'Third-Rate, Malicious And Deeply Misogynistic...': Vivek Agnihotri Slams Portal For Referring To Pallavi Joshi As His Wife After Her CBFC Appointment

Actress and producer Pallavi Joshi has been appointed as one of the members of the newly reconstituted Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) board. The announcement of the same happened on Wednesday. A news portal, on X, shared an article about it, and in their caption they referred to Joshi as 'the wife of outgoing board member and filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri'. This didn't go down well with The Kashmir Files director, and he took to X to slam the portal.

In a long tweet, he wrote, "What kind of third-rate, malicious and deeply misogynistic journalism is this? Pallavi Joshi is a four National Award-winning actor. She started acting at the age of four. She had already become one of India’s most recognised television stars at a time when many of the journalists writing this story weren’t even born (sic)."

He further explained that he didn't even know the 'p' of production when Joshi produced Arohan, a women-centred TV show on Indian Navy. "And yet, when you write about an accomplished, self-made woman, you choose to introduce her primarily as 'the wife of filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri' (sic)," he further wrote.

Agnihotri Highlights Joshi's Achievements

In his tweet, Agnihotri wrote that this is how patriarchy works by reducing a woman's decades of independent achievement to the man she happens to be married to. He further wrote that Joshi did not borrow her identity from anyone and has built it herself after working for four decades.

He tweeted, "If you cannot acknowledge an accomplished independent woman on her own terms and instead feel compelled to define her through her husband, then perhaps the problem isn’t Pallavi Joshi. Perhaps it is your own deeply patriarchal lens (sic)."

The filmmaker further gave an example about what the headline could be in which he mentioned Joshi's achievements. He concluded the tweet by writing, "That difference is not journalism. It is patriarchy masquerading as journalism (sic)."

Reconstituted CBFC Panel

Apart from Joshi, many other celebrities like Preity Zinta, Pankaj Tripathi, Suniel Shetty, Priyadarshan, Rupali Ganguly, and others have been appointed as reconstituted members of CBFC.