After a major controversy over the new web series titled ‘IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack’ on the streaming service Netflix, the head of Netflix India, Monika Shergill, has been issued a notice by the Union Information and Broadcasting Ministry. This series, which depicts the 1999 hijacking of the Indian Airlines flight IC 814 by the Pakistan-based terrorist organization Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, has angered users of social media after people accused the producers of changing the names of the hijackers to "Bhola" and "Shankar" for dramatic effect. 

IC 814
Image Source: Wikipedia

The Controversy Surrounding the Portrayal of IC 814 Hijackers

The series, directed by Anubhav Sinha and Trishant Srivastava, draws inspiration from the book Flight Into Fear: The Captain’s Story, which is written in collaboration with Captain Devi Sharan and journalist Srinjoy Chowdhury. It also stars actors like Naseeruddin Shah, Vijay Varma, and the film’s director, Pankaj Kapoor.

The web series shows the real-life account of the hijacking of Indian Airlines Flight 814 on 24 December 1999. Fitting the description of the deeply tragic event, the plane that was bound for Delhi from Kathmandu, Nepal, with 191 souls on board was attacked by five hijackers posing as passengers. The plane then deplaned and made other stops such as Amritsar, Lahore, and Dubai, only to be redirected to Kandahar, Afghanistan.

IC 814
Image Source: IDRW

The crisis forced the Indian government under Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to set free three dangerous terrorists among those, including Masood Azhar, Ahmad Omar Said Sheikh, and Mustaq Ahmad Zargar, in order to free the hostages. Many sources indicate that the Taliban assured the preparation of the movement of hijackers and released terrorists in Pakistan.

The Union Home Ministry, in a statement issued for January 6, 2000, had named the hijackers who perpetrated this act as Ibrahim Athar, Shahid Akhtar Sayed, Sunny Ahmed Qazi, Mistri Zahoor Ibrahim, and Shakir. The Home Ministry statement said, “To the passengers of the hijacked place, these hijackers came to be known respectively as (1) Chief, (2) Doctor, (3) Burger, (4) Bhola, and (5) Shankar, the names by which the hijackers invariably addressed one another.”

In the middle of all this, several journalists who covered the week-long hijacking that occurred in 1999 have on their social media posts said that the hijackers used these names in reference to each other, according to the passengers. BJP spokesperson Amit Malviya has criticized the makers and writers of the respective web series for using these names in the series. He shared his thoughts on X and said, "The hijackers of IC-814 were dreaded terrorists who acquired aliases to hide their Muslim identities. Filmmaker Anubhav Sinha legitimized their criminal intent by furthering their non-Muslim names. Result? Decades later, people will think Hindus hijacked IC-814.” He further added, "Left's agenda to whitewash the crimes of Pakistani terrorists, all Muslims served. This is the power of cinema, which the Communists have been using aggressively since the 1970s. Perhaps even earlier.”

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