Mumbai: Babita Phogat had shot to fame after the success of Aamir Khan-starrer ‘Dangal’, which revolved around the wrestling journey of Phogat sisters.
During a recent interaction with media, Babita expressed her displeasure over not getting any help from Aamir’s team to open a wrestling academy in her village.
“After the film’s success, my dad spoke to Aamir’s team and requested them to help us open an academy in Haryana for wrestlers, but that was ignored. It takes about Rs 5-6 crore to open a nice academy,” said Phogat.
The wrestler also claimed that despite Dangal’s huge success, they were offered only a small amount for a film to be made on their life.
“I got very less money. You will be surprised to know, after the entire story was written, they were even having a discussion to remove my name from the film altogether. They wanted to change the character’s name in the film,” she said.
“They wrote the story and shared it with the family before they appeared on Aamir Khan’s show Satyamev Jayate. It was after this that Aamir Khan’s team called us and said they want to change the characters names. But my dad was not okay with it. He said, if you want to make the film, then it is going to be our real names. The fees for the rights was decided much before they wrote the story, which was not even 1% of its total earnings, i.e. around Rs 1 crore,” Phogat told News 24.
As per a report by Sacnilk, ‘Dangal’ minted Rs 2070 crore globally. However, Babita Phogat alleged that the family got only Rs 1 crore for selling the rights of the story to the filmmakers.
Recently, Babita’s cousin Sakshi Malik alleged that she had planned the wrestler’s protest to get the chair of WFI president.
Defending herself, Babita claimed that the allegations against her are false and are intended to increase the sales of Sakshi’s book.
#WATCH | Charkhi Dadri, Haryana: On wrestler Sakshee Malikkh’s allegations, wrestler and BJP leader Babita Phogat says, “Sakshee Malikkh is levelling baseless allegations. Tomorrow, she can say that Babita made her level allegations of sexual harassment. She can also say that it… pic.twitter.com/5yDHCinCVH
— ANI (@ANI) October 23, 2024