A Mumbai based professor has filed a P.I.L demanding that Aamir Khan’s latest movie Ghajini be recertified as “A” – adults only for Indian movies. [DNA]

Her reasoning? Too much violence.

Naitthani has said in her petition that she saw Ghajini on December 28. The overdose of violence and blood spill made her cringe. “It was more shocking to see that children, right from the age of three to 15 years, in the theatre, watching the film,” she has stated.

Now I’ve not had the opportunity to watch this movie yet, so I’ll go with the details from the DNA story.

The film opens with Aamir Khan killing a man with a pipe attached to a tap. Blood drips down the nozzle, jutting out from the man’s stomach.
The heroine is stabbed in the back, then has her head smashed with an iron rod fitted with an iron plank, which the villain swings like a golf club.
Aamir kills a bad guy by breaking his neck. The man is shown lying on the ground, with his head twisted grotesquely.

Strictly based on this, I would agree with the professor. The film needs to be certified as “for adults”. Don’t get me wrong, I’m for certification of the movie, not for censorship. Regardless of the label, it is up to the parents to decide if their children should watch it or not.

The movie’s director was quoted as saying:

“I would take a child from my family to watch Ghajini. Kids today are much more exposed to violence through WWF and Discovery Channel.

I can understand the director’s hesitation with certifying the movie as “adults only” resulting in loss of revenue from a large demographic. But the “kids are exposed to other violence” arguments comes across as – “everyone else is selling drugs to kids, so why can’t I?” – intellectually dishonest variety.

He goes on to state:

In fact, we have cut out some violent scenes from the original version in the Hindi remake. Also, one needs to note that there are no sex scenes, or women unnecessarily exposing, in the film.”

This brings an interesting aspect of movie certification in India. Untold amounts of violence and gore gets certified as universally acceptable but women in skimpy clothing and words like “condom” earn the movie an “adults only” certification or even worse, get censored. Priorities, I tell you.

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