Veteran film maker Shyam Benegal on Monday slammed those who returned their awards and said that if a person was given an award by a country, he should return it only if he had nothing to do with the nation.

Speaking to reporters here, the seven-time national award winning director spoke on a wide range of issues including the FTII controversy and censorship in films.

"Ours is not a monolithic country and we need to be tolerant and accepting the idea of inclusiveness, which means one has to develop a sense that your neighbour is as well a human being like you," he said.

Stressing that there have been instances of intolerance in the country, citing the murder of Kalburgi and the UP beef killing, and the growing need to fight it, Benegal however said he was not favour of returning awards, terming the sequence of events an 'epidemic'.

"A national award is given by the country, and the government is just an elected lot. Returning the awards now does not make any sense. Dissent can be expressed in other ways, politically," he said.

Commenting on the strike at FTII where he twice served as the chairman, Benegal said that the students should have demanded for a meeting with the chairman instead of staging a series of protests. He reiterated that he did not justify or unjustify the appointment of Gajendra Chauhan.

"The chairman is selected by the ministry of broadcasting and information on the basis of his/her experience in the film industry, their credentials and capability of understanding and helping to develop an academic institution. The students there believe that the incumbent (Chauhan) is a political nominee of the ruling party, which I personally don't believe. In fact they don't have to deal with the chairman directly, they only have to do with the director of the institute. Yet if they believe he is not capable, they should have asked for a meeting with the designated chairman and put forward their apprehension and get him to answer them. That has not taken place in the present situation, and the problem is yet to be resolved," he said.