Bollywood has lost a fine actor in Asif Basra. Asif Basra commited suicide in his home in Himachal Pradesh. While the reason is unknown, Basra’s friend and 2019 Taskent Files director Vivek Agnihotri tries to shed some light.
Asif Basra had a substantial role in the Taskent Files. He worked alongside Mithun Chakraborty and Naseeruddin Shah.
Vivek Agnihotri had plans to cast Asif in his next venture ‘Kashmir Files’. Now of course that is nit possible.
Asif Basra and Vivek Agnihotri go way back.
Vivek used to direct the nail-biting thriller Saturday ‘Suspense’ on TV and Basra acted in it. “I am in shock and it is yet to sink in that he’s no more. I last met him when we had a party to celebrate the completion of the 100-day run of ‘Tashkent Files’. We had a blast. He was a personal friend.”
Vivek also said that Asif had loved working in ‘Tashkent Files’. “I found him quite fine when he did ‘Tashkent Files’, he was a bit bitter about Bollywood but then I guess many of us are, even I am,” Vivek added.
What exactly was Asif Basra bitter about?
“Well, I have nothing sensational to reveal here. We simply used to talk about how we don’t take good actors seriously in our industry. He used to say yahan ya to phir star hota hai ya everybody else hota hai. Supporting actors are not supported. He had issues about that,” and added, “But that’s true. I agreed with him.”
When asked to elaborate he further added,”Stars are allowed to waste money to the tune of 60-70 per cent of a film’s budget. Someone should research this and see- so many film with stars in the lead are so pathetic- no content, star kuch bhi bol raha hai, kuch bhi pehan raha hai. And why is this being tolerated? Because people can be fooled with PR campaigns and absolute lies.”
“I have worked with stars who smoke and drink but they paint an image in public that they are teetotallers. Time is not spent on craft and talent is not respected. And let me tell you I am not bitter per se. Mere se koi bhi kaam karta hai main wahi baat karta hoon that how we can make our film industry better. So I can’t really say whether Asif was indeed bitter or not, but he wasn’t talking about great experiences in the industry.”
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Asif Basra has worked in a lot of Bollywood projects namely Jab We Met, Hitchki and Krrish 3.