Padmavati: Body found near Jaipur fort linked to film protest

NEW DELHI: Protests related to upcoming Indian movie Padmavati are getting violent with each passing day, as a body was found hanging from the ramparts of a Jaipur fort today, with a sentence scratched on a rock nearby that implied anger over the upcoming release of the film.

The scratching on the rock on the precincts of the Nahargarh Fort was in Hindi.

“We don’t just hang effigies,” it said. Below that sentence was scratched the word, “Padmavati”.

The police have identified the body as that of a 40-year-old local Chetan Saini.

#Rajasthan: Body found hanging at Nahargarh Fort in #Jaipur, threat note on rocks also seen #Padmavati pic.twitter.com/sSx9ONhF7D

— ANI (@ANI) November 24, 2017

The deceased’s brother refused to believe that Saini took his own life, or that he had anything to do with the sentence scratched on the rock.

“My brother cannot commit suicide, it appears to be murder. We will demand an investigation into the death. He has nothing to do with it (the note written on the rocks),” Indian news agency ANI quoted Ram Ratan Saini as saying.

The Hindi film, directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali, is in the eye of a raging and often-violent storm. Bounties have been announced for the “heads” of Bhansali and the film’s heroine Deepika Padukone.

Those offended by the film haven’t seen it but believe Bhansali has distorted history and that the film shows the title character, a Rajput queen called Padmini, or Padmavati, in a bad light.

Padmavati is a fictional character.

The official December 1 release of the film has already been postponed and several states have already banned it.