Nepal bans screening of Hindi movies amid Adipurush dialogue row

Kathmandu: All Hindi films, including "Adipurush", were banned in Nepal on Monday following a controversy over its dialogues, including the mention of Sita as "India's daughter".

According to reports, the screening of Om Raut-directed "Adipurush" has been halted nationwide, after the movie, a retelling of epic Ramayana, was banned in Kathmandu and Pokhara.

Police personnel were deployed across 17 halls in Kathmandu to ensure that no Hindi film was screened.

Kathmandu Mayor Balendra Shah on Sunday said no Hindi film will be allowed to run in Kathmandu Metropolitan City until the dialogue "Janaki is a daughter of India" in "Adipurush" is removed not just in Nepal but also in India Sita, also referred to as Janaki, is believed by many to have been born in Janakpur in southeast Nepal.

Pokhara Metropolis Mayor Dhanaraj Acharya said "Adipurush", starring Prabhas and Kriti Sanon, will be barred from screening from Monday onwards.

According to Kathmandu mayor, screening "Adipurush" without getting one of its dialogues removed will cause "irreparable damage".

"Screening of all the Hindi films will be barred within Kathmandu Metropolitan City from Monday, June 19, as the objectionable words in the dialogue of the film 'Adipurush' has not yet been removed," he said in a Facebook post on Sunday.

As controversy spiralled, "Adipurush" dialogue writer Manoj Muntashir Shukla on Sunday said the makers of the movie had decided to "revise some of the dialogues" after the film was criticised heavily for its pedestrian language.

Shukla, who has penned the Hindi dialogues and songs of the multilingual saga, said the amended lines will be added to the film by this week.

Raju Pandey, Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) Police chief, said the police inspected the cinema halls within the city on Sunday in accordance with the mayor's instructions.

"We got a positive response during the inspection on Sunday and we are now monitoring all the cinema halls from Monday morning," Pandey said.

"While monitoring QFX Hall at Civil Mahal in Kathmandu... they said they will show Nepali and English movies instead of Hindi ones. We will not allow screening of Hindi movies until the KMC authority gives permission," he added.

A security guard at Q's Cinema situated at the Rising Mall in Kamaladi Kathmandu said the theatre stopped screening "Adipurush" after showing the movie once on Friday evening. "Now, we are screening Nepali film 'Neer Phool' from Monday," he informed.

Produced by T-Series, Retrophiles, and UV Creations, the film also stars Saif Ali Khan as Lankesh (Ravana), Sunny Singh as Shesh (Lakshman) and Devdutta Nage as Bajrang (Hanuman).