Seema Pahwa and Naseeruddin Shah on the sets of 'Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi'; the 'Pagglait' poster
If you have watched both Seema Pahwa's directorial debut Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi and Umesh Bist's Pagglait, you cannot ignore the uncanny resemblance. While Seema Pahwa's film released in theatres on January 1, 2021 after its premiere at the Jio MAMI Film Festival in October 2019, Pagglait went on floors just a month after, on November 2019. Since there has been chatter about the similarities of both films, we asked Seema Pahwa if she watched Pagglait and what she thought about it.
"Also, I felt that because the film was shot after us and by then a lot of people had already watched Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi, they knew the concept already, so I felt bad because maybe they could have tweaked the script a little but they chose to ignore it. I don't know the reason behind it, but maybe it's possible that they had gone way ahead with the script and even after watching our film they didn't feel the need to make any kind of changes," she said.
Bringing up the fact that both films were shot at the same location, Pahwa added, "Or maybe they felt that there were no similarities. But, similarities get even more prominent when the location where the film is shot is the same, because they shot the film in the same house where we shot Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi. But, there are many coincidences like this, so I guess we can consider the fact that they have a similar thought process as us."
When we asked if she would want to have a conversation with Pagglait's director Umesh Bist or producer Guneet Monga this is what Pahwa had to say.
Naseeruddin Shah on the sets of 'Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi'
While she refuses to do anything about it, Seema Pahwa says she does feel cheated with the whole thing.
"Now, this film (Pagglait) is coming on Netflix so now the audience who has seen Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi will watch Pagglait and decide. People who have watched both the films will understand themselves, because my film released way ahead, so naturally it's not copied. So let's see how the audience reacts," she concludes.
Pahwa's directorial Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi stars an ensemble cast of Naseeruddin Shah, Vikrant Massey, Konkona Sen Sharma, Vinay Pathak, Supriya Pathak, Manoj Pahwa, and Vineet Kumar. It follows the story of a family that gathers for the customary 13-day period after Ramprasad's death and situations that then arise.
We reached out to the makers of Pagglait for a reaction, however they refused to comment.
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