Envoy sorry for Israeli director’s remark on The Kashmir Files

NEW DELHI: It was about diplomatic ties, political sparring and Holocaust recalls on Tuesday as Israeli director and IFFI international jury chair Nadav Lapid emerged the centre of furious debate over his comments on “The Kashmir Files”.

A day after the director described the film as “propaganda” and “vulgar”, Israel’s Ambassador to India Naor Gilon said he had abused India’s invitation and should apologise while Israel’s Consul General to Midwest India Kobbi Shoshani said the debate would strengthen India-Israel ties. Lapid’s fellow jury members distanced themselves from his views.

The controversy also saw “The Kashmir Files”, panned and praised for its portrayal of the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits during militancy in the early 1990s, back in the news with the BJP and the Congress at loggerheads, several actors such as Anupam Kher and Swara Bhasker weighing in with their views and a section of Kashmiri Pandits asking that Lapid be deported.

Agnihotri has compared “The Kashmir Files” to Steven Spielberg’s Holocaust epic “Schindler’s List”. The 1993 Oscar winner was referenced by many people, including Ambassador Gilon who wrote an open letter put out in a series of tweets. Gilon added that Lapid -- who is viewed as an anti-establishment director -- should be “ashamed” as he had “abused in the worst way” the Indian invitation to him to chair the panel of judges. Indian film director Sudipto Sen, who was part of the international film jury, the views expressed by Lapid were “personal”. “Whatever has been said by IFFI 2022 Jury Chairman Mr Nadav Lapid about the film Kashmir Files, from the stage of closing ceremony of 53rd IFFI was completely his personal opinion,” Sen wrote in a note shared on Twitter.

‘Will quit filmmaking if facts proven false’

“The Kashmir Files” director Vivek Agnihotri on Tuesday said he will quit filmmaking if intellectuals, including Israeli filmmaker Nadav Lapid, are able to prove that events depicted in his film are false. “I challenge the world’s intellectuals and ‘urban Naxals’ as well as the great filmmaker who came from Israel if they can prove that any shot, dialogue or event of ‘The Kashmir Files’ is not absolute truth, I’ll stop making films. I’m not someone who will back down. Issue as many fatwas as you want, but I’ll keep fighting,” he tweeted.