“I didn’t make Mann Bairagi for Chaploosi,” Sanjay Tripathy on his Modi film : Bollywood News

Taking a dig at the atrocious Narendra Modi bio-pic featuring Vivek Oberoi that came out last year, Sanjay Tripathy who has directed a new film about PM Modi’s early years says the film was born out of no ulterior motives.

“I didn’t make Mann Bairagi for Chaploosi,” Sanjay Tripathy on his Modi film

“I haven’t made the film for chaploosee (sycophancy). And I’ve no idea whether it will reach Modiji or not. For me, it was important to discover how a chaiwala at 16 became the Prime Minister at 64. It is a highly motivational story, and one that would inspire young people, not just Indians, all over the world,” says Tripathy whose last feature film Club 60 came 6 years ago. He then directed a television series Ek Nayi Ummeed Roshni.

Tripathy says the Modi project is a sort of companion piece to last year’s National award winning film Chalo Jeete Hain also produced by Mahavir Jain and directed by Mangesh Hadawale. “In Chalo Jeete Hain there were incidents from Modiji’s childhood. My film is about the two years in his late teens when he left home and travelled in pursuit of Swami Vivekanand’s teachings by visiting Swami Vivekanand’s ashrams. But he did not have the necessary qualifications to be inducted in any of them. But Vivekanand remained a major on Modi.”

Mann Bairagi captures that period of uncertainty turmoil and finally revelation in the teenager’s life.

Says Tripathy, “Every youngster goes through a period of churning. Not everyone emerges from that period of uncertainty to become a Narendra Modi. What were the forces that made him into the figure that he is? That’s the question I’ve tried to answer in my film.”

The director is all praise for the debutant actor Abhay Verma who plays the young Modi. “We chose him out of innumerable others. Abhay has the makings of a major star.”