The blockbuster Bollywood action-thriller Dhurandhar, which is dominating the Indian box office, is not being released in Singapore and the Gulf — places with large Indian populations — as per information available.
There is no word on whether the film’s release in Singapore is only delayed or cancelled altogether. The film has reportedly been “banned” in the Gulf (short for Gulf Co-operation Council), where the United Arab Emirates is a significant market for Indian cinema.
In Singapore, an e-mail sent by Golden Village Multiplex Pte Ltd reveals that the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) — the national body for a classification system for films, television programmes, and video games — has not yet given a “final” rating for Dhurandhar, leading to the delay in release.
“Final IMDA rating for Dhurandhar (Hindi) is still pending and may be delayed. Because of this, we are currently unable to provide a firm update on the release or confirm showtimes,” said the e-mail from Golden Village Multiplex. “Once the classification is finalized, we will update the listing on our website and share the latest details on our social media platforms,” it added.
As a result, many moviegoers in Singapore who cannot wait to watch the Bollywood blockbuster are crossing the border and going to Malaysia this weekend to watch Dhurandhar in Johor Bahru, capital city of the Malaysian state of Johor.
The creative director of an Indian-led company in Singapore laments that her passport has been submitted for a visa stamping and she cannot go with her friends’ group to Johor Bahru this weekend to watch the movie. “Hope to receive the passport this week and then catching the movie next weekend may be possible,” she told Connected to India.
No such luck for Indian viewers in the Gulf; they have to wait for the film’s OTT release. A December 12 report by The National, an Abu Dhabi-headquartered media brand, said: “Bollywood blockbuster Dhurandhar will not be released in Gulf cinemas, industry insiders have said. Distributors in the region have given no reason for the ban, but Indian media reports claim it is over the film’s divisive portrayal of Pakistan. The Gulf is one of the most lucrative markets for Bollywood films, thanks to its large South Asian diaspora.”
The espionage thriller — its title means “one with expert knowledge” and it stars Bollywood A-lister Ranveer Singh in the title role — dives headlong into the decades-long India-Pakistan hostilities, which have sometimes been expressed as open war and more often as relentless terrorist attacks upon Indian citizens and assets by Pakistani or Pakistan-sponsored terrorists.
Opening with the December 1999 hijack of Indian Airlines flight 814 (IC 814) by Pakistani terrorists of the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen group, and the forced diversion of the aircraft to Kandahar, Afghanistan, the film then moves to the December 2001 attack on the Indian Parliament by Pakistani terrorists.
These two major attacks on India prompt the Indian intelligence apparatus to insert someone into the Pakistani mafia-politician nexus in order to gather information as an insider.
This insider character is “Dhurandhar”, and the aim is long-term Indian intelligence dominance in Pakistani politics.
However, the film also does not shy away from showing Indian intelligence failure. The spy Hamza (played by Ranveer Singh) gains crucial information about the Pakistani ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence) plans to launch a major terrorist attack on an Indian city. He passes the information to India, but lapses on the Indian side result in 26/11 — the unthinkable three-day siege by Pakistani terrorists on Mumbai, the financial capital of India, starting on 26 November 2008.
A dialogue in Dhurandhar, uttered by ISI chief Major Iqbal (played by Arjun Rampal), references the line widely attributed to the military-terrorist strategy of Pakistan: “Bleed India with a thousand cuts.”
The National report said that “several major Bollywood films” with the India-Pakistan conflict theme had been “blocked regionally” in the Gulf.
It said: “Last year, Hrithik Roshan and Deepika Padukone’s Fighter, based on a rescue operation in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, was not released in UAE cinemas. That same year, Article 370, also set in Kashmir and with a script by Dhurandhar director Dhar, was not cleared for release.”
