Ram Gopal Varma is in an intense battle with T-Series at the moment and it may affect the release of his latest film, Sarkar Raj. Bhushan Kumar of T-Series, has filed a criminal complaint against RGV stating that the director has made false allegations against the company where he says that the agreement they signed with him was forged.
This whole controversy started in 2006 when RGV assigned audio and video home rights to 14 of his next releases, including Sarkar Raj, to T-Series. T-Series payed 50 lakhs as the first payment. Since the agreement was made, RGV has had three releases (Shiva, Darwaja Band Rakho, and RGV Ki Aag) and T-Series has paid for the promotion of all these films and these payments were acknowledged by RGV. But after all of the aforementioned films bombed at the box office, T-Series wanted to renegotiate the terms of the agreement. T-Series and RGV mutually agreed for a downward revision of the consideration amount for his upcoming films and settled the past films within the agreement on an already incurred basis. T-Series then went on to spend about 1.40 crores for the publicity of RGV Ki Aag. Out of this amount, 50 lakhs was adjusted towards consideration for RGV Ki Aag, 50 lakhs towards consideration for Sarkar Raj, and 40 lakhs to be adjusted on account for future films that RGV would be produce. Then totally from left field, RGV allegedly terminated the agreement stating that the documents that were shown by T-Series were forged and they did not own the music and video rights for his films.
This move by RGV angered Bhushan Kumar. He said to a newspaper, “Media has been writing things that are untrue. First of all, T-Series office was not raided, in fact it was me who had called the forensic experts to check our documents and give their verdict. They have already checked it and have declared them as authentic. Thus I have filed a suit against RGV as he had called them forged. He is trying to terminate our agreement for 46 lakhs! We are making films with Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan which are bigger banners than Ramu’s! He was the first to cry foul and seek legal intervention and if he is willing to do it so are we. His films didn’t even do well, its just that he is banking a lot on Sarkar Raj and thinks it will help him make money like never before, has got greedy and now wants to sell the rights for bigger money, which is why he is terminating the contract signed with us!”
As for Sarkar Raj’s delay, Bhushan Kumar went on to say, “It will definitely be delayed because we will not let the film release before our issue is resolved! The film was to release in April but now it may see the light of day in July!”
Now for those not in the know, Sarkar Raj has been tentatively scheduled for release on June 6th as part of the IIFA weekend. But if this issue is not resolved, then the film just may be delayed to a later date. Let us hope for everyone’s sake that this issue gets resolved quickly and the film gets a clean release!
