The political-drama series Tandav, which was recently slammed by many on social media for allegedly hurting sentiments of the Hindus, made us look at six Hindi projects on OTT platforms that have courted controversy in the last few months.
TANDAV
An FIR has been lodged against Ali Abbas Jafar and Gaurav Solanki, the director and writer of the recently released web-series Tandav, for allegedly depicting Hindu gods in a bad light in a particular scene that features actor Mohd. Zeeshan Ayyub performing a college play. Many felt that the sequence insults the Hindu deity Shiv. Commenting on it, BJP's Rajasthan unit chief Satish Poonia said that while Indian democracy gives freedom of expression, many projects are insulting Hindu deities in the name of liberty.
Following this, the creator of the series Ali Abbas Zafar apologised on behalf of the entire cast and crew, asserting that they did not intend to offend anyone or insult any religion and political party. However, Akhil Bhartiya Akhara Parishad said that there was no question of pardoning unless all Muslim actors and directors submit affidavits that they will not insult and ridicule Hindu Gods and goddesses.
Related | Is Tandav row a fresh call for OTT censorship?
MIRZAPUR 2
A case was filed on Monday against the producer of the web series Mirzapur and streaming platform Amazon Prime in Uttar Pradesh, alleging that the web series hurts religious, social and regional sentiments and damages social harmony. Last year, Mirzapur MP Anupriya Patel had also demanded an inquiry against the show for portraying the district in a poor light and promoting caste violence.
AK Vs AK
The Indian Air Force was not too happy about Anil Kapoor wearing a wrong uniform and using abusive language in the film and urged the streaming platform Netflix to remove the scenes with the discrepancies. Anil later apologised for unintentionally hurting sentiments of the Indian Air Force.
A SUITABLE BOY
In November, an FIR was registered in Madhya Pradesh against two Netflix officials for allegedly hurting religious sentiments through the web series A Suitable Boy. Prior to the FIR, Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Narottam Mishra had said the state police have been asked to probe the web series by Mira Nair to check if kissing scenes in the show had been shot in a temple or not. He had also hinted at possible legal action against the makers of the web series.
AASHRAM
Even though the series revived Bobby Deol's career, the director of the series Prakash Jha was served a legal notice in November for allegedly hurting Hindu sentiments. The legal notice was sent to the OTT platform MX Player and Jha on the ground that is was "directly targeting the ancient tradition, custom, culture of Hindu, Ashramas Dharma". The notice was sent by Surjeet Singh, Pradesh Sangathan Mahamantri of Karni Sena. A month later, Jodhpur court had issued notice to Jha and Deol after Advocate Khush Khandelwal moved the court alleging that Hindu gurus have been shown as rapists and drug traffickers.
PAATAL LOK
Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee president Manjinder Singh Sirsa had shared his concern about the depiction of Sikh characters in Paatal Lok, which starred Jaideep Ahlawat and was produced by Anushka Sharma. He had especially objected to a scene where a Sikh man was shown to be raping a woman while another Sikh man watched.
Indra Hang Subba, MP from Sikkim, had written to Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar over the sexist slur used by one of the characters on the show, saying that over than 10.5 million people in India speak Nepali and they were deeply affected by the incident. The Bharatiya Gorkha Yuva Parisangh, the youth wing of Bharatiya Gorkha Parisangh, had also objected to the slur.
(With inputs from IANS)