If Satluj had been shown in the theatres two years ago, it would have come and gone without controversy

The sudden takedown of the film Satluj from an OTT platform within 48 hours of release sparked a lot of discussion. The film was made four years ago and the censors had asked for 127 cuts which the director Honey Trehan refused. Once it was pulled down, it was distributed all over Punjab for free for audiences to watch.

“I'm quite surprised at the way the government has behaved in the whole thing”, veteran journalist Kanwar Sandhu said in a podcast discussion with Sidharth Bhatia.

He said the manner in which the film was pulled down “raised the curiosity of the people.” He managed to see it online but “in the last two minutes there was a message that there was a technical error and I couldn’t see any more. What is it that they don't want the people to know?”

He said Khalistan was not an issue at the moment at all in Punjab. “There are Sikhs abroad who have certain grievances, they feel slighted, they feel hurt,” he said.

Sandhu also spoke of the government’s handling of the protests of the last few weeks. “My mind goes back to the farm protests. I see similarities in the playbook. You take decisions without consulting the stakeholders. That's what they did when they brought in the farm laws.” When the prime minister finally relented, it was done in a “half-hearted way.”