Senate Committee approves Zindagi Tamasha’s screening

ISLAMABAD: The Senate Committee on Human Rights has approved the screening of Sarmad Khoosat’s ‘Zindagi Tamasha’, dismissing all objections raised against the film.

PPP Senator Mustafa Nawaz Khokar, who chairs the panel, took to Twitter and said, “Senate Human Rights committee has unanimously agreed with Censor board’s decision to allow screening of movie Zindagi Tamasha.”

The PPP Senator further said, “We’ve found nothing wrong with it. The Censor board has our go-ahead to release post-COVID. Detail reasoning to follow later.”

Senate HR committee has unanimously agreed with Censor board’s decision to allow screening of movie “zindagi tamasha”. We’ve found nothing wrong with it. Censor board has our go ahead to release post Covid. Detail reasoning to follow later.

— Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar (@Mustafa_PPP) July 14, 2020

‘Zindagi Tamasha’ had faced controversy after Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan called for protests against its release, alleging it was “blasphemous”. Later in January, the government announced that the movie will be sent to the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) for review.

In March, the Senate human rights committee took the matter in its hands. The panel directed the Central Board of Film Censors to provide the committee a copy of the movie for screening.

The film, written by Nirmal Bano was set to release on January 24, 2020. The film was directed and co-produced by Khoosat along with his sister Kanwal Khoosat. The film chronicles the chaos that ensues in the life of a devout elderly man when a video featuring him gets uploaded onto social media.