Political hand behind ‘Jodha Akbar’ protests
(2 votes, average: 1 out of 5)
Eminent filmmaker Shyam Benegal Monday alleged that there was a political hand behind the protests held against Ashutosh Gowariker’s epic romance “Jodhaa Akbar” in several cities.
“This is the way politics is being played in this country,” he said at a press conference here. However, he refused to elaborate on which political party could be responsible for the protests.
Benegal said there were only a handful of people protesting the film and blamed the media for hyping the issue.
“Forty channels are reporting that people representing Rajput organisations are staging protests against the film and preventing its screening. There may be 50 people staging the protest, but the moment the news comes on national channels, you think it is a national problem,” he said.
On Monday, groups tried to disrupt the screening of the film in Gurgaon, Ahmedabad and Patna, saying that Gowariker had distorted historical facts.
Starring Hrithik Roshan and Aishwarya Rai, the movie was released Friday but banned in Rajasthan. The Karni Sena there has been spearheading a campaign against the film for quite some time.
The community says Gowariker is presenting Jodha Bai as Mughal emperor Jalaluddin Akbar’s wife, which is factually incorrect.
According to them, Jodha Bai was not the daughter of Raja Bharmal of Amber as shown in the film. The princess was the daughter of Motaraja Udai Singh of Marwar and she was married to Akbar’s son Salim alias Jehangir. And Mughal king Shahjahan was her son.
Gowarikar, however, says he made the film after thorough research and consultations with historians.
— IANS
Benegal needs to understand. There are crores of Rajput. I am msyself in USA, educated from top most engg college in India but still I am a rajput. Any distortion of facts hurts my feelings and this needs to displayed..
I feel if you vote amoung Rajputs, 90% will say ban the movie but we are not organized else instead of say 150 people you would have seen 150000 and our leaders like Amar Singh go to premier of such movies.. We lack leaders who can raise our problems..