Ill-fated actors had no idea they had to do stunt

The two actors who drowned in

Thippagondanahalli

reservoir after jumping from a helicopter during a Kannada film shoot were allegedly told they had to perform the stunt themselves only the previous evening. In fact, they were made to jump even after they expressed fear saying they may not be able to pull it off,

Magadi

police said quoting statements from movie unit members. 'Anil Kumar V, 33, and

Uday Raghav

, 32, appear to have jumped from the helicopter under duress,' a police officer privy to the investigation said.

Anil, Uday and the film's hero Duniya Vijay jumped from the helicopter while the climax of

Maasti Gudi

was being shot on November 7. While Anil and Vijay, who were not wearing life jackets, drowned, Vijay, who had a jacket on, was pulled out of the water by locals. 'Uday and Anil didn't know they had to jump from a height of at least 60 feet. The information was revealed to them during a team meeting on the evening of November 6,' police said quoting film unit members.

UDAY HAD SOUGHT DUPE
The members also told investigators that Uday had fever and had asked for a stunt dupe. 'You need not bother. Just jump. The height is around 50 feet,' the duo was told. However, the actors were made to jump from 100 feet. 'The change was necessitated as the director and the stunt director realized the chopper may end up splashing water on the actors. The decision to jump from 100 feet was taken on Monday morning,' police said quoting the unit members.

Senior police officials said they have CDs of the TV footage in which Anil and Uday said they didn't know they had to do the stunt till the previous evening.

TIMES VIEW
The untimely deaths of the two Kannada actors show that safety was not a priority on the film set. The fact that the budding artistes were not confident of performing the stunt and were virtually coerced to take the plunge only highlights the callous attitude of the producer and director, who put their own interests before the duo's lives. Acts of daredevilry are not everyone's forte and must be performed only by trained professionals. Unfortunately, not many take this seriously. The arrests of the film crew should serve as a lesson for others in the industry who compromise on actors' safety just for some hoots and moolah.