Actor Amol Palekar, who was interrupted by curator
Jesal Thacker
during his speech at the
National Gallery of Modern Art
(NGMA), called out the establishment for suppressing freedom of speech in the country. On Sunday,
Amol Palekar along with his wife
Sandhya Gokhale
addressed a press conference in Pune, where they shifted the focus on how artistes in the country struggle to speak up.
"It is not important which party is in power, the establishment has restrained freedom of speech for years," said Sandhya Gokhale.
Watch the video of Amol Palekar's speech which was interrupted by curator Jesal Thacker Palekar further said that he was merely talking about changed rules of the NGMA and that there was nothing objectionable in what he said during the speech. “Many of you may not know that this retrospective will be the last show that is decided by the advisory committee of local artists and not by some bureaucrat or an agent of the government with an agenda of either moral policing or proliferation of certain art commensurate with an ideological incline,” said the upset actor.
On Twitter and other social media platforms, artists, students and filmmakers came out in support of Amol Palekar. Filmmaker
Alankrita Shrivastava tweeted, "Thankyou #AmolPalekar for your courage. There cannot be space for
censorship
in a true democracy."