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Lux Style Awards say they respect ‘freedom of audience views’ after outrage over Feroze Khan’s nomination

Lux Style Awards say they respect ‘freedom of audience views’ after outrage over Feroze Khan’s nomination

Oscar winning director Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy has announced she will return her lifetime award in protest against his nomination.
Updated 24 Nov, 2022

The Lux Style Awards (LSAs) will not be excluding Feroze Khan from their list of nominees despite widespread criticism, including from Oscar winning director Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy.

In a statement released on Wednesday night, the awards said, “The Lux Style Awards submissions are received from artists and channels as part of an open call for entries for consideration in the awards. All shortlisted nominations, for the Viewer’s Choice Category of the LSA 2022 are a result of exclusive viewer voting without any intervention by the Awards.

“As part of our third party, independent and transparent voting process, which is audited end to end by PricewaterhouseCoopers, LSA cannot participate in short-listing, vetting or excluding any submissions or nominations.”

In a followup statement, the LSAs said they believe in “respecting the freedom and diversity of audience views, and does not regulate or limit engagement (except in cases of content with obscene or inappropriate language) on our social media platforms.”

Their move comes after Obaid Chinoy announced she was returning her Lux Lifetime Achievement Award, which she was awarded in 2012, in protest.

“Lux is a beauty brand that sells soaps to women yet it has chosen to allow the nomination of a man known to have violently abused his ex-wife. Its parent company, Unilever, has a global campaign that says no to domestic violence and advocates against it. The company signed up to the United Nation’s SDGs, including SDG 5 on gender equality,” she wrote, noting that Unilever’s offices in Pakistan do not seem to share the same values.

“In 2012, I was awarded a Lux lifetime achievement award, which I will be sending back to Unilever as the brand and I no longer share the same values. As a society, we must stand together against domestic violence and we must call out those who provide platforms to abusers,“she wrote.

“Unilever and Lux have done a disservice to the awards and to society and it is not ok for them to allow the celebration of abusers.”

Obaid Chinoy was referring to the inclusion of Feroze Khan in the Best TV Actor - Viewer’s Choice for his drama Khuda Aur Mohabbat.

His costar in the drama, Iqra Aziz, has already withdrawn from an upcoming project with him in a show of support for victims of domestic abuse. In her message announcing her decision, she said she stands with Aliza Sultan, Khan’s ex-wife who has accused him of abuse.

Photos of Sultan with bruises started circulating on social media late October along with her emergency room and MLO reports. They were among the documents her legal team submitted to a District East Family Court as well as a report from the Accident and Emergency Department at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre documenting a complaint of assault in November 2020, mentioning “blunt injuries on both arms, [the] back, chest and face”. A “minor nosebleed” was also recorded. The provisional diagnosis read that it was an “assault”.

This caused a stir online as celebrities started to condemn domestic abuse openly and express their support for Sultan. Stars from the entertainment industry such as Mariyam Nafees, Asim Azhar, Osman Khalid Butt, Mansha Pasha, Shae Gill, Ushna Shah, Minal and Aiman Khan and Usman Mukhtar rallied behind Sultan en masse, offering their full support.

Khan then released a statement, denying all abuse allegations levied against him. Calling them “baseless, malicious and untruthful”, he said as a believer of human rights, he has “never knowingly hurt another human being”.

The family court is hearing two cases — one filed by Khan for custody of their two children and another filed by Sultan for maintenance money for the children. The former couple announced their divorce in September and in her announcement, Sultan had accused him of “continuous physical and psychological violence” as well as “infidelity, blackmail and degradation”.

Sultan and Khan married in 2018 and share a son and a daughter together.

Comments

jsav12 Nov 24, 2022 12:09pm
Such awards have no meaning. Nothing lost in returning them.
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Abida Nov 24, 2022 12:30pm
Good decision by lux style awards
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NYS Nov 24, 2022 12:54pm
I have nothing to say short of words ....
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M. Saeed Nov 24, 2022 02:06pm
No merits in such awards and their promotions. We are not a nation that works for the promotion of true merits.
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Annie Nov 24, 2022 02:14pm
I don’t think an actor’s personal life has anything to do with awards or his career. No need to create a drama over his nomination.
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BeTolerant Nov 24, 2022 02:20pm
Although this issue needs to be highlighted, but there are already many forums for it. People like Iqra Aziz or Sharmeen are using the Awards for their own popularity. This issue is a personal matter between a couple and it should not affect the career of one or the other. If that had happened while at work, then it's a diffrtent matter. A person does not lose his job because he had a fight with his wife. It's a personal issue and dealt with in courts or at a personal level.
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nauman Nov 24, 2022 02:25pm
Chenoy , is she the same person who accused her sister's doctor of harrasement in the wake of facebook friend request ?
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M. Emad Nov 24, 2022 02:35pm
“baseless, malicious and untruthful” abuse allegations levied against Feroz Khan.
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Asif Nov 24, 2022 04:23pm
I 100% agree with Shirmeen on this. His name should have been taken off from the nomination.
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FAZ Nov 24, 2022 04:54pm
Has he bee formally charged by the courts or by the likes of Sharmeen chinoy?
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Dr. Salaria, Aamir Ahmad Nov 24, 2022 05:34pm
Freedom? What freedom?
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IRFAN Nov 24, 2022 05:50pm
What a drama, what a joke! So, from now on to be nominated, one has to be a pious husband! If that's the case then all actors in Hollywood and Bollywood should never be awarded or even nominated.
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Rubab Nov 24, 2022 06:33pm
Good decision by LSA management
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zarmeena azeem Nov 24, 2022 07:44pm
Obaid Chinoy should return all her rewards.
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Ed Nov 24, 2022 08:48pm
The court has not shared the verdict yet. He’s not proven guilty yet. This is a premature action and reaction from the media.
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Its me Nov 24, 2022 09:17pm
Take her reward back. What does she think about herself? She's nothing more than ordinary Pakistani to us.
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U T Nov 24, 2022 09:56pm
Are all actors sincere with their wives? how can one judge it?
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Sunshine Nov 24, 2022 10:24pm
Not guilty until proven. And even so, he deserves for work he did. Not for being a perfect husband. Personal and professional life has to be different. In that case, many of our male politicians, stars, celebs, sportmen, people in power, have been involved in corruption, had affairs, scandals, cheated or for that matter married surreptitiously, children out of wedlock, etc....outside their wife's knowledge; yet all is forgotten. Let's be fair. Leave it between them.
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Sunshine Nov 24, 2022 10:29pm
Sharmeen, you belong to the same film industry. Yet you don't realize that the award is for best actor category and how much talent is required to qualify for it. It is not for best spouse or father! Which actor in the west (or east) has not cheated on their partner? It is the norm there. Or been abusive. Let the law deal with them or punish them ONCE they are proven.
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MBA Nov 24, 2022 10:42pm
@BeTolerant Sorry. Violence is NOT a personal matter of a couple and violence is NOT tolrable also at home. Many women suffer and some of them also die because of this logic. You can BeTolerant in many cases, but not when health and lives of an significant part of our society is in danger.
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Tariq Choudry Nov 24, 2022 10:45pm
Has he been convicted through legal system or we just rely on people's justice.
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Arif Jan Nov 25, 2022 05:02am
Pakistan is, and will always be, a very hypocritical society.
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Irfan Huq Nov 25, 2022 08:34am
The violence that is shown in our TV drama is Onscene and deplorable. Everyone slaps the girl the father the mother the brother the Uncle , and pull the hair and treat them badly. Does anybody do anything about it because the violence starts from these places do they sancttion the writer the director. Thehippocrat
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