Kanooni kashmakash—kya vakil ‘Bandaa’  (Manoj Bajpayee) kaafi hai ? --- by Chaitanya  Padukone

In the upcoming film ‘Bandaa’,( expected to premiere and start streaming on ZEE5 from May 23) the ‘Family Man’ and ‘Gulmohar’ OTT show) super-actor Manoj portrays Poonam Chand Solanki, the Jodhpur-based lawyer who led the prosecution against self-styled Godman Aasaram Bapu for allegedly raping a 16-year-old girl from Uttar Pradesh, in his ashram way back in August 2013. Creative producer Suparn Varma informed the news-media that the survivor’s courage prodded him to tell the story. "Her courage inspired a courageous lawyer to stand against the country*s biggest lawyers," he begins. At the same time, the film gave the producer an opportunity to analyse the role of faith and Godmen in India. In India, we are lucky to have a system where we have gurus and gyanis. But when some play around with faith, it hurts."

The Trust has sent the legal notice for demand of justice for seeking prohibitory orders, directions and instruction, against release/promotion of Hindi film titled ‘Sirf Ek Bandaa Kafi Hai’ portraying life of a lawyer practicing at Jodhpur in Rajasthan, for depicting story of life and character of my client, Sant Shri Asaram ji Bapu, presently facing imprisonment at Central Jail Jodhpur(Rajasthan). .

The notice further reads, “it is also worthwhile to submit that in the Teaser and Trailer of the movie aforesaid, very obscene and hatred language has been used, by filmmaker, which is not only derogatory, rather it impeaches very character if my client no. 2, by portraying him as ‘Raavan and serious Rapist’ which is an insult to his religious and spiritual character and so also belief and sentiments of lakhs of their followers and devotees. The movie seeks to portray him in a negative character, which would definitely cause irreparable damage to his character, reputation and standing in society and public at large across the country and abroad. This will cause immense mental agony, humiliation and embarrassment to my client and his followers.

“Furthermore, as per the guidelines issued by the I & B Ministry on the subject of certification of films, any content that may hurt the sentiments of a community or religious group must not be allowed to be shown in public. The portrayal of my client as a villainous character in the film is highly derogatory and is likely to cause outrage among his followers, leading to law and order issues in various parts of the country,” added the notice. The notice also reads, “It is also stated that after seeing the movie trailer it is revealed that the character, voice and name of my client is exactly same and even his original voice has been used at various places and the counsel who contested this case on behalf of my complainant against my client is also same.”

Not only this, it said, “It is learnt that these filmmakers who do not get the Certification for the release of the movie from the CBFC, often move to OTT platforms for telecasting such film/movie.