JOIN USSupreme Court to hear plea against Kerala HC order on 'The Kerala Story' on May 15
The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to take up on May 15 a plea against the Kerala High Court's refusal to stay the controversial film 'The Kerala Story'.
A bench of Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud and Justice P S Narasimha fixed the matter for consideration on Monday on a plea for urgent hearing made by senior advocate Kapil Sibal on behalf of the petitioners.
This is the fourth time when the top court would consider the plea related to related to the movie.
The plea questioned the validity of the High Court's order of May 5 declining any relief, saying there was nothing against offensive against Islam or Muslims in the film.
Meanwhile, producers of the movie, Sunshine Pictures and Vipul Shah filed a petition in the Supreme Court against the ban on film by the West Bengal government the decision not to release in theaters in Tamil Nadu saying that it is against the artistic freedom.
They are likely to mention the case for urgent hearing before the court of Chief Justice of India on Wednesday.
After watching the trailer of the movie, the Kerala HC had said it did not find "anything offensive to any particular community as a whole".
A bench of Justices N Nagaresh and Sophy Thomas had then heard a batch of petitions seeking to cancel the certificate of the film and staying its release.
"After going through the trailers of the movie, we find it does not contain anything offensive to any particular community as a whole. None of the petitioners have watched the movie," the court had noted in its order.
After hearing the counsel, the bench also asked the counsel, "What is against Islam? There is no allegation against the religion. The allegation is against ISIS."
The bench had also said there are umpteen number of movies where Hindu sanyasis are depicted as smugglers or rapists.
"Nothing happens, no one protests. Many such Hindi and Malayalam films are there," the bench said.
"Merely because some religious head is shown in bad light is not a reason to ban the movie. This has been happening in Hindi and Malayalam movies for a long time," the bench had further said.
The producer of the movie, however, had then said they are ready to put a disclaimer that this is a work of fiction, inspired by true stories.
The Supreme Court had earlier as many as three times rejected a plea to stop the release of the film, saying that it must also be considered that a filmmaker invests a lot of money and time in making a film and actors also put in a lot of work.
The film, produced by Sunshine Pictures Private Ltd and directed by Sudipto Sen, was released on Friday, May 05, 2023 across the country. The West Bengal government, however, had on May 8 banned it.