The Maharashtra High Court has somewhat salvaged the situation by pulling up the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) for ordering cuts in the film Udta Punjab and reminding it that it is a certification board and not a censor board. Had CBFC chief Pahlaj Nihalani known the basics of cinematography, he would not have ordered 87 cuts in the film on the flimsy ground that Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap took money from the Aam Aadmi Party to show Punjab in a bad light.
May be, in his desperation, to please political parties in Punjab and drug peddling rackets, he did not realise his monumental folly in insisting on scissoring significant portions of the film. The film in question addresses the issue of drug addiction in Punjab and keeps fidelity to the ground reality.