Subhash K Jha (DNA; January 9, 2015)

Manoj Bajpayee is all set to get in bed with another man to do justice to his role of a gay professor in Hansal Mehta’s Aligarh, which is expected to be the first mainstream Hindi film to feature a full-fledged homosexual lovemaking scene.

Aligarh is about Srinivas Ramchandra Siras, a real-life professor whose service was terminated weeks before his retirement, after being caught on camera making love to another man.

Says a source close to the project, “This scene would be filmed and not simply suggested on screen. Manoj, who plays Prof. Srinivas, is a brave and fearless actor. He had no qualms about doing the scene.”

Says Hansal, “Manoj will go by the requirement of the script. But the conviction to do what has to be done must come from within. When I was shooting for Shahid, it was Rajkummar Rao who suggested that he strip down to his bones for an interrogation scene.”

The director feels Aligarh would be his toughest film to date. “We have Article 377 and that means every act of homosexual love-making is criminal. To make a film about an academic who was gay is not an easy task. You’ve to constantly remind audiences that though teachers are supposed to set an example, they are, at the end of the day, only human.”