As I was going through some articles pertaining to Marvel's latest superhero offering, Black Panther. I was surprised to see mentions of Lord Hanuman in a couple of them. Apparently the Jabari tribe, lead by M'Baku (Winston Duke), are ardent devotees of The Monkey God, and even their slogan is 'Glory to Hanuman!' But when I watched the movie (twice, actually), there was no reference to Hanuman in the movie at all. So what happened here?

Well, you guessed it right! There are speculations that the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC), or its more popular moniker, CBFC, have muted out the word because it might hurt religious sentiments. That's nothing surprising about it, as CBFC is known to delete scenes and mute they deem can incite riots. Remember the trimming of the kissing scene in SPECTRE? However, I am note sure how the mention of Hanuman can cause religious sentiments to be hurt, as I am sure that people who watch these movies are not the ones who exactly get hurt over such trifle things. And secondly, there is nothing to get hurt by a tribe that worships Hanuman. Seriously what's being so offended about that?

If there has something to be offended, it's about the screwup of the logic in Black Panther. How can an African tribe who has been exclusively restricted to the continent revere an Indian God, is something that needs to be questioned. Nothing else.

In an interview with Variety, Winston Duke had this to say about being a tribe that gets compared to animals, “They haven’t been affected by colonialism and all the narratives that are associated with developing a sense of inferiority and people comparing them to animals. To them, this is just who they pray to, and they find their strength and agency in this religion. So being a bit gorilla-influenced was a sense of pride for them."

Black Panther is directed by Ryan Coogler and stars Chadwick Boseman,  Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, and Andy Serkis.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 20, 2018 03:46 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).