Sri Lankan beauty Jacqueline Fernandez who was doing fairly well for herself in Bollywood, suddenly finds her career hitting a major roadblock. Her serious run-in with the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which has now attached Rs 7.27 crore worth of her assets in the extortion case against conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar , now threatens to destroy her Bollywood career.
Ever since Jacqueline’s troubles with the ED erupted, filmmakers have been playing the wait-and-watch game with her career. Producers were fairly confident that her name would eventually be cleared, hence her roles in her most recent releases Bachchhan Pandey (with Akshay Kumar ) and Attack (with John Abraham ) survived the scissors.
Curiously, Jacqueline played a similar role in both Bachchhan Paandey and Attack of the hero’s sweetheart who gets murdered mid-way. The superstitious film industry now attributes the massive debacle of both films to Fernandez’s tarnished image.
One of Jacqueline Fernandez’s directors on condition of anonymity speaks on her future in Bollywood. “It’s not very bright, I am afraid. It is crystal clear that her troubles with the law are not going to go away. Our film industry tends to stay away from trouble. She had two recent releases Bachchhan Pandey and Attack. Both bombed badly in spite of big heroes. She now has Cirkus with Ranveer Singh and Ram Setu with Akshay Kumar. They will either replace her or play down her character and role.”
Apparently, even Jacqueline’s mentor and guide Salman Khan has decided to keep a distance from his Kick co-star professionally, though she is still welcome to his parties. Salman who loves mentoring firangi actresses (e.g. Katrina , Iulia Vantur , Jacqueline) has decided to distance himself from Jacqueline was dropped from Salman’s Da-bangg tour in Riyadh earlier this year.
She is also no longer a part of the Pawan Kalyan period drama Hari Hara Veera Mallu in Telugu directed by Krish Jagarlamudi . Jacqueline had been signed for this lavish costume drama reportedly at an astronomical price. But now with the scandal and controversy plaguing her image, she has been quietly replaced by Nargis Fakhri .
After her exit from a big-budget Telugu film opposite the State’s superstar Pawan Kalyan, we now hear that Jacqueline may be out of yet another prestigious project. Apparently, Jacqueline is no more a part of Kick 2 , the big Salman franchise which producer Sajid Nadiadwala will direct.
Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha.
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