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Bullets in the Beat: Glorification of Gun Culture in Punjabi Songs and Cinema, Its Social Impact and the Limits of Legal Regulation in Punjab

Volume
3
Issue
1
Pages
921-935
Published
Oct 2026
0
0
2
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Abstract

Punjabi popular music and cinema now command a global audience, and a substantial part of that output turns the firearm, the criminal case and the defiance of police into emblems of status. The murder of singer Shubhdeep Singh Sidhu (Sidhu Moosewala) in May 2022, a series of first information reports against singers, executive bans on a gangster film and on songs that glorify weapons, and judicial directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court have together made the question a live socio-legal controversy. This paper asks two questions. First, whether, and to what extent, songs and films that glorify gun culture contribute to violence and to the deterioration of law and order in Punjab. Second, whether the legal response of the State, comprising criminal prosecution, executive prohibition, film certification, digital takedown and judicial direction, is consistent with Article 19 of the Constitution of India. Drawing on media-effects scholarship, licensing data, reported prosecutions and case law, the paper argues that such content is better understood as a risk factor that normalises violence than as an independent cause of crime, and that the present regulatory approach is episodic, vague and vulnerable to constitutional challenge. It concludes with suggestions for a narrowly drawn, procedurally fair and evidence-based framework that targets incitement and real-world firearm misuse rather than aesthetic expression as such.

Authors
TS
Taranjot Singh
NS
Nakul Sihag
SS
Sunny Sharma
Keywords
gun culturePunjabi cinemalegal regulationArticle 19social impact
References
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