Another Mahabharata

Author Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s bestselling novel The Palace Of Illusions may soon be adapted for the big screen by producer N.R. (Babloo) Pachisia, who’s made films like Son Of Sardar and Zameen in the past. We hear that Pachisia has bought the filming rights to the book that presents the Mahabharata from Draupadi’s point of view, and he’s likely to join hands with Dipankar Jojo Chaki, who’s been associated with recent films like Garbage and Sonata.

“The Palace Of Illusions is a very interesting novel, and it’s based on the Mahabharata. It comes as a bit of a surprise that it’s being made into a single film, considering Aamir Khan was thinking of making a three-part film series on the epic,” says a trade source.

It is reported that Anand Neelakantan, who has penned some fictional work related to the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, has been roped in to turn the novel into a movie script.

If the project takes off, it will be Divakaruni’s second book to be turned into a movie. In 2005, filmmaker Gurinder Chadha and her husband Paul Mayda Berges had adapted the author’s Mistress Of Spices into a film starring Aishwarya Rai Bachchan.

— Sanskriti Media

HT07