In an overnight turn of events, the makers of Puneeth Rajkumar’s yet-to-be-titled film have shown the exit door to the film’s first chosen heroine and found an immediate replacement. Priyanka Jawalkar is out of the film, directed by Pavan Wadeyar, and the makers have instead roped in Kannada heroine Rachita Ram.

The film's shoot that began on March 12, with Priyanka on the sets. Neither the director nor the production team is talking about the change. However, our source tells us that Rachita Ram is already on the sets and has started shooting. While this change has been done overnight for reasons unknown, there are rumours that Priyanka’s dates were clashing with her other projects and that she couldn’t commit full-time to this film. There's also buzz that the makers of the film, after watching the rushes at the edit table, felt that it would be better to bring in a local heroine who knows the language.

Interestingly, the same thing happened with Puneeth’s 25^th film, Chakravyuha. Director Sarvanan, who had initially chosen Poonam Bajwa, replaced her with Pallavi Joshi, and later Rachita Ram was brought in.

Presently Rachita is gearing up for the release of her film Johnny Johnny Yes Papa, while also juggling between Ayogya and Seetharama Kalyana. This will be her fourth project this year.

Puneeth’s latest is made under Rockline Productions, and has music by D Immam and cinematography by Vaidy.