New Delhi, Aug 19

The Supreme Court Friday "quashed and set aside" the two-month ban imposed by the Uttar Pradesh government on the screening of filmmaker Prakash Jha's "Aarakshan".

An apex court bench of Justice M. Sharma and Justice Anil R. Dave said the state government cannot seek deletion of certain potions of the film as this amounted to censorship.

The court said once the Central Board of Film Certification cleared the public screening of a film, no state government can raise objections on its content.

Referring to the Uttar Pradesh government's contention that reservation was a very delicate issue and certain scenes in "Aarakshan" had the potential of affecting the law and order situation, the court said it could not agree with this as the film is being shown all over the country, including in the states which are sensitive to reservation.

"Aarakshan", starring Amitabh Bachchan, Saif Ali Khan and Deepika Padukone, deals with caste-based reservations in the Indian education system.