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Tuesday, May 26, 2009
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National Anthem distorted: court

Legal Correspondent

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court, while declining to entertain a writ petition by director Ram Gopal Verma challenging the refusal by the Central Board of Film Certification to certify his film ‘Rann’ for allegedly distorting the national anthem, has asked him to approach the Film Certification Appellate Tribunal.

A vacation Bench, consisting of Justices V.S. Sirpurkar and R.M. Lodha, on Monday dismissed the petition as withdrawn and asked the tribunal to decide on the matter in a month.

Justice Sirpurkar told senior counsel Arun Jaitley: “We have read it. It [the national anthem] has been distorted, and it gives a totally negative sense. It seems every line of the national anthem has been filmed wrong. Nobody has any right to tinker with the national anthem. You go to the tribunal.”

In his petition, Mr. Verma said: “This song is part of a promotional film.”

It raised important questions of law: whether the impugned, May 8 order of the board took a constricted and perverse ground of alleged distortion of the national anthem in the petitioner’s promo/song, more so when flags of the Indian National Congress, the Trinamool Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party are tricolour, and could they be said to be a distortion of the national flag? Could a song be composed respectfully with the words of the national song, ‘Vande Maa Taram’ or the national anthem? Could there be a flag with the same colours as the national flag, but having other symbols in place of the Ashoka Chakra at the centre? Could a citizen be prohibited from using the national symbol/anthem/song for artistic expression respectfully?

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