No second thoughts

Will Randamoozham get a second chance? Chances are less if the stance taken by M.T Vasudevan Nair is any indication. The veteran writer seems to be in no mood to relent. On Wednesday, his advocate conveyed to the Kozhikode First Class Additional Munsiff Magistrate Court that he was not interested in mediatory talks in the row over Randamoozham film script.

The Jnanpith Award-winning writer completed the script based on his acclaimed novel Randamoozham in which Bhima of The Mahabharata is the protagonist, for the movie with the same name. He handed over the script to director Sreekumar Menon for the 1,000-crore project, bankrolled by NRI business tycoon B.R Shetty, four years back. The contract was that the film should be materialised within three years. MT waited for four years and then approached the court to get his script back from Sreekumar Menon and Earth and Air Films Private Limited.

“Not a single step has been taken since the script was handed over. Hence there is no point in holding mediatory talks,” MT’s lawyer told media. Sreekumar Menon had told the court that the preliminary talks for the project were going on and the case should be settled at the earliest and that mediation talk was needed. When media broke the news of MT approaching court for getting back his script, Sreekumar Menon had flown down to Kozhikode and directly met the renowned writer, but to no avail.

The court had temporarily barred Menon and Earth and Air Films Private Limited from using of the script.

Randamoozham novel presents The Mahabharata through the eyes of Bhima. Superstar Mohanlal was cast in the role of Bhima and many stars of the Indian film industry were said to be roped in for the much-awaited project. As per the contract, MT had prepared the script both in Malayalam and English. B.R.Shetty had announced that the film would be made with or without the script of M.T. Vasudevan Nair.