Aamir Khan meets First Lady of Turkey; draws flak on Twitter
Istanbul, August 17
Bollywood superstar Aamir Khan, who is in Turkey to shoot his upcoming film “Laal Singh Chaddha”, met First Lady of Turkey Emine Erdogan.
According to the official website of Presidency of the Republic of Turkey, the first lady received the actor at the presidential residence at the Huber Mansion in Istanbul on Saturday, India’s 74th Independence Day.
First Lady Erdogan also tweeted about the meeting on her verified Twitter account.
I had the great pleasure of meeting @aamir_khan, the world-renowned Indian actor, filmmaker, and director, in Istanbul. I was happy to learn that Aamir decided to wrap up the shooting of his latest movie ‘Laal Singh Chaddha’ in different parts of Turkey. I look forward to it! pic.twitter.com/3rSCMmAOMW
— Emine Erdoğan (@EmineErdogan) August 15, 2020
“I had the great pleasure of meeting @aamir_khan, the world-renowned Indian actor, filmmaker, and director, in Istanbul. I was happy to learn that Aamir decided to wrap up the shooting of his latest movie ‘Laal Singh Chaddha’ in different parts of Turkey. I look forward to it!” she wrote.
Khan, 55, briefed Erdogan about the social responsibility projects he was associated with during the meeting and the first lady congratulated him for addressing social issues in his films, as per the statement on the website.
“Mr Khan stated that he would complete the shooting of his latest film ‘Laal Singh Chaddha’, which couldn’t be completed in India due to COVID-19, in Turkey, and invited First Lady Erdogan to the film set,” the press release further read.
The meeting drew flak on Twitter.
Taking a sarcastic jibe at Aamir Khan, BJP Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy tweeted from his verified account on Monday: “So I have been proven right in classifying Aamir Khan as one of the 3 Khan Musketeers?” Filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri took to his verified Twitter account to ask: “Should Amit Khan have met the caliphate leader? What do you think?” Agnihotri misspelt the actor’s name, but the fact that he was referring to Aamir Khan when he wrote Amit Khan is evident from the fact that his post is in reaction to a tweet that Erdogan had earlier shared, along with pictures of her meeting Aamir, on her verified account.
Reacting to a news piece talking about the actor’s meeting with the First lady of Turkey, Agnihotri wrote in a separate tweet: “Is this hypocrisy? What do you think?” “Dear @aamir_khan, some person informed me that you had not wished people on our 74th #IndependenceDay. I couldn’t believe it because you have been otherwise very particular on wishing people on such occasions. But then it came out to be true,” tweeted film producer Ashoke Pandit.
The release of ‘Laal Singh Chaddha’ was recently postponed to Christmas 2021. The film also stars Kareena Kapoor Khan, Mona Singh and Tamil star Vijay Sethupathi.
The movie, which is an official remake of Tom Hanks’ 1994 feature “Forrest Gump”, was previously scheduled to hit the theatres on December 25 this year.
The production of the film is yet to be finished.
According to Ajit Andhare, Chief Operating Officer, Viacom18 Studios, the team is currently focused on completing the movie.
“Secret Superstar” helmer Advait Chandan is directing the film from a script by actor-writer Atul Kulkarni.
The project is backed by Viacom18 Motion Pictures and Aamir Khan Productions.
The film has music by Pritam with Amitabh Bhattacharya credited for the lyrics.
Khan was last seen in ‘Thugs of Hindostan’. PTI
