Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap on Thursday lashed out at Manmarziyaan co-producer Kishore Lulla after he agreed to delete certain scenes from the film in the wake of objections by Sikhs.
The controversy blew up further after Twitter deleted his angry post targeting his co-producer Lulla. In his controversial tweet, Kashyap had given the phone number of Lulla asking people to contact him directly for any queries regarding the film.
He wrote, “Congratulations. Hereby all problems of Punjab are solved and Sikh youth have been saved. Happy to be back in La La Land, again. Next time you are threatened by a film please call Kishore Lulla directly on Eros knows how to solve matters in minutes.”
Moments later, Twitter support team got in touch with him via WhatsApp requesting him to delete the tweet since it carried the personal mobile number of Lulla. Kashyap refused to oblige and asked the support team to either blur the number or delete the tweet from their end. The microblogging site took down the tweet forcing Kashyap to repost the old tweet without Lulla’s number but with the screenshot of his conversation with the Twitter support representative.
Before my tweet is taken down -Congratulations . Here by all problems of Punjab are solved and Sikh youth have been saved . Happy to be back in LaLa land again. Next time you are threatened by a film please call Kishore Lulla directly on Eros knows how to solve matters in minutes pic.twitter.com/4yqU3T9utK
— Anurag Kashyap (@anuragkashyap72) September 20, 2018
The controversy started after Lulla allegedly agreed to delete the scenes against the desire of Kashyap. The controversial scenes included Abhishek Bachchan smoking after removing his turban, the smoking scene of Tapsee Pannu, who plays the character of Sikh woman and the scene showing Abhishek and Taapsee entering a gurudwara for anand karaj.
Kashyap posted his full statement, which read as follows;
I am not in India and I have been reading about the Sikh community feeling offended by the smoking scene. This film is not commenting on a community , it talks about individuals and their choices. Every step of the way, we asked for guidance from Sikh people for the film. When we shot the sequence in Gurudwara , we were told we can’t shoot them getting married as it can’t be faked so me made the actors do only “Mattha tekna “. When we were shooting scenes , no member of crew was allowed to smoke inside the houses . When we shot the smoking scene , it was shot on the street and there were close to 150 people watching the shoot. We asked before doing the scene and were told that he has to take the Turban off before he smokes away from his house. We were also shown how Robbie should take the turban off with both hands and how he should hand it over and how the cousin should take it . Most of the 150 people in the crowd were sikhs and we were told that’s how it is. We created what we saw with our own eyes and after discussion. It was never the intention to hurt the community and why would we do that when we got so much love from them . The city of Amritsar opened their hearts and doors to us and everything was done with utmost care . Not a single thing was shot without guidance. We wanted to show things the way they are. No religion teaches crime or anything anti-humanity , yet those things happen. It doesn’t mean they are offending the religion. Manmarziyaan is a story of three individuals and not their religion. I am sorry if anyone feels genuinely hurt but I would also request that please don’t make this unnecessary political because it’s not. I have always put out things the way they are without an agenda. Technology does not allow us to cut a scene and it affects the story telling . So I definitely can not do that now.To those whose hurt is genuine , I offer a genuine apology , that wasn’t my intention. And for those who are doing it for attention , I am glad you have got the attention.
One of the reasons why Kashyap appeared to have been peeved by Lulla’s decision was that he chose to delete the scenes a day after the former issued a statement expressing his inability to remove the objectionable scenes.
Manmarziyaan was released on 14 September and has collected over Rs 19 crore at the box office.
