Uri The Surgical Strike is doing well at the box office, and has turned out to be the first hit of 2019. The war film, starring Vicky Kaushal in the lead, is directed by debutant Aditya Dhar. The movie is enjoying fairly good reviews, as well as a great opening weekend at the box office. However, the movie has also come on the bad side of a few, who allege that Uri is propaganda disguised as a war film and should be called out as such. Uri the Surgical Strike Box Office: 5 Reasons Why Vicky Kaushal and Mohit Raina’s War Film Has Become a Winner!

Not Anurag Kashyap, though. The auteur film-maker, who is known for his fair share of controversies, has gone on Twitter to write praises about the film. The movie's lead actor, Vicky is dear to Anurag. Vicky's big screen debut was in Anurag Kashyap's Bombay Velvet and he had also given acclaimed performances in other Kashyap movies like Raman Raghav 2.0 and Manmarziyaan.

In one of these tweets, Anurag Kashyap claims that Uri is not a propaganda film, unlike some of the war films that have been made in Bollywood. Not sure, if Anurag has got confused between 'propaganda' and 'jingoism', but there is no doubt that Uri was a propaganda film, even if it is not in-your-face as its Friday competitor, The Accidental Prime Minister. Uri Movie Review: Vicky Kaushal's Josh-ila Performance is One Big Reason To Watch This Fallacious War Drama.

To which, Suparna Sharma, editor and film critic for Asian Age, tweeted back, poking holes into Kashyap's views.

Well, there is truth in the fact that India has carried out surgical strikes before Uri, and no one made a hue and cry about it. An article in Outlook India wrote, "India has performed similar operations at least three times in the past, going by official records. The first was half-a-century ago, when the army struck hard along the Chittagong Hill tracts of what was then East Pakistan to serve a blow to Mizo insurgents who were trained by their supporters in Islamabad and the US. The second was in 2000, following the previous year’s Kargil War triggered by infiltration of Pakistani soldiers disguised as Kashmiri militants onto the Indian side of the Line of Control. The third was “some years later”—the officials would not disclose the exact time—in a nearby sector where the Indian army used tanks to attack Pakistanis who had ambushed a BSF patrol party and taken away the body of a jawan."

Anyway, the debate continues, as Anurag sticks to his stand on why Uri isn't a 'propaganda' film.

While Sharma argues that there were better ways to drive the point in the film, than what's shown.

The debate got even more interesting when Anurag argued that our sports movies are more jingoistic than Uri.

Again, jingoism and propaganda are two separate terms, which was pointed out by Sharma.

Anurag had then to further defend his stance on the film, while stating that Uri showed the politicians the way they are (the movie has actors masquerading as Narendra Modi, Arun Jaitley, Manohar Parrikar etc) so it is far more realistic. Uri The Surgical Strike: PM Narendra Modi, Manohar Parrikar, Arun Jaitley – 5 Politicians Who ‘Appear’ in Vicky Kaushal’s War Film (Spoiler Alert).

Another Twitter user pointed out the fallacy in his observation.

So which side of this argument are you on? Is Uri a propaganda movie or not?

To give you some context of the whole argument, Uri is based on the surgical strikes carried by the Indian government, 11 days after four terrorists infiltrated into a military camp in Uri, Kashmir in 2016 and killed 19 of our men, before being killed themselves. The scope and scale of the surgical strikes are still being argued upon, as the government insists on the narrative is true, while its detractors claim there is no proper evidence to prove it. Also considering that Uri: The Surgical Strike comes mere months before the April elections, the timing of the release is brought into question to validate BJP's claim in being the bigger party during the elections.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jan 14, 2019 03:52 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).