The Kerala High Court on Friday allowed the release of the film The Kerala Story 2: Goes Beyond, lifting a stay ordered a day earlier by a single-judge bench, Bar and Bench reported.
A division bench of Justices SA Dharmadhikari and PV Balakrishnan set aside the order of Justice Bechu Kurian Thomas, who stayed the release on Thursday, observing that the film could disturb communal harmony.
It was hearing urgent arguments in a petition moved by the film’s producer, Vipul Amrutlal Shah, hours after the stay order, Live Law reported.
The film The Kerala Story 2 - Goes Beyond allegedly depicts women from various states being lured into relationships with Muslim men and coerced into religious conversion. The teaser released on February 17 includes a scene in which a Hindu woman is forced to consume beef.
The makers of the film had earlier argued before the court that the content shown in the teaser was not a part of the movie.
On Thursday, Thomas said that on a preliminary reading, the Central Board of Film Certification ignored guidelines for clearing films and asked it to re-examine the matter.
On Friday, the division bench questioned how the single judge had drawn serious conclusions about the film’s impact without watching it, The News Minute reported.
“Merely on the basis of a few clippings and without viewing the movie, the findings of the learned single judge that the guidelines for certification have not been borne in mind by the CBFC while granting certification cannot be countenanced,” Bar and Bench quoted the judges as saying.
In their petition, the filmmakers had argued that halting the release of a film that had already been cleared by the Central Board of Film Certification was an extreme step that should be taken only in exceptional circumstances, Live Law reported.
The counsel for the filmmakers had added that last-minute stays on film releases suppress free speech through economic harm rather than direct censorship. “Such a commercial disruption would destroy a person,” Live Law quoted the lawyer as having said.
The matter has been posted for further hearing after two weeks.
A day after the teaser was released, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had criticised the film on social media, alleging that it was “aimed at sowing hatred against Kerala and insulting our secular tradition”.
“It is the responsibility of each of us to prove that the secular foundation of Kerala will not be destroyed by false propaganda,” Vijayan had said on social media.
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