THE ACCIDENTAL PRIME MINISTER

The Accidental Prime Minister,

which hits some 1,800 screens across India on January 11, has been making headlines since the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) unofficially endorsed the film by sharing the trailer on the party’s Twitter handle. But long before that, the casting of Anupam Kher as Manmohan Singh, prime minister during the UPA regime (2004-2014), raised eyebrows, given Kher’s support for the BJP and the background of the film’s director, Vijay Gutte. Gutte’s father, Ratnakar Gutte, contested and lost

the 2014 Maharashtra assembly election as a member of the Rashtriya Samaj Paksha, part of the BJP-led alliance in the state. Based on Sanjaya Baru’s eponymous book about his years as media advisor to Singh when he was PM, the film is being promoted with a disclaimer: the “characters have been fictionalised for dramatisation”. In an e-mail interview, Kher spoke with india today about how he approached the role. Edited excerpts:

How hard was it to play Manmohan Singh?

Playing Dr Manmohan Singh has been the most difficult role in my career to date as I’m portraying a person who’s still very well known and active in politics, someone who has a quality of not being typical and yet being typical. I had to work for two months to bring out the quality of the thin voice he has.

There was a dangerous possibility of it turning into a caricature. So I needed to imbibe and internalise it. For four months, I watched hours and hours of his footage. I couldn’t depend on my acting capabilities alone.

After finishing the film, you said “history will not misjudge” him (Singh). Can you elaborate?

The line “history will not misjudge” has been taken from the last interview he gave: “I hope that history does not misjudge me from the media’s point of view.” Because I lived and became the person, it was very natural for me to have that thought process and feel the change. I think he was very sincere and had a certain amount of dignity with which he conveyed his acceptance of the situation, about all the corruption that was rampant during his period. His 10 years in office weren’t the best, but it’s not possible for the term of any political leader to only have good times. You can make out that he’s not a typical leader, he’s a bureaucrat. A bureaucrat with a certain kind of principles. He’s not trained to be a politician and that’s what makes him a misfit.

You’ve praised PM Narendra Modi for “his hard work, honesty and vision”. How do you see the two leaders?

I’m a supporter of Narendra Modi-ji because I think he thinks about India, about positive changes. He’s a doer. I met him while I was showing my film A Wednesday and he was the (Gujarat) chief minister in his 10th year. The moment you reached Ahmedabad, you could see the work he had done. You know his intentions are well. I have rarely come across a leader who cares so much about the country; you can’t fake that for years. Dr Singh wasn’t a leader who was raised as a politician. Of course, I’m sure he too thinks about India’s good and has brought in some reforms, but I consider him as a weaker leader or maybe a leader who was not given freedom with regards to his position. My only issue with him was that, with so much happening around him during those 10 years, he should’ve taken a stand.

Your wife has proved herself to be an adept politician. Is contesting an election on cards for you in the near future?

Yes, Kirron has completely shifted to Chandigarh and I am really very proud of the work she is doing. People say film-wallas do not make good politicians, but I think a politician’s job is to work for the people and Kirron is doing a fantastic job. It’s not me but people from Chandigarh who are saying this. I am not interested in joining politics. I will talk about my country, about what bothers me. I don’t have the time or inclination towards joining politics. They say never say no, but I have no intentions in the coming few years. If I join politics after, say, seven-eight years or whenever, I don’t want anyone to say I had said I don’t want to join politics. There are so many things we say we won’t do, but growing up is about understanding life. And when you grow up, you discover that may be your earlier interpretation was not quite correct. But right now, I have no time to get into politics.n

—with Suhani Singh

Dr Singh isn’t trained to be a politician, and that’s what makes him a misfit, says Kher