The recently released film Kesari Chapter 2, starring Akshay Kumar, R. Madhavan, and Ananya Panday, has come under fire after poet and YouTuber Yahya Bootwala accused the makers of copying lines from his original work without permission.
Bootwala took to Instagram to share a video comparing a scene from the film with a clip of him reciting his poem titled Jallianwala Bagh, which was published five years ago on the UnErase Poetry YouTube channel. The film scene features Ananya Panday delivering lines that closely resemble Bootwala’s original writing.
In a strongly worded post addressed to the film’s dialogue writer, Sumit Saxena, Bootwala wrote:
"So @nisoooooooooorg sent me a clip 4 days back from the movie Kesari 2 of dialogues he felt were copied from my poem... Here are the two clips and honestly, this is a clear copy-paste and it’s not like they’ve tried to hide it as well, matlab phusphusana jaisa shabd bhi uthaya hai" (They have even lifted words like phusphasana).
He went on to say:
"As writers, the worst thing you can do to a fellow writer is pick their material up and use it without giving credit."
Bootwala urged his followers to tag producer Karan Johar, director Karan Singh Tyagi, and actors Akshay Kumar and Ananya Panday, in hopes of getting their attention. In a cheeky comment, he also invited Johar to contact him directly if he ever needs original dialogues for future films.
Despite the controversy, Kesari Chapter 2 has been doing well at the box office, reportedly earning over Rs 50 crore in its first eight days.
Directed by Karan Singh Tyagi and produced by Dharma Productions, the film is a courtroom drama based on the life of C. Sankaran Nair, a lawyer who stood up to the British Raj following the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919. Akshay Kumar plays Nair, with R. Madhavan as British barrister R. Neville McKinley, and Ananya Panday as Dilreet Gill, a young lawyer.