Heera Lal Panna Lal

It simply doesn't pay to be nice. This is the bitter lesson Mithun Chakraborty has learnt the hard way. This week's release, Heeralal Pannalal, stars Mithun in the lead role but, can you believe it, the film has been released without Mithun's voice! Yes, Mithun has not dubbed a single dialogue in the film. And no, not because the actor was busy but because director Kawal Sharma kept him in the dark and literally bluffed him. He told Mithun, the film would be released on 29th October, but the next thing the actor knew was that Heeralal Pannalal was hitting the screens a week earlier. Mithun realised that Kawal had fooled him and had got a dubbing artiste to dub his dialogues. The shock must've indeed left the actor speechless. What has hurt Mithun more than anything else is that Kawal had fallen at the actor's feet when he had wanted to launch the film. Said Mithun to Information in a telephonic talk from Ooty, "Kawal had pleaded that if I didn't sign his film, he'd be on the streets. He emotionally blackmailed me to act in his film. Even when the film was completed, I told him not to bother about my balance payment because I knew, he was in debt. Had he told me that he didn't have money for the dubbing, I would have even paid from my own pocket for the same. But he has cheated me." Kawal Sharma, perhaps, doesn't realise the harm he has done to producers of other Mithun-starrers. After Heeralal Pannalal, distributors of the forthcoming Mithun films may start demanding proof of Mithun's dubbing for the films. The actor has lodged his complaint with the Cine & TV Artistes' Association. "Such fraudulent producers should not be let to go scot-free," concluded an agitated Mithun.

Version of Bade Miyan Chote Miyan (1998)