Kerala HC intervenes; Sanal Kumar Sasidharan's Sxxx Durga to be screened at IFFI

After whipping up quite a lot of controversy, Sanal Kumar Sasidharan's directorial venture Sxxx Durga or S Durga (named earlier as Sexy Durga) has finally won the legal battle and will be screened at the 48th International Film Festival of India (IFFI).

The Kerala High Court has reportedly ruled in favour of the director who challeged the decision of the Information and Broadcasting Ministry that removed the film from the final list of films selected for Indian Panorama category. 

In the petition, Sanal Kumar had argued that the decision of the ministry and the organisers of the IFFI to drop his film from the list was  "illegal, arbitrary and unjust".

 "I usually dont celebrate victories. But this I cant stay away. This is the victory of cinema. This is the victory of our democracy. This is the victory of those people from jury who sacrificed. Cheers India! [sic]," Sanal posted on Facebook after the court order. 

The movie will be exhibited in the Indian Panorama section of the festival. Three members of the jury that selected the films for the section had quit their post protesting the exclusion of the films - Sxxx Durga and Nude. Filmmaker Sujoy Ghosh had resigned as the head of the jury of IFFI's Indian Panorama section in mid November to register his protest. Gyan Correa and Apurva Asrani followed suit. 

Sxxx Durga is the first Indian movie to win the Tiger Award at International Film Festival Rotterdam.

Read more: Celebs support Sexy Durga

Recently,  the film had a grand Kerala premiere at Aries Plex SL Cinemas in Thiruvananthapuram on November 15. After being promoted by many celebrities, the movie garnered positive response from the audience.

More about Sxxx Durga

The movie narrates the story of a north Indian girl named Durga and a Keralite named Kabeer, who run away on a midnight. Two small-time gangsters offer them help to catch a train to shift to a remote place. Certain unfortunate incidents that happen during that night form the crux of the movie.

The movie was apparently shot without any solid screenplay or a written story. Rajshri Deshpande and Kannan Nayar play main characters in the Malayalam movie which is said to expose the predominantly patriarchal society of Kerala.