Nikitin Dheer says he had ‘very bad experience’ on Jodhaa Akbar, addresses rumour that Ashutosh Gowariker became upset with him mid-production

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He said that he worked very hard for the film, but things began going south after he signed on. “As an artist, I didn’t have fun working on the film. It was a very bad experience for me, to the point that I told my father that I’d entered the wrong line, and that I’d rethink my life,” he said. Nikitin’s father is the veteran actor Pankaj Dheer, who was friends with Ashutosh Gowariker. But he didn’t step in to mediate tensions because he’d told Nikitin that he’d be on his own once he started his professional journey.

Prodded to reveal more details, Nikitin continued, “I worked on my physique for the film, I trained for months in Urdu. I shot for more than 100 days. For example, I specially flew back from Istanbul to dub for the film. I must’ve made 90 phone calls to figure out what the plan is, but nobody from the production answered my calls. The third day, I was supposed to return to Istanbul, and that’s when I’m told that they’ve got somebody else to dub my part. It made me very angry. And there are so many incidents like this.”

Asked if signing Mission Istanbul before Jodhaa Akbar’s release was the reason that Ashutosh Gowariker became upset with him, Nikitin said that he’d never heard about this. “I changed my look after finishing work on Jodhaa Akbar, and I started shooting for Mission Istanbul only after I was done with Jodhaa Akbar, so I haven’t heard this theory before. It’s important for an actor to keep moving from film to film, especially if you’re the villain, because there are no guarantees.” Nikitin implied that he wasn’t given the room to perform to the best of his ability in Jodhaa Akbar. “There were a lot of things that I’d been led to believe would happen, but during the shoot, I realised that it wasn’t going according to what I’d imagined,” he said.