Just days before its big-screen premiere, Shahid Kapoor’s ‘O Romeo’ is grappling with a family-fueled lawsuit that threatens to derail everything. Hussain ‘Ustara’ Sheikh’s daughter, Sanobar, has fired off a court petition accusing the film of slanderously transforming her crime-fighting father into a cinematic gangster. The trailer’s imagery, she contends, shows him as unhinged and criminal, ignoring his real contributions to India’s fight against underworld elements in Mumbai and beyond.
Sanobar’s plea details the profound emotional and reputational injury this could cause her and her children. She insists the Vishal Bhardwaj directorial, starring Triptii Dimri opposite Shahid, is essentially a veiled biopic rooted in her father’s exploits, adapted from Hussain Zaidi’s ‘Mafia Queens of Mumbai’. Police complaints have followed suit, targeting both the director and author.
Scheduled for today’s adjudication, the case revives questions of consent and accuracy in fact-based fiction. Bhardwaj and Zaidi maintain the characters are invented, with only loose inspirational threads from reality. Zaidi recently told reporters the film weaves partial truths into a wholly imaginative tapestry.
Echoing the ‘Ghooskhore Pandit’ uproar involving Manoj Bajpayee, this clash highlights Bollywood’s vulnerability to pre-release injunctions. Fans eager for Shahid’s intense portrayal are left in limbo. As legal arguments unfold, the controversy boosts the film’s buzz, but at what cost to its February 13 launch? The outcome may set new benchmarks for how filmmakers navigate sensitive real-life inspirations.