Anirban Bhattacharya and the “Unofficial Ban”: What the Federation Dispute Was About
Actor Anirban Bhattacharya and some directors challenged the technicians federation in the Calcutta High Court and say they then found little or no work. What is on the record, and what is not.
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Films in this article
Facts below are taken from published reports available on 20 October 2026. Claims by the people involved are attributed to them.
Actor Anirban Bhattacharya has said in interviews that he has had no work in Tollywood. Reports describe an “unofficial boycott” of him and two directors after they challenged the technicians federation (FCTWEI) in court. This article sets out what is documented.
What the dispute was about
Directors argued that the federation, headed by TMC leader Swarup Biswas, was interfering in their right to work and in how state health insurance for the Directors’ Association was routed. In April 2025 the Calcutta High Court (Justice Amrita Sinha) observed that the federation cannot infringe a director’s right to practise their profession, even if the person does not hold its card. The first petitioner was director Bidula Bhattacharya; a later petition came from 15 directors including Parambrata Chattopadhyay and Anirban Bhattacharya (IBNS via IndiaBlooms).
The “unofficial ban”
By January 2026, Millennium Post reported that Anirban, director Indranil Roychowdhury (Phoring) and Subrata Sen had moved the Calcutta High Court against what they called arbitrary federation interference, and described an unofficial boycott of them. Anirban was last seen in Dev’s Raghu Dakat. Other directors who had opposed federation rules, including Srijit Mukherji, Kaushik Ganguly, Shiboprosad Mukhopadhyay, Rahool Mukherjee and Parambrata Chatterjee, later reconciled with it; Parambrata publicly apologised. A later analysis in The Federal says Anirban, Sudeshna Roy and Indranil Roychowdhury have had little or no work since.
The federation’s own side is not quoted in the reports we found; the only contact described is Dev’s appeal to its president and to then minister Aroop Biswas.
What Dev did
On a Friday in January 2026 Dev met federation representatives and producers at EIMPA and asked them to lift the restrictions on Anirban. He said he was “saying sorry on behalf of Anirban to the Federation”, appealed to then chief minister Mamata Banerjee and TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee, and said Anirban had been “banned for eight months”. Dev did not confirm whether Anirban would be cast in his Puja 2026 film; Anirban does appear in DeSu7 as the main antagonist according to our film page.
What changed after the election
After the BJP formed the government, the federation was dissolved and its president arrested on allegations (see our explainer). BJP MLAs Rudranil Ghosh and Papiya Adhikari said there would be “no ban culture”. We found no report saying whether the restrictions on Anirban, Sudeshna Roy or Indranil Roychowdhury have formally ended.
Questions people ask
Was Ridhima Ghosh also banned?
We found no published report linking actor Ridhima Ghosh to this dispute. The people named in the reports are Anirban Bhattacharya, Indranil Roychowdhury, Subrata Sen and, in one analysis, Sudeshna Roy.
Was there an official ban?
The reports describe an unofficial boycott, which the federation is not quoted as accepting or denying.
Did the court order work for Anirban?
The April 2025 observations concerned directors’ right to practise and insurance routing. We found no order directing anyone to give him work.
