First, the writer . Now the director Adipurush’s team seems to be keeping the Maharashtra police very busy. First, it was Manoj Muntashir Shukla who wrote all the street-friendly dialogues for Hanuman , and now the director Om Raut too is under police protection.
Apparently the producers of Adipurush are also likely to be provided with security.
But no one seems to know where the threat to these creative artistes is coming from. Sure, the audience is angry, and their anger is not misplaced.
Instead of tendering an unconditional apology for making a hash out of the Ramayan, the team seems to be on the offensive .
On Thursday and Friday the ticket rates for Adipurush were frozen at Rs 150 in many multiplexes across the country.
“But the audience won’t some to see something that has played with their religious sentiments even if you offer it for free,” says Moti Sagar whose father Ramanand Sagar immortalized The Ramayan on screen.
I remember speaking to the late Ramanand Sagar about his ceaselessly renewable series some years after its telecast on Doordarshan.
He had said, “Everything I had done before the Ramayan seemed like a waste of time after Ramayan. I was born to do this. The series was blessed by Shri Rama himself.”
I wonder what Ramanand Sagar would have to say about the Ramayan.