Kolkata: Members of Nationalist Students’ Front (NSF), a right-wing students’ organisation, plans to screen Vivek Agnihotri’s ‘Bengal Files’, based on the 1946 Great Calcutta Killings, at the Triguna Sen auditorium at JU on Sunday. Left-leaning students’ organisations objected to the screening, saying the film could disrupt the campus harmony, and urged the university authorities to be alert to avoid any untoward incident.NSF founder Somsurya Banerjee said, “As the film was released across the country, the film studies department here wrote it could be screened. Official permission has been received from the university administration to screen ‘Bengal Files’ on Sunday. I see this screening as a historic moment that places democratic engagement above political intimidation. The game is not against any ideology, it is for the right of students to think, question and decide for themselves.”SFI, JU local committee secretary Abhinaba Basu said, “We uphold the democratic prerogative to screen even the most aesthetically bankrupt and politically nonsensical films. Censorship is not our politics. We merely demand that the authorities secure the campus against the ingress of external lumpen elements seeking to sabotage its democratic and peaceful environment.” Secretary of RSF, JU unit, Indranuj Ray wrote to the VC, urging him to not grant permission. “Such screenings risk inciting communal hatred and undermining the secular, democratic and inclusive atmosphere of the campus. Our concerns are not only apprehensions but are also based on experiences. We have repeatedly witnessed attempts by such organisations and individuals to communalise the university campus,” he added. V-C Chiranjib Bhattacharjee declined to comment.
