JUDGMENT :

Dipankar Datta, J.

1. By this common judgment and order, we propose to decide Public Interest Litigation (L) No. 4336 of 2022 and Public Interest Litigation (L) No. 5227 of 2022 together with Writ Petition (L) No. 5235 of 2022.

2. Writ Petition (L) No. 5235 of 2022 has been placed before us in terms of an order dated 23rd February, 2022 passed by a coordinate Bench of this Court. Their Lordships having been informed of pendency of Public Interest Litigation (L) Nos. 4336 and 5227 of 2022 desired that the writ petition be placed before this Bench for analogous hearing.

3. The grievance raised in the public interest litigations and the writ petition has its genesis in certification of a film titled “Gangubai Kathiawadi” (hereafter “the film”) by the Board of Film Certification (hereafter “the Board”) constituted by the Central Government under section 3 of the Cinematograph Act, 1952 (hereafter “the Act”) for public exhibition. The attempt of the petitioners is not to stall release of the film on the date scheduled, i.e. 25th February, 2022, but to tinker with the freedom of expression of those behind production of the film on the specious ground that a particular dialogue, the title of the film as well reference to a particular area as a red-light area would hurt the sentiments of the people belonging to the North-Eastern states of the country, people hailing from Kathiawad in Saurashtra, Gujarat and people residing in Kamathipura in South Mumbai.

4. Public Interest Litigation (L) No. 4336 of 2022 is at the instance of an Indian citizen who claims to be actively involved in works towards social causes and legal awareness. It is the pleaded case that the trailer of the film was uploaded on YouTube on 4th February, 2022 wherein the lead actress is seen to be visiting a dentist. The character of the dentist is played by an actor from the North-East and upon the dentist urging the actress to open her mouth wide, she responds by saying “PURA KA PURA CHINA MUH ME GHUSAYEGA KYA”. According to the petitioner, the said dialogue clearly and directly intends to connect the North-East person/actor to China in spite of he being an Indian. It is also his claim that the said dialogue is per se defamatory, hurts the sentiments of the people of the North-East community and brings out a feeling of insecurity within them together with increased vulnerability to racial discrimination. Based on such pleadings, relief is claimed seeking directions upon : the respondent nos. 1 and 2 (Bhansali Production and Pen India Limited) “to pull down/delete the trailer from YouTube and other social media platforms forthwith and to modify/delete the subject scene that is racist in nature”; and the respondent no.3 (the Board) “to carefully scrutinize the dialogue of the entire movie before issuing certificate for the film as well as for stay of the release of the film until such modification/deletion is made, as directed by the Court”.

5. We record that Mr. Saraogi, learned advocate for the petitioner, did not seek the relief of stalling of release of the film but confined the petitioner’s grievance to use of the word “China” in the aforesaid dialogue. According to him, since the said dialogue has the potential of affecting the interest of the people of the North-Eastern region, the word “China” should either be deleted or muted.

6. Mr. Kadam, learned senior advocate appearing for the respondent nos.1 and 2 in PIL(L) No. 4336 of 2022 submits that the events depicted in the film relate back to 1950 when quite a few Chinese dentists had been practicing in the relevant area where the character, on whom the film is based, resided. He further submits that the character of the dentist is of a Chinese (Dr. Chung). A screen grab on a cell phone is shown to us of a board carrying the name of the dentist, hung outside his chamber to support the assertion. It is Mr. Kadam’s specific statement, on instructions, that the character of the dentist is neither of a pers