Nanak Shah Fakir row: Supreme Court rejects SGPC plea on film ban

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stop screening of the national award winning movie Nanak Shah Fakir, prima facie rejecting a plea by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) that a movie on Guru Nanak was violative of the community’s right to worship and was against a religious edict that no human being would ever portray any of the gurus or their families.

Senior advocate PS Patwalia, appearing for the SGPC, told a three-judge bench that the movie was against a 2003 resolution passed by the SGPC that no living human being would ever portray the gurus. “This movie shows Guru Nanak with his father, mother. He later marries…,” he charged.

The producer of the movie on the other hand claimed through senior advocate Rupinder Singh Suri that he had made the changes SGPC wanted. “Whatever can be done, we have,” he said, blaming an “afterthought” by the SGPC for its about-turn.


Suri claimed that a SGPC sub-committee had suggested the changes and these were carried out. The producer claimed the movie had been released in three countries and was about to be released in others.

“It has been widely hailed,” Suri said. It had also won a national award for national integration. The SGPC has challenged the CBFC certification granted to the movie after failing to stop the release of the movie in an earlier round.