Which Movies are banned in India and why?

Nowadays mostly people have OTT subscriptions and censor board can’t interfere into that movies. But what about the movies that is released in cinema. And because of various reasons censor board cut some scenes that would be intolerable for audiences. And even they or sometimes government banned some movies in India.

I’m going to discuss about some of Bollywood movies that are banned in India. And also I’ll specify the reason of its ban.

Movies that are banned in India

Kama Sutra – A Tale Of Love (1996)- Banned movies list of India

Mita Nair directed ‘Kama Sutra – A Tale Of Love’ is a perfect historical romantic movie. But somehow for its adultness, it is ban in India.

Tara is a princess whose best friend is Maya who is also her maidservant. They grow together by spending a memorable childhood.

But, when they start their journey as adult, some complexities enter between them. And that is, when Maya tries to seduce Tara’s would be husband, Prince Raj Singh.

The first segment of the film is based an Urdu Indian writer, Wajida Tabassum written a short story ‘Utran’. The casts includes in this film are; Rekha, Indira Varma, Ramon Tikaram, and Naveen Andrews.

Although, this film is full of sexual and erotic content, this film has nominated for and won various awards at that time of 90s.

According to our narrow minded Indian society, ‘Se* relevant topics’ is an improper topics to have a conversation on. Somewhere, people do believe that discussing  on any sexual matter is against our culture.

So because of its storyline and some scenes, it got completely ban in India.

Urf Professor (2000)

In the direction of talented director Pankaj Advani, ‘URF Professor’ is one of the brave experimental project of the Bollywood industry.

It’s a thriller movie. This movie has the touches of gangsters, thief, con-girl (A woman who tricks people to get their money), and many more suspicious characters.

This film features Sharman Joshi, Antara Mali, Manoj Pahwa, Yashpal Sharma, Hemant Pandey, Rasymon Singh and Shri Vallabh Vyas.

This film is ban in India by the censor board, because this film is entirely filled with vulgar scenes and highly raw languages.

Director Pankaj tried to make a perfect a highly effective crime thriller. And therefore, he include all these elements in the film.

Being banned by the censor, this film never released, but reaches to audience by several internet platforms.

The Pink Mirror (2003)- Banned movies of India

The next treasure that is also hide from the audience, by the censor board of Indian Film Industry is ‘The Pink Mirror’.

This amazing film is directed and written by Sridhar Rangayan. And Saagar Gupta is the producer of the film. And Edwin Fernandes, Ramesh Menon, Deepak Sonavane, Rufy Baqal, Rishi Raj is in the key roles. 

This film recognized as the first Indian Film to light up the subject of ‘Transsexuals, Gays and all the LGBT community’.

It is the story of two transsexuals and a gay teenager who are determine to seduce a handsome man.

As we know that, talking about LGBT community is still a improper and kind of offensive in our society. So this is the biggest reason of its ban.

This film is banned by Indian Censor Board. The Boards told the reason of behind banning this is ‘being so much vulgar and offensive film’.

Although it is still banned, but it is displayed in several film festivals. The film has been shown not only in the Indian film festivals, but also showed to the foreign countries (more than 70 international Film Festivals).

India’s foremost gay activist Ashok Row Kavi is also appreciates the movie. It is a remarkable support to the LGBT community and expression of their perspective to life.

Paanch (2003)

The ‘crime thriller specialist director’, Anurag Kashyap directed and wrote ‘Paanch’. This is also a crime thriller and I think you have already imagined that ‘How brilliant this crime thriller is’ that Indian Censor Board has to ban it.

This film features Kay Kay Menon, Aditya Srivastava, Vijay Maurya, Joy Fernandes, Tejaswini Kolhapure. This film is a story of five friends who is wasting their youth. This group has one female member, who is an escort.

This film has all that element that a crime thriller should have. It includes kidnapping, drugs, murder, blackmails and also bad languages, just like any other’s Kashyap movies.

But the difference in this film and other regular crime thriller is the detailing and depth of the film in its every factor. For this violence in the film, the Central Board of Film Certification ban this film.  

