Brawllywood Nights!  
May 21, 2004

A It’s the hottest topic in Bollywood now. And not just because lesbianism is one more window for Bollywood to enter the bedroom. Fact is, two first-time directors — both making movies on the subject — are literally bitching about each other. Plagiarism is the charge... and counter-charge. 

Here’s how the script unfolds... 

MANISHA ALMADI  - ATTACK 
Shrey Shrivastava, director, Men Not Allowed, says: ‘‘Karan Razdan stole my script. He was aware of my script when he started his film Girlfriend. In fact, his leading actress Amrita Arora told me that Karan was making a film similar to mine. My film, slated for an August release, is about the love and bisexual relationship between two girls. It features Payal Rohatgi, who plays a rich girl; and Monica Castelinoa, who plays a girl with a traumatic childhood. The two girls get together because of bad experiences with men in the past. The USP of my film is that it’s a true-to-life story of two lesbian actresses. The film is not just about their sex lives but also about their emotions. Society is accepting lesbian relationships and the film won’t attract controversy. The audience will identify with this adult film, that has bold English and Hindi slang.’’ 

COUNTER - ATTACK 
Karan Razdan, director, Girlfriend, says: ‘‘Shrey stole my script. I had registered my script with the writer’s association — this shows he is riding piggyback on my script. He decided to copy my film when he learnt it was hot property for distributors. My film, slated for release on June 11, is very different from Shrey’s. In my film, Ishaa Kopikkar plays a lesbian who gets very possessive about Amrita Arora when this girl becomes close to Aashish Chowdhury. In Shrey’s film, both actresses play lesbians. Shrey looks like a chaprasi. He is a C-grade director who is gaining mileage and publicity through all this. It’s his only means of being in the news since he hasn’t even started shooting his film. When he asked Ashish Chowdhury, the hero of my film, to act in Men Not Allowed, Ashish told him: why should I do a film whose director can’t even make conversation?’’