Vidarbha outfit happy over Peepli's exit from Oscars

Nagpur: An outfit working for farm widows in suicide-hit Vidarbha region of Maharashtra is happy after Peepli Live, India's official entry to the Oscars failed to get selected in the Foreign Language Film category for the 83rd Academy Awards.

The critically acclaimed movie, directed by Anusha Rizwi was out of the Oscar race as it could not make it to final list of nine films chosen for next round of voting in the category.

"Finally, the Oscar Academy has respected sentiments of thousands of Vidarbha farm widows by not selecting Peepli Live," said a release from Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti (VJAS), an NGO working for farmers and their widows in the eastern region of the state.

The NGO had earlier objected to the selection of Aamir Khan's movie as the official entry for the Oscars calling it a "black comedy".

It is a wrong representation of the misery of family members of farmers who had committed suicide, it said.

"Rejection of Peepli Live will certainly avoid further the wrong projection of Indian agrarian crisis where around 200,000 farmers committed suicide in the last decade. The basic theme and script of the film is a satire on this serious issue. It would be absolutely wrong to say that farmers are committing suicide for compensation," said VJAS President Kishor Tiwari.

Vidarbha farmers and widows had earlier on August 15 protested the storyline of the film and burnt effigies of producer Amir Khan.

The film shows how the protagonist (Natha) decides to commit suicide as he is about to lose his plot of land because he is unable to pay back his debts. His brother encourages him to commit suicide so that his family can live off the compensation money, the release said.