Kangana Ranaut on Friday announced on her X handle that she is sad that her debut directorial film “Emergency” will not be released on September 6 as it is still awaiting approval from the Central Board of Film Certification. The actress-filmmaker, who plays former prime minister Indira Gandhi in the period political thriller based on the 1975 Emergency, said the Sikh community has objected to their portrayal in parts of her film. Meanwhile, a web series on Indira Gandhi, starring Vidya Balan, has also been stalled.

Indira Gandhi’s series was also banned

Much before Kangana Ranaut started working on the film ‘Emergency’, in 2018, Vidya Balan had bought the writers of journalist Sagarika Ghose’s 2017 book ‘Indira: India’s Most Powerful Prime Minister’. Vidya said that it was her long-time dream to play the character of Indira Gandhi on screen. Her husband Siddharth Roy Kapur was the producer under his banner Roy Kapur Films. In an interview given to Firstpost in 2019, Vidya revealed some things about this web series. The actress had told that instead of a film, a web series was being planned on Indira Gandhi and it was to be directed by Ritesh Batra of ‘Lunchbox’ fame.

Why did Vidya Balan not become Indira Gandhi?

Vidya Balan had said, ‘Making a web series on Indira Gandhi is taking more time than I expected. We are rewriting the script according to the web and soon these stories will come to me. Web is a different kind of game, so it takes more time.’ Vidya said, ‘Even five years ago, many people had offered me this role, but I told them that I could not do a film until you get permission for release, but making a web is very easy. The government may hardly allow it to be released or you may have to wait a long time for release.’

Vidya Balan got the offer of Thalaivi

In the same interview, Vidya revealed why she turned down the opportunity to play former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa in ‘Thalaivi’, a biopic directed by AL Vijay. She said that since she was already set to play Indira Gandhi on screen, she did not want to play two political figures of the same age who are so close to each other.

Kangana Ranaut became J Jayalalithaa

However, Kangana Ranaut played both Jayalalithaa in 2011’s ‘Thalaivi’ and Indira Gandhi in ‘Emergency’. Emergency is co-produced by Zee Studios and Kangana’s Manikarnika Films.