‘Santosh’ Release Blocked by CBFC in India For its Portrayal of Police Brutality

The critically-acclaimed film Santosh, which has been making waves internationally, has been denied a theatrical release in India after being blocked by the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC).

Santosh, written and directed by British-Indian filmmaker Sandhya Suri, has been denied certification after the CBFC objected to its portrayal of police brutality, caste discrimination and misogyny, according to a report in The Guardian.

The drama, that was filmed in India with an all-Indian cast and stars Shahana Goswami, Sunita Rajwar, Sanjay Bishnoi and Kushal Dubey, is centered around a young widow who joins the police force and investigates the murder of a Dalit girl.

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The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and was selected as the UK’s official entry in the international feature category for the 2025 Academy Awards. It was also nominated for a British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA) for Best Debut Feature and lead star Shahana Goswami recently won Best Actress at the Asian Film Awards.

In an interview with The Guardian, director Sandhya Suri said she was disappointed and called the move “heartbreaking."

“It was surprising for all of us because I didn’t feel that these issues were particularly new to Indian cinema or hadn’t been raised before by other films," Suri remarked, adding that the censors raised concerns on the film's themes of depiction of police conduct and wider societal problems.

“Maybe there’s something about this film which is troubling in that everybody is morally compromised and there is no single hero,” she said. “I think that’s what might set it apart from other stories in Indian cinema which often show a maverick cop in a rotten system.”

The filmmaker stated that the censors had demanded a lengthy list of "radical cuts" that ran for several pages which would have been “impossible” to implement.

“It was very important to me that the film is released in India so I did try to figure out if there was a way to make it work. But in the end it was just too difficult to make those cuts and have a film that still made sense, let alone stayed true to its vision," Suri said.

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The 2012 Delhi gang rape case, known as the Nirbhaya case, was what initially inspired Suri to make the film, and she has been collaborating with Indian NGOs to build the story. She had been nervous about releasing the film in India in the current climate, but also said that it was “vitally important” for her that the very people affected by the issues in the film were able to see it.

Though there are no appeals allowed with the CBFC once their report is submitted, Suri added that she would keep fighting to make the film available to Indian audiences.