The 28^th of July will go to be the most awaited day for the fans of both the stylish macho man and the witty girl of the Hindi film industry, namely, Ranveer Singh and Alia Bhatt respectively. Their most awaited upcoming movie under the directorial comeback of Karan Johar (KJo), ‘Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani’ is all set to be hitting the theatres on that day. However, as has almost become a norm in the Hindi film industry, controversy is something that has become almost inseparable from the movies. Either the depiction of certain characters would be inviting criticism from fans or the dialogues would contribute to the game of controversy with their nonsensical delivery and approach. This time too it has not been different as the movie has garnered some flak from the authorities of the Central Board of Film Certification of India (CBFC), who has felt that it is necessary to curtail and edit some of its dialogues and references that has the potential to build up a controversy. After running their scissors through the love story, the movie has finally been permitted to run across theatres all over the country.

Unveiling the Story of Love and Drama

The directorial comeback of Karan Johar (KJo) shows the cute story of the dramatic story of love between two young adults who are growing up in the union territory of the capital of India, New Delhi. The story revolves around how ‘Rocky Randhawa’, who is being played by dashing actor Ranveer Singh is a carefree boy, who loves to live his life on his terms and how ‘Rani Chatterjee’, who is being played by Alia Bhatt is a girl, who loves to remain traditional and simplistic. The movie shows how ‘Rocky’, who visits ‘Rani’, an auditor, after a financial mishap takes place in his life, instantly, fell in love at first sight with her. The couple will have to take on every odd that comes their way, especially, the one being that the boy is a Punjabi by birth while the girl is a Bengali by her ethnicity. Helmed by Karan Johar, the movie promises to captivate the audience with its free-flow style of storytelling highlighting every aspect of the life of the couple. The director, known for his bold and evocative style of storytelling, ensures an interesting experience of cinema. An intriguing and compelling performance by the actors is also anticipated in the film. However, despite this, everything seems to be not right with the movie as the movie has already garnered a lot of flak from the authorities of the censor board owing to some of its dialogues and references that were made in the film that was feared might have the potential to raise a controversy.

The Scissors Run Through the Love Story

The movie is set to mark the seventh directorial debut of Karan Johar (KJo) after seven years with his last one being ‘Ae Dil Hai Mushkil’ which starred Ranbir Kapoor, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Anushka Sharma. This marks his seventh directorial debut and is anticipated to bring in a fresh air of entertainment, fun and romance for the viewers. Unfortunately, in recent times the movie found itself sunk in some controversy owing to some of its delivery of dialogues and references made within the movie, though in light-hearted humour. As per a report that was submitted by a source close to the makers of the movie, the Central Board of Film Certification of India (CBFC) took offence at the liberal use of Hindi cuss words that were used in the movie to give an authentic New Delhi feeling. Certain cuss word such as ‘b*********’ was censored to ‘behen di’ to reduce the impact of the word on the viewers. In another instance, the certain word ‘bra’ has been changed to another word ‘item’ to make it look more acceptable to the viewers, especially the female viewers. Certain other dialogues have been cropped as they were thought to be misogynistic and derogatory to the females. A dialogue with a direct reference to the ‘Old Monk’ brand of rum was filtered to change the name of the rum to ‘Bold Monk’ to avoid the issue of covert advertising of alcohol and items of intoxication. What prompted the censor authorities to take fast action was the reference to the lower house of the Parliament of India, Lok Sabha and the Chief Minister of West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee that were immediately dropped from the list of the dialogues from the movie. Another dialogue from the list of dialogues of the movie was dropped owing to the vulgarity that it showed while referring to women in a scene in a lingerie shop. Another dialogue that tried to show the National Poet of India as well as the Kabiguru of Bengal, Rabindranath Tagore in a less dignified way was dropped too following the mixed reaction from the audience who watched the trailer of the movie. Though some of the critics ignored the Kabiguru incident, some others felt that it was an intentional belittling of the poet Rabindranath Tagore, who is considered to be the pride of Bengal as well as India in general. Apart from these major alterations and a few other minor changes that were made in the film, no serious overhauling of the movie has taken place so far. The movie has been granted a universal adult or ‘U/A’ certificate by the censor authorities and is expected to run for exactly 2 hours and 48 minutes.

Freedom of Artistic Expression versus Censorship Issues

It is an undeniable fact that artistic expression in India has often faced the flak of the censor authorities with an excuse to reduce any chances of public controversy. However, we must not forget that the makers of any film also do not have the right to produce anything in the name of freedom of art or else it could rile up the audience at any moment just as it happened with Om Raut’s ‘Adipurush’ that is said to have belittled the story of the famous Indian epic of Ramayana. Makers of a film sometimes employ some dialogues that would provoke thoughts, invoke and convey ideas that are nuanced and challenge the accepted norms of society. Instances of censorship have restricted the area of work of the makers of the movies who have recently complained of feeling stifled and unable to give the best of their artistic abilities in restricted parameters. Unfortunately, balancing the freedom of the artists and avoiding controversial sensitivities remains a challenge for India to date.

‘Meanwhile, the film is all set to be released on the 28^th of July this year with a stellar cast of Ranveer Singh and Alia Bhatt in the leading roles with veteran actors such as Dharmendra and Jaya Bachchan and Bengali actress Churni Gangopadhyay sharing the screen with them.