New Delhi, Sept. 16 -- The Centre on Wednesday reconstituted the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) more than six years after the three-year tenure of its previous panel ran out, bringing actors Preity Zinta, Pankaj Tripathi, Suniel Shetty, Pallavi Joshi and Prosenjit Chatterjee, and Grammy-winning musician Ricky Kej, among others, onto the 18-member board.
Days after Chatterjee became the chairman of the 32nd Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF), the Padma Shri awardee actor has been inducted in a newly-constituted 18-member censor board committee for a three-year term.
The reconstitution comes weeks after the CBFC held its first board meeting in six years on August 29. Under the Cinematograph (Certification) Rules, 2024, the board is required to meet at least once every quarter.
The new board, headed by CBFC chairperson Shashi Shekhar Vempati, has been constituted with immediate effect for three years or until further orders, whichever is earlier.
The new panel also includes filmmaker Priyadarshan, film critic Vinod Anupam, actor Manoj Joshi, filmmaker Abhishek Jain, singer and former parliamentarian Hans Raj Hans, producer Supriya Yarlagadda, poet and writer Yatindra Mishra, actor Roopali Ganguly, filmmaker Nila Madhab Panda and actor Nishigandha Wad.
Theatre director Waman Kendre and writer and RSS pracharak Ramesh Patange are the only two members of the previous board to have been retained in the newly constituted panel.
The CBFC was last reconstituted on August 11, 2017, for a three-year term, which ran till 2020. Members of that board, however, continued beyond their stipulated tenure because provisions allowed them to remain in office until their successors were appointed.
The prolonged continuation of the board also figured in Parliament earlier this year, where the government stated that under Rule 3 of the Cinematograph (Certification) Rules, 2024, every member holds office during the pleasure of the Centre for a period not exceeding three years, but continues until a new member is appointed in his or her place.
The outgoing board included actor Vidya Balan, filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri, playwright Mihir Bhuta, actor Gautami Tadimalla, Vani Tripathi Tikoo, actor Jeevitha Rajasekhar, filmmaker T S Nagabharana and filmmaker Naresh Chandra Lal, besides Kendre and Patange.
The new panel has several members with links to the ruling BJP or the broader Sangh Parivar. Ganguly formally joined the BJP ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, while Hans is a BJP leader who represented North West Delhi in the Lok Sabha from 2019 to 2024.
Patange, one of the two members retained from the previous board, is an RSS pracharak and author of the book "Why Are We in the RSS...?". It carries a foreword by RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat.
Incidentally, Pallavi Joshi is the wife of Agnihotri. She was among the producers and cast members of "The Kashmir Files", which had triggered a political storm, directed by him.
Priyadarshan is a veteran filmmaker who has worked extensively in Malayalam and Hindi cinema, while Panda is an award-winning filmmaker known for films such as "I Am Kalam". Jain is a filmmaker and producer associated primarily with Gujarati cinema.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.