Saswata Chatterjee Disassociates Himself from ‘The Bengali Files’ Controversy
19 August-Kolkata, India: According to some information, Vivek Agnihotri’s recently released film ‘The Bengal Files’ is based on the riots of 1946. Ahead of its release in September, the film is receiving a lot of negative reviews and criticisms for some of the characters’ portrayals and historical inaccuracies, which also led to legal notices and heated public discussions.
Saswata Chatterjee, the iconic Bengali actor, stated that they had originally entitled the Vivek Agnihotri film as ‘The Delhi Files,’ but someone changed it at the last minute. He totally separated himself from the ‘The Bengal Files’ issue and claimed that he did not know either the plot of the movie or the rationale behind the last-minute title change.
The actor from ‘Kahaani’ and ‘The Night Manager’ made his remarks two days after the Kolkata authorities cancelled the film’s trailer release, prompting Agnihotri to denounce the Mamata Banerjee-led administration as “fascists.”
The ‘Bengal Files’ staff in West Bengal is also juggling a lot of FIRs for allegedly misrepresenting the state.
The reason behind disruption of the trailer
According to reports, they halted the trailer release for Vivek Agnihotri’s next movie, “The Bengal Files,” on Saturday. Additionally, according to the director, a multiplex first cancelled the event before relocating it to a hotel where they cut off the power supply.
The critics charge the film with damaging the legacy of the liberation warrior Gopal Mukherjee, who they called “Kashai Gopal Patha” in the movie. His family thought this was offensive. The grandson of Gopal Mukherjee filed an FIR against Vivek Agnihotri and his team for accusing the creators of distorting his grandfather’s historical significance. The Bengali authorities also cancelled the trailer launch.
Gopal Mukherjee played a very important role during the 1946 riots, which later turned into a resistance movement against the Muslim mob violence led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah. According to Santanu, Agnihotri’s movie calls his grandfather a butcher. Gopal Mukherjee, according to Agnihotri, is an inspired character rather than a major story point in his movie.
Vivek Agnihotri response
The director lashed out on the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC governement in West Bengal at a public press conference where he stated that “We will go by the Constitution. We will go legally. If they stop us, we will take the legal course. What can we do? We are common citizens like you… We will pray that sanity prevails and the state government does not do it (stop the release).“
‘The Bengal Files’ is a third part of the ‘Fear triology’ by Vivek Agnihotri. It stars Saswata Chatterjee, Anupam Kher and Mithun Chakraborthy in lead roles.
