Indira Gandhi Bio-pic With Vidya Balan Shelved

Vidya Balan’s  soaring ambition  to play  Mrs Indira Gandhi has crashlanded. Vidya Balan  was to play Mrs Gandhi in  a web series  to be produced  by  Vidya’s  husband Siddharth  Roy Kapur  It  was to be based on well-known  television journalist Sagarika  Ghosh’s critically acclaimed book on Mrs Gandhi.Three years after  the announcement,reliable sources say the  project has been called off.

“Making  biopics on controversial  political figures is  not conducive  to the current political climate. With  Kangana Ranaut playing Mrs Gandhi,it makes no sense for Vidya Balan  to go down that dangerous road,” a  source informs me.

This  is  not the first Indira  Gandhi bio-pic to be called off.

Manisha Koirala was  to  play  India Gandhi The project was launched on the occasion of the 85th birth anniversary of Indira Gandhi .Titled Indira Gandhi  A Tryst With Destiny, the film  was  to be produced by Nittin Keni   and directed by N Chandra.

  Script Writer Kamleshwar, who wrote the script for Aandhi(also based on  Mrs Gandhi, hence the rhyming title)  conceptualised the project for which Hridaynath Mangeshkar was  to  score the music.The film was  meant to be  a  biographical sketch of Indira Gandhi.  With a strong emphasis on objectivity. The film was  going to   concentrate not only on the political career of Indira but also her personal life.Manisha Koirala was so excited  about playing the  iconic Mrs G that  she even decided to get the shape  of her nose  altered. However  the  project, like many proposed  biopics on Mrs Gandhi before  and after, was  aborted.

The late filmmaker  Krishna Shah(of Shalimar  “fame”) also   approached Madhuri Dixit to  play  Mrs Gandhi.He met Madhuri in her home in Colorado  in 2009  and showed her the vast research that he had done. Nothing happened  thereafter.