Kolkata: Calcutta High Court is likely to hear on Monday a petition by Santanu Mukherjee, grandson of freedom fighter Gopal Mukherjee, the legendary "Gopal Pattha" and a key defender of central Calcutta's Hindu neighbourhoods during the Direct Action Day clashes of Aug 1946.
He is seeking edits and cuts in the film ‘Bengal Files', which, according to him, spreads misinformation by wrongly depicting the freedom fighter as a slaughterer of a particular religious community. The film is slated to release on Friday.
Mukherjee's counsel, Debanjan Mukherjee, submitted before Justice Amrita Sinha: "If this movie is allowed to release, it will permanently tarnish the family's honour.
has depicted him as being involved in the massacre of members of a minority religious community.
If this movie is released and comes before the world at large for public viewing, everybody will see him in a completely different way..."
During the hearing before Justice Sinha, absence of CBFC or Centre counsels was pointed out. In fact, time was also given to Mukherjee's counsel to get the respondents. "CBFC is required to be heard. Without hearing the respondent, how can it be done?" Justice Sinha told the counsel while pointing out that a second police plaint against the film was filed on Aug 23.
Even though time was given, the counsel could not return with the CBFC counsel, and the matter was scheduled for hearing on Monday.
Mukherjee demanded an impartial probe into the role of CBFC on which Agnihotri serves as a board member, including a request that Agnihotri step aside while this probe is conducted. The petitioner argued that the movie's trailers, teasers, and promotional interviews portrayed Gopal Chandra Mukherjee in a derogatory manner through the use of terms like ‘patha' (meaning ‘goat' in Bengali, considered a pejorative) and ‘kasai' (meaning ‘Butcher').