Bipasha Basu is dubbing for her next film Lamhaa and is trying her level best to drop her anglicised accent and diction to sound like a Kashmiri Muslim girl that she plays in the movie. This, of course, is easier said than done. Even when Bipasha had done Bengali film Sob Charitro Kalponik, she had been forbidden by director Rituparno Ghosh from dubbing her own lines although Bengali is her mother tongue.
This time Bipasha is however determined not to allow her voice performance to suffer on grounds of her accent. For months the actress has been secretly practising her lines. "It is tough, really tough because I don't really understand Urdu. But I'm never one to shun the urge to learn. I find it great fun. And my director Rahul Dholakia is very patient and chilled out," said Bipasha.
Since Lamhaa tackles the sensitive issue of militancy in Kashmir, Dholakia is pretty adamant on getting every nuance right. He has asked sound recordist Manoj Sikka to monitor Biapasha's diction. "I'm putting my trust in Rahul's team and the sound recordist," said the actress.
According to Dholakia, who's supervising Bipasha's dubbing, the actress has made the best effort possible to sound like an authentic Kashmiri Muslim girl.
"At the moment I'm simultaneously doing two very different jobs on two of my very different films. While I'm editing my social satire Society, I am supervising the dubbing of my film on Kashmir, Lamhaa. Dubbing the dialogues of a film with as vast a historical-political canvas as 'Lamhaa' is very tough. I wish I could devote more attention to Bipasha. But she's doing a fine job," said Dholakia.
While Sanjay Dutt, who plays an outsider, can get away with his characteristic drawling dialogues, Bipasha and Kunal Kapoor, who play Kashmiris, have had to slog to do away with their Bengali and Punjabi twangs respectively.