The Kashmir Files: Director says Bollywood's silence doesn't matter, planning series

Reacting to the silence of a normally vocal section of Bollywood on The Kashmir Files, the film's director, Vivek Agnihotri, said: "It is not important." The filmmaker is also toying with the idea of making a web series on the same subject as he has accumulated a lot of material during his four years of research for The Kashmir Files.

New Delhi: Reacting to the silence of a normally vocal section of Bollywood on The Kashmir Files, the film's director, Vivek Agnihotri, said: "It is not important." The filmmaker, who researched for four years on the film, said that there is so much material that he can produce a series on the subject.

Holding back no punches, Agnihotri said: "India is changing. Old established orders are coming down and collapsing. In the movie, too, we refer to the establishment. There is a dialogue by Pallavi Joshi's character, who says, "Hukumat kisiki bhi ho, system to hamara hai (Whosoever be at the helm, the system is ours)."

He then added: "But this is now coming to an end as the reality and truth comes out. 'The Kashmir Files' is a true account. The movie is about real people and their tragedy. It is not about Bollywood. People are talking."

Anupam Kher, who plays Pushkar Nath Pandit, whose family was a victim of the violence unleashed by the militants in 1989, in The Kashmir Files, said: "It is not about Bollywood, it is about real stories. Comment or no comment doesn't matter."

But there have been notable exceptions. Celebrities such as Kangana Ranaut have criticised Bollywood for its silence over The Kashmir Files. On Sunday, she took to her Instagram and wrote: "Please notice the pin-drop silence in the film industry about #thekashmirfiles. Not just content, even its business is exemplary ... investment and profit proportion might be such a case study that it will be the most successful and profitable film of the year."

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Director Madhur Bhandarkar reacted to the film with four telling words: "The power of cinema." Akshay Kumar tweeted: "Hearing absolutely incredible things about your performance in 'The Kashmir Files'." The reference was to Kher's interpretation of his tragic character.

He along with the cast and producer of the movie was in the national capital to interact with the media on the movie. During the presser, Agnihotri said that it took him and his team four years to research and make the movie, and the Global Kashmiri Pandit Diaspora (GKPD) helped him find and locate the Kashmiri Pandits, who were the direct victims of the violence in Kashmir.

Agnihotri said, "We have so much material that we can produce a series. All accounts are heart-wrenching ones. These are human stories... We are thinking about it... We will come out with a series."

"The immense response that we got from the community was tremendous. These are all true accounts. Nobody knew about these. When we began with the thought, no one believed that this had happened with Kashmiri Hindus."

(With agency inputs)