Author and former journalist Shubhrangshu Roy has said that many audience members and reviewers only concentrated on the India versus Pakistan politics of Dhurandhar, completely missing out on a currency scam perpetrated by the neighbour on India in the Ranveer Singh movie.
According to his Facebook post, Dhurandhar levels a "serious allegation" against a nameless 'Indian minister' who signed a currency paper deal in London in 2008, the same year the 26/11 Mumbai attacks happened.
In the film, R Madhavan's character IB Director Ajay Sanyal (a reel version of the current NSA Ajit Doval) says that after the deal, the minister flies into Dubai with his son where they reportedly handed over two printing templates to the ISI's middleman, and laundered cash.
Shubhrangshu Roy stated that P Chidambaram was India's finance minister at the time. Both the former minister and his son Karti Chidambaram have already been charged with several corruption and money laundering scams. They are currently out on bail.
The former journalist, whose last job was at the Financial Chronicle newspaper, recalled he was able to put two and two together as he collaborated with The Age, a Melbourne-based daily, on a work of investigative journalism related to India's switch from paper to polymer currency notes.
"And soon, the polymer currency story disappeared from our collective memory, along with The Age, years before the Chronicle itself downed shutters... and was eventually forgotten... until this weekend, at The Regal in Maryland, when I woke up to Dhurandhar, and the memories flashed back relentlessly.
"In the ongoing sordid brouhaha over the done and the not done, the right and the wrong, the good and the evil, and the Hindu and the Muslim, in an all-out propaganda war of nerves between India and Pakistan, moviegoers and critics alike seem to have missed out on the fine print of a currency scam that Pakistan perpetrated on India, just around the time that RBI's Thorat was desperately attempting 'counterfeit resistance' at home, and The Age was on its polymer chase halfway across the world," he wrote.
Shubhrangshu Roy said that Dhurandhar "deliberately leaks an extraordinary lead to an incredible monster that can hardly be stuff of Bollywood make-belief".
"The chain of events is too circumstantial to ignore, even when accounting for the missing links in the narrative: RBI did contemplate a switchover to polymer, to resist counterfeit currency. But the move was abruptly dropped. Paper was contracted with the London currency cartel.
"ISI did push fake currency into India. 26/11 happened. The finance minister was shifted to home ministry, the next finance minister's telephone was tapped. Where did ISI get the plates to print Indian currency notes in Karachi? Dhurandhar knows best. It is time for us to get there (sic)" he wrote.
Released on December 5, Dhurandhar is a high-octane spy drama predominantly set in Lyari, a town in Pakistan's Karachi infamous for gang wars, arms race, and politically-motivated murders. Directed by Aditya Dhar, the Hindi film also stars Ranveer Singh, Akshaye Khanna, Arjun Rampal, Sanjay Dutt, and Sara Arjun.
Also Read | Dhurandhar: How Rehman Dakait Was Killed By Chaudhry Aslam After A Years-Long Chase Through Lyari
