Shonali Bose remembers pitching "Ainu" to a Bombay producer. She told him the film was about an Indian-American girl's journey to India to find her roots. That was fine. Then she said the film was about the anti-Sikh riots of 1984. He stopped her right there.
"He got up and said, 'A film about '84 will get burned in the theater. It cannot be made.' I went out into the street and cried," said Ms. Bose. "It was my lest pitch."
The producer Ms. Bose had approached was affiliated ...