A collective of four student bodies — Maatram Maanavar Ilaiyor Iyakkam, Free Tamil Eelam Students Organisation, Tamil Youth and Students association and Progressive Students Front — in Tamil Nadu has called for a ban on actor Vijay’s next film, ‘Kaththi’ and Pravin Gandhi’s ‘Pulipaarvai’, alleging that the two films promote the economic and political interests of Sri Lanka.
While Lyca Productions, which is producing ‘Kaththi’, is accused of having business links with Sri Lankan President Mahindra Rajapaksa, ‘Pulipaarvai’ is alleged to be an attempt to project LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran’s son, Balachandran Prabhakaran, as a child soldier.
The students are willing to reconsider their position on ‘Kaththi’, according to a representative, if Lyca Productions formally withdrew as producer. However, they weren’t prepared to make any concession for ‘Pulipaarvai’. “The trailer and the posters of Pulipaarvai clearly show that it is an attempt to depict Balachandran as a rebel when he was just an innocent kid who was executed. It is an attempt to portray him as a combatant killed in action,” said N. Pradeep Kumar of Maattram Maanavar Ilaiyor Iyakkam.
The student collective also made it clear that any political leader or a party speaking in support of ‘Kaththi’ and ‘Pulipaarvai’ would also face the heat from the student community.
