#BanNetflix: How a poster for Navarasa led to calls for boycotting the streaming giant

Netflix has inadvertently made its way into murky waters yet again, this time with the release of its new Tamil anthology series, Navarasa, presented by Mani Ratnam and Jayendra Panchapekesan. A poster of Inmai, one of the segments of the show that appeared in a Tamil daily, Daily Thanthi, sparked outrage on social media, from members of the Muslim community, for its use of a verse from the Quran, the holy book of the religion.

Raza Academy, an organisation of Sunni Muslims in India, made their displeasure very clear in a tweet against the poster, calling it an insult to the holy book and demanding strict action against Netflix. They called for a boycott of the streaming giant and the guilty newspaper with the hashtags #BanNetflix and #BanDailyThanthiNews. The Academy had also been involved in similar calls for action in the name of religious indignation in the past, too; they had protested against a 2015 movie which depicted the life of the Prophet Muhammad.

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Looks like netizens have divided opinions on the issue; while a few feel that what happened was ‘unacceptable’ and hurt religious sentiments, the others were seen making fun of the organised calls to impose a ban on the streaming platform.

The much anticipated Navarasa hit the streaming platform on Friday, immediately positioning itself on Netflix’s ‘trending’ list. The series, which consists of nine segments, centers on the nine ‘rasas’ or emotions in the Indian arts, with each episode being dedicated to one ‘rasa’. Inmai, the poster of which sparked the row, is based on the emotion ‘bhaya’ or fear. It tells the story of a woman who has to face confrontations of her past, on the arrival of a young man.

The series features several well-known faces from both the Tamil and Malayalam film industry, including Suriya, Vijay Sethupathi, Siddharth, Arvind Swami, Revathi, Parvathy Thiruvothu, Prayaga Martin, Yogi Babu, Remya Nambeesan and Nedumudi Venu among others.