Pakistani cinema houses will start screening Indian films from December 19, reported Dawn. The owners of the cinema houses on Saturday said they had stopped screening Indian films because of rising tensions between the two countries, but had not banned them. Bollywood actor Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s Freaky Ali will be the first Indian film to be screened after the suspension is lifted.
Nadeem Mandviwala of Atrium cinemas said the films that were not screened because of suspension will be screened first. Aadil Mandviwala, chief executive officer of Mandviwala Entertainment, said the decision was meant to put the message across that Pakistan would like to support Indian films and expects the same in return. “It takes two hands to clap, it does not matter if one hand is bigger or smaller. At the end of the day, its the clapping that counts. This is the message that we want India to hear,” he said.
On September 30, Pakistani cinemas said they would not screen Indian films a day after the Indian Motion Picture Producers Association banned Pakistani actors and technicians from shooting in India till “normalcy” returned. Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena had also asked all Pakistani artists to leave India.
President of MNS’ film wing Amey Khopkar had said: “The day Pakistan will stop attacking our country, we will extend the hand of friendship. We do not have anything against art but the artistes who are employed in India remained mum on the terror attack in Uri.”
Relations between Delhi and Islamabad have soured since the Indian Army conducted “surgical strikes” on “terror camps” along the Line of Control with Pakistan in September. On September 18, militants attacked an Indian Army installation in Kashmir’s Uri sector, killing 18 soldiers.
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