The arrested CEO of Central Board of Film Certification(CBFC) Rakesh Kumar is accused of taking bribe of Rs 1 lakh to clear a Punjabi movie, which deifies Indira Gandhi’s assassins. Even CBI suspects that several Bollywood controversial movies slipped through the Board by bribing the Board Chief.
In the case of the ‘Kaum De Heere’ (Diamonds of the Community), CBI alleged that Rakesh Kumar gave the clearance after cutting some scenes. The Punjabi movie had been on the radar of intelligence agencies who warned of possible tensions triggered by the movie as it projected former PM Indira Gandhi’s assassins Satwant Singh and Beant Singh as heroes .To add, the PM was assassinated to avenge the attacked the Holy shrine of Sikhs, Harmandar Sahib in Amritsar (3 June 1984). ‘Kaum De Heere’ reportedly tells the story of Satwant Singh and Beant Singh, Gandhi’s assassins. Beant Singh was killed by police shortly after the assasination while Satwant Singh was later hanged. It is produced by Satish Katyal while it has been written and directed by Ravinder Ravi. The movie has already been released in Europe, New Zealand, Canada and the US.
A senior CBI officer stated “The movie’s release was earlier rejected by Censor Board in January this year due to which it’s previous scheduled release could not happen on February 28. The movie got clearance on May 29 with an ‘Adults’ certificate after the makers of the movie paid Rs 1 lakh to Kumar. We are probing the matter”. The movie has been labelled as a Controversial and several political parties opposed its release as Punjab Youth Congress, BJP and even Punjab CM Prakash Singh Badal voiced against the movie and said that he will ask the Home Ministry to look into it.
The CBI is now inspecting all the movies which were cleared after January, since Rakesh took over in CBFC. These include Bollywood releases some starring leading superstars who rule this industry. Those filmmakers are now believed to have however acceded to the same societal malaise —paying bribes to gear the system to their advantage. Everyone is petrified that the movie could create tension between Sikh and Hindu community but no one is standing with the truth. Though it is sad that this all happened in past but the History can’t be changed and everyone has the Right to state the truth and facts. The attack on the Sikh holy shrine is counted as a Black day in History and the aftermath effects were assassination of former Indian PM followed by massacre of tens and thousands of innocent Sikhs only because the bodyguard of PM were Sikhs who avenged the attack on Holy Shrine. Let us see how this new accusation of bribe and the controversy of the movie affects the future movies and even the release of the movies that voice the communal injustice to the common man.