bollywood

Updated: May 19, 2017 10:42 IST

Actor Kangana Ranaut has landed herself in yet another controversy: Days after film writer-editor Apurva Asrani accused her of taking the “screenplay and dialogues’ credit” for Hansal Mehta’s Simran, filmmaker Ketan Mehta has now sent a legal notice to the Queen star for “hijacking” one of his most ambitious film projects, Rani of Jhansi: The Warrior Queen.

Kangana during the poster launch of Manikarnika.

Sources close to the filmmaker have revealed that he had spent around ten years researching for the movie.

“This is regarding my project called Rani of Jhansi: The Warrior Queen and her (Kangana’s) attempt and the producer Kamal Jain at hijacking the project. Since 2015, I was in contact with Kangana for the project. I was sharing research material and several drafts of the script with Kangana and she was actively participating,” Ketan told Hindustan Times.

“My legal notice says how we have worked on the project for two years and how all of a sudden everything happened. We have asked for the film (Manikarnika) to stop as we plan to go ahead with our project (Ketan’s film),” the filmmaker added.

He also said that he learnt of Krish’s Manikarnika only through newspapers and that he was shocked to see Kangana announcing Rani of Jhansi with another producer and director. Kangana being privy to all the documents and research material along with the script, has knowingly hijacked the project in collusion with producer Kamal Jain, he said.

Kangana performed Ganga Aarti at Varanasi during the poster launch of Manikarnika.

When asked if Kangana and Ketan had a fallout in March because the filmmaker wanted to make the film in English, he said, “No! This was a fabricated piece of news. The film was supposed to be bilingual - English and Hindi. We believed it is a story that needs to be told not just in India, but abroad as well. Rani of Jhansi is one of the most fascinating characters of human history.”

“Kangana introduced me to Mr Kamal Jain. We had an international producer and we were looking for an Indian co-producer. We had meetings with Mr Kamal where Kangana was also involved and we shared all the information. And then, suddenly, we hear about this project. It is completely unethical. And this was after we shared access to all our research material from past ten years,” he added.

Ketan is the maker of internationally acclaimed films like Mirch Masala, Sardar (on the life of Sardar Patel), Maya Memsaab, and Manjhi- The Mountain Man.

Ketan said that he had confirmation that Kangana has received the notice but has not heard from her or the producers.

Hindustan Times tried contacting Kangana’s manager, but there was no response.

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