Film director Suhaib Ilyaisi on Wednesday alleged that Shiv Sena has threatened to disrupt the music launch of his upcoming film in which Pakistani singer Ghulam Ali was invited. The music launch of the film Ghar Wapsi was scheduled on January 29 at The Club at Andheri and has been called off allegedly after Shiv Sena’s protest. However, Shiv Sena’s cine wing has rubbished the allegations and said their stand against Pakistani artistes is not new, but that they did nothing to cancel the said show.
“Today we went to deposit the money at The Club, the venue for my programme. Ghulam Ali sahab had confirmed his presence for the programme, as he has acted in the film. But The Club refused to take the deposit and said it had booked by somebody else. We have come to know that the venue is not booked and Shiv Sena pressurised them to cancel the programme,” Mr Iiyaisi said. He also added that the show would be conducted in Delhi.
However, Shiv Sena Cine Wing chief Akshay Bardapurkar said the party did not do anything out of the way to cancel the event. “Our stand against the Pakistani artistes and cricketers is known. We will oppose their entry to Mumbai. But we are not aware why this programme was cancelled. In fact, Mr Ilyaisi had called me to ask if we were conducting any protest against the programme,” Mr Bardapurkar said.
It is also not clear if Ali had confirmed that he would attend the programme. Earlier, this year, Shiv Sena had cancelled two of Ali’s shows in Mumbai and in Pune. Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray has maintained that the party would oppose any event involving Pakistani artistes or players.
