Akshay Kumar’s Tasveer release not on schedule

Akshay Kumar’s forthcoming Tasveer 8x10 might not hit the screens as scheduled on April 3 as one of the co-producers plans to sue the other over a cheque-bouncing case.

Akshay Kumar’s forthcoming Tasveer 8x10 might not hit the screens as scheduled on April 3 as one of the co-producers plans to sue the other over a cheque-bouncing case.

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Super Cassettes Industries (T-Series) claims that co-producer of the film Percept Picture Company (PPC) has defaulted a payment.

On August 28, 2008, the two firms had entered into a co-production agreement to jointly produce the movie. T-Series had also got the sole music rights of the Nagesh Kukunoor film, which stars Akshay Kumar, Ayesha Takia and Sharmila Tagore.

But on March 4, the two companies signed another agreement according to which T-Series could opt out of the project and withdraw 50 per cent of the total agreed cost, if PPC paid them on time through post-dated cheques.

Though PPC honoured the first payment of Rs 50 lakh, the second and final amount of Rs 6.67 crore, which was paid by a post-dated cheque (No: 897813 HDFC Bank, Worli Branch), bounced on Thursday.

Consequently, T-Series re-entered as co-producers of the movie and asked the laboratory to stop delivery of the prints and negatives till further notice in writing.

Vinod Bhanushali, president (marketing, promotion and publishing) T-Series, said they were suing PPC in the Delhi High Court.

“In the best interests of our company, we’ll take the legal route to recover our dues from PPC. We’ll be proceeding with two cases.. one for the cheque bouncing and the other to stall the release till our dues are cleared,” he said, adding that they will be stalling the promotion and publicity on satellite television channels.

Navin Shah, CEO of PPC, claimed this was not true. “This is news to us. There’s nothing like that. Whenever a big film is releasing, the rumour machinery works overtime.”

But Bhanushali refuted Shah’s statements. “We’re protecting the interests of the company and our lawyer Amit Sibal is already working on the paperwork,” he said.