Casting director Honey Trehan, who turned a feature film director with the Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Radhika Apte starrer Raat Akeli Hai (2020), has started working on his second project. Peepingmoon.com has exclusively learned that Trehan is next directing a human drama based on a true event that will star Diljit Dosanjh and Arjun Rampal in the lead roles. Ronnie Screwvala of RSVP Movies is producing this film along with Trehan and Abhishek Chaubey’s banner, MacGuffin Pictures, marking their third collaboration after the critically-acclaimed Sonchiriya and Raat Akeli Hai.
The film in question is said to be set during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and will see Diljit Dosanjh playing an activist. It’s a human story about an activist who fought for the victims and unravels an unsparing account, abounding with insights and revelations, of the 1984 mass killings and their aftermath. The details of the real activist that the film is based on have not been revealed yet, however. Arjun Rampal plays the second leading hero, but his character details have also been kept under wraps at this moment. The film has already gone on floors and is currently being shot at real locations in Amritsar.
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One of the darkest chapters in modern Indian history—the 1984 Sikh Genocide that claimed the lives of almost 3000 Sikhs within a period of three days—has been the subject of many films over the years. From Shonali Bose’s Amu (2005) and Shashi Kumar’s Kaya Taran (2004) to Vir Das’s 31st October and last year’s critically-acclaimed Disney+Hotstar series, Grahan, the harrowing days in Delhi during the riots have been the backdrop of many movies. Diljit himself has previously done Anurag Singh’s superhit Punjabi film Punjab 1984 (2014) based on the same subject, and is also doing a film with Ali Abbas Zafar which is also set in Delhi amid the politically organized riots that broke out after the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31st, 1984.
The Honey Trehan film will mark Diljit Dosanjh’s tenth Hindi film since he made his Bollywood debut in 2016 with Abhishek Chaubey’s Udta Punjab. The actor and singer also has a crime-comedy, Detective Sherdil, lined up for release this year. The Ravi Chhabriya directorial sees him playing a bumbling spy alongside Sumeet Vyas, Boman Irani, and Banita Sandhu. Arjun Rampal, meanwhile, has seven films coming up this year, which include Aparna Sen’s The Rapist with Konkona Sensharma, Abbas-Mustan’s Netflix film Penthouse with Bobby Deol, Lovers with Vidya Balan, and a period drama based on the battle of Bhima Koregaon.
