'Badlapur' sequel to have a female lead

Mumbai: Producer Dinesh Vijan said the sequel to "Badlapur", a 2015 revenge drama that had actor Varun Dhawan in the lead, will have a female protagonist. "'Badlapur' 2 will have a female in the lead. That's the only thing we can divulge. We still have to finalise the casting and as soon as we do it, we will let you know," Dinesh told reporters here at the success party of "Hindi Medium".

Produced by Dinesh and Sunil Lulla, the first part of "Badlapur" featured Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Huma Qureshi and Yami Gautam besides Dhawan. There were reports that Deepika Padukone will be part of the sequel. Asked if the 31-year-old actress fits the main role for the second installment, Dinesh said, "Which role she doesn't fit? She fits all the roles. She is lucky for me. Right now scripting is on and depend on the character, we will decide on casting." Dinesh said "Badlapur" director Sriram Raghavan usually takes two years to complete a project.

"Sriram takes two years to write a script for his film. He took similar time for 'Badlapur' as well. He has recently completed the script of 'Badlapur 2'. We give a lot of time to writing and that happened in the case of 'Hindi Medium' and 'Raabta' as well," he said. Dinesh is happy with the audience response to "Hindi Medium", featuring Irrfan Khan and Pakistani actress Saba Qamar, that he has produced with Bhushan Kumar of T-Series. "We are getting a lot of messages saying the film is relevant, appealing and entertaining at the same time. Hopefully, for the next two weeks also the film will do well," he added.