HC stood on right side, IFFI must screen Nude too: S Durga actor

PANAJI: Hours after the Kerala high court on Tuesday asked the Centre to screen S Durga at the 48th edition of Iffi in Goa, its lead actor S Kannan Nair said the “court has stood with the right side” and the festival organisers should also screen Nude, the other movie which was selected by the jury but withdrawn by the I&B ministry.
The festival director, Sunit Tandon, however, declined to comment on the status of the film’s inclusion at the festival.“I am not appropriately placed to talk,” he told TOI.
Kannan said the court verdict proved that the team was on the right side. “We were hoping for the best. The court is the only hope for people like us. They (makers of Nude) didn’t go to court. They made that mistake. But the film should also be screened here. Because the jury had unanimously selected both these movies and Nude was supposed to be the opening movie of Indian Panorama,” Kannan told TOI here.
Kannan, who is representing the S Durga team in the absence of its director Sanal Kumar Sasidharan who is currently in Australia, said the I&B ministry had a history of mistreating filmmakers and rejection of S Durga was not the first.
“The right to freedom, freedom of speech, we must protect it. That is the lesson we learnt from this. They (I&B ministry) are making these mistakes again and again. Why they are treating filmmakers like this I don’t know,” Kannan said.
He said the high court verdict, apart from being a victory for the film’s team, is also a victory for those jury members of the Indian Panorama section who had protested against the withdrawal of S Durga from Iffi.
“The jury positively supported us. Three of them resigned. Six wrote a letter to the ministry. So out of 13, nine supported us. So, this is a great honour for them too, for supporting freedom of expression,” said the actor.