The Kolkata police on Saturday stopped the trailer launch of The Bengal Files, based on the 1946 Calcutta Riots, its director Vivek Agnihotri claimed.
IMAGE: Kindly note that this image has been posted for representational purposes only. Photograph: ANI Photo
The trailer of the controversial film was slated to be screened at a five-star hotel in the metropolis in the afternoon.
Police personnel present at the venue refused to comment on the issue.
Agnihotri, however, alleged that it was an attack on the democratic rights of people, as the censor board had cleared the film and “the Calcutta high court stayed a ban on it”.
The screening of the trailer was first stopped by a representative of the hotel around 1 pm, who said that permission had been granted for only a press conference, he said.
“If the hotel authorities wanted to stop the screening, why had they given permission to hold the press meet in the first place? How can a film’s press meet be held without screening of its trailer?” Agnihotri said.
As the trailer was shown again a little later, “suddenly five-six Kolkata Police officers entered the banquet hall where the programme was being held and stopped the screening midway,” the director claimed.
The filmmaker was also seen engaged in a heated argument with the police personnel and a hotel staff.
Agnihotri indicated that the screening was stopped at the behest of the ruling Trinamool Congress and “someone at top”.
He alleged ruling party also exerted pressure on the hotel management to halt the trailer midway.
He asserted that ‘The Bengal Files’, “which is based on facts and has passed the censor hurdle”, was being prevented from screening by the regime run by Trinamool Congress.
Asked if he meant the administration helmed by Mamata Banererjee, he told reporters, “I merely said someone at the top level.”
In a post on X, he said, “With anguish I inform you: Today West Bengal police, on orders of ‘top authorities’, illegally stopped the trailer of #TheBengalFiles. First theatres, now even a private hotel. Who fears the truth of Hindu genocide? And why? Democracy is dead in Tagore & Vivekananda’s land.”
“The trailer is now being seen all over the country, but since it is based in Bengal, we wanted its launch here. They don’t want the atrocities on Bengali Hindus in 1946 and the fightback of people like Gopal Mukherjee to be shown in cinema. If it is a part of history, do you want to change history?” he told reporters.
“There can be only one reason behind such a move, to ignore the conspiracy to divide Bengal again,” Agnihotri said.
The trailer was later screened at the BJP party office in Salt Lake before party functionaries and the media.
‘The Bengal Files’ delves into the communal violence in undivided Bengal during the 1940s.
The film is scheduled to release in theatres on September 5.
Producer Abhishek Agarwal told PTI that “no force can stop us to release the film on September 5.”
“We are taking advice from legal experts. The trailer launch programme had no legal hurdles. We will move the court soon after today’s development,” he said.
State BJP leaders Shankudeb Panda and Sisir Bajoria were also present at the trailer launch programme.
Reacting to the incident, Senior TMC leader and state Education Minister Bratya Basu wondered why Agnihotri was not making a film on the Gujarat riots of 2000.
“Is he working for the RSS-BJP? And about the police and hotel authorities’ action, I can say that it was purely an administrative decision,” Basu added.
Panda said, “The presence of policemen at a film’s trailer launch programme is unthinkable. They forcibly stopped the screening of the trailer, which proves there is no democracy in Bengal. Leave it for the audience what to see and not when the censor board had already passed it.
