The bench of Justices MM Sundresh and M Sundar had rejected a plea for the revocation of censor certificate of Vijay starrer movie- Mersal. The division bench of Madras High Court while rejecting the petition held that the cinema goers have to make their own perspectives and whatever is there in movie is nothing but an expression.
The court held that our country has a matured democracy and in the matured democracy like ours the views and expressions of the minority cannot be ignored, they are allowed to express their views. However, the views so expressed are palatable or not cannot be a question for debate.
The petition was filed by the Mr A Ashvathaman on the ground that the movie had quoted wrong facts with reference to GST operation in India. The petition submitted that the movie has wrongly mistaken that GST is collected at 28% in India as compared to 7% in singapore, but no free medical aid is being provided in India as in singapore. It is further submitted in the petition that in India the highest slab for collection of GST is 28%.
The petitioner further submitted that because cinema is a powerful media and has such a strong influence on the general public that depicting wrong facts in movie will convey the wrong message to the public and will also affect the sovereignty of our country. The Petitioner relied on the judgement of Madras High Court in the case of A ArulMozhi vs Government of India, wherein the court revoked the certificate issued by the censor board on the ground of vulgarity in the movie.
Disagreeing with the submissions of the petitioner, the court held that the censor board is competent authority to grant the certificate to a film and it is at the discretion of the public whether to watch a movie or not.
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