Kangana Ranaut opens up about CBFC cuts to Emergency: ‘The film wasn’t made to mock anyone’

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“I would have liked if the full version had come. But even with the cuts, there is no issue, because it’s not like the film was made to mock someone. It’s not like that. It’s fine. They completely removed some episodes of history. And the fact that it doesn’t impact my film, in a way, it is a testimony that it doesn’t matter,” Kangana, who is also a parliamentarian of the ruling BJP, said.

“The story is very much intact. The film’s message, which is patriotism, is very much intact. So I don’t think it has affected the larger narrative. But there must have been a reason why we shot those scenes,” the Mandi MP added. The CBFC, a statutory body under the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting led by Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw of Kangana’s BJP, oversees film certification in India.

Watch Kangana Ranaut’s Emergency trailer here:

Previously, Kangana had alleged that certification for her film had been halted due to threats directed at CBFC members. “There are rumours doing the rounds that our film, Emergency, has been granted Censor certificate. This is not true. In fact, our film had been cleared but certification has been stopped because many threats were coming in. Death threats. The Censor Board members are getting threats. We are under pressure not to show the assassination of Indira Gandhi, not to show Bhindranwale, not to show the Punjab riots. I don’t know what will be left to show then… This is unbelievable for me and I am very sorry for the state of things in this country,” she said in a video posted on X in August 2024.

While the makers took the matter to court, accusing the CBFC of “illegally” and “arbitrarily” withholding certification, they ultimately agreed to most of the changes proposed by the board’s revising committee. Also starring Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Ashok Chhabra, Mahima Chaudhry, Milind Soman, Vishak Nair and Satish Kaushik in key roles, Emergency will hit the screens on January 17.