The Central Board of Film Certification is at the centre of a controversy for the decision of its Mumbai Regional Officers to mute the word "Bombay" in the video of a song by the artist Mihir Joshi titled Sorry, from the album Mumbai Blues. The tune is the lament of a father to his daughter, reflecting on the problem of violence against women in Indian society.
What the Censor Board’s certification means is that under Indian law (The Cinematograph Act, and the CBFC Rules), this video cannot be shown on television with the word “Bombay” audible. Under Indian law, all video films, however short, have to be cleared by the CBFC before they are exhibited on television. However, any restriction, or censoring of a video film has to meet the standards of the law governing this process, which in this case is by section 5B of the Cinematograph Act.
Under this law, the exhibition of a film can be restricted if it is against the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, security of the state, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, decency or morality, or involves defamation or contempt of court or is likely to incite the commission of any offence.
Unjustified restriction
Surely, referring to Bombay as Mumbai cannot be justified under any of these categories. If members of the Censor Board began applying the law, based on their own political sensitivities and sensibilities, there would be no space for creativity, and authorial integrity. In this particular case, Mihir Joshi has explained that the reason he used the word Bombay in the song is so that it rhymed with the word “today”. But the point is that Joshi has no need to explain this. These are creative decisions taken by artists that the Censor Board should not be meddling with. Imagine a world of film excised of the word Bombay, Would Anurag Kashyap have to rename his film, Mumbai Velvet? Is every Bollywood scriptwriter going to change any mention of the word Mumbai with Bombay.
Comic relief
Besides being a totally incomprehensible interpretation of the existing law, the muting of the video on television makes no sense when the official video for the song has been circulating online with the word Bombay since May 2014 (the same time that the certification of Sorry is dated). Besides providing comic relief, the utterly silly decision highlights the larger problems with the institutionalisation of the CBFC’s role. The CBFC’s role should be to rate films, and only in exceptional cases intervene to tamper with the content of films. Instead, the CBFC has a long history of excising content, suggesting cuts, and infantilising the Indian public.
While this particular incident happened at the regional level, and is not connected to the new dispensation at the CBFC, the new Censor Board Chief Pahalaj Nihalani’s statements on assuming responsibilities at the Board are already cause for concern. Nihalani has been reported to call for correcting the "double standards" in judging films and television, and has expressed his displeasure with the display of nudity online and on television. His comments raised a storm in the media, with a number of people questioning the jurisdiction of the CBFC chief in regulating television programmes. Nihalani’s comments also prompt the question – what are these channels that the CBFC chief watching? My experience of watching film on television is one of utter frustration, with the over-the-top self-regulation of movie scripts on television channels, where a large number of words are unnecessarily beeped out, and images blurred.
The episode with the song Sorry raises another crucial issue – the decision of the artist not to contest the decision. In a landscape in which the censors have a long history of undermining artistic integrity, it is the responsibility of artists to challenge these decisions and to use every forum available to contest these arbitrary excisions. While Joshi has tweeted about this episode, enabling a public debate on this issue, what is needed is for artists, as well as commercial enterprises including music companies and movie production houses, to take this fight to the Film Certification Appellate Tribunal and the courts to help set positive precedents.
Siddharth Narrain is a lawyer and Research Associate at Sarai – Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi.
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What the Censor Board’s certification means is that under Indian law (The Cinematograph Act, and the CBFC Rules), this video cannot be shown on television with the word “Bombay” audible. Under Indian law, all video films, however short, have to be cleared by the CBFC before they are exhibited on television. However, any restriction, or censoring of a video film has to meet the standards of the law governing this process, which in this case is by section 5B of the Cinematograph Act.
Under this law, the exhibition of a film can be restricted if it is against the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, security of the state, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, decency or morality, or involves defamation or contempt of court or is likely to incite the commission of any offence.
Unjustified restriction
Surely, referring to Bombay as Mumbai cannot be justified under any of these categories. If members of the Censor Board began applying the law, based on their own political sensitivities and sensibilities, there would be no space for creativity, and authorial integrity. In this particular case, Mihir Joshi has explained that the reason he used the word Bombay in the song is so that it rhymed with the word “today”. But the point is that Joshi has no need to explain this. These are creative decisions taken by artists that the Censor Board should not be meddling with. Imagine a world of film excised of the word Bombay, Would Anurag Kashyap have to rename his film, Mumbai Velvet? Is every Bollywood scriptwriter going to change any mention of the word Mumbai with Bombay.
Comic relief
Besides being a totally incomprehensible interpretation of the existing law, the muting of the video on television makes no sense when the official video for the song has been circulating online with the word Bombay since May 2014 (the same time that the certification of Sorry is dated). Besides providing comic relief, the utterly silly decision highlights the larger problems with the institutionalisation of the CBFC’s role. The CBFC’s role should be to rate films, and only in exceptional cases intervene to tamper with the content of films. Instead, the CBFC has a long history of excising content, suggesting cuts, and infantilising the Indian public.
While this particular incident happened at the regional level, and is not connected to the new dispensation at the CBFC, the new Censor Board Chief Pahalaj Nihalani’s statements on assuming responsibilities at the Board are already cause for concern. Nihalani has been reported to call for correcting the "double standards" in judging films and television, and has expressed his displeasure with the display of nudity online and on television. His comments raised a storm in the media, with a number of people questioning the jurisdiction of the CBFC chief in regulating television programmes. Nihalani’s comments also prompt the question – what are these channels that the CBFC chief watching? My experience of watching film on television is one of utter frustration, with the over-the-top self-regulation of movie scripts on television channels, where a large number of words are unnecessarily beeped out, and images blurred.
The episode with the song Sorry raises another crucial issue – the decision of the artist not to contest the decision. In a landscape in which the censors have a long history of undermining artistic integrity, it is the responsibility of artists to challenge these decisions and to use every forum available to contest these arbitrary excisions. While Joshi has tweeted about this episode, enabling a public debate on this issue, what is needed is for artists, as well as commercial enterprises including music companies and movie production houses, to take this fight to the Film Certification Appellate Tribunal and the courts to help set positive precedents.
Siddharth Narrain is a lawyer and Research Associate at Sarai – Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi.