The Bengal Files

About the film

The Bengal Files is a 2025 Indian Hindi-language political drama propaganda film written and directed by Vivek Agnihotri. It presents a storyline focused on the Direct Action Day and the Noakhali riots, depicting the violence and its aftermath as a genocide. The film stars Mithun Chakraborty, Pallavi Joshi, Darshan Kumar, Anupam Kher and Simrat Kaur.

The Bengal Files is the third and final installment in Agnihotri's The Files Trilogy based on modern Indian history, following The Tashkent Files (2019) and The Kashmir Files (2022). With a runtime of 204 minutes, it is one of the longest Indian films and was released on 5 September 2025. The film received criticism over its distortion of history, and was commercially unsuccessful.

Plot

The story begins in present-day India with a senior Central Bureau of Investigation officer, Shiv Pandit being assigned to trace a missing journalist, Gita Mukherjee who had been working on sensitive historical research. Geeta had been investigating old records from Bengal around 1946 before disappearing under suspicious circumstances. At first, Pandit treats it as a routine missing-person case, but he quickly finds that multiple official files related to the journalist's work have been sealed, altered, or completely erased. People who were last in contact with Gita either refuse to speak or provide contradictory accounts, and it becomes clear that powerful interests are actively obstructing the investigation.

As Pandit follows the journalist's trail, he discovers that the missing research focused on events in Bengal during 1946, especially the communal violence that erupted around Direct Action Day in Calcutta and later spread to other regions. The narrative shifts repeatedly into flashbacks showing how rising political tensions between communities, fueled by colonial withdrawal and competing political demands, escalated into large-scale riots, killings, and mass displacement. These events are shown through multiple perspectives, including survivors, victims, and those caught in political machinery, revealing confusion, fear, and breakdown of authority during that period. Pandit learns that many of the testimonies recorded at that time were either suppressed or never officially documented, creating gaps in historical records.

Back in the present, the investigation intensifies as Pandit uncovers that Gita had identified a hidden pattern linking certain families, political figures, and institutions to both the 1946 events and present-day influence networks. Each breakthrough leads to increased pressure on Pandit, including surveillance, intimidation, and attempts to shut down the case. A key turning point occurs when he finds an old survivor, Bharti Banerjee who directly connects the missing Gita's final research notes to a specific chain of events during the riots in Noakhali and Calcutta, suggesting that some incidents were systematically documented and then deliberately erased.

Production

Agnihotri announced the project in April 2022 following the success of The Kashmir Files. He initially titled the film The Delhi Files: The Bengal Chapter to emphasise his belief that "the destiny of India is written in Delhi and not in Bengal". In June 2025, Agnihotri officially renamed the film to The Bengal Files: Right to Life, reflecting the central focus on Bengal history rather than Delhi.

Agnihotri explained that the title shift was prompted by public sentiment: a social media poll received overwhelming support for renaming the film to better reflect its subject. He said, "The first and foremost reason is that the film is about Bengal... then I did a poll where 99 people asked me to change the title. That's when I thought, why get stuck in the communication... Now, it makes more sense." He also noted that the second part of the project will similarly undergo a title change after the first chapter's release.

Principal photography began in November 2024. Agnihotri confirmed that filming was wrapped by the end of January 2025.

Soundtrack

The soundtrack of The Bengal Files consists of a single released song and a background score.

The devotional folk-based song Kichudin Mone Mone was released as the first single. It is sung and composed by Parvathy Baul, with lyrics credited as traditional.

According to the film's credits, Samarth Srinivasan is listed under the music department.

Release

The Bengal Files was theatrically released on 5 September 2025. The film received an A (adults only) certificate from the CBFC, with a runtime of 204 minutes, with reasons citing extreme violence and gory content. Agnihotri warned that he will pursue legal action if West Bengal prevents the release of his film. Actor Victor Banerjee urged the President of India to guarantee that the screening occurs peacefully, free from intimidation or interference, and that the rights of both artists and audiences are fully safeguarded. Prior to the film's release, Agnihotri publicly appealed to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, urging her not to impose a ban on the film. He emphasized that it was a work of art and historical storytelling, rather than a means of division.

The film began streaming on ZEE5 from 21 November 2025.

A day before the film's release, Pallavi Joshi alleged that the film had been unofficially banned in West Bengal, claiming theatre owners were being intimidated due to political pressure. She wrote a letter to Droupadi Murmu, the President of India, urging protection of the film's supposed constitutional right to be viewed. This issue escalated further when Amit Malviya, the chief of BJP IT Cell, accused the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress government of unofficially banning the film, while the accused party denied any involvement in the film's non-release, asserting that the decision rested solely with theatre owners and multiplex operators. Theatre owners in Kolkata clarified that no slots were available for the film as they were already screening films such as The Conjuring: Last Rites, Dhumketu, Bohurupi, and Baaghi 4.

Key details