Puneeth and Rana’s Rajaratha ride

Anup Bhandari will start 2018 with the release of his second film Rajaratha on January 25. This bilingual film will be released in Telugu as well, as Rajaratham. The film has his brother Nirup Bhandari in the lead and the team has also roped in Tamil actor Arya to play a pivotal role. The director has more surprises in store. 

The bilingual will also be a multi-starrer with two south Indian actors Puneeth Rajkumar and Rana Daggubati, who will act in its Kannada and Telugu versions respectively. Anup, not sharing details about their characters, says that more will be revealed through a trailer.

However, Anup tells us how he managed to convince the stars to work in his film. "I had Puneeth in mind while I wrote the character but couldn't meet him face to face to discuss it, because he had other work commitments. But a telephone call did the trick. I told him that there was a role for him in Rajaratha, and after he heard the one-liner about his character, he immediately agreed to be part of it.”

As for bringing in Rana, it was Arya’s suggestion to have the Baahubali actor on board for the Telugu version. Anup says, "I was wondering who to cast for the role and Arya felt that Rana would be the perfect fit. He even called Rana and connected me with him. My first film Rangitaranga came in handy; Rana immediately recognised me because of it, and was happy to be part of Rajaratham.”

The film, made under Jollyhits, also features Avantika Shetty as the female lead and Ravi Shankar in an important role. With Anup also scoring the music, the film has background music by Ajaneesh Loknath and cinematography by William David.