Saturday 23 June 2012

'Ustad Hotel' fails to get Animal Welfare Board of India nod


ALAPPUZHA: The Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI) refused to give no objection certificates to two films -Anwar Rasheed's 'Ustad Hotel' and M A Nishad's 'No 66 Madhura Bus'.

The AWBI refused to give NOC to these films following the complaints filed by Heritage Animal Task Force (HATF), an animal lovers' forum with the AWBI. It will adversely affect the release of these two Malayalam films.

"The directors of these two films used animals in their films without the pre-shoot permission of the AWBI. As per the Performing Animals (Registration) Rules, 2001, shooting with animals should be undertaken only after getting pre-shoot permission from AWBI," said V K Venkitachalam, secretary of HATF.

In the film 'Ustad Hotel', director Anward Rasheed used a camel in a song scene without the permission of the AWBI.

When HATF lodged a complaint with the AWBI in this connection, the director and the producer of the film approached the AWBI for its permission. However, the AWBI refused to give the NOC saying that using camel in Kerala for films could not be permitted because a camel cannot live in Kerala due to the climate here.

However, Anwar Rasheed told TOI that the film would be released on June 29 at any cost and they did not have any plan to remove the scene in which a camel was used.

The film 'Ustad Hotel' stars Dulquar Salman, Nitya Menon and Thilakan among others.

"People and media with some vested interests are trying to stop the release of my film. Now there is no problem for the release of my film and it will be released on June 29," he said.

M A Nishad has also used a captive elephant in the film without the pre-shoot certificate from the board.

Following this, the AWBI refused to issue NOC and directed M A Nishad and the film's producer to produce the ownership certificate of the elephant from the wildlife department.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kochi/Ustad-Hotel-fails-to-get-Animal-Welfare-Board-of-India-nod/articleshow/14348050.cms

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