Bal Thackeray was one of the most loved leaders of our country. He was stylish, creative, witty, aggressive with a tremendous aura surrounding him. It thus came as no surprise to us when we learnt that his most favourite daughter-in-law Smita Thackeray who has produced several films earlier, had decided to make his biopic titled Saheb. She has two sons.

The older one Rahul Thackeray has completed his film making course from Canada after which he has assisted Raju Hirani as an assistant in PK. It was always Balasaheb's desire that he do something big for Rahul and it was Rahul's wish to make his first film on his aaja(Marathi word for paternal grandfather). The film is in its final stages of scripting and will start shooting end of this year to be released on Bal Thackeray's birth anniversary on Jan 23, 2017. While we will wait to see who plays the 'Tiger' himself (the title given to Balasaheb) but it will also be interesting to see who plays the important characters of Uddhav Thackeray, Raj Thackeray, Meenatai and Smita Thackeray herself as these were some of the most important people in the life of Balasaheb. Excerpts from a conversation with Smita Thackeray, who literally worshipped Balasaheb.

The star who plays Balasaheb must have aura and a command over his voice: Smita Thackeray

It can't get bigger than a biopic on Bal Thackeray. Did you talk to him about it while he was alive?
Yes. Initially I wanted to write a book on him. This film is of course very big but it is also very close to our heart and I have been wanting to make it from the time Saheb was alive. He knew that it was my passion to make a film on him. He would say, 'I will keep on talking and you collect the material in whichever way you want.' So whenever we got a chance to sit with him and talk, we would do that. Saheb loved music and he was very creative. He had a small Casio which he used to make music on. His creativity has come in my kids also. Everyone else only talked politics and that is why he enjoyed talking to us as we preferred to not talk about politics. Of course, he had given us the freedom to talk to him about everything, even within the political area and if there was something I didn't like, I was allowed to tell him that. He would never go to the theatre so we would tell him to watch certain films. Either the print would come to the house and he would see the film before its release on a screen created on his wall in the bungalow itself or he would see it on a DVD later based on his time as he was always so short of time. But he loved watching films.