A significant controversy has disrupted the twelfth International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) in Thiruvananthapuram, because the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B) has withheld screening permissions for several movies, resulting in cancellations.
Shashi Tharoor SLAMS I&B Ministry over withholding clearance for 19 movies at IFFK
Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has sharply criticized the choice, calling it “deeply unlucky” and highlighting the denial of clearance to 19 scheduled movies. On December 16, 2025, he noted on social media that the unique list was longer, but some approvals followed his intervention with I&B Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, requested by festival chairman Riyas LP, while others await Ministry of External Affairs clearance.
Tharoor described the bureaucracy’s stance as a “staggering lack of cinematic understanding,” questioning blocks on classics like Battleship Potemkin, a 1928 Russian Revolution film seen by thousands and thousands worldwide, including in India. “The list of 19 movies suggests a unprecedented degree of cinematic illiteracy on the a part of the bureaucracy. To disclaim clearance to a classic like Battleship Potemkin, a 1928 film on the Russian Revolution which has been viewed by literally a whole bunch of thousands and thousands all over the world (and in India) over the past century, is laughable. Denying permission to some Palestinian movies reflects bureaucratic over-cautiousness quite than the cultural breadth of vision that needs to be involved in relation to world cinema,” he wrote.
It’s most unlucky that an unseemly controversy has arisen over the central government’s denial of clearance to 19 movies which were scheduled to be screened on the International Film Festival of Kerala in Thiruvananthapuram.
The unique list was for much longer, but several…
— Shashi Tharoor (@ShashiTharoor) December 16, 2025
He urged Ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and S Jaishankar to expedite approvals, warning of injury to India’s cultural image, especially in cinema-loving Kerala.
Movies lacking Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) approval require special I&B Ministry exemption for festival screenings, and the absence of those has stalled the IFFK schedule.
Veteran filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan decried restrictions on landmarks like Battleship Potemkin, The Hour of the Furnaces, and the Spanish film Beef, calling it a “clear misunderstanding of cinema” that judges by titles or politics, undermining artistic freedom. Organizers are negotiating resolutions before the festival ends on December 19, amid delegate inconvenience.
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