawat's well-researched book captures the rise of Hindutva in Bollywood by focusing on five key figures: filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali, along with actors Akshay Kumar, Kangana Ranaut, Anupam Kher, and Ayushmann Khurrana, the source of 'hope' in the form of resistance to Hindu nationalism. This approach works well.

Reading Religion

This monograph is an engaging work that is an important (and timely) read for students and scholars of religion, politics, film and media studies, and South Asian studies.

South Asian History and Culture

In this fervently composed book that minces no words, Gehlawat proffers an extensive examination of Bollywood's changing dynamics in relation to present sociopolitical transformations in India, notably an increase in communal violence and the rise of right-wing Hindu nationalism.

Studies in South Asian Film & Media

Bollypolitics is a compelling and contemporary critical reading of key Bollywood films and protagonists in the context of India's political landscape and leadership. As insightful and revealing as the book is about the workings of popular cinema, it is equally telling of the production of culture, representation and identities under particular political maneuvers.

Rajinder Dudrah, Birmingham City University, UK

This powerful ethnographic study of the Bollywood milieu is the first major work to capture the intimate ties between the Hindi film industry and the right-wing Hindu regime that now rules India. Through close readings of some crucial promoters and victims of this alignment, Gehlawat's story makes a chilling argument about the capture of an entertainment medium by a larger political regime of icons, images and narratives.

Arjun Appadurai, NYU, USA