The Madras High Court dismissed a petition seeking to revoke the censor certificate of the controversial movie Mersal, citing that it was only an imaginative story and that the freedom of expression was there
for all.

Mersal was in the midst of a controversy after the Tamil Nadu unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) demanded the removal of certain dialogues, which take a dig at the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and Digital India programme.

The High Court, in this context, said, “Why was there no complaint against smoking and drinking in films or about the projection of LGBT? A film is only an imaginative story and it is not real life. If someone doesn’t like a film, a person can refrain from viewing it. The freedom of expression is there for all.”

However, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, his senior colleague
P Chidambaram, DMK working president MK Stalin, Tamil superstar Rajinikanth, veteran actor
Kamal Haasan and a host of Tamil cinema industry representatives have supported the cast and crew of the film.