The film ‘Udta Punjab’ is a super hit even before its release thanks to the controversy it generated on account of the publicity it got from Censor Board which wanted to cut several clips from the movie. One thought it was a ‘mili-bhagat’ (cooked up controversy) between the makers of the film and the censor board along with the hired media consultants. Their intention was to create a controversy and generate interest in the film among the audiences so that it succeeds at the box office. The High Court has given a go-ahead for the film’s release after a single cut which means the censor board had purposely erred in their duty to give undue publicity to the film. Censorship in today’s age of internet is unwarranted when all sort of stuff is freely available on YouTube, various social media sites, Google etc. People should decide what is good or bad for viewership and it is not the job of the apex court of our land to be pressurised to guide us on such things when it has other significant matters and cases to look at which are of national importance.
Corruption rules roost in the Censor Board and such controversies can be avoided if people not related to films are made to certify them for neutrality. Better sense should prevail and censor board should be scrapped and replaced with a certification team which could be issued a certain set of guidelines to certify a film!
S.N. Kabra
(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)
