In support of the Girl

Jasmine Singh

The tragic story of The Danish Girl received seven nominations at the 20th Satellite Awards and of course umpteen other prestigious awards, including Academy Award for Best Actress in a supporting role for Alicia Vikander.

And when the Indian audiences saw its teaser some days back that announced its telecast, the time and channel details were noted and memorised. And now, the news is that India’s film censorship has barred Sony Pictures’ channel from telecasting this Oscar nominated film! The film authority have apparently objected to its sensitive storyline and found it unsuitable for audiences below 18. If you are appalled at this turn shouldn’t you be asking how much censorship on television do we require? Should there be different guidelines for TV programmes?

The TV fraternity has a lot to say on this. Of course, some hadn’t seen The Danish Girl. TV actor and stand-up comedian Armaan Thakur from Jalandhar takes a while to collect his thoughts on the topic. “What do I say, I just hope the authority that banned the films screening know it is a Hollywood film that has won many awards. I would suggest that the authority should have sent someone to Hollywood when The Danish Girl was being made, and said, ‘we have to show this on TV in India, thode dhyaan se banana.’

If you have watched Hollywood films shown on television, especially those unreleased In India or the ones that are premiered first time on TV are not the original ones, they are cut, keeping in mind the sensitivity of the TV watching audience in India. This is apparently what happened to The Danish Girl. The broadcaster tweeted: “We regret to inform you that Sony Le Plex HD is unable to telecast the television premiere of the award-winning film The Danish Girl on March 26 as the necessary certification to enable the telecast of the movie has not been received.”

Also, the CBFC has put a ban across channels, and now no other channel can also show the film.

TV actor Tarun Khanna, who is seen in the role of Mahadev on the show Shani on Colors, takes a rather sarcastic route on this. “I think the ban is right, why should the TV audiences be allowed to see something sensible, they should be shown serials where wives are scheming and plotting, where women abuse each other on reality shows.”

Is this undermining the intelligence of the TV audience in any which way? All the same, does this mean that those who watch TV are sanskaari and that they shouldn’t be shown anything that can hurt their sentiment? And what about the power to use the remote control when you don’t like a show?

Adds TV actress Sumedha Singh, who too was surprised when she read about the ban, “TV is anything but small. Hasn’t it become as popular and as much in demand as Bollywood, or let’s say slightly less. TV shows are not just about saas bahu they have a lot of content too. In this case, they should ban half the shows on Discovery channel where they explicitly show animals making out, a lion wooing a tigress, their sexual games and all. Why let that be shown?”

And before you draw any conclusion, “Is someone also debating on banning reality shows like Bigg Boss?” Prashant Chitwan asks.