Pooja ecstatic after winning 'Rog' obscenity case

Filmmaker Pooja Bhatt is delighted after a long-pending obscenity case against her, for 2005 film "Rog", has been quashed.

The Bombay High Court had on Nov 22, quashed the obscenity charges against Pooja and her company Fish Eye Network Pvt. Ltd. And disposed off a complaint filed by social activist Vinod Jain.

"Divine Justice - in the form of a high court hearing in my favour for an obscenity case against my film 'Rog'. Fought this for 8 long years!" Pooja tweeted Saturday.

In January 2005, Bhatt was booked for using posters with a skimpily-clad South African model Elina Hamman, while promoting "Rog".

The case filed by Jain had been discharged by the magistrate court in July 2008 on the basis of lack of sufficient evidence. However, in January last year, the session's court had reopened the case and quashed the magistrate court's order.

However, Pooja moved the Bombay High Court which, on Nov 22, disposed off a complaint filed by Jain.

"In the light of this situation, the prosecution initiated against the applicants by the complainant more leans to publicity stunt than any obscene feeling," Justice K.U. Chandiwal observed while passing the order.

Chandival, however, pointed out that the term "obscenity" varies from moral standards of the society and that the photos need to be examined with responsible reader test.

He said that the issuance of the process under the obscenity sections is quashed and set aside and the application disposed off.

An ecstatic Bhatt further tweeted: "Had I chickened out and settled out of court as most people in entertainment are prone to do, it would have resulted in more such cases Each one to their own in the film industry. But the ones who stick their necks out for the larger cause pave the road for the fence sitters," she tweeted.

"The ROGues have been silenced," she said.