Politics over Raajneeti

Over the last few days, despite the continuous array of nationally important events, including the municipal polls in West Bengal, with its attendant consequences, the completion of one year in office by the United Progressive

Alliance-2 and various other events of note, there has been considerable brouhaha in the media, particularly the electronic media, over the so-called “censorship” of the film Raajneeti by the Central government. Several reports have appeared on news programmes, complete with canned histories of alleged incidents of censorship indulged in by the Congress Party in the past and some instances where the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has done the same. Any reasonable follower of the news will be forgiven for concluding that the Congress-led UPA government was extremely touchy about one particular film, Raajneeti, because it is alleged that in the view of the Congress, the film reflects poorly or seeks to draw comparisons between the heroine of the film and the Congress president. It is, of course, immaterial that even a cursory examination of uncontroverted facts will show beyond doubt that there is not a shadow of truth in any of the allegations against the Congress Party.
To begin with, both the producer and the writer of the film are at pains to point out that the characters in the film bear no resemblance to Sonia Gandhi. Second, the fact of the matter is that the film was actually cleared by the censor board, with a “U/A” certificate, which is exactly what the producer wanted. Therefore, it is difficult to understand what exactly the Congress Party now stands accused of. During one of the TV debates in which I participated I suggested that perhaps the entire issue was being blown out of context as some kind of publicity gimmick to popularise the film before its release.
To set the record straight I have not seen the film, although I have every intention of doing so. I understand that the film purports to be a “hard-hitting look” at politics. Well, good luck to the makers of the film. In news reports several false allegations are made, including that the film was screened for the Congress members who insisted upon various cuts and the censor board had played a villainous role in the entire affair. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The film was screened in perfect compliance of usual rules before a censor board committee in Mumbai. The members consisted of a representative section of society, namely a film actress (no connection with the Congress), an academic (no connection with the Congress), a card-holding member of the BJP and two persons who are indeed members of the Congress. This team decided to give the film an “A” certificate. The ladies particularly suggested that a very long portion in the film depicting explicit sexual content be cut short, which has nothing to do with the Congress and was agreed to by the producer.
The next objection by this group was the argument in the film that electronic voting machines (EVMs) were useless and could easily be manipulated by a satellite or some other means, thereby rendering our entire voting system meaningless. Some of the members objected saying that this could show the Election Commission — not the Congress Party — in a bad light and needed to be examined for legal and other consequences in our democracy, where, by now, all elections are held with EVMs.
In fact, some would argue that in a country like India returning to the ballot paper would not only be tedious, time consuming, ecologically unfriendly and wasteful but also be a regression to the past. Be that as it may the objection was under a specific guideline in the Cinematograph Act and has little to do with the Congress. Another objection related to a scene where a woman is depicted approaching a political leader while removing the “pallu” of her sari in order to obtain a party ticket for elections. When I argued with the writer of the film that it was false and unfair to depict women in politics in this very unflattering and dismissive way, his patronising argument was that he was actually trying to show the woman as the victim and was portraying men in unflattering light! Well, all that can be said of that particular argument is the old cliché that with friends like this women don’t need enemies. There were one or two more minor objections, one of which — readily agreed to by the producer — involved replacing the word “vidhwa” with “beti”. In, brief, as one of the committee members observed to me every single objection was based upon an infringement of a specific quoted guideline of the Cinematograph Act and had no connection with the Congress.
In this background, I find it amazing that the film managed to generate so much hype suggesting wrongful censorship by the government. The saga continues. The producer appealed against the “A” certificate given by this committee to an appellate tribunal, which incidentally consisted of a chairman and three or four members all of whom with the exception of the Chair, are active Congress members. They reversed the order of the first committee, and cleared the film, just as desired by the producer with a U/A certificate.
In the light of these incontrovertible facts it is difficult to understand how responsible sections of the media could carry on a campaign against the UPA government and the Congress Party based on lack of information, insinuation and half-truths. It is unfortunate in the extreme that the public at large is sought to be misled in this manner about the government and the party in government for the sole purpose, it would seem, of generating a sensational news story with the ultimate objective of raising public interest in a newly released film, thereby trying to increase the viewership of the film. In the larger interests of our democracy campaigns against censorship are serious business and should always be based upon solid facts. Baseless campaigns such as the discussion over this particular film tend to trivialise the entire issue and distort more important questions in this regard.

Jayanthi Natarajan is a Congress MP in the Rajya Sabha and AICC spokesperson.
The views expressed in this column are her own.