Thiruvananthapuram, December 13 – The Indian films to be screened at the film festivals should be exempted from censor restrictions as these festivals are forums for exchange of ideas and information, said Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam, directors of ”Dreaming Lhasa”, the first internationally recognised Tibetan feature film.
”Foreign films which are shown at the festivals are exempted from any censor restriction. There is no reason why the same should not apply to Indian films,” said the directors who had to wait long for a censor certificate for their film to be shown at the festival.
The laws for issuing censor certificates to Indian films before being screened at the film festivals in the country should be revised, they told reporters here.
Eventhough ”Dreaming Lhasa” was screened at several international film festivals, the Censor Board had delayed in giving a certificate.
Sarin said there was no idea why the delay had come in getting the certificate as there was nothing controversial about the film.
”The issues already exist and these have been highlighted in various platforms, There is nothing to provoke the Chinese also,” she said.
She indirectly that said the Chinese had always put pressure on the countries highlighted the Tibetan issue.
Noting that the film in a ”human film rather than a political one”, Sonam said ”it explores the hopes and aspirations of Tibetans who have been struggling to come to terms with the questions and confusions of five decades of living in exile.” When asked about the crew from different countries who had worked in the film, Sarin said it was a pooling of different people.
”The film does not have a home, like a film of homelessness.
After all the film deals with the people in exile”, she said.
Sonam, a Tibetan himself, on the idealogy of the film, said that the film was born from inside. ”I was born in India but I want to go back to Tibet. The younger generation of the refugees have never seen their homeland. Even when we say that we are Indians, the question of who we are and what we are remains unanswered. Are we Tibetans or Indians? This question is asked by each and every Tibetan who lives in this country”, he said.
