Ragini Dwivedi’s weight-loss and transformation has won her appreciation from moviegoers and filmmakers, who are now keen to rope her in for their projects. But the actress is taking her time to choose the best. 

While she waits for the release of Nane Next CM, the actress has completed shooting for Kicchu and is currnetly shooting for Gandhigiri. She is to announce a few of her projects for this year, which includes a Tamil-Telugu bilingual and Ravi Srivatsa’s directorial, to be presented  by MN Kumar and produced by his son, Yogish Kumar.

What is interesting about the second is its subject. The actress confirms news of her project with Ravi Srivatsa, and reveals a bit about the story. “I want to stress on the word ‘different’. This film, by Ravi, is based on the underworld and is realistically told. It will see me play a raw and rugged character. Work on the film is to start from October, and it will be set in North Karnataka, with shooting planned at unexplored locations,” she says.

Discussions between Ragini and the director about the subject have been going on for the last one-and-half years and, a few days ago, they came to a decision. “Ravi is a long-time friend of mine and a very creative director,” says the actress. “Underwold genre is his forte and he gives such movies the best treatment. In fact, I kind of got goosebumps when I heard the story.”

Speaking to CE, Ravi Srivatsa says that casting Ragini in an underworld movie feels like a fresh start to his career. “I entered the industry with a female-oriented subject, with the Malashree-starrter Lady Police, and then went on to work with her in 13 films,” he says. “My work with her has always been, and will always be, an inspiration for me, and I still want to do more films with her. Meanwhile, I was keen to work with Ragini in a movie set in the underworld.”

Working with Malashree, in movies that mostly saw her play a police-woman, Ravi had studied a few case files and came across a real-life story that had taken place in North Karnataka. “I have had this subject in mind for a while now, but everything fell together now and work is about to start,” he says. “Luckily, even my producer MN Kumar had Ragini in mind, which worked to my advantage.”

The director, who is looking forward to the release of his Tiger Galli starring Sathish Ninasam, will simultaneously start working on this underworld movie. He will finalise its cast and technicians before they start work on this project. “We will have a lot of surpises with regards to this film in the days to come,” he says.