Ravan back in Lanka

As Mani Ratnam faces problems from the foreign authorities to shoot his Ravana in the jungles of Kerala there are strong chances of him going to shoot in Sri Lanka which has a similar forest area like that of Kerala.

Few years back, Mani Ratnam had shot his film with the LTTE as the back drop in Lanka. The film had starred, Madhavan, Nandita Das and Simran.

His film Ravana's shooting was stopped by the forest authorities of Kerala when he was shooting at the famous Malayattoor forests which are situated 30 kilometres away from Kochi. Principal chief forest conservator P. M. Manoharan had found many vehicles parked inside the forest violating the rules. The reason given was, shooting was conducted against the rule of forest department. According to the rule of forest department the shooting should be held between 8 a.m to 6 p.m, avoiding disturbance to the animals. Also the ecosystem should not be disturbed. Violating these small huts were built in the location.

But Mani Ratnam's unit had given the excuse of building these small huts only to protect their expensive shooting equipment from rains.

This unit was also supposed to be joined by Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai on Sunday 12th October. But as Amitabh Bachchan was hospitalised, they postponed their visit date to the film's unit indefinately. Mani Ratnam had then gone ahead with shooting the portions of his film with other actors.

--SAMPURN