Parineeti Chopra replaces Shraddha Kapoor in Amole Gupte’s Saina

Shraddha Kapoor, who trained for months under ace badminton player Saina Nehwal to pull off her character convincingly, has reportedly dropped out of the much-awaited film Saina. According to reports, Parineeti Chopra has replaced the actress in the sports biopic on Saina Nehwal.

Saina is a film that has been in news even before its official announcement. Earlier it was being reported that Deepika Padukone would play the title role in the movie. However, filmmaker Amole Gupte surprised everyone by announcing the name of Shraddha Kapoor as the female lead.

Then reports started coming out that Shraddha was finding it extremely difficult to learn the game, despite being trained by Saina Nehwal herself. She also suffered from dengue during the process.

The actress was expected to resume work on the project in April. However, since she had a number of other films on her platter including Street Dancer, Chhichhore, Saaho and Baaghi 3, she let go of Saina.

“Despite everyone’s best efforts to accommodate the Saina biopic, dates were clashing, so it made sense for Shraddha to opt out. The decision was taken by mutual consent. Meanwhile, Parineeti loved the script and will start prep soon,” a source revealed.

Producer Bhushan Kumar confirmed the news. “We want to wrap up Saina by this year-end for an early 2020 release, so going ahead with the project is a decision taken by mutual consent. We are glad Parineeti has come onboard for the film. Saina has made every Indian proud and we can’t wait to take her story to the world in the year of the Olympics,” he said.

Parineeti Chopra is ecstatic to have bagged such a plum project. “It’s a part of my personality, but as an actress, one that I have not explored so far. I’m delighted to get an opportunity to portray a strong and powerful girl like Saina who put our country on the world map. I am excited to put in all the training and hard work that comes with learning the game and portraying Saina on screen,” said the actress.

Chopra is presently looking forward to the release of her next Kesari, co-starring Akshay Kumar.