After PM Modi’s surgical strike on OTT platforms, Allahabad High Court says, ‘Filmmakers intentionally hurt Hindu sentiments’

On the same day when the Narendra Modi government released a set of guidelines for OTT and social media platforms to adhere to — Allahabad High Court justified the centre’s decision by rejecting the application of Amazon Prime Video’s Aparna Purohit in connection with the ongoing investigation against Tandav for allegedly outraging religious feelings of the Hindus and showing revered Hindu Gods in poor light. The single bench of Justice Siddharth in a 20-page order, whilst referring to Purohit, said, “Such people make the revered figures of the religion of majority community source of earning money”.

The court held that Purohit was granted protection from arrest on February 11, but failed to cooperate with the investigation. The bench was in no mood to relent as it raked up the bogus ‘intolerance’ debate manufactured by the liberals such as Purohit and her accused partners.

Read more: Modi government breaks the backbone of social media and OTT platforms that were playing with rules for very long

“Whenever such crimes are committed by some citizens of the country, like the applicant and her co-accused persons, and it is made the subject matter of demonstration and public protest, the forces inimical to the interest of this country become active and they make it an issue and raise it before different national and international forums alleging that the Indian citizens have become intolerant and ‘India’ has become an unsafe place to live,” read the judgment.

Moreover, Allahabad Court drew parallels from the West where Jesus or Prophet is not ridiculed by the filmmakers, unlike the Hindi film industry.

“Western filmmakers have refrained from ridiculing Lord Jesus or the Prophet but Hindi filmmakers have done this repeatedly and are still doing this most unabashedly with the Hindu Gods and Goddesses,” the court observed whilst also taking the example of ‘comedian’ Munawar Faruqui who gained limelight using a similar ‘modus-operandi’.

“This tendency on the part of the Hindi film industry is growing and if not curbed in time, it may have disastrous consequences for the Indian social, religious and communal order. There appears to be a design behind such acts on the part of the people who just give a disclaimer in all the films and depict things in the movies which are really religiously, socially and communally offensive in nature,” the court added.

Reported by TFI earlier, when the makers of the controversial web series had first reached the Supreme Court to grant them interim protection from arrest, and transfer of all FIRs filed against them in various states to Mumbai, the bench then also had given a scathing reply.

“Your right to freedom of speech is not absolute. You cannot play the role of a character that hurts the sentiments of a community,”

Read more: ‘You cannot hurt religious sentiments,’ Supreme Court rejects interim protection to makers of Tandav

Like any other Hinduphobic web series, the creators of Tandav had thought that they would go scot-free after surrendering an ornamental apology and by cutting a scene or two from the series. However, the recent remarks of the Allahabad High Court and actions of the government prove that OTT platform Amazon Prime and its Hinduphobic executives like Purohit are in for the long haul and that churning such malicious content does have severe repercussions.