Mumbai (Maharashtra): With the furore over ‘Udta Punjab’ in a see-sawing state, veteran filmmaker Ashok Pandit on Friday said that it is very sad for the CBFC that it was being dragged to the court and being told to justify its stand on making cuts from the film.
Pandit told ANI that nothing could be worse for the censor board has now been asked by the court to justify its stand.
“A producer moving the court against CBFC, I believe there can be nothing worse for the censor board. The kind of observations were made by the court made, where it asked the censor board to justify cuts, how will the cuts be justified. You are saying remove Punjab from the movie, remove Amritsar from the movie, how will the board justify this,” said Pandit.
“Moreover it is a great setback for the whole film industry that a respected institution like CFBC is dragged to court,” he added.
Pandit further said that it is very unfortunate that the courts have to tell the Censor Board to understand the mindset of the current generation.
“It is a very sad situation that the court has to tell us that today’s generation is mature and they want to watch something else. All this was not needed, it was easily avoidable,” he added.
The Bombay High Court yesterday sought an explanation from the Censor Board over its insistence for deleting Punjab signboard in the drug-themed film.
The CBFC, however, has submitted all the 13 changes amendments it wanted.
A bench headed by Justice S C Dharmadhikari was hearing a petition filed by Phantom Films, producer of ‘ Udta Punjab’ which is aggrieved by an order of the Revising Committee that suggested changes in the film before its release on June 17. (ANI)