Delhi Belly in Kathmandu and the Amir Khan rumours

Right after "The Himalayan Times" called Delhi Belly a messed up fun, things actually started getting messy for the movie in Nepal. The government had banned screening of the Indian movie ‘Delhi Belly’ citing the reluctance by the cinema halls to remove certain scenes from the film. 

           After being put on hold for two days following censors' objections to the expletives peppering its dialogues, Amir Khan's home production "Delhi Belly" finally reappeared in Nepal's theatres Wednesday after a scene was cut and some abuses muted.

The Gopi Krishna Multiplex in Kathmandu, where the trouble started Sunday evening after police raided its theatres and seized prints of the Abhinay Deo-directed film, told IANS Wednesday that "Delhi Belly" was back on the menu after a written apology to the Film Censor Board by the owner of the theatre, Uddhav Poudel who is also the sole distributor of the film in Nepal.

Poudel apologised to the censors, agreed to pay a fine of NRS 5,000??? if required and gave an undertaking that he would not in future screen films flouting censors' recommendations. Nepal's censors had agreed to clear "Delhi Belly" for viewing by theater-goers above 16 years provided the distributor saw to it that an offending scene was cut and some expletives in two scenes muted.

And the rumors have been running wild in facebook and twitter saying "Amir Khan has recently in an interview today has told that Nepal and Nepali are illiterate and orthodox so raise your voice against this statement". It doesn't take a publicist to figure out that this is a false rumour. Nothing official like that is said and let’s not share negative statements especially if they aren't backed up by facts. Here is an actual excerpt of Amir Khan’s view on the ban of his movie.

As is expected, Delhi Belly has come to a sudden rise in its publicity after its simultaneous ban in Pakistan and Nepal. Jai Nepal Cinemas including other cinemas had multiple calls from people asking if the movie was back on. One thing for sure, instead of picking movies individually, a censorship system and proper age classification board would have been ideal. (Many have argued that the language used in the movie is nothing new for adults and is common in western movies.) As for Delhi Belly, we all know from previous experiences (Gharwali Baharwali for example) that there is nothing called bad publicity.