Ajay, Emraan, Vidyut, Ileana, Esha Gupta in Baadshaho

Milan Luthria's multistarrer rolls in Mumbai this August; a two-month schedule in Rajasthan to follow.

Mirror (January 13) had earlier reported that Milan Luthria and Ajay Devgn were reuniting for Baadshaho, a multistarrer set in Rajasthan, six years after Once Upon A Time in Mumbaai. Now, we've learnt that the filmmaker has zeroed in on the rest of the cast, which includes Emraan Hashmi, Vidyut Jammwal, Ileana D'Cruz, Esha Gupta and Sanjay Mishra.

"It's an exciting line-up, as all the actors play characters they've never done before. While Ajay is a man of the soil, impulsive and stubborn, Emraan's turn is rustic and twisted. On the other hand, Vidyut plays a cocky guy, while Ileana's character is a charmer, who has people eating out of her hands. Esha's character is a no-nonsense chick. All of them have shades of grey," reveals Milan, adding that the first schedule of his film rolls in August.

"It's a 15-day schedule to be shot on a set in Mumbai, after which we head to Rajasthan in November and stay on till December. We are yet to finalise the exact locations in Rajasthan and will be going on a recce sometime next month."

Baadshaho, co-produced by Milan and Bhushan Kumar, and written by Rajat Aroraa, is a thriller set in the Emergency era of the '70s. Milan and his team spent three months on the research. "We read a lot of books and saw several documentaries that talked about the media censorship during that time, among other things. We learnt how newspapers would arrive at doorsteps with certain reports clipped out," he adds.

Earlier, Milan had cast Pulkit Samrat, Shruti Haasan and Lisa Haydon in the film but reveals that a change in the script resulted in a change of cast as well. "They were part of a different subject but we found out that some elements of that script were used in another film so we changed the idea. The script was turned around last year in October," he reveals.

Milan's film was also surrounded by speculations that Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Kareena Kapoor and Diljit Dosanjh were among the names being considered for the lead roles. "When a script changes, sometimes the people we reach out to no longer fit the bill. We did speak to a couple of actors but nothing was finalised," he explains.

Milan will collaborate with a foreign action director for Baadshaho. The music includes Rajasthani folk with a funky twist, composed by Ankit Tiwari.