Fresh FIR filed against Vivek Agnihotri for 'wrongly' portraying character in 'The Bengal Files'

Kolkata, Aug 18 (IANS) Fresh trouble seems to be brewing for 'The Bengal Files' Director Vivek Agnihotri, as a new FIR has been registered against him on charges of "wrongfully" describing freedom fighter Gopal Mukherjee a.k.a Gopal Patha "as a butcher", in the movie, the trailer of which has been released recently.

Gopal Mukherjee’s grandson, Santana Mukherjee, who has registered the fresh FIR, said they have taken exception to portraying his grandfather in the movie without the prior permission of the family members.

“Secondly, we take strong objection to describing our grandfather as ‘a butcher’ in the movie. Besides being a part of the freedom-fighters' group, 'Anushilon Samity', my grandfather owned two goat-meat shops. He was a wrestler. He took to arms to protect people from the communal violence unleashed by the Muslim League in Kolkata in 1946,” Santana Mukherjee said.

On July 31, Agnihotri and his wife Pallavi Joshi approached a single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court seeking dismissal of two other FIRs filed against 'The Bengal Files'.

An FIR was registered against the movie in Murshidabad district soon after the teaser campaign for the movie was released.

Later, another FIR was also registered at Lake Town Police in Kolkata. The main accusation in the FIR was that the movie might contain some sensitive matter that may hamper the communal harmony in the state.

On August 4, a single-judge bench of Justice Jay Sengupta imposed an interim stay on the FIRs filed against the upcoming movie.

'The Bengal Files' is perceived to be the third part of the 'Files' trilogy -- the first being 'The Tashkent Files', which was released in 2019, and the second was the much-controversial 'The Kashmir Files' released in 2022.

Previously, the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government had been accused of issuing gag orders against the feature films on allegedly “flimsy” grounds.

--IANS

src/dpb