Hear­ing the pe­ti­tion of young Mum­bai lawyer Am­rit­pal Singh Khalsa, the Mum­bai High Court to­day di­rected the Cen­tral Board of Film Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion to re­view the por­tion the movie ZERO, its trailer and posters wherein the lead ac­tor Shah Rukh Khan is shown to be wear­ing a Kir­pan -one of the five ar­ti­cles of the Sikh faith, in a deroga­tory man­ner. The mat­ter has been listed for fi­nal ar­gu­ments on 18 De­cem­ber as the film is slated for re­lease on 21 De­cem­ber.

Hear­ing the ar­gu­ments from all sides, a bench of Jus­tice B. P. Dhar­mad­hikar and Jus­tice Sarang Kot­wal di­rected the Cen­tral Board of Film Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion to re­view the im­pugned sec­tion of the trailer as the pe­ti­tioner had al­leged that this was blas­phe­mous and had of­fended his re­li­gious sen­si­bil­i­ties.

Speak­ing ex­clu­sively on the phone line from Mum­bai, Am­rit­pal Singh said, “I am glad that the Mum­bai High Court has taken cog­nizance of the mat­ter. Let us hope that the mak­ers of ZERO see rea­son and with­draw the scene which is of­fen­sive to the Sikhs.” He fur­ther clar­i­fied that he had told the court that nei­ther he nor the Sikhs are against the movie in to­tal­ity, but the un­nec­es­sary scene show­ing Shah Rukh Khan wear­ing the Kir­pan must be re­moved from the movie, trailer and the posters.

Singh Sabha Mum­bai has also pe­ti­tioned the CBFC and they have com­mu­ni­cated to Singh Sabha through a let­ter that they will re­view the com­plaint and take nec­es­sary ac­tion.Vice Pres­i­dent of the pre­mier or­gan­i­sa­tion of the Sikhs in Mum­bai Kul­want Singh and his as­so­ci­ate Man­deep Singh Laadi were pre­sent in the court room when the ar­gu­ments were un­der­way. Speak­ing to WSN, Kul­want Singh said, “We are pur­su­ing the mat­ter with the Cen­tral Board of Film Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion since the day we came to know about the ob­jec­tion­able trailer and poster. If there is a need, Singh Sabha will join the pe­ti­tioner with an­other pe­ti­tion on the sub­ject to fur­ther boost the Sikh case.” 

Se­nior coun­sel Navroz Seer­vai ap­peared for Shah Rukh Khan whereas CBFC was rep­re­sented by Ad­vo­cate Sethna. The pe­ti­tioner was rep­re­sented by the lawyer him­self. 

Sikh cir­cles in Mum­bai and else­where are hope­ful that the Mum­bai High Court would do jus­tice to the Sikhs.

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The full or­der of the Mum­bai High Court in the mat­ter is awaited.

Mum­bai, 30 No­vem­ber 2018, WSN News Bu­reau