DNA (August 24, 2018)

Producer Ajay Devgn decided to wait for director Pradeep Sarkar to fully recover from dengue before resuming the film’s post-production Last week (August 16), After Hrs reported how director Pradeep Sarkar took special leave from the hospital to shoot Amitabh Bachchan’s cameo for his upcoming Kajol-starrer, Helicopter Eela. The latest news is that the release of the movie, also starring Bengali actor Riddhi Sen, has now been rescheduled from September 7 to October 12.

A few days before the shoot, Sarkar was diagnosed with dengue and was admitted to a hospital in suburban Mumbai. However, since Big B had, much in advance, given the date of August 14 to shoot his portions, the director had to leave the hospital midway. Producer Ajay Devgn’s team had ensured that an ambulance and a doctor were kept on standby at the Andheri studio premises, where Sarkar was shooting. Since Ajay was not in town, Kajol was present on the set to ensure that everything went smoothly as the director wanted. After shooting Bachchan’s scenes, Sarkar, who still had the IV drip needle inserted, went back to the hospital. He was discharged yesterday (August 23) and has been advised a week’s rest.

Keeping Sarkar’s health in mind, the actor-producer reportedly decided to shift the movie’s release date. A source associated with the film tells us, “Ajay doesn’t want the post-production of the movie to go on without Pradeep dada around. He wants the director to complete the film as per his vision. Ajay is ready to wait for Dada to be fit enough so he can himself oversee the last stages of post-production. So, he decided to defer the release to October 12.”