Amol Palekar objects to tax exemption for 'propaganda films' like 'The Kashmir Files’ and ‘The Kerala Story’

Amol Palekar objects to tax exemption for The Kashmir Files and The Kerala Story. Pic- (Amol`s Instagram)

On Monday, June 26, veteran actor and filmmaker Amol Palekar responded angrily to various states' tax exemptions for films such as The Kashmir Files (2022) and The Kerala Story (2023). He also referred to these films as "propaganda films."

Amol Palekar made these remarks at the Samajik Salokha Parishad in Kolhapur, Maharashtra, to commemorate the birth anniversary of the renowned king and social reformer, Shahu Maharaj. He said that goons used to harass the aam junta, but that the government and politics now favour masked crowds. He also claimed that minorities had been terrorised in recent decades.

Amol Palekar expressed outrage that troll armies harass those who hold opposing views and that 'propaganda' films such as The Kashmir Files and The Kerala Story are now tax-free in India.

The Kashmir files tells the story of the early stages of the anti-India revolt that has roiled Indian-administered Kashmir for three decades and continues to this day. It promises to depict the tale of the Pandits, a small Hindu minority among the mostly Muslim people of Kashmir.

Whereas, the Kerala Story's plot revolves around a group of Kerala women who are forced to convert to Islam and join the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

For the unversed, it is not the first time when Amol Palekar has caused controversy by stating his mind. In February 2019, he raised concerns about the purported cancellation of two renowned artists' retrospectives at Mumbai's National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA). It caused quite a stir. He noticed a month ago that politicians and leaders do not encounter censorship when giving speeches, but when he tries to convey the same in films, the sequences are met with resistance. In April 2017, he questioned censorship policies once more and petitioned the Supreme Court for a rewrite of the Cinematograph Act.

Amol Palekar has recently been seen working on back-to-back web projects. In Raj-DK's web series Farzi, he played Shahid Kapoor's grandfather, and in Manoj Bajpayee's Gulmohar, he played Sharmila Tagore's brother-in-law.