The trailer of The Accidental Prime Minister — an upcoming political biography film starring Anupam Kher as former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh — courted controversy on Saturday with reports of the Congress-led Madhya Pradesh government mulling a ban on the film. Earlier, the Maharashtra Youth State Congress had issued a letter to the film’s producers demanding a special screening and threatened to move court if denied an audience.
The letter accused the makers of playing with facts and misrepresenting Manmohan Singh and former Congress president Sonia Gandhi. On social media, the film was slammed as propaganda when the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) shared the trailer through its official handle.
Directed by Vijay Ratnakar Gutte, The Accidental Prime Minister is based on Sanjaya Baru’s 2014 autobiographical book of the same. Baru served as Manmohan Singh’s media advisor and chief spokesperson during his dual-term as Prime Minister between 2004 to 2014. In his book, Baru alleged that Singh was never in total control of his cabinet or the PMO’s office and that he fell prey to the Congress’s internal dynasty politics.
Reacting to the uproar against his film, Anupam Kher rejected the Maharashtra Youth Congress’s demand for a special screening of his film. He said at a press conference in Mumbai, “Our film is based on a book that has been in the public domain since the last four years. If anyone had problems with the facts of the story, they should have raised an issue against it earlier. The book is not written by an outsider but by someone who was very close to Manmohan Singh and served as his media advisor.”
Rejecting the Maharashtra Youth Congress’s demand for a special screening, Kher retorted, “No, why should we have a special screening? What’s the point of the censor board then? The only person I’d do it for is Manmohan Singh. We have portrayed him with respect in the film. You will fall in love with him after watching the film.”
The 63-year-old actor also hailed his performance in the film as his best one ever and lamented that while political films made in foreign countries end up winning Oscars, in India they are targetted by controversies. “Daniel Day-Lewis won an Oscar for Lincoln, so did Ben Kingsley for Gandhi. I considered The Accidental Prime Minister to be the best work of my career. I have worked hard on this role and given it my best. But instead of gathering praise, I have to sit around addressing everyone’s objections.”
The Accidental Prime Minister also stars Akshay Khanna as Sanjaya Baru and Suzanne Bernert as former Congress president Sonia Gandhi. The film is scheduled to release on January 11, 2019.