Rajniesh Duggall made his Bollywood debut with 2008 horror thriller 1920, but he was supposed to enter the film world much before that. The actor has now alleged that he had signed Priyanka Chopra’s 2005 film Yakeen, but she refused to star with him. 

In a recent interview with Siddharth Kannan, Rajniesh opened up about getting dropped from his first film, where he said that Priyanka refused to work with him as he was a newcomer.

What did he say

“I was the first choice for Yakeen, I was signed for the film. In fact, I was working on it. When I met director Girish Dhamija, he asked me, ‘When can you move to Mumbai?’ I was already planning to move to Mumbai. So, I got training from Girish ji himself; he is an alumnus of the National School of Drama and a dialect coach,” he said in the interview.

Rajniesh went on to share that the producer invested a lot in him, and signed a three film deal with him. They even gave him a Juhu penthouse, a chauffeur-driven car, and a cook. He also took training for the film for five months. However, things changed with Priyanka’s refusal.

“Suddenly, the producer, Sujit Kumar Singh, called me to his office at night. He told me that Priyanka has become a big star in the time span since they had signed me and they had paid her for the bulk deal, now she is saying ‘I will not work with a newcomer.’ My first reaction was that change the girl because I only saw them putting money on me. I didn’t understand movie business at that time,” he recalled.

On Priyanka’s denial

The actor was not pleased to know about the change of plans, but still feels that her managers must have taken that decision on her behalf. That’s why he doesn’t blame her. I don’t blame her, but she was aware that I was doing the film. She could have said, ‘No, he will do it’,” he said.

Along with Priyanka, Yakeen starred Arjun Rampal, Kim Sharma, Sudhanshu Pandey and Saurabh Shukla.

More about Rajniesh

Rajniesh started his tryst with the glamours world as a model, going on to win the title of Grasim Mr. India 2003 and represented India at the Mr. International 2003 pageant held in London. He emerged as the 1st runner-up. After his Bollywood debut, he participated in reality show Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi 5 and was named as the winner.

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