/> Who tried to ruin the chances of Shabana's new comedy being released on time this Friday, and why?

Director Manish Archarya isn't blaming anyone. But on Tuesday which happened to be his leading lady Shabana Azmi's birthday. Manish was in for a huge shock.

"I was on the way to Shabana's house with my birthday gift for her when God decided to gift me with a jolt from the blue. I made a casual call to my assistants asking if the prints were in order. I was told the sound parameters were slightly off.

My antennae went up and I decided to check the prints myself before reaching Shabana's. To my horror I discovered the sound to have been reduced to a flat mono-level as though it was recorded through an amateur departmental-store recording device.

By then I was in a state of utter panic.My release was three days away. There was no way I could release the film in that condition."

Further investigation revealed that a scratch ran across the entire soundtrack. "As if someone had deliberately done it. It couldn't have happened accidently. It was a systematic scratch," says Manish with surety.

Where and how did this sabotage happen? "The initial recording was done at Raj Kamal studios. The sound was fine then. I had checked.Then it went to Prasad Studios...The rectification was done overnight at Q Lab.

They opened all their doors for me and I sat with the sound engineers till 3 am in the morning. Otherwise we wouldn't have made it into theatres on Friday."

Manish finally reached Shabana's home in the wee hours.

"I didn't want to play the blame game yesterday when I was in the thick of the crisis. But now I need to get to the bottom of this. Tampering with the soundtrack is no small matter."

Due to the crisis Manish is unprepared for the premiere. "I've had no time to invite people to the premiere. As it is I'm new to Bollywood's protocol. I wonder if anyone would turn up at this short notice! Yesterday when the crisis happened I couldn't care less about the premiere. I thought my film was doomed.

Now that I've managed to pull myself out of the flash-crisis I wonder! If this is the kind of home-coming I've received what waits for me in the future."