Although the director of the film Nandita Das earlier commented how she was working to have her film, the Nawazuddin Siddiqui starrer Manto release in Pakistan. The chairperson Federal Censor Baord  Danyal Gillani in his talks to Dawns clears that  no importer had approached the board for clearance for the film yet.“There are many importers of movies in Pakistan. Difficult to tell offhand what are their thoughts about a specific movie,” said Danyal Gillani. Nadeem Mandviwalla of Atrium Cinema also said that nothing regarding the release of Manto has been yet  confirmed by any distributor and the movie is not showing in the coming sections of any leading cinemas in Pakistan including Nueplex and Cinepax.