In Episode 21 of South Central, hosts Pooja Prasanna and Leena Reghunath discuss the Empuraan controversy and the Telangana government’s use of bulldozers and police force to clear ecologically rich land near Hyderabad Central University, alongside TNM’s Nandini Chandrashekar, lawyer Nikhil Narendran, and environmental journalist Bahar Dutt.

On the outrage over Empuraan, Nikhil says, “What is the problem? If you make a movie using the name of a known convict – Babu Bajrangi – why should the Hindu sentiment be hurt?”

On Mohanlal expressing regret over the film’s contents , Pooja remarks, “If anybody could withstand pressure, it's a star like Mohanlal. There was no call for ban, not even from the BJP. So what was the need to buckle?”

Leena adds, “People like that – soft Hindutva insiders – you don’t need to threaten them with violence. Even a letter saying his honorary position as Lt Colonel will be removed is enough to shake them.”

As the conversation moves to the Hyderabad University land row and the student protests against it, Bahar Dutt says, “We are the land of Chipko. Here we have students who have decided they want to save the forest and the biodiversity in their backyard. Yet we are not celebrating it. Instead, we are lathi-charging and arresting them.”

Nandini, who is also an alumna of HCU, observes, “There is no reason [for the government to take this land.] It is not befitting the Chief Minister to call students cunning jackals.” 

All this and more—tune in.

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Audio Timecodes 

00:00:00 - Intro

00:01:49 - Announcements

00:03:03 - Headlines 

00:12:29 - Empuraan  

00:41:34 - HCU Land Row

01:09:10 - Recommendations

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Produced by Bhuvan Malik, edited by Jaseem Ali

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