Censorship – Arts

National award-winning filmmaker Suman Ghosh today said he has accepted the Censor Board’s recommendation to remove the word ‘Gujarat’ from his documentary on Nobel laureate Amartya Sen after consideration. The film ‘The Argumentative Indian’, which was shot in two parts in 2002 and 2017, has Sen talking about the social choice theory, development economics, philosophy, and the rise of right-wing nationalism across the world including in India.

The Central Board of Film Certification, Kolkata, had, on July 11, asked Ghosh to cut or mute six parts (both words and phrases) – ‘Gujarat’, ‘In India’, ‘Hindu’, ‘Cow’, ‘These days’ and ‘Hindutva’ — from the documentary for a ‘U’ certification. “I recognise that the decision (on removing the word ‘Gujarat’) is not the best but I strongly believe that the film should be shown to the public without further delay since beyond the controversies, which were rather unfortunate I have a larger point in the film which needs to be communicated,” Ghosh told PTI from the US.