Hiren Kotwani (BOMBAY TIMES; January 6, 2018)

Ever since the release of Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Padmavati (now Padmavat) was deferred from December 1, 2017, speculations have been rife about the film possibly coming to cinemas on January

26. However, the Republic Day weekend has already been blocked in advance for R Balki’s Pad Man starring Akshay Kumar and Neeraj Pandey’s Aiyaary starring Sidharth Malhotra and Manoj Bajpayee.

Though Viacom18 Motion Pictures, the studio behind Bhansali’s film, hasn’t officially announced its new date, we reached out to the teams of Pad Man and Aiyaary to check if they would consider moving their films, in case Padmavat also plans to release on the same day.

While no one from Sony Pictures Entertainment was willing to speak on record for Padman, a source said, “On January 4, Akshay announced on social media that this film is releasing on January 25. So there is no question of changing the date.” Director Neeraj Pandey recently said that they always wanted to release Aiyaary on January 26 because it’s about army men. So, it’s unlikely that they would shift the film release to another date. However, Jayantilal Gada, one of the producers of Aiyaary, told BT, “Let there be an official announcement from Padmavat makers, then we will see. We are three partners on Aiyaary — Reliance Entertainment, Neeraj’s production house and my company. If Padmavat announcement happens over the weekend, we will meet on Monday and discuss our course of action."