The Munnabhai 3 mystery

Munnabhai MBBS and Lage Raho Munnabhai came in 2003 and 2006, respectively. Thirteen years on, the third film in the franchise has been in the doldrums for multiple reasons.

While producer Vinod Chopra and director Rajkumar Hirani get asked about it at every interview or press meet, lead actors Sanjay Dutt and Arshad Warsi are faced with the same question. While they have all kept mum, our source reveals, “The script of the third part of the film had some issues in the first half and one problem in the second half. The creative team has been working hard to solve that issue, but that has not been done because of a connecting problem. Rajkumar Hirani has been busy getting around four more scripts ready. With him being busy in the script development of the other films, he has not been able to devote time to get this in order.”

It is interesting to note that at the end of Lage Raho Munnabhai, Vinod Chopra had put out a teaser for a film titled Munnabhai Chale America. “But the script went for a toss, and Munnabhai went to jail. It is 16 years since the first part came out, and Sanjay Dutt, who was around 43 when he was shooting for Munnabhai MBBS, is now 60-years-old. The new script also has to go with his age because people are not ready to accept a big jump in the age at the moment,” adds our source.

During a recent media interaction Arshad Warsi shared that he did not know when the film would happen. “Whenever I ask Raju Hirani, he says that he is definitely making the film. But if you ask him when, he has no answer,” he reveals.

Meanwhile, after going off the radar following allegations of sexual harassment during the #MeToo movement in Bollywood last year, Hirani is expected to start his next film with Shah Rukh Khan.
—Sanskriti Media