Bollywood Recap 2017: Padmavati, Nepotism and Azaan - all the brouhaha over controversies

Bollywood has been in the headlines for enough controversies in 2017. From Kangana Ranaut tagging Karan Johar as the flagbearer of nepotism to protest against Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Padmavati and the release date being pushed to uncertainty, the Hindi film industry was at the tip of the knife this year. Have a look.

Protest against Padmavati

Sanjay Leela Bhansali's period drama Padmavati irked the Karni Sena, an organisation of the Rajput community, who protested against the film for allegedly having a dream lovemaking scene between Rani Padmini and Alauddin Khilji and distorting historical facts. The sets of the film were vandalised and even Bhansali was slapped during the events.

While Bhansali denied having such scenes in a statement strongly rejecting the charges of distorting historical facts about the mythological Rajput queen, played by Deepika Padukone in the film.

Bhansali later screened the film for a few mediapersons before the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) cleared it which further added fuel to the fire. The film's scheduled release date of December 1 was also deferred until further notice.

The controversy turned ugly when members of Karni Sena issued a Rs 10 lakh bounty on Deepika Padukone's head and Sanjay Leela Bhansali.

Nepotism row

Kangana Ranaut sparked a nationwide debate about the prevalence of nepotism when she called Karan Johar the flagbearer of nepotism on his own chat show Koffee with Karan season 5. While it seemed like the debate would die down in the show itself, it snowballed into a bigger controversy when people started taking notice of it. At the IIFA Awards event, Karan Johar and other actors like Saif Ali Khan and Varun Dhawan were seen poking fun at Kangana who chanted nepotism rocks on stage. They, however, later apologised for their remarks after attracting widespread criticism.

Sonu Nigam's Azaan row

Sonu Nigam lashed out at forced religiousness on Twitter after being woken up by the azaan one morning. "God bless everyone. I'm not a Muslim and I have to be woken up by the azaan in the morning. When will this forced religiousness end in India?" he tweeted. After all the noise, Sonu even shaved off his head in response to a Muslim cleric who announced a bounty of Rs 10 lakh to have his head shaved.

Mira Rajput's puppy comment on Women's Day

Shahid Kapoor's wife Mira Rajput received widespread criticism after she commented on feminism and working women. "I wouldn't want to spend one hour a day with my child and rush off to work. Why did I have her (Misha)? She is not a puppy, you know. I want to be there for her as a mother," she had said at the event.

Ranbir Kapoor and Mahira Khan smoking picture

Ranbir and Mahira attracted a lot of attention when they attended the Global Teacher Prize gala in Dubai earlier this year. Later, one of their pictures surfaced online wherein they were seen smoking cigarettes on the streets of New York City. While Mahira was shamed for her act, Ranbir came to her rescue along with Pakistani artistes and issued a statement supporting the actress. Mahira made Bollywood debut with Raees this year.

Akshay Kumar's national award, Mallika Dua 'Bajata Hoon' row

Akshay Kumar winning the National Film Award for Best Actor for Rustom raised many eyebrows as it was felt the decision was unfair. The actor was caught again in controversy when Mallika Dua's father and renowned journalist Vinod Dua lashed out at him for making a comment on his daughter "Mallika ji aap bell bajao, mai aapko bajata hoon" on the sets of The Great Indian Laughter Challenge show.

Fatima Sana Shaikh trolled for swimsuit

Dangal and Thugs Of Hindostan actress Fatima Sana Shaikh was trolled for wearing a swimsuit at a beach during the month of Ramzan. She received a lot of flak for posting the photograph on her social media page.

Nawazuddin Siddiqui's memoir

Nawazuddin Siddiqui's memoir An Ordinary Life made a lot of noise when a few excerpts from the biography landed on the internet. The excerpts elaborated his past relationships, one-night stands and extramarital affairs that involved his Miss Lovely co-star Niharika Singh and first girlfriend
Sunita Rajwar.

Nawazuddin, who came under close scrutiny for revealing explicit details of his private life, apologised on October 30 for hurting sentiments with his memoir and announced on Twitter that he was withdrawing his book.

His biography had been made available in stores for the general public on October 25.

IFFI's non-screenings of S Durga and Nude

Malayalam film S Durga and Marathi film Nude were dropped from the Indian Panorama section of the IFFI which were initially shortlisted by the jury. Jury members like filmmaker Sujoy Ghosh, scriptwriter Apurva Asrani and others resigned in protest.

Rishi Kapoor Muft ki daru

Veteran actor Rishi Kapoor rounded off the year by rebuking invited journalists at a book launch event in Delhi by saying "Muft ki daru..." The report states that as Rishi Kapoor stepped out of the washroom adjacent to the venue of the book release, he asked the journalists: "aap log kaun hain". And later said that they were there only for the freebies.