Why did Amitabh Bachchan & Madhuri Dixit never do a film together?

There are various reasons why films get shelved. But why did three which were to bring Amitabh Bachchan and Madhuri Dixit together, fail to take off? The first of these projects was Bandua which JP Dutta was to direct in 1989. The film never went beyond the mahurat shot.

To this day when I ask my friend JP Dutta about why Bandua never got made he retorts, “Ask Mr Bachchan about it.”

The late Rituparno Ghosh wanted to cast Mr Bachchan as Satyajit Ray and Madhuri as Ray’s muse Madhabi Mukherjee. But there was a fear of the Ray family taking offence. Ritu dropped the project.

Another director Somnath Sen, who made Leela with Dimple Kapadia, offered to bring Mr Bachchan and Ms Dixit together. The project never took off.

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Some dream pairs aren’t meant to be.

This is not the first top-notch pair that has refused to work together. What about Dilip Kumar and Sadhana, or Sharmila Tagore and Raj Kapoor, or Mala Sinha and Dilip Kumar? It is no coincidence that these pairs never happened, all thanks to the Great Indian Male Ego. Somewhere these heroines refused to play up to the heroes or maybe chose to be chummy with other rival heroes. Sharmila Tagore was never known to flatter her heroes whereas Raj Kapoor liked his leading ladies to pamper his ego.

Meena Kumari and Raj Kapoor, both topnotch actors of the 1950s never worked together except in Sharda where she played the woman who married Raj’s father. Raj Kapoor and Waheeda Rehman only in Teesri Kasam, the biggest flop of Kapoor’s career.

Mr Bachchan’s other shelved projects include Ek Tha Chandar Ek Thi Sudha with Jaya Bhaduri based in Dharamvir Bharati’s acclaimed novel Gunahon Ka Devta. Subhash Ghai had launched his very ambitious Devaa with Mr Bachchan. It didn’t go beyond the mahurat. Amitabh Bachchan and Sharmila Tagore began shooting for Basu Chatterjee for a film that was shelved after the first schedule.

JP Dutta was twice unlucky with Amitabh Bachchan. After Bandua failed to take off he wanted to cast Mr Bachchan as Bahadur Shah Zafar. But before this dream could turn into a reality the junior Bachchan’s Umrao Jaan with his future wife Aishwarya Rai bombed. Dutta shelved all plans of doing another costume drama.

Come to think of it, Mr Bachchan hardly ever did any costume drama in his career, except Shashi Kapoor’s disastrous Ajooba.

Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha.

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