Indian farmers tell film fans to stop stealing milk for movie ritual

As a tradition, fans perform a ritual called palabhishekam, in which life-size posters of superstar Rajnikanth are bathed in milk before the launch of each of his films.  (ARUN SANKAR/AFP/Getty Images)

Dairy producers in southern India are warning film fans to stop stealing milk to pour over posters and large cutouts of movie stars as a way to show their devotion ahead of big-budget premieres.

The practice is linked to one Hindus perform during some religious ceremonies where they pour milk over the idols of deities. Some fans have twisted the ritual and pour the milk over posters in hopes their favorite movies will become a hit.

“It is a practice of worshipping gods – not film stars,” SA Ponnusamy, head of the Tamil Nadu Milk Dealers Association, said. “Fans across the state do it because they equate the stars in the film to demigods.”

Ponnusamy filed a complaint Wednesday with the local police to seek a ban on the practice. He told the BBC police have assured him “action will be taken” though it’s unclear what that specifically means.

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Milk products arrive on trucks from dairy farms early in the morning and are often left outside of shops that sell them. In the few hours between drop off and the store opening, fans walk by and snatch the dairy products to be used for their homemade movie projects. Milk traders say the looting has become such a problem that they are facing heavy financial losses, the BBC reported.

Things took a turn for the worse on Tuesday when Tamil actor Silambarasan released a video encouraging fans to celebrate the release of his upcoming film by pouring “pots” of milk over his cutouts which are plastered across Chennai.

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The video went viral and the TNMDA pushed back.

Ponnusamy say he’s been trying to kill the custom, called “palabhishekam,” since 2015. He regularly launches social media campaigns against the practice and has even reached out to Tamil movie stars Rajinikanth and Kamal Hassan asking them to dissuade fans from stealing milk.

Fans of actor Rajinikanth spray milk as they celebrates the release of his long awaited film '2.0' at Imax Wadala on November 29, 2018 in Mumbai, India. (Kunal Patil/Hindustan Times via Getty Images)

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A spokesperson for Rajinikanth, one of Asia’s highest-paid stars with a devoted fan base, told the BBC that “fan groups aren’t controlled by the actor.”

“We have requested them not to indulge in this practice but they see it as a form of celebration,” he added.