Ram Gopal Varma's 'Sarkar Raj' set for June release

Mumbai, April 9 (IANS) Ram Gopal Varma's long-awaited 'Sarkar Raj' featuring Bollywood icon Amitabh Bachchan along with his son Abhishek and daughter-in-law Aishwarya Rai is all set for release June 6.

A few days before its commercial release, the film, which is a sequel to Varma's 'Sarkar', will be premiered at International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) to be held in Bangkok.

Confirming these developments Varma says the film's release date has been on the anvil for a while.

'People have been unnecessarily speculating about the matter. We never announced any date. I was very clear that I wanted to release it during the summer vacations. We were undecided between the last week of May and the first week of June. Now we've zeroed in on June 6,' Varma told IANS.

Confirming 'Sarkar Raj' will be premiered at the IIFA, Varma says: 'With the Bachchans being closely associated with the IIFA it seemed appropriate to premiere it there.'

Any specific thoughts on 'Sarkar Raj'?

'People have been making so many assumptions about the film I wonder what they expect,' he chuckled.

First, audiences should not expect Abhishek and Aishwarya to play their real-life roles as husband and wife. For most of the film, the couple play adversaries and opponents in business and morality rather than partners.

Second, Big B's character goes into the shadows as Abhishek takes over the empire. And third, Varma insists, people should stop drawing real-life parallels.

'This time the socio-political content is higher than in 'Sarkar', but the characters are not modelled on real people.'