The Kashmir Files row: Sudipto Sen says he found Nadav Lapid’s remark ‘unethical’, reveals why film was rejected at IFFI

Filmmaker Sudipto Sen has opened up about Israeli filmmaker Nadav Lapid’s remark on The Kashmir Files at the 53rd International Film Festival of India (IFFI).

In a new interview, Sudipto said that he felt fellow juror Nadav’s comment were ‘unethical’. As per the report, Sudipto added that The Kashmir Files was one of the 17 films, which were “rejected” from being awarded at the film festival. He added that ‘the film did not fit in the artistic criteria we had’.

Nadav, who served as the chairperson of IFFI’s international jury, had termed Vivek Agnihotri’s The Kashmir Files a ‘vulgar and propaganda’ movie in his speech at the award ceremony during the closing night of the nine-day film festival in Goa.

The Kashmir Files portrays the exodus of Kashmiri Hindus from Kashmir in the 1990s. The film is one of the most commercially successful Hindi films of the year. It featured Anupam Kher, Darshan Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty, and Pallavi Joshi among others.

Speaking with news agency ANI, Sudipto has now said, “As a practice, etiquette and ethic, the jury board is supposed to talk about films that are awarded. We don’t talk about films that are not awarded.

The jury board has nothing to do with someone bringing out a rejected film for discussion in a public forum. If one of us (members) randomly goes to talk about a film which wasn’t even awarded at some platform, I would find it unethical.”

He also explained how the films are shortlisted for the award, “We received 22 films, from which we were supposed to give out 6 awards – Best film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Female Actor, Special Jury Award for aesthetics and artistic values and Best Debut Director Award.

We saw each of the 22 films, and collectively analyzed each of them based on criteria like camera work, editing, sound, storytelling, acting etc. We shortlisted 5 films to be awarded. The judgement was collectively agreed upon by all jury members on the basis of the artistic values and format of the film festival.”

Earlier, speaking with news agency PTI, Sudipto had said that Nadav’s remarks about The Kashmir Files were his personal opinion. Sudipto had said, “As a board member, I stand by that we didn’t award The Kashmir Files. We only awarded five films. This decision was unanimous. And we gave an official presentation to the NFDC and the festival authority.”

He had added, “After that jury board’s work is done. Now after that if somebody goes in public and pick up one particular film and say something which is not expected, then that is his personal feeling. It has nothing to do with the jury board.”