Persecuted for art, then and now

Filmmaker Ketan Mehta’s ambitious project Rang Rasiya has been in the cans for over a year now...

Filmmaker Ketan Mehta’s ambitious project Rang Rasiya has been in the cans for over a year now. However, after receiving accolades at the London Indian Film Festival, the biopic based on controversial painter Raja Ravi Varma, will be finally be released this September.

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Mehta says, “The film charts Raja Ravi Varma’s life, from his early days in Kerala to his time in British Bombay where he made his fortune.”

Randeep Hooda, who plays the painter, feels Varma’s life was similar to MF Husain’s.

He says, “Both were persecuted for their art and then made to sound like heroes posthumously. It is sad that when they are alive, society makes them go through hell and then celebrate them after they are gone. Things are the same even after 100 years. So how far have we really come?”