Anurag Kashyap's unreleased debut film Paanch to hit the screens after 22 years, confirms producer

Anurag Kashyap made his directorial debut with the 2004 crime thriller Black Friday. However, he shot Paanch before that, which never saw the light of day.

Anurag Kashyap has directed 18 full-length feature films so far, but his first one remains unreleased to date. In an interview with Bollywood Hungama, Tutu Sharma, the producer of that film Paanch, dropped a happy news for Kashyap fans. (Also Read – Abhay Deol says Anurag Kashyap's Dev D glamourised alcohol and drug addiction: 'Idea was to call out toxic masculinity')

Paanch to release next year

“Paanch is definitely coming next year. I plan to release it in cinemas within six months. The film was banned and the negatives have slightly deteriorated. The process of restoring them has already started. As soon as it's ready, we’ll release Paanch,” confirmed Tutu Sharma.

“The issues (with the Central Board of Film Certification) were resolved. But then we faced some more challenges; hence, the film was lying on the cans. Also, the trend of re-runs is here now. So, one can imagine the potential of Paanch. That’s a very encouraging sign. Also, the times are such that such films are being watched, and they have an audience,” added Tutu.

The news comes a few days after the release of Anees Bazmee's Naam, starring Ajay Devgn, which had been in the cans since 2008. It finally saw the light of day in cinemas last week on November 22. Several hits of the 1990s and 2000s are also being re-released now amid much fanfare.

About Paanch

Loosely based on the 1976–77 Joshi-Abhyankar serial murders in Pune, Paanch is the first film Anurag served as a director on. Prior to that, he had written movies like Ram Gopal Varma's Satya (1998), Shool (1999), Kaun (1999), Sanjay Gupta's Jung (2000), and S Shankar's Nayak (2001). After the CBFC objected to Paanch's release due to its sensitive subject, abusive language, and violence, Anurag continued his career as a writer with Srinivas Bhashyam's Paisa Vasool and Mani Ratnam's Yuva in 2004. The same year, he finally debuted as a director with the crime thriller Black Friday, starring Kay Kay Menon.

Kay Kay also headlined the cast of Paanch, which also featured Aditya Srivastava, Vijay Maurya, and Tejaswini Kolahpure. Anurag's latest directorial, Kennedy, has also been awaiting release for a couple of years now.