'Bombay' Trial: Humanity's Survival Amid Terror's Shadow

One film these days which has come out of the Censor Board after a long struggle is Sanjay Niranjan's "Bombay". The film is set to hit theaters in April. This film has been in the headlines for one reason or the other. First, the producer tussles with the censor board, and then social organizations threaten to change the title of the film. Now that the film has reached its release after avoiding all the opposition, the producer organized a trial show of the film for his team and some special people, of which I was one.

Sanjay Niranjan Questions Censor's Objection to Film Title

After watching the film in the trial show, writer-director Sanjay Niranjan wanted to know - what is my reaction? I was surprised why the censor had any objection to the title of the film! Actually, as per what has been told and shown in this film, at that time this metropolis was called "Bombay", the name Mumbai came later. During the 1993 riots, people and characters talking about the events of the film, related news, and terrorist incidents were seen saying 'Mumbai' in the film, then it seemed funny. It would have been unreal. Wonder why the censor objected? Similarly, the threat by a social organization to not allow the film to be tagged with the name 'Bombay' also seemed unreasonable.

Discussing the censors, Sanjay Niranjan says - "Leave aside the title, I was also told that there was no real footage. That is, I should have been shooting when the riots were happening! They wanted a clip of the video I shot myself of that incident! Tell me, the time when your life was in danger while shooting...? Such things are meant to harass. This is like a TV channel executive asking a producer to bring the profile of the film's writer 'Munshi Premchand'."

The thing to tell is that the story of "Bombay" is after the Mumbai riots (1993) i.e. in 95-96...when there was a period of investigation. Then how, where, and in what manner these terrorists were talking about the restoration of peace at that time? At that time humanity did not die under the shadow of terror. How the events had unfolded and everyone was concerned about maintaining peace. Those circumstances are depicted in 'Bombay'. Along with Hindi, this film has also been made in Marathi, Telugu, and Kannada and all of them have been censored separately.

'Bombay' stars Gavi Chahal (Punjabi film star), Deepshikha, Danish Bhatt, Ashish Warang, Vandana Lalwani, Ganesh Pai, Akshita Agnihotri, Pradeep Kabra and Deepak Bhatia in lead roles. The cinematography is by S Pappu, the action is by Moses Fernandez, and the art director is Manohar Patil.

The film 'Bombay', made under the banner of Hallmark Studios, is produced by Firdous Shaikh and the writer-director is Sanjay Niranjan.

-Sharad Rai

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