Raees won't Budge

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Last week, Shah Rukh Khan announced that Dilwale would release on December 18, the day that Sanjay Leela Bhansali had booked a long time ago for his Bajirao Mastani. Barely, had the hungama over these two film's clash died down that Yash Raj Films announced that they would release Salman Khan-starrer Sultanon the date announced by SRK for hisRaees.

Affecting equations
The shocking bit is that the two superstars Shah Rukh and Salman, who recently turned friends from foes, will now be clashing at the box-office. Also, Aditya Chopra has taken this decision, which is not likely to go down well with SRK, whose next film Fan is being produced by YRF.

Why the clash
Sources close to the development feel Yash Raj's decision to release Sultan for Eid 2016 was taken after Salman's court cases went in his favour in May. "Salman told Aditya Chopra that he won't startSultan until the court verdict in the hit-and-run case. Now that he has been given reprieve, he has green-lit Sultan and will shoot for it on a war footing," says a close friend of Salman.

Won't move
When asked to comment on the developments, Ritesh replied, "My tweet says it all." Soon after the YRF announcement, he tweeted: We had announced in February that we would release our film on Eid 2016 and we are on schedule to release it as planned.

With no sign of either mammoth project budging from the Eid slot, a Salman-SRK clash seems inevitable. Says trade analyst Komal Nahata, "If Raees and Sultanindeed clash for Eid 2016 it will be bad for both films as they will cut into each other's collections. I feel better sense will eventually prevail and the release date of one of the films will shift from Eid to another day."