The Kerala Story: Despite SC’s stay on the ban, no Bengal hall is ready to screen the film

The Bengal government banned The Kerala story in the state on May 8. Later, on May 18, the Supreme Court put a stay order on the ban. However, it is still unclear when the movie will be shown in the theatres in Bengal. The cinema hall owners of West Bengal say that no hall is vacant for the coming three weeks. Hence giving slots to The Kerala Story is not possible right now. They said that they would reconsider the situation after three weeks. The owners also said that they could not cancel the slots already booked for other movies. 

Arijit Dutta, the managing director of Priya Entertainment, told ANI, “This is a blockbuster. But sadly, we can not show it right now. All the slots are filled for the next three weeks. We can not cancel them. We can think of showing the movie after two or three weeks.” 

Arijit also said that the movie was doing well before the ban. He is hopeful that given a chance, the movie will run for 50 days. 

Navin Choukhani, the owner of Navina Cinema Hall, told E-Times, “We stopped our program due to Fast X being released on Thursday. We are showing Fatafati for two weeks. Hence, we do not have any slot for The Kerala Story.” 

The film's director Sudipto Sen became vocal about why the film is not being shown even after the ban was lifted. He told ANI, “We are keeping in contact with the distributors. We are getting calls from the hall owners who say that they are threatened not to show the film.” He also said that he would definitely reveal the names of those who threatened, once he got to know them.