A Supreme Court Bench led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra on Thursday agreed to hear pleas on January 29 for initiating contempt of court action against the Gujarat, Haryana, Rajasthan governments and Karni Sena members for aggravated incidents of violence, even against schoolchildren, in the background of the release of film Padmaavat .
“We will see,” Chief Justice Misra said at the mentioning.
The petitions, filed by activist Tehseen Poonawala and Supreme Court advocate Vineet Dhanda, described the destruction caused to public property, theatre premises and how suspected members of the Karni Sena pelted stones at a bus carrying schoolchildren in Gurgaon.
They questioned the lack of proper preventive measures taken by law enforcers in the States which, they said, gave agitators a sense of free hand to indulge in violence in the name of protest.
The petitions said the violence and the lack of efforts on the part of the State authorities to neither prevent nor control them amounted to contempt of the apex court’s January 18 order that the State is obliged to protect the fundamental right of free speech and creative rights.
On January 18, the apex court lifted orders issued by some northern States prohibiting the exhibition of Padmaavat in theatres. It ordered that no State across the country should pass such prohibitory orders against the screening of the movie.
It observed that its conscience was shocked by the States’ decision to prohibit the exhibition of the Censor Board certified movie.
The court subsequently refused the Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh governments’ applications to recall its order, saying a mob cannot take to the streets to choke free speech. The court said that if the States capitulated to mobs now, they would make a “virtue out of creating trouble”.
The movie portrays the 13th century historical battle between Maharaja Ratan Singh and his army of Mewar and Sultan Alauddin Khilji of Delhi. Outfits such as the Karni Sena are up in arms against the portrayal of queen Padmavati in the film.
Chief Justice Misra had said a film may bomb at the box office or people may choose to not watch it, but the State cannot use its machinery to prohibit ia film's exhibition citing risk to public order.
The court had observed that the grant of certificate by the Central Board of Film Certification under the Cinematograph Act of 1952 denudes the States of any power to exercise prohibition of exhibition of a film.
Gujarat and Rajasthan had issued notifications on January 5 and 17, respectively, prohibiting the screening of Padmaavat . Haryana had, in principle, agreed to a ban on its exhibition. Madhya Pradesh had made statements that they intend to ban the screening of the movie in theatres.
