Mystery surrounds 'Two States' heroine

It wasn't too long ago when Sajid Nadiadwala and Siddharth Anand were collaborating on making a film based on Chetan bhagat's novel 'Two States'. At that time the actors under consideration were Saif Ali Khan with a toss up between Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone.

However, it is a different situation now with Vishal Bhardwaj coming in place of Siddharth and Shah Rukh Khan being the leading man for this film which still remains a Sajid Nadiadwala production. This also means that there is not much clarity around whether the choice of leading ladies would still be between Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone or some other name will emerge as well.

"The rights of 'Two States' are with Sajid. When he and Siddharth were working together again after 'Anjaana Anjaani', things were a little different," says an industry insider, "Since Siddharth is close to Saif Ali Khan (after working with him in 'Salaam Namaste' and 'Ta Ra Rum Pum'), the actor was earlier finalised for the role."

This was the time when news around Priyanka Chopra or Deepika Padukone being the chosen one started making the rounds. However, Sajid kept mum about it and didn't make any declarations about the heroine.

"Now that Siddharth is no more directing the film, Sajid is in conversation with Vishal for the girl who would eventually step in", continues the insider, "It is obvious that Shah Rukh would be involved in the finalisation as well. You never know, there could be a total surprise in store."

Is Salman fine with SRK's 'Two States'?

Shah Rukh Khan would be doing Sajid Nadiadwala's 'Two States' which would be directed by Vishal Bhardwaj.

Meanwhile one does wonder what Salman Khan is feeling about the recent developments. His 'Jaan-E-Mann', when released alongside 'Don', couldn't face tough competition that Shah Rukh Khan gave when the two films released on the same day. Moreover, Shah Rukh and Salman are still not on good terms.

"Well, it's all about having strong business acumen, something that Shah Rukh as well as Sajid understand," says an insider, "It's Bollywood and one has to see what works best for everyone's career progression. Shah Rukh Khan has now done three back to back intense films with 'My Name Is Khan', 'Ra.One' and sequel to 'Don'. He too would want to let his hair down with a commercial entertainer like this where he would be playing a quintessential Punjabi man."

"On the other hand Sajid Nadiadwala is one of the only 3-4 independent producers who are making multi crore extravaganzas with reigning superstars in Bollywood," he continues, "To build his empire further, Sajid is doing nothing wrong in getting Shah Rukh, Akshay as well as Salman for his next three films. And not to forget that he would also be starting a film with Shahid Kapoor (Heer And Raanjha) soon. I am sure his close friends would understand where he is coming from."

SRK to work with Vishal Bhardwaj in Nadiadwala's adaptation of novel Two States

This has to be the biggest development of the year as 2010 comes to a close. No one could see it coming but the fact is that Shah Rukh Khan has been signed by Sajid Nadiadwala for the screen adaptation of Chetan Bhagat's 'Two States'.

Says our source who broke the news, "This announcement is going to shock quite a few. All this while one had been hearing about Saif Ali Khan to act in 'Two States' adaptation which was to be directed by Siddharth Anand. Sajid Nadiadwala had the rights and while there was an announcement in this regard a few weeks back, there was some road block as the screenplay was taking some time to shape up."

"That's right", continues our source, "For a long time Shah Rukh Khan and Vishal Bhardwaj wanted to work with each other. In fact there were also rumours of how both of them were upset with each other during one of the films that they wanted to make earlier. There were some creative differences pertaining to the script and both had to part ways as they couldn't converge at a common point."