I always find it very strange the tendency of people to emphasise on whose idea it is rather than the idea itself.

I for one have been credited many times for innovative ideas and also discovering so many talents both in actors and technicians. But did it occur to anyone what I might have thought about those ideas and the talents at that point of time?

The fact is that I never thought anything of anybody or anything or thought everything of everybody and every thing. The only reason I took Anurag Kashyap in Satya was nothing to do with my perception of his talent, but it was because he was the first writer to approach me after I decided to make that film. And later on he got Saurabh Shukla to join in as a co-writer. Why I credited Saurabh Shukla’s name first in the titles of satya was because he was older in age than Anurag.

People thought Anurag was the main guy among the two because I continued to work with Anurag and not Saurabh. The reason I did that was because Saurabh got married and he did not have as much time as Anurag to hang out with me.

Similarly I did not think that Shimit Amin was more talented than Prawal Raman just because Shimit made Ab Tak Chappan and Prawal made Gayab. On the contrary I believe that given the material of Ab Tak Chappan Prawal would have made a better film and given the material of Gayab Shimit would have made it worse.

I made Satya and Daud back-to-back at the same time. So who is the real me? Anurag writes “Satya” and “Main Aisa Hi Hoon” and makes “Black Friday” and No Smoking”. So who is the real Anurag?

Likewise why would Rakesh Mehra make “Aks” first and “Rang De Basanti” next? Why did Ashutosh waste his time and talent on “Baazi” before he could make a “Lagaan” and why were Yashraj making blockbusters last year and failures this year?

The fact is that each and every one of us here are as good or bad as the material we take up at that particular time. The rest of the hype is in the media’s, the industry’s and the audiences mind. Fair enough the material I or anyone picks up surely is an individual choice but without knowing what factors affected that choice at that particular time, one cannot take it for granted that someone is very talented. That is just being ignorant about what goes behind the making of a film.

In effect I am saying if Anaurag came to me for Daud, we would have made as bad a film and if some other writer was in Satya it would have been as good. I am not taking away the credit off him or Saurabh’s or Sandeep Chowta’s or the various actors and technicians of that film. All I am saying is that we all shined because of the material I picked up by chance and ‘chance’ is the operative word here. If I precisely knew what material to pick up why would I be also making bad films?

And what did all those actors and technicians of the film do before and since Satya released 10 years back? All you have to do is to list down the works of Anurag, Saurabh, Manoj Bajpai, Sandeep Chowta, Mazhar Kamran the cameraman etc including myself for you to see my point.

In Satya an idea just fell in place. Every one connected should just be happy with it and forget it, and be thankful that nobody realizes that a good film or a bad film can happen as random as that.

To Be Continued.....