Vivek Agnihotri sends legal notice to Mamata Banerjee over comments against The Kashmir Files

Filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri has sent a legal notice to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee over comments made by the leader against him and his film The Kashmir Files recently. This comes a day after the CM banned the screening of The Kerala Story in the state.

On Monday, during her address to the media, while announcing a ban on The Kerala Story, Banerjee had said, "What was The Kashmir Files? It was meant purely to humiliate a particular section of society. What is The Kerala Story? It is a distorted story.”

Sharing a four-page legal notice on Twitter on Tuesday, Vivek wrote, "BREAKING: I have, alongwith @AbhishekOfficl & Pallavi Joshi, sent a LEGAL NOTICE to the Chief Minister, Bengal @MamataOfficial for her false & highly defamatory statements made with malafide intention to defame us & our films #TheKashmirFiles & upcoming 2024 film #TheDelhiFiles."

The notice states that Banerjee had called The Kashmir Files a “conspiracy”, and her statements had caused damage to the filmmaker’s reputation and the film’s profits. “You had tweeted the same and also made a statement on the floor of the assembly without taking the name of the movie. You further stated that the movie is funded and created and that there is a conspiracy to create unrest. You also urged the people not to watch the movie,” it read.

It is also stated that Vivek had planned to make a movie on Bengal Genocide in 1946-47 and another film titled Delhi Files, but when they announced the project in Kolkata, they were “attacked, abused, threatened of FIRs” by Banerjee’s party members.

Demanding an apology from the CM, the notice also read, “It is required that either you substantiate the allegations made by you against my clients and their movie by producing authenticated proof or to withdraw your statements by addressing media in a similar manner and tendering an unconditional apology to them. You need to give an equal amount of publicity for withdrawing the accusations made against my clients.”