A 37-year-old Congress worker has filed a case against Netflix series Sacred Games and its lead Nawazuddin Siddiqui. Rajeev Kumar Sinha, in his complaint to Girish Park Police Station in Kolkata, says that Siddiqui’s character in the series – gangster Ganesh Gaitonde, uses abusive language when referring to late prime minister Rajiv Gandhi.
Sinha says that Gaitonde refers to Rajiv Gandhi as ‘fattu’ in the series. He also claims that the film misrespresents the facts from that period and has taken Indian television to an all-time low.
Sinha has requested the police to take immediate action and file an FIR against the producers of the series, and Siddiqui in connection with the case.
The complaint has been accepted by the police station, but has not been acted upon as yet.
A spokesperson for Netflix India said that they had only recently been made aware of the complaint. “It is being taken care of by our legal department, and at present, we have no comment,” they said.
Siddiqui’s spokesperson refused to comment on the issue.
Sacred Games is based on the novel of the same name by author Vikram Chandra. Staged as a cat-and-mouse game between Sartaj Singh (Saif Ali Khan) and Mumbai don Ganesh Gaitonde (Siddiqui), the series offers biting commentary on many important scandals in the 70’s and 80’s. Couched in the content are scathing criticisms of the BOFORs scandal and the controversy surrounding the Shah Bhano case.
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The series, directed by Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane, was launched on the streaming platform on July 6. It has received mostly positive reviews. This is in direct contrast to the reception that the novel received. It failed to make good on Vikram Chandra’s $1 million advance from Harper Collins. Sales of the novel were disappointing with reports that the book lost around $650,000.