Amitabh Bachchan once declined to get paid for playing an important role in a 2010-film which was inspired by the Kandahar Hijack.

Anubhav Sinha directed web series, IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack has been dominating the headlines lately. The web series features Naseeruddin Shah, Pankaj Kapur, Vijay Varma, Dia Mirza, and Arvind Swamy. The series is based on the true incident of an Indian passenger flight being hijacked by five Pakistani terrorists back in 1999. While the stellar performance of the cast left everyone in awe, the series received hate for meddling with the facts. Well, do you know that Amitabh Bachchan once did a film, based on the Kandahar, and that was also for free?

Amitabh Bachchan once worked on a film based on the Kandahar Hijack for free

In one of his blogs, Amitabh Bachchan talked about playing a role in a film, which was based on the Kandahar Hijack. Over the years, several movies have been made based on this incident, and one of these movies was the Malayalam film, Kandahar, which was released back in 2010, and was directed by Major Ravi. Amitabh Bachchan played the cameo role of ‘Lokanatha Sharma’ in the film.

Talking about the same, in one of his blogs, Big B mentioned that Mohanlal, who played a pivotal role in Kandahar, and the director, Major Ravi, came to his home to sign him for his role and make payments. Amitabh mentioned that he declined the payments as it was a three-day shoot with Mohanlal, whom he admired a lot. He penned how they spent the evening. Big B also added that the shoot would take place in Ooty’s picaresque background. Amitabh’s blog could be read as:

“They (Mohanlal and Ravi) had come over to officially sign me on and make payments etc.. Ha..!! Payments? Fees? Remuneration? For a guest appearance of three days? With Mohanlal who has always had my greatest admiration? No way !! I don’t charge money for such acts. Respectfully declined their offer, gave them some home-made tea, shook hands, embraced and saw them off. It will probably be shot in Ooty,the picturesque and quaint hill station in the beautiful Nilgiri Range of mountains down south.”

Abhishek Bachchan too played a role in a 2003 film which was inspired by IC 814 Hijack

Not only Amitabh but Abhishek Bachchan, too, once played a role in a film based on Kandhar Hijack back in 2003. The film, directed by Rohit Shetty, was named Zameen. And it also featured Bipasha Basu, Ajay Devgn, Pankaj Dheer and Amrita Arora in the important roles, while it was Rohit Shetty’s directorial debut as well.

Netflix representatives have been summoned for IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack

For the unversed, The Kandahar Hijack took place back in December 1999, by five Pakistani terrorists named Ibrahim Akthar, Shahid Akhtar Sayed, Sunny Ahmed Qazi, Zahoor Mistry, and Shakir. The terrorists asked for the release of their militants, who were captured in India, in exchange for the release of the Indian passengers of IC 814. Among the passengers, Rupin Katyal was stabbed to death, who was returning home with his newly married wife, Rachna, from their honeymoon.

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Well, as soon as the series was released on Netflix, it caused a stir for a lot of reasons, and what angered the viewers more was the fact that two of the terrorists in the series were named ‘Bhola’ and ‘Shankar’. And now, Netflix representatives have been summoned by the Ministry of Information and Broadcast to explain about why the series should continue airing.