Round One of the Lungi Wars

Why a ban on the garment in a Chennai multiplex brought about an unexpected backlash

Recently, a multiplex in Chennai put up a board barring patrons in lungis from visiting the complex. The protest against the dress code was quick and furious. An angry columnist of a Tamil weekly went clad in a lungi for a movie at the multiplex to make a point against elitism; city bloggers ranted against the snobbish dismissal of the humble garment. The board was withdrawn. The lungi people had held their own against the multiplex generation.

The lungi people are easy to spot: while going to a first day, first show Rajnikanth caper, you’d see them in hordes. Within, they would hitch their lungis up their thighs and fold them adroitly, letting their cotton underwear show. When the hero appeared on the screen, they would rush to the theatre pit and throw flowers and money at the screen. The lungi people were whom the stars loved most, for they ensured repeated viewings of their potboilers, fanned their political ambitions and believed in their superhuman abilities as much as the stars themselves.

The lungi or kaili is also a sensitive garment because it is more than just a piece of cloth. It is a sartorial emblem for the Tamil male. It denotes a rite of passage into adulthood. The lungi serves as his passport to casual freedom and as a flexible garment that makes life easy for him in the heat and dust of the tropics. It is not surprising that Erode, a town near Coimbatore, is said to produce the highest volume of lungis, even exporting to neighbouring countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

The lungi has gone up the class ladder too. From the engineering student in Tambaram, a suburb in Chennai, or a college professor, to even the Chief Minister not shying away from being photographed for the morning’s papers in his lungi and vest, it’s found its rightful place as an indigenous casual outfit. A ban on it was the kind of stupidity that only those who are blind to an entire universe can envisage. That’s the multiplex generation, the neo-elitists. “A western outfit like shorts and vest is seen as casual and trendy on the roads or an entertainment complex, but the humble lungi is dissed,” says Selva, an angry employee in the infotech sector of Chennai. While the war is going to be drawn out, the first battle is decided. Word is out on Chennai’s streets: the lungi will not be judged.

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