 "Vidhu Vinod Chopra reacts to plea demanding stay on Shikara's release; Abhijat Joshi defends director's depiction of Muslims")
After a petition was filed against Shikara demanding a stay on the release in Jammu & Kashmir, filmmaker Vidhu Vinod Chopra has opened up on it. The petition, filed in Jammu & Kashmir High Court, alleges Shikara has distorted facts about Kashmiri Pandits and Kashmir. The petition also demands certain scenes “portraying the valley’s Muslims in a bad light” be removed. In a statement to Indo-Asian News Service, Chopra says, “We have just learnt from media sources that a petition has been filed by few people in J&K Court against the release of Shikara. We have no other information in this matter. Our counsel Harish Salve will take appropriate steps as may be required.”
A still from Shikara. Image from YouTube
The petitioners Majid Haidari, Iftikhar Misgar, and Irfan Hafiz Lone said Shikara does not depict the correct picture of what happened during the community’s mass exodus from the valley in the ’80s. They further state Shikara holds the entire Kashmiri Muslim population responsible for the exodus. However, Abhijat Joshi, Chopra’s frequent collaborator and the co-screenwriter on Shikara, has defended the film and Chopra’s handling of religion in it. Speaking to News18, Joshi asserts Chopra has made Shikara with “total integrity and without bitterness.” Joshi says it has almost been 25 years since Chopra came up with the idea of making Shikara, and he has braved many adversities in the past to get the film made — from working with as many as 4,000 actors, shooting night-long in Kashmir’s intense cold to even “facing threats and continuing.” “It is a very big thing for me to see how, in the last 25 years from the time he started thinking of telling the story of Kashmiri Pandits and their mass exodus, he has never uttered a single bad word about any other community or religion,” Joshi states. Shikara, described as “a love letter from Kashmir,” is produced by Fox Star Studios and VVC Films. The film marks Chopra’s return to his hometown Srinagar, post Hrithik Roshan and Preity Zinta-starrer Mission Kashmir (2000).
 "Charlie Kirk, shot dead in Utah, once said gun deaths are 'worth it' to save Second Amendment")
 "From governance to tourism, how Gen-Z protests have damaged Nepal")
 "Did Russia deliberately send drones into Poland’s airspace?")
 "Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages: Qatar PM after Doha strike")
 "Charlie Kirk, shot dead in Utah, once said gun deaths are 'worth it' to save Second Amendment")
 "From governance to tourism, how Gen-Z protests have damaged Nepal")
 "Did Russia deliberately send drones into Poland’s airspace?")
 "Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages: Qatar PM after Doha strike")
](https://images.firstpost.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/shikara-825.jpg){kind=link}