Salman Khan’s Bharat: The real facts about this hush-hush project

Bharat is going to be Salman Khan’s patriotic pitch in the Indian market. According to sources, the film whose plot premise is based on the successful Korean film Ode To My Father, will pitch Salman in the same mould as Manoj Kumar’s Bharat and the characters that Akshay Kumar has been playing in his recent films on socially relevant themes.

Says a friend of Salman, “The whole idea behind doing Ode To my Father with Salman is to pitch him as the face of India. If you’ve seen the original film it features the Korean hero (Hwang Jung-min) as he goes through the various phases in Korean history. The entire Korean film is being re-written in the context of Indian history. Salman’s character will be seen going through various phases in the history of India, from the Partition of the country to present day.”

This is Salman’s most ambitious and most expensive home production being produced by his brother-in-law Atul Agnihotri and directed by Salman’s current favourite Ali Abbas Zafar. The original choice Kabir Khan is no longer a part of the project. The budget being put aside for what promises to the Superstar’s career-defining image-changing role is around Rs. 200 crores, give or take another Rs. 10 crores.

Salman in what is going to be the biggest challenge of his career will do prosthetics for the first time. “His character starts at the age of 18-19 and then goes through the different chapters of our history piece by piece. Every episode will require a different look. Salman who hates prosthetics has agreed to it just this once. After all you didn’t get to play ‘Bharat’ every day,” says the source.