A day after the Election Commission (EC) watched the biopic on Prime Minister Narendra Modi on directions of the Supreme Court (SC), the film's lead actor visited the EC office and met its officials. The film was scheduled to release on April 12, but was stalled by the EC after it received complaints alleging that it was violating the election Model Code of Conduct (MCC).

On Monday, the SC bench headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and comprising Justice Deepak Gupta and Justice Sanjiv Khanna ordered the EC to watch the film 'PM Narendra Modi' and submit its view to the apex court in a sealed cover by April 22.

The film's producers had moved the SC against EC's order stalling the release of the film. "A committee is looking into it. They have heard the view of the producers and we are deliberating over the issue," senior deputy election commissioner Umesh Sinha told reporters during a briefing here on Phase-II voting.

After his visit to the EC office, Oberoi said he was happy with the response of the EC officials to the film, however, he did not reveal what they had to say about the movie.

"Election Commission officials have watched the movie on Wednesday. In a way, the movie was premiered at the ECI office yesterday. The first thing we asked the officials was how did they find the movie? However, I cannot reveal their answer as it is the constitutional body and we ought to respect it. Though the officials' answer made us happy," Oberoi said.

"I have been reiterating that neither the movie nor me are related to the BJP. There is no intention and financial funding involved in the movie," the actor said. "The entire team is sad. We had hopes. It took one-and-a-half years to make the film and we were excited."

In a detailed order on April 10, the EC had said that it had received complaints on films such as NTR Laxmi, PM Narendra Modi and Udyama Simham. "It is claimed that such creative contents are a kind of surrogate publicity by the candidate or the political party during the period of MCC," the EC had said.

It then ordered to halt screening of any biopic material in the nature of biography, hagiography that served the purposes of a political entity and had the potential to disturb the level playing field during elections.

What ECc Said

The EC on April 10 said that such creative contents are a kind of surrogate publicity by the candidate or the political party during MCC