Producers Guild president Mukesh Bhatt and Dharma Productions’ Apoorva Mehta met Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday to demand security for theaters that would screen the movie, Aye Dil Hai Mushkil, starring Pakistani star Fawad Khan.
The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) has said that it will not let the theaters in Maharashtra to screen the movie, which also also features Ranbir Kapoor, Aishwarya Rai and Anushka Sharma. The film has hit a hurdle with many single screen theaters refusing to screen it.
The Home Minister is learnt to have assured the Producers Guild of providing security to the multiplexes and theaters that would screen the movie. “We are entertainers. We are interested in working with artistes, and not whether they belong to Pakistan, China or Africa,” Mr. Bhatt told the media after meeting the Minister.
Asked if they didn’t have full faith in the Mumbai Police, he said: “I will give them 200 per cent marks to Mumbai police. But the film isn’t releasing just in Mumbai. We want to safeguard ourselves, so who better than the Home Minister? It is his domain.”
“We want to celebrate Diwali. We want to get entertained with a good family entertainer film. I feel that the state is definitely going to give me support and protection against people who want to create violence for no reason. People are free to see the movie. India is a free country, but at least you should not stop people and then stop people violently. That is something I feel that the government of today should have zero tolerance towards, violence.”
Ae Dil Hai Mushkil has become the first target of those who are against inclusion of Pakistani artistes in Indian films after the September 18 Uri attack that killed 19 Indian soldiers in Jammu and Kashmir. The attack was followed by surgical attacks by India across the LoC.
