Jami accused of plagiarizing an NCA student’s film

KARACHI: It all started off with a Facebook post when Ahmad Baig, a student from the National College of Arts (NCA) in Lahore, shared a post, claiming that filmmaker Jami’s upcoming film Jugnu’s trailer looked strikingly similar to his thesis film called Ibbo Ki Eid which was made in 2015.

Eventually, the news made its way around social media with several people calling for a boycott of Jami for allegedly stealing the student’s ideas and making a film on it.

Twitterati also claimed that when confronted with the allegations, Jami responded angrily and decided to boycott NCA juries in the future.

Finally, the filmmaker took to Twitter to respond to the allegations. Jami cleared out that he was not on the jury that watched Baig’s thesis film, therefore having no access to Ibbo Ki Eid. He also added that he is not refusing to be a juror for NCA, the aforementioned text came as a response to all the hate and abuse he was allegedly receiving from NCA students.

He then shared screenshots of conversations that have taken place with Jugnu‘s writer and director Ali Abbas Naqvi as early as 2014, before the release of Ibbo Ki Eid. In the screenshots, it is clear that the idea of the film originated nearly 4 years ago.

Others have spoken out in support of Jami.