BJYM workers come for Manmohan film with band, create ruckus

Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) activists Friday created a ruckus outside a multiplex here where they had arrived to watch the first show of the film "The Accidental Prime Minister".

A BJYM leader said they watched the film with fanfare, because the Madhya Pradesh unit chief of the National Students Union of India (NSUI) had warned theatre owners against screening it.

Hundreds of BJYM workers reached the Malhar Mega Mall here, which houses the multiplex, with a band. Before entering the cinema hall, they shouted slogans against Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath, and got into fracas with the police who were present there anticipating trouble.

BJYM's local unit's president Manasvi Patidar said that NSUI had warned cinema halls against screening the film, so "in order to give a befitting reply, we watched the film in this manner".

NSUI state president Vipin Wankhede had said in a Facebook post on December 28 that theatre owners will be responsible for the consequences if the film is screened.

The Congress has termed the Anupam Kher-starrer film, which revolves around Manmohan Singh's tenure as prime minister, as BJP's propaganda.

NSUI spokesperson Vivek Tripathi told PTI that Wankhede's post could be his personal opinion but the Congress government in the state provided adequate security to the theatres.

He also alleged that the release of the film before the Lok Sabha polls was a "sponsored game plan of the BJP".

Madhya Pradesh Public Relations Minister P C Sharma said, "Manmohan Singh was not an accidental prime minister. He is a renowned economist and gave a new direction to the country's economy. It is Narendra Modi who is an accidental prime minister.