Gadar Casting Rumours: Was Govinda Supposed To Say, “Hindustan Zindabad Tha Hai Aur Rahega” Instead Of Sunny Deol? (Picture Credit: Instagram & IMDB)
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Sunny Deol and Ameesha Patel’s Gadar: Ek Prem Katha is having a glorious re-run in the theatres with audiences clapping, hooting, and mouthing dialogues in sync with the lead character Tara Singh. The re-release has been a promotional strategy before the sequel hits the screen on August 11. However, there were strong rumours that this was not the original cast for the film.
According to the rumored trivias, some reports say that Govinda and Kajol were the original cast for the film. While some reports also claim that the film was offered to the iconic pair of the 90s Govinda and Neelam one day, director Anil Sharma himself addressed these rumours.
In an interview, the director accepted the strong theories of Govinda being offered the film and then getting replaced by Sunny Deol. Even IMDb trivia mentions that Anil Sharma offered the film to Govinda, but after Maharaja flopped, he changed his mind and changed the cast for Gadar.
While talking to Siddharth Kannan, the director addressed these rumours in 2017 and said, “This is an outright lie. People talk. The truth of the matter is that I was working with Govinda on Maharaja. During Maharaja, I told him the story of Gadar. He perhaps misunderstood that I wanted to cast him in the film, and that’s how the rumours originated.”
Anil Sharma even mentioned how he had no other actor in mind for Gadar but Sunny Deol. “I would work with him (Govinda) in a heartbeat on not one but ten films, but I never wanted to do Gadar with him. Sunny Deol was the first and last choice for the central role.”
He was even asked about the role of Ameesha Patel’s Saqeena, which was first rumoured to be offered to Neelam and then Kajol. While the director denied approaching Neelam, he neither denied nor confirmed Kajol’s link to Gadar. However, he clarified, “I had approached several big actresses of the time; Neelam was definitely not one of them. They all had some problem or the other. Some didn’t like the story; others didn’t like us. Some had their own personal agendas; some didn’t want to do period films.”
For the unversed, Gadar: Ek Prem Katha is the love story of a Sikh Boy from India and a Muslim girl from Pakistan who marry each other under horrible circumstances and the backdrop of the India-Pakistan partition but develop a strong bond of love only to get separated later due to the strained relation between the two countries after the partition.
The film was said to be loosely inspired by a true story of Boota Singh, another strong rumour. Gadar 2 is all set to release in theatres on August 11 and is ready to face a triple clash with Ranbir Kapoor’s ANimal and Akshay Kumar’s Oh My God 2!
