HYPOCRISY OF THE CENSOR BOARD
THE Central Board of Film Certification(CBFC) (often referred to as the Censor Board) is a statutory censorship and classification body under the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India. It is tasked with “regulating the public exhibition of films under the provisions of the Cinematograph Act 1952”. The board is led by the Chairperson Pahlaj Nihalani. The censor board has always been surrounded by numerous controversies,most of which are never justified.
Have you seen the new ad for Doublemint? If not check it out here
[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5BbHPHpbvE[/embedyt]
So what do you think? You like it? Well, I do but the question that now comes to mind is that how did the censor board allow an ad that has kissing scenes. It goes understood that Television definitely has a larger reach than movies and are watched by children also. Movies are still subjective because you know what you are getting into when you go to watch one. In the case of this ad, did kissing not become vulgar, as stated by Pahlaj Nihalani time and again? Doublemint’s ad is just an example,what about other movies like “Befikre”? How many James Bond fans out there? Remember the controversy about Bond being “sanskaari”? The board considered the kisses to be too long and believed it wasn’t suitable for the Indian audience and cut them. Mild slangs and words such as”lesbians”,”gay” are muted. Where lies the need?
We’d like to ask,why such hypocrisy? On one hand,you subject movies to cuts on the basis of cultural violation and on the other hand pass movies and worse still advertisements which clearly are violations on the same grounds. Being biased is not what the Board is here for,is it? The underlying duty they have is to classify movies into “A”, “U/A”, “U” on the basis of content. They can be subjected to cuts if the director refuses to let the movies be rated ‘A’ instead of ‘U/A’, in which case also not all the cuts are justified. They need to understand India is mature enough country. By adding kissing/intimate scenes, no value is violated.Face it and grow up. Begin by treating all movies and ads on the same grounds. Don’t be a hypocrite. Don’t engage in double standards.
In his attempt to be sanctimonious,he is only coming off as a prude. Instead of a more liberal approach, he is going towards conservatism.
