Twenty nine years after it was completed, Libaas, made by poet, lyricist and film director, Gulzar in 1998, is all set to hit the big screen soon. This maybe a long gestation period, but there are many Indian films that have died premature thanks to controversies, politics and, believe it or not, carelessness on the part of the producers.
Here is a list of films that never made it to Indian theatres.
1) Kissa Kursi Ka (1977)
Directed by Amrit Nahata, the film was a satire on the politics of Indira Gandhi and her son Sanjay Gandhi. It was banned by the Indian Government during the Emergency period. Around 51 objections were reportedly raised by the censor board and later, all the prints were confiscated, brought to Maruti factory in Gurgaon and burnt.
2) KamaSutra: A Tale Of Love (1996)
Directed by Mira Nair, the film based on famous India literature by Vatsyana was globally acclaimed but banned in India. KamaSutra depicted the tale of two girl friends who become sexual rivals at maturity.
3) Ladies Only (1997)
Directed by Dinesh Shailendra, this unreleased film was a remake of Tamil hit Magalir Mattum, starring Kamal Haasan. The Tamil film was also the remake of the 1980 American film 9 to 5. Ladies Only featured Randhir Kapoor, Heera Rajagopal, Seema Biswas, Shilpa Shirodkar and had Kamal Haasan portraying the role of a dead body as guest appearance.
4) Paanch(2003)
Directed by Anurag Kashyap, the crime-thriller film based on the 1976-77 Joshi-Abhyankar serial murders never got a theatrical release. The CBFC objected to the violence, depiction of drug abuse and cuss words in the film starring Kay Kay Menon, Aditya Srivastava, Vijay Maurya, Joy Fernandes and Tejaswini Kolhapure. After some cuts the film was cleared by the censor board in 2001 but due to some problems faced by the producer, it was only screened at a few film festivals.
5) Gulabi Aaina/ Pink Mirror (2003)
Pink Mirror directed by Sridhar Rangayan remains India’s first ever film to comprehensively focus on Indian transexuals. Besides being critically acclaimed, the film was screened at a numerous festivals globally and also won awards. However, it was declared as ‘vulgar and offensive’ by the censor board in India.
6) Hawa Aaane Dey (2004)
Directed by Partho Sen-Gupta, the film centered around the growing tension between India and Pakistan. The censor board reportedly ordered a few sound and piture cuts in the film reducing the duration of it to about 20 minutes.
However, the filmmaker was not convinced and hence it never was released. Apart from winning several awards, this Indo-French collaboration shot in the suburbs of Mumbai, was screened at Berlin Film Festival.
7) Dazed in Doon (2010)
Directed Ashvin Kumar was an alumni of The Doon School and hence was invited to shoot the film within the premises. Little did he know that the school authorities would object and suppress the distribution of the film on the grounds that it shows bullying, ragging and smoking.
8) Gandu (2010)
Directed by Qaushiq Mukherjee, the Bengali, black and white movie may have got banned from its theatrical release but was later unofficially released on YouTube. The censor board had reportedly raised objection over the language and some sexual scenes.
(Feature Image Source: YouTube)
