“We do not certify backwards”: Film Censorship in Postcolonial India

Abstract

This chapter will provide a succinct introduction to the Indian state’s film censorship laws, policies, and practices, and thenmove on to a chronological overview of evolutions in film censorship in post-colonial India by focusing on two crucial historical periods of the 1970s and 1990s that were marked by a series of censorship controversies and protracted legal wrangles.1 Although mainly restricted to manifest censorship of popular Hindi cinema produced by the Bombay film industry, I shall also make occasional references to regional cinemas and new wave, art, and documentary films.