Abstract
This article adopts US civil rights advocate Alec Karakatsanis’s conceptualisation of ‘copaganda’ to analyse the commercially successful ‘Cop Universe’ directed by Rohit Shetty, situating it within a broader socio-legal analysis of contemporary policing in India. It argues that copaganda in Hindi cinema recasts police officers not only as vigilantes, but also as embodiments of Hindutva and nationalist virility and a Brahmanical patriarchal order. In doing so, these films normalise extra-legal policing, obscure the structural realities of custodial violence and impunity, and reframe state violence as both necessary and morally desirable. The article situates these cinematic narratives alongside contemporary developments in policing practices, criminal law reform, and public attitudes towards state violence to demonstrate how mainstream cinema shapes, legitimises, and reinforces dominant understandings of policing, justice, and punishment in India. It argues that copaganda operates not merely as entertainment, but as a cultural and ideological project that legitimises carceral governance while consolidating majoritarian political imaginaries. It juxtaposes these depictions with those in alternative-genre films including Visaranai, Jai Bhim and Santosh, arguing that their unflinching and subversive portrayals of policing expose the patriarchy, casteism, and structural inequalities embedded within the criminal legal system. In contrast to mainstream cop films that redeem institutional failure through the figure of the ‘honest cop,’ these films destabilise the moral legitimacy of policing itself and open space for more grounded imaginations of justice.
Recommended Citation
Shah, Stuti and Tomar, Jyotika
(2026)
"Glorifying Khaki: Policing, Power, and Copaganda in Hindi Cinema,"
National Law School of India Review: Vol. 37:
Iss.
1, Article 5.
DOI: 10.55496/JMBX9865
Available at:
https://repository.nls.ac.in/nlsir/vol37/iss1/5
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
10.55496/JMBX9865
