MUMBAI: After claims by a mumbai-based writer that the entire story of ‘Jannat 2’ is plagiarised, now another reputed filmmaker is in legal trouble.
Screenplay-script writer, Danish Raza claims that Ram Gopal Varma’s ‘Department’ was inspired from his script, and now the director has completely forgotten about him. Raza says, that sometime in June-July 2010, one Neeraj Sharma from Ramu’s office contacted him to write the screenplay of ‘Department’.
"I met them, they looked at some of my scripts, liked my work and asked me to start work on the film. I started with the draft of the story and after many meetings sent the first draft on July 19, 2010, which was okayed. I further started work on the screenplay. Ramu worked on some scenes and we had a discussion like the normal creative process. My fee was fixed but all along, I kept asking for the contract. But they kept dilly-dallying. As a result, I stopped work and they sent me a soft copy of the contract via mail. Now I felt that they will sign the contract and I kept waiting for the hard copy which never happened and they stopped taking my calls," said Danish to the press.
"In Feb 2011, Neeraj told me that Department was shelved due to fund issues and that Ramu had got busy with his next project, ‘Not A Love Story’. I stopped pursuing for my payment since I felt it was now futile and I left for Delhi for my other project. But later, I saw that the promos and stills of the movie were out. I came back to Mumbai and filed a police complaint. I have got all the evidence, copies of all the mails exchanged and contract mails they sent me. Then I have also got the hard copy of the script with corrections in Ramu’s handwriting," the writer added.
A leading daily reports, that Ram Gopal Varma claims to have never heard of this writer. "I am busy mixing these days. I don’t have the memory of coming across any such person. I meet at least five writers everyday. I have no idea, my office deals with all this," said the film-maker.
Raza has filed a police complaint of fraud against Ram Gopal Varma on May 7 for not paying him his dues for the film.
