West Bengal ban on ‘The Kerala Story’: SC agrees to hear producers’ plea

The Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to hear on May 12 a plea by the producers of controversial multilingual film ‘The Kerala Story’ against the West Bengal government’s ban on screening of the movie after the makers said they are “losing money every day”.
Senior advocate Harish Salve mentioned the matter for urgent listing before a bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justice P S Narasimha.
Salve said the petition challenges the ban by the West Bengal government and the “de-facto” ban in Tamil Nadu.
The bench said it had on Tuesday posted for May 15 a separate plea against the Kerala High Court order refusing to stay the release of the movie and the fresh plea would also be heard on that day.
However, the bench agreed to list the plea for hearing on May 12 after Salve said, “We are losing money every day.”
‘The Kerala Story’ starring Adah Sharma was released in cinemas on May 5.
Directed by Sudipto Sen, the film depicts how women from Kerala were forced to convert to Islam and recruited by the terror group Islamic State(IS).
On May 8, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had ordered an immediate ban on the screening of the film in the state to avoid “any incident of hatred and violence”, a senior state government official had said.
The apex court had on Tuesday agreed to hear on May 15 a plea against the Kerala High Court order refusing to stay the release of the film. On May 5, the high court had refused to stay the release of the movie and said the trailer does not contain anything offensive to any particular community as a whole.
The high court had noted the producers’ submission that they do not intend to retain an “offending teaser” which contained a statement that “32,000 women” from Kerala were converted and joined a terrorist organisation.