It was a great script but Aamir Khan changed the climax, it turned out to be a masterstroke for...

Released on 26 January 2006 concinding with the Republic Day, Rang De Basanti was headlined by Aamir Khan and helmed by Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra. The coming-of-age patriotic drama also featured Siddharth, R Madhavan, Sharman Joshi, Atul Kulkarni, Kunal Kapoor, Soha Ali Khan, Alice Patten, Anupam Kher, Kirron Kher, Om Puri, and Waheeda Rehman in pivotal roles.

When Mehra came to Aamir with the Rang De Basanti script, the superstar didn't like the climax and changed it with the ending of a story he had written himself. While talking to the journalist Tarun Tejpal at the Think Fest in 2011, the Dangal star said, "Originally what the climax was that we kill the defence minister and we try to escape from the city and each one of us gets shot at different places. So I asked Mehra, 'I love your script (but) the end doesn’t make sense to me because why are they running? Do they feel they have done something wrong?' So he was also like, 'Ya, why are they running?'"

Aamir further added, "Throughout the film, your parallel is Bhagat Singh. Bhagat Singh didn’t run away. So he got arrested by choice and then expressed what he had to. Even these guys therefore shouldn’t run away. I had this story I had written many years ago. In my version there were two guys, it reached a situation where they needed to communicate with society. So they enter a television studio and take over. They go live so they can start talking to the people. I took that and told Mehra that I had this story and I will now not make it because the climax is gone. But he liked it and we fitted that climax scene into Rang De Basanti."

The socio-political drama became one of the most culturally significant and critically acclaimed films in Indian cinema. Made in just Rs 28 crore, the Aamir Khan-starrer earned Rs 53 crore net in India and grossed Rs 97 crore worldwide. Rang De Basanti was chosen as India's official entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 79th Academy Awards or the Oscars, but it failed to earn the nomination.

READ | This was the most expensive and biggest flop film of the same year, starred three superstars, was debut of...

The DNA app is now available for download on the Google Play Store. Please download the app and share your feedback with us.