Anil Ravipudi: “We Haven’t Cut Anything From Neekevvaru, We’ve Added A Scene”

Sarileru Neekevvaru  director Anil Ravipudi woke up to reports  on  Saturday morning that an entire  section of his  film was being edited out of the  film , as audiences  didn’t  approve of it.

Too amused to be angry Anil says, “This was  news to me. I had not heard a single person complain about about that sequence in the train with Mahesh Babu, Bandla Ganesh , Rashmika, etc being  boring . In fact if you see the film with the audience they’re seen to be falling off their chairs laughing in that sequence. The audience didn’t want it to end.”

Anil completely repudiates  the report of the lengthy sequence  being chopped off  . “On the contrary  , we  added approximately two  minutes more to  the 45-minute  sequence. That train sequence  was already 45 minutes so we had edited it by a bit. Now seeing  the positive reaction to  the  sequence we are adding a few minutes more to the train sequence where Rao Ramesh will be featured.By  spreading lies about our film some section are  trying to downsize its success. It won’t work.Our film in unstoppable.”

So where  are such negative rumours coming from?

Anil shrug. “I am not pointing fingers at anyone. But  anyone smart enough can see who stands  to gain from such irresponsible talk. We are not at all afraid  of competition. We welcome healthy  competition. Every successful film is reason to celebrate.”

Anil Ravipudi is  overjoyed by the  public response  to Sarileru Neekevvaru. “We had worked hard , wrapped up the  shooting in  about three months in spite  of fifteen days  in Kashmir.This was the first time I  was  directing Mahesh Babu. I had earlier written Aagadu which starred Mahesh Babu. But we hardly had a chance to inteact then. Now after directing him in Sarileru Neekevvaru we’ve hit it off so well.Yes, I will be doing another  film with Mahesh Babu shortly, though not  the  next one , maybe the one  after that when he will have  dates for me.”

Anil  looks back at  the Kashmir stint  with  joy and priede. “We shot without any problem. All the local people of Kashmir , the army and security personnel were so supportive. I can’t wait to  get back to shoot there.”