February 16th, 2009
Mumbai: "Slumdog Millionaire" may have won the hearts of many but the movie, which is on the verge of winning Oscars, is facing defamation threat.
Eminent Hindi poet and Bollywood song writer Gopal Singh Nepali's son Nakul Singh has claimed that the song "Darshan Do Ghanshyam Nath Mori Ankhiya Pyasi" was originally written by his father and is planning to file defamation case against director Danny Boyle.
The song, "Darshan Do Ghanshyam Nath Mori Ankhiya Pyasi", that features in the movie, is from 1957 film "Narsi Bhagat" which was directed by Devendra Goel.
The film was based on the life of 15th Century Gujarati saint-poet Narsinh Mehta, who was a devotee of Lord Krishna.
The song, based on one of the oldest ragas — "Rag Kedar", was written by eminent Hindi poet and Bollywood song writer Gopal Singh Nepali.
Call it his destiny or an oversight by the Oscar-front runner team protagonist Jamal is shown winning Rs 2, 50,000 in the film despite giving a wrong answer.
"Slumdog Millionaire" is based on Indian diplomat Vikas Swarup's novel "Q and A" and was adapted into the movie by scriptwriter Simon Beaufoy, who changed some parts of the story to make it fit in the film's narrative.
The result of it is that Jamal ends up giving a wrong answer to a question with wrong options.
Swarup's book refers to "Ankhiya Hari Darshan Ki Pyasi" as the song by saint-poet Surdas. The question for the protagonist in the book is a different one.
Surdas, a contemporary to Narsi, wrote "Ankhiya Hari Darshan Ki Pyasi" which expresses a similar sentiment.
In the movie Jamal is asked to name the poet who wrote song "Darshan Do Ghanshyam Nath Mori Ankhiya Pyasi" during the show- Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? He has four options from the show host- Surdas, Tulsidas, Meerabai and Kabir.
Obviously, none of these is the right answer. The producers of the film were unavailable for comment.
