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Indian Express
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
What led Chandigarh-based author Khushwant Singh to turn his book ‘Maharaja in Denims' into ‘India's first AI feature film'
When author and former state information commissioner of Punjab, Khushwant Singh, wrote Maharaja in Denims, it immediately caught Bollywood's attention. Iconic villain Ranjeet was the first to bid for its rights around 2016, presumably to launch his son. Soon after, producer Guneet Monga showed interest. And why not? Maharaja in Denims has all the makings of a larger-than-life feature film — a work of fiction that follows the journey of a young boy who believes he is the reincarnation of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, founder of the Sikh Empire. Through regression therapy, he finds himself transported into key moments in history, including the Partition of 1947, the anti-Sikh riots of 1984, and eventually the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. But when no deal materialised and the book was no longer tied up in any rights agreements, Singh's cousin — tech guru Gurdeep Singh Pall — offered an alternative. Pall, known for his long tenure at Microsoft, most recently as corporate vice-president overseeing business AI projects, suggested they stop pitching the book and instead spend two years turning it into India's first full-length AI-generated feature film. 'It's a period drama. The biggest hurdle was the budget — it would have required hundreds of crores. And post-pandemic, it has become increasingly difficult to draw enough people to theatres to justify such an expense,' Singh, who is based in Chandigarh, told The Indian Express during his visit to Mumbai for the debut edition of the World Audio Visual Entertainment (WAVES) Summit. 'Gurdeep suggested we make it as an AI film, which meant we no longer needed to spend crores on elaborate sets or casting an A-lister as the lead.' In 2023, Pall and Singh co-founded Intelliflicks and set up a team in Chandigarh. 'There are seven of us, including Balpreet Kaur, who translated the novel into a script and is also leading the screenplay and direction. The rest are experts in software engineering and AI,' said Singh. Using tools such as Runway, Midjourney, and Clink, the team generated the visuals and video content through a combination of prompts and software. Singh played us nearly 10 minutes of footage — the environments and characters, barring a few inconsistencies, looked surprisingly lifelike. He says the film is close to completion. 'We have already stitched together about 30 minutes of footage. We are targeting a total runtime of around 100 minutes,' he said. Initial challenges, he noted, were lip-syncing and continuity. 'We had dubbing artists lend their voices, but cutting-edge lip-sync technology was not publicly available until after the US elections — likely due to concerns over deepfake manipulation. Continuity was also tricky because the same prompt can yield different results each time. But we have figured out ways to manage that, and when the film releases, you will see how the visuals are hyper-realistic.' Now, the team is focusing on marketing — an area outside their expertise. Another challenge, Singh admitted, is knowing when to stop. 'Technology evolves so fast that every week brings new improvements. At some point, we have to accept that the film is done.' They are aiming for a release by August or September this year. Is Singh worried, given that he has invested his own money? He quoted his cousin Pall: 'Even if it's not the most entertaining or gripping film, it will still be a breakthrough — India's first AI feature.' He added, 'Someday, if the Cannes Film Festival introduces a category for AI films, we want India to have a nomination in it.'
Hindustan Times
09-05-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
Kartarpur Corridor shut from India's side indefinitely, Pak keeps doors open
Following escalating border tensions between India and Pakistan after the Pahalgam terror attack on April 22, India has closed its side of the Kartarpur Corridor — the only active surface-level link between the two countries — indefinitely. The Union ministry of home affairs' bureau of immigration announced the closure of the corridor 'till further orders'. The closure has halted the pilgrimage of Indian Sikh devotees to the historic Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur, Narowal district, Pakistan, while Pakistan continues to keep the corridor open on its side. On Wednesday morning, around 150 Sikh pilgrims who had arrived at the Dera Baba Nanak integrated check post in Gurdaspur district were turned back after waiting for over 90 minutes. In contrast, Pakistan has maintained that the Kartarpur Corridor remains open on its end. Ramesh Singh Arora, president of the Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (PSGPC) and a former MLA, appointed as ambassador for the corridor, said, 'The corridor is open from our side. It is a conscious decision of our government to continue welcoming the pilgrims.' He added that the corridor was a symbol of peace, brotherhood and harmony propagated by Guru Nanak Dev. 'On Tuesday, we received about 200 pilgrims from India and suddenly, the next day, the arrival was zero. When we checked, we were told that India had stopped pilgrims from going to Kartarpur Corridor. Despite the corridor's close down from India's side, the Pakistan government has decided to keep it open as a goodwill gesture,' Arora told HT over WhatsApp. He added that PSGPC had also started the process for facilitating pilgrimage visas to Indian pilgrims for June to mark the martyrdom of Guru Arjan Dev. The corridor, inaugurated jointly by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on November 9, 2019, fulfilled a long-standing demand of the Sikh community to access one of their holiest shrines without a visa. Under the bilateral agreement, Indian devotees have visa-free, dawn-to-dusk access to the shrine, which has turned out be a meeting point of people from Indian and Pakistan Punjabs, divided since the Partition of 1947. The 4.7-km passage connects Dera Baba Nanak Sahib in India's Gurdaspur and Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan's Kartarpur, believed to be the final resting place of Guru Nanak Dev. Despite its brief closure during the Covid-19 pandemic after just four months of inauguration, the corridor was reopened on November 17, 2021, and both countries renewed the agreement for another five years in 2024.
Hindustan Times
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
After Op Sindoor, Kartarpur Corridor closed, 150 Sikh pilgrims turned back
Kartarpur Corridor, the only open surface link from India to Pakistan, was closed on Wednesday morning, hours after Operation Sindoor was launched. Kartarpur Corridor, the only open surface link from India to Pakistan, was closed on Wednesday morning, hours after Operation Sindoor was launched. (HT file photo) Nearly 150 Indian Sikh pilgrims, who had arrived to take the Kartarpur Corridor for the pilgrimage to the historic Sri Darbar Sahib gurdwara in Narowal district of Pakistan, were asked to return home after a wait of an hour and a half at the integrated check post on Wednesday morning. The ministry of home affairs' bureau of immigration announced the closure of the Kartarpur Corridor 'till further orders'. Gurdaspur deputy commissioner Dalwinderjit Singh, however, said that the corridor has been shut for today (Wednesday). He said the district administration had not received any orders from the government for the coming days. The pilgrims had started arriving around 9am on Wednesday amid apprehensions that they would not be allowed to cross over to Pakistan due to the conflict underway since the wee hours. 'Immigration and defence officials told us that the situation is not conducive and advised us to return around 11am. It's unfortunate that we could not make it but national interest is above all,' said one of the pilgrims, requesting anonymity. After the escalating tension on the border since the Pahalgam terror attack on April 22, there had been a steady decline in the number of Indian Sikh pilgrims going to Pakistan. On April 23, the Government of India had decided to downgrade diplomatic ties with Pakistan in view of cross-border links to the terror attack that claimed the lives of 26 people, most of them tourists. While trade through the integrated checkpost at the Attari-Wagah border in Amritsar district was suspended, the Kartarpur Corridor had remained open till today. The corridor was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then Pakistan PM Imran Khan on November 9, 2019, on the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, fulfilling a long-pending demand of the Indian Sikh community to have khuley darshan-didar (opportunity to visit) of the historic gurdwara. Under the bilateral agreement, Indian devotees have visa-free access to the shrine, which has turned out be a meeting point of people from Indian and Pakistan Punjab after they were divided by the Partition of 1947. The corridor was normally open from dawn to dusk and pilgrims had to return the same day. Last year, both countries renewed the agreement for five more years. Initially, the corridor was operational for four months before the governments of both countries closed it in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. It was reopened on November 17, 2021.
