Bollywood actor Rani Mukherjee announced her comeback to Bollywood with the new movie “Hichki”. She had taken a break from the world of films after the birth of her daughter Adira, and is now back after a gap of over 3 years. While the trailer of the movie which focuses on Tourette’s Syndrome, has received rave reviews, it appears now it has found it self in a controversy over plagiarism.
Nishant Kaushik is an author and novelist, having written books such as “A Romance with Chaos” and “My Father is a hero”. After seeing the trailer of the movie, which is directed by Director Siddharth Malhotra, Kaushik took to twitter to vent his thoughts. In a series of tweets he alleged that the movie seemed to have similarities with a project he had worked on.
He claimed that director Malhotra had approached him in March 2015 for writing a story, based on a one-line brief. He claims that he worked on it for over a month, developing characters, motives, plotlines, and a story synopsis. He then emailed the material to Malhotra, and waited for a response.
He did not get any communication, in spite of reminders and assumed that either the project had stalled or the work was not good enough. Now, on seeing the trailer, he claims that he found the storyline similar to his work. The protagonist had the same speech disorder and other nuances too, which he clarifies he cannot claim an exclusive right to, but are “undoubtedly similar” to the ones he portrayed.
He also put out screenshots of his email communications with Malhotra, and claimed that he had all the communication on record. He reiterated that he does not claim that the story of the movie is his, but feels cheated for not even having been acknowledged by the Director.
His full set of tweets:
Copies of emails etc as shared by Kaushik:
Even as the movie faces allegations from Kaushik, reports have also emerged that the trailer bears striking similarities to a 2008 English film ‘Front of the Class’ which was about a boy with Tourette’s syndrome who overcomes criticism to achieve his dream of becoming a teacher. That movie in turn is based on a true story of American motivational speaker, teacher, school administrator, and author Brad Cohen. Wonder when the truth of this story will come out.
