Q: Some say bringing Mahatma Gandhi into your plot is a gimmick.

I wasn’t a huge Gandhian before making this film [Lage Raho Munna Bhai]. But I started reading up on him for this film. It required a helluva lot of research. That’s when I discovered this amazing man. His simple honest principles are eminently applicable today. Why do we wait for others to change the world? Why can’t you or I do it? I don’t claim to be anywhere near perfect. But I’ve strongly started believing in Gandhiji’s ideology. You know, I wasn’t scared of writing Munna Bhai MBBS. But writing Lage Raho, where I had to bring in Mahatma Gandhi, was scary. What saved Gandhiji and my film from getting stressed was the humour. You know, Gandhiji was a very humorous man…. But still I took a big risk in doing a film where Gandhi was a character.

Q:The actor who plays Gandhiji is being criticised for his makeup and mannerisms.

Several actors including Naseeruddin Shah were auditioned for Gandhi’s role. We had spoken to Naseer. He was interested. But he got busy with Krrish. Then there was his own directorial venture. Then we thought of Surendra Rajan who had played Gandhiji in Rajkumar Santoshi’s Legend Of Bhagat Singh. Surendra had played the sweeper in Munna Bhai MBBS. We finally zeroed in on this wonderful theatre and television actor Dilip Prabhavalkar for Gandhiji’s role. We sent Dilip’s pictures to the guy who had done Ben Kingsley’s makeup and he approved. Though Dilip had done his homework fully he couldn’t get it right on the first day. We then let him be. We told him to stop aping Gandhiji, just be himself because the attire was enough to suggest whom he was playing.

Q:The turning-the-other-cheek philosophy seems outdated….

But we honestly need to revise our ideological stance. Many incidents in my film have really happened. Take that scene where the uncouth man keeps repeatedly spitting outside the neighbour’s door and the neighbour decides to clean the spit repeatedly until the other man is shamed into stopping…that actually happened to my mother-in-law. A neighbour used to throw eggshells into her garden. A couple were in dispute about buying a flat because according to the expert it wasn’t the correct location by the rules of vastu shastra. After seeing the film the couple decided to give the vastu angle the slip. They’ve decided to go ahead and buy the flat. I don’t think the first film had this kind of impact. People are saying Lage Raho has gone far beyond MBBS. I’m not offering Gandhism as a full and final solution. But it’s better than the complete erosion of ideology in today’s society.

Q:Fine, you are good with the Munna Bhai series. But what beyond that?

I agree I really need to prove myself beyond the series. Otherwise my wellwishers will turn around and ask, ‘Can he do anything else?’ But, of course, Sanju, Arshad and I have a responsibility to carry forward the series. But Lage Raho… wasn’t a sequel. It’s an independent film. Thank God, critics saw this to be an original script. But I need to get away from these two guys. I must say Sanju and Arshad worked very hard. In MBBS they had a readymade script to rely on. Here the script went through changes right till the end. Sanju’s contribution was immense. He was really charged by the role. I do have a comfort level with Sanju and Arshad. And it would be stupid to let go. But at the same time it would be stupid to hold on to them for the sake of the comfort. But let me tell you I’m not scared of doing another sequel. When I did Munna Bhai MBBS they said comedies don’t run. When I did a sequel to MBBS they said sequels don’t run. Now they’ll say sequel kar sakta hai, par serious film nahin kar sakta hai. What to do? I’m really not worried about the next Munna Bhai film. I already see it in my mind.

Q: One group of people think Lage Raho trivialises the issues so seriously dealt with in Rang De Basanti.

The comparison is flattering, no matter how it’s made. I’m glad Rakeysh Mehra had the guts to do a film like Rang De Basanti. On paper it must have looked as scary as Lage Raho Munna Bhai. Any regular producer would’ve said, ‘Yeh kya hai, Gandhi aa jata hai?’ From the reactions I’ve got so far I’d say this film has gone much further than the earlier Munna Bhai film. People are talking in absolute superlatives. The response is overwhelming. It’s getting a standing ovation in theatres in the US. But just to assure those who think I’ll remain stuck with Munna Bhai, I’m doing a non-Munna Bhai film next. It’s a serious take on the education system and how it’s screwing up the kids.

EXTRA FREE

Rajkumar Hirani, is already planning a third film — “Yes, it’s true. As soon as we saw the final print of Lage Raho Munna Bhai my writer Abhijat Joshi and I hit on the idea of the next Munna Bhai film. Sanju has been after me to do a Munna Bhai film where I take Munna and Circuit to America. Once I had seen Sanju and Arshad in a golf cart in the US. They looked damn funny. These two guys, both bhais, being transported from one location to another in a golf cart. That’s when I joked to Sanju, what if we send Munna Bhai to America? It started as a joke. But now it’s serious.”