New Delhi: Director Prakash Jha says male gaze is thoroughly permitted in the Indian society and while cinema cannot bring about a change, he believes it can help in keeping important issues alive.

Talking about his last production "Lipstick Under My Burkha", Jha said he found the "female gaze" of the script unique but had to fight hard with the censor board for its release. "Male gazing in our society is thoroughly permitted...

From a male's point of view, everything is permitted. Values, systems, stalking... A male can stalk a woman in movies and in stories. But here a female wanted to stalk. Here a female wanted to look at the issue from a female gaze and the story looked so different," Jha said while speaking at the World Congress of Mental Health.

Recalling his tussle with the censor board over the film, Jha said he was even ready to release it on the Internet for free but thankfully the film was cleared by Film Certificate Appellate Tribunal.

"Society always looks for change, for the breathing space. It is a process, I don't know that society will suddenly start looking at things from a female point of view but there is one more world which is coming in somebody's story, music and writing," he said.

Jha said he loves cinema because it can throw light on some of the burning issues of the society. "I don't really think that films can bring about a real social change. I haven't seen that happening since the medium was invented. But it is a strong medium to keep issues under discussion. It is a very strong medium

"... The incidents of rape will not stop if we make a movie on it. The behaviour will not change. But we must constantly keep talking about it so that people don't put issues under the carpet. That's what films do and that's why I do it and continue to do it," he said.