Although after many cuts, it was about the release but it couldn’t. However, you can watch this through any torrent websites.

Although, it is so offensive film according to our Indian Central Board, but this film was screened in many film festivals for long time.

Black Friday (2004)

This wonderful work of art is also created by Anurag Kashyap. This film is about the Bombay bomb-blasting in 1993 and based on a book written by Hussain Zaidi, called ‘Black Friday: The True Story of the Bombay Bomb Blasts’.

Indian movies that took inspiration of novels you don’t know about.

At first, this film wrote as a television series for a TV news channel. The producer of the film, Arindam Mitra reached Anurag Kashyap to this. But for various reasons, at last, it presented as a movie.

After crossing a long way before its release, it released on 9^th February 2007.

At first, this film was screened at 2004 Locarno international Film Festival on 13^th August 2004.

But unfortunately a group of accused person of that 1993 bomb-blasting filed a case. Therefore, the release of the film, postponed by the Bombay High Court.

And after so many efforts, the film got release and screened at numerous Film Festivals.

Parzania (2005)- Banned movies in India

This is a true incident based film, directed by Rahul Dholakia. Basically, this film is based on a Parsi boy, Parzaan Pithawala (Azhar Mody, the real-life  character) who was missing during the communal riots in Gujarat in 2002.

The film showcased the whole journey of Parzaan’s parents of finding him.

Parzan’s character is perfectly played by actor Parzan Dastur (That time, he was 14 years old).

And beside him, Naseeruddin Shah and Sarika also added the magic in the entire movie with their performance.

This film was premiered in many film festivals in 2005 but got theoretical release on 26^th January 2007. Although this film got the approval from the Indian Censor Board, nevertheless all the Gujrati cinema owners denied to display this movie.

And due to this, the other theater owners also refused to screen this movie. So, all this causes the film to became one of the ‘Banned movies’ in India.

Inshallah, Football (2010)

Ashvin kumar directed ‘Inshallah, Football’ is not a 2.5 or 3 hours long movie. It’s an short documentary of 80 minutes.

This film is not based on a true event, rather, story took inspiration from a true incident.

This movie focused on a young boy of Kashmir, named Basharat Baba aka ‘Basha’.

Basha is a 18 year old boy and so much passionate about football. His father is a member of the training camps in Pakistan, since 1990 (during the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from Kashmir).

But the main complications starts, when Basha’s passport disapproved by the Government of India. But, Basha struggled to get into a prominent football team.

Because of the sensitive topic of “Kashmiri pandits exodus”, causes this film to ban in India.

Water (2005)

Deepa Mehta directed movie “water” is sensitive subject, about ‘Lives of Widows’. The story is written by Deepa Mehta.

This film’s screenplay was handled by Anurag Kashyap.

Water is the third installment of Deepa Mehta’s ‘Elements Trilogy’. The first and second parts of it are ‘Fire’ (1996) & Earth’  (1998).

The film showcased the condition of widows around 1940 at several ashrams.

In 1940, the lives of widows were tragic and miserable by deceptive rituals, narrow-mindedness, disrespect and negligence.

Although, we agree that the behavior with widows was wrongful in those days, but it is also true that somewhere we believe and accept it as a part of our Indian culture.

Protesters crossed every possible limits to stop the making of the film. They destroyed film sets and attack the cast and crew of the movie. And even threaten the director Deepa Mehta.

But it was Deepa Mehta’s courageous step, which made this film possible to complete. But unfortunately, this was not so fruitful as it got ban in India.

So this is the list of Banned movies in India. I hope you definitely found something likely content or information from this article.

To conclude this, we can say that, some stories is present through movies and some movies made stories itself. And Every banned movies made its own history.

Our country tries to prevent these by giving so many excuses. Sometimes either for religion, caste, politics and sometimes for the sake of Indian culture.

Movies that showcased truth without any hesitation and fear

Have any new thoughts about the above movies? don’t forget to comment below.