Shantanu Mukherjee, the grandson of Gopal Mukherjee, popularly known as ‘Gopal Patha’, has moved the Calcutta High Court demanding a stay on the release of the movie ‘The Bengal Files’, slated to hit movie halls on Friday in West Bengal.

A single bench of Justice Amrita Sinha will hear the matter on Monday.

The counsel for the petitioner submitted in court, “We want a stay in the release of the movie in (West Bengal). Also, Gopal Mukherjee has been depicted in a ghastly manner. We want the complete removal of scenes which depict him in a dishonourable fashion. Further, we want scrutiny over the role of Vivek Agnihotri in the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC). How can he remain a board member of CBFC and run a production house parallelly?”

Speaking to The Indian Express, Advocate Debanjan Mukherjee said, “We want Agnihotri to stop misusing the name and identity of a historic person who was a freedom fighter.”

In August, Shantanu Mukherjee had filed a complaint with the Bowbazar Police against Vivek Agnihotri for allegedly using derogatory terms about his grandfather. According to Shantanu, Agnihotri had also not taken the permission of the family before making the film in which his grandfather is shown.

The complaint letter read, “What hurts us is that such efforts are not alien to us; previously, loads of despicable endeavours aimed at dragging down the image of my late grandfather Sri Gopal Chandra Mukherjee had occurred, leaving the entire family in utter shock. Not only his words or deeds, but his ideological conviction along with his interpretation of the historic struggle was also denigrated, and the same is occurring recurrently at present by the said Vivek Agnihotri, who is seen openly referring to my grandfather as a butcher and is seen talking about his involvement in alleged violent actions that reportedly took place during Direct Action Day, thus besmirching his reputation as a freedom fighter.”

Agnihotri had earlier claimed in August that the Kolkata Police had stopped the trailer launch of The Bengal Files — based on the 1946 Calcutta Riots — at the “last moment”. He had questioned whether Bengal followed a “special constitution.” According to police sources, the director had sent an email requesting police permission for the trailer launch, but no permission was granted.

Written and directed by Agnihotri, ‘The Bengal Files’ stars Mithun Chakraborty, Anupam Kher, Darshan Kumar, and Pallavi Joshi.