While the world was gathering to watch new films in Cannes a few weeks back, Indian filmmaker Honey Trehan was using the occasion to host a private screening of a film that he fears may never see a commercial release. At least not in a form that he approves of.
Punjab ’95, starring singer-actor Diljit Dosanjh, has still not been cleared for Indian release since being submitted to India’s Central Board of Film Classification (CBFC) in December 2022.
In September 2023, the film was selected for the Gala Presentations section of the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), but withdrew at the last minute. Trehan alleges that this was due to political pressure placed on the producers of the film and that they’ve also had to turn down invitations from several other international film festivals.
“There’s pressure on my producers to write off the film, coming from government officials, from central government officials,” says Trehan, sitting down with Deadline in Cannes to talk about the film.
“But my entire film is based on the observations and decisions of the Indian courts, as well as the people who testified in those courts. So if my film is judged as incorrect, that implies the Constitution of India is also incorrect, and of course nobody wants to make that implication.”
Directed and co-written by Trehan, Punjab ‘95 tells the story of activist Jaswant Singh Khalra, who discovered evidence of the abduction, murder and cremation of more than 25,000 Sikhs by the police during the insurgency period in the Indian state of Punjab from 1984 to 1995.
Khalra campaigned to bring attention to the deaths in India and the Canadian parliament, after which Canada offered him political asylum. But he chose to return to India where he disappeared after being abducted from his home in Amritsar in September 1995. His body was never recovered but six police officers were later sentenced to life imprisonment for his murder.
Dosanjh, now one of the Punjabi music industry’s biggest stars, plays Khalra, while Arjun Rampal plays a Central Board of Investigation (CBI) officer sent to Punjab from Delhi to investigate the case. The film was produced by Ronnie Screwvala’s RSVP Movies and MacGuffin Pictures, the production company founded by Trehan and Abhishek Chaubey.
Trehan explains that the CBFC took six months to respond when the film was first submitted in December 2022, then ordered 21 cuts and also demanded that the name of the film be changed from Ghallughara – a Punjabi word that refers to historical massacres of the Sikh people.
“I was opposed to those cuts because they were ridiculous – things like changing the name of the protagonist, which makes no sense because it’s a biopic,” Trehan says. “So we decided to fight in the High Court.”
Between 1952 and 2021, India had a body that enabled filmmakers to appeal decisions of the CBFC – the Film Certification Appellate Tribunal (FCAT) – but it was abolished four years ago, which means that filmmakers now have no option but to engage a lawyer and petition the High Court.
The producers of Punjab ’95 did exactly that in May 2023, after which there was an attempt to reach an out of court settlement, all of which was still dragging on when the TIFF invitation came. Trehan says the producers were told the film would receive a censor certificate if they agreed to the 21 cuts, removed the the case from the High Court and also removed the film from TIFF. “I was heartbroken, but said let’s do it, let’s make those changes, because we really couldn’t see any other way to get the film released.”
After making the cuts, the film was re-submitted to the CBFC and, as per the body’s own rules, viewed by a separate committee. However, Trehan says the board then demanded further rounds of cuts, which would have taken the total number to more than 120. After agreeing to some of these additional cuts, Trehan says he eventually reached his limit and gave up on ever receiving a censor certificate for a release in India.
“They wanted us to remove the name of the protagonist and to remove the Indian flag. They didn’t want us to mention the 25,000 extra judicial killings or portray the Punjab police in a negative light. They also asked us to make this a work of fiction. But all these things are a matter of public record, so it doesn’t make any sense to remove them from the film,” Trehan says.
Deadline has reached out to both RSVP Movies and the Central Board of Film Certification for a comment but not received a reply. TIFF confirmed that it selected the film as a Gala Presentation in 2023, but that the producers withdrew it “due to a matter before the courts in India”.
Speaking to Deadline off the record, some Indian industry execs who deal regularly with the CBFC say the board may have been concerned that the film could incite violence within the Sikh community, as well as have a negative impact on India’s relations with other countries.
Relations between India and Canada have been at all-time low since 2023 when former Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau alleged that Indian agents were involved in the killing of Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar, leader of a Sikh separatist movement. Trehan’s film does not broach the topic of Sikh separatism, but does feature scenes set in the Canadian parliament.
Punjab ’95 is one of a growing number of Indian films that have struggled to get certified for theatrical release in India in recent years. Sandhya Suri’s Santosh, about a female police officer encountering police corruption, has not been released since its premiere in Cannes Un Certain Regard in 2024. After the CBFC demanded extensive cuts, the producers decided to forego an Indian release rather than face a lengthy appeals process.
Other titles that remain unreleased include Arun Karthick’s Nasir, which premiered at Rotterdam in 2020; and Suman Ghosh’s Aadhaar, about a man volunteering to be the first person in his village to get an ID card, which premiered at Busan in 2019. The latter film was cleared by the CBFC but was unable to release after objections from the government body that issues ID cards, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
After giving up on an Indian release, Trehan has also run into a roadblock with getting Punjab ‘95 released internationally. On Screwvala’s suggestion, he found a company to acquire the film’s international rights, Vancouver-based White Hill Studios, but on the condition that the producers could pull the film from international release if there was too much political pressure.
Dosanjh, who has a large following in the UK and Canada, announced in his Instagram Stories in mid-January that an international release had been scheduled for February 7, 2025. But Trehan later announced that the release was cancelled “due to circumstances beyond our control”.
For now, private screenings at festivals are the best Trehan can hope for. “We had an almost full house. It was overwhelming to see how everyone responded,” Trehan says as he left Cannes. He is also continuing his work as a filmmaker, recently wrapping a sequel to Rat Akeli Hai for Netflix.
Trehan says he fears that a cut version of the film will eventually be released, as it would be too awkward for the government to simply bury it, especially with the attention it’s gaining from Dosanjh’s fan base. Both Dosanjh and Trehan have publicly stated that they will remove their names from the film if a cut version is released.
Dosanjh sent a WhatsApp message to Deadline via Trehan: “Me and Honey, director and writer of Punjab ’95, stand together for our film on this issue. Therefore we have decided that if there are any cuts made to the film, we will remove our names from the credits. That is the least we can do to stand by our film and our conscience.”
The post Indian Filmmaker Honey Trehan On His Two-Year Censorship Battle Over Diljit Dosanjh-Starrer ‘Punjab ‘95’ appeared first on Deadline.
