‘Uri’ maker Aditya Dhar turns producer with his film ‘Article 370’

National Award winner Aditya Dhar has launched his production house B62 along with his older brother Lokesh Dhar. Their first production, ‘Article 370’, stars his actress wife Yami Gautam, Priya Mani, Arun Govil, Vaibhav Tatwawadi and others. It is directed by another National Award-winning director, Aditya Suhas Jambhale. It is their joint venture with Jio Studios.

During the trailer launch of the film, Aditya Dhar said, “I give credit to Jio Studios’ team, and Jyoti Deshpande and her entire team. We have already done three projects and it has been satisfying collaborations. They have given us a free hand even though we are a first-time producer.”

The film involves Aditya Dhar’s entire family. Speaking about it, he said, “It is actually a family affair – my brother Lokesh is part of the production house, my wife is acting in it, there is a baby on its way, who is also part of it. It was an amazing time for us. The way this film has turned out, during the shoot we got to know about the baby and it reminded me of Abhimanyu’s story from Mahabharata!”

Lokesh Dhar revealed the story behind the name of their production house and said, “It is the address where we were born and grew up, my parents got married there. We spent quite a few years there. Another interesting thing is that on one side of our house in Delhi, we had a theatre called Sapna and on the other side Alankar; every Sunday, our parents would take us to one of the theatres. That is where our love for films started and we became extremely passionate about it. We were big fans of Amitabh Bachchan and others. We are not from the film business as such. I have been in the film business for more than 20 years in the US. We joined hands in 2019. Aditya had made ‘Uri’ and he had come to the US. We decided that we wanted to start something. It is an exciting thing for us. It is for the first time that we are talking about our company.”

On why the brothers chose this particular subject to start their journey as producers, Lokesh Dhar shared, “This is a very personal film for us, we are Kashmiri Pandits. Our families have been affected by this. This was not something that we were thinking of doing when the Article 370 was abrogated, the germination of this happened much before that. It was not the exact topic, but it was based on events that have taken place in our lives. As professionals, we want to make everything perfect, we want to create something that is of international standards.”

Aditya Dhar chose not to direct this movie and instead decided to give it to new director Aditya Jambhle, explaining his stand behind this, he said, “As a director, you are always tempted to do it. It took me almost more than a decade to make my first film ‘Uri’. According to me, there was a huge problem in the industry, which I understood, that the talent was not being backed. The reason for it was nepotism, I met Aditya Jambhle during the National Award ceremony and I realised that he might do a better job than me in this film. Our company’s motto is to give chance to outsiders. Our base is excellence and giving the audience what they have never experienced. We also believe in great stories with great actors. I get involved in the creative aspect of it and Lokesh takes care of finances. But we are not going to think much about box office numbers.”

Meanwhile, Aditya Jambhle was to launch his production house with his dream, ‘Ashwatthama’, starring Vicky Kaushal. However, he had to put that film on the backburner due to the kind of VFX and budget that was required. The director is now gearing up for his maiden project, ‘Article 370’, which is releasing on February 23.