In the early 90s, there was a huge rivalry between beauty queens Sushmita Sen and Aishwarya Rai after they participated in the Miss India pageant together.

Though it seemed that they were going neck to neck, it was Ash who came out triumphant in the long run with better and bigger films like 'Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam', 'Devdas', and the more recent 'Dhoom:2' and 'Guru'.

She has maintained herself much better (Sushmita has done badly in that department and looks much older) and also became the envied Bachchan bahu.

Ash seems to have left Sush behind once again now.

After Sushmita Sen decided to shelve her ambitious project on the valiant queen Laxmi Bai, director Ketan Mehta is thinking of reviving his project on the Rani of Jhansi. He had kept Ash in mind and wishes to sign her again.

In the beginning, Mehta had planned the film as a sequel to his movie 'The Rising' with Aamir Khan which was about the first Indian revolt of 1857 against the colonial Brits.

Mehta had even approached Aishwarya to play Rani Laxmibai. But the project never took off for various reasons including Mehta's differences with producer Bobby Bedi.

In the meantime Sushmita Sen announced her plan to make a film on Laxmibai.

She was ambitious about the whole idea and researched extensively for the film. She looked hard for a director but all the work has gone waste because she has ultimately decided not to go ahead with the project.

Now after this latest development, Mehta has decided to revive his shelved project. And sources say that Aishwarya Rai still happens to be his first choice to play the queen of Jhansi.

Ash has already played a warrior in the Hollywood film 'The Last Legion' (that was a major failure) for which she trained in horse riding and sword fighting.

Though not many people paid attention to it, she has the skills and can very well put them to good use! Looks like Sush is seething in jealousy again.