Ash forgotten

Bipasha Basu, the husky dusky sexy bombshell of bollywood who oozes oomph with every twist and turn, has been selected to play the character of Abhishek Bachchan’s wife in upcoming mega- budget flick ‘Raavana’

Bipasha Basu will play the part of Mandodari, who was ‘Raavana’s most loved queen and had the authority to advise him on any state matter without inviting wrath of the demon king. Sources close to director Mani Rathnam say that Bipasha will play a full-fledged role in the flick, and she is going to start shooting in right earnest from the middle of September. The highlight of Bipasha Basu’s character in ‘Raavana’ will be a sizzling hot item number, which is likely to be in the same genre as that of ‘Omkara’s ‘Bidi jalai le….’

In all, Bipasha will have around forty minutes of footage in Mani Rathnam’s magnum opus, which is likely to take around twenty days of her shooting time. Aishwarya Rai plays the part of Sita (not Abhi’s wife as was the case in Mani’s earlier flick ‘Guru’), while Vikram essays the part of Rama in the flick.

Sources close to Bipasha Basu say that Mani Rathnam had approached the sizzling hot bollywood diva for the role opposite Abhishek Bachchan around a month ago. Bipasha seized the opportunity and immediately said yes to the project. However, Mani had prevented her at that time from disclosing about it to anyone else, and so she kept mum till now.

But now when Bipasha Basu’s costumes are ready, she just can not hide her excitement about the project. Her look as Mandodari, ‘Raavana’s chief queen, is gorgeous, and sultry beauty has been waiting with bated breath to join the unit of ‘Raavana’ to shoot her sequences.

The buzz doing the rounds in the industry is that Mani Rathnam chose Bipasha Basu to play the part of Mandodari as she can project the right balance of oomph and intelligence in the scenes, which was a must for the character of Mandodari to come alive on the screen.

In fact, Mandodari was not only Raavan’s queen but is also credited with the invention of chess, which is purely a mind game. It is for this reason that whenever Mandodari would reprimand Raavana for abducting Sita, he would just laugh it off without being angry. In fact, Raavana had a deep respect for her intelligence and righteousness.

However, the grapevine has it that Bipasha Basu was not the first choice for Mandodari’s character and got the part only after Sushmita Sen rejected the offer. Insiders reveal that Sushmita Sen did not have any objection to the role, and in fact, wanted to enact the character but Aishwarya factor finally led her to opt out of the project.

It may be recalled that Sushmita Sen and Aishwarya Rai have been bitter rivals from their initial days of Miss Universe and Miss World respectively. They never liked each other and have always tried to avoid as much as possible. So, there was no possibility of Sush forgetting all that for Mani Rathnam’s ‘Raavana’.