Exclusive: We should love our country, says IMPPA president on banning Pak artistes

During their 87th Annual General Meeting yesterday (29 September), the Indian Motion Pictures Producers Association (IMPPA) passed a resolution of banning Pakistani artistes from working in Indian films. The decision came as a surprise as there wasn’t any pre-announcement about the same. 

During an exclusive chat with Cinestaan.com, producer TP Aggarwal, the president of IMPPA, revealed that it wasn’t premeditated and it started off when he decided to remove Rahet Fateh Ali Khan as one of the singers in his upcoming movie. 

“This wasn’t pre-planned. I removed Rahet Fateh Ali Khan’s song from my upcoming film Laali Ki Shaadi Mein Laddoo Deewana. Following this, all members in the AGM said that we should not allow Pakistani artistes to perform in India till the situation returns to normal,” he said.   

Aggarwal also revealed that one of the main reasons behind the move is that none of the Pakistani artistes have condemned the attack when Indians, including their body, did that when school children were killed in a bomb blast in Pakistan in December 2014. 

“When 200 school kids were killed in Peshawar, we paid shraddhanjali (tribute) to them in our AGM. But none of these Pakistani artists have condemned the attack. Why couldn’t they even tweet about this? Subhash Chandra of Zee has stopped airing Pakistani shows on his channel. He said that if they do condemn they attacks, he has no problems,” he said and added, “Hum mein deshbhakti toh honi chahiye na? We should love our country.” 

After the Uri attacks in Jammu and Kashmir, few political parties have demanded a ban on films like Ae Dil Hai Mushkil and Raees as they have Pakistani actors as part of the cast. But Aggarwal pointed out that they don’t plan to stall the release of such films. “The films that are already made won’t be stopped from releasing.” 

With the current situation, it is to be seen how long the ban will be in force.