The hero of a typical Pashto film on CD is an enviable figure. He is characterised by a thick flowing mustache and is always accompanied by his trusted Kalashnikov. The roaring hero is a figure of inspiration, a Robin Hood of sorts, but simultaneously has flaws.

He drinks heavily and picks up any girl he likes at gunpoint and makes a mockery of law. As a source of income, he trades in arms and drugs and bribes the police so that they do not interfere in his business.

This is the hero of the productions at Nishtarabad, Peshawar – the hub of Pashto CDs and telefilms that have come to signify violence and vulgarity in the world of cinema.

And one negative effect of such unregulated productions has been their influence on naive young children who internalise the ideas they see in these films.

Take Raheel, a student of grade 9 and an avid buff of Pashto CDs. One day as he was imitating the villain of a Pashto telefilm, he took out the pistol which suddenly went off and the bullet hit the head of his young cousin, Arshad, who died on the spot.

Gul Wali, Raheel’s brother and a resident of Malakand, explained that Raheel loved Pashto movies, especially those with bloody gunfights and long action sequences. “I think that the tragic incident was unintentional but it left deep scars on our family.

Arshad’s mother is hysterical now being unable to cope with the untimely death of her son,” said Gul Wali, and concluded, “After the incident I burnt down my personal computer (PC) and pledged never to watch the Pashto CDs.”

Such mistakes can happen anywhere, but the worrisome trend is that many such incidents are turning out to be deliberate and inspired by unregulated Pashto cinema.

Recently, the story of Satana Gul, a young Afghan refugee living in the outskirts of Peshawar made the news. Gul killed his sister when she applied for admission in a university programme without his permission even though he was younger than her.

In a statement, Gul said his act was inspired from a Pashto movie in which a villain had done the same to his sister when she disobeyed family rules.

Senior actress Shazma Haleem condemned such messages that are conveyed through films and are internalised by young children: “In most Pashto movies and CD films women are the victims of aggression and the whims of men. Such movies encourage similar attitudes in society and cause violence against women to increase,” she said, adding that such anti-feminist content should be banned.

Encouraging anti-feminist attitudes is one aspect of such films. The other aspect is that they have brought violence home and made it a part of common day-to-day interactions.

A few months ago, another young boy in Charsadda reportedly killed his cousin over an old land dispute. According to reports, Khanwali, 18, after committing the crime, proudly claimed that the act was based on his experience of watching movies and plays. He said he had realised that only guns can settle such disputes because courts litigation and the jirga only got one tangled in long, drawn-out and futile processes.

These cases are anecdotal and not much research has been done to quantitatively track the influence of films on youth, but enough people are taking notice to call for regulation and action against them.

Noted actor and President of an artists’ organisation titled ‘Awaz’, Tariq Jamal, is one prominent figure who quitted acting in the Pashto movies three years ago because he did not like their content.

“Only a powerful censorship board can be the solution. Today, there is no difference between a cinema movie and a CD film and every Tom, Dick and Harry can produce a CD film within a month on minimum budget,” opined Tariq Jamal.

In his opinion, the vulgarity and violence are tools to attract and influence the raw minds of the young children, “and the results are in front of you,” he argued.

Everything from the script to the cast, the music to the storyline, of these movies is meant to satisfy the most basal instincts of the viewers and maximise profits for the movie makers. Even their titles, like Badmaash (Mobster), Baghawat (Rebellion), Zama Toora (My sword), Za Baghee Yem (I am a revolutionary), are provocative and invoke aggressive emotions.

“We demand that the KP government should form a censorship board having on board all the stakeholders, members of the civil society, artists, writers, directors, professors and cultural reporters,” said Ihtisham Toru, President of Culture Journalists Forum (CJF).

Culture Journalists Forum is another organisation that is working on revival, preservation and promotion of art and culture and is carrying out efforts to purge the cinema of excessive violence.

Toru’s contention was that an effective censor board can play the key role of giving Pashto film industry a new direction where it can have a more positive influence.

However, at the same time, not all blame can go on the lack of regulation. Parents and teachers also need to take responsibility and make their children master the skill to distinguish between good content and the bad one and limit their exposure to things that have a bad influence on them.

Juvenile crimes may be an immediate problem, but having a whole generation grow up on blood and gore with a skewed sense of right and wrong inspired by extreme film content is a troublesome future. It is high time that the problem is tackled head on.