DECEMBER 23: Mira Nair's Kamasutra will continue its wait for a theatre release. A division bench of the Bombay High Court today ordered that there is no question of certifying the dubbed versions again. The Censor Board has been given six weeks to go in appeal against the order in the Supreme Court.

The order followed a plea by the Censor Board which had refused to grant its certificate to the film's dubbed versions in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. The board's examining committee had suggested visual and textual cuts to the dubbed versions after it had granted an `A' certificate to the English version. Agreeing to the textual cuts, the producer, Mirabai Films, filed a writ petition in the high court challenging the committee's powers to suggest visual cuts.

"There are no rules for censorship of dubbed versions which can enable the Censor Board to suggest any visual cuts. The guidelines issued by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (1993) clearly provided that in case of a dubbed version visuals will not be certified again," argued the producer's advocate, Veerendra Tulzapurkar.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.